One sunny afternoon, when I arrived early at the Gull for a shift that evening I found Duke giving a pirate show to a little girl. For fear of giving myself away I stayed in my vehicle. I remember wishing that I had a camera, but it didn't last long. All of a sudden Nathan and Audrey were running onto the Gull's porch – Audrey ran to and grabbed the girl so she couldn't escape while Nathan ran up to the second floor to try to grab Duke before he fell, Nathan did not succeed. Duke fell off the second floor balcony flat onto his back. After I got out of the car I stood back to try to analyze the situation.
"Let me go!" the girl shouted.
"Ginger stop! You're hurting people. You've hurt Duke." Audrey.
"I didn't do anything. We were just playing. Duke's fine – you're fine Duke!" Duke had remained on his back until that point, and then he tried to get up.
"Yeah, I'm fine." To which he fell over onto a chair. At least the second landing was softer than the first.
While Audrey took the girl, apparently named Ginger, to sit down at a table and chat, I offered to drive Duke to the hospital since I clearly didn't know what had happened already. Halfway to the hospital Duke woke up, but I bullied him into at least getting checked before I would drive him back to the Gull. That day I finally got to meet the infamous Jordan that Nathan had previously been so enamored with, well before Jordan tried to kidnap Ginger. When I arrived back at the Gull with Duke, Jordan was in handcuffs and seated at a table in the center of the room. Ginger used her trouble to force Jordan to answer her questions. When it started to get too heavy for the girl Audrey sent her upstairs; I followed her.
"Who are you?" Ginger asked me.
"My name is Fae. I am a friend of Duke."
"Why are you up here?"
"Don't you mean, 'Why aren't you down there with them'?" She nodded. "I wanted to test something. And I thought you might want some company."
"Okay…"
"I want to see if you can command me like you did to Duke." She started to look sad. "I know Audrey probably told you that it was bad to control people like that. She's not wrong, but I am asking you to, so you won't get in any trouble."
"What should I make you do?"
"It doesn't matter, just something simple… Tell me to spin around once."
"Spin around." Nothing happened. "Why didn't you spin?"
"Guess I'm special… Do you know how to play the piano?"
"No."
"Well then come here and I will teach you a song." I taught her Twinkle Twinkle Little Star completely before the Trio came to get us and go to find her father.
While Duke brought Ginger into the Guard's safe house, I waited outside next to the car. I was the look out in case more Guard cronies came up the driveway. When two cronies left the house, I almost shot them, but at the last second I saw that one was handcuffed so I let them go. I didn't have my bike so I couldn't follow them to see if they would lead me to another Guard safe house unfortunately. I ran inside after they had driven down the driveway to make sure than everyone was alright. It was decided after we left that Duke would use some of his connections to find the family a new, safer place to stay until the troubles were over.
A couple days later, the usual suspects were all called to a meeting at some processing plant that had seen better days. I walked in last, taking in every detail of the place.
"This is a need to know crime scene." Nathan.
"And what exactly do we all need to know?" Vince.
"The uh, creepy coroner guy outside said we were on the list." Duke. "Oh…"
"Our paper gets the exclusive right?" Dave.
"This isn't about a story or volunteer cops." Nathan.
"It's about the bolt-gun killer. Tommy Bowen." Audrey. A skin "suit" was shown to the room.
"Oh my god, that's his… I thought Tommy was the bolt-gun killer." Vince.
"So did we. The real Tommy was murdered and skinned several weeks ago. The real killer assumed his identity." Nathan.
"There's a…skin-walker in Haven?" Dave.
"So where is he?" Duke.
"Who is he?" Vince.
"We don't know. He escaped. But we have an idea on a way to find him." Nathan.
"The thing is, Tommy made a series of rookie mistakes. I hardly noticed them at first but when you add them all up there's no way he could be a trained cop." Audrey.
"I would just like you to know: I told you, I told you so." Duke.
"The skin-walker sounds and looks like his victims, but he doesn't know what they know." Audrey.
"It's a performance. He can steal their voice, their appearance, but he can't steal their mind." Nathan.
"So we catch him using secrets, memories, it would be like a test?" Claire.
"Well hot damn kids, sounds like one hell of a plan. When do we start?" Duke.
"I already have. The killer picked someone who was already in our circle." Audrey.
"We know he's looking for information on Audrey and the Colorado Kid." Nathan.
"He's been with us the whole time and I bet he still is." Audrey.
"What are you saying?" Claire.
"When we're done here, I need you all to go down to the station. One of us could be the skin-walker." Audrey.
"Including you." Duke.
"We're all suspects." Audrey. Just then, a dog barked outside. Nathan said something I didn't catch before he and Audrey left us alone to our thoughts.
Slowly but as a group we left the processing plant and headed to the station. When Audrey and Nathan returned to the station, Audrey took Claire in first. Second was me. I passed easily by using my trouble to project music directly into their heads. I had been working on this technique for weeks as well as to try to recognize individuals based on the music inside of them. Every person has a unique sound to them and I had been trying to master it for the past week, I originally used patrons at the Gull and was caught by Claire a week ago. She volunteered to help me master it. But when I projected into Claire at the station and listened to her sound, it was drastically different than it had been the week before. I thought it was probably just because she now had to help Audrey search for a skin-walker among our friends and wrote it off.
Then they called in Duke. I did my best to keep everyone calm and played a relaxing melody while everyone waited. After Duke slammed the interview room door on his way out, I caught his eye. He just batted his hand back at the door, downcast his eyes and let out a huff before stomping off and out of the station. Next was Nathan. His interview was just as long as Duke's, but he came out looking much less distressed than had Duke. In fact he looked quite pleased. The final interview was for the Teague brothers together. When they were called I stopped the music since I had no one to play for. After the brothers left as well I waited to chat with Audrey and Claire; they were concerned that the skin-walker hadn't been among the friends or that maybe it had slipped by. I suggested that whatever had happened, we should be thankful that, for the moment, no one we cared about had died. That night I had to sing at the Gull so I left them earlier than I wanted but they promised to come to the show later.
The next day, again all the likely suspects were called to a meeting but this time at the station, all except one.
"When we discovered the skin-walker was stealing parts of women's faces, we started a computer program to piece together what it would look like if the parts were assembled. Now that we just got the final ID of the women buried at the cannery-" Nathan.
"-we can finally get a picture of who the skin-walker's been building." Dave.
"Scuse me. Umm, why isn't Claire here for this?" Duke.
"Claire…Claire's dead." Audrey.
"Skin-walker took her." Nathan.
"When? When did the skin-walker take her?" Me.
"A couple days ago. Why?" Audrey.
"I have been developing a way to identify a person based on their soul's sound. Each person's is different, is unique, but it can change. In the interview, I thought Claire's sound had changed because of stress so I didn't say anything, but if she was the skin-walker yesterday… I will be able to identify that sound if I ever hear it again."
"We need to get that son of a bitch." Duke.
"We will." Audrey.
"And it's gonna pay." Dwight.
"Graph's almost finished." Nathan said just before it enhanced itself.
"That's impossible. Arla Cogan?" Audrey.
"Who?" Dwight.
"No, it can't be." Duke.
"When Duke and I were in Colorado, we found out that James Cogan was married." Audrey.
"The skin-walker is building your son's wife." Nathan.
"Well I'm sure that'll be creepy: all sewn together." Me.
"Why would the skin-walker wanna look like James Cogan's wife?" Nathan.
"Maybe it always was her. After James died, no one in Colorado ever saw Arla again." Duke.
"Maybe she came to Haven with James and never left." Nathan.
"We'll go through the archives." Dave.
"See if there were any women skinned 27 years ago." Vince.
"See if some of your business connections might know something." Nathan to Duke.
"They just might. Spread the word." Duke said before he left.
"The skin-walker has the answers. So we need to find her before…" Nathan.
"Before I disappear for 27 years. Well, this will be a mighty cold case by then so we better wrap it up. And please, we've seen what she's capable of doing so just, be careful." Audrey. Meeting over, Dwight followed me out.
"I assume they still don't know your family's history." Dwight.
"No. But that doesn't mean I won't use it. I'm calling my Grandmother as soon as I get home."
"Good."
"Don't worry. I'll let them know everything if I find anything." He nodded to me before we went our separate ways. Unfortunately, my Grandmother wasn't very helpful.