Chapter Text
(PROLOGUE) Case 0: Ring Around the Rosie / (CHAPTER 1) Case 1: Death of Rosa Wolf
5/22/1988
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It was dark when Samuel King woke up from his slumber, Donna's form loosely clung to his as their house phone on the nightstand rung, cutting through the ambient sound of Late-Night Grimsborough. He groaned as he rubbed his face, feeling the stubble growing in on his jawline as he sat up, picking up the phone. “Samuel King, How can I help you?” He spoke in the stock-standard response that the GPD expected of him, though the exhaustion and irritability in his voice was more than clear.
“I apologize for calling so late, Inspector King.” The voice of Chief Patterson buzzed from the other end of the phone. “But we were called to a potential homicide scene at 333 Solomon Drive.” The address was processed by King, who's eyes widened and shot out of bed, startling Donna.
“I'll be right there. Tell the responding officers to secure the scene until I get there.” Without any other questioning he hung up, rummaging in his closet for his uniform.
“Sammy?” Donna's exhausted voice slowly called out as he swiftly got dressed. “What's going on? Is everything alright, darling?” Samuel shook his head as he pressed a kiss to Donna's forehead.
“No, no it's not.. it.. it's Evelyn and Imogen - their home, a potential homicide was called at their house. I… I'll keep you updated when I know more.” Samuel pressed a frantic kiss on Donna's lip, running out the door as she called out for him to be careful. He knew exactly what had happened - more so who did it. As soon as he got to the drive scene in record time, there were already officers on the scene.
His partner looked up, hazel eyes shining with recognition and exhaustion. “Sam, hey-”
“Where is the body?” King immediately interjected, pushing past him to enter the house. His partner paused for a moment before following him quickly.
“In the bedroom, it- it's horrific- There's a child in there too-” King immediately sped up, racing up the stars and pushing through the officers that crowded the room.
“Get out of my way!” He barked at the officers, pushing them aside. Once he pushed past, the forms of a body laying on the bed and a trembling, small child. King glanced at the body for a while before his full attention was drawn to the trembling child, who upon further inspection had a distant, terrified look on his face.
“Imogen!” King called out, rushing towards him to kneel down. ‘Imogen’ shrunk away from him, his blood-soaked hands threaded tightly in his brown locks. Eventually, his eyes flashed with recognition and he leaped towards him, clinging onto him as if he was his last lifeline before he drowned. King slowly ran his hands up and down his shaking back, he could feel his heart racing against his chest. Imogen didn't speak a peep, Which was normal to his usual behavior - but it was especially haunting this time. He sobbed into his shoulder, King leaned his head against the child's. “It's okay, it's… I'm here now, I'm here now. You're not in any danger, my boy.” King picked up the child, barking orders at the rest to manage the scene of the crime as he whisked Imogem away to safety – the Police Department.
–
“Inspector King.” The Chief of Police acknowledged as he entered his office, slowly sitting down. “How is the investigation? Have you identified any suspects?”
King deeply inhaled, his analytical eyes staring down his chief. “Yes. We’ve identified five suspects so far. Ashton Cooper, who was last seen with the suspect and her son before her murder. Alden Greene, a businessman who had sent her encoded threats of financial ruin. Serena Johnson, a socialite of Maple Heights and old friend of Evelyn. Howard Johnson, son of Serena and had been sending her several love letters and gifts – all of which being rejected…” He sighed, clenching his fists. “...And Milton Grimmes, the victim’s ex-husband and prison warden. Their relationship ended very poorly, which resulted in Evelyn gaining full custody of Imogen.”
The Chief hummed, resting his chin on his fists. “Speaking of, how is the young boy? Have you gotten anything out of him?”
King shook his head. “No. Imogen has always been a very quiet child, barely even spoke his first word. We’ve given him drawing materials to see if that works, but the poor boy is in shock.”
The older man’s eyes narrowed, tilting his head. “You speak about all of these suspects as if you know them very intimately, especially the boy.” It wasn’t framed as a question, moreso an observation, but King shifted in his seat.
“Yes. They’re all my friends, sir, and I’ve known all of them for a better part of my life.” He looked down. “Imogen is my Godson, sir, I have a responsibility towards him to find who did this heinous act towards him and his family, and to get him the help that he needs.”
The Chief hummed, a moment of silence fell on the two of them before he sighed. “Samuel. You are the best detective the GPD has, and I understand that you have this… duty to The Boy–”
“His name is Imogen.” He quickly snapped at him. “Sure. Refer the victim as the victim, but do not dehumanize and label a five year old who can barely even communicate.” King didn’t know where this form of insubordination had come from, he barely spoke out of line, but there was something about this situation that brought out his bite. The chief stared down at him with cold, professional eyes.
“...I understand you have this duty to… Imogen , but you have a very clear bias in this case and that causes risk to hasty work. For those reasons, I am taking you off the case. Your partner will finish up this case with a separate detective.”
King felt a fire burning in his stomach, wanting desperately to fight in this case, but he knew it was futile. He nodded and quickly looked up. “Please, at least let me take Imogen to my home. I don’t want him staying here alone and I know him the best out of everyone here.” His eyebrows furrowed in concern. “ Please. ”
The Chief’s eyebrows twitched, before sighing. “Considering your close relationship with the b– Imogen, I will permit it.” He put his reading glasses on, his weathered hand moving to write on a file. King dismissed himself and picked up Imogen, who had been sitting at his desk, curled up with the pieces of paper and colored pencils sat quietly, undisturbed, on the table.
They drove home in silence, Imogen curled up in the front seat with clean pajamas, clutching the teddy bear that Donna had gotten him when he was a baby. When they had arrived at the manor, Donna had been waiting at the porch in her nightgown and a cardigan thrown on her. King quietly handed the sleeping child over, smiling as he watched Donna cradle Imogen – memories of when they had their son flooded back. But as he entered the Manor, he turned back. A crimson-claddened figure stood in the woods surrounding their estate. The crimson helmet, a grim reminder of what truly happened that night.
–
CASE 1: THE DEATH OF ROSA WOLF
November 29th, 2011
–
Imogen Grimmes, now 28, strided into the Grimsborough Police Department’s 1st precinct. His head held high and his shoulders pushed back like a cadet. His feminine yet cold brown eyes stared firmly ahead of him, the cool wind of November blew through his dark brown curls, framing his elegant features. He efficiently evaded the other officers, moving through the precinct before making his way to the debriefing room. A small group was gathered with the Chief of Police, Samuel King. While standing at the podium, King turned to the incoming man, his eyes softening as he got closer, reaching his hand out to shake his.
“Am I late?” Imogen’s soft, yet firm, voice rang out as he gave Chief King a professional handshake.
“You’re right on time, Mr. Grimmes.” He responded as he turned to the group of people that had been gathered. Imogen’s eyes shifted to each one, taking in their features. There was an Indian man with chin-length hair and a goatee, A younger man with greasy hair and visible acne as well as an attempt at facial hair, A tall woman with slender features and auburn hair wearing a lab coat, a darker-skinned man with a thin mustache laying on his upper lip, and a man more close around Imogen’s own age with Ash Brown, spiky hair and the most blue eyes he had ever seen – only accentuated with his light blue police uniform.
“Everyone, this is Detective Imogen Grimmes.” His authoritative voice boomed out, gesturing to the man standing next to him. “Do not let his appearance deceive you, I’ve known him for many years and he is an incredibly intelligent man.” Both of their attentions were moved to the blue-eyed man, who snickered and whispered to the Indian man. “And do you have anything you’d like to say, Inspector Jones?”
The man – presumably named Jones – shot his head up, his mouth opening and closing before shaking his head. “No, Chief. I was just–”
“I see you are volunteering yourself to train and work alongside Detective Grimmes, which is perfect as I was assigning you two together anyway.” He gestured to the open chair beside Jones. Imogen calmly sat down next to Jones, who gave him a baffled look but looked back at King, slouching in his seat whereas Imogen sat with a pristine posture.
“Now, first thing is first, I want you to help Detective I–” He was interrupted by an assistant, frantically whispering in his ear. He looked up at the two detectives. “Officers, there's been a report of a dead body at the town entrance, go investigate the scene!”
Jones and Imogen looked around for a second, before King yelled. “What are you waiting for?! Go now before I change my mind and have you both work under Ramirez!” Imogen tilted his head at the statement, but didn’t have time to react as Jones grabbed his arm and pulled him out the door.
Jones sighed as he got into the driver’s seat of the police car, running a hand through his hair as he put on the sirens and began speeding out the precinct as Imogen scrambled to get his seatbelt on. “I’m missing something because why did you start scrambling when King stated if we didn’t leave he’d put us with… whoever Ramirez is?”
Jones scoffed. “Ramirez is a bumbling dumbass, he was my rookie right before you came. He’s a patrol cop now, always squeamish about blood– wanted to be a homicide detective! Could you believe that?”
Imogen pursed his lips, raising an eyebrow. “Sounds like he didn’t know exactly what he was getting into. He sounds pitiful.”
The other man turned his head to Imogen. “Why does everything that comes out of your mouth have to sound like a founding father is saying it?”
The brown-eyed man narrowed his eyes and was silent the entire rest of the car ride.
When they arrived, it was an eerie scene. Not the most violent scene ever, but it still made Imogen's gut drop just the slightest bit. “Victim was identified as Rosa Wolf,” Jones began, checking the info that had been sent to him. “21 years old, Cheerleader.” Imogen could gather that information just by looking at her uniform. He knelt down in front of her, observing how her skin was sickly pale from blood loss and how her straw-yellow strands of hair got into her youthful face.
Imogen huffed, standing up as other officers responded to the scene. “Looks like a horrible place to die.” Imogen was blunt, his hand dug deep into the pockets of his trenchcoat. “Almost got out of this city, got cut down right at the finish line.” Watching as the medical examiner’s team carried off the body bag, his careful eyes naturally drifted down where a blood stained knife laid. Carefully, he knelt back down to examine the knife, it was just an average switchblade, the entire tool was lathered in blood. Carefully he picked up the blade, shoving it in an evidence bag. “I think we found everything here!” He called, turning his head to Jones.
Jones looked up. “Alright! We’ll give them both to Nathan, our Medical Examiner.” He handed the knife off to one of the responders as Imogen got back into the passenger's seat. He glanced briefly at the other man as he got into the driver’s seat, how… careless he looked as he looked over the crime scene again and drove back to the precinct. He likely had a year or two's experience over Imogen, but his spark and attitude towards the job had significantly decreased. His eyebrows twitched before looking away, crossing his legs as he looked on.
–
The Medical Examiner’s office was about as sterile as Imogen believed it to be, the entire office being far colder than his imagination however. He had been thankful for his thick coat and sweater, though he briefly felt bad for his partner with just his GPD issued uniform. He had gotten special permission from Chief King to continue to wear his usual business casual outfits, granted he wore some form of identification on his person – which he landed on a lapel pin with the GPD emblem on it. The Indian man from before poked his head from across the hall, his lips quirked into a smile as he waved the two over. “Jones! Good to see you two, I just got done with your autopsy!”
Jones moved faster than Imogen, clapping the man’s hand and pulling him into a hug – a supposed “bro hug” Imogen had heard about among former colleagues. Jones sidestepped after Nathan further messied his already mussed hair. “This is Nathan Pandit,” Jones formally introduced, gesturing towards the taller man. “He’s the best damn coroner in the Tri-state! Don’t let his job creep you out.”
Imogen narrowed his eyes a bit, before turning to Nathan, holding his hand out. “Imogen Grimmes.” He spoke firmly as he shook the other man’s hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Dr. Pandit, what could you tell us about our victim’s death?”
Nathan gestured for them to walk into the morgue, where the body of Rosa Wolf laid. “Her death was simple,” He began. “Just a slit to the throat, I found no drugs or alcohol in her system, nothing on her body to warrant any suspicion, nothing from the blue light…” He shrugged. “The only trait I could find of your murderer from the victim’s body is that they are right handed,” He pressed his fingers on the side of her neck where the wound was the deepest. “They attacked from behind, meaning that they would have to reach over to slit her throat, starting on the left side. Typically, the deepest part of the wound is where you start, and with the cut being so precise, I can definitively say that your killer is right handed!”
Jones squinted at the convoluted explanation while Imogen took out a leather-bound notebook gifted to him by Chief King, titling the case as “The Death of Rosa Wolf” and jotting down everything they knew and investigated so far. “Thank you, Dr. Pandit.” He looked up as he nodded curtly towards him. “We will let you know if we require any more of your expertise.”
As the two left the chilly morgue, Chief King met them by their desks. “Grimmes, Jones.” He addressed the two detectives as Imogen stood up straight at attention while Jones remained in his usual posture. “We just obtained an anonymous tip regarding the murder, they said they saw the killer fleeing the scene in a blue cap, needless to say they will most likely still be wearing it.” Imogen quickly jotted down the new attribute in his notebook, looking back up at King as the elderly man continued his statement. “I want you to return to the scene of the crime and investigate further, there’s one more clue missing here.” Imogen nodded swiftly, making his way with Jones back to the car to investigate one more time.
The second sweep of the decrepit neighborhood did not lead to much at first, the entire street being littered with garbage and other miscellaneous items here and there, Imogen guessed that the house they were currently looking at was some sort of abandoned hoarder house. Imogen slowly scanned through the environment before he noticed a torn, bloodied shirt on the side of the road. “Jones!” He looked over to the other man, who had been doing an active sweep over the crime scene. “I found something!” Jones perked his head and walked over, tilting his head before snapping his fingers. “Aha! You’ll need your forensics kit for that, one second,” He jogged over to the car and grabbed a bag from the trunk, returning to Imogen. “Here is your forensics kit, it has pretty much everything you need.” He handed the kit to Imogen, who knelt down.
“A forensics kit can pick up samples that we can’t see, identify code, lift pr-” When Jones looked over again, Imogen had already completely repaired the torn fabric, revealing a bloodied football jersey. “Jesus Christ!”
Imogen shrugged as he stood up. “What? I like to sew.” He slipped his forensic kit into his sling bag, looking intently at Jones. “So, do we send this back to Nathan?”
Jones shook his head, flagging over some other officers. “Nah! We’ll send this over to Grace, she’s our lab expert.” He nudged Imogen back towards the car as he walked over. “She’ll have it done in a jiffy.”
–
Just like Jones said, as soon as they returned to the precinct Grace Delaney had finished the lab analysis. She glanced over at the two men entering her lab, a confident smile forming on her lips. “Jones,” She nodded curtly at the officer, her face brightening when she saw Imogen. “Hello there!” She approached the new detective, staring him down. “My name is Grace Delaney, and I thank you for coming over to visit me in my lab.”
Imogen curtsied a little bit, though his face remained stoic. “Is there anything you can tell us about the sample we gave you?”
Grace nodded. “Well, I can certainly tell you that this shirt belonged to your killer, it seems like they were trying to destroy all evidence of the crime being done, but thanks to your recovery I was able to determine the blood belonging to your victim.” She crossed her arms. “Meaning your killer wears the number 9!”
Imogen wrote down the final attribute, nodding a curt ‘Thank you’ to Grace before leaving the lab, inhaling deeply. “Do you think we are ready to arrest our killer?”
Jones nodded. “King said that we already rang in some notable suspects, let's go make your first arrest!”
–
Imogen walked into the room where the suspects stood in a line up, only two notable people stood in the lineup on the opposite side of the glass. Chief King was standing in the room, looking out to the suspects. “Ash Bison,” King gestured towards the more stout man with longer hair as the two joined his vigil. “Notable gangster affiliated with the Vipers, he was seen loitering around the area where Rosa Wolf was killed.” He gestured to the other man, a charming young athlete. “Matt Barry, up and coming football star for the Grimsborough Quails. He was supposedly dating Rosa Wolf before her demise.”
Imogen narrowed his keen eyes on both of the suspects, glancing between the two. Ash Bison seemed like the most obvious choice, but he had been missing one attribute, whereas the other…
“Matt Barry.” Imogen spoke. “Matt Barry had to have killed Rosa Wolf. All attributes match his profile and he had close relations with the victim.” Chief King nodded his head at the officers as they went into the room, reading his Miranda Rights.
He quietly watched as the two hauled him out of the room and into his holding cell until his court date, noting that Imogen had clearly matured into a fine young man.
“You’re on your own now, Imogen Grimmes.” Chief King quietly mumbled to himself, taking a deep breath. “Please, understand.”
–
Additional Investigation
Jones pushed open the door to the bar after a long, long shift. After having gone nowhere with the investigation on the Vipers and their leader, Jones had invited Imogen to go out for drinks after work. It was… a safe bar considering the standards of the Industrial Area, mainly populated with factory workers and failed businessmen drinking their sorrows away. The two sat at the desolate bar, Jones flagging down the bartender.
“So,” Jones began as two beers were handed to them. “Tell me, why did you choose this profession?”
Imogen blinked, raising an eyebrow. “What's that supposed to mean?”
Jones opened his mouth before closing it again, trying to figure out how to word it correctly. “I mean… I don’t know, you don’t seem like the type that would’ve gotten into this line of work– I mean,” He gestured to his outfit. “You don’t… look like the person who’d be investigating deaths.”
Imogen narrowed his eyes at him. “If you’re trying to get me to become friendly towards you, this is the complete opposite way to do things.” Jones grimaced, taking a long swig from his bottle with a clearly frustrated look on his face. “...I joined because of something personal that happened to me.”
Jones immediately turned his head towards Imogen. “Really? What happened?” He leaned forward to listen to Imogen, who leaned back from Jones.
“...I do not want to disclose that to you right now.” He spoke bluntly. “This is our first day knowing each other, I do not want to share my full life story to you immediately.”
Jones tilted his head, before shrugging. “Fair enough.”
The two spent the rest of the night speaking quietly about random things that came to mind; their hobbies, politics, the economy. It had been well past midnight when the two left. The streets of the industrial area were quiet this time of night, save for the arguments down the bend and the sound of constant sirens. The skies had nearly been completely covered by smoke in the factories, further dulling the environment.
“This is my home turf,” Jones began. “Never got promoted out of here, Chief King just doesn’t understand this is how things go around in the Industrial Area. People here are aggressive and… frankly they’re just assholes. You need to not let that bullshit slide, and sometimes that means treating your suspects harshly.”
Imogen nodded along to Jones as they got into his car, the quiet rock music filling the air as Jones drove Imogen home. “Where’d you grow up?” Jones tilted his head. “I don’t think I ever knew you in my childhood.”
Imogen shrugged. “I grew up in the Historical Center.” He spoke bluntly, looking out the window of the car. “My… parent never really let me out and play. Had to focus on my studies.”
Jones hummed, the rest of the car ride was silent up until they got to Imogen’s apartment, upon which Imogen left. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” Jones called out, Imogen waved goodbye as he entered the building.
Nearly as soon as they got into their bedroom, they collapsed in bed, unaware of the fate he had just sealed for himself.