A/N: I don't own any of the Cold Case characters and I am not making any money from writing this.
Please forgive any minor spelling or grammar mistakes, English is not my native language.
This story takes place in "season eight" (post season seven), around Christmas time 2010. It is a case!fic: a lot of focus on the investigation with some character dynamic/friendship along the way. No shipping. While most episodes have songs from the year the murder happened playing in the background of the flashbacks, this one just includes many different Christmas songs from many different decades.
This idea comes from the IMDb user d_henderson1810. Thank you so much! This is dedicated to you.
Cast
Oliver Hudson as Danny Morgan
Missy Crider as Amy Smith
Patrick Warbruton as Bruce Walters
Percy Daggs III as Keith Newman
William Langham as Alan Summer
Renee Felice Smith as Bridget Summer
December 23rd, 2005
(Last Christmas by Wham!)
The young man in the Santa Claus costume was standing on a sidewalk, looking around and getting every pedestrian cheerfully. There was a red plastic tripod near by, a bag hanging from it, filled with coins and some bills. Some would greet him too and drop some money into the bag. Many would just walk by.
One eldery man, wearing a big wool coat, stopped and observed the young man, whose name was actually Danny Morgan, for some time, then dropped two ten dollar bills in the bag before continuing on his way.
"Merry Christmas!", Danny said, smiling. The man said the same think and went on with his way without giving Danny another look.
Danny looked down the street for a moment, then sighed, checked the money in the bag, closed it, removed it from the and put it over his shoulder. He left the tripod in the corner-it was too heavy to get stolen, not to mention not really valuable. Still, he looked around before making his way to the establishment on the other end of the street. He hesitate for a moment, almost feeling nostalgic somehow, but he eventually took a deep breath and walked inside.
The diner was modest, but well decorated and pretty warm. There were about ten round tables with chairs around them, more than half of them crowded, mostly with smaller groups of people. Nobody was sitting at the counter, and young blonde Womn was standing behind it, looking about an interested as ever while doing dishes (by that point just a few dirty plates and glasses). Danny felt a bit silly while making his way toward the counter, most of the people either not laying attention to him or just giving him a glance or two, though it felt nice to see the few children inside happy.
"Hi", he said a bit awkwardly to the waitress before sitting down, sighing as he did.
"Hi", she replied politely, smiling back. "What can I get for you?"
Danny rubbed his hands together. "Oh, just some coffee", he said.
"Sure", the waitress replied before. While waiting for his order, Danny looked around the cafe. It was full of people: some young, some old, some Happy, some sad, some just indifferent. But, for the most part, the customers were obviouly friends and family members, gathered in small groups, talking together, smiling and laughing, the Christmas spirit quite obvious about most of them. Danny sighed, a pained look flashing over his face for a moment, when the waitress put the white ceramic mug full of warm coffee on the table in front of him.
"We are pretty busy lately", Jenny commented, having apparently noticed Danny looking at the customers. She put some dirty glasses into the sink. "A few locals and people here on a visit to their families or friends... some just stop by on the way."
"What about you?", she asked carefully after Danny took a sip of coffee.
"Huh?", Danny muttered, obviously taken aback.
"I've been seeing you around a lot lately", she explained.
"I have some... business to finish here, but I'll be back home tomorrow."
"Oh." She smiled sweetly at him. "That's too bad."
It was then that the small door in the corner, near the counter, creaked open. The owner, Brad Walters, a heavy set Caucasian man in his forties, with short brown hair and brown eyes, walked out, looking around until his gaze stopped on Amy. "Amy!", he called out.
Amy flinched, stopping in her tracks as she turned to face her boss. "Yes, mr. Walters?"
"Move those boxes out of the storage!", Brad ordered in a soar voice. "I see that nobody is waiting for orders. It's about time." He glared at her. "Still, make it fast."
Amy looked away. "OK", she agreed silently. The rest of the customers glared at the conversation, exchanged a few whispers, but that was it.
"And hurry up with the dishes!", he groaned before retreating back into his office, slamming the door shut behind. Amy put the rest of the glasses down in the sink too, then looked at Danny, who gave her a small, empathetic smile.
"So much about the Christmas spirit", Amy commented. She wiped the surface of the counter with a cloth a few times before putting it away and then turning around, heading to the other end of the establishment. "It isn't even my line of work", she mumbled.
Danny smiled sadly and took another sip of coffee.
Just one more night, and then, he will be back home.
And maybe find some happiness there again.
#
December 24th, 2005
Danny's body laid lifelessly, face down, in a river, slowly sinking down the small area that didn't turn into ice yet. He was still dressed in a Santa costume, his blood stained face mostly concealed with the water and near by chuncks of ice.
There was nobody else around, and the sky was pitched black by that point, stars clearly visible, as well as a shiny full moon.
The snow kept falling down.
#
The young detective from missing person's case put the box on one of the shelves in the storage room. "MORGAN, D." was written on the lid. He looked at it sadly before turning around and walking away.
#
Lilly sighed upon noticing the change of interior once she walked into the office: ornaments hanging from the wall. There was nit mistletoe anywhere, thank God. Scotty was already there, sitting at the desk opposite to herself and doing some paperwork. John was probably in his office and it was probably going to take some more time for Nick and Kat to arrive: it was pretty snowy outside.
"They have already put up decorations, huh?", she commented, looking around.
Scotty chuckled. "Well, it's about time, Lil'." She sat down at her desk. Scotty observed her, smiling. "What? Not your thing?"
Lilly smiled slightly. "Just not my thing."
"Christmas or the?", Scotty teased.
Lilly grinned. "Don't push it, Scotty."
At first, they didn't even notice John walking over to them. "Speaking about the Christmas mood", he commented drily before hanging each of them one copy of the case file. He started his summation before they even begun reading.
"Danny Morgan", he explained. "Found dead the day after Christmas 2005 in, his body partially frozen by that point. The river wasn't that deep on that end and the ice would build up pretty fast, otherwise who knows what woulf become of it. Shot twice in the head. Well, face, to be exact. Caliber .45. No match in IBIS."
Scotty frowned. "I remember reading about that. Man found murdered, wearing the Santa Claus uniform, no clues about the identity... bizarre. I don't remember much of the details though.
Lilly looked up from the file. "Why is this case being re opened?", she asked. "A new clue?"
"Yes, identification", John said. Lilly and Scotty looked at him, surprised. "The body wasn't identified until tomorrow, via DNA. Found the hit in the missing person's database."
"They only added his DNA profile in the database recently?", Scotty questioned. "He was murdered five years ago."
John sighed. "A work error. The person in charge, whoever he was, stored Danny's info, photograph, dental records and fingerprint samples in the database, but forgot to add the DNA profile. The techs examined the database after the servers crashed and somebody noticed that there was a lot about Danny on there but no his DNA profile, and thought that was odd. He reported that, the quick investigation was launched, the error was discovered, the records of his DNA profile were found in the police archive, added to the database and compared to the ones relating to cold cases... and they found the match."
Scotty scratched his head. "Well, that's... interesting."
"There is no evidence of an intentional wrongdoing", John assured him. "Nobody involved has any known connection to the case."
"No wonder that the other info wasn't of much help", Lilly read, going through the file. "His face was badly deformed due to the gunshots. He last visited the dentist when he was fifteen. The inner flesh ok his hands was really damaged by the time the body was found due to the low temperature..." She grimaced. "And fish."
"Not to mention, Danny lived in a different neighborhood", Scotty added. "The body was found in Schoykill river, near the city centre. He never lived there-well, not close to the river-never worked there, had no known connections to that area. Neither her nor any of his family and friends."
"So, what was he doing there?", she wondered.
She looked back at the Christmas decorations for a while, then turned her attention to the crime scene photograph, showing Danny's body laying face down in a frozen river.
~OPENING ROLES AND CREDITS~