A Criminal And His PI Crush

The Assignment

He stood quietly in the hallway. Chairs stared at him from the other side, he was told to sit by the kind young woman who guided him from the lobby to the office to his right. He was told to sit, but the chairs looked damn uncomfortable. He felt the continuous throb his feet screamed at him, like he just walked miles. He knew he should've sat, but here he was, leant against the wall. He didn't even trust his ass to not fall asleep, so this was possibly the better option.
The air around him was stale, hot and thick from the Florida sun beating endlessly down, the breath against his ceramic mask made his cheeks flush with heat. For being such high maintenance, and something that sucks away tax payers money, the police station had shit air conditioning.
Springs in Florida were stupidly hot, unnecessarily so. It was like a personal middle finger directed towards people who had to dress a specific way that made life just that much worse.
The coat that rested on his shoulders was long, black, almost trench coat like, it made his dress shirt stick to his damp skin. Terribly uncomfortable. The ceramic mask on his face was more for decoration than for protection or convenience, the small eye holes made it difficult to see much beyond the corner of his eyes, he relied heavily on sound and movement. The hood on his head slipped down, blocking out more of what little vision he had.
As he attempted to adjust his hood, the door to his right swung open into the room, a tall man with brown curly hair poked his head out, glancing down the right side of the hallway, not seeing the PI sitting in one of the seats.
"Dream?" He called unsurely, his head finally turning towards our character. He yelped, skeleton jumping out of his skin, he leant against the doorway for support. "You- uh- okay, uh, Halloween came early this year..." he turned and entered back into the office room.
"Please come in." He complied, joining him in the man in his office and seeing the same kind of shitty chairs for guests, he sneered lightly under the mask, opting to stand once again to the dismay of his aching feet.
The man who sat at the desk was fairly young, probably in his forties, his desk was adorned with plenty of picture frames and little knick knacks. A few family pictures with a blonde older man with a kind smile, a young blonde boy holding a large stick in hand, the chief himself, and then a talker man with bright pink dyed hair. A child with red hair and a lovely looking woman with red hair, they smiled brightly towards the camera, a beautiful little family.
"That's my wife Sally, and our son Fundy," the chief said, his smile soft but slightly painful. "The others are my father and my brothers, Tommy, Techno, and Phil."
"Techno?" Dream echoed, confused by the nickname.
"Somehow picked it up and now we call him that, probably from highschool or some other young adult thing." He said over his shoulder, turned away to rummage through a filing cabinet. The tag on his desk read 'Wilbur Soot'. He turned around and smiled kindly and sighed in relief.
"I assume you are Dream?" Dream responded to the man with a curt nod, glancing down at the shitty chairs, maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to have a sit for a few minutes. Mr. Soot smiled nervously, clearing his throat and motioning towards the chairs as an invite to sit.
He finally caved, sitting down with just a little too much exhaustion.
"Well," Mr. Soot started, voice and face growing impeccably grim. "I presume you already know why you're here, correct?"
"'Course." He responded, leaving no room for more conversation on that end. The chief nodded, the case that sat on the table was fat, extremely thick for such a little bit of time that it had been in motion.
"Good," The chief said, nodding his head. "Good to know you actually researched before showing up."
"Your other PI's don't research before showing up?"
"Sometimes they don't, and it can be quite inconvenient." He hummed in response, Dream raised his eyebrows under the mask, tsking at the stupidity of other people.
The yellow file was labeled with a white lined stick, with four large numbers, '404'. The name of the criminal was underneath on a smaller line, but the last name was scribbled out, and the only thing he could see was 'George'.
"George not found," he hummed his thoughts aloud, and the chief smiled at him.
"Might as well give him a nickname if you'll be chasing his ass down."
"Where was he last seen?" Dream asked, immediately throwing himself into the case. Mr. Soot raised his eyebrows as he sighed doubtedly.
"Last appearance was in Malibu not too long ago, some of us think he's trying to hop states."
"Why would he try to do that? Isn't there enough people here in Florida to take out?" Dream asked, his mind was hopping from one idea to the next, he had seen what George did to those people. A gruesome sight each time that continuously got worse and worse as time passed on.
Each one of the victims was a man, mutilated beyond belief, but their faces were left, usually sliced off, left on top of ice, or sewn back on viciously. No one knew if the victims were alive or dead when he performed such acts. It sent shivers down Dream's spine.
"You have the task now," Mr. Soot said seriously, folding his hands together on the desk. "Please help us."