Wings of Scarred Ch. 03

Years later and Nick had found himself a profession that suited him just fine. It was strange too. He'd always thought it a waste of time yet here he was, at his desk at the 290th precinct in the bustling New York. He leaned back in his chair, wondering why he suddenly thought of the fuzzy afternoon. Maybe it was because of the events that had happened over the last couple days.

It had all started with his cell phone ringing for the third time that day. His cell had rung yet all he did was stare at it. He knew who it was and didn't want to have to deal with it. The precinct he worked in was busy and noisy, so he hadn't heard the person walk up. Someone tapped him on the shoulders and he looked back to see his partner, Marcus.

"Are you just going to leave it ringing like that all day?" The man who he had known as Marcus Gunnuir asked, smirking at him. The man had the kind of face one always read about. The one where whomever saw him smiling felt right at home, like he was a lifelong friend. This was the point. Marcus looked like the good cop and without even saying a word; he made one think he was. But as soon as he started talking, one realized he was anything but.

Nick sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "It's just going to end up being Tally again." He replied in way of explanation. Marcus nodded in understanding. Natalia Manuel, Tally to her friends and family, was a mess. She drank, smoked god knows what and slept around like she was collecting detriments to her health. It was downright frustrating to be the one to pick her drunken ass home every weekend. And that person was Nick.

He would have talked to her about it but she never listened. She seemed to be lost. Like she was unsure what to do with herself and though he hated how she was, Nick knew he had no right to chastise her. Especially since he was the reason why she was like this.

Just then, the phone rang again. This time his parent's ringtone sounded. Marcus and he exchanged a look. "You want to handle this?" Nick asked hopefully.

Marcus laughed and shook his head. "And get between you and your folks? Hell, no, partner." He retorted, patting his friends shoulder sympathetically. "You're on your own. But I will be here to watch the fireworks."

"Asshole." He muttered, just before answering the phone. "Hello?" He sighed, anticipating his mother's firm but somewhat shrill voice, demanding that he go pick up his sister. Yet all he heard was silence. "Hello?"

"Hello, Nick." A deep voice replied. Nick sighed in relief. Only one man he knew had that deep but soothing voice that made one wonder how he got along with his (some people say) high strung mother.

"Dad? You're calling me?" He asked, sharing a look of confusion with Marcus. Derrick Manuel was the peace maker in their family but never had he actually started a conversation. Usually, Nick's mom beat him to it. So this was new.

"It's not weird for a father to call his son about something, is it?" Derrick asked, as if reading Nick's mind. He, as a man in his late 50's, was as sharp as he'd been when he served as an officer himself.

"No, sir." He replied, sitting up in his chair. He knew his father couldn't see him but it was engrained in him to do so when being spoken to.

"Good." His father said, clearly smiling since his voice got less stern. "Anyway, about Tally...."

"Oh, no! I am not doing this today, dad." He interrupted, wanting to get this out of the way. "I have a lot of work to do and I can't just leave and pick Tally up. Just have mom pick her up. It might help." He suggested. At this point, Marcus had taken a seat beside him and lounged about, watching the one sided conversation with amusement.

A sigh sounded on the other end and Nick knew what was coming. Derrick Manuel's infamous lecture. How many snotty teens had reverted to looking like guilty children who'd been caught? How many criminals had succumbed to his epic speech of right and wrong and morals? All from this man's lecture. There was no way out of this!

"Nicholas Alejandro Manuel!" Nick cringed, Oh dear, he was pulling up his middle name. Any worse and his Christian name would pop up. "You are my eldest son and a great source of pride for me but I will not allow you to talk about your family like that." He scolded, making Nick want to curl up and die. Marcus was snickering next to him. The black man had met his father and knew the tongue lashing Nick was getting. And, like a kid, he was enjoying the show.

Again. Asshole.

After a whole five minutes of guilt tripping his 31 year old son into submission, his soothing voice returned like a salve to heal his wounds. "Now, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, I was going to tell you that Tally doesn't need you to pick her up."

"I'm sorry?" He said, surprised at this development.

"Well, you should be." He father retorted, continue on. "Tally seems to have found a ride home in a taxi. Had you answered your phone, you would have known this. This is what you get for making such assumptions, Nicholas." And then, again, he was scolded but only for two minutes this time before a call from his sergeant forced him to have to hang up. It was a good thing too, since the man was jabbing at some old wounds. Why did he have to bring up his childhood mistakes? He was 31 now. There was no need to bring up the yogurt incident.

After that depantsing, it was good to know his dear friend and partner was there to ridicule him about being scolded like a child by their father. Really, what would he be without him? One word. Happy.

Marcus spent the entire 20 second trip from their desk to their sergeant's office teasing him. The man was merciless. He even brought up the yogurt incident. How did he even know about that?! Was it now on his public record?

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Soon afterward, he and Marcus stood in front of his sergeant, Kelley Hudson. And yes, she was a woman. The first female sergeant in the entire history of their precinct. Quite the prejudice was against her. To make it worse, she was small, cute and curvy. Her looks were so in contrast with her job, she had developed a complex about it. Kelley was anything but nice. She was the biggest hard ass anyone in this precinct had ever faced.

Even as he stared down at her petite body, he couldn't even think of a joke to make about the fierce expression on her adorable face. Anyone who had served under her knew she was not as sweet as she looked. Hell, she didn't even like her own name. She claimed it was too weak a name so she ordered everyone to address her by her last name.

"What the hell took you so long?" She demanded, sitting behind her desk, looking even smaller in the old sergeant's chair. "I called you both a half an hour ago."

Nick glared at Marcus. "I apologize, ma'am, but Marcus was being an asshole." He explained bitterly. Hudson shrugged.

"What else is new?" She said, rolling his eyes. "I want to know why your late, not the reputation update on your partner." Marcus laughed at this, earning a glare that shut him up. The fact everyone knew he was an asshole was a great source of laughs around the office. It wasn't that Marcus was a bad cop, he was excellent. And he wasn't even a bad guy. One could be friends with him. He was just an asshole toward some people. Some people hated him for it, which was why he had never held onto a partnership for any longer than a couple weeks. Others, like Nick and Hudson, tolerated him and accepted it. As such, Nick was the only partner to stay with him for longer than 3 months. He broke that record 4 years ago though.

"What he means, ma'am, is that while he was being scolded by his dad, I may have forgotten to tell him you were looking for us." Marcus explained, grinning despite the glares he was getting from both inhabitants of the office.

"I wasn't even on the phone then!" Nick gritted out, still annoyed by it. Marcus' response was to pat Nick's shoulder good naturedly, like he hadn't inconvenienced his friend. Then again, Marcus was like that.

"Anyway!" Hudson interrupted, regaining the full attention of both officers before her. "I have a new assignment for you two. What do you guys know about the recent disappearances of teens in the city?"

Nick thought back to the snippets of info that he had heard about the case. It was supposed to be a high profile case, due it being in connection to several CEO's of big name companies. Though the connection was shaky, they had narrowed it down to two leads.

"I heard that the two lead suspects in the case are Jaix Cataphos and Alikos Perisaros." Marcus said, as if continuing a thought. "But I also heard that officers Jackson and Turner were on the case. This is stuff you already know we know, so why the sudden questions?" Another reason to like Marcus was how fast he saw through ones bullshit. He always could tell when someone was leading another on. It was uncanny.

Hudson stared them down for a moment and then let out a breath. "You probably don't know since I've been keeping it under wraps from the rest of the staff, but both officers have been severely injured."

Both Nick and Marcus took a step back, shocked. Not about the officers being hurt, that happened a lot. It was the fact that is was being kept from everyone else.

"Why?" Nick demanded, walking up to Hudson's desk and slamming his hands on her desk. "If an officer has been injured, shouldn't we look into their attack? It might be in connection to the case they were working on before."

Hudson rested her porcelain pale chin on her hand and looked up at Nick. "That's exactly why I'm putting you two on the case." She said. "I also agree that there's a connection but what I'm not sure about is their attack. It was definitely a warning but...." She stopped, staring down at the files in front her.

"You aren't sure who the warning was from." Marcus guessed. Hudson nodded. "Well, what kind of weapon was used on the officers? We know the suspects can afford to hire some thugs to attack those they want out of the way but we need clues to pinpoint which sent them." He reasoned.

"Moreover, we'll need to talk to them as well." Nick continued. "Are they well enough to talk?"

Hudson turned in her chair to take out a thick file out of her drawer and handed it to them. "This has all the information you're looking for." She said, a bit distractedly. Taking the file, Nick exchanged a look with Marcus and turned back to Hudson.

"Is there something you're not telling us, ma'am?" He asked. She didn't say anything for a second and then she sighed, like she was about to admit something big.

"I don't know why but," She started, rubbing her temple. "I feel like there's more to this case than what we're seeing."

***************************************

After that, the two left, their sergeant's words echoing in their mind. Both wondered why she assumed that there was something they were missing. Surely, the information within the file wasn't that bad. Clenching the file tight in his hands, Nick turned to Marcus who was on his phone as he walked back to their desks.

"What should we tackle first?" He asked, opening the case file. "Do we go and see the injured officers or check out the crime scene they were found at?" He sat down with a sigh. The case files didn't say much more than what was said. The officers had narrowed down their suspect pool down to two CEO's.

Jaix Cataphos, age 29. CEO of Cataphos Exports. Despite starting out small, in a few short years, his company had went from a small company to a major corporation that handles the country's most influential trades. They were also said to have ties with several mafia groups and other questionable clients but no connection had ever been found. There was almost nothing on Jaix before starting his company at the age of 26.

Alikos Perisaros, age 32. CEO of Perisaros Conglomerate. What started out as a simple advertising company exploded into a major conglomerate soon after Alikos took over 4 years ago. Young, ambitious and daring, Alikos took the business world by storm with his risky but calculated decisions. Like Jaix, Alikos has no records before taking over what would later be called one of the top conglomerates stationed in New York City.

Many had investigated the matter but none had yet to find a thing on them. It was almost like they'd just popped up into their society one day and lived like they belonged. Anyone who looked into the matter too long always ended either hurt or indisposed in some way. Or they just stopped looking into it all together. It was strange.

What pissed Nick off the most was the fact that neither of them even bothered to try and hide their lack of identities. They did have some records but they were so flimsy, anyone who looked into it long and hard enough could find holes in it. Did they just think no one would care?

"The crime scene is going to be released soon." Marcus said, hanging up. "Which means we have to check it out soon or else we won't have much to go on."

Nicholas nodded, falling into his chair as he read the report. Marcus definitely continued speaking but Nicholas didn't hear a word. He was more focused on the words telling a very familiar story in front of him.

Marcus shook his shoulder, obviously bothered by Nicholas' lack of an answer. "Huh?" Nick turned to Marcus. "What did you say?"

Marcus raised an eyebrow at him. "Weren't you listening?" He demanded. Nick stayed silent. Sighing, Marcus continued. "That was a stupid question. Of course you weren't." He looked around the room and then, after what seemed like a long moment of contemplation, Marcus smacked Nick in the back of the head.

"Ow! What the hell?!" He cried, rubbing his head. Marcus said nothing on the subject, just continuing on like nothing had happened. He did that very often and it always pissed Nick off to no end. But they had more important matters to take care of.

"Officers Jackson and Turner were investigating the kidnapped teen's case before they got attacked right?" Marcus asked, staring down at his desk. On it rested a small portrait of his family. A beautiful wife and two kids. One of which, was the same age as the abducted kids.

"Yeah, but they couldn't find much connection between the teens. Other than being around the same age group, none of the kids relate to each other. Some are middle class, others are runaways or orphans. So far, no upper crust kids had been taken, making the officers think the kidnappers don't want to be noticed too much." Nick continued, looking through his copy of the report.

"Right." Marcus agreed. "These bastards are only targeting kids who can't otherwise defend themselves or those the system has forgotten. Perfect targets. So much so, we have no idea how many kids they've already taken thus far." He said, his fist clenched. After a minute, the man let out a breath and appeared to calm down some. "Anyway, we have a lot of work to do before we officially start this investigation."

"I'll go and interview the detectives." Nick stated, already standing up and picking up his coat to go out. At the baffled expression on his partners face, Nick went on to explain. "These guys were attacked and immediately hospitalized. That means they must have information that wasn't written in their reports."

"I'm sure the chief sent someone over to check in on them before." He retorted, crossing his large arms across his chest.

"Yeah, but how coherently do you think their story were?" He countered. "They'd just been attacked in a dark alleyway after a long night. After the shock they went through, I'm sure they missed something and we shouldn't take any chances with this."

Marcus stared at him for a minute before nodding. "Fine. I'll drive us over to the hospital then." He offered, holding up his car keys. Nick shook his head.

"I want to go alone." He said, walking ahead. "You go and check out the scene where they were attacked. You have a much keener eye than those CSI's do."

Marcus crossed his arms. "And how are you going to get there?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Two words my friend." Nick pointed out. "Sub. Way."

"That's one word, dumbass." His partner retorted as the neared the door.

"I'm not talking about the restaurant, Manny!" He argued. Nick always hated that nickname and Marcus knew it but he ignored the obvious bait.

"Neither am I." He let out a breath and dragged his hand through his hair. "Seriously, what is the point of you even having a license? I've never seen you drive anywhere."

Nick shrugged. "I just prefer the train and bus. That's all." He replied, opening the door, breathing in the sweet scent of the city. Street food, mud and people, along with all the little things that made their city so cluttered.

"You prefer pickpockets, homeless people and fares to a free ride?" He asked, clearly thinking his friend and partner was insane. "And they call me weird."

"No. We all call you an asshole. There's a difference, amigo." He said, patting the man on the shoulder. "Besides, at least trains don't have to suffer from traffic jams."

"Yeah, you just have to deal with all the crowds and delays." He retorted, smirking as they went their separate ways. Marcus stepped into his car, waving back at Nick as he headed toward the subway. As soon as Marcus disappeared into the sea of traffic, Nick's smile fell.

"This is going to be a long day." He muttered, walking down the subway stairs.