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byrdstrolls · 8 months ago

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Meet-Cute

(teehee, wil and melina belong to @dirgelwch!!)

Wilmar Roheir was probably the worst person you could have picked to investigate this case. This is not said as a detriment, but as a disclaimer. He was excellent at reading people. He was good with hard, physical evidence. His mind was as sharp as it ever was in connecting dots and finding patterns. But his damning flaw would be his lack of experience with technology. The key strings and pieces that tied together each of Tyler’s victims were purely digital. The pattern in the victims was clear. They were all jadeblood women, aged 20-25. They had similar horns, facial features, sometimes even clothes. They were all unarmed, killed by gunfire. His first guess would be some kind of psychosocial obsession with replicating perhaps the first victim. The pathos was the easy part to understand. How the killer found them?

Er, He had no idea.

The deaths weren’t pinned down by any one location. The killer traveled long distances sporadically. There was no physical trail of evidence, no repeated character or place in any of their lives. They came from different caverns, towns, backgrounds. Their homes were never broken into, the front door left open as if inexplicably, each and every single woman let the killer in. Several even had more robust security systems that were deactivated seemingly by administrator. Perhaps the killer had some kind of voodoos that made them pliant, or allowed him to track them down all across the country.

But maybe he didn’t need to know that. Maybe he didn’t need to understand the complex digital web Oswell had enclosed around Alternia. Maybe all he needed to know was the pattern, because it was predictable, because it was concise and never varied. Because just maybe, he could find a troll that fit the exact profile before the killer did, and simply cozy down in a stakeout and wait. It was something he had put on the backburner. The private investigator worked several cases at once, and the time consuming work of looking through records for a jade with a similar horn shape was something he’d sometimes just knock out 30-45 minutes of at the end of a long day.

It had only been last week he had found one. A librarian, a two to three hour drive from here. He had made the trip, and had the difficult conversation with her that he suspected she might soon be targeted by a murderer. He had given her his contact information, and told her to call if she saw ‘anything suspicious. Anything suspicious at all’. Monday through Thursday, radio silence. Friday morning, the woman had rung him up to tell him she had gotten a strange text, threatening her with blackmail and demanding to meet up in person. Incredible, that it had happened so fast. He wasn’t sure if he could call it lucky or unlucky. Just a little chilling. Had he been even just a week later, this lady could have died.

The blackmail explained their willingness to meet with the killer, at least a little. He buckled up and made the long drive down to this woman’s hive again. The trap that could be laid from there was idiot proof. Agreeing to meet with the killer, Wilmar could hide in a nearby closet or something, and simply pop out once the troll was in sight and subdue him. He sat down at the kitchen table, and with the woman drafted and sent a willing response. The dots on the other side of the screen danced for a moment, disappearing, and appearing again.

[Haha okay] the killer says. [Just one question! I noticed you made a phone call at 10:21 earlier tonight :> Wondering what that was about <3]

Wil stared down at the phone. Wondering how the hell they knew what kind of calls she was making.

[was talking with my hive cleaners] he answers.

[Wowwwww that's funny because I ran a search on the number and it actually pops up for a private investigator firm. The economy truly is in shambles if you’ve got detectives vacuuming your rugs.]

[Irenie, do you pretty please promise, that when I show up at your hive you wont send out some kind of guy with a gun in a wig, right? Like you’re not that stupid. And neither am I. And I would kill you and leak your sensitive images anyways.]

“What’s he saying?” Asks the concerned Irenie to him from across the room, and he sighs, squinting at the phone keyboard. Not wanting to scare her.

“More threats.” Wilmar answers, and that's not a complete lie, is it?

“Are you sure this is safe?” She asks.

“I’ll be right here the whole time.” He answers, trying to compose another text.

[I promise]

Simple and to the point.

[And I’m just supposed to take you at your word?] The killer answers.

[you asked.]

[More as a demeaning hypothetical to illustrate my knowledge more than anything.]

[it's only been a few hours. You really think a detective was able to make the trip all the way down here for a minor blackmailing threat? Those assholes didn’t send me anybody.]

[They’re still gonna be poking around once things are over.]

[when things are ‘over’?] He answers. Two can play at the game of catching someone one out. The typing bubble appears again, and then disappears.

[Yes, when our meeting is over. You’re gonna call them again.] He responds, barely skipping a beat.

[can’t we just talk this out, like civil trolls? I don’t even know you. Why are you doing this to me]

[I need something from you. It will only take a second.]

[then get over here already] he pleads. [Whatever you want, you can have it. Don’t leak my images.]

[If there's a detective there you’re both dead, do you understand?]

[I understand. It’s just me. I won’t call them again.]

The bubble appears, and disappears again.

[okay.] The killer says, finally. [see you.]

Wilmar sets down the phone, pushing up his glasses, barely able to believe that worked. And then passively scolds himself for celebrating so early. The troll could still not show. But judging from how the killer had spoken, he seemed to be missing a key part of the puzzle, that he was already working with Irenie prior to the call this morning.

The good thing about not working digitally, is that things like Wilmars initial drive out and verbal conversation with the woman months were invisible to him. No phone record. Perhaps the story he had spun about the agency not being able to send someone out this early and quickly seemed reasonable to Tyler.

He was not sure what he expected when he climbed in between Irenie’s sweater, squeezing himself just barely into a closet in her living room. He left the door ever so slightly ajar, not wanting to break the woman's doorknob by kicking it out, lifted his pistol close to his chest, and hunkered down.

“Can you see me?” He calls out.

“No,” Irenie answers, wringing her hands. “You’re a big guy tho, it can’t be comfortable.”

“I’ll manage.”

“Are you sure you don’t want snacks, or anything?” She says.

Wilmar pauses, blinking incredulously. Of course not. He needed his hands free, and the killer would be showing up in only about ten minutes. But he should not be harsh. People say all kinds of silly things when they’re scared.

“I’m fine.” He answers. “But thank you.”

The jadeblood paces back and forth, and Wil stares at the wooden grain of the door.

The previous victims had not been large, but there often seemed to be some kind of struggle. Judging by the autopsies, the killer was not that skilled a shot, seeming to rely on being the only one with a gun and just shooting it repeatedly. Best case scenario, he manages to quickly disarm him. He wasn’t expecting a huge troll here. Trolls who kill for pleasure usually only use guns if they have no other choice, if they don't have a physical advantage that would allow them to overpower and spend more time with the victim. His first guess had been that the Killer was some kind of jade, or highblood government official, who would have access to a vast amount of records that would lead him into finding these women. He had guessed he was small.

But, glancing as the troll walks in, he had not thought he would be that small, that sickly looking. Ding Ding for highblood, though, he thinks, catching a glimpse of what sure appears to be fuschia eyes through the crack of the door. The guy has a gun in one hand, and a photograph in the other.

“Hi” Tyler says, and bizarrely, holds the photograph up seemingly to compare it with the victim's face.

He could ponder the implications of this later. The troll was distracted. This was his moment. Wil slams open the door, and fires a shot out the window, having a triple purpose both to distract, scare, and warn the attacker. Tyler jumps, and then he just rushes him, hands closing down on the man’s weapon, and after a moment's struggle, wriggling it out of his grasp. He was small, but he was definitely spirited, scratching and biting and letting out several anguished noises.

“Hey” Wil says sternly. He had two guns, what did this guy think he was accomplishing here? He winces as the guy’s nails dig into him, and resolves to just reach over, and grab the serial killer by the scruff of his hoodie, lifting him up like a disobedient kitten, and holding him just out of reach.

“Hey” He repeats, a little more loudly.

“Kill him!!” Irenie exclaims suddenly in a random twist of vengefulness.

“Calm down,” Wilmar says. “Both of you. He’s disarmed.”

The woman stares for a moment, rouses, before smoothing out her dress.

“Sorry.” She says flatly. “Got carried away.”

“I will make your life hell,” Tyler says. “I will send every nsfw text you’ve ever sent to your employer if you don’t set me down right now. You have no idea who you’re messing with. I could destroy you with the click of a button!”

“N-s-f-w?” Wilmar answers, completely sidestepping this threat by a simple way of not understanding acronyms.

“If you kill or arrest me” He says. “You and everyone you love will regret it until the day you die.” Tyler threatens, having another fit of trying to attack him and failing.

“Uh huh” Wilmar answers, unphased. “Shaking in my boots.”

He turns back to Irenie.

“I’m gonna head back to the office” He says, tilting his head at the redhead. “I’ll keep you updated.”

The little guy continues to try punching him, maybe even landing an odd blow but not having a lot of force behind them. Eventually, Wil wants this to not be his problem anymore enough that he grabs the man’s arms, flipping him over and handcuffing them behind his back. He’s smaller than him, but this still requires a little bit of force. Suddenly, he squints, glancing down at a spot on the troll's wrist where, for the lack of a better word, the color of the troll's skin has smudged ever so slightly, like a well set foundation.

He is baffled for only half a second, but unfortunately for Tyler, he has already met one of his kind before. This case only gets more confusing as it goes. The last thing on Alternia he expected was a human serial killer. Against his will, enough of a vague sense of pity encapsulates him that he decides not to inform Irenie of this discovery.

“Are you gonna kill him there?” Irenie asks.

“We’ll figure it out once we get there,” Wilmar answers.

Tyler suddenly pauses his wriggling.

“My photograph!” The alien insists suddenly. “Grab my photograph! I won’t leave without it!” He says, as if he still has any kind of choice in the matter.

Irenie, possessed by curiosity, starts to walk over towards where the thing had dropped on the floor.

“Stay back bitch!” The human insists, kicking his legs in the way, trying to drag the polaroid back near him with his feet to varying degrees of success.

“I got it,” Wilmar says, leaning down to pick up the thing.

In the half a second he does not have a hand on him, Tyler immediately sprints for the door, only to be tripped by Irenie putting out her leg to trip him. Wil sighs.

“Are you gonna be like this the whole way?” He says, pocketing the photograph. Tyler does not answer, only glaring daggers with his vibrant, sunken eyes, and Wil picks him up off the floor and throws him over his shoulder. It was probably going to be a long two and half hour drive.

By the time they got to the office, the murderer had changed his tune. In an almost ridiculous one eighty, Tyler had turned into a picture of politeness and kind hearted restraint perhaps in the hopes of sucking up enough to get out of this whole thing. He could easily tell he was lying with his pssionics, but he might not have needed them even with how the human was acting. Chronically online was not a term that was in Wilmar’s vocabulary nor sphere of reference, but he was able to surmise that the man’s social skills were sorely lacking.

“Mr. Detective” Tyler says, as he had suddenly taken to calling him mid car ride. “This is all a big misunderstanding.”

“How so?” He says, flipping through his desk for the paperwork he needed to finish filing this case.

“You hunt murderers- that's the same thing I do! We’re on the same side, really.” Oswell insists, tilting his head.

Suddenly, Wilmar pauses. Confusingly, the alien appeared to be telling the truth, or at the very least, he believed he was telling the truth.

“What did 30-40 unrelated jadeblood women ever do to you?” He asks.

“They- Mr Detective, one of them killed someone close to me. I’m just trying to figure out who.”

Wil pulls the photo out of his pocket, the pieces sliding together, Tyler freezes as he stares down at the picture. Perhaps the human had just recalled his very not troll mother was clearly in frame.

“This lady?” Wilmar says, pointing at Taylor, taking the whole alien thing so nonchalantly it confused him. There is a long pause before he answers.

“Yes,” Tyler says slowly.

“So you’re looking for this woman” He says. “Trying to find this murderer, and just… killing every single woman with a vague resemblance to her just in case?”

The Alien does not answer.

“I am sorry to break it to you,” Wilmar says. “But that is not even remotely close to anything I do as a detective.”

“Not even a little bit?”

The cerulean cusp sighs, touching the bridge of his nose, trying to think of how to handle this. He couldn’t give him over to law enforcement, he’d immediately be culled. But he couldn’t just let him run around massacring people either. He continues to shuffle through his papers, thinking.

“Okay” He says, straightening a pile of reports by taping it on the desk. “How about this? I let you go, you stop murdering people, and I take on this case and find this woman’s killer for you.”

Perhaps forgetting he was supposed to be being charismatic and demure, Tyler Oswell laughs out loud.

“Are you deranged?” He says. “Are you stupid? Is it crack that you smoke? I have been looking since I was thirteen years old. I have an entire galactic empire to search and the hunt has consumed me for half a decade. You think you can just FIND the troll that murdered my parents? You think you can just FIND them???” He says. Then, he finally seems to recall he wants to leave this place, and get out of here consequence free.

“I mean,” he says. “You must be very good at your job, Mr. Detective. Sure, that deal seems fair to me.”

Wil squints back at him, and then exhales. “Alright” He says. “I still have some things I need to file regarding this. Wait out front and I’ll be there in just a second.”

It does not take long lingering in the lobby for Tyler to figure out he’s being watched. A minor debate happens in his mind on whether or not to turn his head and notify whoever was across the way he had noticed, out of fear of both violence and awkwardness. Eventually, in a series of slow, hopefully natural looking movements, he shifts his sight far enough that direction to notice the other troll in the room.

She was a woman, standing calmly across the way in a long Victorian gown. She had long, platinum white hair that curled where it fell on her collarbone. Wasn’t that an unusual color for trolls? His mind went immediately to his own redheadedness, and then quickly dismissed the comparison as silly, but a misplaced feeling of solidarity did not fade. She was dressed modestly, which he liked. She had a smile that well, could not quite be called serene but there was something distant about it. She was taller than him, by at least four to five inches, and he could not decide whether this upset him or not. With a careful unease, the thought crossed his mind that, between a gender segregated boarding school, and male juvenile detention center on earth, and never leaving his hive on Alternia, Tyler had not really had a lot of chances to have more than passing conversations with women since he was young. His gaze slid away from her to the floor, suddenly frustrated by this.

“Hi,” He says. “Are you the like, secretary?” Coming out swinging with a misplaced sexism that his teachers in Edinburgh would have been proud of but only confused Melina.

“The what?” She answers.

“You know, the lady up front who answers calls and does paperwork” he describes.

For an elongated moment, the troll simply stares at him blankly.

He begins to feel uncomfortable, suddenly. Knowing that this alien did not have the background on complicated gender dynamics of earth to understand that what he said had been demeaning, but inside some hidden part of him he was unwilling to admit, he knew its implications.

“No.” She answers, finally, continuing to flash that smile.

“Sorry” he says nonchalantly. “I haven’t talked to a girl in years.”

“Ah” She answers. “That’s alright.” The troll takes a step or two closer.“My name is Melina,” She says. “What’s your’s, if you’re willing to share?”

Comforted by the familiarity of her politeness, he relaxes a little.

“I’m Tyler Oswell” He says, offering a small half smile. “It’s nice to know some people still have manners” He remarks, as if he himself had not just been asking Wilmar if he smokes crack and threatening to leak his nudes not so long ago.

“I’ve known one of your kind before” She says, regarding him with an intense and possessed curiosity in her eyes.

“You have?” He asks, made only mildly self conscious by it, curious as well.

Suddenly, a darkness flashes across her gaze, as if remembering something unpleasant, or maybe painful.

“Yes” She answers. “I didn’t know there were more of you around” She says, artfully sidestepping a deeper explanation regarding Vinh, the playfulness returning to her gaze. “Why are you handcuffed?”

“Silly reasons” he dismisses, turning his hands in the cuffs. Suddenly, he is taken by a bizarre desire to do something impressive.

“Wanna see a trick I learned in earth juvie?” He says.

“Earth what?” She answers.

He does not answer, instead deciding to put extravagant amounts of effort into trying to shim the cuff’s Wilmar had put on him, and frustratedly not being able to manage it. The more Melina gazed as this bizarre looking behavior with confusion, the more frantic he became, pushing his knuckles together more and more forcefully, until, with a tiny, upsetting little crack, he is able to pull his hands from the cuffs, having severely cut into his index finger.

“Are you alright?” Melina asks.

“I’m fine” he answers, blinking back tears.

She stares at him for a moment.

“I’ll grab a bandage” She says, “The denizens of Earth Juvie do not appear to be as reliable a teacher as you imply them to be.” She says.

“It’s- that barely hurt” he insists. But Melina does not seem to entertain this response, returning with a small bandage anyways. He winced as the purpleblood carefully cleaned and wrapped the wound. She lingered perhaps just a little bit too long at the sight of his bright red, human blood, which upset him.

“Why are you here if you don’t work here? Also under arrest?” He asks.

“No,” She says, with a slight tilt of her head. “I’m friends with one of the detectives.”

“The blue one?” Tyler says.

“Do you mean Wilmar…?” Melina replies, ever so slightly confused.

“Never asked his name” The human replies. “Is he blue?”

“You may not know this, as an alien” Mel answers. “But that’s a strange way to refer to someone's blood color. Blue encompasses several castes.”

Yes or no question! He wants to retort. But in a remarkable show of restraint and slightly condescending ‘respect’ for women, an earth specialty that regarded the other gender as much too fragile for such things, he does not.

“Sorry.” He says. “I couldn’t tell which.”

“My friend is an indigo cerulean cusp,” She says.

“That would explain it.” He says, slightly unhappy she was close with the man, Tyler did not have any real fondness for him.

“Have you been on Alternia long?” She asks. “How are you finding it?”

“Pshh” He mutters. “Not very long” he lies. It has been five years. But he doesn’t want to tell her that, because it would make his cultural blunders harder to justify.

“I could show you around,” She says. “If you’d like.” And then she pauses. “Perhaps also help you with a better disguise” She says.

It’s not the first time someone had told him that, but the way she quietly sidesteps outright remarking on his stupidity pleases him. He glances back at Wilmar’s office.

“I don’t know how long this will take.” he says, lifting up his left hand and glancing at the one cuff still attached, the other swinging below it. He pauses. Contemplating just dipping from here as he had many times attempted to do earlier. But, he did not feel altogether mentally prepared for an outing the likes of which Melina had described. It felt like the kind of thing he needed at least a day to convince himself to do at least.

“Could I have your number?” He asks, pulling out his phone. “And maybe we could meet up some other time?”

“Sure,” Melina says, taking out her phone as well to recite it to the strange little man.

Tyler Oswell constructed the first non-murder victim phone contact he had made in years, writing down Melina’s name and number. The conversation was more friendly and curious than everything, but by the time made it home for the day he had already retroactively decided and imagined he had been quite suave.

#serial killer tw #<---no deaths in drabble #blackmail tw #sexism tw #tyler writing #my writing #fantroll #fantroll rp #homestuck #homestuck oc #homestuck rp

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