A/N: This is the first chapter of the real Murder Games story. This is the first Intermission chapter before the first real Scenario. The cast for this chapter is as follows: David Carter (me, weskerian on dA), Alana Rayner (Shakahnna on dA), Leanne Rosier (123LeaLea on dA), Mori Aureolus (LonelyMori on dA), Angela Leavantis (Paul16 on dA), and Alka Kunnas (ES-Dinah on dA). All other characters are original NPC's created by myself, or adapted from the original CT2, as in the case of Detective Gotts. This all takes place in the fictional town of Greenville, which is "somewhere in the Midwest".

Intermission One: Starting Over

It had been two weeks since the Greenville Police Department had been called out to investigate some kind of seismic disturbance forty miles north of the city limits. That disturbance had turned out to be the collapse of a natural cavern beneath a privately owned mansion, where they'd found the bodies of thirty five dead children. The case was the most disturbing in the town's history. Greenville itself had one of the lowest crime rates in the American Midwest. The last big crime had been a vandalised phone mast the month before, and the kids responsible for that were already out on bail.

The details of the so-called "Clock Tower Killings" spread out before Detective David Carter like nightmares poured onto paper. Dead bodies caught in glossy stills lay alongside supposed adoption records for each murdered child. Beside those was a thick dossier, containing each item meticulously catalogued during the department's week-long investigation of the mansion. He was close to being able to recall every article specified in it by memory; it was certainly better than looking at the photographs, with their lifeless, staring eyes and slack faces. Next to that were the tapes of the interviews with their only witness, Leanne Rosier, complete with transcripts, which read like a horror novel, but without the safety net of fiction.

He'd only been a detective for the past two months, ever since he'd encountered a wanted murderer from New York on the streets. He'd only been a regular patrol officer at the time, but the man had run and he'd given chase, almost without thinking. Part of him had been certain that he was going to die, that the killer would double back and put a knife between his ribs without so much as batting an eyelid. Instead, the man had tried to jump the rail of a footbridge and ended up plummeting into oncoming traffic.

The chase, and its anti-climactic end, had made him a front page sensation. That was why he'd been promoted. That was why the case had landed in his lap. That was why everyone was looking to him to solve one of the most appalling multiple homicides in recorded history.

He pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling another migraine coming on, and gathered up the photographs, with their withered, decaying faces, tucking them back into their manila envelope. He could only look at them so long before he felt his gorge begin to rise, sickness brewing in his stomach at the thought of so many young, innocent lives snuffed out. He didn't have the experience to handle this case - in fairness, no one in the G.P.D did - but what he lacked in experience he hoped he could make up for in determination.

Downing his cup of water, he was about to stand and get himself another when Detective Gotts came by his desk, a stern expression plastered across his weathered features.

"Weaver wants to see you," he said, "bring your case."

He didn't explain why he was being called away - by the Chief of Police, no less - but Carter could make an educated guess that it wasn't good news. Sighing to himself, he stood up and gathered his files.

"I'll be right there," he replied, as the other man walked away through the crowded office.

-x-x-x-x-x-

When the door banged shut, the noise of the busy office outside fell to a faint murmur. Carter straightened the front of his charcoal-coloured suit jacket with the hand that wasn't currently full of documents, and turned to look over at his boss. Police Chief Hank Weaver, a broad-shouldered, middle-aged man who'd always been meant for bigger things than Greenville, looked up expectantly.

"You wanted to see me, sir?" the blond asked him.

"Sit down, David," his superior responded, gesturing to the chair across the desk from his own.

Carter did as he suggested. He was now surer than ever that this was going to be bad news. The Chief usually had time for pleasantries, but today he was all business. If there was one thing that Weaver knew how to do, it was draw the line between boss and friend. He was up for a laugh and a joke as much as the rest of the precinct. But when the time came to put his subordinates in their place, he did it, without hesitation and without concern for what they might think of him. For the most part, the younger man respected him, at least for how difficult his job was, even if not for the decisions he made.

Something told him he wasn't going to like this decision much either.

"I'm closing the Clock Tower case," he said, as soon as Carter had taken his seat, confirming his suspicions immediately.

"On what grounds?" he asked, restraining the outrage he could already feel bubbling up inside him.

"On the grounds that the murderer is already dead," the Chief replied, taking hold of the dossier that Carter had brought in and flicking through the pages, "I've read your summary of the case - outstanding work on collating all that evidence, by the way - and it seems fairly elementary to me. Mary Barrows' fingerprints were found on the murder weapons..."

He reached into the folder, removing sheet after sheet and slapping them down on the desk in front of his subordinate. A photograph of a butcher knife lying on a tiled floor, another of a hunting rifle left discarded in dirt, a third of what looked like a pair of fused and buckled ornamental garden shears - all had been used in the slayings.

"...her D.N.A was found on the bodies of several different victims..."

More pictures landed on the tabletop, each thump like a nail slamming into the lid of the case's coffin, images of children's hands, delicate fingernails chipped and bloody from their dying struggle.

"...and we have her signature on all thirty-seven adoption certificates, including the ones for our survivors..."

The stack of certificates, bound at their middle with a thick elastic band, thumped down in front of him, almost like Weaver had decided to forgo the nails and just throw a slab of concrete on the casket.

"She even has the perfect motive. We have medical documents from ten years ago, when these murders first started, explicitly stating that Mary Barrows gave birth to stillborn twins, right here in Greenville. A trauma like that would be enough to shake a person's sanity, but to find out that her husband was engaged in an affair with another woman? All the evidence adds up. She killed her husband and his mistress in a fit of jealous rage. Grief-stricken at the loss of her sons, she adopted orphans from around the state under the guise of being Simon Barrows' representative, and then killed them too, probably when they realised that she'd lied to them. All I want to know is, if these are your conclusions thus far, why aren't you the one telling me to close this case?"

Carter had been dreading this moment for the past week, since his part in the investigation had started. He stayed quiet for a few moments, and when he spoke his voice was little more than a murmur. "Because Leanne Rosier's statement doesn't name Mary Barrows as the real killer."

"This 'Scissorman' she mentioned," Weaver said, nodding, "he doesn't exist. We didn't find another body in that bell tower, certainly not one who'd been electrocuted and crushed by falling debris. And even if we had, the killer would still be dead. The current running through that power box would have lit him up brighter than the fourth of July, and that fallen bell would have turned him into paste. There's nothing to gain by keeping this investigation open any longer."

"And what do we have to lose, sir?" the younger man asked him, the ire rising in his voice, despite his best efforts to suppress it.

"I'm not sure I like your tone, David," the Chief told him, a subtle threat in his even tone, before rocking back in his seat, clasping his hands in front of his chest, "we've had orders from the Mayor's office to bring a close to this case as soon as possible. The town is in an uproar over these murders - school attendance has dropped by 75%, for God's sake. We can't afford to let this case hang over the city like some kind of storm cloud, and we especially can't fill people's heads with nonsense about some supernatural killer who wields a giant pair of scissors. We have a duty to preserve the public peace..."

"I just think there's more to it than that, sir," Carter interrupted, but the other man glared him down, halting his objections as they came.

"You're young, and far too trusting for your own good. When you've been at this as long as I have, you'll learn not to believe everything that people say to you. Leanne Rosier has been an orphan most of her life; she's attention-starved and traumatised. It's not surprising that she's living in a fantasy world. I've made a request that she receive psychiatric help from Doctor Castleman at the Greenville Mental Health Centre."

"Sir, with all due respect, I don't think she'll be receptive to a stranger. She trusts Alana, and..."

"Alana?" the older man grunted, "you're too close to this one, David, so do as I ask and take a step back. We'll bring an end to the investigation and then we can all move on with our lives, Ms Rosier included. Don't force me to suspend you until this whole mess dies down."

Carter was silent, glaring into the middle distance for a few seconds, trying to compose himself - or make the water cooler in his superior's office burst into flames, one or the other. "Fine," he said eventually, standing up from his seat and moving to gather up the files littering the desk.

"Leave those."

He paused in mid-motion, half of the folders already in a neat stack on the tabletop. He stood back, letting the documents go, and then turned around to the door.

"You'll make a great cop one day, David," Weaver told him, as he pulled it open and a flood of noise from the office beyond rushed in to great him, "providing you don't jeopardise your career by doing something stupid."

"Thanks, Hank," he responded, and then slammed the door shut behind him.

-x-x-x-x-x-

The Greenville Municipal Library was a wide, white-brick building, a structure as old as the town itself. The architect had excelled himself. Broad, sculpted columns rose like tall, stone trees from before the front steps, holding aloft the boughs of carved archways, each depicting a different famous figure of science or literature. Before its grand exterior stood the central plaza, an immaculately-maintained garden, bordered by sculpted hedgerows and ornamental flower beds. It reminded Leanne of the Acropolis in Athens, where the Ancient Greeks had worshipped Athena, as though it had jumped from the pages into reality, though obviously less grand, and far less ancient.

There was a sense of peaceful tranquillity there that made her feel almost drawn to it. She had spent some of the most enjoyable hours of the past week there - reading and eating lunch in the sunshine and open air. It was a pleasure simply to be there, not least because of all the things she could learn. The Granite Orphanage had kept a library, where she had spent most of her time, but it had been tiny in comparison to the town's own.

This was also the place where her guardian, Alana, conducted most of her research, other than the University where she gave her lectures and seminars, and the apartment that they now shared. The swarm of journalists that had been pursuing her since she had first arrived in town kept their distance from the older woman, who had quickly picked up a reputation for being none too courteous to reporters. So long as Leanne looked like she was going to visit Alana, like she was now, she wouldn't have any trouble from them.

The only downside to the building, that she could see, was the spire of the decommissioned clock tower rising from its centre. The very sight of it was enough to bring back memories of the Barrows Mansion that made her mouth run dry and her heart wrench. Still, they were only memories, she assured herself, and that was what she really needed to remember. The only time she heard the snap of those steel scissors was in her dreams, when she would awaken screaming in the middle of the night, only to find herself in a comfortable bed at Alana's apartment.

Aside from that, her life was, it seemed, back to normal - better than normal, in fact. She would never need to go back to the Granite Orphanage again. Thanks to the police, she was now an emancipated minor, free to make her own decisions like an adult. Alana had even offered to support her while she began her life anew. Though she still didn't feel completely comfortable in the other woman's home, it now seemed, more than ever, that she had a future before her, one that she had never thought possible until now.

It was just difficult to relax considering what had happened the last time someone had agreed to take her in.

She turned her eyes away from the immense clock face looming high above, with its hands frozen just after half past three, and walked into the sanctuary of the library's interior. She pushed the unwanted memories away from her thoughts, focusing on the now.

"Hello, Miss Leanne," the clerk greeted from behind her desk, smiling as she looked up from her ledger, "how are you this afternoon?"

"I'm fine, thank you, Mori," the redhead replied, stopping for a moment in the presence of a friendly face who was rapidly becoming a familiar fixture of her new life, "uhm, is the clock tower...?"

"Still broken? Yes," the older woman said, her voice earnest and pleasant, "it has been since before I was born, Miss Leanne, remember? But if you like, I can speak with Mister Lorenzo again and make sure that he has no new plans to fix it."

"No, that's okay," she insisted, "I just ... don't particularly want to hear the bell chiming, that's all."

"I understand," Mori told her, with a nod, "please let me know if I can help you in any other way today."

"I will. Actually, do you know where Alana is at the moment?"

"Miss Alana is in the backroom using our telephone. Detective Carter called her from the police station a little while ago."

"So they still haven't fixed that cell tower yet?"

"I don't believe they have, no. But I understand they are working on it as we speak."

"Okay, thank you," Leanne said, before hurrying off to find her guardian.

-x-x-x-x-x-

"What do you mean he's closing the fucking case?" Alana Rayner barked, drawing disapproving looks and a few shouts of protest from the library's other occupants.

Apparently they could hear her even through the window separating her room from theirs. She even noticed a couple of them getting up to leave. Still, they shouldn't have been listening in on her private conversation, so she cheerily responded with a middle finger and turned her attention back to the phone.

"There was nothing I could do about it, Alana," Carter responded, his own tone almost apologetic, despite the fact that she wasn't angry with him, "Weaver's got it in his head that Mary was responsible for the murders and that's what the press release will say. He wasn't going to listen to me."

"But Leanne saidMary wasn't the only killer," she pointed out, voice tight with annoyance.

"He thinks she made it all up," her lover told her, "or that it was all in her head. He was insisting that anyone fried by that electrical system the way she claimed would have been killed, and they didn't find a body."

"What?" she asked incredulously, to a fresh wave of exclamations from her fellow patrons next door, "what kind of fucking nonsense is that? They didn't find a body, so they're going to stop looking? Maybe I should have a little chat with him."

"I don't think that'll help. We've got to find a way to keep the case going. I'm heading up to the Granite Orphanage right now. I want to speak to the other survivor they found."

"You mean that ten year old blond kid you told me about? How's that going to help?"

"He didn't give a statement. The Child Protection Service took him away before we could find a suitable adult to sit in with him. Leanne knew more about what had happened than he did, so we didn't bother following up on him after he left. But if he confirms what she was saying about two killers then Weaver will have no choice but to keep the investigation open. I'll probably get suspended, but at least you two will be safe."

"If you get suspended then I'm going to kick Weaver in the balls," she told him, "but you don't need to worry about us. I'm not about to let anything happen to Leanne after what she's been through. Anyway, what if that doesn't work? What then?"

"Then I'll head back to the Barrows Mansion, see if I can find anything the C.S.I team missed. It's a long shot, but something might have been overlooked, some evidence that the Scissorman is real, and hopefully dead to boot."

"Did you want me to come with?"

"No, someone needs to stay behind and make sure Leanne's okay until we can tie up these loose ends."

"You be careful if you go back there, David Carter."

"Yeah, and you take care of the two of you, just in case he is still alive," he insisted, "I love you, Alana."

"And I love you!" she told him, blowing a kiss down the phone to him, before dropping it back into its cradle.

It sucked knowing that he was going to be out of contact until he got back from the orphanage, but there hadn't been any cellular signal for a month now. The sooner they got the mast fixed, the better. She turned to leave the backroom and saw a familiar head of red hair moving between the desks towards her. Smiling, Alana let herself out of the room and waved to Leanne as she approached.

"Hey, girlie!" she greeted, any previous frustration having vanished completely from both her voice and her bearing, "what's up?"

"Not much," her charge and current roommate responded, digging her hands into the pockets of her jeans, "it was quiet at home, so I decided to come for a walk."

"Didn't have any trouble with the reporter scum, did you?"

"No, it was fine, really. It's a nice day outside."

"We should go out walking together then," the older woman suggested with a smile, before her face turned serious again, "do you still have the thing I gave you?"

Leanne nodded, taking the object out of her pocket and holding it out for her guardian to see. It was a black stiletto flick-knife that Alana had found and taken possession of during one of her seminars. One of the girls she tutored had obviously been carrying it, hopefully for self-defence purposes, and had left it behind. She hadn't thought it very sensible to leave a blade lying around, so she'd taken it. She'd used it as a bribe to convince the girl to stay with her in the first place, telling her that even she wouldn't be able to mess with her so long as she kept it close. It had been a gesture of trust, and she liked to think that it had helped to put her at ease.

But it was more than that. Dave had told her that most of the cops at the precinct didn't believe in the Scissorman, but she believed, and she never wanted her young guest to be defenceless against a monster like that again.

"You just keep that safe, okay?" she said, moving to close the girl's fingers around the weapon, only for her to jerk her hand away, "oh! Sorry."

"No, I'm sorry. It's just..."

"Seriously, sweetie, don't you do any apologising," Alana cut in, resisting the urge to ruffle her hair, "if your reactions are that quick then you shouldn't have any problem taking care of yourself. Just do me one favour."

"Uhm, sure," she agreed, tucking the knife into her own pocket, "what's that?"

"Don't tell Dave I gave that to you."

-x-x-x-x-x-

Carter had never had much time or patience for the press. The majority of his colleagues looked upon them as an occupational hazard, at best, but none of them seemed to dislike them as thoroughly as he did. He'd heard that some officers saw journalists as an opportunity for fame, as a tool to help in their cases, or as a way to make some quick money, giving out unofficial tips for cash bribes. Fortunately for themselves, these people were smart enough to keep those views quiet when he was around.

The front of the station had been swarming with photographers and cameramen from various news channels for the past two weeks, all of them eager to chronicle the horrifying Clock Tower Killings. Reporters had come from every corner of the country to get a piece of the most sensational story in Greenville history. And when it came down to it, that was all it was to them - a story.

That was probably the main reason that Carter hated reporters as much as he did. Normal people didn't reduce everything to viewing statistics and sales figures; it took a special kind of scum to look at a dead body and think "ratings". The press were leeches, clinging to society's underbelly, sucking away whatever they could, oblivious to the dirt they were wallowing in. Thirty-five dead kids, two more irreparably damaged, and all they saw was the headline it would make.

Sometimes the most brutal part of human nature was how it could so readily ignore a tragedy when there was profit to be made.

He took the back door out into the parking lot, where his car was waiting. If he was going to get the second victim's statement, and maybe overturn the Chief's decision to close the case, then he would have to be quick. Alana had suggested a while back that he take copies of his case files, just in case he needed them. That advice had never been as useful as it was now. All the information about the boy and the Granite Orphanage, where he was now staying, was waiting for him at her apartment.

Unfortunately, the moment he stepped out into the fading sunlight, someone thrust a tape recorder under his nose.

"Care to make a statement for the evening edition, Detective?" a woman's voice said, before he could react.

"No comment," he snapped reflexively, before his eyes took in the blonde female standing behind the Dictaphone, "damn it, Angela, get that thing out of my face."

"No inside information to share with an old friend, David?" Angela Leavantis asked him, hurrying to follow as he swept the recorder aside and strode past her towards his car.

"Friend?" he grunted, turning to glance back at her as he searched for his keys in his inside jacket pocket, "is that what you call it?"

"Hey, I turned you into a local celebrity."

"You made me look like an idiot."

"My story made you a detective."

"Just drop it, Angela," he insisted, turning away and unlocking the door of his vehicle, "if you want to know what's happening then you'll have to wait for Weaver's statement, just like everyone else."

"You're in a bad mood," she observed, but she obviously wasn't about to let that stop her from landing her story, "does that have anything to do with the Chief's decision to close the Clock Tower case? Odd that he'd do that when it conflicts with the only witness's statement."

That surprised him. He wasn't sure how she had managed to discover that the case had been closed, considering that he himself had only been told less than a half hour ago, but he was suitably impressed. That didn't change the fact that she was still just a reporter, and he was determined not to give her anything. He reined in his incredulity and said the only thing he possibly could say in that situation, keeping his voice as flat as possible.

"No. Comment."

"If you have a difference of opinion from the department's official stance, we'd be happy to represent your side of the story," another voice chimed in, and he turned to see a girl who looked to be in her late teens standing beside Angela. She'd probably been there the whole time, but Carter had been so preoccupied that he hadn't noticed.

"And you are?" he asked, pausing for a few moments, the door of his car standing open and his right foot itching to carry him into the driver's seat.

"Alka Kunnas," she replied, her voice enthusiastically professional, "I work at the Herald..."

"She's a college student," the other woman interrupted, much to her fellow blonde's displeasure, "she's working as a temp at the office. I thought it would be good experience for her to see how a reporter works in the field."

"Is that right?" he said, folding his arms over his chest and smirking, "well, if you want my advice, find another mentor."

With that, he slid into his car and pulled the door shut with a slam of finality, starting the engine and rolling out of the precinct's lot. The reporter and her protégé watched him leave, both of them with mouths agape. After a few moments, Alka's incredulous expression curled up into a mischievous smile, and she shot a sidelong glance at the veteran journalist standing beside her.

"Making friends and influencing people?"

"Oh shut up."

-x-x-x-x-x-