Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended. All characters belong to Syfy and the writers of Being Human and Crossing Jordan. I´m writing just for fun and I make no money with it. The locations and persons/names used in the story, as far as they do really exist, don´t have any connections to any real events/cases and all content is completely fictional.
When Aidan and Henry manage it to escape from Mickey´s house which he sold over to Suren and her human lawyer, they believe that all orphans died in it as the invitation warded off with the change of the human owner. While Aidan has to take care for his son, an exsanguinated corpse is found and as usually with undefined cases of death, the police takes over.
Unfortunately Bishop is ashes and so the Boston Vampire Family has no connections now to the Boston Police Department to protect their secrets from the eyes of the human public. The vampires are about to be exposed when they won´t find out just in time who´s responsible for the upcoming disaster. And vampire leader Mother has announced to pay the vampires a visit...
After more than three centuries the Boston Vampire Family is in serious danger when the team of Dr. Jordon Cavanaugh from the Boston Police Forensic Department put their hands on the victim...
Set up after the end of Being Human´s season 2, episode #8 I´ve got you under your skin and leading into the events of episode #9 When I think about you I shred myself, it follows the vampires thru a new threat, set up by anybody who´s out for revenge. Crossover from Being Human with Crossing Jordon which both are at home in Boston. I got the idea when I watched an episode in which criminologist Nigel had to examine a corpse who might have turned out as a vampire victim due to marks on the throat.
There are no such things as vampires out there
Chapter 1
Anywhere in Boston at nighttime
The firefighters rolled in their hoses when the smoke disappeared from the area. Anybody from the neighborhood had called for the Boston Fire Brigade when he saw two figures crash through the wooden door of the house vis á vis.
Flames had been licking to the broken window glass and a shadow of hands clinging to the iron window cross before they fell apart and disappeared in what looked like sparkles and ashes which must have come from above. Flames and a roaring fireball that disappeared as fast as it had risen seemingly out of nowhere.
The two men who had managed to escape the fire ran down the street after a short catfight, in which the taller one of them was hindering the younger one by sheer force to run back into the rising inferno in an attempt to save what and whomever.
Remaining undiscovered by the two men as well as by the watchful neighbor a hooded figure, hidden by the shades of a nearby brick wall, looked down the road after the two men. Then he heard the klaxons of the Fire Engines that came down the road and stopped dead in front of the building. The area became busy with firefighters.
Half an hour later:
The Lieutenant stepped back from the door.
"If I wouldn´t know this better I would say; a case of backdraft. No large fire inside. Anything seems to have almost extinguished the fire before it could grew large enough to set the building ablaze. Luck for us and the owner. No immense damage inside. Lots of ashes in heaps. Looks like a lot of paper had burned very fast to very fine structured ash powder..." He shrugged his shoulders and waved to two of his comrades to follow him.
Another man in the uniform of the BFD with a box that seemed to be heavy despite its small size entered the house by the stairs and disappeared inside.
The Lieutenant indicated him with his thumb; "Tickelstone will survey this fire and we´ll know what exactly started the fire. Let´s do him his job!", he smiled and took off his helmet before he went back to his unit.
The hidden figure in the shades slid deeper into the shade of his hood and peered around the corner over to the house where the last fire fighters finished their job and finally climbed onto their fire engines and drove away. When the street was empty and silent again he came out of his hiding place. Crossed the street and came over to the house. He stared at the broken window and tears dropped down his cheeks, ran down into the collar of the hoody sweater. He choked and let out a deep gasping sound.
One was responsible for what had happened here. Anyone was responsible for the betrayal.
He knew who had died inside this house and he had known those for which this house had become a resting place for their ashes.
But who ever was responsible for the orphan massacre; was going to pay for! Was going to pay for his loss.
When he went down the street he knew what to do next. His tears dried when the wind stroke his cheeks and the salty taste in his throat became heavy with wrath.
Dorchester, Boston, two days later
The rain drops were falling thick and heavily on the glistening flagstones of the sidewalk. Most of the inhabitants of Dorchester were hiding under the umbrellas and the street at the end of the block was almost empty by this hour. The night was cool and from the bay the wind brought over the salty breath of the ocean. The wind wasn´t that strong but steady and the young man was a little bit drunken from the beer he has had in the cheap club on the other side of the street. He stumbled along the sidewalk and his hand touched the wet wall of bricks when he staggered. The man stopped dead in his tracks and let his back fall against the wall, fighting for breath and regaining control over his steps.
"Damn strong stuff...", he mumbled when he went on down the street.
He crossed the street and went around the corner into a narrow passage. No one was following him into the poorly lit alleyway. His steps echoed from the walls and he avoided a garbage can merely by luck.
"Damn...should better be home soon before I got...ups!" He murmured an excuse to no one in special. He squared his shoulders and made a few steps forward. A group of garbage cans was placed along a wall and he looked over them, searching the best position to empty his bladder, when a detail caught his sight...
The sole of a shoe protruded from between the cans. Skeptically he watched more closely and shrunk back, his hand rose to his mouth when he began to choke hard.
Anything was lying between the cans and when he watched more closely he saw...a motionless body. The body of a man. Definitely dead. As the living couldn´t copy the posture of the dead.
The young man stumbled backwards and fled from the alleyway. He fumbled for the cell phone in the pocket of his jeans. For a moment he hesitated to call the cops, being afraid of getting connected to a case of death. He looked down the street and there was another person walking down. Someone who might have seen him coming out of the alleyway in a panic. No excuses! He sighed deeply and with trembling fingers he dialed the 911.
Ten minutes later the alley was lit by the flashing red and blue spotlights on the roofs of the police cars and a makeshift flood light on a pillar bathed the alley in bright light. Five officers from the Boston Police Department sealed off the crime scene from the rest of the street. Yellow plastic ribbon made a border for all pedestrians.
Crime scene-don´t enter
"Who found this body?" The voice of Detective Hoyt was calm with the routine of the experienced homicide detective. An officer indicated to the young man who stood nearby and lifted his head when the Detective came to him.
"You found the victim? What´s your name, sir?"
"Wilson. Paul Wilson, Detective. I...I was on my way home. Had some beer over there at Club Valentine. Nothing else. I...I don´t use if you understand...", he tried to make clear that he was none of the junkies which populated some certain streets of the Dorchester District.
"Detective Hoyt. I´m from the Boston Homicide, not from the Drug Department. When did you find the victim?"
"Some ten or fifteen minutes ago, Detective...I came in here from the street...wanted to shorten the distance and do some pissin´. It´s quite dark and empty in here...I mean...before you came..." His finger rose and his arm circled around, embracing the whole, now very populated, area.
"Okay. Please take a look on him! Do you probably know the man?", ordered Detective Hoyt and lead him to the place, where the victim of murder was lying.
Wilson closed his eyes and swallowed hard before he dared to open his eyes and look at the man who was lying on his back on the wet dirty flagstones. There was nothing frightening about him irrespective the fact that he was dead. He wore a dark suit and dark leather sneakers. Way too elegant for this district. He simply didn´t fit in, had nothing in common with most of the inhabitants.
The victim seemed to sleep to the eyes of an inattentive viewer. There was no gunshot wound or cut throat. There was a lack of blood at the crime scene. Definitely the man had not died here as far as he could decide from what he had seen on screen so often.
"I...I don´t know him, Detective Hoyt. Have never seen him here nor in the club where I came from. He looks so...", helplessly he searched for the right expression.
"Looks what alike, Mr. Wilson?" Detective Hoyt looked at him and studied his facial expression. He searched for the indication of a lie, but there was none. The only thing he found was astonishment and a distinct touch of fear. The witness seemed to be scared on a normal level.
"I mean he looks so...like he doesn´t belong over here. His clothing...Looks like some business type from the Financial District. No one to walk this part of Dorchester, you know what I mean..." he was teetering nervously from one feet to the other, seemed to feel uncomfortable. Nothing uncommon when one stumbles over a dead man amidst the night.
"I just was on my way home. Nothing else intended...", he murmured, his voice sounded helplessly, and hoped that the good Detective was going to let him out of this now. And fast please!
"Okay, Mr. Wilson. Please give your personal data to my colleague. We´ll need you for witness! Stay within the town please.
"I...I didn´t kill this man!" Wilson protested. He rose his hands in a gesture of self defense. "Not me! I didn´t..."
"Kill him! We know.", Hoyt completed with a grin. And didn´t tell him that he naturally didn´t trust anyone until his innocence was verified. Everybody near a crime scene was suspicious.
A woman with long hair, bound up to a pony tail climbed out of a car that stopped at the corner. She came over to the restricted area, her hand lifted the plastic ribbon and she dove through under it. A young officer tried to stop her but she smiled, tore out a police badge and the officer stepped back to let her in.
"Dr. Jordan Cavanaugh, Coroner.", she introduced herself with a smile. Then she came over to the corpse.
"Uhh, good man, seems he doesn´t know me until yet...", she pointed to him.
"He´s a newbie, Doc. Now let´s take a look on this..."Hoyt directed to the victim.
"He was moved?"
"No, Doc. The witness found him like that. Can you say something at the first view? His clothing doesn´t fit into the area. Looks like he´s from Downtown, the financial district..." Hoyt commented while Dr. Cavanaugh started a first examination.
Carefully she opened the jacket, searched the pockets for an ID card and found it in the pocket inside.
"Uhm...Mr. George O´Donnell...born 1961-May-24... Run that through the data base, Detective...", she handed over the ID card and Hoyt put it into an evidence bag, took out his handy and called for his bureau.
It took a few minutes and he got an answer from his assistance at the BPD.
"Mr. O´Donnell is a successful banker...manager at Massachusetts Central Bank in Boston...Hm, he´s...was really wrong in here. Like Wilson said. None of the common guys here. Somewhat far from his usual...safe...area. I´m wondering what he was searching over here in a dark alley. Maybe should test him for drugs..."
"Run him through the Tox. His skin is cold and his liver temperature is low...some 88° F...in relation to the air temperature I would define he´s dead since four hours...Okay, fix that..."
An officer made photos from the victim, his position and the area around. When the securing of evidences was finished they put him into a body bag to drive him to the forensic institute of BPD.
In the laboratory Dr. Vijay, simply known as "Bug" opened the black bag and together with an assistant he put the victim on a steel examination table. Nigel came over and bowed over the man, his eyes examining the somewhat pale face.
"Pale guy. Doesn´t look very healthy...", he smirked.
"Dead men never look healthy, Nigel!" he was corrected by Bug with disapproval.
"That´s part of our job, Bug. But look..." His fingertips shoved up the eyelids of the left eye; "...his scleras are really pale. Nearly white with the vessels nearly invisible...looks like he had been anemic...I´ll do a blood screening".
Bug unwrapped the victim level after level, put the jacket, the pants, socks, shirt and shoes in plastic bags with labels. All would run through forensic investigation.
Bug and Nigel found the skin clean. There were no blood traces on the body. No need to wash the victim before examination. The pale color of the skin fitted with the sclera color.
"Hm, he seems to be anemic! Maybe too much salad instead of regular meals. Bankers are often so busy they forget to eat!" Nigel explained.
"Nigel! He was a manager! They tend to have opulent meals with other managers. Business meals in expensive restaurants, nights in bars and upper class hotels! Such things we´ll never be able to enjoy!" Bug grumbled.
"What´s the benefit of such a life? Weight problems, heart attacks, high cholesterol levels and high mortality rate! I don´t need this. I enjoy my vacations. No emails, no stock exchange earthquakes that drives you mad! I wouldn´t like to have his job...", Nigel meant with a look on the victim.
"Now let´s search for the cause of death...", Bug murmured when he began to inspect along the body, searching for external evidences of a murder or suicide. His fingers in latex gloves drove over the skin of the belly, using soft pressure to test for internal injuries that would fill the abdomen with blood what could be an explanation for the pale skin color.
"Pressure in the abdomen is normal...when there are internal injuries like a rupture of the spleen or the liver, we´ll find them when we´ll open the belly."
"Chest-abdominal-incision. That will do!" Nigel answered while he went down the belly and the groin with his hand, spreading the legs apart to inspect them.
"Hey, Bug! Look at this! That´s very unusual!", he suddenly called out.
"What? What did you find? Some crab louse?" Bug laughed out. He lifted his head from the chest and turned over to the legs where Nigel directed to the area of the femoral artery.
"What do you think of this?" Nigel pierced him with the eyes. His smile was suspiciously.
"Looks like the impression of teeth!", Bug took a more intensive look; "Maybe uncommon sexual techniques...? Maybe he preferred special services. " He grinned. "We should check his private area for contacts with prostitutes who carry out such techniques...Tell Woody!"
"You´re such a blind one, Bug! Use your experience with the cinema!" Nigel looked at him doubtfully.
"Cinema? What has it to do with the cinema? We´re real crime scene investigators! Where are you going to, Nigel?"
"No cinema if he prefers to be bitten by a dog to get off! Somewhat risky I would say."
Bug bowed deeper, took a magnifier and looked at the teeth impressions. Front teeth from upper and lower jaw. Not uncommon. Upper and lower canines. Back teeth. Horse shoe shaped impressions. Size like that from a human jaw.
"Looks like from a human being!" Bug looked at Nigel, magnifier in hand. He raised his eyebrows.
"Yeah, human. But a definitely special species I suggest! You can´t be that ignorant!" Nigel expected him to finally agree with him.
"Stop tormenting me. Or do you think you simply have to beat me with phone books until I agree with you?" Bug smiled. Then his facial features became earnest.
Nigel´s face went serious. He would have to be totally serious when he would inform Bug about his opinion.
"That, Bug, looks like vampire bite marks. You can´t simply ignore the much deeper impressions of the canines of the upper jaw. And it is the upper jaw, because of the larger radius! Upper teeth always cover those in the lower jaw, this you know! And the incisions are going right into the femoral artery. There is no mistaking, Bug!"
"Maybe a manic fan of vampire films. I´ve read that persons go to the dentist to get prolonged canines. They make a mold, then an abrasion and finally cover the canines with permanent tooth crowns.", Bug supposed with a shrunk. "Would be glad to have a look at this jaw in nature. That would testify my suggestion!"
"Better not to meet a vampire alive. Have you never seen what they do with humans? And this man looks like he had lost a lot of blood if not nearly all his blood. Bug, I beg you! This man is a vampire victim!"
"Nigel! This is Boston! Not Transylvania or some foggy London 1898...! You have read way too much Stoker!" Bug shook his head.
Nigel looked up from the body. In the other laboratory Dr. Cavanaugh had ended up with the examination of another victim of murder: a gunshot had ended the life of an middle aged hunter. Nothing on this case was to the slightest this unusual like that of the victim Bug had on the table.
Nigel grinned and waved over to the other room.
Bug shot him a critical look, hissed: "What are you doing, Nigel? Are you…?" Mad wasn´t the right term but sometimes Nigel tended to go…spooky with his cases. To declare a victim of sexual, even kind of kinky, sort of enjoyment as a vampire victim was really strong stuff. It could even endanger his reputation as an experienced examiner and criminologist.
"Stop, Nigel! Don´t tell her he is a vampire victim! That´s freekely nonsense! There are no such things like vampires out here in Boston! I´m afraid you spend your leisure time in going through way too much vampire TV series!", Bug whispered in a warning tone.
Nigel grinned.
For good luck Jordan hadn´t totally finished her body job so she nodded a Yes in their direction but it gave them a short extra time before she would enter their examination room.
"You don´t even imagine what is possible! Know Nick Knight? Know what?"
"Who´s Mr. Knight? What does he has to do with our case?" Bug looked at him concerned.
"Nick works together with a cop named Shanky in Toronto. Nick is a vampire working night shifts after Shanky´s partner died in a shooting. And the best is: Shanky doesn´t know he´s working together with a vampire cop partner!" Nigel explained with a smiling; "Can you imagine what all happens? You´re working in cases of murder and your partner climbs up walls like a bat, can fly and observe town and crime scenes from above while he flies around! A vampire won´t make such noises while flying like a helicopter does!"
"Nigel! That´s kind of…" Bug waved his hand up and down in a definite gesture in front of his face; "…kind of mad! That´s kintopp!" Now Bug was really concerned about the good Nigel, hoping only fantasy had taken him on a wild ride.
But Nigel was up now straight forward!
"When once Shanky found a drained victim, who was killed by another vampire, he asked where all the blood had gone and Nick answered: It´s evaporated!... And I bet we won´t find much blood left in this victim, Bug! There are no large sized cutting wounds, only this bite mark in the femoral artery. That isn´t a hole of a size to bleed out a man like a cut up cattle in slaughter house."
"He could have died by heart attack! He isn´t that young and when his female partner exhausted him too much during sexual activities…", Bug began.
"Who says it was a female?"
Bug shrugged his shoulders; "Dear God, let it be a male one. What so ever! And if not exhaustion then maybe a kind of cult! Satanists or something like that with a tendency for blood-letting, using a suction device of some kind. We should search for evidences, traces of such a device. In preparing bodies for embalming a trocar is placed in the femoral artery to exchange blood against embalming liquid, you know that, Nigel!"
Nigel shook his head no. He wasn´t going to accept that Bug searched for a normal explanation when the evidence was open to the eye, depending you´re going to accept the existence of the so called paranormal. And vampires were definitely ranking among the paranormal side.
"Why are you tending to a male murder?"
"Cause it takes a lot of strength to suck a victim dry when the blood was sucked up while drinking!", Nigel explained his tendency to a male murder. Vampire. But vampires were called to be very strong, much faster than human beings and enabled to consume blood out of living victims via teeth incision and mouth.
Bug rolled his eyes in exasperation;
"The bite mark is directly into the femoral artery. Maybe an accident. There a different nerves nearby. Maybe the sex partner tried to make a bite into the nerve that is related to the nerve centers in the groin. Trying to simply arouse him and it went terribly wrong! He/she hit the artery and the good Mr. O´Donnell bled out instead by accident. We still had sexual accidents in here. Remember the one a man was suffocated by a plastic bag when he tried to heighten his experience!"
Bug looked at Nigel.
"You mean he died and his partner put him in between the garbage cans to hide the fact that a person of public interest died during unusual sexual activities. To prevent creating a public scandal. Like Mr. President getting off with an intern in a closet…", Nigel smiled.
He shot a view over to the other room which was simply separated by a thin wall of solid material in the lower and plain glass in the upper half.
Dr. Cavanaugh smiled and uncovered her hands from the used gloves, changed into new ones and came over.
Bug let out a breath. He seemed to be tensed. No wonder when he thought about what was going to happen now when Jordan came into their examination room.
She went to the steel table, looked over the victim.
"What do we have here? It´s the victim from Lower Winsley Road?"
"Yeap! The banker deposited between the garbage cans in the backyard passage. His clothing is into the analysis. What wonders me is that the murder left back the ID card. That´s unusual or he was kind of clumsy. Or he deposited him in a hectic pace…"
"Maybe he wanted him to be known! What, if he was killed as a warning to whomsoever? That´s another possibility.", Bug suggested.
"Yeap. Woody shall take this as a possibility!" Jordan nodded. "Any tox screenings made?"
"I took a sample and gave it over a few minutes ago. It´s still in progress." Nigel answered. "You should look for the hematocrit! And the volume!"
"What about the hematocrit? What do you suggest?" Her eyebrows wrinkled.
"I focus on it because he was bitten by someone…"Nigel saw her brows. "Something. We think an animal or a sex partner… I´ll do a bite mark profile for verification.", he added to be on the safer side.
Not so good to go forward too straight. Bug shot him a warning view.
Jordan knew all too well how much he liked to kneel deep down into uncommon cases. Nigel was an excellent examiner and criminologist. With a large hint for the unusual that sometimes went straight over the border. Kidnapping by extraterrestrials, zombies, dinosaurs…nothing was too unusual not to find his interest or…gulp…to be connected to a case!
"You tested for a lack of blood within the victim?" She looked into his eyes, asking herself why he called so directly upon the blood count. Knowing him she tried to look not too suspicious. She waved him over to the far corner of the room, even if Bug tried to focus his hearing over to them.
Her voice went low when she saw Dr. Macey nearby.
"Okay, Nigel! What´s up with him?", her thumb directed to the victim, her voice quiet and low.
"Uhm, Doc…it is…it looks like…uhm…like he lost almost all his blood what looks…", he especially used the word looks, not: it is…, "…looks uncommon related to the size of a bite mark we found in his femoral artery… What ever the bite mark made it must have induced a massive blood loss! His scleras are white, same with the gums and Bug found no indication for internal bleeding like any organ rupture…" He tilted his head from one side to the other. His eyes fixed onto those of the coroner.
"And?" Her tone was determined. They all were scientists here, not teens on any esoteric trip. That didn´t mean they weren´t open to new things proofed by facts. She made a decision.
They came back to the table and she grabbed a scalpel, cut into the tissue at the left wrist and prepared a vein.
"Uhm…that´s…uhm…" She lifted her head, nodded to Nigel; "There are signs for massive volume loss…the wall of the vein looks somewhat collapsed. Unusual so far from the initial wound… There must have been a massive suction…" she said slowly and thoughtfully.
"Look, Bug! That´s what I said! Massive suction! Almost all blood gone… Bite mark in the femoral. Our killer seems to have a more than massive interest in blood! If you gonna think simply like everybody out there in the Boston streets I can only find one result: a vampire killed him! A he- or she-vampire!" Nigel gestured with his hands in the air, directing to the dead banker.
"Vampiress." Jordan corrected with a smile.
"What?" Bug stared at her in disbelief.
"Vampiress. A female vampire is called a vampiress. Vampire means a male one.", she said softly..
Nigel wondered somewhat to find a kind of companion in her, being used to such fine differences in vocabulary..
Bug breathed with release. Uh. Yeah.
"But naturally you won´t believe that, Doc. Aren´t you?" Bug´s mind disobeyed the imagination of a paranormal existence haunting the streets of Boston. They still had enough common murderers and mad serial killers out there. There won´t be any need for paranormal beings additionally.
Suddenly the door opened and Detective Woody Hoyt entered the room.
"Hi! Here you are! Couldn´t think about any other place on the world. What did he tell you about who killed him?" He liked to banter about the fascination of morbid curiosity with them.
"Mr. O´Donnell isn´t pretty well tonight! He prefers to keep silent about the circumstances of his passing." Bug couldn´t hide a slight smiling that turned into a grin when Detective Hoyt lifted a small plastic card.
"ID card? Drivers license, say for the Maldives. Credit card?" Bug joked around.
"There are no drivers licenses for the Maldives. There you need a boat driver permit! It´s all islands." Nigel corrected Bug and hit him into the rip cage.
"Ouh! What´s that for?"
"That´s for not passing the Boston Coroner´s map designer examination!" Nigel bared his teeth in a very vampire like manner. Bug laughed and longed for the card Woody was holding.
"Careful Mr. Crawler", deforming his nick name which he got for his specialization into insects; "This is a precious thing. No common credit card but a Platinum! Oh yes. Our banker was riding on the high road. Upper class I suppose. As all is…had been…with him!"
"You checked his credit card, Woody?", Jordan asked and looked at him with a view that showed how much she trusted into his cop instincts when he came in now like a winner.
"For sure. And guess what I found out?!"
"Tell us!", came in a chorus out of three throats simultaneously.
"That bunny bit down into everybody´s calf! He was a regular at Halloway Hotel in Boston. Very well-respected house, old history, built up in the nineties of 19th century! I´m on my way to find out more about his…vacations!" Woody took up the credit card from Jordan again.
"Then ask for if he had been in some ones company in the hotel! We found unusual traces of sexual practices onto his body like a bite mark into the femoral artery. Maybe it´s some kind of nest…but be careful! But that´s one thing I won´t have to tell you, Woody! Maybe he only had been the usual kind of cheating husband…with no luck at hand finally.", Bug directed to the groin of the banker and Woody looked. He grimaced, controlled himself and watched more closely.
"Ouch! That looks strange. Won´t prefer that…" He grinned.
"Your special preferences aren´t on the table today!" Nigel smiled impertinently. His flat hand knocked on the steel table.
"Don´t get cute with me!" Woody took the smile as what is was meant to be.
"Gentlemen, a little bit more seriously please. It´s a morgue, not the Two and a half man-show." Dr. Macey complained when he stood in the door. His face was stern and a thick bundle of papers in his arms indicated that he was busy with a difficult case;
"Who´ll be tomorrow at Suffolk County Superior Court?"
"That´s me." Bug lifted his hand. Dr. Macey placed the bundle in his hands.
"Okay. Watch it closely. This case had been difficult enough and I´m not gonna lose it against this forensic expert from Phoenix!
to be continued