“Three sugars, no cream, thank you. Now, ah, Mrs. Hillen, would you please —*”

Riiiiiing Riiiiing.

“Damn, sorry, ‘scusi a moment.” Vinnie extended the antenna, flipped the phone open, and pressed the talk button. “Detective DiCicco speaking.”

"Detective, it's MacGarnagle. Just calling to let you know. We had CSI go over the crime scene last night, and we maybe got something. There's a footprint. A shoe. A big shoe. Maybe it belonged to our perp.

"And here's the thing. It looks like this kind of shoe stopped being made about 50 years ago."

"Interesting... Sergeant, I'm finishing up an interview at Future Visions. Is your office the best place to reach you when I'm done?"

He looked over at Hillen apologetically. Vinne hoped MacGarnagle would take the hint that he couldn't talk, but who knew with this guy.

"Absolutely. I've already called Dr. D'Encre, and told him. See ya."

He hangs up. The phone rings again! It's Dr. Perez.

OOC: Perez can now ask you her questions.

"Hey, Vinnie. We found some interesting stuff. Where are you all? Should I meet up with you somewhere?"

Vinnie was about to talk when the phone rang again. "Shit, sorry."


"I'm in the middle of an interview. Can this wait? If you're near Hob's... Sal's in an hour?"

Let's say we do this interview, so we can get you all together at Sal's and you can discuss what you have learned?

"OK, see you at Sal's in an hour."

Amara packs up and gets on her way to Sal's. She doesn't mind if she has to wait a little.

Wendy Hugh's supervisor awaits to answer Vinnie's questions.

(To save time, to get you all together, it might be best to summarize things rather than rping through the whole interview. So if you give me a list of questions, I can just sum up the answers.)

After speaking with Vinnie, Pascal, with Magnus in tow, heads to Sal's.

Q's for Wendy's supervisor:
- when did she start working on the project?
- was she face-to-face with the client, or support?
- what is the office social culture (happy hours, martini lunches, mani/pedis, massage parlors)?
- what were her work habits (arrival/departure in office)?
- did those habits change at all in the last week or two?

Q for the receptionist on the way out
- like to see phone extensions (check to see if listed extension is same as desk VP took me to)

-- Two weeks ago
-- She was not in face-to-face contact with NWI
-- Some of the employees go out for beers, but the supervisor doesn't join them. There are Christmas parties.
-- Came in on time, left on time. Had no problem working overtime.
-- She and was regularly working long hours on this project.

The listed extension is the same as at the desk.

--

In a short while, you are all gathered at Sal's. It's about 4 pm. You are right across from Hob's Court and can see the trees, Halloween decorations, church at one end, statues etc.

Simon Magnus mentions that the witness, Rowlins, was unreceptive, but that her psychiatrist -- who has strange tastes -- says that she may come out of her shell with treatment. He also asks Amara about the results of the autopsy.
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:28, Thu 13 Jan 2022.

Amara shares what she found, mostly going through details in a mechanical and probably boring way for most. Things are pretty much the same as with the other victims. She discovered two unknown things. One is that the hole was apparently made with something sharper than anything she is familiar with. The other is that she found some really tiny, blue triangular things in the hole. They seemed to be wiggling as though perhaps they are alive, but they have no recognizable cellular structure.

OOC: Feel free to read the autopsy thread to get all the little details, but most of it really was just like the rest.

Simon Magnus' eyes get wide, as far as I you see them under the shades.

"Have you ever seen anything like this before?

"And the blood was missing, yes? No puncture wounds anywhere but the chest?"

"That's fuckin weird," said Vinnie from around a slice of sausage and onions. "Like, little blue maggots?"

Dr. Pepper washed down the bite of food. "Something funky is happening up at Future Visions, too, cause if Wendy Hughes has been working there for the last 2 weeks I'm a Polack. Nobody working overtime leaves dust in his desk drawer that was, 'just cleaned out'. That, and the husband hasn't had much of a chance to see his wife? Nah, Hughes got whacked long before Saturday night. Hob's Court is just a dumping ground.

"And let me tell you nobody in the DA's office is gonna wanna hear that, cause that means the women we find tonight, tomorrow, fuckin for two more weeks? Yeah, they're dead already.

"Oh, but the uniforms did find a lead around last night's vic... a footprint from some 50-year-old type of shoe. Anybody know a good cobbler?"

---

OOC:
Vinnie's being careful about not being in plain public view since that photog snapped a pic of him and Magnus.

Note: Amara actually determined time of death from the autopsy (last night around midnight). So the victim was killed then (though might have been captured earlier).


Magnus says,

"A shoe that hasn't been made in half a century. So... something that someone very, very old might wear."

He looks at you meaningfully.

"I have no idea what the blue things are. They may be some chemical that helped remove so much fluid. I don't know how even fluid from bone marrow could be removed so readily."

Amara thinks about Vinnie's comment. "If she just died last night but hasn't been seen for a while, then she was probably taken. Maybe the murderer prepared her body somehow, which helps make it faster. We should definitely look into Future Visions. If the murderer was able to cover tracks there somehow, then there may be a link back from Future Visions to the murderer."

"There is this..." Vinnie pulls a ziplock bag out of his pocket. Within is a brochure for a spa.

"Other than dust this was the only thing in Hughes' desk. If you're gonna nab somebody, doing it when they're naked and relaxed is a pretty good place for it."

"And maybe, if you're covering things up, you leave it there so someone else might find it and get tempted to go, too. We should check to see if the others went there. It could be a common link."

"That sounds like a good next step," Pascal said, finishing off a greasy slice of pepperoni.  Since he'd worked with Vinnie, he'd eaten more pizza than he had in the reset of his life combined.

"I'll need to go back to Bellevue tomorrow, take another pass at Rowlins."


OOC: What time is it and do we have another task force meeting tonight?

It's about 3:30 or 4. The task force meetings are in the morning at 8.

"Well, there is enough time left in the day. Should we check out the spa? I don't want to sit here until tonight just waiting to see if there's another victim."

“May as well. Though…” The cop looked at Magnus. “Nobody gonna believe you’s going to a spa. No offense.”

Vinnie turned to his friend, “Pasquale, what you think about walkin over there with our scholar here to that Greek Church? See what the Monsignor or whoever says about Greek fables.”

Wiping his mouth with a white paper napkin, Pascal nodded in agreement.

"Sounds like a plan," he said as he rose.

"What time do you guys want to meet back for patrol?"

So, Amara goes to the spa. The rest of you walk over to the church. Correct?