Lara lay sprawled on her bed, as she searched the Internet for the location of the place where the Amulet of Light was hidden.
Bryce walked in, holding his laptop. Lara looked at his bedroom attire - spiderman boxer shorts and a blue Ninja Turtles tshirt.
"I'm honestly beginning to wonder when you'll grow up, Bryce," she said, propping herself up on her hands.
"Ah, yes, I'm the boy who never grew up," Bryce practically tossed his laptop next to Lara's and sprawled out next to her. Lara raised her eyebrows.
"What did you find?" she asked.
"In Sunnydale, the only places that the amulet would be - logically - are the caves on Playa Linda Beach, a mausoleum in Restfield cemetery and a Crypt in Shady Hill cemetery," Bryce said, bringing up the map. "I did a trace and they do meet in tunnels underneath the sewerage tunnels away from the cemetery. They were once old mines or storage for the war - all historical accounts contradict each other. But one fact shows up everywhere - the tunnels were boarded up in about 1920 after a cave in revealed a huge black hole and a pile of human bodies gnawed to death," Bryce said. "Charming town."
Lara smiled briefly. "I'd say both the murders and the cave in were caused by the supernatural. Around the Salem Witchtrials, Sunnydale was the place most witches fled once being found out. Can you find any city plans for that black hole - they must've investigated it."
Bryce nodded and rapidly began typing. "Nothing. It's like a brain scan of Austin Powers - completely empty."
Lara looked at the screen of Bryce's laptop. "Nothing on what?"
"I checked out the place of the hole - there is one oblique reference to the tunnels being unstable, but that's it. The murders are done in an ancient police file, but never properly investigated. People were scared of that and preferred not to think about it," Bryce shrugged.
Hillary walked in. "Dinner just arrived," he said. "Have you found anything?"
"Just that this town needs to read it's back files," Lara sighed. "We've found a suspicious location, probably where the amulet has been hidden. Rupert will know where I can find some solid information."
"Of course." Hilly lead them to the sitting room, where their dinner was waiting.
"How do you know those murders were the supernatural, Lara?" Bryce asked.
"I saw the photos. Black and white, yes, but the carnage was very graphic. Only a bear could do that much damage - but a bear wouldn't murder so many and a bear would hardly be found underground," Lara sipped her champagne.
"The photos were truly disgusting," Bryce said to Hillary. "One man had half his face chewed off."
Hillary gave Bryce a pointed look. "We're eating."
"Anyway" Lara continued, "I'll have a look at the library and I'm sure Willow can help us."
"Which one was Willow?" Hillary asked.
"The cute redhead," Bryce said.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Lara was never one to waste time during a 'case', so she rang Rupert for Willow's number straight after dinner. Willow was surprised, but agreed to dig around for information about those particular murders.
Willow was on the 'Net, surfing for anything - Sunnydale had a large online base to search for things like this. *But why would the council display information on a rather gruesome murder online? Police cases were usually private."
But when Willow looked at the case files, she found details on most police investigations for the past 100 years. The murder case was there and Willow felt a rush of suspicion. Finding it was too easy. But then, Lara wasn't a local and probably didn't know where to look on the net.
Willow double clicked the case file and began pouring over it. There wasn't much. Seventy bodies, all in stages of decay. Mauled to death or drained of blood. Or, in several cases, bodies were missing vital organs such as heart or spleen.
There was no investigation into the massacre - just a pile of unidentifiable bodies and a copy of black and white photos. It was all pretty shady. The last victim had been half alive and still lived in Sunnydale, Willow realised, when she saw his name.
*Maybe he can tell us what's down that hole,* Willow thought.
