Realistic or Modern B.A.R.C. - The Decaps (Main IC)

[Kazama]

Patty Bates' Apartment
March 11th, 1983
Approx 01:00 AM
Boston, USA

Patty Bates felt her own breath come in ragged, shallow gasps. She pulled her weight across the living room carpet, but each strain left her winded and sent her head spinning. So was only killing herself faster doing this, and she was getting no where. It was like trying to run away in a nightmare. With every motion, more blood darkened the fabric on her shoulder. It was everywhere. Her hands were slick with it and the carpet had begun to turn a dark red underneath her.

She just had to get to it. She had to hide it. But she'd dropped it earlier. Where was it? Another excruciating crawl. It blurred her vision. Something hard hit her elbow. She was next to the wall. Her hands felt the maw of the open air vent near the carpet. She must be in the corner of the room. It must be near, she dropped it here.

Her outstretched fingers crawled across its hard, fabric surface. Found it. With a moan, she rolled herself over and held it to her chest. She was going. She could feel it. She had maybe seconds before she'd black out. She pushed it towards the vent. It disappeared into black maw and fell from view. Half a second later, a dull thump echoed out of it.

Her eyes locked onto the ceiling. And they stayed that way.
Patty Bates died from blood loss.


Charlestown-East Boston B.A.R.C. Warden Office
March 12th, 1983
12:02 PM
Boston, USA

B.A.R.C. safe houses were often hidden in the same way a rock is hidden in a quarry. Unmarked, unassuming, and virtually the same as all the other unmarked and unassuming buildings next to it, across the street, down the block, and down the block after that. Most B.A.R.C. buildings were hidden like this; even the big North American headquarters in New York. And this safe house, the Warden's office, was the silent heart of all the supernatural activity in the Charlestown and East Boston neighborhoods.

Beyond the stoic building's exterior, and then further beyond a locked set of doors, one will find a series of offices not unlike those of a small police precinct. Complete with a briefing room, an armory, and even a few holding cells. In the main room, walnut desks, most empty save for a handful piled with paperwork. And beyond those, the fogged glass window of a private office simply labeled, 'WARDEN'. At the moment, the office was empty. The only sound in the room echoed from beyond a door labeled, 'BRIEFING'.

"The victim was Patty Bates, 24 years old, died of exsanguination last night after suffering a lethal wound to the neck." Warden Patrick Derry was a man whose gruffness was oddly contrasted by the careful way he arranged the papers on podium in front of the projector screen. The circles under his eyes and the cup of coffee on the podium hinted at the long night he'd just had. He cleared his throat and continued, "Ms. Bates was a mundane human. She's not one of ours', but her death sent up a lot of red flags."

"The first one, according to the Boston PD reports, the wound looked like a bite wound from some kind of animal." He hit a button on the projector control and there was a loud clicking as the slide locked into place. A photograph of a young woman, with short, red hair, lying on her back. A large, ragged wound gaped at her neck. She was wearing a patchy, punk style leather jacket and her nose was pierced with a little black ring. Her eyes were open and glassy, looking up past the camera.

"But it was the second one that got us to call you guys in and tell the PD to back off. Last night at around 8:30 pm, one of our Community members removed the battery on his ankle bracelet. The bracelet stopped transmitting until 1:03am, when it came back on in his apartment. That's Mitch O'Keen, vampire, around 76 years old so he's a relatively new vampire. He's our only suspect at the moment."

A slide of a B.A.R.C. ID clicked into place. A young looking man, possibly around his mid 20's, stared back at them. His head was shaved. For all intents and purposes, he looked normal. Maybe paler than usual, a face thinner than usual, but nothing you wouldn't ignore on a subway train.

"Mitch is a repeat offender for minor infractions. Leaving his assigned territory, disregarding notices, and two counts of unauthorized feeding. Nothing came out of those feedings, no deaths, and he didn't create any new vampires; but either way, he's been a delinquent and has already been relocated once."

"We haven't taken a look at the crime scene in depth, but I've got two deputies there makin' sure it's left alone and intact. Boston PD backed off after receiving the order from the city that another agency is looking into it, but they're giving me a lot of shit. A lot of of angry phone calls from city officials."

"Anyway. As of now, those are your leads. The crime scene is over in East Boston; and Mr. O'Keen lives here in Charlestown. Oh and I should also mention; we have a very old family of vampires living in East Boston. Old and traditional, which means that they may want to attack Mr. O'Keen if they suspect he was on their territory. As you know, old Vlad families are territorial. So it's best that we keep the investigation quiet for now."

He hit a button under the podium and the whirring of the projector stopped. The image died and the room lights came on. Warden Derry squinted, "That's all I have for you right now. Boston's a bit of a hot spot for supernaturals so the faster this gets resolved, the better. Any questions?"

 

[Gabe]

Taighanim "Taiga" Ashari​

Taiga looked at the pictures, listening attentively to the briefing. Cases like these weren't all that new to him, but he could never shrug off the sadness of when a life was taken. He sighed, looking no more than necessary at the picture of the deceased. When the lights came on, Taiga put the pieces in his head. The vampire turned off his bracelet, and then put it back on? Where did he go on this time, and why bother turning the thing back on? The kitsune, unglamoured for the time being, raised his hand. "I have some questions, if I may. First: What's the time that Ms. Bates was killed? Second: Mr. O'Keen was careful as to not kill or turn anyone during his infractions, so why do you think those two cases were correlated? Exsanguination isn't an uncommon vampire related death, but in every case, the blood was in the vampire's stomach, not in the victim's clothes and floor." He tapped a pencil on the table. "Third: Did the doctors investigate the shape of the wound? Vampires use their frontal canines, but in the picture, her neck is dilacerated. Only a more savage predator do that, and not for feeding." He said, pointing at his own teeth. "That is all, thank you." He sighed, sitting down. "And to think I could prepare my things in advance for the new Takeuchi CD, next month..." He murmured.

 

[heycarmilla]

Krista shuffled her papers together in a neat square, and took notes as they were breifed. For a moment she focused in on Miss Bates’ jacket. She was certainly a little more on the alternative spectrum. Cities had an amazing night life, and as a hub for artists to come play shows, Boston has quite the alternative scene. Agent Jackson wrote down some band names from her patches.
“...Her neck is dilacerated. Only a more savage predator do that....”. Jackson didn’t want interrupt the warden, but something struck a chords with her.
“That is if the person in mind was feeding. I think we need to go have a discussion with Mr. O’Keen.” At first glance, this case seemed awfully open and shut. Even if the autopsy shows this was not a vampire attack, they’d need to clear an alibi for O’Keen. “If this is the territory for an old family, they’ll be sniffing around too if word travels about the nature of the murder. Surely they’ve already noticed a buzz.”

 

[nearlyflowers]

Lolli​

Bodies don't feel, but the women with cherry blossom skin could only image the fear that this individual--no Patty--felt before dying alone in a dark, cold apartment. It must have been awful. While the Warden discussed the case Lolli paid close attention to the details he was providing. Once the final word left his stern lips two of her teammates, Taighanim and Krista, started to throw ideas out about how and what happened. Cat-like orbs glued to the where the picture of Patty's body once was as Lolli nodded her head at both the questions and statements that had been tossed around. "Also," Lolli's honeyed voice cut through the silence that hung in the air, "Is it just me or is Mr. O'Keen's ankle monitor turning off before the incident and then back on afterward a little too convenient?"

Either way, it was finally time to go look at the most important thing...the body. It was entirely possibly that the vampire had done this even with Taighanim's point about most of the blood being outside of the body. In Lolli's option, which could be totally wrong, if a vampire had done this it would not have been for feeding purposes. Recalling the picture and the blood that decorated the alley like a Jackson Pollock painting the women had to guess that it was done out of something akin to rage or anger. There was only one way to find out.

"When do we get to see Patty?"

code by @Goldieloxx

 

[Gabe]

Taighanim "Taiga" Ashari​

Taiga looked at the mermaid, Lolli. "Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. The vampire going off the trail, then the murder... We gotta go to this vampire so I can verify the monitor. Malfunction is really unlikely, I run tests every single week on those things, but better safe than sorry." He said, pulling a PDA out of his pocket. The thing was bulky, a whip of wires rising from the top. The whole device was mostly comprised of buttons, the small screen akin to a phone than to a fancy piece of equipment. "I can check the integrity of the monitor with this, but I gotta have it in my hands."

 

[Kazama]

(Sorry about the delay fellas. Irl got out of hand and I had to travel out of town for something for a while. I'll edit this into the next post soon and we can start in earnest.)

 

[Kazama]

Warden Derry shuffled a sheet of paper around on the podium, "Well, with this briefing, you know everything I know. I can't really answer any of those questions. You're not wrong about those suspicions, but that's why you're here."

He stepped down from the podium, "I know you people have a particular process of doing this, but this needs to taken care of and swept under the rug a.s.a.p. We have jurisdiction over this, but the Boston PD are threatening to take this to the Federal level and if it comes to that, we'll have to freeze the case until we can kindly tell the FBI to fuck off. That's a lot of paperwork, and by then the trail will probably go cold. So do your thing but... do it fast."

There were now two destinations of interest. Mr. O'Keen's apartment, and the murder site.

The murder site was in East Boston while O'Keen's apartment was in Charlestown.
Both locations held clues, information, and even potential witnesses.
D.C.A.P. Investigators had free reign on how they approached the investigation; and so they were free to delegate tasks to one another as needed.


(I could put this in the OOC, but it's more visible here. I'll leave it amongst you to divide how you go about investigating your current locations. You have one crime scene and one suspect/person of interest. You could split up, or all of you to one location, etc. What each of you know in your fields obviously has an effect on what information you get.)