Portland In Black 4

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"You're it, sunshine."  Blackthunder shook her head.  "You were so happy to hop into something that wasn't your business before, Necromancer.  Why are you choking up on it now?"

Noir didn't respond.

"That's what I thought.  You want to hear the details now, or do you want to keep trying to weasel out of it?"

"He isn't trying to avoid it, Blackthunder."  Jesha interjected.  "I'm curious myself about this... Wolf?"

Blackthunder sighed.  "Who are you again?"

"Independent subcontractor.  He might give me this job, you know?"  Jesha smirked.  "This serial killer's been up and down the coast?  Then why haven't I heard of him?"

"He isn't contacting the press.  We don't know why, but he's been just leaving bloody sites for law enforcement to find.  He doesn't leave as big as messes as this one.  But he left it, with the same old calling cards he's used in Salt Lake City, Phoenix and Sacremento.  The local agent... he knew this girl.  They really want to find this guy."

"But no witnesses.  No sloppy bits to make a case out of."  Noir answered.  Police work didn't run on miracles, despite the image most people conjured of it.  It relied on witness testimony, lucky breaks and noticings the right thing at the right time.  Most scientific approaches helped establish clues, but they didn't actually get investigators anywhere.  Add in a variety of things, like the cost of a investigation, the nature of the investigators, biases and all that...

"So far."  Blackthunder said.  "This crime scene is still fairly fresh."

"Wait.  This isn't a cold case?  Why-"

"I have my reasons, Bedarte, okay?  You go into the scene, talk to the body.  Go from there, right?"

Jesha gave Noir a curious gaze.  Noir shrugged.

"If whoever died left a ghost.  Sometimes that doesn't happen.  The death has to be... emotionally strong to trigger that."  Noir scratched his chin.  "Otherwise, nothing.  Serial killers tend to leave bodies that leave ghosts, but that isn't a exact rule."

"When you see what happened, you'll think there is a ghost there."  Blackthunder handed Noir a folder.  It looked like some sort of official document.  "That'll get you into the scene.  You're girlfriend will have to wait outside."

At the word girlfriend, Noir could see Jesha's smirk widened.  This whole thing made the undead hunter excited.  Noir felt some irritation set in at that.  "She's not my girlfriend."

Blackthunder ignored him.  "I haven't any legitimate authority on this scene, so I'm just dropping you off.  My bosses aren't going to like me even going near this... thing."

That got Noir's notice.  "Wait.  Why?"

"There's more going on around this town than just some serial killer at some fast food joint, Bedarte.  There is some sort of gang war between different external threats going on.  Some of my superiors don't want to get noticed by some of the organizations fighting one another."

"Translation: supernatural things, they don't want to have to fix them."

"The USMS is about analysis and threat assessment.  We don't fix problems, necromancer.  Sometimes that isn't something you should do."

"Unless you need me to do it."  Noir answered.

"Unless I need you to do it."

Jesha shrugged.  "Or maybe you don't do something or do something based on whether or not its the right thing to do.  Overthinking it just makes things worse."

Blackthunder just shook her head as they pulled into Beaverton.