Hi, this is my first story. I realize I probably suck at writing fanfiction since I'm still new to it, but I'm open to all criticisms and advice. If you have anything to say, please don't hesitate. I also apologize in advance for grammar mistakes and potential out of character writing. I just really hope whoever reads this gets to enjoy it.

Disclaimer: Not mine! Cover art credit goes to the amazing tumblr user viria.

Trigger warnings (for the entire story): Graphic/semi-graphic violence, smoking, blood, alcohol, knives, guns. Please don't hesitate to tell me if you would like a specific warning to be added at the beginning of any given chapter. Your safety matters. :)

1.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Someone was knocking at his door.

"Come in," Nico di Angelo called from his office desk. He rubbed his temples, closing his eyes. Headaches, again. It was as if he had become immune to aspirin or something.

He heard the click of his door opening, and the familiar flop of a fat folder being plopped down in front of him. Sighing, Nico opened his one of his eyes to look up at his partner's face. "What do you want?"

Will Solace was in his mid-twenties, yet to Nico, he looked more like a rebellious teen with his perpetually-messy mop of shaggy blonde hair on his head. Seeing the look in his partner's startling blue eyes, Nico groaned, sinking his face into his hands, rubbing them vigorously against his cheeks as if that would scrub all his problems away.

"They assigned us another case," Will told him, sitting down in the chair on the other side of Nico's desk. He licked his forefinger and opened the file. Nico kept his head in his hands, staring blankly at the desk with enough intensity to burn through the wooden surface.

"We just got done with a case," Nico complained. He looked at his watch. "Not even twenty-four hours ago."

"Don't complain to me," Will replied. He laid out some pictures in front of Nico, making sure they were all facing him. "New day, new case. Tell me what you think."

"Who is this?" Nico asked, reluctantly resigning to tackle the task his job presented him. He rested his head on his right hand as he examined the pictures.

"The victim's name is Jason Grace. Twenty-nine. He worked as a neurosurgeon at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, been treating kids for almost three years now. From what I've heard, people say he's a good guy. When he didn't show up for work three days in a row, one of his co-workers went to his house to investigate. Found him dead in his own chair and called it in."

Nico stared at the pictures before him. Jason Grace's corpse exhibited a laid-back posture as he lounged behind his mahogany work desk in what Nico presumed was a chair in his office, giving the illusion that he was alive. Everything on his desk was neat and tidy, stacks of paperwork held down by paperweights, a row of pilot pens next to his right hand, the white curtains behind him drawn back, even an upright Newton's cradle next to a journal. It seemed almost like just another Friday in the home office of a neurosurgeon.

Well, it would have looked that way except the blood.

The blood in the pictures were only pixels of color, but Nico di Angelo felt as if the sheer amount of crimson was going to overwhelm him, almost tasting the metallic tang on his tongue. The scarlet drops were scattered everywhere over the perfectly placed items on his desk, staining the mahogany and the virgin white of paper. A waterfall of red dribbled from an oozing stump of neck, soaking Jason Grace's suit and tie and dripping off the leather of his chair. One of the pictures revealed that a small puddle had formed around him.

Perched precariously on top of the oozing stump was Jason Grace's head, his eyes blank and staring. The lack of blood on his face was a stark contrast to his crimson-splattered surroundings. It didn't take an FBI agent to see that he had been beheaded painfully and purposefully.

Nico shivered. The pictures were so vivid that he almost felt as if he was there. "What kind of a killer beheads his victims?"

Will shrugged in response, saying nothing.

"Not only is it incredibly impractical not to mention insane, any smart killer knows that the pattern the knife leaves on a victim's neck is easily traceable to the knife in question."

"That's where it gets interesting," Will replied. "Forensics analyzed the wound and knife patterns when they got there. They found that the knife used to murder Jason Grace was actually one of his own kitchen knives. It was there with the rest of his set, no fingerprints, no clues. It was a dead end."

"That doesn't make any sense," Nico told him. He took his head off of his hand and made a "duh" gesture at his partner, his palm facing the ceiling.

"Well, the killer must've broken in and made a little detour to the kitchen first." Will shrugged again. "It was smart not to use his own murder weapon and take something from the house instead."

"That's not what I meant." Nico turned one of the pictures around with his index so that it was facing Will instead. "Look at it. If this man was beheaded in his chair or even in this room, there would've been a huge mess. The papers would've been everywhere, but they're still stacked neatly on his desk. This man wasn't killed in this room. Someone brought him here and set up a show after they killed him."

Will stared at the pictures, thinking about Nico's words. "Couldn't the killer have placed everything back where it belonged after?"

"Still wouldn't be the same. The blood was applied while everything was where it is now in this picture." Nico frowned. "Which means that the killer had to break into the victim's house first, take a knife, go somewhere else to murder this man, and drag him back here for the finale."

"Weird," Will commented. "There weren't any signs of struggle or traces of blood anywhere else in the house. No signs of break-in either. None of the neighbors saw anything weird."

Nico's frown deepened. "There was no blood anywhere else? You sure?"

"Nope," Will replied. "You're lucky you weren't the one who had to get up at four in the morning just to see this damn crime scene."

"That makes things even weirder," Nico told his partner. "Because from the way it looks to me, this killer had to break into the house, get a knife, go somewhere else to behead this guy, drain at least a good percentage of his blood, drag him back to his house, and put the red dressing on him after all that work."

He hesitated, staring at the pictures with Will in silence.

"I mean," Nico continued after the pause. "How else could you explain that there is blood everywhere in this one room where everything is untouched yet there is not a speck of blood anywhere else."

"Just to stage a show," Will concluded. "This wasn't just any homicide; this was theater."

Nico stood up and stretched. "We should try to ask some follow-up questions to the people he worked with, especially the guy who found the body. But first, I'm getting some coffee."

"Coffee first," Will agreed, shuffling everything back into the case file.

Nico di Angelo rubbed his eyes. The headache was only getting worse.