Lights flashed, harsh blues and reds that strobed over the grim crowd of people. There were always so many people. A floodlight suddenly ignited, bathing the scene in its unforgiving white light. Her body glowed, the dark blood and pale skin thrown into harsh relief by the powerful beams. Whatever privacy the girl may have had once had been stripped away completely. First by the man who killed her and dropped her body here with trash, now by the ones whose duty it was to catch that man. They thought nothing of her life—their attention solely enraptured by her death.

Adam snapped on his gloves, affixed paper shoecovers over his athletic trainers, and then ducked under the sagging yellow police tape. The gloves gave off the dull scent of latex, an odor Adam had learned to dislike. To dislike and to ignore. “Hey, Duck, how long you been here?” He called to Howard Duckworth, the medical examiner. Miles Landry, a tall lean black man and Adam’s partner, nodded a greeting to the round-faced Duckworth.

Duckworth, or Duck as most cops called him, sighed and wiped a forearm over his brow. “Not long, Detectives. You guys are right on the ball. For once.” Grunting, he stood, stepped back. “Take a look. I’m gonna find my assistant so we can bag her and get her back to the morgue.” Before Stanton or Landry could ask, Duck answered their question. “I would say the cause of death is strangulation, though these puncture wounds could factor in too. Liver temperature suggests she’s been dead somewhere between ten and twelve hours, but it’s warm. We’ll draw vitreous fluid to get a better idea.”

Adam turned his attention to the body. He tipped his head to the side, his darkly crystalline eyes probing and studying. The victim was female, probably between seventeen and nineteen. Her hair was brilliantly red, the color so striking it seemed it could only come from a bottle. But her pubic hair was the same shade, and Adam didn’t think she would dye that. Her face was white; few freckles dotted her girl-next-door features. She had taken care to protect herself from the sun. She appeared well-nourished, her breasts would have been high and lush, her hips rounded. Not a runaway, then. Her eyes, an indeterminate color between blue and grey, were open and stared at the blinding floodlight. Glazed and empty. Some would say soulless, now that life had fled her body, but Adam was not so pious. The eyes were glazed because the reflex that caused her to blink had ceased with her heartbeat, causing the filmy look now that they weren’t moistened with tears.

He crouched down and let his hands dangle between his knees, one of which gave an ornery twinge at such abuse. Adam was aware of Miles walking closer, standing quietly aside and studying the body as well. Without touching the body, he indicated the dull yellow bruising marring the otherwise flawless face. There was a darker discoloration on her chin. Both were round and roughly fist-shaped “I think he took her time with her. Some of the contusions have had a chance to begin healing.” Adam stated. There were also definite bruises on her neck, a finger pattern, that could be seen through the coagulating blood.

“Yeah. Look at all the bruising on her thighs and arms. Her breasts have been hacked to hell and there are what look like bind marks on her wrists and ankles.” Landry agreed, unwrapping a piece of Juicy Fruit and tucking it in his mouth. The silver paper was folding and stuck in a pocket.

Duckworth came back, his assistant in tow. “Not gonna learn much else now, Detectives. We’ll open her up tomorrow.”

Landry turned his long face to his partner. “Think we ought to do the grid?”

Watching as the two prepared to lift and bag the body, Adam shook his head. “Nah, let’s wait for homicide to get here. You know those guys, they always get touchy when we search without them.”

“Detective Frances Logan,” The big man announced, stepping from his car and casting a hard glance across the younger man’s face. Really calling him a man was pushing it, he was a kid, fresh faced and new. One of the hundreds of rookies that seemed to pop up like weeds in a spring rain the moment a murder scene began to hum. And while Logan might remember the feeling well of being in the kid’s shoes despite the years, that did exactly nothing to alleviate the harshness of his gaze or the expression some might call down right cynical as he slammed his door and finally made the distance between to the patrol car that was between him and the lines of yellow police tape.

At six foot eight inches tall Frances or Frenchy if you were looking to get your teeth kicked in, made an imposing sight. The rookie looked up at him, craned his neck (he was a tad on the short side) and Logan was hardly any happier here than he had been getting out of his car as the officer waved him off before he got out shouting his identity.

That of course only made the kid more nervous and he looked up at the goliath in the massive rumbled brown suit with an equally brown tie and he swallowed nervously before piping up.

“I.D. sir!”

Reaching a meaty hand into his jacket, Logan pulled his badge and didn’t bother flashing it. The uniform looked at it, carefully looked at it and he nodded even as an apology slipped from his lips.

“Sorry sir. Um…I just had to be sure.”

That made the big man smile, his strong jaw seeming suddenly harsher than normal, but what came next was a surprisingly good natured laugh.

“No problem kid, we all do what we’re paid to do.”

Alright perhaps the kid’s plight alleviated more annoyance than anyone might have guessed and yet Logan wasted no time in moving on beyond him and pass all the other uniforms on the outskirts of things.

Most people had no idea how many people gather at a murder scene, you saw it in movies sometimes, but then again like most things movies never seem to get it quite right. Everywhere Logan looked there was motion, techs, specialists, profilers, and photographers. All of the latter made a final barrier before which he paused and immediately turned his attention on the obligatory boxes of gloves and shoe covers. Someone had loaded the various sizes on an old card table, or maybe it had been once upon a time. It was marred and scuffed and well used and no doubt had gone to this use more than once.

And yet Logan quickly turned his attention from it to the boxes, enough stalling, it was time to work and as much as work might bother him at times, he was good at what he did.

Pulling on gloves and likewise slipping shoe covers over his leather slats, the big man moved into the scene proper and the harsh glare of the flood light and the glow of blue and red in its perpetual pulse.

The body and that was just what it was, a corpse a shell, not a person. Never a person was flat on its back, unseeing eyes turned upward and its skin shallow and a pale. The hair was a shocking crimson and all of its body was in view, completely nude. As Logan got closer, he noticed the marks, the bruises. Forcing himself to not think of it as any more than a shell and giving it the visual once over, did Logan’s attention finally stray and he noticed the others as if they’d suddenly appeared.

Glancing from face to face, he let out a sigh.

“Frances Logan, I’m homicide. You boys go over it yet?” It, not her. He continued in his line of thought.

God she hated finding this kind of shit... And on her night off too.

Jax had been looking for her own prey when she caught the stench of a corps... Death. She had seen some horrible things in her life, but rapes, murders were always the worst. Especialy ones like this. The poor girl... She had plenty of years on her. Probably would have made a great wife and mother.

She had been standing in the back after answering all those stupid questions that they ask you five times and always get the same answer. What had shee been doing when she found it? On her way home from dinner. How did she find the body? She smelt something off in the alley, faint, but still off. What did she do when she found the body? Called the cops.

Jax wasn't a suspect or anything, after all what cop would do this. Besides, the girl had been raped. Jax didn't have the equipment, nor the toys, to do something like that.

As Adam fell back Jax put a hand on his shoulder. "Hey." She said quietly, her fingers flicking across his neck gently, but yet so briefly as not to catch attention. He had been the first here really, since it was part of his department. And normaly Jax wouldn't have been here. But hell if she hadn't drawn the short straw and found the body. A cold shiver went through her body as she watched the girl placed in a body bag, disappearing from the world until some coroner decided otherwise.

"This is the first one like this right? You guys need my help with anything?" She asked him. "Investigation or anything?" But it seemed not as one of the heads of the homicide department came in to take a look at the scene. "Perhaps an extra pair of hands to help look for clues?"

Adam glanced up at the big man shoving his way towards the body. Draped in a drab brown suit, the man looked not unlike a bear lumbering forward, or perhaps a tree trunk with legs. A rookie, his uniform pressed and starched, dared stop the guy to ask for ID. Adam waited to see what reaction the rookie would get. Hm, well, civil. That was good. Last homicide detective he'd dealt with had been a real asshole.

The big man clumped on. Watching him, Adam noted that the man didn't really seem all that clumsy--just, well, big. Reminded him of Markus Magraw, a defensive lineman from the Wolverines. They looked like they should stump around like Paul Bunyan but they moved fast.

Adam's hand twitched. He'd been about to hold it out to shake Detective Logan's, before remembering he was still wearing gloves. "Detective Adam Stanton, this is Detective Miles Landry." Landry gave a nod and continued to chew his Juicy Fruit, content to let Stanton do most of the talking. "We took a cursory look at the body. Duck's getting ready to bag her, but we can wait if you want to look at it yourself. As for the scene, we're waiting for the technicians to get done. Figured we'd talk to the wits while we're waiting."

A brush at his shoulder. Stanton tensed slightly. He didn't like it when people came up behind him. But he relaxed when he turned. Jaxon Synclair. "Captain Synclair." He greeted her formally, but smiled. It faded quickly as he turned back to look at the mutilated body of the young girl.

"First one this brutal anyway." It was an unfortunate truth in a big city like Demaitre, though, that violent rapes happened all the time. "An extra pair of skilled hands is always welcome, since you're offering." Briefly, he wondered why she was here. This wasn't exactly Mobile Forces stuff.

Stanton glanced back to Logan. "That is, if you have no objection."

“None.” Logan replied, not sharp, just pert. And as pert as it might have been there wasn’t anything particularly rude about it, simply focused. So it wasn’t perhaps the oddest thing in the world to watch the big man kneel and reach a gloved hand into his breast pocket, talking briefly as he worked, that is if a few words could be called talking, briefly or otherwise.

“Nobody try to bag her. I’ll take ya up on that look around.”

“Nice to meet ya fellas.” Logan was saying then, his voice holding the slightest hint of accent, his Toronto roots showing at least a little. And pulling a light pin from the pocket he’d been working, Fances flipped it on even as he returned the other cop’s subtle nod. It was perhaps the deepest communication Logan would have with anyone until they had it, it being the body, bagged, tagged, and ready to drag in a perp behind. Still Logan was always better with body language than words and he nodded briefly before using his pen light to carefully raise one of the body’s hands.

Again, Logan was real careful to just think of it as a body. It was just flesh and bone, until he had the bastard that had done this. That was the way it worked, the way he could sleep at night, well that and maybe a little something extra.

He noted and knew the other officers must have noticed likewise, the marks at the wrist. Restraints, nothing hard, the mark wasn’t so bad, but something nonetheless. Logan didn’t bother to mention it, Stanton and Landry had no doubt taken note of it somewhere.

And yet the wrist was hardly the law officer’s goal as he shone his tiny light against pale fingers and equally pale nails. Reaching out a gloved hand, he was careful to grip the base of the hand as he looked at the woman’s nails in the careful light, his hand telling him that rigor mortis had set in with a vengeance. For the nails however, they were clean. No sign of blood or flesh or anything really…not even a struggle.

Then again that itself was odd, really odd.

“Her nails are clean.” Logan announced, “Too clean. I think someone washed them or at least cleaned them. When the boys get her to the morgue, get them to check the nail-bed will you? You never know what you’ll find.” The homicide detective asked, not exactly talking to anyone in particular and yet knowing none the less with as many people around as they were, well somebody would remember.

One of the few good things about murder scene swarming, somebody was always around to hear anything out of your mouth. Well good and bad. You couldn’t take back anything said at a murder scene either.

Continuing his exploration, Logan put a finger under its chin, and tilted the head as he looked at the puncture wounds.

“Any ideas what was used to do that?” He asked, looking the marks over with careful eyes.

He seemed bothered... Jax was as well... But it was nothing unusual in her world. She wanted to make that worry go away, and she knew she could. But not here. Not now.

"Okay. I can help for a little bit... But I'm actually working tomorrow night so I have to get home to get to bed." Great place for an invitation to him, but he'd be busy until dawn more than likely.

Jaxon's head turned to the large man as he spoke. "Could have been unaware that she was dying Logan." She said simply. "Might not have been scrubbed and that would be very unlikely unless the perp planned it out. Something like this though... Just seems random." She shook her head slightly.

But as Logan pointed out the bite marks, of course she knew what those were, she stood still. Jax had known he was going to find them, but she couldn't really think of a plausible reason. And she knew when she found the girl that there wasn't anything to do about them. Had she just died, Jax could have closed the wounds. But she had been long dead.

Stupid vampire.

"There's some gang around the city that does that. I don't know what they use, but usualy they're not rapests though. That's not their norm. So unless this guy was a black sheep... He could have just been trying to throw us off."

"Any idea what was used to do that?"

"I'm thinking ice pick." Adam replied, tipping his head to study the wound around Logan's bulk. Odd way to kill a person, really, stabbing them twice in the neck. The only reason Stanton could think of would be to make some kind of statement. Maybe reference pop culture, vampires, y'know? Kind of stupid really.

"Could'a been som'thin' simple too. Pencil, maybe." Miles offered, speaking for the first time since Logan's arrival. "Looks a little broad t'been an ice pick s'all."

Stanton thought about that. "True."

Duckworth watched the big man's study of the body. "Sure, that's easy 'nough." The heavy ME replied, craning his neck to study the hands. His assistant fidgeted slightly, impatient to get the body loaded and back to the morgue. The cops could do this study there too, you know.

Jaxon's comment made Adam shake his head, holding in any disparaging comment he might have made if it had been someone other than a superior. “She had to have known what was going on. Random attack or not, this guy took his dear sweet time. Either he tied her up before she could fight back or he drugged her.” He glanced over at Duckworth. “You should probably do a full tox screen.”

“Already planning on it.”

Stanton watched Logan’s careful study of the body, wondering if the big man was looking for anything in particular. While he waited, he studied the area around the body—the street, the walls, the dense carpet of trash. Something odd caught his attention. Crouching, he waved a hand over a particularly deep pile of garbage. “It’s warmer close to the ground.”

Jaxon watched silently as she went over and over in her mind about how to cover this damn mess up. If she found out who did it... Oh she was gonna give them hell. If there was one thing she hated, was vampires giving her more work to do. In the back ofher mind she was wondering why the Amman hadn't stopped this one. Why hadn't they just cleaned it up like they always did for the stupid ones.

Damn the bastard who did this and the bastards who didn't catch it soon enough.

Jax staired at the body a bit longer... Wondering what had exactly happened... The rape... Must have been... While the vampire was between feedings. He could have tied her up while she was asleep... Raped her, killed her... Was it wrong that the idea of being taken by force, having no control over someone who wanted every inch of your body as you cried and screamed, actually excited her slightly? Eh... Maybe. But then again, not in some ways she supposed.

She snapped out of her own thoughts as she listened to the conversation. She stayed quiet for the most part. Forensics wasn't her strong suite... It had always been bruit force and physical skill. She wasn't stupid by any means though. Her gifts had just been harnesed from an early age. Well, that and enhanced by her vampiric state...

Speaking of which she'd have to get home before sun up... She'd have to be smooth if she wanted to get away with that though.

"No, not a pencil either... There would be tearing of the skin around it unless it was a razor sharp pencil. But the skin's not torn. Just cut clean. Like... Maybe... Fuck... to small to be a dagger... Maybe a small letter opener of sorts? But I dont' think what is the real question here. But why... Why put two holes in her neck like that?" She pointed out, trying to get them off of the what.

After all, it was only a breath away from being said that they were almost like teeth marks. It was obvious to her, but of course not to the others.

"Warmer?" She echoed. "What do you-" Damn it all. Now she knew this was a vammpire... No doubts in her mind. They had said the body was nearly twelve hours old at first look right? That would put it around... eleven in the morning... Kind of hard for a vicious vampire to rape a girl when the sun is out... But... "It's older than we thought... Maybe from closer to dawn. Or just before day break." Which would have given the vamp pleanty of time to play with his victim and run... He had probably killed her just with enough time to beat the sunlight. Damn it all...

"If you have any leads on the perp by tomorrow night, I would be able to follow them as best I can when I start tomorrow night." She said to the officers. "You know my group can track down anyone as long as we have something." She pointed out.

Logan frowned at the pencil remark and just as he was about to say something when Captain Synclair beat him to the punch. Listening it wasn’t hard for Logan to understand her point and her last question, well that question made his own theory seem, well no less strange, but it was perhaps a reason why.

“Alright, this is gonna sound pretty weird, but that’s the world we live in boys and girls. You know what these marks could be…looks like spout marks almost. Hell I don’t know the proper name for the damn things, but they’re the little spouts bar tenders put in bottles. Little cylinder, round and razor sharp at the end. And why, well I guess the fact that it’s used in bars to smooth beverage pouring…well that kinda speaks for itself huh?”

Frances blinked then at Synclair’s next statement and he nodded despite himself.

“You think; massive blood loss would have thrown off that assessment a little bit?” He asked toward Detective Stanton.

Standing then, Logan turned to Synclair and gave her a wry smile.

“Sounds good ta me. But Synclair ya ever want a job, I like how ya think. Homicide can always use a good thinker.”

And with that Logan turned one more glance back at the body.

“I’m done.” He said then, hesitantly. “Run all the tests that the department will pay for guys. This is a weird one, but yeah we can get to the bottom of it.”

"Really? Huh, never noticed." Stanton replied, listening to Logan's theory on what tool could have caused the wound on the victim's neck. Seemed kinda funny, though, to put something sharp on the taps. 'Course, Stanton never took much notice of what was on the taps, only in what came out of them. They'd have to look into that.

Landry chewed his gum, and though he looked like nothing so much as a cow with its cud, he was listening closely to everything being said. He'd be the first to admit he wasn't much of a snap-thinker, but the tall detective remembered just about everything, let it all sift around through his mind until something caught. Great for interrogations. Off Synclair's comment about the time of death, something did catch. "Damn. How could I'a missed that? Rot makes heat."

Stanton slid him a little how do you know this stuff? look, but didn't say anything. Far as he knew, Landry was the king of inane trivia. "Whatever made those marks, it was different from what was used to hack her up." His voice was calm, almost oddly so considering his subject. He shifted, dark green eyes following the body as Duck and his assistant quickly and efficiently loaded the body into a bag atop a stretcher. "The stab wounds on her neck are round, almost perfectly so, kind of like big knitting needles. Something thin was used on the rest of her. Blade-like, but not perfectly flat."

He glanced at Synclair and Logan. "You wanna do a grid search?"

"Grid Search... We could I guess... But. How long are we looking at? I've got duity tomorrow night... And I have some stuff I need to get done before I go to sleep here. This is my night off afterall." She hated to sound like a cold hearted bitch, but if she didn't get home before dawn, she'd be no good to anyone. No, worse. She'd be dead.

"The Perp could be in California by now... Or he could be watching us laughing... But either way I dunno how much more we can get here. Yeah?"

That would suck... A vampire, perched on the roof of the building, watching as the vampire cop covered for him... Many times Jax had wondered if this was assisting a crime.. But they'd be better off not knowing. Besides, they'd probably call her crazy anyway.

"I can help for maybe another hour. But after that I've gotta get going... I'm sorry, really..." She was mostly looking at Adam as she spoke.

Logan glance at Synclair with a wave of his hand, simply a shooing gesture. His smile was wry and more than a bit sardonic, but it had nothing to do with the woman, and Logan hopped he made that clear as he said rather casually.

“Take off, Synclair. We’re all cops here, we know how it is. If you’ve got duty tomorrow…” He paused looking at his watch. “Damn, actually that would be today wouldn’t it?” He grumbled.

A slight look a chagrin, he began again.

“That’s to say we all know what you’re going through. Besides I think you’ve done a hell of a lot on your day off already. Finding bodies on the job ain’t fun and I wouldn’t recommend it as a hobby. But you kept things together, I can’t speak for Stanton and Landry, but I appreciate it. We’ll do the search. I need to get off my log anyway. Just make sure you get home. I don’t want any more calls.”

Yeah, Logan knew he sounded like a gruff bastard at the end, but hey why fight it. He was what he was, and was how he was. Besides he knew there wasn’t a person on scene that wasn’t going to be working over time on this thing. It’s what the job means and you catch rest, catch personal time whenever you can. Sometimes it’s all that keeps you together…so sayth the drunk, but the source don’t change the truth.

"Nah, it's fine, Captain." Adam replied, his eyes on the area where the body had been. "Day off and all, finding a dead body's as extracurricular as you need. You wanna shove off and take what's left, I'm not gonna complain." To Logan, he said, "I'm thinking just a ten-by-ten area right now. We can pick up anything obvious and let crime-scene fine tooth comb the rest."

To Jax again, he smiled slightly, kind of subdued considering the circumstances. He would have put his hand on her arm to give it a friendly squeeze, but he was wearing gloves. "Go ahead. We won't hold it against you. Right?" The last part was directed to his partner.

Landry chewed his gum, then replied, "She wanna go, she can certainly go. We can handle dis." It was a long speech for the laconic detective.