1.20 - Cleansing

As Erika went inside she could hear noises.  They were coming from the living room so she went straight there, only to find a strange man in the most obvious 'I'm a burglar' outfit ever trying to stuff their wide-screen TV into his pants.  She cleared her throat to catch the man's attention and tried to appear more confident than she felt.

"Who are you and what are you doing in my house?" Erika demanded of the stranger.  This was not a good situation.  The guy was a lot bigger than her, and it didn't help that she was in a dress too.  But she did remember the gun that she had stowed away in this very room.  If she could just get to it.

"You!" the man exclaimed, surprising Erika since that wasn't the reaction she was anticipating.  "You're not supposed to be here!  I was told that the family wouldn't be back until late!" he shouted, sounding somewhere between shocked and angry.

"You were told?  Who told you?" Erika demanded when all of a sudden the man started charging her.

She didn't know if he was just trying to barrel past her to get out, or if he was actually going to hurt her, but she wasn't going to take her chances.  The bookcase was just to her left and she could even see the gun wedged behind it.  If she could just get a hold of it...

Somehow, despite her panic, she got a hold of it.  "Stop or I'll shoot!" she announced, leveling the gun at the burglar.

He let out a cry of alarm and staggered backward.  He tripped on the chair and ended up sprawled on the ground before lifting his hands in front of himself for some sort of protection.  "Wait!  Don't shoot!" he cried.

"How do you even have a gun?" the burglar cried in disbelief.

"This is the house of a police officer, of course we have guns.  Or didn't you know that?" Erika demanded.  The man didn't answer that question and she frowned.  "Oh, stop sniveling.  You're disgusting," she snapped.  "Now, it seems like you might have some interesting information.  Get up off the ground and spill your figurative guts and I might let you live," Erika ordered.

"All right, all right.  Easy there, kid," the burglar mumbled, rising slowly from his position on the floor.  He kept his hands in front of himself as if they would offer some sort of shielding.  "Just what is it you want to know?" he asked.

"Who gave you the information that we'd be gone?" Erika asked first.

"I can't say.  It's information that gets funneled down to us.  I'm not very high up, you see.  One of the high-rankers probably got a hold of it.  They wanted this place hit.  I just took the money for it," the man explained nervously.

"What organization?" Erika demanded.

"The crime organization.  Can't say more than that because even if you don't kill me, they will," the man mumbled.

"Fine.  Then I have one more question.  What do you know about the murder of Nielson Gaul?  It happened about twenty years ago and happened during a supposed burglary like this one," Erika asked.

The man paused, first looking surprised and then looking thoughtful.

However, the thoughtful look didn't last long.  "Look, kid, why would I have any information about a two-decades old murder?  I was just a kid back then and not involved in any of this," he scoffed.  "I mean, the fact that they never caught the dude probably means he was involved with the group, but like I said I'm pretty low-down.  I don't know everyone or what everyone's done.  Only the higher-ups know that," he declared, looking at her like she was stupid for asking.

Even though that wasn't the information she wanted, it was more information than he probably thought he was giving.  Only people in the crime organization had access to that stuff... huh?

Well, that was a thought for another time.  Right now she still had this guy to deal with.  And now he was really starting to piss her off.  "That's it, hm?" she repeated.  "Well then, I guess you don't have any further use to me."

She raised the gun again and the burglar started to look worried.  "Come on, kid.  You're way too young to be using something like that.  Do you really think you can kill someone in cold blood?  Look, I haven't taken anything so why don't you put the gun down, I leave, and we just both call it a night?" he prompted nervously.

"You don't want to turn into a criminal, kid," the burglar tried pleading once again while inching around her.

"Actually... I think that's exactly what I want to do," Erika announced before pulling the trigger.  The gun went off with a bang that startled Erika.  She didn't expect it to be so loud.  It struck the man in the head and knocked his mask off.  She watched as he went down and as the blood seeped into the ground beneath him.

"Ha!  That's what you get.  You idiot, coming into my house.  You're a stain.  A stain on the perfection of this city and a stain on the perfection of my home!  I'm going to purge this world of all of you.  Your organization will be cleansed.  Cleansed by me!" she shouted, glaring down at the corpse as the bloodstain continued to spread.

Suddenly the adrenaline left her and she felt faint.  She'd just killed someone.  She'd... she'd killed someone.  She didn't feel a soul-shattering amount of guilt, but she definitely felt the weight of her actions and momentarily covered her face as she gathered herself.

But she wasn't just gathering herself emotionally.  She needed to figure out what to do next.  She wasn't about to admit to killing the guy.  Fortunately, it didn't take long to formulate a plan.  All she needed to do was stash the gun in her mother's room where no one would look and then call the police to report a dead body.

Danisha had spent most of the evening at the wedding.  It wasn't until the newly married couple finally departed for home that her thoughts turned to home herself.  She pulled out her phone to check the time only to see ten missed calls.  Some were from work, some were from Bianca and one was even from Romeo.  Concerned she listened to the voicemails and then proceeded to try not to panic.  Shakily she raced to the police station, changed into her work clothes, and grabbed her evidence kit before heading to the last place she ever wanted to get called to on a job.  Her own house.

She hadn't gotten all of the details yet, but no one had mentioned Erika on the phone.  But her daughter had already left for home... she tried to calm herself and act professional as she headed up to the apartment.  Some small part of her mind noted the unnecessary overuse of the caution tape on the door.

When she went inside the first thing she saw was Erika.  Her little girl looked so small huddled up like that and Danisha's heart nearly broke.  She felt bad that she hadn't been there sooner, but she was here now and she'd do whatever she could for her daughter.

Even though she knew she needed to do her job and get to the crime scene itself she stopped in front of her daughter.  "Erika?  Honey, are you okay?" she asked gently.  Erika looked up at her blankly before slowly standing up.  Her eyes seemed distant, making Danisha very worried.

"Hm?  Oh... Danisha..." Erika murmured.  Danisha couldn't hold back any longer and pulled her daughter into a tight hug.  Erika returned it tightly and buried her face in her mother's shoulder.  It seemed she was playing the role of traumatized girl perfectly, judging by her mother's responses that was good.  So far none of the officers who had shown up on the scene had suspected her of a thing and had taken her vague statements without question.

"Listen, honey, I have to get to work now.  There's no need for you to stick around any longer, okay?  We're going to be here for a while... but try to get some sleep if you can.  There's no reason anyone will be checking either bedroom whether you want to sleep in your bedroom... or mine," Danisha urged.  She knew Erika was a teenager now, but wanted her daughter to know that her bedroom was open too if she'd feel safer in there.

"Okay," Erika replied softly, still keeping her gaze diverted as she answered.

Danisha watched her daughter slowly make her way down the hallway before turning her attention to the other people in the room.  The first thing she noticed was Officer Fangman investigating the area around the corpse.  He seemed deep in thought so she decided not to bother him at the moment.

Instead she turned her attention back to the body and Bianca who was standing by it.  "Glad you could finally join us," Bianca commented as Danisha knelt by the body.

She started to examine the body.  The cause of death was fairly obvious.  A gunshot to the head.  Unfortunately for the poor man it looked like he'd survived the bullet wound for at least a little bit judging by the size of the puddle around his head.  Not that he'd likely been conscious for that.  The color of the dried blood also indicated that he hadn't been dead for very long.  He'd likely died shortly before Erika got home and made the call.  That thought sent a chill through Danisha, thinking that her daughter could have encountered the murderer herself.

And throughout the examination she was trying to suppress any flashbacks she might have had to a similar bloody scene in a previous apartment...

"So, do we have any possibilities for suspects yet?" Danisha asked after having recorded all of her findings and the evidence she needed.  They could now move aside so that the body could be bagged up and transported back to the lab for a more in-depth autopsy and so that they could start cleaning up the crime scene.

"Well, we need some more information for that.  That's why you were called in," Bianca replied with a shrug.

"What do you mean?  Surely the footage from the lobby had something?  Eye-witnesses?  Anything?" Danisha demanded angrily.

"Easy there.  That's where you come in.  Erika said she didn't see anyone, either in the apartment or in the lobby or on the street.  We've confiscated the lobby footage for you to analyze back at the station.  Beyond that we're going to be relying on what you gather here," Bianca replied, raising an eyebrow at her friend's anger.

"Oh... oh yes... I suppose so.  I'm sorry it's just..." Danisha mumbled.

"It's scary, knowing they were in your own home.  Right?" Bianca replied with a sympathetic smile.  "If you'd feel more comfortable we could put you up in a hotel for the night..." she began to offer but Danisha shook her head.

"I didn't let myself be driven out of the last apartment I owned, I'm not letting them with this one too," she declared firmly.

"But I will confess to being tired," Danisha admitted, rubbing her neck.  This had been a very long day between the wedding and now this...

"No worries.  The evidence will be there when you get in tomorrow morning.  We're going to have an officer stationed down in the lobby so no one's getting back in tonight at least.  I'll head in to write up the preliminary report now," Bianca assured.

"Thanks," Danisha replied sincerely with a smile.  She watched Bianca order the remaining officers and specialists in the room to start packing up before turning her attention to Officer Fangman.  While she had ended up in a lab and Bianca was on a fast track to replacing Romeo as head of the department, Officer Fangman had elected to stay on the streets as a regular officer.  It's not that he didn't have the credentials for a promotion, he just didn't want one.  Danisha respected that and valued his opinion.

"So, what do you think happened?" she asked as she walked up to him.  He'd been silently surveying the scene since before she got there so he must have some theories by now.

"In my opinion, two crooks were out to hit the same target and bumped into each other.  This kid was probably fairly new to the job while the other one was likely a veteran.  The shooter barely left a trace at the scene so they were probably a pro.  Either this kid did something stupid to piss the guy off, overstepped his bounds, or it was just a matter of principle on the shooter's part.  Either way, the kid ended up dead and the other guy got away," he explained with a shrug.

"So you think it was a turf-battle of some sort between two criminals?" Danisha repeated.

"That would be my best guess," the officer agreed with a nod.

"I see...  Thank you, I'll keep that in mind," she replied.  He nodded and cleared out with the rest of the officers.  Danisha tried to stay out of their way now, acting as the civilian rather than an officer herself.  They ended up having to remove the rug the guy had bled on, but they'd been able to clean off the flooring.  She was thankful for no longer having carpeting.

At last they all left, leaving Danisha alone in the room.  She stared at the place the body had been.  Now she had the memory of yet another murder happening in her home.

She sighed and then went to check on Erika.  Her daughter had apparently elected to sleep in her own room which wasn't too unexpected.  Danisha was also grateful to see that she was apparently sleeping soundly.  She'd had trouble sleeping after Nielson's death due to nightmares, but having the corpse be a stranger rather than someone you loved certainly helped.  And it could just be the exhaustion of everything that let Erika sleep so soundly.  Being on an adrenaline rush all day would wear anyone out, even a teenager.

"Good night, my dear," Danisha murmured softly to her daughter so as not to wake her before closing the door again and heading to her own room.  Unfortunately, despite her age, sleep did not come nearly as easily to Danisha.  Even knowing the place was guarded, every little sound woke her and she ended up barely getting any sleep.


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Hello!  I finally got this chapter written.  I actually had more that I was going to include in this chapter, but I feel like I'll deal with the aftermath in the next chapter.  I also apologize for making the officers a bit stupid in this chapter.  Would a normal teenager be able to trick the police like this?  No.  But Erika is a genius and for story purposes I had to make her smarter than them, including her own mother :P  Sorry.  This chapter also really let Erika's Evil trait show.  After 'killing' the guy (he wasn't actually dead, just posed that way) she literally walked up to him and started doing the evil maniacal laughter.  As if she knew what she'd just done in the story... and was very proud of it.  I would have loved to include a picture of it, but it doesn't fit into her persona.  She's more of a refined evil than a super-villain type, I'm afraid.