Frank Barnes

     time: Monday morning, just past 9      location: just outside Cooke Manor

He and Frank hadn’t talked about the case for the rest of the weekend, though they’d spent just about all of it together – all but that morning, when Fitz had apparated back to his own flat to have a shower and get dressed, to get his things together before they were set to meet Quell at the Manor. 

But now that he was stood in front of the house itself, a sense of dread and uncomfortable anticipation raising gooseflesh across his arms– or was it just the New England chill, colder than he would have expected this late into the spring– he was beginning to wish that maybe they had. Maybe he’d been too cavalier, assuming that he could handle this just like any other case, despite the unusual supernatural elements.

He finds himself standing closer to Frank than he ordinarily would, like his presence, or maybe just his body heat, could chase away the uncomfortable cold. And he finds that when a man exits the house, walking towards them with a hand raised in greeting, he doesn’t want to move away, can barely summon the courage to.

     ‘Quell, I assume?’ he asks, finally, when he knows he’s got no other choice, striding forward to meet the man’s offered handshake. ‘I’m Corporal Burke, and this is Corporal Barnes. Thanks for meeting us so early.’

The manor looks- well just exactly as one would think a haunted manor hidden from time would. Almost completely covered in vines, Frank could almost see how the former owner could have overlooked it if it weren’t for the shear size of the place. Looking up at its imposing structure, he lets out a shaky breath, his uncertainty over the case growing more. Feeling Fitz’s shoulder brush against his as he lingers beside him, he doesn’t even need to ask him if he feels the same. He’s just about to mention that maybe they should try to find a second assisting to accompany them on the case when suddenly the front door opens, revealing who Frank can only assume to be Horatio Quell. As Fitz steps forward, he subtly brushes his hand against Fitz’s, a quiet reminder that he was in this with him, no matter where it took them. 

“Ah, good you have finally arrived,” Quell greets, extending his gloved hand for Fitz to take before repeating the same action to Frank. “And we haven’t a moment to waste I’m afraid. It appears things are much more serious than I first expected.” 

“And how is that?” Frank asks from behind Fitz, stepping up to stand beside him again. 

“I’ll have the girls explain it to you, they’re just inside, here follow me,” he answers, and quickly turns back to the front door, ushering the two aurors in as he holds it open for them. 

They nod in agreement. That much is certain, even if they still aren’t exactly clear on what could’ve been going on at all, thanks to the limited information in the case file. They only know that it had to be related to everything else that had been happening somehow, even tangentially, given the timing of everything. That was the only possibility that made sense in their mind. But they had no idea how, and it was hard to suss that sort of thing out when the majority of the information in a case was written, instead of from people. They couldn’t very well use their legilimency on papers and case files, sadly. The few people who were listed as persons of interest didn’t seem to be particularly helpful in the why either, but then, that was why they were there, to figure it out. Salem only hoped that Frank had a better idea of how to go about it all than they did, unable to keep some of their nerves from surfacing, given everything going on around them.

“Yes, I looked at it a bit before coming down; there’s not much to go off of, is there? But I’d, um, well, I’d bet good money that it’s all connected to recent events. I suppose we can’t get much further without knowing what’s gone, though, right?” Salem suggests. The sooner they dive into it all, the better, not just for the sake of the case, but for their own peace of mind. They hate feeling like they might now be involved in something bigger than themself, thanks to the unfortunate happenstance that they had been assigned to the case, but then again, perhaps it wasn’t a happenstance at all. Thinking on it, there’s a strong possibility that there’s a reason they were put on the case. That thought only makes their stomach turn into an uncomfortable knot.

With their course of action determined, Frank nods his head, agreeing that finding out what exactly was taken was the best way to move forward. Stepping over to the reception desk, a young wix greets them, flashing the pair of them a wide welcoming smile before they realize just why the two aurors had stopped down. 

“Oh, yes of course,” they nod, “Chief Snow said you would be coming down, here I’ll show you where the case files were.” 

It isn’t too much longer before the wix leads the two aurors through the extensive case file floor, weaving them through several rows of towering filing cabinets until they make it to a section blocked off by a heavy wrought-iron gate. 

“Have you guys done a check on the gate’s wards?” Frank asks as the wix begins to unlock the series of protective spells in front of them. 

“Yes, Griffin Jones, our night patrolman did just this morning. He said he couldn’t find anything wrong with them, no evidence of tampering.” Frank looks over to Salem at the mention of one of their three suspects. 

“And did he mention seeing anything out of the ordinary the night of the theft?” he asks, knowing what it’d said in the file, but interested what one of the man’s own coworkers thought of his claims. 

“No, but” the wix sighs as they pull open the gate to let in the two aurors. “Griff is getting up there in age, I don’t want to get him in trouble or anything, but he’s known to sleep on the job. Which who can blame him though, this place is dead as doornail at night, and he is pushing 80.” 

“Do you think maybe he’d slept through the robbery?” Frank asks. 

An audible sigh of relief leaves her lips when Frank speaks again. Casting the spell together was a much easier way to keep it going while the woman phased through the wall. He is right; this is what they have to focus on at the moment. There’s no point in worrying about the dead body right now. They’re going to have time to take care of that. Juliette feels some of the tension abandoning her body as rationality returns to her once again. 

She takes a sharp breath as the spell is cast. 

Five, ten seconds. Nothing happens. Worry is starting to seep into her once more when she finally sees the familiar grey mist passing through and moving in front of them. She waits a bit to drop the spell, just in case. She glances at Frank, then at the smoke again, only to find a corporeal Marisol Xu completely formed. For a moment she finds herself lost, not really knowing how to proceed. It takes her a second to snap out of it. 

“Ms. Xu, come with us, please. We’re not sure if the threat has been completely neutralised. We’re going to take you somewhere safe.”

Frank breathes a sigh of relief as Marisol Xu materializes in front of them, visibly unharmed from the chaos that surrounded them. With their main objective now completed his mind goes back to the body Juliette had pointed out earlier. He had no doubt it would only be the first of several found that night, but for now they needed to find anyone else that could still remain in the manor. 

“Juliette will you take Ms. Xu outside to the triage Fawn and Cal are setting up? I can finish up here, make sure we’ve got everyone else out before the ceiling collapses for good.” 

     ‘Next to none, really,’ he answers, but Frank’s plan isn’t far off from the one that had been forming in his mind. Whatever was strange about this case, it was also just another case, another problem to be solved. If he stepped back from the weirdness, from the unsettling strangeness that surrounded it, from the curse breaker and the mansion appearing out of nowhere and the lack of evidence, it was just a murder, really – or, at least, just like any other murder case: as likely to be a murder as to not be one.

Everything he’d come across had human explanations, human motivations. It was why he was good at his job. A ghost lying to you wasn’t all that different from any living wix lying to you: there would be a motive, there would be evidence, there would be some driving force underlying it all that would make things make sense as soon as you found it. When he thought about it that way, his unease about hauntings and the like seemed to abate. He only hoped it would do the same once he was actually in the mansion, face to face with the alleged ghost. 

     ‘I think that sounds like a good plan. See what we can do about solving the murder and keep an eye out for why he might want us to solve a murder, if there wasn’t really a murder at all. We leave first thing Monday?’

He nods along as Fitz goes over the plan, recollecting the various contents of the case file as he does. When he’s finished the bed is bare again, and the file in question has found a new residency on his nightstand. “Yeah, that’s what Snow said anyway. I guess Quell is going to meet us there, so that should help us out, since he’s already done his own digging into the manor’s history.” 

He wasn’t expecting this case to be an easy one, not with still so many strange and bizarre questions still circling around it. Still though, he’s glad that for once the case that will occupy the two’s time for the next week isn’t that of their usual one. 

Returning to his original spot seated next to Fitz, he looks over at him expectantly for a moment, the hint of a playful grin fighting its way across his features. “So...” he draws out, “do you have any plans until then?” 

Everything felt strange. The whole office seemed to be trying to continue on all of their business as usual, while still waiting for any hint of information on what had happened to be passed around. As it was, though, there was nothing so far, and so they all had to keep going, everything continuing on in hushed tones, people turning at the slightest sound, wondering if now might be the moment that Snow walked through the door and gave them some information. They weren’t expecting it anytime soon, though, even as they couldn’t help but reach out around them and listen to the various theories and worries flitting through everyone’s minds, they knew it wouldn’t be so easy.

What they also hadn’t been expecting, though was a memo for a new case to appear on their desk, followed shortly by a note from the lead, Frank Barnes, to meet him down on the 56th floor to get started. Wrapping their head around a new case feels difficult, with thoughts still so full, but there’s no choice in the matter, and even the little bit that they look through before heading downstairs makes their stomach drop. Their gut tells them something has to be related, but in what way, they had no idea. It’s clear why they were dropped the case, though, and that’s the part that worries them.

Still, Salem tries to appear at least slightly calm when they finally step out of the elevator and see Frank sitting there waiting. That’s another reason for nerves; while they know who he is, have seen him around plenty, they don’t actually know him, and working with someone they’ve barely spoken to before on a case that felt so important is more than a little terrifying, in their mind.

“Hi…I’m Salem…I, um, I got your note…Frank, right?”

“That I am,” he nods, before getting up to greet Salem by the elevator, “thanks for coming down after such short notice, I figured the quicker we started the better, given everything else going on around here.” They could probably stay in the lobby all afternoon discussing just what had rattled their office that day, but he figured leaving the subject at that was probably best for the sake of the case in front of them. If someone really found a way to break into the case file rooms without detection that could mean their current troubles were just getting started, but hopefully with a partner such as Blanchard, they would be able to get this thing wrapped up before it only added to the drama at the office. 

“Did you get a chance to read over the file before you came down here? We’re the first aurors to look into this so there isn’t much in there, but it’s a start I suppose.” What would really help them out would be to know just what files exactly were taken, but hopefully their trip into the file room would help them come up with that answer. There should be some kind of connection between the cases though, some reason why out of all the files stored away on the massive floor that those three in particular were stolen. That was the hope anyway. 

He takes a seat on the edge of the bed, cigarette in hand, and listens for a moment as Frank explains the case, flips through the file absently as Frank hands it to him. He, as a rule, excels at cases guided by the whims of human nature – jilted lovers, scorned exes, revenge and greed and everything that comes with it. That’s where he’s always been most comfortable, with break ins and murders and missing persons grounded in human emotions. Cases where the thing that needs figuring out revolves around strange occurrences and magic, as such, have never been his forte. Or at least, not his comfort zone. 

So the murder mystery of the ghost of a man who never existed, or at least was never murdered, appearing in a house that ought not to exist either, isn’t exactly the kind of case he’s used to taking on willingly. He takes a moment to read a bit further, with a bit more attention than he’d given it before, before responding. 

     ‘Well, it seems to me like there are two options,’ he starts, slowly, and then takes a drag of his cigarette before going on. ‘Either: this Lord Darley belongs somewhere else and somehow mistakenly ended up trapped in the wrong manor, or Lord Darley isn’t who he really is.’ Why a ghost would be faking his identity was beyond Fitz but… well, no, actually, it wasn’t beyond Fitz: there were probably several perfectly good reasons a ghost might be faking his identity. It was just a matter of finding them.

Shifting closer to where Fitz sat on the edge of the bed, Frank looks down at the file over his shoulder, none of it he hadn’t read before, but he was curious to see what Fitz had thought of the same pages. He ultimately comes to the same possible outcomes he had thought of himself when he read the file hours ago. The real question though was how were they going to be able to find out which it was though, a case of mistaken location, or something more nefarious in nature. 

“Maybe...,” he begins the thought still forming in his mind, “maybe, we should try to just solve his murder like he wants us to- carefully of course. If he really is who he says he is, we should be able to figure that out in a murder investigation, if not, then we’ll have a better idea of who or what we’re dealing with here.” It was a bit more on the risky end, playing into whatever game this spirit had up his sleeve, but it could give them the answers they were looking for one way or the other. 

“Have you had much experience in haunting cases?” he asks suddenly. The few he had were nothing to write home about, all simply taken care of in an afternoon with the help of a medium. None of them even close to the likes of Lord Darley and the mysterious Cooke Manor. He’d grown used to feeling a bit in over his head though with the cases he’d been getting lately, these were federal cases after all, if they were easy then the local divisions wouldn’t have given them up. 

Fawn makes a little face at Frank’s naming process. “That’s awful,” she judges, shaking her head. “And you’re right – I don’t think she looks like an ‘East 2nd Street’.” The quiet laugh she gives after is as much at her own joke as it at the huffy little protest the kitten gives to being moved. “Guess she told you.” Reaching out, she scratches between the ears of the still-unnamed cat. “She’s not sassy. She just knows what she wants.” The kitten stretches then, rolling onto her side a little and tucking her head under. 

The mention of Frank’s sister only just pings at Fawn. Mostly because he had never mentioned a sister before. There’s a soft smile on his face, though, and Fawn likes it. “That’s a much better idea,” she says, thinking. “Maybe she could be Medusa, or Penelope.” She thinks, then, of the storm that had been roaring through the day she found the little thing. “What about Charybdis? A big name for a little thing, but I always liked the sea monster.” As if in answer, the cat gives a wide yawn and then begins to lick at Fawn’s fingers.

After a moment of quiet between them, Fawn prompts, “I didn’t know you had a sister. What’s her name?” It’s quite possible that Frank has merely not mentioned the sibling until this point. Something in her chest, though, tells her that’s not quite right.

“Charybdis” he hums as he looks town at the small kitten, it was a very big name for such a quiet gentle thing, but he liked it. And so did the kitten by it’s response, which pulls yet another quiet chuckle from him. “I think she likes it too,” he nods, “like you said, she definitely knows what she wants.” The next few moments are pleasantly quiet, the only sounds that could be heard were the soft purr of the sleeping kitten in his lap, and the muffled noise from the neighbors downstairs, most likely griping about the magical outage no doubt. Fawn hadn’t said how long it would last, but whether it would be just a few more moments or hours, he found he really didn’t care. 

When Fawn does speak again, the question draws the same soft smile from him, the same one he always wore when the topic of his sister came up anymore. “I did, yeah,” he replies, his use of the past tense, done to help clue Fawn in to her passing. “Her name was Charlotte, but I called her Charlie. She knew exactly what she wanted too” he chuckles, as he pets Charybdis. He leaves out the part that in all actuality it was Fawn that reminded him of his sister, not wanting to make the moment awkward. 

“What about you?” he asks as he turns towards her, “Do you have any siblings?” 

She can hear the sound of the battle near them, and the screams of the other team that was supposedly chasing the suspect. But who was even capable of doing something like this? Had this been a political hit? Was this move even supposed to mean something? Or worse, intentionally targeted at someone? Questions swarm inside her mind, but she knows this is not the time, nor the place for those. Right now, she needs to focus on the task in hand; so she offers Frank a nod and mimics his movements, trying not to disturb the rubble too much so they won’t become the ones buried by it. 

After he speaks again, Juliette starts scanning the place desperately for any little speck of green. Even though she knows finding a body here is more than probably, it takes her off guard when she does. A single hand sticks out from what it seems a cluster of wood and stone. She inhales sharply, and for a moment feels nauseous. “Frank-”, she starts, but suddenly realises he’s the one calling her over, so she rushes towards him. 

She isn’t sure whether the audible yelling coming from Ms. Xu is comforting or even more worrying. “We can mist her.”, Juliette answers, her voice low for now. “But we have to let her know what we’re doing. If she turns corporeal as she’s passing through the debris well- it’ll be nasty.” Juliette swallows before she continues. “There’s- there’s a body over there. Perhaps one of her security escorts. I think- well, we will have to take care of that at some point.”

Frank’s gaze follows where Juliette is pointing, his stomach dropping as he sees the lifeless hand sticking out from the rubble. “We can get him after we’ve gotten Xu out of here, we’ll just want to make sure she doesn’t see him, not like that anyway.” He doubted the man would be the last body found within the rubble by the very state of the place, but that didn’t make it any less harder to look at him now. 

Turning his attentions back to the matter at hand, he nods to Juliette’s suggestion, it was risky, especially if like she said Xu turned corporeal in the process, at the moment though it looked like the only real shot they had. “Alright, we do it together then, yeah?” he asks, as he steps around the rubble below him to get closer to where Xu was, “should be less of a risk with both of us.” 

Turning towards the wall he was certain Xu was standing behind, he lets out a shaky breath before calling out to her. “Ms. Xu! We’re going to get you out of there, but we’ll need to mist you first!” 

“You’re going to what?!?” the woman replies, the fear in her voice clear. 

“The ceiling is caving in,” he responds, “if we try to blast you out it might send the rest of it falling down. I’m afraid it’s the only way to get you out of there with the aparation wards still intact.” 

“Well... alright then, just please hurry!” 

Looking over to Juliette he nods his head and casts his wand in Xu’s direction. 

Despite her usual MO – or maybe it’s just the whiskey talking – it is nice to talk about all that has been roiling through her. Especially all the confusion that is her thoughts about Trip. Some of the pressure that had inhabited her chest since leaving the commune is relieved. It’s a little easier to breathe. Though, Fawn has found that it’s usually a little easier to breathe with Frank. Something about his gentle touch and how his smiles seem to lurk beneath it all before brimming forth…

She takes another healthy swallow to stop thinking that way and giggles a little as the kitten makes her presence known. Despite the relief, she’s happy to turn the conversation away from Winter and Trip and Burke. “We do,” she affirms, running a careful finger down the teeny things nose. “Once I decided to keep her, I realized I had just been calling her ‘Kitty,’ and that’s no good.” The kitten was a rangy little thing – skinny with long limbs and paws that indicated she would grow to be big. She was black with a few white patches and had bright green eyes. But it was her perfect, little pink heart-shaped nose that made Fawn stop and collect her from the street.

“I prefer names for pets, you know. Not like… Fluffy or Spot or something.” Something about that practice seems indignant to Fawn. She has more respect for the little creature than that. The kitten took that moment to yawn hugely and start kneading against Frank’s lap. “Isn’t she precious? I’m not one to be swayed by, like, cute animals but honestly. Look at her. Fawn makes a delighted coo and tucks herself even further into Frank’s side. “What do you think?”

“Hmm,” he hums, in response to her question tilting his head to get a better look of the small creature. “I dunno what does she look like to you? I named a few of my old farm cats after road names, then again she’ll probably just get stuck with a number if we do that.” As the kitten’s kneading intensifies, he shifts her slightly, so her small claws dig more into the denim folds of his jeans, rather than sinking straight through the fabric and into his thigh. She lets out a small mew in retaliation of the unwanted movement, but complies soon after, as she resettles herself in her new spot. 

“Hmph, sassy little thing isn’t she,” he chuckles warmly. Resettling himself back into the cushion he lets out a soft sigh as he tries to wrack his brain some more of possible names. “My sister used to always name her pets after famous mythological figures and creatures,” he says without really thinking, not realizing until after he’s said it that it was the first time he’d ever mentioned his sister to Fawn or anyone in New York for that matter. Instead of quickly covering the small slip-up though, he smiles at the fond memories of his sister and her endless trail of pets she’d owned in her short life. “She was usually much more creative than I was when it came to naming things obviously.” 

It’s a few leisurely and enjoyable hours later, when Fitz finally decides he’s up to the task of talking about the new case they’re meant to head out on, come Monday. And while he’d rather spend the entire weekend in Frank’s bed, not thinking about anything in particular, he also knows that they’ve got a job to do – just because he’s got a new lead on the case he’s been working on for his entire career, and just because he’s got a warm and rather handsome body in the bed next to him doesn’t mean he gets to be a shoddy auror all of a sudden. There’s work to be done.

     ‘Alright,’ he says, after a while, rolling over to press a kiss to Frank’s bare chest before pushing himself up out of bed and pulling on the spare robe he’s started keeping at Frank’s apartment. He pulls his telekit out of the pocket of his abandoned trousers, too, finds himself a cigarette. ‘So: Cooke Manor. Fill me in.’

He’d had a cursory glance at the case file before coming over, but he knew Frank had paid it more mind than he had – he’d been distracted, after all, by the prospect of having to relive his past all evening. 

    ‘Mysterious mansion appears out of nowhere, occupied by a ghost asking for his murder to be solved. That’s the gist of it, right?’

He lets out a quiet groan of protest when he feels the bed move beneath him, signaling the break they’d taken was now over and they had to move on to their other matter to attend to that evening. Sitting up, he uses one hand to move the sheet up over his lap as as he rubs the sleep out of his eyes from the other. “Yeah basically,” he nods, smiling to himself briefly at the thought that this was now the pillow talk he was going to have to be getting used to- ghosts, and murders, and weird mansions that defined the laws of physics. 

“But that’s the thing though, there’s no record of the guy having ever lived there, or ever existing at all for that matter. Sure it’s not like they were exactly keeping great census records at the time, but there would have been at least a newspaper article or something on the murder if there had been one.” 

It’s nice to know that they were on the right track with it all. Fawn rubs at her forehead a little, letting Frank process the information about timing and drug intake. But her attention perks again when they turn to talk about the help that Zelda was getting. When the mother mentions Donald Meake, her blood runs cold. Frank turns to her and she can only offer a wide-eyed look, something like anger starting in the pit of her stomach.

“What was Zelda like after the sessions? Was she animated or upset?” It wasn’t likely that Meakes would be straightforward with them, so they need all the information they can get from the family.

Mrs. Pickering frowns. “She was…normal, mostly. Usually a little tired. Mostly, on those nights, she’d eat her dinner and then go right to bed. But I know something therapy like that, talking and all, can be exhausting.”

Fawn nods, hoping to reassure the mother. She doesn’t want to alert her to the suspicion of Meakes. He’s respected, it seems, so an indication that they’re considering him would likely make them clam up and fast. “One last question, Mrs. Pickering. Do you know if Mr. Meakes was offering his services to anyone else?”

The woman nods. “I know he was, but I’m afraid I can’t tell you who. Zelda just mentioned that she wasn’t the only one going to him. But she never said who any of the others were. It’s so awful, you know, to think of any more of our babies caught up in all this…”

Fawn reached across and laid a hand over Mrs. Pickerings. “I know, ma’am. But we’ll get to the bottom of this. And maybe we can help save a few other children on the way.” The woman sniffles and gives Fawn a nod. With that, Fawn pulls back and turns, nodding to Frank. She’s ready to go, unless he has any other questions. She wants to go to Meakes. She wants to look him in the eyes, see just what this is all about.

He listens quietly as Fawn finishes up the interview, still trying to piece together all the different pieces they had. On their case file Donald was described as having gone on about his theories of no-maj involvement, all of them differing, and each just as odd as the next. At first he took it to be just the ramblings of an old bigot, out to find any way to pin these crimes on public enemy number one. But if Mrs. Pickerings was to be believed, which she had no reason to be lying, that meant Meake should have known about the drug addictions- about all of them to some degree. 

Donald Meake was the last person of interest on their case file, and so far was looking like their culprit, now it was only a matter of playing their cards right to make sure they could get him on this thing. Returning Fawn’s nod with one of his own, he turns to Mrs. Pickering’s as he extends his hand out for her to take. “Thank you for letting us talk to you, we’ll let you know what we find out as soon as we can.” 

“Thank you, she really was a good girl, our Zelda,” she smiles faintly, “she just got a little lost is all.” Standing up, she shows both of them to the door, she thanks each of them again, before saying her goodbyes. 

Once he’s sure they’re alone, Frank turns towards Fawn, the complete shock of what they’d just learned moments before now apparent on his face. “So Meake did all of this?” he asks, “He took in these addicts, promising to help them, then to turn around and kill them?” If Meake was their man then they’d have to make sure to bring him in and fast, it was no telling just how many others he had taken into his “care”. 

He nods and then reaches a hand out to take the file – the images of the tattoos, everything else that Frank had collected. It’s going to be a delicate task trying to explain the situation to Lobo without giving too much away: the last thing he wants is for the other man to know his entire sordid history, everything he’s spent eleven years in the department doing his best to keep under wraps and out of the rumor mill, not to mention the complications that might come with someone else looking over all of the evidence. But he’ll cross that bridge when he gets to it.

Frank’s right, after all: they’ve got a case in front of them that hasn’t gone cold to work through first, a mysterious re-appearing mansion, the ghost of a murder that was never committed, and a young couple who had, apparently, been trying to get someone to come out and take the case for months. It’s delicious, the kind of case Fitz would normally let absorb him completely, and it’s only a matter of poor timing that he finds himself reluctant to move on to the other file on the table, finds it hard to focus his energy on the trip to New England Monday morning and strange investigation bound to take place once they’re there.

     ‘You’re right, of course,’ he says, setting the old case file to the side. ‘I’ll talk to Lobo once we’ve wrapped this up. And as for Cooke Manor…’

He glances at the second case file, means to move to pick it up, but he finds it hard to summon the energy, or the will, to do it. It’s just today, he thinks, just the fatigue of seeing all those old photographs, of dredging up the past. He’ll be able to throw himself fully into the case once he’s had a break, once he wakes in the morning with a fresh start.

     ‘Well, we haven’t got to go over it now, have we?’ he continues, letting his voice tip its way over into suggestive as he reaches for his glass again, finishing off its contents. ‘Feels like we deserve a little time not focusing on work first.’

It’s hard to describe exactly the way he feels as he watches Fitz collect the case file, the same one that he’d once spent months obsessing over, hunting down dead-end lead after lead, until finally he tucked it away for the sake of his own well-being. It was almost like coming up for air in a way, after years of the case weighing down on him, now to finally try to right the wrong with the person he’d wronged the most. It won’t undo what he’s done, he knows this guilt is one he’ll carry for long past this night, but it makes it easier to bear. 

His eyes follow Fitz’s to the other case file on the table, the documents within it more crisp and clean than the other, barely touched by the hands of time. He doesn’t think he’s ever quite had a case like it, the haunting cases he had in Missouri were few and far between, and nothing like the peculiar nature of the events at Cooke Manor. At the moment though, he doesn’t quite feel up to the task of pouring over yet another case file, not after the emotional weight of the last one. 

Fortunately Fitz seems to be of similar mind, although a bit more in the gutter than his was, but that was common for the two of them. Just as common as the small grin that hooks the corner of his lip at the suggestion. “No,” he shakes his head, “I’m free all weekend.” Free to do what exactly he leaves for Fitz to interpret on his own. 

Frank’s hand on his steadies him, for the moment that it’s there, brings him back to focus, back to the moment at hand instead of reliving the past. The rough of his fingerprints against Fitz’s palm is calming, easy; he can relax into it the same way he relaxes into the gentle burn of whiskey, a sensation to anchor him in the present, to keep his thoughts from drifting too far, drifting back to the person he’d been when that photograph was taken.

He watches patiently, mildly, as Frank goes through the file for pictures of the tattoos, as Frank spreads them out on the table between them, recounts how he managed to come across them. He lets his eye linger on each one, none of them familiar except in their unremarkability, exactly the kind of tattoos you’d imagine a handful of shady troublemakers who got pissed over gobstones to have on them, like the waitress had just thought shady gang members and drawn the first thing that came to mind–

       Except for that one.

He sees Frank make the realization at the exact same time he does. The hellhound, black and red. The one on Lobo’s arm doesn’t glow like this one does, but he knows enough in passing to know that Black Hellhounds tattoos glow red, when danger is nearby. The likelihood of Lobo happening to know the gang members who were there that night is unlikely, at best, but it’s better than nothing: they know, now, at least, who those men were connected to, what kind of backing they had. 

He knows, now, that they were the kind of men who would’ve been angry enough to do it, and well-connected enough to have the means. 

     ‘Hellhounds,’ he says, looking up from the images on the table. 

He can’t stop himself from looking back down at the drawing, continually making sure that it was in fact the same one inked across Lobo’s arm. After sixteen years of collecting dust in his trunk, it seemed nearly impossible that now he’d finally gotten a break in the decade and a half old case, yet here it was. Fitz’s words only confirm his own suspicions, and he replies back with a nod. Lobo wouldn’t have been in the gang at the time of the murder, from everything he’d heard about the auror he was only gone for about six years before reappearing in the squad again with his new collection of gang tattoos. But still, he could at the very least lead them in some new direction. 

“Lobo has to know something,” he replies, “I have some general descriptions of the men as well, maybe he might recognize one of them? Or at least point us in the direction of someone who could?” It was worth a try, anything was with a case as cold as this one. 

They’ll need to take care of this Darley matter first, given the still very alive wixes living in the house, but once they were finished with that bit of nasty business, there was nothing stopping them from diving head first into whatever lead Lobo could give them. 

There’s a smile that lingers on Frank’s face and Fawn has to admit it’s nice to see. Not that she hasn’t seen Frank smile before, but this was a different sort of smile. Pleased and soft and a little embarrassed. A laugh pressed from her chest and she ignored the fact that underneath everything else, there was a current of something sad running. “I thought it would be,” she murmured. Sitting up, she reached for the bottle of firewhiskey and poured herself another before refreshing his glass.

Frank’s gentle teasing still raises a blush to her cheeks. It isn’t that there’s anything wrong with Winter. But Fawn is fairly certain that everyone on the squad interested in his gender has had a go. Which doesn’t speak toward his character, but it might say something about hers. Falling on the one person that was an easy answer. And she let all those stupid needling dares and comments get to her… As stupid as ever, Fawn thought to herself.

She takes a healthy swallow of her drink before shrugging and flopping back against the couch. “No. And I wouldn’t really call rutting up against Winter in a dark hallway like a teenager ‘getting back out there’.” She huffs a sigh and is about to cross her arms before she realizes just how petulant she sounds. Loosening a little, she sways to lean against Frank once more. “It wasn’t bad. And it was nice to…get it out of my system? But it didn’t feel…like anything?” That wasn’t entirely true. Sure, when they were actually in the act it didn’t feel like anything more than what it was. But leaded up to that, the flashing eyes and the barbed comments and the leaning closer and closer… She liked that. And maybe, after, checking on him despite his denials. Hearing his grinding assurance that he was fine… Well. It was nice, but in a way that was entirely different from the nice that this was – sitting in the comfortable dark, leaning against Frank.

Sighing, she tilts her head to pass Frank a smile. “Either way, it’s not as if I’m going to be in your place, wondering what exactly we’re doing together. If I know Winter, that was a one-time thing.”

He smiles back at her thoughtfully at her small remark, it felt nice to finally talk to someone else about Fitz, although there were still some aspects of their relationship he figured were best kept between the two of them. But even just mentioning the little he had, suddenly made it feel more real than it was before, and not some dirty secret or fabrication. He was curious though if Fitz had done the same yet, or if his subtle comment in passing to Fawn was the most he’d talked about him to any of his own friends. 

One-time thing or not, he’s pleased to hear she’d begun to reach out for something new. Something that could possibly make her feel the desire to stay, rather than leave once she’d been okayed to go back on undercover work. His reasons were both selfish and for a concern over her. Despite her claims to the contrary, he feels like maybe this kind of field work is better for her, after so many years of having to pretend to be someone else. 

Taking a drink of his newly poured drink, he settle back into the couch with her, the kitten in his lap making a small mew in protest to the movement, before settling back down again. Scratching the back of its head gently he smiles. “So, we still gotta name it right?” He asks, only to realize he wasn’t even sure if it was a boy or girl. He’d never been particularly good at naming animals, the few barn cats he’d had at his old house were all named after simple things, such as the street he’d found them on, or a name related to their fur color. With growing up on a working farm, he was raised on the notion to avoid naming anything until you knew for certain you were going to keep it. Something he learned the hard way on several occasions, and resulted in his naming capabilities to be quite stunted.  

time: 9:30am

status: closed to @larrisamichaelis

With so much still unknown about what all had occurred at the President’s Gala, the entire office felt on edge. Those who weren’t working on cases tied to the Gala, were on pins and needles, waiting for Snow to come out of his office to give them any updates on just who could have been responsible for the lives lost at the event. 

That morning when Snow emerges on his office he still has no new updates on the case, but he has a new one, one whose timing felt particularly odd given the recent circumstances. Frank’s gut wants to tell him that there’s some kind of connection here, that there had to be a reason that only a few days following the attack that several highly secured cases should go missing as well. But he knows better than to walk into this thing with too many assumptions, not when he hadn’t even known just what cases exactly were missing. 

After sending a note to his case partner, he heads down to the 56th floor for the first time since he’d been assigned a spot on the squad. When the elevator dings open it opens up to a small reception area, where a lone wix is seated at a desk stationed between two large oak doors on either side. Greeting the wix, he takes a seat in the small room, wanting to wait for Larrisa before he got any further.