Mobius, Sharon, and Bert
Day 2 | Toon Town Club | Teen
⚠ M is for Murder & N is for Noir
As strange Derleth things went, Sharon had to admit that the time travel weeks were the least strange out of the lot. Even though they were presumably surrounded by animated toons, some of the people who were typically at Derleth were also animated.
On second thought, it was incredibly weird, but so far, and she absolutely knocked lightly on the cherry wood table in front of her, no one was dying or being chased by dinosaurs, no ghosts, no aliens, and everyone seemed to have their memories and their full ability to consent to conversations, so there had been worse weeks, in Sharon's opinion.
Currently she was waiting at a table at the Toon Town Club for Mobius, and to that end, the possibility of a mystery being sent their way. At least, that had been what Valiant & Valiant had told her, and considering that Loki was out cold, Sharon suspected a project to work on might be exactly the thing Mobius needed.
She straightened up as the waiter - an all too attractive fox in a tux - stepped towards her. "May I get you a drink while you're waiting?"
"Yes, please, just a gin and tonic." She glanced up, catching sight of Mobius at the door. "Make that two why don't you?" she added, with a slight nod towards the entrance.
"Absolutely ma'am," a wink - and he was gone.
A Toon Town club - now there was an interesting venue idea if he ever saw one. Mobius wasn’t sure what he was expecting this week but after the last seven days of Derleth where he’d been cursed to run around as a dog during the daytime, how could he even begin to predict anything at all? That was always the issue and he was starting to think that trying to nail shit down was as impossible as trying to blueprint a storm - it just seemed less and less likely, and yet that wouldn’t stop him from trying. Because if he definitely stopped then it definitely wouldn’t happen - and he was far too stubborn to stop.
Besides, investigatory work and research had brought him to Sharon, brought them closer - and that was something he was incredibly grateful for. His feelings for her were starting to kind of evolve and blossom and he continued to be along for the ride - it was a great ride so far. They already knew they made one heck of a team.
Now to just figure out their latest challenge inside a venue that featured penguin waiters, an octopus slinging drinks at the bar, and was that Betty Boop sashaying around with cocktail napkins and a tray? Indeed it was - and, well, alright. The whole vibe of LA as it was now was very noir, very hard-boiled - all flickering street lamps and the curl of smoke and apartment buildings where you were likely to find a bottle of rye whiskey in every spare drawer. Why not, right.
He showed up and spotted his favorite blonde, with Mobius wearing a blue suit appropriate for the era - he adjusted his tie and stooped to kiss the top of her head, then sat across from her. “Hey there, beautiful - was that fox hitting on you?” he smirked but, well, who could blame the cartoon fox?
"I certainly hope so because he was rather foxy," Sharon returned, glancing up to give Mobius a sultry smirk. Yes, she'd just done that, but she rather thought Mobius would appreciate it.
"I ordered a Gin and Tonic for you, but who knows, maybe we'll have time for two. Or maybe we should go find some bottles of our own and take back to campus when we're done. OR maybe both," which did feel like the best way to both take advantage of the moment and to prepare for whatever the future would be because certainly it would throw something ridiculous their way. Why else would they be sitting in a bar, with toons waiting on them.
"This feels very Casablanca," she looked towards the door wondering if their client would show up soon. "Well, except for I'm pretty certain I just saw Betty Boop head for the ladies room."
“Both,” Mobius agreed right away, settling in his chair and thanking the foxy fox when those gin and tonics were dropped off. “Definitely gin, either way.” If you didn’t mix it with something it tasted like Christmas trees but sometimes he was at the point where he just didn’t care. And wanted to get as drunk as possible as quick as possible.
He followed Sharon’s trajectory to the door, then glanced back at her - the lighting in the club was dim, which definitely made the place feel like the happening speakeasy or whatever it was. Like the perfect place to share some secrets - or learn some new ones. “I also saw Betty Boop - almost asked her for an autograph,” he chuckled, reaching over and covering Sharon’s hand with his, stroking between her fingers before there was a bit of a flurry at the door and he thought he caught sight of their ‘client.’
Hard to miss him, anyway - he was a ‘toon through and through, wearing a colorful and baggy zoot suit and had long, floppy ears. Mobius would have guessed his name would be Goofy if he didn’t introduce himself as ‘Bert.’ And then added, “you two cool cats must be who I’m supposed to talk to.”
Valiant had described him, but Sharon didn't entirely believe that the description would be correct until Bert was standing in front of them. She knew that the investigation involved a toon that had been murdered, and so it made sense that it might be another toon who would want answers. She nodded, standing to meet him before offering a chair at their table.
"That's right I'm Sharon, and this is my partner Mobius," she went ahead and introduced them both. Even if they hadn't technically been murder detective partners, they'd been partners in a lot of other things in Derleth, and in some ways this was reminding him of their first investigations together, when they'd bee in Schmigadoon. Granted they'd just been trying to get some answers - not solve a murder.
"It's a pleasure," Bert drawled and he did take the seat, glancing around the room before he did so. "So you know about Dorothy Darling, what happened? They're sayin' it's an accident." He leaned forward, as if he was trying not to be overheard, although Sharon didn't see anyone close enough to worry much at this point, and the singer - a large busted Chipmunk with a very high pitched soprano - seemed likely to keep anyone from over hearing anything they were saying easily.
"That's what they said - that it was supposed to be water, but it wasn't." Sharon filled in the information that they'd heard. "What makes you think it wasn't an accident?"
"I checked the buckets early that day, there wasn't any dip around there. I'd have paid attention to something like that."
Dorothy Darling. That was definitely a name - Mobius kept a straight face though (and it wasn’t like he had any room to talk, since Mobius wasn’t all that normal a name either, whatever counted as normal). “Makes sense,” he nodded, since yeah - he’d believe that a toon would notice the one thing that could kill them easily, whereas in other instances they could be hit by a bus and generally walk away just fine from the whole thing. Not to mention toons on a toon movie set? They wouldn’t just have dip lying around; he was apt to believe that it wasn’t an accident either, but they’d try to collect as much info as they could.
He took a sip of his drink and it was surprisingly decent - again, file that under ‘not sure what he was expecting’ but maybe it was that a toon drink should taste like glitter. Honestly, weirder things had happened. “Can you tell us how Dorothy behaved on set?” he asked, taking out a notepad and getting ready to jot down a few things. “Anyone she was particularly close to, or anyone she already made enemies with? Someone who had a grudge?”
“Well, she was real popular with some - not so popular with others,” Bert snorted. “Heard it was a nasty breakup with one of the stuntmen. She cried on my shoulder about it one night. Mascara ran everywhere.”
Sharon nodded along with Bert's description of events. Like Mobius, she thought it made sense that if he had personally checked something, he would have definitely noticed something like that.
Mentally she made a note, as she took a sip of the drink. She'd missed decent alcohol - it had been long enough since she'd had any that this seemed amazing. Bad romantic break-ups certainly could be something to look into. "Did she mention what facilitated the break-up?"
"He thought she was seeing someone else, accused her of it, they had a right fight about it," Bert frowned. "She really cared for him so it was a bunch of Codswallop naturally, but he was mad as hell. Heard him cursing her out to another guy last week."
"Did he threaten her that you know of?"
"No," Bert admitted. "The cursing was just calling her names, you know? Nothing threatened, that I know of."
Sharon took another sip and glanced across at Mobius, knowing if he had anything to add he would. "Do you know how long between when you checked the props and when the event happened? And perhaps a list of who normally would have had access to that space?"
Mobius was writing this all down, taking adequate notes - he had a good memory but he also just liked to keep things organized. Research was his bread and butter and tools to help him do his job better happened to be the icing on the cake - if he could have, he’d just whip out the TemPad and create another case file but he tried not to use it unless he was working on Derleth research; the battery drained easily and it was sometimes a pain to have to juice it up again.
Plus in the hard times, hard-boiled Casablanca era, that kind of tech would just scare the crap out of people.
“It wasn’t long at all,” Bert said, adjusting his cartoon fedora (because of course he wore one, and it was probably supposed to look snazzy but, well. Cartoon. Mobius didn’t think he/d get used to that but it wasn’t like he’d have much time to try since they were only going to be here for a week). “A couple-a’ days. I can get you a list though, but granted, most of the folks on set had access. It’s a real snarl of a thing.”
“Did she have any other noteworthy connections? Or friends, anyone else jilted?” was Mobius’s next question.
“Both - she was successful. Loved. Adored by most. But she also had collected a lot of secrets to be able to use on her climb to the top, you know what I’m saying? There were lots of rumors of jealousy.” Oh yeah, Mobius had a feeling Sharon knew all about collecting secrets to use as leverage - it was the smart thing to do when you were building an empire, or had bigger places to be.
That seemed problematic, when having access to a space allowed for the possibility of someone killing a toon, but Sharon just nodded. It would make their job more difficult, probably, because they would have to figure out who had the motive, and then that they had possibly been in the area with the bucket and could have filled it.
"If you could get a list that would be helpful," Sharon told Bert, reaching for her drink to hide a smile as he adjusted his fedora. She knew it was just what she was used to, but it was difficult to take seriously someone who felt a little like Goofy. At the same time, she'd seen some of the signs around LA, and suspected that there was prejudice in this version of it, and she didn't want to add to it. Even if the amusement was there. She took a sip. "And if you could take that list and note anyone who might have had a contentious relationship with Miss Darling. It would help us narrow things down," Sharon said.
"Yeah, yeah, I can do that," Bert said, and there was an edge of emotion to his voice. He ducked his head for a moment and looked between them. "She was a good friend though, and yeah, you don't get to the top without pissin' some folks off, but she didn't deserve to go like this. She had a good career ahead of her and, well there's folks that'll miss her. I'd like to see whoever done this be brought to justice." . Poor guy. Mobius felt for him - he seemed to really care about Dorothy, plus the idea of murder on your film set just didn’t sit well. The idea was to make a cinematic triumph, not be wondering who replaced the water with actual dip - they probably never even considered that would happen. It was a shame.
Maybe Mobius was just tender-hearted - actually, he knew that was true. Oh, well.
“We’ll do all that we can to assure justice is served,” he promised, slipping his notebook back into his suit jacket pocket. Then he went back to his drink, the coolness of it refreshing - and if they could bring back more bottles to make more gin and tonics, he’d consider Toon Town to be a successful week.