Life in Fae Valley

Chapter 4: Part 1

✩This chapter has depictions of gore and death. Not for the faint hearted. Read at own risk.

"JD... Repeat that for me quick?"

Natalie laughed a bit awkwardly and nervously as she gazed over at the detective next to her, wishing she'd misheard him. Hoping what he said wasn't what he actually had told her.

"Natalie please don't make me repeat myself, you know I don't want to! I am scared out of my mind right now and I want to fucking throw up because the smell is starting to come into the car. For the love of god, Nat I'm gonna lose it!" He hissed back at her through gritted teeth, parking in a clearing in the woods and nearly throwing himself out the car to throw up in some nearby plants.

She sighed and went over to JD, holding his hair back a bit while he threw up while glancing back at the car. The hell did JD get himself into?... She knew weird things were happening in this little countryside town, but what in the absolute hell was this? Unidentified dead man in a car JD randomly found...

Once he was done throwing up, she let him just rest a bit before she went over to the car and opened up the trunk of the car. The first thing that hit her was the smell... The smell of rotting flesh and decaying organs was never a smell anyone would enjoy and brought with it every premonition of death one could think of.

Covering her nose against the smell that caused her eyes to water, she tried to take a better look at the remains in the trunk, though what she saw would haunt her dreams forever. His face was almost completely torn off, his eyes bulging grotesquely in his skull almost at the rate of popping. Like two disgusting milky green pimples. His stomach was shredded open, his intenstines wrapped around his throat, probably having been used to choke him out with his own organs... He had no legs or arms, his hair looked as if it had been shaved off and he was missing all of his teeth...

Natalie took a slow step away from the car as she tried not to throw up either, slowly sitting down before she looked at the number plate, then looking over at JD. "Have... Have you tracked who the car belongs to?" She said slowly, JD slowly nodding as he made his way over to her, the man and women sitting side by side as they tried to process this absolutely horrible murder case.

"I did... Owner died 10 years ago due to natural causes. Some guy named Eustass Windslock... He was the previous forest ranger before Ford Leroy... No one knew much about him other than he was fucking terrifying" JD sighed, rubbing the back of his neck a bit as he stared at Natalie, slowly looking over at the car. "Unknown dead man in a dead man's car... Can't say this is a boring case."

Natalie sighed and nodded, resting her head in her hand as she tried to think over this before looking over at JD again, sitting up a bit. "That only leaves us with one real option... We have to go ask our beloved forest ranger what he knows about Mr Windslock..." She sighed, chuckling a bit as she heard JD groan at the mention of having to see Ford, gently nudging the detective a bit. "Lighten up, geez! If we see Ford, there's a high chance Dante is with him and I know how much you like him" she teased, earning a bright blush from JD who pushed her away lightly, both laughing as they got up.

They walked side by side for awhile, contemplating for a moment where they'd find Ford but their question was soon answered as they could hear his voice laughing away about something... As they neared, they froze up to see him hacking away at something, just to pick up whatever he had been cutting apart... A not deer head. Grabbing it's horns, he tore the head clean in half though paused as he noticed Natalie and JD and smirked, licking his lips slowly before flashing her a fanged smile.

"Who... Who taught you how to be able to do that?" Natalie whispered in both awe and terror, taking one step back and gulping a bit, her hands slowly clenching into fists apon instinct. Instinct of being ready for a fight.

"Oh, my old mentor. Horrible man really, god awful. Everyone hated him. Some say he was the reincarnate of Satan himself... His name was Windslock. Eustass Windslock" Ford replied, tossing the halves of the not deer on the rest of the pile of its body parts, then licking up some of the blood from it that had dripped down his arm, humming in delight at the taste before he turned to face the two of them, wiping some sweat off of his brow.

He stood there simply in some boots and jeans, his muscular body glistening with sweat in the sunlight that filtered through the tree's. JD slowly leaned in closer to Natalie and whispered, "Now I think I know why those vampires in Twilight were always shiny. Must have been very sweaty."

This had Natalie burst out with laughter, leaving Ford a bit bewildered and frankly a bit hurt that she'd laughed over his physique, sighing a bit and shaking his head, the tattoo on the back of his neck writhing around some before the tentacles rested around his throat, which he now scratched at a bit. "You going to stand there and laugh at me like five year olds or did you come to ask me something?" He sighed, putting down his axe as he walked over to them, both detective and ex-soldier quickly falling quiet as he was quite a bit taller than them.

"Uhm... Yeah sorry, we came to ask you some things... About your old mentor, Eustass. Do you have a spare minute?" JD questioned, Ford nodding some as he walked inside his wooden cabin, motioning to them that they follow after him. JD and Natalie shared an uncertain look but did regardless follow him inside, rather uncomfortably sitting themselves down in Ford's living room on his couch.

It wasn't that the couch was uncomfortable or anything, no it was the exact opposite. The couch was in fact very comfortable, but it was hard to focus between the soft LED lighting, the Wendigo skull on his mantle and the random pole in the middle of the room which was suspiciously close to one of the arm chairs.

There was a tense silence in the air as Ford made them some tea in the kitchen before walking over and sitting down on the armchair next to the couch, handing them their tea as he sipped on his own hip flask of something that smelt suspiciously a lot like bourbon. "So. To what do I owe the pleasure to have not only my cousin's gorgeous girlfriend in my house, but our city boy detective in my home as well?" He questioned, getting straight to the point.

He didn't exactly seem like someone for small talk, unless it was to be flirty, which in this moment in time was definitely not for. He could atleast recognise they were on work related business, putting his flask aside as he put his shirt back on, tapping the side of his head a bit as he let his head rest in his hand, raising his eyebrow.

"So? Spit it out. I don't have all day. I have a date with two gorgeous people soon and I dont want to make them wait."

Natalie then gently nudged JD who was brought out of his thoughts a bit and cleared his throat some, getting out a notebook as well as a pen which he clicked a few times before he got comfortable, looking over at Ford before clearing his throat once more. "Mr Leroy-" He started, to which Ford was quick to cut across, "Mr Leroy was my dad. Just call me Ford."

"Oh, uhm... Ford, as I'm sure you know there have recently been some disturbing occurrences here in Fae Valley... One of which I find most disturbing of all... My associate Natalie here and I have found an unidentified dead man who was brutally murdered in the trunk of a car that belonged to your old mentor, Eustass Windslock. I asked around, but no one seems too keen to talk about him... You seem to have known him rather well. Could you tell us a bit about him?" JD said slowly to Ford who sighed and nodded, adjusting a bit how he was sitting in his chair.

The blonde man first seemed to carefully think over how he was going to phrase what he wanted to say before shrugging, chuckling a bit to himself as he sighed. "Old Eustass was a real bastard. Flirted with any lady he came across, slapped ass if he liked it and had the worst sense of humour. People didn't like him much because he was a Mutantur... If you don't know what that means, I'll explain it. It means he could shift into anything that has haunted your dreams before. He could turn into creatures of nightmares and he loved using that ability to scare the crap out of nosy kids" he explained, stretching a bit.

JD and Natalie glanced over at one another before looking back at Ford, Natalie being the one the say, "Why would the kids be nosy? I get he was a forest ranger but that's not exactly something to be nosy about..."

"Oh, that's simple. He was a convict. Served time in prison and no one really knew for what. But I do... That old bastard had been through jail time for murder."