New Faces, New Cases

There was a very post-apocalyptic ‘feel’ about the area they now entered. Despite years of maintenance gone unfulfilled, several concrete pillars supported the suspended railway in perfect alignment with the tracks. Underneath one of these pillars, yellow police tape marked the place where the victims had been found. Trash littered every corner of the scene, some in mounds of chipped plastic, cigarette butts, and broken glass, while others displayed more like an offering; soda cans stacked in a ‘pyramid’ design or rubber tires resting upright in a line. The ground itself nurtured only weeds and overgrown ferns, of which attracted lacewings that flitted noiselessly in-between the stalks.

The dilapidated train station could be seen a block over and had long since turned to ruin from years of disuse. A small walkway connecting it to the tracks served as the only bridge between the two, although this was now covered by a thick layer of rust. Rotted scaffolding peeked through gaps in the rails above, and every second or so a flash of sunlight would reveal jagged pieces of rubar within. It would’ve made a photogenic picture if not for the tacky yellow tape.

Apart from the investigators currently scoping out the area, the tape seemed effective in halting unwanted visitors from loitering beneath the underpass. And thank goodness. The department didn’t need civilians thinking it was okay to tamper with a crime scene.

“Beside the railroad here. They were left outside.” Dom crouched over one of the orange flags set up to show the other officer where the bodies had been found. It was a circular patch of earth with very large dimensions; obviously more than enough space for the two skeletons to stretch out fully. Strangely enough the vegetation didn’t appear to grow here as strongly as it did in other places. In fact….the earth here almost looked flattened; as if something large had settled here for a long time. “-And the victims were human,” he added, sparing Harper a calm look. “No genders yet until the dental records come back, but we know from bone structure they were definitely older adults. Both died with heavy doses of LSD in their systems also.” He listened to her story about the girl who crossed out houses with red x’s, and once again found himself impressed with her for being so mindful.

“So the Rossi are a bit careless. Either that or they take joy in seeing the world burn.” Dom suspected the latter was true, although Harper seemed to know a lot more about both mobs than he would’ve expected. For just a moment he watched her with a skeptical look, wondering how she could be so certain…but then he realized the topic might’ve simply been interesting to her before this. The Valentine and Rossi were the biggest and most influential gangs in Twin City after all. Why wouldn’t she want to study them?

Suddenly there was a flash of blue and green above them. Tugged from its hiding place within the scaffold by a strong wind, drifted a single lonely feather of intense coloration. Hitting the sunlight it appeared almost translucent, scattering glints of cerulean across the underpass for seconds at a time, and gently gliding towards the other side of the railway a few meters ahead of them. Dom turned his attention to the object, but didn’t make any motion to catch it. It didn’t look like any normal bird feather he’d ever seen…although feathers weren’t exactly the reason they’d come to the crime scene either.

Harper ducked under the tape holding out the civilians from this crime scene. Her golden eyes took everything in. It was a rather...well she hadn't seen anything like it out here. Gangs, smaller ones, seemed to like to be out in the main parts of the city rather than here. Sure, she had heard that there were beings who enjoyed rituals. Humans would gladly bow down to those with powers just to gain some back. Demons were largely known for that. And to be fair, Harper knew a good deal about them. Those who took a pact with Travis had a great deal of power vs Serenity...who simply seemed like a little familiar rather than a being who could be able to grant limitless powers. Devils did the same thing. It was...something she was glad she didn't have to deal with on her end.

Looking down at the area the two bodies were found, she had little doubt this was were the sacrifice had been taken place. How or by what was another question entirely. Something they should likely look into. Kneeling down, Dom had said that the victims were human. Even more interesting. Well...rather normal. Humans were easy. You could shuffle them in here by many different means. Or buy them if they were....well that was another thing entirely. Squatting down she did her best to examine the area as best as she could. But at this point, there was nothing that could be done.

"Have you meet a Rossi Member? Not that I have personally....but...I mean that havoc that has happened in the Valentine family simply over the...er...happy love child that is Eirk Valentine, Rhyan Rossi and Trever Valentine's kid. Eirk is a nice guy. Really doesn't take after either parent." Glancing up, she caught the look Dom was giving her. It caused her to panic. She was saying too much and she knew it. "I mean...after all it is always all over the tabloids that circulate in the city. Big scandals and what not. The City makes gossip just by us blinking. Shocked there isn't more out there." Ah...yeah she blew it. But hopefully she didn't blow it nearly as bad as she thought.

It was then a feather started to fall down from the sky. Both took their attentions off of one another and focused on it.  Dom made no attempt to catch it, letting Harper stand up and get it. Running after it, the werewolf girl caught it with ease. It was rather...well it was beautiful. And large. Turning it over, the first thing that came to mind was a peacock. But as far as she knew, they didn't live around here nor did someone actually have one in the city. For that matter, there would be no reason for one to be all the way out here. Did they even fly? She highly doubted that. Thumbing it, Harper had moved back to where Dom was, showing the catch to him.

"Well....maybe we are dealing with something like Dragons. I'm not really well versed in them, but maybe some of them have feathers? Or maybe this is simply just happened to flutter out from somewhere else." That really could be it, after all, things like this could just happen to show up but...what if there was more? Harper returned her attention back to Dom. "Well, while we're still out here, if we find anymore feathers like this, we should take it with us and note where it came from. Maybe we can even run this and see if it matches the same kind of traces as the victims. Maybe even cross this with the stack of names you're getting from our wonderful android."

“Great catch,” he said, eliciting a whistle of amazement at how fast she moved. Footnoting their chat about the Valentine and Rossi for a moment, he rose to check out the feather in Harper’s grasp. Her agility and quick reflexes appeared to lend them a new focus, and quite the odd one too; as she speculated its nature to be draconic. Whether or not this was the case, he couldn’t be sure, and agreed that they’d have luck testing it for evidence back at the station.

In the meantime, he slipped a hand over hers to lightly trace the surface of the quill. Immediately its coarse exterior raised a warning to its strangeness. Birds were ordinary in Twin City as far as he knew, without magical properties and unable to be personified on the scale of supernatural, so he expected a more silken texture to the feather. This one, however, he’d compare more to the underside of tree bark. -Layered in a flat pattern, but rough like wet wood-grain. Scaly perhaps? The connective cartilage was a dark red instead of translucent like a normal feather. Whoever it came from certainly had a large wingspan, and needed strong quills in order to take flight.

Dom subsequently stepped back and shifted his gaze upwards, looking about the railway to identify where the feather dropped from. Another glint of blue caught his attention a couple meters above their heads. Poking out of the disintegrating frame was another plume. Its vibrance had only become uncovered by the displacement of the previous feather. “You see that?” he said, pointing in its direction. The area was too high for them to reach alone, but he reckoned they’d discovered a nest of sorts. “Hm. You’re right, it couldn’t hurt to run a diagnostic and see what turns up. The crime techs definitely missed something here…”
Sunlight trickled through the clouds in low hues of orange and red, and swept over the team for just a split second before disappearing again. Dom turned to scan the crime scene once again, but he couldn’t really pick out anything else peculiar other than the murder site itself.


“So, you’re one of those people who read into tabloids, huh?” Dom turned back to Harper with the ghost of amusement in his expression. She seemed a lot more pragmatic than that; not at all the type of officer to sift through aggrandizing magazines for the latest gossip. Then again, she was still a girl despite her supernatural status, so it wasn’t too odd an explanation. “About the Rossi, I haven’t met one of them yet, but in the drug division we bust plenty of movers who say they work for them. The Valentine not so much. They hide their tracks very well in comparison. Well, not with that Eirk kid of course. But if either gang has a drug syndicate in this part of town, it could be a reason why the victims had access to LSD.”

Running was something she liked to do on a normal days. At times like this, she was very aware that her speed was something more well...supernatural. Someone like Dom would not be able to move nearly as fast as her. Could he have catch it? Sure. If he was a runner, he could. Regardless, she caught it and he was impressed. Though, to be fair, it really wasn't that impressive. Not really....not in her circle. There were still much faster beings than her. But that wasn't important right now.

Handing him the feather then resulted in more. Glancing up to where Dom had pointed, Harper saw some kind of nest. Something had lived up there. It was something puzzling. What could possibly have bird like feathers, that felt almost like scales, but lived in a nest so high up in a tree? She felt like the answer was on the tip of her tongue. As if the type of creature that it could be was right there. But racking her mind on this wasn't going to solve things. Without more information, she was simply grasping at straws. With so many different supernaturals that were running around, there were still too many possibilities of who, or rather what, it could be. And with Dom on board with her idea of running a few tests on it, maybe they could narrow it down even more from here.

With nothing more picked up between the two of them, they decided to head back to HQ and get everything in and grab that packet of people. As Harper slid into the driver's seat, Daamodar had asked her a question. Well more like accused her of being one of those tabloid readers. Honestly, it was a lucky break. Truthfully, she read the headlines on the front cover. It was enough to get her through life. And at this point, it was going to be enough to get through this car ride. Laughing, she spoke again. "Oh yeah, this upcoming spring the big it color is going to be Pink. Get ready for pink everything. You won't be able to escape it."

Her attention went back forward as she listened to him. It was no shocker to her that Valentines were hard to find. They were good at this. But not all were fantastic and thus why some got busted. However, Harper wasn't going to simply say it out right. She needed to keep her mouth shut a bit more on that. "I'd say avoid her then. But in our line of work, sooner or later we're going to run into one, ja?" And if that wasn't the truth, nothing was. "That's something we should look into as well when we get that packet. And maybe crossing it with that new feather if it's a match for LSD. But I won't count my blessing just yet. It might simply help us find a key witness who might have seen it....or can identify people who frequent that place."

Pulling up to the garage after another long drive, Harper turned off the car and looked over to her partner of the day. With a smile, she got out of the car and closed the door. "Well, I think we did good so far. So maybe we can wrap this up but tonight and then head out to dinner. Not that I'm asking you out on a date. Just a getting this done super quick kinda outing." She felt the need to clarify. Not that Harper was against dating coworkers...it just didn't seem appropriate. They were looking for a killer. Not a date.

Dom settled into the passenger’s side and grinned at her tabloid comments, but opted out of saying more on the subject. More pressingly, their new piece of evidence may grant them a lead in the case. After submitting it for analysis he hoped they’d be able to match up one suspect by the end of the week; or even sooner if time was on their side when sifting through the files. He knew strange phenomena couldn’t be underestimated in Twin City, so with any luck the feather would point them towards the answers they were searching for.

He listened as the young werewolf continued. “Sounds right. My team can confirm if the mob is involved once everything is cross-referenced.” Sunset cued the streetlights to flicker on once they reached the station. This was followed closely by the lamps on the opposite sidewalk, and soon enough the adjacent streets were cast in a bright yellow haze. Traffic slowly petered off into a welcome drone of cab drivers and delivery trucks, while many locals preferred to travel on foot during the evening. “-But whether the feather belongs to a witness or a suspect, it’ll be wise to find out who our victims actually were before picking on anyone just yet. Makes the case more of a waiting game, but it pays to be thorough.”


By that time the pair had entered the precinct and breezed past the front desk. Nothing appeared to change since they’d been away; only the rearrangement of personnel prepping for the graveyard shift. Luckily their team could break camp as soon as the evidence was processed. In the meantime, the smell of takeout wafted temptingly from the break room; instantly making him grateful when she mentioned grabbing dinner. “Good idea. About the food I mean. Dates are pretty reliable catalysts for good meals though, if you plan on buying,” he added jokingly. As downright invasive as their colleagues were, she probably didn’t need those sort of rumors floating around the department.

They reached the evidence office and moved to the front of the line fairly quickly. Their resident android didn’t have any special appearance…or skin for that matter. Its mechanical exoskeleton displayed no outward gender, nor did its face retain any range of emotion or expression. He shared a slightly intrigued look with Harper before inviting her to present the feather. After a lengthy analysis the bot updated the files with new information.

“Here you are. Good luck Officer Fairfax, Officer Bhatia.” It seemed to lift its mouth into the semblance of a smile as it handed them the folder, but Dom couldn’t be certain if this was of its own volition or the result of a pre-programmed action. Nonetheless, they left the office with some measure of success in their dealings. And heading back to the narcotics unit, he was eager to lock up the valuable information at his desk. “So, what does a Fairfax like to eat anyway? I’m hesitant to say you’re cheap like the rest of us.”

Harper was getting ahead of herself. As always. But no matter. Such was the life of a Fairfax. Listening to Dom, she nodded and understood. Rushing headlong into this was not going to get the work done faster. They needed to work smarter, not harder. If the feather belonged to anyone useful would be second to exactly who the victims were. The more we knew about them maybe the more we could learn about what was going on. "Right. We should look into that as well."

She was shocked he was up to go on out with her. Well, she wasn't taking it back now. If he was up to it, she was offering. Not that she needed friends...but since her only real friend was someone who worked for the Valentines, it was good to actually try and have normal friends. Like cops. Cops were great friends. She was a great friend....one day. Regardless, a smile formed on her face as he continued speaking. "Yeah I'll buy. That way I don't have to feel weird about spending your money. I might seem small, but I have one hell of an appetite. Not as big as some others but big enough were a salad simply won't fill me up." Salads felt like lies to her. Not that she wouldn't eat one every once in a while. You know, to keep up with her girlish figure and try and lose weight, cry, then break down and get a burger. Ah the pains of being a girl.

They continued to walk until they reached the old android. Just seeing ti sent shivers down her spine. You would think that the station would be able to afford to put some kind of skin on it by now. But no. Not with everything going on. It seemed as if that was the least of their worries. Dom seemed to have no issue talking with it. They did an exchange. Well more like she handed over the feather for the android to look over and Dom had gotten the files that were needed in order to start mulling over after the files were updated. At least they had gotten the list sorted and or shortened. With it saying good luck, Harper gave the droid a smile and a nod. Yeah. They were going to be needing a good amount of it, huh?

Walking away, Dom had asked what she liked to eat. Ah...the good old question. Laughing, she looked up to the male and spoke. [color=#3399ff}"No worries. I have lived the college life for many years it feels like. I'm good with take out. Or even cheep burgers and fries. My issue is I tend to order more than I should. I eat a bit more than normal but then I order more past that so my bill tends to get a bit long. Thus why I'll front the bill. You pick what you want and I'll eat it, ja?"[/color] She laughed again as they entered Dom's department. Spotting his desk, Harper pulled up a chair and started to get to work looking over the files. She took about half of them and gave the other half to Dom. "While I'm looking through a few of these, did you want to see if anything has been found out about the victims? And maybe order something." Harper pulled out her card and slid it to him. She trusted him enough to make an order at least.

Dom waited patiently as she sectioned the files into separate stacks. Briefly skimming over the parsed documents, he noticed a few highlighted sections indicating where the feather matched up with a supernatural ID. And while some included a black and white photo of the person or animal in question (either a mugshot or a blurry candid image), most displayed only a grey background where the picture should’ve been. In this case, three words printed underneath gave diminutive accountability: NO IMAGE AVAILABLE. The list went on for about 4 pages in this fashion.

He looked up from his rummaging when Harper extended the card, and after taking a brief pause to register what it was, passed her a bemused look. So, she was serious about paying for dinner. This didn’t seem to trouble her in the least, but it honestly placed him in an odd sense of mind; kind of like pouring sugar into the cup before the coffee. As endearing a gesture, he couldn’t help but attach a footnote of unorthodoxy to it. Even if it were only temporary, they were a team now.

“Dhanvvaad (Thank-you), but how about we split the tab this time. I’d be a pretty lousy partner to let you carry us throughout the entire investigation,” he said, flashing a pacifying grin. Not wanting to leave room for protest, he rose from their small command post and left to do as she suggested…which included making the food order of course. No high-road reason to turn that down. Later after he’d returned, and they settled down to Chinese takeout, he leaned back in his seat and looked over the victims’ profiles.

“Danny and Rodin Papaqui. 35 and 29 years old. Brothers. Looks like they were both photographers from out of town...way out of town. Some state in Mexico called Puebla.” Dom flipped over a page and continued to read, narrowing his eyes as he did. “Hm. There’s no criminal record for either of them.” Considering the gruesome nature of their proposed deaths, this detail left him a bit puzzled. Drug use didn’t always equate to an immediate offense with the law, but most of time, especially in the case of a strong hallucinogen like LSD, avoiding a run-in with the courts became less and less likely. Perhaps they had been first time offenders. “Do you suppose they were visiting any supernatural in the city?” he asked, returning a curious gaze to the other officer. 

She was honestly taken aback by his foreign words. It was nice. Smiling, she nodded to him and replied what she could only assume was a thank you. "It's no problem. Okay, splitting the tab should be fine. I'll take pork pot stickers, lo mien without the veggies, orange chicken, and half a pint of sweet and sour pork." Was it a lot for one person to eat? Yeah it was. But Harper was no ordinary person. After all, she was a werewolf. And werewolves tend to eat a lot of food. You should have seen the food bill at her parents house with five of them under one roof. Strangely enough, it was always her mother and her brothers who ate the most.

Her attention went back to the files after he went off to order the food. Her brows furrowed together. Why on earth were there no images to be seen on some of these? Why was their camera so terrible at picking up things? It was enough to make the girl sigh. Oh well, nothing she could really do about this. At the very least, they had a list of beings that might or might not match up with this feather. It was enough to work on. Harper made a list of the files she was going to check out, ones that centered around the feather more so than anything else. While she was doing this, Dom had returned.

As they waited, she excused herself and picked up all the files that had been on that list and started sorting them out into two stacks. Stack one were files that had repeated offenders and the other stack were single or few busts. It was about then that the food came. Smelling it made her mouth water. Ah the smell of cheap food. It was always a welcoming smell to have. Comforting even. She wasted no time and started to dig into the lo mien.

Dom started to talk about the victims. Out of town, from Mexico, photographers, and brothers. "They could have been visiting a supernatural. That is very possible and we can look into possible people whom they could have known." But...Harper highly doubted that. She tapped her chopsticks lightly against the takeout box and thought. [color:7396=3399ff]"Was there a camera picked up at the scene? Maybe there might be a clue in that. If they weren't visiting someone, my guess is they could have accidentally stumbled into the city. Like maybe there was some kind of portal that was open where they were walking and they just walked through." It would be a lot more useful if they had the camera. It might answer a few questions they had. Even if it didn't have the thing that killed them.

Her gaze went back to the files as she read them over again. One type of creature caught her eye over all the others, glancing up to Dom, she slid one of the files to him. "Have you ever heard of Quetzalcoatls?"

Harper’s spread was impressive to say the least, and made him wonder where she got her appetite from. The feast didn’t seem to daunt her at all. Dom dubiously looked down at his own meal and couldn’t help but feel somewhat…underwhelmed. Mushroom and cabbage stir-fry. Sesame tofu. A fortune cookie. He picked up the cookie and cracked it open for curiosity’s sake:

~Your career will be greatly enriched today. Lucky Numbers: 21 8 44…~ 

With a sigh he flipped the paper flat on the desk and returned to skimming the documents. Even in Twin City fortune telling was a circus. “Personal possessions would be helpful,” he replied after a moment, passing her a curt nod. “-But the techs didn’t recover much from the bones. And I think we’ve got as much as we could out of those." In the aftermath of the incident, a pair of skeletons had been found in pristine condition underneath the railway, and the only evidence their team currently worked with were a mysterious feather and residual acid content. The victims were both adult humans, and siblings; a very rare collective in the city, and potentially dangerous as well. His brow creased in a contemplative frown. "We could hand the story over to the news to try and draw out anyone that could've interacted with them before they died. The chief would have to approve first, but it might be the best option to find out how they got here.”


Most non-supernatural didn’t have the forthcoming knowledge to enter the metropolis. Typically they’d be welcomed by an internal agent, maybe a family member or a friend or a coworker, and given a straightforward directive on their purpose here. But as far as he knew random entrances weren’t commonplace in Twin City. If what the other officer said were true, this made their case all the more eerie. Portals weren’t the sort of subject he was well-versed in, yet he wondered if they could be produced in the natural world somehow?

Dom archived this line of thought before carefully reading the file she handed over. The word she mentioned, ‘Quetzalcoatl’, came up quite frequently. “Hm, the name sounds familiar. It's a mouthful, that's for sure.” Turning to the computer on his desk, he searched for a description using the department’s information bank. He flipped the screen around so Harper could see. “Check this out.”  

{The Quetzalcoatl come from Aztec mythology. Its name translates from nahautl to "feathered serpent". Originally, it was a name of one of their gods, but now it's a name referred to for the giant feathered serpents that roam the world...}

He gestured to a stock image of the serpent included with the description. A familiar golden shimmer, green plumes, blue barbs, and a red quill were part of its features. The feathers of Quetzalcoatl perfectly matched their own evidence. “Huh. We’re investigating some sort of god then?” he asked, tone laden with confusion.

Why was it never this easy? Of course if they had a camera on hand, they could have answered something like this a while ago. Maybe even earlier in the day. Frowning, Harper just stuffed her face with more noodles and continued to think on this case. Sitting back, Daamodar continued to speak, saying something about letting this lose out to the public. That was also a good idea. A very good idea. It would narrow one answer down: Did they walk in by accident, or did they know what this place was? Nodding to him, she finished what she was currently eating and spoke again. "I think that might be a good idea. It could help us in one way or another. Either we know that someone knows about them, or we know they walked in by accident. Either way, it's more than what we know today."

She stuffed her face with a bit more food and then looked at the images of the two who had died. They were likely going to have to get in touch with whatever task force that ran through Puebla. That was going to be a pain as well. But regardless, one that they would have to do.  "Okay. I'll get to work writing up a report for the sheriff office in Puebla. Something along the lines of stumbling across an addict looking for some extra cash and got trigger happy. Or had been in a car accident and burned to death." It wasn't like they could just say they were sacrificed to some kind of supernatural being who might or might not have lured them into a death trap. Dealing with the outside world like this was always a tricky one. But something like that, Chief of Police Prince dealt with more on his hand. She just had the honor of writing up the report.

Dom had pulled up the picture of the being she had asked about just earlier. He turned the computer screen to face her, allowing the werewolf girl to get a good look. It did match the feather. It was also a very pretty snake. Harper continued to stare at it. Seeing if there was anyway she could get any information out of that. She couldn't, of course, but you can't fault her for a lack of trying. "It doesn't say that it is a god. To humans, anything that is stronger than them is something all powerful and mighty. Be it good or bad. Aztec....were those the people who lived in South America somewhere and killed people to their gods? Okay that's like every olden day group. I mean the ones when the Spanish people went across to find the city of gold? I'm getting off track. Anyways. I don't think we're actually going up against a god. I mean if we were....I'd be pretty scared myself. But they are a group of your normal supernatural beings. Just giant snakes with wings. Can't be that hard to find....not that we normally see one running around but still."

Harper let out a sigh and rubbed the back of her neck. She needed to get back on task here. "The feather matches that type of being. Between talking to the public and pulling up records on Quetzalcoatls both in our system and possibly in the city, maybe we can find something. There can't be that many in this city, right? It's not like trying to pick out one werewolf or demon. That would be a really, really, really difficult time there." Or at least she had hoped it was going to be that easy. Werewolves were the most recorded and documented being in the city. They at least could be looked up no issue. Harper herself was documented and on file in town hall. Just in case one of her changes went bad and she ended up killing someone without meaning to. But this creature? There were some beings she had never really heard about. Or at least not in great detail. This was one of them. But, after this case, she would look more into them regardless if this race was involved or not.