Snow was floating about, dusting everything with its innocent whiteness. Winter had barely even arrived and the tiny snowflakes were already eager to make an appearance.

Capturing a cigarette between her lips, Lee held her hand over an invisible lighter as if to stop the wind from blowing the flame out as she seemingly lit the stick. Pretending to inhale the smoke, she looked down to watch the snow land on the pile of flesh lying on the ground, slowly becoming red as it did.

She let out a sigh as though she were blowing the smoke out again and squatted down next to the body, her eyes scanning what was left of what used to be a beautiful woman. Remaining patches of blonde hair, mascara mixed with blood and what looked like a semi-devoured hand clutching a pink phone might have been enough to send any normal person running for a trash can, but not Lee.

Her partner and one of the few people willing to put up with her quirks, however, stood a few steps back. He was pinching his nose and looked away while trying his best not to gag.

"James, what do you think?" Lee asked him without looking away from the corpse. Chunks of meat were missing, as if an animal had eaten from it, but there were no animals in the city that had teeth nearly as big as this woman's torso.

"I think that you're an insane person for taking such an interest in a case like this," the young boy replied with a nasal voice.

"But you already know that, don't you?" she retorted as she pushed the remains of the jacket aside with a gloved hand, finding it gripping how there was more clothing than body left. As if something had knocked her out before eating her, careful to take in as little cloth as possible. Like picking olives from a pizza because they tasted horrible.

Lee watched as a group of police agents appeared at the scene, one of them joining James to ask him some questions while the other came to take photos of the corpse. He didn't talk to her so she took the liberty of running the case through her mind, trying to get a clearer picture of what was going on.

This was already the fourth victim within a time span of thirty-four days. There was no obvious connection between them, except for the fact that they were all the kind of people who liked to hang out when it was dark outside, and the pattern of their deaths.

First they'd go missing for a few days; that was why the police were being much more careful with reports of people disappearing. The first thing they'd ask was whether or not the person in question had been out during the night, if no, then they'd pass it along to someone lower on the food chain, if yes then they'd add it to the possible victims of this killer.

It never took more than five days until the bodies would be found again, looking as if someone had eaten them. So far, Lee didn't have any clues as to who or what was doing it, but she almost found herself wondering whether this was the work of something, or someone, inhuman.

The officer who had joined her with the body to take pictures threw a glance at her that told her that he deemed her ability to remain longer than should be possible with this stinking and rotting corpse rather unsettling. She was used to the curious gazes of bystanders and didn't care for them, though. She merely waited for them to leave her be so she could do her damn job and that was exactly what she did in this moment, making it as obvious as possible that she was waiting impatiently for the cop to leave her alone with the cadaver.

When he finally did return to his partner and James, who were watching Lee doing her thing once again now that the only living thing inside her personal space bubble was she herself, she continued her investigation.

The pockets of the jacket were empty. What caught her attention most was that this woman didn't have a purse or wallet on her, no ways of identification, no money. She would remain unnamed, a Jane Doe, until they managed to give her back her proper name, of which chances were pretty slim if she hadn't been signed up as missing before the showing up of her body.

For Lee, however, the missing wallet in its whole was more interesting than the fact that she didn't know Jane's real name. Nobody went out anymore without a credit card or cash, and an ID. Seeing as how all Jane's pockets were empty, that meant that the murderer had taken them; but why, if it seemed to be some monstrous animal that had found her to be a delicious meal? It was a sign of robbery, or just of the ability to think about one's acts, which was something that an animal couldn't do.

Or maybe it had just swallowed it by accident when eating at the rest of Jane's body.

No - it had avoided the clothes at all costs. To gain access to the wallet, it would have had to dig through them without destroying them.

Or she had used a handbag in which she kept her belongings, which she had dropped when she had gotten attacked.

But then why the phone in her hand?

Probably talking to a friend.

But after prying it from her limp grip and scrolling through its data, Lee found that she hadn't called anyone since two weeks ago - which would have been too long for the suspected killer's modus operandi. The last text, too, dated from around the same time. Then what had she been doing on her phone?

She had wanted to call someone. Who, then? And why exactly at the time of attack? Coincidence, or had she felt it coming?

Lee continued rummaging through Jane's clothes, patting around for any pockets she might have missed. Before calling it a disappointing day, she lifted Jane's shirt as well, and then checked her bra. Indeed, as she had almost expected, there was piece of paper crumbled inside, squashed against Jane's still, palish blue breast.

It seemed as though she had shoved it in there hastily and when Lee unfolded it, she wasn't even surprised by what was written on it. It used to be some sort of business card, with a company name, the company's address and phone number printed on it. This one seemed rather sloppily-made, though, and she mentally shook her head at the cheapness of it.

Mentally because she was already too absorbed in reenacting the crime inside her mind. An alley, just like the one she was sitting in, appeared before her, though it was darker. Night, of course.

Jane happened to be walking through it, either returning home or on her way to a wild night, when she heard a noise from somewhere behind her. She turned around, but she couldn't see anything out of the ordinary. Still, with those kidnappings and murders she had heard about in the news at the back of her head, she pulled her phone out of her pants or her handbag, as well as the business card. She started typing the number into her cell, but it was already too late - she got pounced by the attacker. Somehow she still managed to hide the card into her bra, almost as though she hadn't wanted the murderer to find it. Well, he hadn't, and thanks to that nifty little trick Lee finally had a lead to follow.

Still - why had Jane wanted to call Devil May Cry and what did this company have to do with the case?

It was time to pay someone a visit.