Hello everyone, thank you for the wonderful reviews! Here's the next chapter to this story, that took way too long in my opinion, for which I am so sorry. A fair warning, there is some mature content up ahead, not sure how mature you guys would rate it...it is pretty descriptive...well, onward and upward, happy reading!
Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson and The Olympians
Bullies
Okay, what a jackass. As if it wasn't bad enough I had liked the guy in that sort of way, I come to find that he is an asshole with his head so far up his ass, he may as well say 'hi' to his smaller intestines. Bottom line, I hated his guts.
And what was up with him calling me 'hound' or 'dog' anyway? Seriously, it wasn't that hard to say 'Percy'. He refused to call me anything else other than hound or dog, what a...jackass. My lips thinned as I packed whatever essentials I would need for the case although 'Nico' didn't exactly specify.
"Hound, what's taking you so long?" Came the exasperated question that had me gritting my teeth and biting my tongue so as not to say anything rash. Now, he was just doing that on purpose.
"I'm almost done," I snapped and then proceeded to wince since I hadn't meant to show how much he annoyed me.
"You better be," came the reply, I could literally hear that stupid smirk of his.
Five minutes later, we were in his car, ready to leave and only waiting for Rose, the girl who looked so much like Marisol to come back and lead the way to where our case was. Being in such an enclosed space with him had me feeling a bit flustered and I really wanted to go back to the apartment and rest, after all, I did come back from a long trip. Being in the car felt stuffy and I was starting to get bored, not to mention Nico was busy reading the dossier with the information on the place. I hadn't exactly read the info, more like skimmed it so I was, somewhat, at a loss, but I bet if I asked him to explain it to me, he'd laugh in my face.
I looked from the corner of my eye and saw a bit of the info, not to mention, I remembered some of what I had read. Apparently, some machines in this factory on the outskirts of Attica had killed three employees. The owner and the guards didn't know how this happened, much less why. Not to mention, the workers were getting a bit panicked. So far, there didn't seem to be any connection between the victims so we were going in blind. The information was scarce and there wasn't anything else besides the information on the dead victims and the machines responsible for their deaths.
"Can I ask why do you keep glancing my way?" Nico asked when I had looked over at him again.
My cheeks flamed as the notion of getting caught sunk in, I didn't mean to really look at him, I was just looking at the dossier. "I...uh, only skimmed over the info, I read about the worries of the owner and the panic setting in, but not much else..." I admitted without looking at him.
"Hn." Nico grunted and as I turned to glare out the window, I heard him speak once more. "Well, the factory we're going to distributes food to the city, to be precise, they distribute meat. The machines that killed the victims are only on during work hours, not to mention, that they can only be on/controlled by the managers of the factory. Employees of lower rank don't have access to the machines, not to mention the vice president of the factory has a key to the control unit of where you can control them. Right now, we're looking into the managers and the vice president."
To say I was surprised he had indulged me, let alone even speak to me for that long, sharing information about the case, left me a bit dumbfounded. I had really thought that Nico would instead let me read the dossier when we reached the place, let me seem incompetent and blow chunks on the first case I ever worked. But this was pleasantly surprising.
"...the first victim," I shook my head and realized I had tuned Nico out, he was still explaining the situation to me, "was a 32 year-old man, his name was Kevin Brown, an African American man who worked on the assembly line...apparently he was killed by the meat grinder machine, and I mean, they have like this huge meat grinder machine that grinds the meat in large quantities...he was..." Nico made a face, "grinded..."
Oh, ew. Well that's disgusting.
"Here, look," Nico motioned for me to look at a picture.
"Oh, god, fucking gross man." I turned away from the picture.
It was of Kevin Brown, or what was left of him seeing as how his insides were now out and put through the grinder...literally.
"Says here, the machines of this place are intelligent enough that when they sense a human's presence too close to the machine, the machines stop working immediately, that's why there's so few accidents...barely actually..."
"But...this one didn't stop..." I said, I couldn't get the image of Mr. Kevin Brown out of my head. Shuddering, I turned back to Nico.
"Yeah and that's what we're going to figure out." Nico had a pensive look on his face before he looked back to the file. "The other victim is Martin Howard, a 35 year old, white male, killed by being flattened by another machine...also on the assembly line..."
"Please tell me there is not a picture, I don't think my stomach can handle it." I asked the young man beside me, not wanting to see another picture of a human being with their insides out.
"Nope, and the last victim, was a 29 year-old, he was also white and he was run over by, you know, those cars that are driven around the warehouse, or factory, carrying large piles of things? Those things...you know what I'm talking about, right? I forgot what they're called..." Nico asked me without looking at me, flipping through some papers.
"Yeah," I answered, rolling my eyes, how clueless was he? But in all fairness, I didn't know what they were called either.
"Yeah, well one of those, run over and then dragged all over the factory, and he left quite the skid marks..."
I scoffed, he really didn't have a filter did he?
"And when did all of this happen?" I asked him as he close the dossier.
"The accidents all took place one week after the other, all at night."
"Wait, at night? What, do they all live within the factory or something?"
"Yes," Nico replied, "hound, it's in the outskirts of the city, far, far away, the workers in the factory all live there...even the president and vice president running the company."
"That's weird," ignoring the way he had said hound and instead focusing on the weird way of life for the factory workers.
Finally, we heard a car beep beside us and we both turned to look out the window, where we saw Rose waving to us. I started the car and saw her drive down, with me following behind her.
While driving, I took that time and studied Nico more closely. Yeah, he was definitely good looking but he was also a dick, at least to me, which I had no idea why? Yeah, I was accused of doing something completely horrendous but that still didn't give someone the right to act like such a huge dick. Jeez, why was I even attracted to him in the first place? Not that I was now, I was just admitting that when I first looked at him, I had found him attractive. Other than that, I definitely didn't find him that good looking now, especially with the way he was acting with me.
Why was he so damn mean? Seriously, what exactly had I done that made him act that way towards me? Other than the fact that he most likely read my file and saw that I had supposedly "killed" my family, I don't have any idea what I had done to him to warrant such hostile behavior from him towards me. Shaking my head free from my wandering thoughts, I focused back on driving, didn't want any accidents to happen now, did I?
Finally, after what felt like two hours, we were now at the factory, the big gates opened up to let us inside. Driving in, we were greeted by security who asked us to flash our IDs before letting us in. It made me wonder, with all of this security running around in this place, how exactly did three men wound up dead? Going further inside, we drove until we came at a stop in front of the front doors of the factory. Outside, there was the VP of the company, waiting for us with two guards.
The factory was a dull gray, square-ish building, huge of course, but still, it made it seem as though life here wasn't all that great. Kind of made the Attica Annex Facility seem more homey compared to this.
"Welcome Enforcers, thank you so much for coming, how was your trip?" VP Jacobson asked us as we came to a stop in front of him and the guards.
"Good, thank you," Nico replied, smiling a bit. "This is my partner..." He looked at me and nodded his head, as if signaling me to speak.
"...uh, Percy Jackson, nice to meet you," I said, gathering my wits, I should've known he wouldn't introduce me. Dick.
"This is my partner Luke Castellan, they will be helping us sort out this little...problem we have on our hands," Rose spoke up after me.
"Yes, thank you again Enforcer Nico and Rose, if you will follow us inside please, we will lead you to President Masters's office." VP Jacobson said and then turned around and then went inside, the doors of the factory opening up as soon as he stepped within a foot away from them.
We followed him all throughout the factory, looking in at the different parts that were shown to us as we passed them by. There was a locker room type behind one door where it looked to be in use at the moment. Then there were a few other doors that had no small window for us to see in, they were wooden and completely closed off.
"What's behind these doors?" I asked the VP, who we were still following, as he walked on.
"Those doors and the ones you've passed by and will pass by in the second and third floors hold the rooms to our workers." He answered.
It was silent after my question and we continued to walk until we reached another door that was slightly bigger than the others. VP Jacobson knocked once on the door before opening it and letting the four of us in, before coming in himself with his guards in tow.
"Mr. Hamilton, the Enforcers are here," Jacobson announced as he stood before the president of the company who was looking out of his window, his back to us.
Turning around, I saw a man in his early 40s perhaps, with sandy blond hair and gray eyes. He had laughs lines, indicating he was a man who didn't mind having a good, hearty chuckle out of things, he even had crow lines near the edges of his eyes. I looked around his office, which had dark navy blue carpet, the walls were a warm brown, with a touch of dark gray mixed in the paint. There was a couch off to the side of the office while the desk was in the center, before the big windows giving light to the room.
The desk was black with two comfy chairs seated in front of it. Lamps were hung up at different points along the wall and they were lowly lit. The office also had a bit of decorations in it. There were a few paintings hung up, and there was a shelf to one side that had books, large quantities of books. On the other side of this four-walled room, there was a small, wooden table that had beverages on it. Glasses were there if anyone wanted to grab a drink, a drink of what, I didn't know.
"Thank you so much for coming Enforcers," Mr. Hamilton had spoken, bringing my attention back to him.
"It's not a problem Mr. Hamilton," Nico speaks up, shaking hands with the president of the company.
We all crowd around his desk and soon, Rose and Nico start to question both the president and vice president of the company. What did they have in mind about what was causing the machines to act out, how and if these accidents are connected, why was it only happening at night. It happened at night because that was the only time in which the controls to the machine were under lock and key and not exactly monitored, until after these incidents. See, during work hours, the regualr employees know they aren't allowed in the control center and there's always someone watching over the room. Nighttime would be the best way to do it and get away with the crime.
Soon enough, when both Nico and Rose were satisfied with their questioning of the vice president and president of the company, both of them having only the knowledge that was provided in the dossier, Nico asked if we could talk to the employees that worked here and their close friends of the victims.
"Yes Enforcer, of course, I'll hand you all of our files on every employee and point out the close friends of the victims." The president started to download on a flash drive all of the information they had on every employee in the factory.
"We'll also need to see the security tapes as well," Rose informed the VP.
"Oh, of course, although...if I may say," vice president Jacobson timidly spoke, as if afraid of what he was about to say next, "after the first murder, we reviewed the tapes and well...they seem to have been tampered with. Same thing when we reviewed the tapes for the second and third murders..."
"You're joking?" Rose scoffed lightly.
"No, have a look for yourselves, we were completely baffled by it too," Jacobson fiercely shook his head, as if wanting to make us comprehend, to understand that he was telling the truth.
"Okay, we'll go over the tapes ourselves, see what we make of it..." Rose scratched the bridge of her nose.
"Here you are Enforcers," Mr. Hamilton handed Nico the flash drive.
"Thank you," Nico said, before motioning for us three to follow him. Once outside of the office, Nico turned to us, "okay, I suggest we split up in to two, each getting a set of employees to interrogate, first we interrogate the close friends of the victims and then we question the rest. We are also going to question the security guards, see if they know or found anything suspicious. Sound good?" Nico looked at us for approval.
"Sounds good Chief," Rose tipped her head to him and smirked as Nico rolled his eyes.
"Good, let's see what we can get out of these guys, hound," Nico looked to me and I saw Rose's and Luke's eyes widen slightly, "you're going to be paired up with Rose-"
"Wh-what?" Rose spoke up, obviously confused as to why Nico was even doing this in the first place.
"Rose, I need him to go with you, you're going to be reviewing the tapes right?" Nico looked over at his fellow companion.
"Well, yeah..."
"Okay, well, you're going to get another opportunity to teach your partner how to look through evidence on tapes, decipher anything or even hack into something, by your scores Rose, you're somewhat a tech buff, I need you to teach the dog how to do all of that, that's going to come in handy...not to mention, it gets him away from me."
"Nico," Rose shook her head at him, "first off, he has a name and it's Percy, secondly, he's your partner, you're going to need to deal with whatever issue you have with him a-"
"Yeah, I'd like to find out why Mr. High and Mighty feels like he's better than me," I snorted, breaking Rose off.
"Oh trust me dog, I am better than you," Nico narrowed his eyes at me.
"Really? 'Cause right now, you're not acting like you're better, you're acting pretty petty," I glared at the man in front of me.
"Oh really, we-"
"Okay enough children," Rose came between us, looking at the both of us, disapproval clearly evident in her eyes. "You two wanna act like kids, you'll be separated like kids when they're misbehaving."
"Rose-" Nico started, only to be interrupted by the brown eyed girl.
"Like I said, I'll take Percy for the day, teach him how to handle a bit of tech, but you two gotta fix your damn problems. You're living together now, so whatever you two have going on, fix it." Rose turned to me then, "come on Percy." I followed her to another part of the factory, only looking back once to see Nico talking to Luke with no problem.
A few minutes later, Rose and I reach a room that's empty and only has a table with three chairs. The room is gray and claustrophobic and makes me feel trapped and uncomfortable. The walls are bare and the bright fluorescent light that's shining above us makes me feel a bit dizzy. I close my eyes for one second, all I need is one second because suddenly this whole room is bringing back memories of what happened after I was captured.
How I was stuck in a similar room for what felt like hours on end, until someone came, two people, just like Rose and I and they started to question me. And because I am a criminal, they think they have the right to harass me. They interrogated me, scuffed me up pretty good, not enough so that others could tell what happened to me, but enough to make me feel pain, they taunted me, saying how I was going to rot in prison because of the crime I committed, the sin I committed which was harming my family. Killing them as if they were nothing of importance when those idiots didn't even know the fucking truth!
"Percy?" I hear Rose's voice but it sounds so far away and I swear to God that it sounds just like Marisol's voice and I would vouch my life that Rose is Marisol except Rose said there was no Marisol, there never was because Marisol didn't exist and yet for some reason, it's like something is telling me that this...this is all wrong. Something...something feels wrong. Not just the case but also...ever si-
"Percy? Do you need to sit down? Do you want some water?" Rose asks me again, pulling me away from my thoughts.
"I'm uh...fine, it's just this...this whole thing...brings back memories and not the good kind either," I look around the room again before turning my gaze to her. Looking at the girl in front of me, I try for a smile to seem brave but I can tell it came out looking more like a grimace because her lips are soon pressed tight together into a thin line and she shakes her head once before walking to the door.
"I'm going to get you a cup of water, sit tight," and before I can protest, she's already gone. And really, what good would it have done to protest to Rose, when she seemed like the type to take 'no' for an answer.
Thirty minutes later, and I find myself questioning another close friend with the Vics, telling both Rose and I the same story.
Nothing was wrong with the victim, he never acted out of sorts following the days before the accident, nothing out of the ordinary. Everything was the same, everything was normal, things were fine, he was himself. He never acted weird or anything. Can't believe he's gone. That's what they finish with. You can always count on that being the last line. Can't. Believe. He's Gone.
And I guess I'm sort of numb when another person feels loss because I've gone through that except it was more personal, and somehow, more important because when they say that, I feel the strong urge to punch them in the face.
"Come on," Rose says after the last person being interrogated leaves the room, she's stretching her body and I can't help but stare at her a bit. It's been a long time since I've been with a woman and Rose is pretty, plus, she treats me like a fucking human being.
I start to look closely at Rose. She's got one hell of a body I notice, curvy, with a very endowed bosom, not to mention her butt is not bad either. Oh yeah, it definitely has been a long time since I last had sex and pleasured a woman. Now, I'm going to be very honest here and I don't care what crap you gotta say, but I've had my fair share of experiencing sex in all its fine glory...as fine and glorious as it can be when you're busy getting busy in the underbelly of Attica and not get caught.
I lost my virginity to a woman, a very special woman at the age of 16 going on 17, back when my family was still alive and an old buddy of mine from high school introduced me to the underworld of Attica. Where you could have sex with a prostitute and drink liquor, actual liquor that could burn your throat when it was too strong, liquor, hard liquor that could make your head spin. It would make you feel warm, as if a fire were starting in your belly and your head was spinning and you found you couldn't walk if you didn't watch yourself and drank too much but it didn't matter to me because I was young and I needed to drink because I was about to lose my virginity to a fucking prostitute and I was scared because I had no fucking idea how to satisfy a woman.
This special woman who took me in my virgin state and transformed me into an animal that could please a woman with just a caress of my hand in the right place or the stroke of my tongue... Her name was Karen, lovely, beautiful, experienced Karen. She took me, a boy, in and out came a man. Beautiful, dark-haired Karen was patient, teaching me all night long how exactly to please a woman, where to touch her to drive her crazy, where to lick to make her scream. The first time with her...oh god, I can still remember it.
"First time?" She had whispered in my ear, and I couldn't face her, couldn't lift my eyes to look her in the eye, couldn't answer because I frozen solid where I stood. I felt so inexperienced and so out of place, I felt awkward and I felt that I would mess up at any given moment. Even with the simple tasks of taking off my shirt and my pants.
"It's okay baby," she whispered in my ear as she ran her hand down my spine, and boy if it didn't make me rock hard at just her gentle touch and her seductive voice, "I'll teach you all you need to know on how to please a woman."
Kissing me on my lips, she stood before me, slowly undressing. And with the silent whisper of her dress falling to the floor, I had my first introduction with the female body, and had allowed myself to be taken by a whole new world of the indescribable pleasure known only as sex.
Morning had come too damn soon.
"So, how's it feel to be a man, my friend?" My buddy slung his arm around me, smirking as he glanced at me side-ways and waited for me to answer.
How did it feel? How did it feel? It felt like I was on top of the world, like I could do no wrong, at least when it came to the pleasures of a woman. God damn did I feel good. More than good, just remembering how many times I had that woman call out my name, scream it even, had me smiling smugly, rubbing my nose. That blessed woman had been a good, patient teacher but the student had eventually surpassed with far greater expectations than she could have hoped and god damn if I still didn't feel her warmth around me...
She had given me instructions to ask for her if I was ever coming back, and boy, was I coming back. Karen had looked absolutely delicious with the sheets pooling around her waist as she gave me her card, and I couldn't help but stare at her hips and breasts which still had my imprints, confirming to me that that night of passion had been real. Not anything short of it.
I was definitely coming back...
...And I kept to my promise, at least for a while...that is until the novelty that I wasn't the only man, never was going to be the only man in her life wore off. Nothing would ever come out of it and so, I stopped going to her. It had also been during this time that I met Ben, and no, he was not a prostitute.
I had gotten a job at a bookstore, as a sort of hobby to distract me not just from boredom but also from teenage hormones. See, in the bookstore I worked in, I would see a lot of different kids come in, some from my school, others from different schools. And because so many kids came in, I never had the pleasure of meeting Ben until he came up close and personal. By that, I mean he came up to my register one boring Wednesday afternoon that was being dulled because it was raining and the bookstore was close to being empty.
He came up to me, with his brown hair a bit ruffled, big brown eyes and a wide smile, and he brought up with him a few notebooks and few other books. And I honestly couldn't remember what I had said because I couldn't stop thinking he was the cutest thing I had ever seen. He payed for his things, left and I had thought that would be that...
Except he came back the next day and browsed around the entire store for almost an hour before buying only a pencil, that was when I knew or more like felt I had a slight chance. So I talked to him as he was paying, and wouldn't you believe it! I made him laugh with my stupid jokes, and he said he liked talking to me, gave me his number and asked to go to the movies with me.
That night I had gushed to my mom and dad about it, they were always very accepting and dad took me aside and told me I had to treat this boy right if I really liked him, I had to treat him right and I couldn't ever make him feel like he was worthless. And I took that advice to heart, I was determined to make sure Ben never felt unwanted by me.
Burning with determination I did everything in my power to be the perfect boyfriend to Ben. Always paying for our dates, whenever I could, surprising him with small gifts here and there, surprising him while at school, because surprisingly enough, we went to the same school. Our first kiss had been the night I had dropped him off at home from the movies, I got to first base when he came over my house to study, I got to second base one night after taking him to the school dance, third base was in the back of my parents car. And finally, we went all the way after 7 months of dating in my room one night that my parents and my little brother had gone out, and it was so worth the wait.
Pleasuring a guy is much different than pleasuring a woman, all the same, I quickly learned what made Ben feel more than good. Not once did it ever occur to me how strange it was to be into a girl and then suddenly be into a boy, because I never really thought of it that way. And I found myself not exactly caring because I had an amazing guy by my side. I honestly thought we were going to be together forever...guess I should have seen the signs when he started to pull away.
Dammit how fucking naïve was I to think it would last when he started to pull away and spend less time with me? He would start to hang around me less, and whenever I would call him to talk, he would sound so disinterested in me, so distracted, before he made up some excuse that he had something to do. Then I see him hanging with this new guy and all I can think is how fucking idiotic I am because I should have seen the signs. We broke up, plain and simple and painful.
Thank the Lord it was only puppy love. At least that's what I told myself at the time...
I look Rose over and damn if I'm not feeling a bit tight in my pants. Too bad my Enforcer is attached to me like glue unless he says otherwise, because if Nico's going to be next to me every second of every hour; there's no way in hell I would ever be able to have sex with a prostitute in the underbelly of Attica. No fucking way.
"Let's go check on those security tapes," Rose is walking to the door and turns back to look at me, before I too, stand up and follow her out.
Excuse my uncouth manners but dammit does sex sound good right about now.
"Okay, just sent a message to Nico saying we're reviewing the tapes right now and told him of what we found when interrogating the employees. He sent me a message earlier saying we're still got half of the employees to go through. In the meantime, you are going to learn a bit of techno over here," Rose glanced my way as she spoke, "hope you're ready."
"Bring it on."
Boy did she bring it, all of this tech talk had my mind whirling with numbers and shortcut keys. First we went over the tapes and just like the VP had said, they were tampered with. Then Rose tried to make out at least a few faces, since they were either blurred out or something was in the way, making it impossible for us to make out who the hell committed these murders. She tried to fix the tapes by hitting a few keys, which to me seemed at random until she explained what hitting a few keys at the same time could do. But no such luck, she hadn't been able to fix the tapes and now, we were stuck down here in the surveillance room waiting on Nico and Luke, who were still interrogating a few of the employees, to get down here and figure out what to.
Soon enough, Luke and the little devil came into the room and now it was Nico who busy hitting random keys as he heard Rose tell him it was futile but man was the little shit ever stubborn. Finally, after a few minutes, he seemed to have gotten the hint because he gave up and sat back down with a loud sigh.
"We could...send the tapes to Calypso?" Rose finally spoke up, breaking the silence that had settled.
Nico looked over to her and something flitted across his face for a brief second, before it was gone, "yeah, that's a great idea. We send the tapes over to Calypso, where she has more advanced equipment in her hands and she could definitely fix the tapes. Let's send them over right now."
He got up and went over to the computer where he pressed his wristband and out popped a list of contacts before he reached Calypso and it started to dial. We waited for all of five seconds before this girl with light, golden brown hair, light hazel-brown eyes, rosy skin, full lips and a slim figure came on the screen. Excuse my uncouth manners but man, was she a babe.
"Nico?" She spoke first, "Rose, what's going on?"
"We need help, we're investigating those triple murders and when we got to see the tapes, we found they were tampered with." Nico explained the situation quickly.
"Are you planning to send them over?"
"Yeah, I'm sending them over right now as we speak." Nico confirmed.
"Okay, I'll see what I can do once I get them and I'll let you guys know at once if I have them fixed, sound good?" She looked to Nico and then to Rose.
"Sounds good, thanks Calypso," Nico nodded his head before he hung up.
"Now all we do is wait," Rose puffed out her cheeks. Just then, a loud bell had gone off throughout the whole factory for a good three minutes before completely shutting off.
"Not exactly," Nico started, "let's get lunch."
Walking down to the cafeteria, which was huge by the way, so frickin' huge you would've thought it was close to looking like a football stadium and maybe I'm exaggerating but goddamn it was big, then again, it's gotta be huge to be able to fit so many of the workers there in one place while eating lunch, we found the President and VP eating lunch with some other people who looked like they weren't regular employees but more like secretaries, helpers of the president and vice president, if their fancy and different clothing was anything to go by.
Making the line to get food, seeing what type of food they eat, which isn't so bad but man, do I miss Jeremy's cooking, well not his cooking per se but his staff's. I look around and see a lot of the workers in groups, reminding me, sort of like high school. Everyone just knew where to sit...
...Or so I thought, because soon enough, we hear scuffling and then there's the loud clatter of a tray hitting the floor before the cafeteria is filled with laughter, mocking, taunting laughter and all I can see is one man, looking down at his food in pity.
"Bryant, it's no fair! Why'd you have to throw my tray like that?!" The man whines before he's being shoved against the wall by the so-called 'Bryant'.
"Aww, is little Michael whining?" He jabbed at the poor guy, "is the poor, little baby upset his food is all on the floor?" The rest of the cafeteria jeered as Bryant kept going with his insults, which made the poor bastard he had against the wall look down as if ashamed and had my blood boiling. He kept at it too, going as far as hitting Michael and the guy was close to breaking out the water works.
Before I knew it, I was making my way across where the scene was unfolding, hearing faintly the calls from Rose and Luke and Nico, calling me 'hound' (of fucking course) telling me to come back, asking me what I was planning to do. I reached the two men, grabbed Bryant by the wrist and when he turned around, slammed him against the wall, where he effectively let go of Michael.
I came in real close, "having fun picking on the smaller guy who won't stand up for himself, even when he didn't even cause any problems in the first place?" I sneered, "why don't you pick on someone your own size, oh wait, you'd be too chicken shit to actually do something like that, right? That's why you pick on the smaller people, right? Right?!" I yell, not even noticing that the cafeteria went silent, listening to my outburst. "You wanna know what you are Bryant?" I chaffed, wanting him to do something to me, do anything so that I could punch his face in, "you're a damn bully. Nothing but a pathetic, pitiful, fucking child-like bully with nothing better to do other than pick and tease and harass someone who wasn't even doing anything to you in the first place!"
Reigning in my anger I let him go, "get out of my sight, and I better not watch you harass that poor man, you leave him alone, ya hear?" Bryant is trembling as he's moving to his table and with a quick nod, he ducks his head as if embarrassed...good. I look over at Michael, and see him give me a small but grateful smile before coming up to me.
"Thank you so much Enforcer..."
"Percy," I supply.
"Percy...thank you, very much.
"Not a problem, the guy was a douche anyway, someone needed to teach him a lesson." I rubbed the back of my neck, that grateful smile suddenly made me feel all bashful for some reason. The guy was looking at me as if I had just saved his life or something...
"W-would you and your friends like to come sit down at my table?" He offers me and I don't really have the heart to turn him down, so I answer for all of us and say yeah. Needless to say, Nico is pissed while Rose and Luke look uncomfortable, not to mention he didn't say anything about there being two other people joining us or rather...we joined them, I guess.
We find out one is named Jordan and the other is Richard and just like Michael, they are outcasts. Asking what the whole deal is with this place, the trio fill us, or rather me in about how they are always the target to bullying around the factory. They don't know how or why it happens but it does and it seems like neither the president of the company, nor the vice president of the company seem too eager to stop it. They spend the whole lunch time talking about how unfair it all is and how there's nothing they can do about it. The way they spoke, it made them seem very angry, which I would get but it was bordering on scary-angry...if that makes sense at all.
Soon enough, an idea pops into my head, and then I start to question them about the murders that have happened around the factory. For a split-second, Michael's eyes widen slightly before he composes himself, and the three start to talk to me about it. Then I start to question them, like I had been doing for three hours straight, and the answers seem normal and ordinary and completely generic to how everyone else in the factory answered except...they don't seem genuine enough to pass off as realistic...
Right then, the bell rings, signaling the end of lunch and the trio get up, saying their goodbyes, Michael thanking me once more before they're gone. Then I turn to the other three occupants of the table, and say, "that...seemed pretty suspicious...wouldn't you all agree?"
"Very..." Rose answers and then gets up, tugging Luke's shirt, signaling him to follow her, "me and Luke are going to check on Calypso and see if she managed to fix those tapes."
They left, leaving me alone with Nico di Angelo... I tap my fingers softly on the table as the tension between us grows.
"We should look around the factory some more, look at where the murders took place maybe?" Nico suggested, looking towards the door of the cafeteria.
"Sure."
Together, we stood up and went out through the double doors, him in front and me trailing behind. He was tall, but still shorter than me, I was around 6'3, and Nico looked to be about 5'8, maybe 5'9? His hair was shaggy and tousled, his skin looked completely blemish-free, his body was lithe and looked well-toned and damn if he weren't such a jerk, I'd definitely make a move on him because, and I'll deny ever saying this, Nico was damn pretty.
We get to the place where the murders occurred, which was the assembly line and start to look around. The machines responsible were closed off, with yellow tape preventing anyone from coming near them. They had been scrubbed clean but if you looked hard enough, you could still see a few blood streaks here and there, not very surprising since it had been a messy death...
I keep looking around, hoping to see if I'll find a clue or something, for some strange reason, I had the strong urge to show Nico I could be useful when on a case, like as if I wanted to impress him...and so I looked very closely hoping to find anything, anything at all connecting someone to the murders. No such luck, it seems whoever did this had been very thorough.
"Hey," Nico called out to me, "I just got a message from Rose, Calypso sent the tapes back and she was able to fix them, as much as she could, Rose wants us back to the security room so we can all see the tapes, let's go back."
The both us started to walk fast to the security room, anxious to solve this case and be done with it. It took us five minutes to get to the security room, where we found Rose and Luke sitting down, both pressing a few buttons on the computer they were on. As soon as Rose saw us, she hit a few keys and soon enough, the big screen in front of us started to play a tape. The tape was dated to the first murder, and soon, we saw the person responsible. It was Jordan. He was walking down with the first victim, both talking until Jordan pushed Kevin Brown, the first victim, away and then he took out this remote control thing...or at least it looked like a remote control. The machines around them came to life, and there was the specific one that had killed Mr. Brown. Soon, the screen went black and Rose shut it off.
"That settles it," Nico spoke up, "let's arrest Jordan, we have enough evidence linking him to the murders."
"Not all three though," I look over at Nico, who glares at me, "let's look at the rest of the tapes and see if anyone else was involved." I continue on, ignoring him.
"Sounds good," Rose nodded her head at my idea, if it looks like it's Jordan, then we'll make the arrest." She said, hoping Nico would comply.
"Fine," the stubborn brown eyed male grumbled.
Rose played the other tapes, fast-fowarding them until we came up to the date of where the second murder took place, and this time we saw that it was Richard who had killed the second victim. Once again fast-forwarding the latest murder had been done by Michael...
"It was like...they had gotten their revenge..." Rose was the first to speak in the quiet room. "These three guys were bullied and...they got their revenge on the people responsible..."
"You guys," Luke spoke up, "what do you think will happen tonight? Bryant had bullied Michael."
"They must be planning to do something..." Nico muttered, we need to arrest those three, let's split up. Rose and Luke you'll get Richard, I'll get Jordan and Percy you get Michael."
"Really?" I ask, somewhat glaring at Nico, "you want to split up now? What? Can't stand to work with me at all?"
"It's not that you idiot, this means we get to cover more ground, I want Luke to go with Rose so nothing happens to her," Nico snapped.
"I can take care of myself Nico."
"I know you can but these guys know the factory better than us, they have the upper hand and I don't want anything to happen to you. Hound, you be careful, watch your steps and once you catch them, make sure to question them about how exactly did they even commit these murders without getting caught. Go!"
All four of us split up, running towards the rooms of Richard, Jordan and Michael, all three of them were roomed separately. Michael was on the first floor so I made my way quickly down the stairs, hoping to be able to catch Michael and see if I could get anything out of him. Stumbling out into the corridor I see a lone figure at the end of the hall and I run towards him. He looks back and sees me coming after, soon sprinting off trying to get away from me. Catching up to him, I tackle him to the ground and see it's Michael.
"Michael!"
"I'm sorry!" He sobs out. "I'm sorry I just...got so tired of getting picked every single day! Every day it was the same thing and they never did anything about it! Not once did they try to stop the bullying, not once!" He yells out.
"And committing murder would help?"
"No! But...Jordan and Richard, they...they met with someone...someone who said they could help..."
"Who?" I ask, hoping to get any information.
"Someone, I never met the person but the person said they could help..."
"Man or woman?"
"I never met the person...never heard the person speak...Jordan and Richard wouldn't tell me either...I-I don't know who it was."
"Michael, this is crucial, how can you have never met the person who helped you commit a murder?!"
"I don't-don't know! I don't know but the person gave us these remote controls...they control the machines in the fac-"
"How did that person get access to the machines?"
"I don't know, the person was secretive..."
Just when I was about to ask Michael a question, I heard a faint ticking before he started to spurt out blood. His head went to the side where he coughed up more blood but some of it had landed on my shirt and the side of my face, which I scrubbed at. His body shuddered as each cough had him curling within himself.
"Michael?" I ask, not noticing I was trembling. "Michael, what's wrong?"
But Michael doesn't answer me, instead he just keeps on coughing, blood clogging his throat. All I can do is watch, feeling completely helpless because I don't know what's going on and I don't know how to handle the situation because I don't know what to do to save someone from coughing up blood. Michael is dying right in front of my eyes and I can't think of a single fucking thing to do.
I tap on my wristband and dial Rose's number, she answers straight away as if sensing my distress. "Percy?"
"I-I don't k-know what to do, he's...he's dying on me Rose- I-"
"Who is?"
"Michael, he's coughing up blood and I don't know how to save him...how to stop him from coughing up blood, Rose there's so much blood..."
"Percy get Nico! He needs your help, Jordan has the remote which means he controls the factory go get him!" Rose urges me to help Nico.
"But-but what about Michael?"
"There's nothing you can do about Michael...he's dead already...now go! Me and Luke will meet you there."
I don't have time to question how Rose already knew about the remote, but I looked down at Michael's prone body and couldn't help but feel angry at myself for being so useless before I start running off to find Nico. Before we had split up, he had said he was going back to where the assembly line was to check and see if a new murder was going to be taking place.
If what Rose said was true, about Jordan having the remote with him and being able to control the factory then Nico was in serious trouble. I ran faster, hoping to get to the assembly line and find Nico looking around before he found me looking for him. He would scowl at me and call me dog and tell if I was too much of an idiot and needed help finding Michael. That's what I hoped would happen because there was this feeling in my gut that something wrong was going to go down.
When I got the assembly line, I heard a machine whirring to life and damn if my legs could go any faster. Because I wasn't looking where I was going, I collided with someone and heard a grunt of pain from the person as we both fell down, I landed on the floor on one side and the person who I crashed into landed on the other side. Looking up I found that it was Nico.
"Dog," he hissed, whispering harshly to me.
"You're okay..."
"Yeah, what are you doing here? I thought I told you to find Michael?"
"I did...he's dead...and no, I didn't kill him he just started to cough up blood before he died...what's going on, why are you running?"
Nico was about to answer me when a loud yell pierced through the factory, "Enforcer Nico! Come out, come out wherever you are!"
"Jordan is hunting me..." Nico puffed out his cheeks, "but the idiot is an idiot and he's a novice when it comes to taking people out..."
"But...he's got the-"
"Remote that controls the machines on him? Yeah, I know that but see he can't kill you himself, he needs the machines to do it. We get the remote, we gain control and we arrest him and Richard."
"So the plan is to get the remote out of his hand?"
"Precisely."
"Let's do it."
We split up and I round the corner of the machine I was hiding behind to see Jordan looking under and around other machines, most likely trying to find Nico. In his left hand, he's got a black little remote with several buttons on it. Taking out my TG gun, I look for the perfect opportunity to make a break across the other machine so that I could get close to him when all of a sudden, Nico runs out in the open and yells out...
"Here I am you big dumb idiot!"
Does he want a death wish? Jordan looks towards Nico and I get the perfect opportunity to shoot. My TG gun transforms and connects to my wristband, soon enough I hear the stats on Jordan and my gun suggests I use either the Sting or Doom. Figuring that we would need Jordan for questioning and decide to use Sting when suddenly, Jordan falls to his knees and grasps his head, screaming in pain. Not a second later, his head explodes, brain matter flying out and splattering across the floor and machinery.
Nico stops short, his mouth slightly hung open, probably looking like mine as we continue to stare at what the hell had just transpired when Rose and Luke come in and see Jordan's prone body laying in a pool of his own blood and brain matter.
"Same thing happened with Richard." Is all Rose says.
"The murders had been done by Michael, Richard and Jordan. All three men had been given this remote control to control the machines of the factory, it had been supplied by an anonymous source. We still don't know how that person even got to through the security and hard drive of the factory and were able to control the machines and tamper with the tapes but we do know that this case is now closed." Nico informed the President and VP that night which was around 4 in the morning. "I want you to know Mr. Hamilton, that this happened because of the bullying around here. Those three men were outcasts and they had been driven straight off the edge. Take a good look around your factory and make sure you get things straight around here. We wouldn't want another murder on our hands now would we?"
"Y-yes, thank you for your hard work Enforcers...we'll be sure to take care of the bullying problem. Right away," Mr. Hamilton was sweating buckets as he looked down at Nico.
"I sure hope so, let's go guys." Turning on his heel, he left the president behind without so much of a goodbye and we followed after him, Rose saying goodbye on Nico's part.
Getting into our cars, we drove out of here. The case had been closed, a bit unresolved but at least we found the men responsible for the crime. Rose had called Nico, and they were discussing what the hell had gone down at the factory. Someone had provided these three men with supplies so that they could carry out their revenge, then they had tampered with the tapes so that those three wouldn't get caught. How was it possible to even gain access to a place that was so guarded not just physically but also guarded technically. The technology was very advanced in that factory and it was sealed off from regular employees, the only access given to the motherboard was through the president and vice president of the factory.
So then, how the hell did someone get through all of that and provide these three lower rank, regular employees access to the machines. And why?
