The early morning sun was struggling to make much of an impression through the clouds as Roseville's Police Sheriff, Marvin Rorke, rammed on the accelerator to speed his way down the unpopulated streets of the town. He had just been called out of bed by his second-in-command to where the latest crime in town had been committed.
The Sheriff usually'd take more than five minutes to prepare and leave his home. After all, the dead could wait a couple of minutes longer. So why had he rushed out in record time now?
It was because this was the first case where the victim was discovered alive. Although this alone would give the impression that the suspect wasn't a target of their killer, the Sheriff begged to differ. He could feel it in his bones.
Upon arrival, he turned the bend and put on the brakes, pulling the car up to where a line of similar-looking police cars had already been parked. The crime scene tape encompassing the area gave it a sense of foreboding, along with the red and blue lights cutting through the relative darkness. There were countless news crews already on the scene, busy filming the area, and although having no body made the crime less sensational, it seemed that that didn't stop the vultures from flocking down.
Stepping out of his car, Sheriff Rorke felt a chill go through his spine and tugged the edges of his jacket to close it a little more. He turned to the swarm of reporters on the scene, giving them their photo op through the loud chorus of questions.
"Sir, do you believe this is related to the Ghost Face?"
"Sheriff Rorke, do you think the killer has taken the body somewhere else?"
"Sheriff, any leads yet?"
"Isn't it time to put the town under curfew? Or do you not care about the safety of your citizens?"
On and on the questions came, but he declined to answer any of them. He had a case to solve and finally they had some good fucking news. Maybe this was the breakthrough they needed. Maybe this could tip the scale in their favour.
As luck would have it, his detective came to greet him with a takeaway cup before they lifted the tape over their heads and entered the scene.
"Where is the victim?" The Sheriff pulled out something from his pocket with the hand that wasn't holding his drink.
"(Y/N) (L/N) has been rushed to the hospital in the early hours of the night."
"I want to speak with her as soon as she's available, you got it?" The detective nodded in response, as Rorke looked around himself. In his right hand was a crumpled picture of you, smiling. You probably weren't right now.
It had been raining almost non-stop for the past two days, so most of the evidence had already been washed away by now, which made finding any possible trace an even harder task.
"Sheriff?"
The Sheriff's head snapped up to one of the youngest officers of his corps, who stood facing the other side of the alleyway some footsteps away. A white latex finger gestured towards one of the many wet bricks that, upon closer inspection, had an unmistakable dark red stain splattered on it. Blood.
Rorke took a sip of the brown caffeinated liquid and winced at how bad it tasted, wiping some of it off his moustache. There was probably no decent coffee places open this late or early in the day. Although any caffeine would do right now as he blinked away the barely two hours of sleep he had gotten.
"You think it's our man?" He eyed his subordinate, who came walking up to him from behind.
"Implausible. He doesn't leave anyone alive, does he?"
The Sheriff fell silent for a moment, gaze flickering between the barely-there blood stain on the wall and the small drops on the ground. Wordlessly, he followed the trail step by step, grateful that the crimson had seeped into the stone so he could at least see something. But by the time his boots reached the edge of the stone that crossed over into a large, open field, there was no trail to follow any more, no matter how hard he looked.
"Sir, come take a look at this." At that moment a gruff voice called over. Glancing up, the voice had come from one of the officers that was sitting crouched some ten meters away, examining the greenery with great interest.
Rorke made his way over with his detective in tow, and patiently waited for the cop to speak.
"A struggle took place here," the middle-aged man informed him, gesturing on certain spots on the soil. There was no blood to see on the edges of the grass, but when the blades were pushed apart, closer to the ground where the rain couldn't reach as easily, there was. And quite a lot of it, too.
And then, just after the Sheriff ordered to put a yellow evidence marker down, he caught sight of bronze hair from the corner of his eye. Immediately the man could feel his mood sour and let out a curse under his breath, making his way across as promptly as possible.
Nearing the alleyway, the back of a figure became visible, holding a notepad in one hand and chatting away with one of the female officers. Judging from the smitten smile on her face, he didn't need to ask to know that the person had flirted his way into the closed off area.
"I thought I said no talking to the press," Rorke barked at the recruit who was too engrossed with her conversation partner to even notice her boss approach.
The smile on her face immediately froze when she heard the iciness in Rorke's voice. Her face went pale as she saluted him.
"S–Sir. I was just umm..." She didn't get to stutter through her explanation when the reporter briskly turned around.
His nearly pitch-black irises, striking as ever, stared unflinchingly back at the Sheriff, who held back the urge to roll his own. He had no idea how the tenacious reporter got to the crime scene before he did, considering he was notified immediately when the police was called.
It had already been a very long week, and he let it show in his attitude. "Who the hell are you, sonny? And why do I keep seeing you everywhere?"
"I go by Jed Olden, I'm reporting for the Roseville Gazette." Jed stated simply, all cool with not a wrinkle on his features. "I have a job to do. Care to explain what the situation is?"
"Cop," Rorke returned with mounting dislike. "For your information, I got a job to do as well, and you'll be interested to know that I really damn hate intrusive reporters of your kind."
"Cop." Jed echoed, stretching out the syllables. He smiled sickingly sweet, innocent to any person foolish enough to believe his polite façaded, and deadly enough to anyone who had the misfortune of gaining his true selve's sense of attention. "That is rather convenient, because I have a dislike for cops. But our mutual dislike of each other fails to answer my question of what is going on here."
"Someone was attacked." The chief of the police forced an unconvincing smile of his own, and made a motion to escort Jed away from the scene. "If you'll follow me..."
The gesture looked gentle enough, though it was only for the sake of being polite and not because he wanted to. He only smiled in an attempt to display the patience he lacked.
"I have a right to be here. Freedom of the press, I'm sure you know how it works." Jed challenged matter-of-factly and methodical, like he was inviting him to engage in a debate about the subject, only to rile the man up for his own secret amusement.
"You have a right to observe from the sidelines and not to disrupt the ongoing investigation," the Sheriff countered. "Our investigation takes precedence over your... Your... Whatever shit you call articles! Spare me of the details and get lost." With one final push, the reporter was relinquished onto the sidewalk on the other side of the lint.
"Tell me, Sheriff, did you buy that badge in the Toys R Us store, by any chance? You must be working on this for a long time."
A hard look flickered across Rorke's sagging face as he closed his eyes and counted to five. He was exhausted. Challenging did not even begin to describe it, and this brat's taunting didn't make it any easier on him.
The issue was the smile that the words were paired with, or maybe it was his whole appearance altogether. Olsen's face was wiped clean of any arrogance that his words didn't hide, while his choice of clothing were presented in a way that would make the people in Vogue seem shabby.
The Sheriff turned away and eyed two nearby recruits who then moved to stand protectively in front of the closed off area, barricading against the persistent journalist. Just then, a deputy on stand-by marched over from the side. Judging by the light frown tugging on the woman's eyebrows, he mentally prepared himself for the worst.
"Station has identified the two individuals who found Miss. (Y/N) (L/N)," she said. "Two males, in their twenties. Billy Loomis and Stuart Macher are their names."
That was five hours ago.
The room was dimly lit. Cold, barren, harsh with a sound proof door and walls that made it tight with stale air circulating through a small vent high above.
The only furniture in there were two metal chairs on opposite ends of an old and metallic table, hard and unwelcoming, in bleak gray laminate and vynil. The gray and black flecked carpet failed to hide its wear and long-held stains.
Both seats were already occupied. One by the Sheriff who was adjusting the recorder next to his paper and pen, all the while being glared at from across the table by a pair of chocolate eyes. They stared into him, pouring out all the hate and menace coursing through the body of the one they belonged to from the events of the past hour.
The Sheriff was not fazed at all as he calmly took it, the doubled mirror behind him glaring back in his stead. When he saw the brunette made no move to speak, he pursed his lips, realizing he was going to have to take a different approach to make him speak.
After a moment, Rorke sighed and stood, successfully breaking the tension that had been hanging in the air ever since the last time he asked Billy Loomis a question, said question being the standard where were you last night between the hour of X and the hour of X?
It was the same unoriginal question interrogators often started out with, seconds after the one-sided formal introduction. But today that formality lacked, because this male was determined to convince him that he was a mute.
With a calmness Rorke didn't feel, he headed for the door, which someone on the other side had already cracked, seeing his intention to leave through the mirrored window which led to the observation deck.
"Didn't you wanna know where I was?" Billy impassively asked his retreating form.
Without turning back around to face the brunette or deviating from his tantalizingly slow journey out of the room, the Sheriff replied calmly, despite how fed up he was getting. "Yes. I've been asking you that for the past sixty-five minutes."
Walking back toward him, Rorke put both of his hands down on the table and leaned forward until his face was only a few inches away from Billy's neutral one. Neither one of them said anything, but they both stared each other down.
He didn't know what to make of the person he was looking at, with his young face but hard features, and the ability to not say anything for over an hour while making it abundantly clear not a fibre in his body wanted to be here.
That made two of them.
The Sheriff stood straight once again, accepting the fact he wasn't going to be able to intimidate an answer out of him.
"Listen 'ere, boy," he started, roughly pulling out the seat he had been occupying. "We both don't wanna waste our time on this, but the longer you refuse to tell me a goddarn thing, the longer I'm keepin' you 'ere. If you got nothing to hide, you will tell me where you were." The man sat down, inspecting your case file. "This will go faster if you just coöperate with us."
He wasn't going to cave. He wasn't going to give up his only potential lead towards finding out who the killer was—if he wasn't already in the room. The pair of handcuffs dangling from his holster suddenly felt heavier.
Billy lowered his head, allowing his perpetual messy bangs to obscure his gaze from the cop who remained where he was, watching him. "I was with my dad."
The Sheriff kept quiet for a moment, scribbling on the paper attached to his clipboard. "Alone?"
"No."
Shit. It always got a lot more complicated when they had alibis. "With whom?"
"Stu."
Rorke's aging gray eyes blinked slowly, as if contemplating. And then, showing the first trace of emotion that he had done ever since they sat down, Billy gave him a knowing smirk.
"This ain't the first time you got in touch with the law, have ya?" The man dissected Billy's smirk expertly, that in turn quickly fell at the observation. "You wouldn't be smirkin' like that if ya didn't know you had an alibi ready. Am I wrong or am I wrong?"
He was not wrong. Not when seeing his suspect's eyes darkening like a gathering storm in the sky. Billy leaned forward slowly, and so did the Sheriff, who flipped around the folder showing your picture, and shoved it towards him.
Billy's involuntary reaction spoke louder than a thousand words ever could. His brown eyes flashed, his face twisted. The hurtful expression didn't last for long when it smoothed back into one of indifference, but it told Rorke everything he needed to know.
"You know this woman?"
Billy didn't move a muscle. Sure he could have said no, but to his dismay the cop wasn't braindead and denying what was already obvious would only make him seem all the more distrusting.
Not that it mattered, he didn't have anything to do with what the interrogator was getting at, so he felt more at ease than the Sheriff believed him to be.
"You're close to her. She isn't just some stranger on the street you saved," Rorke lowered his voice. "I changed my mind. You're gonna be here for a while, Loomis. Unless you're suddenly feelin' very talkative."