-Pao Pao Cafe, South Town-

"Don't see you around here often," the braided young waiter said to the man at the counter. His arm loaded with some old glasses he had picked up, he sat next to him a moment.

Billy looked at his glass, looked over to Wilson, and chuckled. "With the mess goin' on over at the other side o' town, I figured I'd try my luck here instead. Ain't lookin' for a fight."

"I know. You'd have started one already. Richie said you were alright. Duck coming?"

"Should be on his way."

"It's a mess I hear," Richard said as Bob made his way back behind the counter to drop off the glasses and mix another drink. "Mary's lucky she and Terry decided to go on vacation now."

"I heard they got a monster runnin' around down there," Billy said. "I'm pretty sure their monster is just gonna be one of those goons with a big axe, but hey."

Adding a few sprigs of mint to the mojito he was mixing, Bob looked thoughtful. "I heard through the grapevine that they're sayin' that the work was from something far worse."

"Grapevine?" Billy chuckled.

Richard smirked. "Apparently he heard a drunk spilling the other night who claimed to know Rian's new partner."

"Weirder things 'appened."

"Said there was some weird shit going on over in Second Southtown."

"Been 'earing about that. Duckie told me they found some sorta horrorshow at a place. Dunno much more, though."

"Think it's connected, Richie?"

"Hard to say. I've been here awhile, and there's always something going on, it seems. But there's a sorta...pall over the place I'm not used to."

At that moment, the door crashed open, and a mohawked figure in a leather jacket and baggy jeans came stumbling in, slamming the door behind him. Panting, he looked at everyone through the sunglasses that he still wore indoors.

"Duckie! What the hell 'appened to you?"

Panting and walking over to Billy's spot to sit down next to him and steal a sip of his drink, he looked at the crew. Bob and Richard were looking at him, blinking, nonplussed.

"Yeah, I got some stories to tell you guys. I'm cool, but...holy shit, man!"

-2nd Precinct, South Town PD-

Sipping his now once again lukewarm coffee, Detective Morris grimaced, deciding to light another smoke. Stiff and lukewarm or no, it helped him stay awake going through the folders of evidence on his desk. He had slept at the office last night; he had his own cot and everything set up there for nights like this. He'd probably go home that night to shower and come back again in the morning, alternating nights here and there, unless he got another call.

Rubbing his chin, he opened another folder; this one dealt with one of the incidents a couple months ago at Second Southtown. After the slaughter the other night in the deep recesses of the near-outskirts, South Town PD decided to do a little cooperation with the folks over on the other side. They all didn't necessarily get along-differences in methods and all-but any help was better than none, in this case.

As the rain pounded against the window of his office, he stifled a yawn, seeing that it was still fairly dark out. The sun wouldn't be rising for about another half hour, and given the thick clouds, it would look darker for a little longer than that.

Any investigations had come up with nothing. There was a blood trail that left the area, but it stopped at the park, and there was nothing to be done after that. That part of the town was so bad, all of the few dogs they had could come up with was a couple drug dens, one random body of someone who seemingly fell off a balcony while high, and other odds and ends, but there was no finding the killer anywhere, so they were back to square one.

Sipping more coffee, Morris flipped through the folder. There were grisly photos there, to be sure, but the more he looked, the more they just didn't match the carnage found at their scene the other night. The victims the town over were basically torn apart, while the ones they had found the other night were more crushed and bludgeoned to death. They had a few things ripped and torn, but it was either mostly extreme blunt trauma, to the point of bone being smashed to bits.

He also noticed how the former were almost played with, while these were simply brutally murdered with little fanfare. Taking another drag of his smoke, he exhaled, filling out some notes that indeed. He was convinced this was the work of two separate killers, and he didn't think he could even call them copycats.

After scribbling the stuff down, he decided to head down to the basement to see what Farley was up to. Having been working the late shifts and turning in for a few hours in the afternoon, he was curious to see if he had found perhaps anything else at the scene that he could fill him in about.

The morgue was two basement levels down; he had put his cigarette out first, even though he knew Farley snuck some smokes in the place now and again in the back office. So long as he kept them in the office-at least mostly-they didn't much mind.

Heading in, he saw the man up and about-he had probably been up since about five-and sitting there at the table in the back going over a bunch of papers. He didn't have his usual gloves on, but he was wearing his apron, signifying he was probably going to do some work soon.

"Detective," he said, scratching his head and sipping some coffee he had on his desk. "Find anything?"

"Came down to ask you the same thing."

"Well, I did what I could with the bodies. Got some of the stuff cleaned up for an attempt to maybe find the murder weapon. Bones are all over there," he said. "Got some of the other fresh parts still in the fridge if you wanna see 'em."

"I'll start with the bones, thanks," he grimaced.

"Yeah, gotcha. So look at this." He rolled out one of the carts that had one of the skulls on it...or the remainder of such. It was probably, Morris guessed, the one that belonged to one with his head split in two, by the look. Picking up a piece of it, he pointed. "Yeah, anything I checked this against...knives, hammers, axes...nothin'. I swear, whatever split this head in half...it's almost like it was done by like...ripping it."

"Didn't the Second Southtown victims have some limbs pulled out of their sockets?"

"Yeah," he said. "But not quite like this. They were more ripped up, and had a lot of claw marks on 'em besides."

Detective Morris rubbed his chin. "So in your genuine opinion...would you back me up in saying these are two different killers?"

"Absolutely," the man said, going back to his office to light a cigarette, as Morris followed, sipping more of his now-cold coffee; Farley tended to be a little lax on the rules in the morgue, but he was good enough at his job that when Morris was down here, he'd overlook it. Birkon, not so much, but neither of them liked him, anyway. "Unless we get proof linking them, which we don't have, and he's just really smart and changes his style...nah, this is a different guy."

"Alright, then. Just so I got something to tell 'em."

"Man, I hope this shit gets solved soon," Farley said, rubbing his hair. "I got a feeling it's gonna get worse before it gets better."

"I hope you're wrong...but you're probably not," he said, settling in the chair with his cigarette, sighing as he looked at the strange bone remnant on the desk.

Having wandered circles around the stuffy, dusty apartment for some days-only leaving to try to gather up food or whatnot, which he mostly liberated from stores at night and was of the packaged variety-Jhun had started to get restless. He did not run into a single person since his last encounter.

Looking over the city, his eyes locked on a place from the balcony; several blocks away, he noticed a building. It was large, out of the way...and near alleys.

Far from a lot of things.

He couldn't see the sign...but he knew that particular nightclub would likely be a place to find some... interesting people hanging out. He stared at it, the wind from the open window blowing the long hair about his head. The eerie wind and his breathing were the only sounds in the room.

Perhaps he could explore it some, and see what was going on...

A/N: For a heads up; some of the chapters are going to be more investigative down-time. I mean most horror movies aren't just killing from front to back.

Just most. ;)