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Falling Away |
| It had been a normal day for Del Corzucan. He woke up, carefully got out of bed to make sure not to disturb his wife, got dressed, made coffee, and left for work. He had come into the precinct like he always did, slowly sauntering and grumbling about how this was going to be just another boring day, where he would get no leads or tips for any of the cases he work, while at least one other person would be dragging a handcuffed perp in by their collar. He went into his office like usual. He moved around the boxes upon boxes of case files and papers, sat down at his desk, and finished his coffee. This is where normalcy stopped. He continued sitting, filling out a some form or another, when his phone rang. At first, he thought it just might be a figment of his imagination. He never got calls at this time of the morning. Then it rang again. At this point, he seriously considered calling his doctor, and making an appointment to have his hearing checked. To his incredible dismay, the phone rang yet again. Now, whether Corzucan liked it or not, it was ringing. So, like any sensible person with working electricity, operating phone services, and a phone that was ringing, he picked it up. “Precinct 21, who’s this...” “Hello, Corzucan? I’ve found that Jessye Christopher, that kid you’ve been looking for.” His face locked then and there. He very slowly began to grind his teeth, speaking in complete deadpan through clenched jaws. “Is this some kind of joke?” “No, this isn’t a prank.” His jaw loosened. He tapped a button on his phone, one that began to trace the line. At least if the guy on the other side of the line was lying, he could have a few of the locals bust him. “You’ve really found Jessye Christopher?” “Yes, I have really found her. She’s lying in front of the Tillerman Street Church. Apparently, she just lost it. Yeah, broke down right outside the church.” A church. Not surprising. “...Be right over.” Fast-forward a half-an-hour. The front steps of the Tillerman Street Church were surrounded in yellow police tape, sirens casting light across the stained glass windows but not making a sound, and people gather around, wondering exactly what was going on... About fifteen officers were there, including Corzucan, who was questioning the tipster that had informed him about Jessye’s presence earlier. There was also a single ambulance, with the back doors open. On the gurney being slid inside was Jessye, curled up into a ball, clutching at her head, crying hysterically, looking absolutely terrified. The paramedics had made sure not to strap her to the gurney, as she had already hurt a few other paramedics by thrashing around when they pulled her out of her fetal ball... Penance lied completely still, like any normal knife, right outside the church’s large oak doors. It had not stirred at all. Corzucan was questioning the ‘anonymous tipster’ that had called him about this whole thing. He had decided to kill the anonymity by staying around and watching Jessye, just to make sure she laid screaming and crying and not run screaming and crying. He was a strange one, black hair, black eyes, black coat... and a grin that looked out of place under the current circumstances. “Did she attack you?” “She tried, sir, but she just ended up staggering up the steps, and collapsing before she could get to me.” “But she was going to attack you?” “Think so. Kept sputtering something about being a ‘sinner amongst sinners’. Not really sure why.” Corzucan grimaced tightly, contorting it just enough to make it look like a smile. No matter how much he hated that kid, she was usually right when she went after people. To call this guy a sinner amongst sinners must’ve meant something was wrong with the guy. There probably was, he guessed. “What were you doing here?” “Just admiring the doors. Look nice.” He kept smiling. “...You didn’t have to defend yourself from her, at all?” He shook his head. “Nope. She didn’t even make it all the way up the stairs.” He was still smiling. “Funny, I gave her a quick look-over, and she seems to have some pretty fresh bruises...” The man smiled, and continued smiling. Corzucan kept forcing the grin. How he wanted to wipe that smirk off his face... “Officer, arrest that man!” A commotion broke out at the tape as an old man in a bathrobe crossed over, and began to saunter towards the two of them. Both he and Corzucan turned to look at him. Typical old man, the kind that seized the opportunity to be a gun-slinging hero every chance they got. This man didn’t have any guns, but what he lacked in the weaponry department he had in eye-witness and word of mouth. However, he didn’t get too far. When he was half-way between the tape and Corzucan, his right arm shot up to his chest, and he collapsed with a lost cry as he was struck down by a heart attack. Paramedics took quick notice. One quickly assessed the situation, took a pulse, and noted that he was about ready to go into arrest. As a matter of fact, he very quickly did. CPR was administered. That failed. Defibrillator pads were brought out to resuscitate him, and disaster was narrowly avoided when they somehow began to overload, and tossed into the trunk of a police car before it exploded. No one else was injured, except for the old man, who very unfortunately died. Why he wanted the man with black hair arrested will probably never be known. Perhaps he was the only one paying attention to an altercation that man might’ve had with Jessye Christopher, the only eyewitness who had been watching from his apartment across the street. But, as if he had been struck down by an act of God, he was struck down, and all means of reviving him were taken away. There were no healers around, but that had just been a case a bad luck. All the while, the man with black hair continued smiling, like he had some big secret he wasn’t telling anybody. Corzucan wanted to take him in badly. But he couldn’t. Instead, he continued questioning him on site. Nothing came of it at all. Nothing he didn’t already know. When he got back to the precinct, normalcy continued to take an extended snack break. He got some more coffee, as he felt more tired than he did when he woke up. When he got back into his office, he somehow completely forgot that his floor was strewn with boxes of files and stacks of paper, and tripped over one, his head narrowly missing his desk. His coffee didn’t, though. Splashed nicely on all the papers he had been fooling with earlier. A few more calls came in. Though none were of importance, they still came, and that was still unusual. He got up to go to the bathroom once, and he did so for a half-hour, very certain that he was going to vomit. Which he did. A secretary came in, told him that she was sorry, then proceeded to tell him that one of his daughters had died in a school bus crash, along with thirty-seven other children and the driver. She said the crash was caused by an ambulance which had suddenly swerved, slid onto its side, smashed into it, sending it rocketing off a bridge and onto the rocky ledges below. The ambulance drivers, paramedics, and one certain 15-year-old inside the ambulance survived, despite the fact that one paramedic had been injured terribly, and one of the drivers was going to need some surgery to have all the shards of glass removed from his arms, shoulders, and other various parts of his body. Upon which Corzucan went back to the bathroom and expelled as much bile as his systems could muster. He later asked one of the paramedics why the ambulance had crashed. Turned out their passenger had suddenly began to scrabble through to the front, began laughing a laugh meant only for mental asylum patients, grabbed the wheel, and swerved. Dry heaves ensued. Somewhere, somehow, by some means that normal humans will probably never get to try but will someday fathom, a man with black hair and black eyes smiled. Today had been a fascinating day. Written by Ren Start - 05/27/2002 End - The clock says 4 minutes. Somehow, I really doubt that. Oh, just a continuation, don’t mind me.... |
The C. Force © 1996-2002 Matt Laskowski --- The R. Force and other assorted crap © 1995-2002 Ren