If there are more than a few mistakes in this part, sorry, my beta was busy and I didn't want to wait anymore :)
Part 5 :
The Witness
It was late. I had spent most of my day, as I said before, pondering over the case. I feared that the time I had to solve this crime was running out. The chief was already bugging me to drop the case and get on a double homicide case that had appeared the previous night. Wounds to the neck. Same old, I thought, cases that would never get an answer, but Skittles's had an answer. I knew it, but I just had to find it. The strange thing was I spent most of the afternoon finding excuses why the Summers sisters were innocent. They had gone to the graveyard together to their mother's grave. They were on the other side of the park. They left before midnight...of course I was fighting myself. A part of me held on to my old theories, but this new side seemed to desperately want the two girls to be innocent. I couldn't explain it then; I can't explain it now.
As I was about to call it quits I heard a knock on my door. Who could it have been at that hour? Another surprise that would turn my theories upside down? Who knew...I shouted a 'come in' and the door opened. I was surprised at what I saw. A bleached man in a black leather coat with shifty eyes and a strange smile. For some reason I found it impossible to guess an age, he could've been in his early twenties, or late twenties or early thirties, but I couldn't really tell. He gave me the impression of a troublemaker or a guy who talked big and did little. Someone who intimidated by looks and words more than by actions. I chose not to fear him. He didn't seem hell bent on hurting me either.
"Can I help you?" I asked and he strolled over to the chair in front of me and sat down. The word unnatural came to my mind. Even if I didn't really think he was dangerous, the hairs on the back of my neck couldn't help but stand up.
"Yeah, you could." An accent! British. This was a British guy. Is that the reason for all the weirdness I felt? Perhaps. Foreigners tend to be very strange. Especially british men and their five o'clock tea. He pulled a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it. I waited impatiently till he took the first smoke. I don't really appreciate people smoking in my office, especially since I endured five months of total torture to quit the bad habit. He blew the smoke my way. And all I was thinking that moment was: just one smoke, no one had to find out. But then I came back to reality when I remembered the horrible moment when I considered licking my nicotine patch.
"So?" I asked when he didn't seem to want to start the conversation. "What, did you lose your green card? You are British, aren't you?" these words seemed to get him thinking.
"No. I'm...Charlie. Yeah, that's it, I'm Charlie," he looked around the office. "Lamp...call," he was obviously struggling to contain his British accent.
"You're Charlie Lampcall. Okay, so what can I do for you?" I asked briefly wondering how much of that name was real.
"I'm here to report a crime," he slipped a word in his British accent. I stared at him. He sighed, grunted and said: "Bloody hell, so I'm British!"
"That's better," I said proud that I had convinced him only with a look to drop his act. "Now if you want to report a crime, you have to fill out a form down at the front desk and..."
"The man at the front desk said I should see you. It's about that clown. Said you'd be real interested," he slouched back in the chair. It suddenly dawned on me that the policeman that was at the front desk was named Charlie. Coincidence or not?
"You know something about the murder?" he nodded. "Do you know who did it?"
"Yeah. A big guy, this tall, ugly face. Seemed to have a bone to pick with the clown," he said lifting his hand up to show me a specific height. My old skepticism started acting up again. Who was this man? A friend of the Summers? A friend of Alexander Harris or Willow Rosenburg that was prepared to commit perjury just so they could get away with it?
"Really? And when was this?" I asked while watching him intensely. He didn't seem to be bothered by my stare, quite the opposite, he was so confident in himself. Definitely not the look of a witness, but not of a guilty man either. He had nothing to win or lose in this case. That's what his attitude screamed. I could tell, but yet he was there in my office confessing to seeing Skittles's murderer.
"Two nights ago. I was taking a walk in the park and suddenly this guy with a shovel passes me by and goes straight for the clown. He yelled something like..." he thought about it for a moment. "'You'll pay for screwing up' and he just hit him," he looked at me and realized I was asking myself why hadn't he interfered. "I would've...done something, really, but my shoulder was acting up and that guy was huge" he immediately said.
"And why didn't you call the police?" His story had no foundation. No one saw anyone else in the park that night!
"There was a police car right around the corner, I figured you boys in blue would find 'em," he took another smoke from his cigarette.
"We only found the clown. And he was dead. Why didn't you report this earlier?"
"I was busy. Besides what is this a bloody interrogation?" he looked at me a little annoyed.
"I'm sorry, you're right. Would you help our sketch artist draw a picture?" I asked him. For some reason, I wanted him to be a real witness. It would get the Summers sisters off the hook. Our sketch artist quickly entered my office after I called him.
"What kind of shape did his face have?" Robbie, the sketch artist asked as I looked over them.
"Round face. Biddy eyes, I think they were black. Could've been brown too. He had a scar on his chin. I think he had a couple of missing teeth and...his hair, black. No, no it was blond and, um, curly. That's it, curly. He had a... big, chin, and very big eyebrows...and flappy ears."
"Like this?" Robbie showed him the sketch he had drawn. Charlie Lampcall looked at the drawing squinting his eyes pensive.
"Bigger ears. And the eyebrows met in the middle. And the nose is all wrong... I think it was broken here," he tapped on the sketch. Robbie struggled to correct the drawing.
"Better?" he handed it back to Charlie.
"That's him," he said seeming very much convinced. Leaving the sketch behind Robbie left feeling very proud about himself. I looked at the drawing. A scary looking guy looked back at me from the piece of paper. An incredibly ugly, scary guy. If I didn't really doubt the existence of this guy I would've said god was messing up on the day he made him or that he looked more like a gorilla than a man.
"Tell me something, mr. Lampcall, do you by any chance happen to know the Summers sisters? Or Willow Rosenburg and Alexader Harris?" I asked and he looked at me strangely.
"Never heard of 'em," he said suddenly putting out his second cigarette in my flower vase. I looked at the cigarette floating in the water left over from the flowers I had thrown out that morning. I momentarily pictured myself desperately trying to light it.
"Are you positive?" I asked again staring back at him.
"Yeah. You'd think I'd remember knowing four people," he was one step from rolling his eyes. "So can I go now?"
"I suppose you can...I'll call you if you're needed," I told him, but realized I had no idea what his phone number was. "Where can I find you?"
"Yellow pages?" he suggested as he got up. "I hope you catch the bastard," he said in his most serious faked tone before he left my office.
I was left there with the sketch in my hand wondering what I was suppose to do. I started thinking about convincing Charlie Lampcall to take a lie detector test, but something told me it wouldn't work. Call it a gut instinct. I stared at the drawing again. Who was this mystery man? Was he the real criminal and had I been thinking all the wrong things for the last two days? But what about that guilty look in Dawn Summers' eyes? Or Buffy Summers' shock when she found out I knew she had been in the graveyard too? And Willow Rosenburg's shaky confession? Or Xander Harris's olive sandwich? And Charlie Lampcall's obvious fakeness? Who had done it and how? And where did Charlie fit into all of this? He was the perfect alibi. The witness that would solve all their problems. They backed each other out and if that didn't work they'd send in the mysterious witness that would turn all the police's leads upside down.
I threw the sketch on the desk. Why should I continue to hit myself in the head with it? Sure I wanted to know who it was, but in Sunnydale no one really cares if you find out who killed someone cause it's just one little needle in the hay stack. And what I've learnt in my career as a Sunnydale PD detective, one needle doesn't stand up to the hay stack. Does that mean I should stop solving crimes and just stand around and do nothing? No, it means I should just drop the cases that I can't find a solution to. In the long time I spend working on a hopeless case I could be solving twenty others that do have a suspect and a killer I could catch. So I decided to add the sketch to Skittles's file and hand it over to the chief. Case closed, yet still a mystery.
End Part 5
To be continued... Stay tuned for the two conclusions of 'Who killed Skittles the clown?' in one of which Ronald Thrump lays out his final theory on what happened and the second in which the writer of the fic reveals what really happened to Skittles.
Part 5 :
The Witness
It was late. I had spent most of my day, as I said before, pondering over the case. I feared that the time I had to solve this crime was running out. The chief was already bugging me to drop the case and get on a double homicide case that had appeared the previous night. Wounds to the neck. Same old, I thought, cases that would never get an answer, but Skittles's had an answer. I knew it, but I just had to find it. The strange thing was I spent most of the afternoon finding excuses why the Summers sisters were innocent. They had gone to the graveyard together to their mother's grave. They were on the other side of the park. They left before midnight...of course I was fighting myself. A part of me held on to my old theories, but this new side seemed to desperately want the two girls to be innocent. I couldn't explain it then; I can't explain it now.
As I was about to call it quits I heard a knock on my door. Who could it have been at that hour? Another surprise that would turn my theories upside down? Who knew...I shouted a 'come in' and the door opened. I was surprised at what I saw. A bleached man in a black leather coat with shifty eyes and a strange smile. For some reason I found it impossible to guess an age, he could've been in his early twenties, or late twenties or early thirties, but I couldn't really tell. He gave me the impression of a troublemaker or a guy who talked big and did little. Someone who intimidated by looks and words more than by actions. I chose not to fear him. He didn't seem hell bent on hurting me either.
"Can I help you?" I asked and he strolled over to the chair in front of me and sat down. The word unnatural came to my mind. Even if I didn't really think he was dangerous, the hairs on the back of my neck couldn't help but stand up.
"Yeah, you could." An accent! British. This was a British guy. Is that the reason for all the weirdness I felt? Perhaps. Foreigners tend to be very strange. Especially british men and their five o'clock tea. He pulled a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it. I waited impatiently till he took the first smoke. I don't really appreciate people smoking in my office, especially since I endured five months of total torture to quit the bad habit. He blew the smoke my way. And all I was thinking that moment was: just one smoke, no one had to find out. But then I came back to reality when I remembered the horrible moment when I considered licking my nicotine patch.
"So?" I asked when he didn't seem to want to start the conversation. "What, did you lose your green card? You are British, aren't you?" these words seemed to get him thinking.
"No. I'm...Charlie. Yeah, that's it, I'm Charlie," he looked around the office. "Lamp...call," he was obviously struggling to contain his British accent.
"You're Charlie Lampcall. Okay, so what can I do for you?" I asked briefly wondering how much of that name was real.
"I'm here to report a crime," he slipped a word in his British accent. I stared at him. He sighed, grunted and said: "Bloody hell, so I'm British!"
"That's better," I said proud that I had convinced him only with a look to drop his act. "Now if you want to report a crime, you have to fill out a form down at the front desk and..."
"The man at the front desk said I should see you. It's about that clown. Said you'd be real interested," he slouched back in the chair. It suddenly dawned on me that the policeman that was at the front desk was named Charlie. Coincidence or not?
"You know something about the murder?" he nodded. "Do you know who did it?"
"Yeah. A big guy, this tall, ugly face. Seemed to have a bone to pick with the clown," he said lifting his hand up to show me a specific height. My old skepticism started acting up again. Who was this man? A friend of the Summers? A friend of Alexander Harris or Willow Rosenburg that was prepared to commit perjury just so they could get away with it?
"Really? And when was this?" I asked while watching him intensely. He didn't seem to be bothered by my stare, quite the opposite, he was so confident in himself. Definitely not the look of a witness, but not of a guilty man either. He had nothing to win or lose in this case. That's what his attitude screamed. I could tell, but yet he was there in my office confessing to seeing Skittles's murderer.
"Two nights ago. I was taking a walk in the park and suddenly this guy with a shovel passes me by and goes straight for the clown. He yelled something like..." he thought about it for a moment. "'You'll pay for screwing up' and he just hit him," he looked at me and realized I was asking myself why hadn't he interfered. "I would've...done something, really, but my shoulder was acting up and that guy was huge" he immediately said.
"And why didn't you call the police?" His story had no foundation. No one saw anyone else in the park that night!
"There was a police car right around the corner, I figured you boys in blue would find 'em," he took another smoke from his cigarette.
"We only found the clown. And he was dead. Why didn't you report this earlier?"
"I was busy. Besides what is this a bloody interrogation?" he looked at me a little annoyed.
"I'm sorry, you're right. Would you help our sketch artist draw a picture?" I asked him. For some reason, I wanted him to be a real witness. It would get the Summers sisters off the hook. Our sketch artist quickly entered my office after I called him.
"What kind of shape did his face have?" Robbie, the sketch artist asked as I looked over them.
"Round face. Biddy eyes, I think they were black. Could've been brown too. He had a scar on his chin. I think he had a couple of missing teeth and...his hair, black. No, no it was blond and, um, curly. That's it, curly. He had a... big, chin, and very big eyebrows...and flappy ears."
"Like this?" Robbie showed him the sketch he had drawn. Charlie Lampcall looked at the drawing squinting his eyes pensive.
"Bigger ears. And the eyebrows met in the middle. And the nose is all wrong... I think it was broken here," he tapped on the sketch. Robbie struggled to correct the drawing.
"Better?" he handed it back to Charlie.
"That's him," he said seeming very much convinced. Leaving the sketch behind Robbie left feeling very proud about himself. I looked at the drawing. A scary looking guy looked back at me from the piece of paper. An incredibly ugly, scary guy. If I didn't really doubt the existence of this guy I would've said god was messing up on the day he made him or that he looked more like a gorilla than a man.
"Tell me something, mr. Lampcall, do you by any chance happen to know the Summers sisters? Or Willow Rosenburg and Alexader Harris?" I asked and he looked at me strangely.
"Never heard of 'em," he said suddenly putting out his second cigarette in my flower vase. I looked at the cigarette floating in the water left over from the flowers I had thrown out that morning. I momentarily pictured myself desperately trying to light it.
"Are you positive?" I asked again staring back at him.
"Yeah. You'd think I'd remember knowing four people," he was one step from rolling his eyes. "So can I go now?"
"I suppose you can...I'll call you if you're needed," I told him, but realized I had no idea what his phone number was. "Where can I find you?"
"Yellow pages?" he suggested as he got up. "I hope you catch the bastard," he said in his most serious faked tone before he left my office.
I was left there with the sketch in my hand wondering what I was suppose to do. I started thinking about convincing Charlie Lampcall to take a lie detector test, but something told me it wouldn't work. Call it a gut instinct. I stared at the drawing again. Who was this mystery man? Was he the real criminal and had I been thinking all the wrong things for the last two days? But what about that guilty look in Dawn Summers' eyes? Or Buffy Summers' shock when she found out I knew she had been in the graveyard too? And Willow Rosenburg's shaky confession? Or Xander Harris's olive sandwich? And Charlie Lampcall's obvious fakeness? Who had done it and how? And where did Charlie fit into all of this? He was the perfect alibi. The witness that would solve all their problems. They backed each other out and if that didn't work they'd send in the mysterious witness that would turn all the police's leads upside down.
I threw the sketch on the desk. Why should I continue to hit myself in the head with it? Sure I wanted to know who it was, but in Sunnydale no one really cares if you find out who killed someone cause it's just one little needle in the hay stack. And what I've learnt in my career as a Sunnydale PD detective, one needle doesn't stand up to the hay stack. Does that mean I should stop solving crimes and just stand around and do nothing? No, it means I should just drop the cases that I can't find a solution to. In the long time I spend working on a hopeless case I could be solving twenty others that do have a suspect and a killer I could catch. So I decided to add the sketch to Skittles's file and hand it over to the chief. Case closed, yet still a mystery.
End Part 5
To be continued... Stay tuned for the two conclusions of 'Who killed Skittles the clown?' in one of which Ronald Thrump lays out his final theory on what happened and the second in which the writer of the fic reveals what really happened to Skittles.