teaganmitchell (teaganmitchell) wrote in horror_story, @ 2013-05-09 13:28:00 |
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Entry tags: | complete, cycle002, mike, teagan |
Who: Teagan and Mike
When: January 15th, evening (Say... half past 6ish?)
Where: Starts at the Donnelly Home, goes to The Woods.
What: Teagan's trying to help out the PoPo in her own way. She's not meant for policework.
Warning: Character death, language.
It was the night after the funeral home exploded, and a younger Teagan would have already been out there, picking through the remains for morbid souvenirs. Not even a much younger Teagan. The Teagan Donnelly of four months ago would have been eager to go, dragging Charlie in her wake and hoping to find something interesting. A piece of bone, perhaps. A warped scalpel. She could remember the scheduled demolition of the paper mill in the woods when she was little. How the town had all gone out to watch, toting picnic blankets and making an impromptu event out of it. The boom had been deafening, but the hushed silence of the crowd, followed by the cheer, had been something else, altogether. After all, who didn't love a big explosion?
Being an adult sucked sometimes. She didn't have time to check the wreckage, as much as she might have liked to. If she were being entirely honest with herself, she was a little worried that she might find bits of Charlie in the rubble. Her friend was still missing, and as days passed it was difficult to buy that he was holing up with her sister. His mom was a wreck, thinking he must be dead. Waiting for his body to turn up. Charlie liked his parents, and he wouldn't worry them like that. He could be inconsiderate and selfish, but that sort of cruelty wasn't in his nature.
Then again, Tatum hadn't exactly been acting according to her nature, either. But that was at least partially puberty, Teagan was sure. Charlie was over twenty-one years of age and didn't have the hormone excuse anymore. Besides, it had seemed more likely that he'd run away with Tatum than get himself murdered. Charlie was a follower, and if Tatum was playing the lead bitch in her own little play, Charlie wouldn't have been a difficult target for mind games and manipulations. The only real hole in that theory was the fact that Tatum didn't really like boys, but then neither did the Crows Landing Killer, or whatever they were going to call him. The newspaper sure wasn't committing to anything. They wouldn't even connect all the deaths, which seemed ridiculous to her. How could they not all be related? It might be more than one guy, but if it was, then it was more than one guy working as a group. Not multiple people in town suddenly deciding to turn homicidal for no reason. That made no sense.
In any event, all the deaths had been women so far, or at least mostly. Sully St. Claire wasn't technically a girl, but she'd looked like one, so that counted. The only boy they'd found murdered was Chase Parry, but Teagan had a gut feeling that whoever had killed Chase had done it to get to Jenny. Jenny Parry was very pretty, very sweet, but a spitfire when it came to her son. No way she'd just go with a psychopath and leave him behind. So they probably had to kill Chase to make her docile. Kill her spirit, so she wouldn't try to escape when they raped her to death, or whatever it was they did.
And even if Mike McBrayer wasn't the ringleader of the operation, he had to at least be part of it. It was too coincidental, otherwise, in a case that started with Susanna Wilson. They went after women. Pretty, ones at that. Young ones. Obscenely young ones, in some cases. Not nebbishy boys. Charlie would've been of no use to them. Which meant Charlie was either in hiding for some reason... Or Dr. Frankenbrit had finally made good with the lobotomy. Drilled a few holes in his skull and then lit the place up to cover up the evidence when it all went awry.
Farfetched, perhaps, but not unlikely. Not all that unlikely at all. They'd been expecting such a thing from the creepy old doctor for years, or at least she had. Teagan didn't for a second believe that the mortician was really dead. She'd bet every penny left of her (admittedly meager) savings that he'd just skipped town. Hell, maybe he was involved in the other deaths, too. Mike McBrayer killing off women, dumping their remains to keep Dr. O'Neill in fresh parts in exchange for a tidy sum. A mutually beneficial arrangement. Possibly involving Marcus Caravahlo, as well.
Oh! And then Charlie had found out about it! He'd already been suspicious. Not of his boss, but of his boss's dealings with Caravahlo... maybe McBrayer had started swinging by as well, tipping Charlie off - finally - to the evil at foot in the basement of the funeral home. Maybe Charlie had been imprisoned all these weeks... and had set the explosion, himself, to put a stop to it. Noble sacrifice. Beautifully cinematic. She only wished she could have been there to help him.
If that was really how it had gone down. She wouldn't know until she had more facts to work with, and it was high time she got to work on that. Teagan had tried twice now to get a hold of McBrayer through the auto shop that he worked out, but he hadn't been showing up to work. Sadly, even Avery Weston had apparently started blowing off shifts, so there hadn't even been an opportunity to flirt either time she'd gone by. It had been such a simple plan, too. Lure Mike out with the tow truck, get him to take her home. He'd be reluctant, sure, but there was no reason for him to be afraid of her. He was the dangerous one. He'd probably jump at the chance for another helpless victim. Alas, the bastard had to be truant. Well, that just called for a back-up plan. Teagan was nothing if not resourceful. If she couldn't get Mike McBrayer where he worked, she'd go to where he lived, and everyone knew that little tidbit. Mike was infamous, but aside from that, his would be the trailer marked as management. Easy enough.
She packed a bag for them with the same care that her father had taken when packing for their picnic to the paper plant demolition. Like he was getting ready for the 4th of July. Because Mike would recognize the Lemon, Teagan decided to borrow her daddy's car. She was already borrowing his gun and cuffs. Why not his car, as well? Really, he'd never been in a more generous spirit than he had lately. The peace at home was well worth the price of the smell.
Then she got ready as if for a date. Went the whole nine yards with the glam makeup. Dark, fake lashes, blood red lips, hint of blush to define her cheeks. She even did her hair. Spending the time to smooth it out and put some body in it. Making herself pretty. There was no good reason for doing this, but Teagan had never needed a good reason to play dress-up. She'd jump at any excuse. Besides, it seemed appropriate to look nice for her very first suspect interrogation. Why not? No harm in it. She tried on several different outfits, finally settling on a seasonally inappropriate, sleeveless, charcoal mini dress and a pair of witchy boots that gave her several inches in height. The outfit didn't scream authority figure, but the neckline of the dress worked with the bird skull necklace her sister had given her, and she thought she looked good. After putting on her jewelry and the last final touches to her makeup, she tucked some costume opera gloves in her purse just in case, grabbed her large, shapeless coat, and left the house to head out for The Woods.
Her backup plan wasn't very elaborate. There wasn't much in the way of subterfuge at all. She just drove over to Mike McBrayer's place in her father's car, intending to knock on his door.