"Okay Loki, what the hell is up? You said you would brief me on the drive to the site. Well, we are in the car and driving to the scene. But, yet, you haven't said anything about what the hell I am going to be doing or even where the hell you are taking me," Darcy stated as she frustratedly adjusted the seat belt of the passenger seat of a company car. A company car that her least favorite person was driving. I wish I could have driven. He makes me nervous.
"First off, you shouldn't use such foul language towards me, I am your superior. Second, we are en route to the site of an armed robbery. The perpetrator was already caught red-handed. He or she was arrested by the first officer on scene who was following the 911 call of the elderly lady who lives in the house. Your task is to figure out who did it without knowing who it was. You are to act as though we have not caught him or her yet and examine the evidence as necessary. You will have to analyze all of the evidence on your own; however, the specialist who would normally examine the evidence will watch over you and insure you are performing the investigation correctly," Loki declared pointedly as he pulled up alongside a house that was marked off with yellow police tape.
"This sounds like a project that I did in school. I am not in college anymore, do we really need to stoop to the point where you are testing my ability?" Darcy said, offended.
The only response she received was the raising of Loki's eyebrows and his trademark smirk.
"Fine. Whatever! I'll do it if this means that I will finally be trusted to do something important within this godforsaken team," the brunette yelled as she got out of the car and slammed the door shut.
After grabbing her bag out of the trunk of the car, Darcy headed toward the crime scene. "Is the scene secure?" Darcy asked the nearest officer, Steve Rogers, to the crime scene tape.
He looked at her with questioning in his eyes before he answered, "Yes it is ma'am."
"Great. I shall begin then."
Darcy sat her kit down by the door of the house, put on latex gloves, and grabbed her camera out of its case. Before entering the house itself, she began walking around the building. She noticed footprints in the soil of a flower patch. The footprints lead up to the window and suggested the perpetrator had stopped to peer inside the window. Darcy continued to walk around the house, noticing the footprints trail off and start up again around the windows and the walls of the house. Around this time, she noticed she had a shadow and that Loki was following her around. I should have expected as much, it isn't like he will trust me to do my job or anything. As Darcy followed the house, she came to a set of steps that led to a glass-paned back door. The glass was broken and scattered on the steps and around the door frame. Careful to not step on any stray glass, Darcy continued around the rest of the house and back to the front porch without seeing anything else out of the ordinary.
Ms. Lewis made another lap around the house, this time her goal was to document everything she saw. At the first set of footprints, Darcy placed a number marker, took wide-angle photos of the entire area, midrange photos of just under the window, and close-up photos of the footprints. She also used a ruler to get an accurate scale of the size. To ensure there weren't two sets of footprints, the agent repeated these steps at every set of foot prints she found. When she made her way back to the back door steps, Darcy placed the number marked and photographed the glass in the same fashion as the footprints. However, when she was doing the close up photos, she noticed what looked like blood on the edge of one of the larger pieces of glass and droplets on smaller pieces. She photographed the abnormality and marked it with a number as well.
Once she was done photographing, Darcy returned to front door and grabbed her equipment. Before heading off to continue her investigation, she made sure to through a glare in the direction of her lurker. She made sure to do this every so often to guarantee Loki would know that she was irritated with him. Finding additional collection or documentation of the footprints, Darcy headed straight for the broken glass at the back door. She pulled a swab from her kit and dabbed the presumed blood. She added a drop of a reagent to the swab. She waited a few seconds and added a drop of hydrogen peroxide to the swab. Within a matter of seconds, the swab turned a bright pink. This confirmed her suspicion of the sample being blood. Darcy carefully bagged up the pieces of glass in an evidence collection bag.
"Be careful to not cut yourself. That is a mountain of paperwork that I would have to fill out and I don't have that kind of time to waste on someone like you," Loki stated with superiority.
"If it wasn't for the fact that it would compromise my analysis, I totally would just to spite you. Now shut up and let me do my job, sir," Darcy said with as much malic as she could muster.
With the collection of the glass, Darcy brushed the door handle for fingerprints. Finding a few, she lifted the prints off of the metal. At the completion of this, all of the evidence from outside was collected; this meant Darcy could proceed inside. In fear of tracking in unknown particulates, she put booties over her shoes.
"Please put booties on, I really don't want to be collecting your particles just because you are too lazy to do such a simple task," she said to her 'supervisor'.
"You mistake my knowledge for laziness. We know who did it. You know it wasn't me, therefore booties are unnecessary in this specific case," Loki said with that stupid smirk of his.
"Yea, sure, that is fine and dandy, except of course for the fact that you want me to treat this like any other case. Therefore, put the damn booties on, before I do it for you," the brunette said, her voice rising just a little bit.
"Ok. I will, but only because Jane would have my head if I sabotaged you," Loki said as he put the obnoxious blue fabric things on his feet.
Just like she did outside, Darcy did a walkthrough of the entire house before documenting or collecting anything. She entered every room and opened every door. The only rooms that had any evidence of a disturbance were the office, the master bedroom, the hallway, and the kitchen. However, the only disturbance within the office was a chair laying on its back and work that appeared to be scattered and unfinished. She made the postulation that the witness was working on something in her office, was shocked by the commotion, stood up too fast, and knocked her chair backwards.
"Did the witness say where she was when she heard the offender?" Darcy asked as she continued to look around the room.
"Yes, she said she was on her computer, here in the office when she heard the sound of breaking glass. She immediately called 911 and hid in the closet," Loki read from his notepad.
Within the master bedroom, Darcy found a dresser that was rummaged through with clothes strewn about. At the base of the dresser there was a small collection of, presumably, blood droplets. She noticed a small trail of blood droplets that led out of the suite, into the hallway, and ended at the kitchen backdoor. The trail suggested the robbery was pre-meditated and that the suspect knew where they were going and what they were after.
Darcy returned to her gear and headed for the backdoor again. She repeated the same process as she did outside, starting number marking of the entire substance trail and ending with the close up photos of each and every droplet. She also dusted the inside door handle for prints, and again, lifted what she found. Just the be certain, Darcy tested a drop within the trail and a drop within the collection for blood. They both came back positive. Once the blood documentation was completed, Darcy turned her attention to the pillaged dresser. The top drawer was the most cluttered so Darcy started there. She dusted the entire face of the drawer for prints and lifted each one that she found. Initially she didn't notice anything out of the ordinary with the drawer until she began to notice that drawer appeared too small on the inside. Remembering her final project in college, Darcy knocked on the bottom of the drawer. The knock resonated with the sound that made it seem hollow. She knew then that there had to be a hidden compartment within the dresser drawer.
Looking closely, she saw a small gap at the right of the bottom of the drawer. The gap was just big enough for a finger. Before opening the compartment, she quickly snapped a picture of the gap. Wedging her finger in the gap, Darcy popped the lid of the compartment off. Underneath the lid, there was essentially a very large jewelry box full of necklaces, rings, bracelets, and other ornaments. If all of this is real, this has to be worth a fortune. Darcy captured more photos and bagged up each piece of jewelry. She had to clarify with the victim that there was nothing missing. After doing one more walkthrough of the house, Darcy concluded that she obtained all evidence she could from this location.
She gathered everything she had and needed to take to the lab, and made her way to the company car. Loki was already in the driver's seat and had the car running. When did he stop following me?
"All set?" Darcy nodded, "Good, then now is when the real fun begins: making sure you don't fuck up the few samples that we have. Ms. Ross will be supervising your work on the blood and Dr. Selvig will be supervising the fingerprint analysis. Once we get back to the lab, you are on your own to find them and finish your research. I must focus on my own report for now," Loki said without so much of a glance Darcy's way.
"Aye, aye, captain," Darcy muttered under her breath.
-A Little While Later-
Darcy stood pressing the up button for the crime lab elevator repeatedly. She really just wanted to get up to the lab and begin her work. Analyzing everything was her favorite part of her job. Plus, she was looking forward to not having to work with Loki for the rest of the day. The rest of her coworkers were lovely and incredibly kind to her. She had only been a part of the team for a few days, but they were already treating like family. Everyone except for Loki that is.
Darcy sighed and rubbed at the bridge of her nose with her forefinger and thumb. I worked two jobs and put myself through college. And yet, I feel as though this job will be one of the hardest things I have done in my life.
Ding. After what felt like a millennia, the elevator finally arrived at the garage. As the doors opened, a woman almost a head taller than herself, almost ran her over.
"Oh, Darcy, please forgive me. I didn't see you there," Betty Ross said as she recollected herself.
Darcy couldn't help but admire the woman. She was almost 20 years older than her, but yet Betty was much more beautiful. She was tall and slim with an ethereal beauty to her. She had beautiful long, wavy sable hair and aquamarine eyes. She may have been the dorkiest scientist in the building, but yet she was the most elegant as well.
"Is something wrong?" Darcy asked, concerned about such a graceful person being so frantic.
"No, yes, well, kinda. I just got a call from my son's school. His father picked him up from school early. He is listed as an emergency contact so he can do that, but we have been divorced for a while and I have full custody. The schools can't do anything about it though, aside from calling me," the woman said readjusting her bag on her shoulder. "I am sorry to leave you hanging today, but I really must go. Loki will oversee your work in my stead. I will see you tomorrow, have a good rest of the day!" Betty yelled as she power walked to her car.
Before Darcy could yell out a complaint, Betty was in her car and driving off already.
"Great. Just great. Now I actually have to work with him again. Damn my luck."
"Talking to yourself, Ms. Lewis?" came a sultry voice from beside her.
"Shit," Darcy muttered to herself. She was too caught up with her thoughts that she hadn't noticed Loki saunter up to her and lean against the wall beside her.
"Shall we?" Loki said as he held his arm out for her to grab.
The only response he received was a look from Darcy as though he grew a second head. She proceeded to walk onto the elevator leaving him in his place with a smirk on his chiseled face.
After he walked onto the elevator and the doors closed, Darcy lost a little bit of her self-control and looked at her superior. "Are you bi-polar?" she asked him incredulously.
"No," he said as he pushed her against the elevator wall. He put his left forearm on the wall beside her and leaned in close, "you are just my new plaything, and boy are you fun to toy with."
As the doors opened to their floor, he chuckled to himself and strolled off. Darcy was left breathless, flustered, a little turned on, but a lot furious. I will kill you. I am a forensic scientist, I can do it. I won't be caught either.
Darcy shook her head to clear any negative thoughts and headed for Dr. Selvig's office.
Darcy found the older man leaning over a microscope at his desk. She knocked on the door gently and he looked up.
"Ah, Darcy, are you ready to start looking at your first set of fingerprints? I have the elimination prints for Catherine Wilder, the victim. Shall we begin?" the man with tawny hair and china blue eyes said to Darcy.
"Sure thing, Doctor," Darcy said as she retrieved the lifts she had made of the fingerprints at the scene.
Dr. Selvig watched closely as Darcy scanned the fingerprints to document them and then made physical copies. On the copies, she circled identification markers and compared them to Ms. Wilder's elimination prints. Darcy was able to eliminate all but a few prints. Darcy then took the few remaining and searched the national database for the prints.
"Now we wait," Dr. Selvig said as he pulled up a seat.
"Yea, so what is your doctorate degr—"she was interrupted by the ding of the computer alerting the two to a match.
"That was fast," Darcy said, "Alex Wilder. 18. Priors for breaking and entering into his high school and vandalizing a local library. Sounds like a troubled kid to me. But hey, isn't Wilder the name of the victim? That explains how he knew his way around the house," she said printing out her results.
"Excellent work Darcy. Now you just need to head over to DNA to make sure the blood confirms our findings. See ya later!" Selvig said as he went back to his own work that Darcy had interrupted.
Great. I was hoping my results would mean I didn't need to do the DNA work. I should have known better though.
Darcy made her way to the DNA lab where she saw Loki leaning against the glass panes of the wall. She smirked as mischievous thoughts ran through her head. She quietly walked up to the other side of the glass and then hit it with her hands as hard as she could. She knew it wouldn't break, Mr. Stark spared no expense and made sure all glass was bullet-proof. She giggled to herself as she saw Loki's body barely jump. She knew though, that that small reaction was more than most people get. Feeling quite proud of herself, Darcy promenaded into the lab and smirked at her superior.
"You are so lucky that we don't actually have to work together at the moment. You would be dead before the DNA was done processing," Loki said with the threat emanating from his eyes.
"What do you mean? Don't I have to do the DNA processing?" that threw Darcy through a bit of a loop.
"You would, but since we have the guy and you already have him as your primary suspect due to fingerprints, it is unnecessary. Mainly because I don't want to have to go to the precinct to get his DNA so you can compare the two," Loki said as he began to walk out of the room, "Have a good night Darcy. I will see you tomorrow. Try not to think about me too much." With one last smirk and a wink in Darcy's direction, he disappeared.
Darcy growled in frustration and slammed her fist into the table. She was fired up until she realized this meant she didn't have to deal with the egotistical bastard for the rest of the night. At that, her mood perked up and she skipped her way to the locker room to clock out and gather her belongings. Tonight was going to be a night full of '90s Rom-Coms. She needed something to distract herself from work.
I think I will stop and buy myself a bottle of cake vodka and a pint of ice cream on the way home.