Olympus Drive Book 5: Situation Normal

Chapter 1

Detective Stamos

"I think he's dead."

"I'm so glad you're here."

I am standing on the edge of a cliff. Yes of course at three am. Looking over the edge of a cliff at a body tied to a piece of rope. The body has all of its internal organs hanging out down the cliffside. The organs are pulled out the mouth. I was happy long ago, when I didn't necessarily know that was possible.

"Okay," I rub my face with one hand, "Let's go over the checklist—,"

"You know---have you considered it's not one of the kids---?" Rhea asks, hopefully. To fully set the scene, I am wearing a three piece grey suit I'm sure will be destroyed at some point soon here, and Rhea is wearing joggers and a t-shirt that says 'proud mom of a few dumbass kids'. I don't strictly know why. Hector gave him that shirt last Christmas, for no apparent reason. He just appeared, giggled manically at the two of us, and tossed the shirt at Rhea, said "happy pagan winter time fest" and disappeared. Rhea has yet to take it off. Why were we together on Christmas day? Well, there was a body on my porch and I blamed one person and that person's dumbass kids so we were working on that situation.

"I know that it is almost definitely one of the kids----where's the flow chart?" I sigh. I made a flow chart for exactly this type of situation. It works disturbingly well.

"Fine," Rhea tugs a worn piece of paper from his pocket, sighing dramatically, "Is it a murder---?"

"Yes," I growl.

"Is it multiple murders?"

"Not that we know of yet."

"Was it done with a bow and arrow?"

"No?"

"Was the person incinerated?"

"No."

"Is there no way we can ever prove Hector did it?"

"Maybe?"

"Is it exceedingly vile and horrendous with gratuitous violence?"

"Yes."

In unison, nodding: "Zag did it."

"He's not supposed to be up here," I sigh.

"Supposed to is usually very different from what the child is doing," Rhea says, knowledgably.

"True enough---all right I'm gonna call someone," I sigh, getting out my phone. I'm so damn tired.

"Not gonna get deader if we leave it till morning."

"We do not leave murders till morning," I growl, dialing.

"Are you on shift?" one of the sergeants answers the phone.

"Fortunately not, Vince, but I need to report an incident," I sigh, "I'm gonna need you to send a couple of cars out to the cliffs, we got a body—,"

"Will do, we need you in the center town now though, it's all hands on deck."

"What?" Rhea and I say, in unison.

"Yeah, some dude called in homicide directly after committing it, first officer on the scene says the vic looks like the body got poured out of a blender---,"

"I'm on my way."

"Fuck," Rhea rubs his face.

"Any chance it isn't one of my kids?" I ask, starting back towards the car.

"None."

When we reach the center of town, Thyme is very obediently leaning against a lamp post, handcuffed, while the two responding officers throw up. One of them is a girl and he was holding her hair back and offering her a bloody rag. When she sees us, she kind of moves away from him.