lightaffinity | [closed post]

Sunshine is literally never leaving work via the kitchen door again. She's pretty sure it's cursed - last time she'd done it, she'd found herself here. This time, well, this time she's less than a block from the café when she stumbles across an active crime scene. And not just any active crime scene, either; no, she's walked into a murder investigation.

She knows it's a murder investigation because the cops haven't bothered to cover the body yet, and - fuck. She thinks she's probably going to be sick. It's probably illegal to throw up on a crime scene, too, so she's kind of busy trying not to be sick, and that's why it takes her a while to realize what's wrong with the body.

It's actually kind of surprising, given the shitshow that is her life recently, but she's never seen a dead body in person before. The vampires she's killed, they don't fall over dead (re-dead?) like humans do, because that would be not horribly and entirely awful and gods know she can't have that. And while people got killed in Old Town every once in a while, the cops always showed up and roped the area off before anyone could get close. Not that she'd have wanted to get close. She didn't want to get close this time, either, but see above about never having nice things. So anyway, she's never seen a body in person, but she knows, in kind of an abstract way, what they're supposed to look like, and she knows in a significantly-less-abstract way what they're supposed to look like when the reason they're bodies and not people is because vampires got involved, and the body she's looking at now? That is definitely a dry guy.

Sunshine runs through a mental list of every single curse she knows, and then runs through it again, just for emphasis. This isn't like it was the last time, she knows that, Bo isn't here, and it's not like they followed her to Darrow. Except the only Others she's run into have been people like Luke and Agatha, people who aren't here by choice, and she did enough research to know that the city either doesn't know about or doesn't want to advertise their existence. Maybe they did follow her here.

Get a grip, Sunshine. She can freak out about this later, in the privacy of her apartment, but right now one of the official-looking people on the other side of the yellow tape is looking at her like maybe she knows something about all this, and she really, really needs to be somewhere else.

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From:

youfeelluckypunk

It's the third body that's been found like this since Reid's arrived in Darrow, and it comes just a couple days after the last one. The explanation is easy enough in his own mind, there's no denying that this had been another vampire attack, but he hasn't quite figured out what he's supposed to tell the detectives on the scene. A couple weeks ago, he would have said that he wouldn't figure this as unusual. Vampires, in lore, are known for their thirst, leaving a trail of bodies behind wouldn't be unthinkable; but after talking with people who've had their own encounters, talking with Luke, and having heard what the vampire who'd attacked him had mentioned about only wanting to feed, not to kill, or else a supposed 'them' wouldn't be pleased...

Well, Reid doesn't know what to make of it. He has exactly no experience in this kind of situation, a supernatural one that wouldn't have made sense to him in the slightest if he hadn't been exposed to it so soon after getting to the city. After the first body, he'd suggested that they might be looking for someone interested in the Gothic, if only because the BAU had faced a similar case involving vampire mimicry a few years back.

But he knows better now. The people being killed are chosen, though Reid hasn't figured out a connection quite yet, and if the rate of how often these deaths are occurring is growing, that likely means he has very little time until the next body gets dumped in an alley.

He's about to answer one of the detective's questions about the body being drained of blood when Reid glances up to catch the eye of a woman on the other side of the crime scene tape. He's not surprised by that, observers at crime scenes in a public place are fairly common, but there's a particular look about her that makes Reid look twice. It's enough to make him curious, and he excuses himself from his conversation with the detective to step toward her.

That she looks like she wants to flee cements his suspicion, so he offers a warm smile and lifts a hand in greeting as he approaches. "Hi, there," he says, glancing over his shoulder at the body before looking back at her. "I'm Spencer, I work with the police department. Do you mind if I ask whether you saw anything strange going on around here tonight?"

From:

lightaffinity

Triple carthaginian hell.

Sunshine knows, objectively, that he's not looking at her as anything more than a bystander and potential witness. She lost the ability to be objective about vampire-related things around the time they failed to eat her, though, and she's never been able to be objective about vampires where the cops are concerned, so while the logical portion of her brain is telling her to calm the fuck down, Sunshine, he doesn't suspect you of anything, the rest of it is panicking kind of a lot. It doesn't matter that she hasn't done anything. All she can think is that she might be the reason the vampires are here.

"Sorry," she says quietly, horribly grateful that she doesn't have to lie about this, at least. It's probably paranoid of her - scratch that, it's definitely paranoid of her - but she has no idea if this Spencer is going to be more like Jesse and Pat or the Goddess of Pain, and she doesn't think she can afford to find out, so she plays up her accent the way she does around snobby rich people, letting it turn her voice slow and lazy as she does her best to project uneducated, totally oblivious country hick baker. It wouldn't have worked on the SOF guys back home, but they know her back home. Maybe it'll work here. "I only just got off work, I haven't seen anything going on outside since, like, five."

She does feel a little bad for not telling him what she knows - which isn't really a whole lot, but if he knew it was a vampire that did this, it might help the investigation - but she doesn't want to risk it. Either he won't believe her or he will, and Sunshine genuinely doesn't know which would be the worse outcome.

From:

youfeelluckypunk

The woman apologizes when she doesn't have to, and it's not that Reid thinks that's a sign of guilt because she's very clearly not a vampire, thus not responsible for the body behind them; but in spite of that, there's something a little off about the way she's reacting. He believes her when she says that she'd been at work because she's dressed the part, but he's had just a bit of experience in telling when someone has something to hide over the years and he has no doubt that she is, in fact, hiding something. Reid just can't imagine what it could be because if she'd seen the attack and can give a description of the vampire responsible, there should be no issue in doing just that.

Then again, he reasons, there could be a deeper connection he hasn't seen yet. It's not so outrageous to believe that someone could be involved in some way with a vampire, even one who can't resist the taste of fresh human blood, when he's slowly but surely falling for a man who completely shifts into a wolf and loses all his control to the full moon every month. Quite a lot of things have stopped surprising in Darrow for that very reason.

"That's alright," he says, waving off her apology. "If you didn't see anything, you didn't see anything." He pauses, tilting his head. "What about before today, Miss-- What was your name? You might have read in the papers by now that this isn't the first attack like this that we've seen. I'm sure if you had information, you would've already given it but sometimes, we don't even realize we've seen something that's right in front of us until we look back on it."

From:

lightaffinity

"This isn't the first attack?" Oh no. Oh no. Breathe, Sunshine, it might just be a coincidence. "I, um, don't really read the papers - how long has this been going on?" She's not sure she wants to know the answer, but at the same time, she has to - if the attacks predate her arrival, she's in the clear, all she has to worry about is the tiny, minor, insignificant fact of there being vampires in Darrow. If they don't... she really doesn't want to think about what she'll do if they don't.

Somewhere through the haze of panic she's only barely holding off, she realizes that he'd asked her another question and she scrambles to reply, to keep her accent even. She still doesn't have to lie, thank the gods and angels, because she's pretty sure she couldn't manage anything more than an I don't remember right now.

"I - my name's Rae Seddon. I don't think I've seen anything important, definitely not anyone who looked like a –" she cuts herself off from saying vampire at the very last minute "– like a killer. It's pretty late when I leave here, there aren't usually many people around."

From:

youfeelluckypunk

Reid keeps his expression neutral but her reaction isn't quite what he'd expected. The woman, Rae, is exceptionally terrible at acting like she isn't guilty of something but for reasons Reid isn't quite sure he fully understands, he can't find it in himself to suspect that she's responsible in a way for the vampire attacks. That begs the question, of course, of why she seems so nervous.

"A couple months now," he answers, watching her carefully for a reaction, and Reid hasn't been keening on discussing the details of the attacks with anyone who isn't Luke (and, to some extent, Derek) but offering a time frame isn't anything she wouldn't be able to get by watching the local news. Or reading the papers, like he'd said, which she apparently doesn't do. Reid, on the other hand, reads it daily and is still baffled by how there's never any mention of anything going on outside the city limits. He's wondered more than a few times now how the paper even has enough content to run every single day.

"Rae," Reid continues, giving her a small, reassuring smile, "I hope you'll excuse me for saying so, but you just seem a little nervous. I know it can be hard, coming across a crime scene so close to your work like this, but if there's something more than that disturbing you, I want you to know that I'd be happy to listen. We can even step away from all this, if that would make you more comfortable."

From:

lightaffinity

Oh, thank every single deity in every single pantheon. She only got here a month ago, and there's no way any reasonable person would use a couple months to mean a month, right? So whatever's going on, at least the vampires didn't follow her here. Sunshine's panic recedes from master vampire stalking me across dimensions levels to I live in an unwarded apartment and there's vampires on the loose levels, which, you wouldn't think there would be any difference between the two. You'd be wrong. It's not a huge difference, but Sunshine's practically a levels-of-panic connoisseur by this point, and it's definitely there.

"I really don't know anything," she says, which is just a blatant lie, but the reassuring, friendly cop thing didn't work for the SOF guys back home until Pat locked the door and turned blue, and she knew it wasn't an act for them - they really did want to look out for her. She doesn't know anything about Spencer. She has no idea how he'll react if she tells him what she knows. She does, however, have a sneaking suspicion that I don't know anything is about to become this year's I don't remember, which is just peachy.

(Sunshine is truly looking forward to the day when she can talk to cops without feeling the need to lie about something. Really, she is.)

"But I'd like to stop looking at that body now, if it's all the same to you." A body in an alley near her work... vampires involved... it's all too familiar and she glances down at her hands automatically, half expecting to see them covered in - no, no, not thinking about it. But no, they're just her hands, perfectly clean, with the golden lines just visible in the shadows. They haven't done horrible things for more than six months now. Whatever this is, it's nothing to do with her.

From:

youfeelluckypunk

The only evidence Reid has that she's lying is instinct, but he doesn't want to push the matter when he can't be sure that what she does know has anything to do with this. He's met quite a few people now who are familiar with vampires, whether that's because they've come from a world where vampires exist themselves or they've just been here long enough to already have come across their fair share.

Asking more on the subject would likely only feel Rae like she's under interrogation for something she's likely had nothing to do with, because as much as her body language is of the considerably shifty variety, the hint of relief that'd overcome her after being told it's been a couple months since the attacks had started makes Reid believe that this body's the first vampire victim she's seen in Darrow.

"Okay, so you don't know anything," he says, nodding like he's perfectly willing to accept that, "and you want to get out of here, I completely understand."

Reid pauses, glancing over his shoulder at the crime scene before looking back at Rae. He knows he shouldn't do what he's about to do, but he knows what's waiting behind him. Reid knows the M.O., he knows what the wounds will look like, and he knows that unless he digs deeper, he won't learn anything new. Maybe with Rae, he can.

"Listen, I know that seeing something like this can be disturbing. There's a small coffee shop not far from here, you probably pass it on your way to work all the time. Can I get you a cup?"

From:

lightaffinity

Sunshine eyes him suspiciously, because despite what people tend to assume, she's not actually stupid, thank you very much, she knows perfectly well what he's doing. And she kind of just wants to go home. The only sane option here is to say "no, thank you," walk back to her apartment as fast as she can, and shove a couch in front of her door, just in case.

And yet.

Under the dark in a hundred years, they'd said, and she'd hoped Darrow might be different but maybe it's not. She'd killed a master vampire and done all sorts of things that would have gotten her locked up forever just because she didn't want to die, and she didn't want Con to die, and if she could do all that, she thinks, she can have a drink with a policeman and think about telling him about vampires. Think being the operative term here, because she really doesn't want to get thrown in the loony bin. She's going to have to play this one by ear. She hates doing that.

"Sure," she says. "I don't actually drink coffee, but tea would be really good right about now."

From:

youfeelluckypunk

For a moment, Reid is certain she's going to decline the invitation, which he wouldn't be offended by or even think is unfair but in the end, she agrees. "Tea it is," he says, stopping to wave a hand at one of the officers to indicate that he's leaving before offering Rae a smile as he starts walking toward the cafe. He isn't sure whether this outing is going to accomplish anything in terms of learning anything to solve the case, but it's not the only reason he'd made the offer. She'd been afraid of something, at least bothered by something, and Reid doesn't expect her to tell him all the details of her life story but at the very least, maybe they can come out of this with a slightly better understanding of each other.

"I tried to stop drinking coffee once," he admits, unsure of why he's bringing it up but it's done now so he has no choice but to carry on. "I drink it way too often, I've even had other doctors give me what they think are subtle warnings about it, but I was having these terrible migraines so I tried to cut back and replace my coffee intake with tea." It hadn't worked for the headaches, nothing had until what Maeve had recommended, and once they'd stopped, he'd fallen right back into the coffee habit. "It didn't work, obviously, but I have downgrade to maybe three or four cups a day, which is much better than my previous track record."