Wicked Roommates (MxM/MxF) TEMP HIATUS

11. Let's Go Hunting

Medical Examiner's Office, Snohomish County

Gray Schueller

"You uh, ever seen anything like this Gray?" Perry asked, rounding the exam table slowly.

I shook my head and sighed, leaning forward to take a closer look at the man's abdomen.

Perry slipped behind me and peaked over my shoulder, watching hesitantly as I probed further into the abdominal cavity. Well, what was left of it.

"He's not gonna jump off the table and bite you, Perry." I chuckled, tilting my head to eye him.

"It just makes my skin crawl..." he mumbled, hovering there over my shoulder. "I mean, how the hell does something like this happen in a busy parking lot? And no one sees anything?"

"Exactly." I exhaled, moving my attention to where the man's heart used to be.

"Well, aren't you freaked out?" Terry continues, hovering obnoxiously.

"Are you gonna keep hovering and babbling, or should I find a new intern?" I responded, not bothering to hide the shortness in my voice.

I'm tired, it's been a long day.

Terry clamors out from behind me. "N-no, no. I'll help!"

I glanced up at him while I ran my fingertip over the scalpel-like slash across the breastbone. "Okay, then put on some gloves."

Terry waivered for a second. "Well, you see I haven't had lunch yet..."

"Terry!" I barked. "Do you want to be a forensic examiner, or not?"

He stares at me, and I stare at him.

"Yes, or no, Terry?" I repeated once again, but I'm met by silence.

"Get out!" I snapped, jutting my hand towards the door. He stammers a bit before huffing some choice words under his breath and turning on his heel to leave. I heard him approach the door and open it and called out to him one last time. "Terry?"

"Yes?" He sighs heavily.

"Tell Brenda to start looking for another Intern."

"You tell her!" He yells, stepping through the door. "A-and you know what? This body is fucking cursed, man! I'm telling you! How you can't see that is beyond me. Only a crazy person would stay in here with that thing."

I furrowed my brow and made eye contact. "His name is Jared Fellows, 39 years old, per his license. He's not a thing Terry, he's a person."

Terry huffs and shakes his head. "Whatever, man. Enjoy your evening in the fucking dungeon with this headless body or whatever."

The door closed with a soft "whoosh", despite Terry's efforts to slam it behind him.

"Sorry, Jared." I said aloud, looking over what was left of him. "Some people clearly aren't cut out for this work. Don't take offense, I'm sure you aren't cursed."

I sighed to myself and sat down on a chair nearby. Jared's body had been delivered earlier this afternoon, and I've been in here with him ever since. I've seen a lot of bodies, a lot of humans who'd suffered gruesome deaths, and had family searching for answers. While I don't believe in curses, nor in cursed bodies, I certainly must admit that there's something highly unique about Jared's. Something that did make the hair on my arms stand on end.

The cuts are so clean, so precise, so expertly made one would think they could have only been made by a surgeon's scalpel. Yet, said cuts were made by a sizeable blade—a knife of some kind? Whoever did this was more than familiar with, well, their weapon. The decapitation was made effortlessly, and poor Jared was both alive when he was disemboweled, and when his killer began removing his head. Terry drove me nuts with his weak stomach and theories, but I must admit that I'd also wondered how the fuck something like this could happen amid a busy Walmart parking lot.

The sound of the door swishing open again interrupted my thoughts. I looked up, expecting an investigator from SMART; they'd called earlier, and I'd been expecting them. In walked a tall, dark-haired man holding some paperwork, he looks to be in his mid-thirties maybe. He's followed by a shorter, no-nonsense-looking woman perhaps in her early forties, with square glasses and a dirty blonde pixie.

"You with SMART?" I asked with a tired smile, rising to greet them. The man let out a low whistle, pausing to look over Jared.

"Damn, you see this Graves?" he said softly, nudging his smaller coworker. The woman nodded, somewhat expressionless as she stared at where Jared's head used to be. "I see it."

I looked between them awkwardly, asking again. "So, uh, you guys with SMART?" The man seemed to realize I was sitting there suddenly and sucked in a breath before turning his attention to me.

"No, we're with the FBI. Special Agents Nichols and Graves." He said bluntly, flashing a badge, and the woman followed suit. "Here's the paperwork for body transfer, as well."


I drifted closer to the pair and looked over their identification in silence and took the paperwork. FBI? That tracked, and after reading through the paperwork, it appeared all the documentation had been in proper order.

"I see." I said with a nod, pulling out my pen to sign over custody of Jared's remains. "My name is Gray Schueller, but you can call me Gray. Medical Examiner, as I'm sure you could've guessed."

Agent Nichols chuckles. "Yeah, we guessed. Sorry to barge in here like this, but we need this body prepped for transport. Rest of our guys are on the way here now to move it."

"Wow, um, alright. I hadn't yet begun the autopsy..." I mumbled, running a hand through my hair. Part of me was pissed. I wanted to do this autopsy.

"Exactly." Graves cut in, looking over the body thoughtfully. "Our own people will take care of that; I'm sure you understand."

"Of course, no offense, or anything." Nichols adds with a cough, eyeing his colleague. "You know, while we're waiting Gray, would you mind telling us what you have noticed about the body so far?"

"Course not." I chuckled, slipping on a fresh pair of gloves. "Throw some gloves on and come over here."

Graves follows behind me and grabs some gloves, while Nichols shoves his hands in his pockets, stepping over to the table to watch.

"What I can tell you so far isn't much, but it's also a lot at the same time. Once I explain you'll see what I mean." I said with a shake of the head. "We've determined without uncertainty that Jared, our victim here, died on location at the parking lot based on blood pooling and volume. His body hadn't been moved, where he fell is where he died. I can also tell you that he was alive when he was disemboweled, and alive when the killer started to decapitate him. His heart was removed postmortem here through this wound. It also looks like everything happened very fast; so fast that Jared doesn't have any defensive wounds."

Graves exhales in thought. "What a way to go."

"Mmhmm."

"May I?" She says, pointing at his chest.

"It's your body now." I shrugged.

She doesn't bother to hide her smirk and leans down to run a fingertip over that expert cut.

"Bet you're wondering what made that, huh?" I said.

She eyes me and shrugs. "Mmhmm. What do you think made it, Gray? Hypothetically speaking."
I grinned. "Well, hypothetically speaking, I'd tell you whatever made it was sizeable, maybe a knife of some kind. The only thing is this knife had to be sharp as, well, probably sharper than a scalpel. Whoever did this had to have done something like this before; they're very adept with their weapon of choice. A surgeon, maybe? Somebody with knowledge of the human body? Either way, still doesn't explain how the killer managed to do all this in a parking lot during Walmart's evening rush."

"Exactly." Graves sighs, "how does that happen?"

"Beats me. Probably why you're taking the case, huh?" I smirked.

"Probably." Nichols chuckles, his eyes wandering down my tired form.

The sound of Grave's phone going off breaks the deathly silence of my little dungeon, and I observe as she pops a glove off and answers. "Graves here... yeah, we're with the body now. Go ahead and meet us down here so we can get him moved." She tilts her head towards Nichols and gestures to the phone, whispering, "they're here." She then returns her attention to the call, "yeah. I'll meet you in the parking lot." She pocketed her phone and gestured to the door, "Imma go meet the team outside. They'll be down shortly."

Nichols nods, "I'll stay with the body. Go ahead and I'll met you at the car once they've got it secured."

"Done."

Nichols parks himself next to me in silence, and we watch Graves depart.

"I hate to be blunt, but I don't have a lot of time..." he says, dropping his gaze to meet mine. He's got a pair of very striking, but tired-looking grey eyes.

"Hmm?"

"I mean, uh, look. You into men?" He coughs awkwardly, looking from me to his shoes.

I smiled. "Maybe. You?"

"Clearly."

"I'm busy Saturday, but I'm available Friday night after six."

Nichols smirks. "Your phone, please." I shook my head and returned the smirk, unlocking it then passing it over. He input his information quickly and slipped it into the pocket of my lab coat.

"Well, I gotta say I've never been hit on in my 'office'." I chuckled, gesturing at Jared's body.

"Couldn't waste an opportunity, no matter how... gruesome the backdrop." He shrugs.
We stared at one another for a bit, sizing each other up. Nichols is bold, but there's something about his energy that doesn't exactly read aggressive top to me. I guess I'll find out.

Suddenly the door swings open, and a slew of people in FBI clothing trickled in, followed by a stretcher.
"Guess this is your cue." I said, watching the scene unfold.

"Guess it is."

"I'll be in town for the duration of this case, by the way." he adds, a lone dimple appearing on his right cheek as he throws me a shy smile.

"You know where to find me." I winked.

He just smiled again and departed, wandering over to observe the transfer.

I plopped down on my chair to watch the circus that was moving Jared—he's not a small man, after all. It's gonna take effort to safely move all that dead weight, no pun intended. Jared was six-foot-one and weighed around three-hundred-thirty per his license. Well, before he lost his head at least.

Questions swirled around in my tired brain, but I knew better than to keep asking about a body being taken from me. Someone else was going to get to the bottom of Jared's death, but I couldn't help but hope that Nichols might let me in on what happens as their investigation progresses. Guess we'll see about that, too.

Fifteen minutes or so passed before the circus finally left with Jared's body in-tow. I watched as Nichols slipped through the door, glancing over his shoulder one last time to wave before he left.

He's cute.

Agent Nichols

I followed the team out into the parking lot, watching in silence as they began to load Jared's body into the van. Graves is sneaky, but I could still feel her presence as she appeared quietly at my side.

"They're here." She breathed out.

I nodded. "Yep."

"This is gonna get messy, you know." She says with a shake of the head, pulling a cigarette out and lighting up.

"If it's what we think it is, then yeah, real messy." I muttered, pulling my own smokes out.
We smoked in silence for several minutes, watching as the van doors slammed shut, the rest of the team disappearing into the vehicle.

"It's gonna be a long fuckin' October." She sighs.

"Then we better get to work." I said with a shrug, taking a drag off my Red's.

"I got shotgun." She says flatly, tossing the keys to our g-ride my way.

I caught them wordlessly, and together we headed to the car. "Let's go hunting, Graves." I said, slipping into the driver's side, and she slid into the passenger seat.

Graves smirked.

"Lets."