Dance Studio Flames

3. Mulling It Over

Author's Note: The story was renamed today. I'm not getting much from this, I admit. It doesn't seem like this topic is very popular, which makes me wonder if I should upload my other story – maybe a test trial? Hmm.

Disclaimer applies as always.

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Phoenix PD

17th March 2005

4:37 PM

Detective Cato Delfine looked over the sheets of passengers from over a spread of planes arriving at around the 3 o'clock mark which Detective Aleron Craig had handed him to look for suspects on. They'd theorized for ages and had come up with a couple of working theories, at least, as far as they could see.

One.

The man they had seen in the video – the perpetrator as he would be referred to – had stolen a car, driven it to the studio, then proceeded to murder someone. This was the simple murder theory.

Two.

The perp had still stolen the car, but they had gone to save someone, then killed the captor – for one reason or another. This was the simple version of the kidnapping, saving, and murder theory.

Or three.

Erica still argued there might not be a second person in the mix and that the person that had died had been the same one at the airport.

Cato had a good feeling the first and second theories were more right than the third, the second more so. He trusted his instincts. In any case though, they all seemed pretty plausible not to mention fit the evidence they had and all they needed now was a suspect to try and work out motive and which theory was correct.

But the long lists of passengers were proving stubborn.

All the female passengers had been ruled out immediately. True, there were ways perhaps a girl could look like a boy, but after going back to the airport again to get a copy of the video and going through it with a fine tooth comb, frame by frame, it seemed pretty certain their guy was well… a guy.

"Young." Cato said finally. "Search up ages and rule out anyone who is over, say 30." He sat down with a sigh as the list was taken back and worked on again.

"Take a break." Aleron said, glancing over as he worked on the fingerprints. The ones from Henry Bryant, the real owner of the stolen car, had been eliminated as well as family members. Cato had called the family in for fingerprinting earlier as well as extensive questioning as they thought that perhaps someone who had keys to the car – or access to keys – would be able to open the door do fast came up.

Unfortunately – for the detectives anyway – they all had alibis which were confirmed and the family was released. All copies of the car keys also were checked and the keepers swearing the keys had been with them all day.

So the family was ruled out for now.

Still there were a bundle of fingerprints on the car. Who knew? It might be, in the end, just someone who accidentally brushed against the car and noone at all. It would be another dead end.

An hour later, Cato had fallen asleep at the desk when Erica came back in, bearing the list of names. She looked surprised to see him asleep at the desk.

"Shh." Aleron warned.

Erica shot him an I-know-that look. "I'm just surprised to see him asleep. He was so commanding, confident. Energetic? So into it, I suppose. Now... blepph." She made the slumping noise with her tongue.

Before she could say anything else, Cato was already stirring, and pulled himself away from his desk, running a hand over his face and shaking his head to clear it. "What have you got?"

"I haven't got coffee." Erica replied, "But I think you'll need a cup. Here's the list of names, I'll be right back."

Cato blinked at Erica as she disappeared, but picked up the printed list of names.

"Andrews, Adam." He muttered as he read swiftly. "Arnold, Peter. Abraham, Matt. Brolga, Michael. Casula, James. Clay, Samuel. Cullen, Edward. Dram, Jack." He sighed, scanning the rest of the list of 30 or so people. "Is there anyway to get pictures of these people?"

"Perhaps." Aleron guessed. "In any case, could we look into if there is anyone close to these people that might give them a motive?"

"I'm sure they all have families or people they want to protect." Cato sighed. "Even if it's parents or something. What to do?"

Erica returned with cups of coffee which she passed around. The two men thanked her.

"I couldn't help but hear. You could see if any of the prints you got match, firstly."

"We don't have everyone's prints though." Aleron argued. "Only those that have been entered into the system and you know how many that means aren't."

"It seems we're at a dead end for now." Cato said with another sigh as he sipped at the coffee which brought him to life a little more.

"Look." Aleron said now, looking at his friend closely. "You look tired, so take a break. I'm going to actually get that car looked over and see if it was picked or what so we actually have an idea what kind of person we might be looking for."

"Good idea." Cato said. He shouldn't have assumed it had been picked like that, should he have.

"Erica. You stay with Cato and discuss… whatever with him. Flesh out more, maybe." Aleron instructed, then turned and disappeared out the door.

"Hmm." Erica sat down in Aleron's vacated chair and took a drink from Aleron's cup after putting her own down. "Wasted." She eyed Cato for a while, then finally made some sort of small talk. "You know, I've never really been in this PD. The Arson Investigation has their little branch. Not much action there, usually. So I guess I was a little resentful you took the most interesting thing in ages."

"You could always switch to just police work." Cato said, glancing at her before picking up more notes.

"Fires are what I'm good at though, at least until this time. Seems like I'm always getting bested by you."

The beginning of a smile hovered around Cato's mouth. "I'm just good with instinct… and maybe logic, I don't know. Do you think I'm logical?"

"Maybe. I still don't agree with you totally, but I guess it can be plausible."

Cato frowned as he looked at the document. "Witness statement."

"What?"

"There's a witness statement here. There wasn't anyone around at the time of the accident, at least not that we saw, so where did this come from?"

"You missed evidence?" Erica blinked in dismay. "So what, everything could be wrong?"

"No, nothing about that." Cato replied. "Nothing about any of that. Just what was burned, it seems. It's not long, all it says is that this kid saw purple smoke at first, so didn't know if it was fire or not before it blossomed into a bigger fire."

"And how long was this? How long did this kid stand and stare?"

"A few minutes, maybe. He actually lives pretty far away from the studio and he was only looking out by chance. Besides, he's only ten though."

"So why the statement?"

"Seems like their family is the one that reported it, but it was already a pretty big blaze then and we got a few calls coming in at the same time shortly after also reporting the same incident."

"Right." Erica said a little dubiously. "Anyway, it could throw a spanner in the works, you know. Burning chemicals or other things could account for the purple smoke."

"Then what about the smell?"

"I don't know!" Erica sighed deeply in frustration. "This is all so confusing. It's like there's nothing that will totally convict anyone of anything and ugh." She shook her head violently to clear it.

"Erica. Erica!" Cato stopped her. "For all we know this can't be trusted information. This child could be mistaken. We don't know." He repeated. "And we all know how unreliable statements can be."

"Now you're just trying to twist things the way you want it."

Erica shook her head in annoyance as Aleron entered again and watch the two quizzically in their frustration.

"Alright...? I think something new must have come up."

They filled him in but he seemed to shelve it for further thinking.

"Okay. I have news also. The lock of the car looks like it most likely was picked and then the car looks like it was hotwired. It's some pretty snazzy work there and I have no idea how they did it that quickly." Aleron looked at Cato. "We probably should have looked more into this at first."

"It doesn't tell me much still." Cato argued. "Apart from the fact that I need to find one person on this list that can do that."

Aleron considered a while. "Let's look through the ages then and their backgrounds. I can run some background checks. We'll see who has a squeaky clean background and who doesn't."

"I doubt they're all massive law breakers if they're all pretty young." Erica said sarcastically.

"It's better to have something to do." Aleron murmured as he left.

Cato was still scanning the list, looking over it. "Someone who is local, someone who isn't?" He wondered, muttering under his breath. "When was the fire, when did the car get there? Someone not local."

"Someone not local?" Erica asked, interested.

"If they're not local, of course they would take longer to get there, but of course, we can't get an exact time on any of this so it's hard to say." Cato thought for a minute. "There's also traffic to take into account." He sighed. "I hope I'm not screwing this case up."

"No." Erica's voice was sharp. "So far everything has matched. It makes sense so it must be on the right track."

"Must it?" Cato asked, leaning back on his chair finally. "Just because it makes sense, doesn't mean it's right."

"But it probably is, isn't it?"

"Ever heard of people wrongly accused? People sometimes get convicted for things they didn't do, yet somehow the evidence was all seen in this manner and completely against them. I don't want to get this wrong and send the wrong person to jail."

"This is not a time to start doubting yourself. Stop and count the times you have been wrong."

He looked at her skeptically.

"Go, do it."

"Many times, obviously."

"About who was guilty, or not guilty? Not daily life or something."

"I haven't ever sent the wrong person to jail." Cato conceded finally.

"There you go. Have faith in yourself and your abilities."

Cato blinked at her, and smiled. "Thanks." Then he seemed to think of something. "That earlier thing I was thinking about. Hang on. Relative." He raised his eyebrows at Erica. "What do you think? That means that person must be from out of town with a loved one who has ties to Phoenix?" Cato's voice was more excited.

"A person from out of town." Erica thought for a minute. "That could be possible. It could account for some of the travelling time. It seems like it took longer than it should for the car to get from the airport to the studio. As for a loved one who perhaps is from here or related to here they are about to save. I see your reasoning, but you know this is only if I agree to the kidnapping theory. Why wouldn't they report something like that?"

Cato's eyes met hers. "More often than not the community can't trust the police."

"Why not?" The words felt a little stupid even as they left her mouth.

"Sometimes they're threatened. 'If you call the police, they die.' Sometimes they know the police won't be any help to them anyway and so they take matters into their own hands. Sometimes they think the police will just bungle it and get their loved one killed. There are many reasons." He smiled kindly at her. "You know it."

Erica pulled her knees up and put her arms around them. "I do. I guess I do agree somewhat with your theory, but…" She shook her head. "I just don't know. So much is uncertain."

"Often is." Cato said. "Not to mention the fingerprints are no good. We all know not everyone's fingerprints are on the database. We have a couple of fingerprints, but unless we get a suspect and take their fingerprints to check, we can't know if any of this can be scrapped." Sometimes he just felt like ripping his hair out – not that it would do him any good. Or make him look better for that matter. Better stay away.

"For now though, I think we can get a quick list of who's local and who isn't as a starting point for all these numerous theories now, yes?"

"Sure. I'll help." Erica offered.

They worked in companionable silence, both taking half the list and searching up. They'd finished about three-quarters of an hour later and had about a list of ten. Cato surveyed it quickly and smiled.

"At least I feel like we have some kind of start on this now." Cato said. "I'm going to go back and take another look at the scene and do some hard thinking."

"Should I come with you?" Erica asked. "You can 'sound' me again." She grinned. "You might have to make me a name tag. 'Sounding Board' at your service."

Cato grimace and rolled his eyes, a hint of a smile on his face.

"No. I think I need some time to sort out my thoughts and think this over. I bet there's something I missed. I just need a little peace and quiet. Sorry." Cato smiled apologetically.

Erica nodded understandingly though. "I can understand that. Good luck. I need to review the notes I took about the site and write up an analysis anyway. Alright if I use your computer?"

"Feel free." Cato replied. "I'll see you later."

--

Cato walked out from the parked squad car over to the burnt out building, looking over at it in the dying light of the sunset. Hmm, it was getting dark now, the twilight hours were approaching, but at least there was a streetlight there. It wouldn't be so dark he couldn't see. Cato just needed some time to organize all the confused thoughts in his head into the right places.

Unexpectedly, he sensed movement near the burnt out building and froze, frowning. There shouldn't be anyone there, the police tape around the whole of the place made that clear.

Something wasn't right, Cato could feel it. Carefully, he reached to his holster and pulfled fout his standard police issue gun. He slipped the safety off, hoping firing it wouldn't be necessary. It was there just in case, after all, if therfe was someone there, most likely thefy were up to no good. Even so, he wanted to be cautious and careful not to shoot carelessly just in case it was someone just seeking shelter.

Before he could move though, he was tackled to the ground, slamming into it with a hard thud. Cato and the other person landed in a heap. Cato was winded, but pushed but the other person – which felt like a woman – seemed to be deathly strong. Her expression was cold – as cold as her skin, probably – as she looked down at him. The woman's flesh was icy, but her ruby red eyes held a strange excitement.

"You've been a little troublesome." Her voice was beautiful in its way but also very creepy to hear it say those dark words. "I can't have you interfering."

"What… are you… talking about?" Cato managed to force out around the hold she had on him.

"You've been digging into what happened here. I watched you theorising with your friends. You came so close, oh so close, but you were wrong in one sense."

"What?"

"James, oh my beloved James." Her voice was bitter and her eyes were suddenly full of dislike. "He was only hunting her, that girl, but they decided to play a game." She smiled menacingly at Cato. "He likes games. I like whatever James likes. Liked." She expelled a sweet breath and Cato flinched. "But they caught up. I couldn't help, I was still coming. Arriving. I was lured away before that. So they killed James and saved that stupid human girl."

It took an effort but Cato kept his head still and his gaze unblinking and unflinching on her as she bent close, her long red curls of hair dipping onto the ground as her face came close to his again. "That's why I can't let you continue. Because I'm going to be the one to kill Edward, or at least make him suffer. And I will make that human girl suffer too." She bared her shiny white teeth. "I can't let you do it."

Cato thought frantically, his mind cool even as another part of him knew he would die soon. His gun had been knocked away as she had tackled him and she'd just told him what happened. She would kill him now, this was no movie or story, and there would be noone to save him.

This was cruel reality.

He remembered the name. They had found it on the list of non-locals. Edward. There was only one of them. Edward Cullen. So, he had been the killer, but for the purpose of saving a … girl, it seemed from the person called James, who this woman wanted to avenge now. This James was probably the one who had perished in the fire – or been murdered anyway.

Wait.

Human girl?

"I can see you understand." The woman's voice was soft. "I'm going to give you my name so you know who I am. I am Victoria, and I'm now going to silence you for once and for all. I doubt either of your companions will ever figure out what happened in that studio without you."

Her hand descended even as Cato quickly struggled, etching what he hoped would be the right letters deep into the soil with a finger, even as the hand met with him and his world faded into blackness.

He would never wake again.

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There is an epilogue, I warn you. The story isn't quite over just yet.

What of the new title? Opinions? Should I change it back? (To 'The Arsonist'?) Or would something else be more appropriate?

Review please? If you have even gotten this far? (Let me know! :O )