Author's Note: The perspective this fic is written in is… a secret until you get all the way to the end! Dedications will be given to the entire Animagus Club. I hope you have fun and enjoy the scenes of horror that I've sort of made up, despite the lack of personal reference or a proper ending. I would love to thank my beta, Kat-nee, for being an awesome super fast reader and telling me what she liked about it! Please read and review if you have anything to say!
Warning for some crime scene images and possibly a heavy T rating.
Title/Link: Want to Play?
Team: Kenmare Kestrels
Position: Beater 2
Extension Used: Yes
Season 6, Round 7: Halloween: Resurrection (2002) – SerialKiller!AU
Optional Prompts: (object) toy car, (location) Knockturn Alley, (word) deplorable
Want to Play? by ValkyrieAce
You've been called into an Auror shift on a cold December night.
It was chilly and the fog was bearing down on Knockturn Alley, wrapping you in its shroud of mist and haphazard black ice. You walk carefully, unwilling to succumb to something as sudden as a slippery fall.
You take a sharp left into an abandoned alleyway. It smells rancid, like something burnt combined with the acridity of caustic acid.
You are filled with a sense of foreboding.
You soon arrive at the scene of the crime, looking at the body tiredly. It doesn't take much longer to see what produced the smell in the first place.
The man has been positioned to sit in the fetal position, with his hands tied together at the wrists, his palms facing inwards and covering his eyes. They were held in place with a thick black strip of cloth.
If your suspicions are correct, you presume it would be a smooth satin in texture.
You know what this means, and you can tell your deputy Auror is bursting with curiosity as well, but is waiting for your permission to confirm what you know.
You nod, and he jumps into action, carefully maneuvering his gloves to remove the strip off the dead man's palms. His palms fall onto his knees and you flinch as you notice that his eyes are wide open and that he had been crying red tinted tears.
You snap out of the shock as his hands land on his knees with a crunch, and your attention is momentarily lost as your eyes focus on the open palms. You hear a loud gasp from your fellow Deputy and whirl around, your heart beating faster with every sudden noise.
Now, you can see where the ghastly smell permeating the alley came from.
On the back of the man's eyelids was a foreign symbol, seemingly an ancient language at first glance. It was bloodied, bruised, and burnt in. The state of it was in deplorable condition.
'See no evil…' you think, rubbing the stress lines out of your forehead. You know this is the third murder case that has been linked to one murderer. Only now, he isn't just a murderer. He has now escalated into a serial killer.
You sigh, thinking of all the paperwork, press and prejudice you will have to deal with once word gets onto the streets. You give the signal for the Aurors to transport the body to their forensic facilities, and you turn to leave.
The clicking of your shoes gives you comfort as the paranoia tries to take over. Yet, as you leave, you don't notice the toy car that laid frozen under a patch of black ice.
The next scene you've been called to is located in a meager restaurant in the far east of Knockturn Alley. The body is found in their refrigerator, encased in a large block of ice that will take a multitude of light or fire conjuring spells to melt through.
This time, you notice her hands are on her ears. You know as well as anyone else familiar with the case that the strange markings would be behind one of those ears. If not, –God forbid– it would have to be inside an ear. All you can tell is the blood on the left side of her face has been watered down in the ice, making it look like a shimmering red cloud of sunlight.
You turns to watch the lurking customers in the restaurant. Only one chef was handling grilling the asparagus, the fish, and removing a loaf of bread from the stove with ease. Yet, there aren't many people who have opted to dine here. You know that the paperwork and the press have interviewed and exaggerated the facts to suit the gossipers. It was such a deplorable chain of events that had also brought a decline to the Alley's general population.
There isn't anyone who would want to stroll in here without someone else present. Even for the regular lurkers of Knockturn Alley.
As your eyes take in the evidence that has been set in front of you, you zoom in on a weirdly geometric shape by the sole of her foot. It isn't encased by the ice, unlike the rest of the evidence, which strikes you as an event unheard of.
Perhaps, the serial killer has finally started to unhinge.
You know that is when they leave evidence behind. Useful evidence. Your hands tremble slightly as you bend over and pick it up. Holding it to the light with a gloved hand, you realize the object you had found was a toy car. Thinking quickly, you banish the toy car to the forensics team back at the Ministry, leaving it to them to figure out more about the toy.
You give the block of ice another one over with careful focus. Finding nothing else, you turn around and exit the restaurant.
Your eyes flicker to the sides as you clench your fists. Your paranoia is starting to become unbearable with only a thought giving you grim satisfaction.
The others would let you know what they've found when they've found it.
You sit in your office, your frown deepening with every word mentioned in the god forsaken and deplorable report.
Apparently, the toy car had been both useful and not.
It hadn't provided any finger prints or DNA –you know, you made them check thrice– but it had left traces of salty sand and a evasive plant that can only be found in certain places. That doesn't help you any, but it could lead to a potential location. This idea alone is enough to satisfy your curiosity for the moment.
You slam a fist onto your table with a growl.
His fifth killing is coming upon them soon.
You've gotten another call, prompting you to go back to the Alley. This has happened once every past week, so it hasn't struck you as unnatural. At least this time, you can investigate the area in which the sand and biological sample would most likely be found.
You hear the clicking of the shoes. At first, you think it's yours. But in a few seconds, you notice the lack of spacing between the clicks, and how it doesn't match up to your stride.
The paranoia hits, but you take a breath and walk as you have done so far.
A turn becomes visible in the fog and you fling yourself into it, trying to draw your wand on time in the event of an attack.
You still suddenly.
You can feel the wand press against your artery firmly. It fills you with dread.
"Won't you play with me, Moody?"
You realize three things then.
One, the voice that spoke to you was a woman. Her shoes –heels, in fact– should have given her away.
Two, the toy car was meant to be a message for you. It was bait for you.
Three, that means you are going to be the fifth victim.
You hear your wand clatter onto the cold bricks of Knockturn Alley, the sound echoing through your mind.
The world goes black.
Fin
Word Count: 1,196
Additional Prompts:
The Golden Snitch - Through the Universe - (object) 187. Synodic Month — watch
The Golden Snitch - Ollivander's Wand Shop - Troll whisker: Write about Knockturn Alley.
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry - Term #9, Assignment #2 - Introduction to Quidditch: Quidditch Balls, Task #2 - Write about someone or something causing harm.
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry - The 365 Prompts Challenge - 296. Style - 2nd Person
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry - The Insane House Challenge - 895. Trait - Paranoid
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry - Return of the Chocolate Frog Cards Club - (Bronze) Bridget Wenlock