Fincher and Bobby entered the room in the back of Shadow Manor accompanied by the men who hired them both.

The room had barely been touched since the discovery of the gruesome scene. Fincher waddled from the doorway over to the two dead bodies which were inflicted with hundreds of stab wounds between the two of them.

Fincher leaned over and inspected the wounds closely noting a scalpel to be lodged in one of the victim’s eyes. As the two bodies lay atop one another on the medical examination table, he first inspected Jaime’s body on top, the banker.

He ran his hand along Jaime’s chest feeling the wounds, and he mumbled to himself, “Hmm. I see. I see.”

He then gripped the scalpel handle and yanked it out of Jaime’s eyeball. As he did, he let out a hushed and frightened scream before resuming his normal heavy and audible breathing pattern.

Bobby asked him, “Is everything okay, boss?”

Fincher waved Bobby off with an annoyed flick of his hand, “God damnit, Bobby. Don’t interrupt me.”

Fincher then let out an exhausted breath and said, “Excuse me gentlemen, I need to take a short rest in this chair here. Bobby, you do the rest. Collect as many specimens as you can.”

“Yes sir!” Bobby jumped at the opportunity to help his boss.

Meanwhile, Fincher quickly dozed off as he took his seat and began to snore loudly.

As Bobby worked diligently, General Curtis entered the room and walked directly over to Bobby, “Thank you for coming, Detective Fincher. I hear you are the very best in your field.”

Bobby turned around with a smile, “Oh, I’m not Detective Fincher. I’m Bobby Steele. Fincher’s assistant.” Bobby then pointed to his boss asleep in the chair snoring more and more loudly. “That’s the great Detective Fincher.”

Curtis furrowed his brow and scowled, “That is Detective Fincher? I see.” He let out an exasperated sigh right as Fincher snored loudly apparently waking himself from his short nap.

“Huh?! Oh?! Unhand me!” Fincher leaned up and took note of the room staring at him, “Pardon me. I seemed to have been dreaming.”

He struggled to stand but eventually rose to both feet and greeted General Curtis, “Fincher here. You’ve got an interesting case here General Curtis. Are you sure you want to know who did this? Might be better to just let sleeping dogs lie, you know.”

Curtis nodded, “I am intent on knowing, yes. What are your preliminary findings?”

“Well, this was a crime born of hate. Whether that hate originated with these men, or whether they were simply the recipients of it, I cannot be sure. I can tell you she, Miss Sareena Night, is a powerful ki user.”

Curtis furrowed his brow once again, “They don’t call you the best for nothing Fincher. You have a suspect in mind don’t you?”

Fincher looked around, “I work best with coffee and donuts. Do you happen to have any?” He looked around and spotted them, “Oh my, there they are.”

He picked up a donut and took a big, fate bite out of it. Then as he chewed, he managed to say, “I do have a suspect. But you wouldn’t believe me if I told you. The only way to prove it would be to wait for more murders to occur. And I can all but guarantee there will be more.”

General Curtis smirked, “Entertain me with your outlandish suspect after a cursory inspection of what you’ve seen here.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Fincher grabbed a cup of black coffee promptly spilling the overfilled cup on the floor, “Uhhhh.” He looked at the spilled coffee until Curtis interjected, “Just leave it. I will have someone clean it. Now you were saying.”

Fincher straightened his posture and took a big gulp of coffee, “My number one suspect is a dead woman. Now you said you wanted to know…”

Curtis nodded once again growing more and more irritated with Fincher until Fincher finally gave in, “Okay, very well. My number one suspect is Xenia Victoria BloodStar.”

Curtis’s face contorted with both fear, confusion, and anger, “That’s. Not. Possible. Xenia BloodStar had an open casket funeral. Master Heraklinos himself declared her formally dead after extensive tests. Extensive tests! All you have done is sleep upon your first examination!”

Fincher chuckled to himself, “I know. I know. This case will make more sense after we analyze everything.”

Curtis cut his talking point short, “Then you best be going to analyze everything. I want a more concrete answer supported by more than just hunches by tomorrow.”

Fincher called out, “Bobby! You got everything! We need to get to work.”

Bobby came running out of the room with several specimen containers and various swabs, “Good to go boss! I even found several hairs for us to analyze!”

Fincher grabbed the box of donuts and looked to Curtis, “Uhhh do you mind if I –“

Curtis snapped at him, “Take the damn donuts! And call me when you have something!”

Fincher nodded and both he and Bobby scurried out of the room.

Curtis folded his arms thinking, “So we have hired a lazy, fat, fool who jumps to ridiculous conclusions. God damnit. I’ll give him some time to work, but I am not impressed thus far.”

Although Curtis knew Fincher’s hunch was an absolute joke, he also couldn’t shake the terrifying thought of having wronged a true BloodStar.

________________________________________

Fincher and Bobby began the short drive home with Bobby asking, “Do you really suspect Xenia BloodStar? She’s confirmed dead by the Jarek Heraklinos.”

Fincher sat in the passenger seat eating donuts, “Well. You tell me what you think. When I touched the wounds I had an overwhelming rush of residual ki. I could hardly process it. I’ve never had so much ki attack me like that, especially after being latent for so long on a dead body.”

“Then I had a flash of an image, a beautiful woman stabbing these men over and over with passionate rage.”

“But the biggest shock was when I grabbed the scalpel handle. I could feel her touch. I could hear her voice saying ‘There is no good. And there is no bad. There is only me, and there is only death. There is only Xenia Victoria BloodStar. And good or bad, I plan to throw a lot of dead men at my feet until this world is mine!”

Fincher paused with a blank stare on his face before saying, “Then she vanished without a trace. I have no idea what that means. For such powerful ki to simply vanish… we have certainly delved into deep waters all of a sudden.”

Bobby had a huge smile on his face, “Are you for real?! We could be the two who unearth one of the biggest fake death stories of all time!” He threw his head back, “We are going to be famous.”

Fincher breathed heavily as he lit up a cigarette, “Famous. Or dead.”

He took a few puffs and rolled the window down, “We need to compare the ki signature on those hairs you found to the signature on the Bella Domina bursts. Then we need to implore General Curtis to speak with St. Michael to confirm with Master Heraklinos that Xenia really is dead. Of course, this is all a hunch… it could be a powerful woman who fancies herself as a copycat.”

Fincher began to chain smoke as he blazed through several cigarettes in no time, “Nonetheless, Xenia or not, we need to be extra careful. And we need to keep our ears to the ground. More murders means more clues. And we need all the clues we can get.”

Bobby was still overjoyed with the thrill of hunting down such a huge catch; however, Fincher had hunted dangerous ki users in the past, and he was wary of the dangers. His ki ability to catch glimpses of the past through residual ki had allowed him to catch all kinds of criminals throughout his career. However, he had never felt anything so vibrant upon touching it.

Fincher grunted as he picked up his last cigarette in the box. He lit it up and began to puff on it thinking to himself, “I’ve worked my entire career to land this case. I will not be outplayed. I must make every move with expert precision less I find the recently dead Xenia BloodStar at my door.”

Bobby and Fincher pulled into the old brick building. Bobby began to unload everything from the car while Fincher waddled his way inside to find more cigarettes and coffee.

Fincher hollered to Bobby, “I’ll be smoking and eating donuts while watching the game. Call me as soon as you have something.”

Bobby confirmed with a nod as he grit his teeth carrying in an extremely heavy box behind Fincher. Fincher suddenly stopped on the stairs causing Bobby to bump into him, “And don’t forget. Not a word of this to anyone! As hunters of big game, we do not want to spook our prey.”