Chapter 14

First Case

 

As soon as Vanessa left her apartment, she made her way to the scene as quickly as she could. She wasn’t entirely sure if she was able to enter once they barricaded the area or well, the death scene but it was worth a shot and…and she had to be there. Something inside her screamed at her that she would regret it if she wasn’t there. She knew she wouldn’t be able to do anything as they were dead. So, she wasn’t entirely sure about her reason to be there either…it just, for once…

For once it felt right.

It didn’t even matter if she was still wearing the same clothes she had when she entered the dungeons and she didn’t get the chance to shower or even drain her thoughts. There was no time to focus on herself. While sprinting, Vanessa felt the cooling atmosphere around herself. It didn’t feel right to enjoy it…especially when two youngsters just had their lives unrightfully stolen from them. It didn’t feel right to enjoy the weather…it didn’t feel right seeing how others were trying to enjoy their lives knowing deep down they were in constant fear. It didn’t feel right knowing how the innocent people depended on them and she had…Vanessa felt that she had once betrayed them when she prioritized her emotions and fear of history repeating itself right in front of her and she was constantly powerless to stop it. 

The journey from her apartment to the park was neither long nor short, but it felt like ages for her to reach the once homey park that was now a bloodbath. There was a small crowd, mostly adults as parents surely wouldn’t want their little ones to witness such a gruesome death with bodies mauled and blood splatter. Whispers and murmurs filled the air. Some brought flowers to pay their respects and mourn for the victims. That sorrow was making the atmosphere heavier and heavier. It was like a poison gas that gradually killed them…killed their will to live, killed their trust and killed their freedom.

“The poor teenagers…”

“How could their parents let them out that late…”

“What of our young ones?”

“What have the police been doing? Isn’t it their job to protect us?” 

“Who could have caused this?”

“Sir I’m sorry please step aside, we can’t have you crossing the tape.”

 Vanessa stopped and rested her palms above her knees to catch her breath and ease the upcoming heat from sprinting and sweating. For the first time she never thought she would feel this level of dehydration but that aside, the scene of death was right ahead. She licked his drying lips and wiped off the sweat on her forehead before standing upright again to compose herself as much as she could. She took in deep breaths, inhaling…then exhaling till she was sure that she could speak without having to gasp for air every few seconds. She used her fingers to back comb her hair before walking closer to the scene. 

“Oh…this…this looks worse than I thought.” Vanessa mumbled. 

But when was it not? The scene looked…. gruesome, as if a serial killer was on the run, and there weren’t many noises of a monster, so she wasn’t sure if it was the monster or something but it sure was a nasty scene. And as she expected, the scene was barricaded with yellow police tape. The ambulance and firefighters were there as well with other specialists to identify and clear the bodies. 

Vanessa once again questioned herself. 

“Why am I here…” Her heart sank heavier and heavier from the environment. It felt as if everyone was staring at her. She wrapped her hands on her arms to comfort herself, reminding herself of the actual focus now. Her heart and guts told her to come here and here she is, at a loss of what she had to do next. 

Was she supposed to comfort others? 

Was she supposed to help the police?

Or….

Was she supposed to investigate on the case? 

Vanessa noticed that there weren’t any hunters in the area yet. Or at least none that seems to be as she wasn’t fully aware if they may be out of their uniforms even though she had a strong feeling that no hunters were there. There weren’t any monsters present to kill…unless they came earlier before her. If that was the case, Vanessa was glad as she wouldn’t have to encounter another person like Reid. Yes, it was for a good cause, but she couldn’t help but feel agitated at every approach and question. 

“Okay…okay maybe I should get a little closer and…see what I can do. Maybe…Maybe…oh I don’t know.” Another sigh escaped her lips. “I’ll find a way, I guess. There must be something there that…that…” Vanessa shook her head. The last thing she needed was to spiral down into another depressive or anxiety attack in public and broad daylight. She did not need another picture of hers to be on the papers again. 

Vanessa took another deep breath and looked around the scene again to have a clear vision of the area, environment, and atmosphere. The police were ensuring that everyone kept a distance to not tamper with the poor bodies or the car. She noticed how the car was nearly squashed and the only escape seemed to be the window at the back that was now shattered. She noticed how the officers took out the clothes from the car and kept it in a bag. At least there was still something to identify the victims and spread the unfortunate news to their family. 

After enough surveying of the scene, Vanessa approached…or so she tried to approach the scene.

“Miss I’m sorry you can’t pass this tape. Police only. If you’re a relative of the deceased, then please step to the side.” The police stopped her before she could go any further. 

“What?” Vanessa’s agitation was beginning to bloom. “No, no I’m not a relative but, look I was an officer too.” She tried arguing with her former rank but unfortunately the officer didn’t heed to her argument as none of them were able to vouch for her. 

“Miss, I apologize but you may not cross over the yellow tape, please step back.” The officer said in the most patient tone he could muster. 

“Come on, I can help with something!”

“Miss, I will not repeat myself. Please step back-,” Before the officer was able to finish his sentence, a familiar voice spoke. The very familiar voice that made Vanessa’s heart and blood boil higher than its supposed boiling point. Her eyes rolled when she heard it, and a scoff escaped her lips. 

Now she wondered if she regretted coming here or was it a somewhat set up. 

If it was a set up, then it was a damn believable set up. 

“Officer! No worries she is with me. I’m Reid Larkin, a hunter on this case.” Reid said as he showed his identity card. 

The officer looked at the card, before looking at Reid then to Vanessa before looking back at Reid. “Alright then. Help yourself out but please refrain from touching too much if you can. We will provide you with the details that we found whenever you’re ready.” The officer said before leaving Vanessa to Reid. 

Once the officer left them alone, Vanessa crossed her arms and turned away, refusing to make any eye contact with Reid who instead, let out a small chuckle watching her misery.

 “Great...” She grumbled under her breath. “Just the person I’m totally looking for to help me out. First, he broke into my apartment, then he used my personal information to persuade-,”

“To be fair, it wasn’t quite the private information as everything was on the papers and I merely referenced it and seems to me that it was quite accurate.” Reid said with a nonchalant shrug. 

Now that very statement made Vanessa finally turn to him but instead of any friendly demeaner one hoped to see, she gave a death glare to Reid who’s smirk only widened as he shrugged at her. Well, he wasn’t wrong in a way since that information that he mentioned was as he said, in the papers. But it didn’t stop her from feeling annoyed about it especially if he was going to be a pest who follows her every few minutes with the pesky smile of his that screams ‘I told you so, you should have listened to me and followed me’. If it wasn’t a crime to strangle someone out of irritation, then she would have done it Reid by now. 

“Still, that didn’t give you the right to just spill what I don’t know just to make me join you.” Vanessa stomped towards Reid and clenched her fists, making Reid raise his arms in defense once again as he stepped back away from her. 

“Hey, hey as much as you’d like to take you bottled up anger on me, please don’t as the last thing everyone on this earth, even yourself wouldn’t want to end up in jail after the effort you made to come here.”

“How did you even know about my effort! Were you stalking me again! For someone who said they were on this case sure has a lot of free time to follow one person?” Vanessa yelled, thankfully the commotion around them shielded them from being in the spotlight otherwise what she feared would have come true. Everyone’s eyes would then be on her, and her reputation would have worsened then all that was left is to probably feed herself to the monsters well-seasoned with depression and guilt. 

“Well…I was here an hour ago and you came here running, sweating, and then staring at the ground as if you were contemplating your life which tells me that you weren’t sure if you were doing the right thing and…yeah there was no way it wasn’t an effort when you argued with the office.” Once again, all the obvious facts spilled out of his mouth. If that was his special ability, then Vanessa wouldn’t be surprised about it. But that would work in the actual field where various information on the type of monster, height, size, and attack style would have helped the team. Still, it was nonetheless irritating.

Vanessa swore she could feel the heat rising in her that she had to take a deep breath and rubbed the bridge of her nose. She repeated that a few times to calm herself down as much as she needed till her breathing was even and she wasn’t huffing like a vicious dragon. He was right about causing a scene and ending up in getting arrested in this mess, so now she regretted not killing him or throwing him across her walls when he was at her apartment. Even though she managed to pace herself, the glare she had towards Reid had yet to vanish. 

“Calmer now?” Reid asked almost innocently while eyeing her. He didn’t intentionally get on her nerves but at times it can’t be helped. Well at times was apparently all the time for him except the dungeon. Or so he guessed. 

Oh, how she wished she took a patience class or something.

“Yes…” Vanessa gritted her teeth.

“Great!”

“But that doesn’t mean that I’m not annoyed or frustrated with you. Especially when you’re working on this case in my town. Where the other hunters?”

“Oh?” That perked an interest in Reid. “Really? So, the hunters are fine but me?”

“That’s not what I meant. There’re other hunters in this own so why are you the one assigned to this case? How are you able to get into this crime scene Especially when you said that you just started your agency or so.” 

 Now it was Reid’s turn to cross his arms as he shrugged at Vanessa.

“True…but just because I started it only recently doesn’t mean that I wasn’t an experienced hunter. I just wanted to provide better opportunities.” And that somehow increased the glare Vanessa had on him, but Reid continued speaking, nonetheless. “I’m assigned to this case because the parents of those kids hired me to find out why this happened. Unfortunately…” Reid dragged and let out a sigh.

Vanessa raised an eyebrow as she crossed her arms again and raised an eyebrow at him. “And…?”

Once again, the words that came out of Reid’s mouth agitated her again. 

“Well, I can’t tell you any information or allow you to stay…or enter I guess as only my team has those rights so…” Vanessa knew well where this was going, and her glare still maintained on him. “If, if only you’d agree to join me to work at my agency and I’ll fill you in with the details along with the rest of the upcoming cases. You’ve made it this far so…” Reid shrugged as he looked at Vanessa who was trying to not blow up at him once again. 

“I gave you my answer and I find no reason to repeat it-,”

“Think about it clearly.” Reid interrupted her. “Take a few minutes to think about now that you’re…a little more sober and there’s a scene here right in front of your eyes. I know you came here for a reason and what better to fulfil it right now?”

What Reid said…made a lot of sense even though Vanessa’s heart was as hard as a stone to accept it. But that stone was slowly cracking, as if it was accepting…or trying to get her to accept Reid’s request. 

There was something about his patients and determination he had to get her to work with him. Deep down, there was something that Reid wanted to change but she wasn’t sure if he was genuinely doing it for the people, hunters, innocence and her or himself. Everything was a possibility, so She had to think hard about it and to not be foolishly taken advantage of.

Hard and fast as she knew as much as Reid was persistent, he is currently working and didn’t have that much time to wait for her response if she did say yes.

“That made me wonder…how does. He has that much free time to visit the dungeon to make some of his records, stalked me in my apartment for the whole period then head back somewhere to make a change of clothes and get information? Well, if he is really that good but…he is right about something, and that is to why I came here.”

True, she came here for a reason. There was something unsettled in her heart, and she knew it wouldn’t rest until…until she reaches a resolution…until she had her redemption, for herself and for her former group. Obviously drinking and moping in her apartment didn’t do her or the world much good. Besides, she didn’t want to further worry those who are close to her. She had been ignoring most of their calls and messages and it was about time she made things right for herself. Reid was there to give her an opportunity, she could take things slow again instead of suddenly jumping into action then possibly re-traumatizing herself. However, if anything happens, she could just resign or something. It wouldn’t be that complicated.

With her thoughts finally organized and her mind made up, Vanessa let out a sigh once again. Her arms remained crossed, but she looked at Reid once again and gave a small nod. 

“Alright. I’ll work with you. But I expect you to hide nothing about the case from me and don’t underestimate me. Now let me in the scene.” Vanessa demanded, earning a laughter from Reid. 

“Sure, no worries. Now I wonder who’s the boss here.” He said while lifting the yellow tape to let her in to the scene. “Here, wear some gloves and a mask but as the officer said, try to not touch anything or move it too much. Let me give you a summary of the victims.” 

Vanessa nodded, wearing the gloves and mask, then following behind Reid who first led her to the evidence. This time she decided to stay silent and let him lead on for a start and hopefully this was the right path that she chose. They approached the card where Reid pointed in and started explaining.

“So, the victims are two youngsters who are a couple. Apparently, they stayed out later than they should, or so the young lady was supposed to have a curfew. From the looks of the evidence, their clothes weren’t on their bodies, so I don’t have to explain to you what they were doing at that time.”

“How can you be sure someone didn’t take it off?” Vanessa asked as it was a possibility.

“Because it was still nicely intact and not torn. But there’s that chance so we are sending it for a lab test for any other DNA.” 

Vanessa nodded before asking. “How did you know that these two victims were the exact children of the parents who hired you since they stayed out late? What if it’s another older couple or so?” 

“Because the father of the young man managed to get out from his son that they will be headed to this park with his girlfriend along with his girlfriend’s father. At first, I too, was wondering if they are the related victims before the blood test but with further confirmation of what they wore. They are the victims.”

That triggered something in Vanessa. She felt sorrow rising in her, but she had to control it. It…it wasn’t right when they only wanted to have a fun night with each other only to experience their last demise. Vanessa blanked out for a second before Reid patted her. From his face, she knew he was about to ask her if she was alright and probably if this was going too fast, but Vanessa put up her hand and waved at him to continue their investigation.

“Let’s look at the car. It’s quite interesting.” Reid said, leading her to the card before he carried on. “Look at the back windshield, its damaged and the roof of the car looked like something heavy had pressed it down.”

Vanessa followed his observation. The roof of the car was made from metal and other materials so it would be impossible to not have a bump onto it without something heavy doing its duty or…

“Something even more interesting for you.” Reid once again snapped Vanessa from her thoughts as he pointed at the back of the car.  “I’m surprised they didn’t notice this. Naturally there would be bloods as the victims were mauled apart and some limbs were noted to be missing, but blood wasn’t the only liquid we found, and I can confirm that it’s not any form of lubricants from the stores.”

That caught Vanessa’s attention. She had a feeling that she knew exactly what the liquid or…substance was. She moved away from the car to make her way to the liquid where Reid was pointing to. It was a clear bubbly liquid, and some was mixed with blood that was becoming one with it. It wasn’t a thin liquid, and it could have been mistaken for slime or as Reid mentioned, lubricants. So, there was only one answer.

“You’re right… also you and I are surely familiar with this.” Vanessa pointed out, getting a nod from Reid.

“Yeah. It’s a monster alright but… I was out nearly all night apart from the time I had to change and take a shower before continuing my hunts and even though I don’t reside in this town, there weren’t much of a commotion? Usually, others would have screamed that the monster is attacking them or at least there would be a few witnesses but this…it happened in a blink of an eye.” Reid took out his camera to snap some photos. 

“Now that you’ve mentioned it.” Vanessa continued after him. “Even I didn’t hear anything. There was nothing on the news or from…”

“From the police scanner.”

Reid raised an eyebrow for her to continue.

“Well, I had my ways to get information which I’ll indulge you in that sometimes later. Back at the topic, it was a silent attack. Conveniently for the monsters, they strike happened at night.”

Reid nodded this time with a sigh. The situation just went from bad to worse. They had to inform other agencies about this and keep everyone on high alert. Still, this was Reid’s…or Reid’s new team to settle the case and hopefully make things right this time. Find their weaknesses and get rid of them once and for all. 

“This is getting…” Reid shook his head. It was hard to accept that it was becoming this bad, but he had to force himself to, they had to force themselves to. 

“They are becoming bolder and bolder.” Vanessa finished his sentence. 

“Yeah. Now, they can move through the town undetected despite their large and heavy build. No one heard a thing, no one seen a thing and by the time they noticed, it was too late. They were smart enough to not leave any witness or I guess ensured no witness. Those creatures are smart, and we can’t look over that.”

“I don’t think they are merely becoming bolder just for more food.” Vanessa pointed out, earning Reid’s attention.

“What do you mean by that?” 

“There’s more and more hunter’s now aren’t there? If they know that they are going to be hunted down with the number of their kind getting killed by us to, then wouldn’t they have decreased their movements?”

It made sense to Reid but to him, it could also be that they were declaring a silent war to take over their homes and turn the humans into their meat farm. 

“Fair. However, they could have some rage and revenge for killing but-,” Before he could continue, Vanessa interrupted him. “But the question is, why did the first attack? No one was disturbing them, and they have decided to hunt us down? It was as if they were prepared for this moment. They found the right time to strike and here we are today.”

A silent washed between them to settle down their thoughts. 

She was right. There had to be a reason for them to do this and she agreed with Reid. 

“Alright. Let’s investigate that. For now, help me look out for any details or fine evidence you can get, and we’ll discuss more later.” Reid said, taking out a notebook for her to record down whatever that was deemed important. 

They continued investigating and clearing the crime with the forensics. It lasted for a few hours before Reid joined Vanessa who was taking a break at the side. 

“Regretted joining my team yet or delighted to?” Reid asked, hoping to ease the mood before they carry on with the investigations. Vanessa rolled her eyes at the question.

“I do regret not punching you but, I am glad to join…I guess. It feels kind of good to be back yet…it still feels uncomfortable.” 

“Of course. It’s not easy to suddenly jump back in the action but I’m glad you’re here.” Reid said and patted her shoulder. “Let’s take a short snack before we carry on. We need the energy and I’m sure you haven’t eaten anything yet. The last thing either of us need is one of us passing out from exhaustion, low blood sugar or malnutrition. I’ll pay if you don’t have the money to now.” 

Vanessa wanted to reject it but once again he was right, and she didn’t have the energy to argue now. She was fired up by the case yes but not of Reid yet. 

“Alright then, get me some food. Even a hot dog and water sounds nice.” Vanessa gave in and walked back to the scene to check if there were anything else that they missed.