Disclaimer: I don't own any of the CSI: NY characters.
I know I should continue my other stories (and I will!), but I have been planning this for six months now and I finally wanted to get it out.
This story is especially for lily moonlight, my first and most faithful reviewer :). In opposition to the chapter title please do not think that you can blame her for the things happening in this story, that was all my bad idea. I doubt that I can do her work any justice with this but I'll give my best.
Black Moon Rising – Blame it on the moonlight
Headlights fall into the water, are tossed about and sink to the ground, drowning back into darkness. Only the moonlight holds on, skipping gingerly from wavelet to wavelet. She walks on the pavement alongside the river, her curls bouncing in rhythm with her brisk steps. Partly to outrun her thoughts, partly to structure them with the cadence of her walk. She pulls her coat a little tighter. The night is already crisp with the coming season. She enjoys the cool breeze, the promise of snow drifting through her mind. The idea of sparkling white expelling the gloom of her thoughts, lingering on their most recent case.
The sparkle of her green eyes is invisible in the darkness around her, but her eyes are alive, flickering from the glimmering ripples of the river to the passing headlights to the warm gleam of windows looking at her from the other side of the street. She's always enjoyed this illumination of the city. The eyes of houses coming to life, and telling her, our inhabitants are home. The people she works to protect. A light smile brightens her lips.
From cases like this. Three bodies, in as many nights. It may not seem like a good idea to wander the night, given the nature of the case, but she feels she's not a target. She knows how to defend herself. There might be a killer lurking behind one of those windows, but not a monster, not in that sense. She knows the monsters are just a story, although there is a truth at the core. Count Dracula, really a tyrant exerting dreadful deaths on his enemies. Impaling them. Maybe the belief that vampires can be killed by stakes through the heart is a sort of revenge. But whose idea was it that they would turn into a pile of dust? The victims they are now looking at certainly didn't.
They are lying on Sid's neatly metallic tables. Cold light shining down on them. He sure wouldn't have dust around them. And it will take a while yet before they do turn to dust.
Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust. They had been dead before the stake had been driven through their hearts. But not so long that one could assume they'd spontaneously turn into dust then … she shakes her head, no, someone is playing a game with them. She clasps her fingers around the railing separating her position from the river. Cold metal, the feeling runs through her as she stares into the black depths of the river in between the floating, silver strands of moonlight.
-o-
Flack looks up at the moon, hanging over his head like a lampion. Burning its way through layers of mist and smog. Full moon. Lovers' moon. Yeah, sure. Well, maybe for some, but the majority of people just seems to be going crazy on a night like this. Keeping him from spending a night under the moon with someone he has come to like, a lot. That's not entirely true. He does get to spend the night with her. But the atmosphere is far from romantic. He looks down at the body again, sprawled out on the ground before him. Body number four. A sigh escapes his lips, in unison with Angell.
A splintered piece of wood projects from the woman's body, seems to reach for the moon. No blood around the wound. Her eyes lie open, the misty air reflecting in them. She looks pale, and sad, troubled. He wonders if she was afraid of dying, if she saw it coming. How was she really killed? And could vampires fear death too? With an angry gesture he brushes that thought from his mind.
This is real life. A very real victim with a name, family, friends, an occupation. And that certainly wasn't 'vampire'. Though it seems that their killer wants to give the impression that he has taken up the occupation of 'vampire slayer'.
-o-
Sid bends over one of the victims, a male. Pale under the cold morgue light. He runs his hand, paled by a latex glove, along the frozen body. Pulls out the wood wedged through the man's ribs. It must have taken a lot of force. But given the fact that he had already been dead and on the ground, not as much. The killer could be anyone weighing over 120 pounds or well trained. If the killer and the person handling the stake were the same.
He continues his investigation of the body, lifting the victim's lips. Teeth looking bloodied. He frowns. It could be porphyria, but that form of it is quite rare. Make-believe? He rubs over the teeth. The color stays on. If it is make-believe it goes deeper. His nose wrinkles in solidarity with his forehead. He moves closer to the mouth and sniffs. Garlic. What vampire would voluntarily eat garlic? A masochistic one? He shakes his head with a smile. That garlic affects people with porphyria hasn't been proven. But whatever is the connection, this case has him interested.
-o-
Mac opens another folder. Moonlight is filtering through the window of his office, frosting over his desk. The air feels wintry around him, cold rising from the pictures he sees before him. His hand travels over his tired eyes. Apart from this case troubling him, too many deaths in too few days, he feels the fangs of the press closing in. Vampires. He can see reporters licking their teeth for that story.
Tampering with a dead body is considered a crime. Inserting a stake into a dead body is definitely tampering. Even if the person who did it believes that it was for a higher good. A gathering of want-to-be vampire hunters flocking around cemeteries is decidedly not what this city needs. Much less when they might have a serial killer to deal with.
-o-
Something brushes against her. With an instinctive flick of her hand Stella sends it off through the air. A moment later she sees a black speck hit the ground, sort out its eight legs and scurry away from her. You'd better. She glowers after it.
She pricks her ears. There's a sound bouncing through the night. A clicking noise, slightly metallic, cold. She turns slowly. It seems to hesitate, staying just out of reach. Trying to avoid her eyes. Trying to avoid being caught. But circling, sneaking closer, longer gaps between each click. She stiffens.
There you go, first cliffhanger, but just a miniature one to warm up :). Thank you very much for taking the time to read. I'd love to know what you think of it so please don't hesitate to leave a review. All thoughts and comments are appreciated any time, and replied to where possible.