We went in head-first to investigating this thing for Massimo.
We checked out the scene. No hedge gateways nearby. We checked the nearby shopping centers and Nail parlors for hedge gateways and other news about Dung Mai specifically or the “event” that occured at “that Bank of America the other day”. Not much information seemed readily available. I did get my nails done, though.
Holden, however, did eventually run across some folks who knew Dung Mai and where she lived. Additionally, Tim found out that uhhh apparently she was a prostitute, not necessarily just a nail technician. Yeah. Well, I can't say I'm too surprised, in this area… *looks around*
So while Tim and I went to talk to Anne Meryls at a starbucks downtown, Holden and Jake went to “talk” to Dung Mai's former roommates/friends.
Anne was nice, very straightforward, and didn't give us any BS when we were trying to get information from her. Seems like she is what Ahriman once explained to me as being an “ensorcelled mortal”. I guess she has a crush on Massimo. I'm not surprised, really, he is very good looking. He sold her a Porsche Targa 4s, which I was very interested in seeing.
Fortunately, Tim got a call from that girl from Agnes Scott and had to leave, so I tried to push my luck a little to see if Anne would take me for a fun little ride in her car. And yay, she did! So cool! One of these days, it would be nice to have a fun car like this. Maybe Massimo can cut me a [really big] deal someday, heh.
Um, er, yeah, anyways.
While I was joyriding with Anne, apparently Jake and Holden met Dung Mai's former roommates. They didn't really find out anything useful from them. So instead, Jake called Dung Mai's pimp, the number which Tim had acquired earlier when he was talking to her day-time prostitute associate, and arranged a meeting at a local Waffle House.
This meeting was rather… odd. I played dumb and no doubt Jake likes to assume that I simply AM that dumb. Sigh, oh well. But anyways, I'm glad I didn't have to really be actively involved in this other than being “fire support” for the group. I don't like seeing people, girls, in this kind of situation, and it may've triggered a bit of “road-rage” on my part if I would've gone to the car with them.
Anyway, Jake got the name of some crooked cop from A Pimp Named Huu Tran. Between him and the copnames on the case that Anne had given us (Montgommery Stephens and Elly Rush)… we had a little bit to work with finally.
I guess Holden called the crooked cop, John Whitherspoon, and prodded him to find out more info on Dung Mai's case. Apparently he's a pedophile. Arrgh. Jake and Holden also headed down to the police station to get a look at the casefiles. Apparently all the cases involve vine-tentacles ripping faces off. And now that the deed has been caught on security footage, all 6 cases have been forcibly closed by the District Attorney.
It's hard to understand what the motive of these crimes could be, assuming they are Fey-related. I know Fey can do a lot, but not necessarily in the human world. Also, if one of these other supernatural types were orchestrating this? To what ends?
Anyway, the following list encompasses the “vine-tentacle-face-ripping” cases:
| Name | Gender | Nationality | Age | Date of Death | Occupation | Location of Death |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dung Mai | F | Viet | 19 | July 19 | Nail Technician / Prostitute | BoA ATM @ 2am |
| Hung Dao | M | Viet | 35 | June 21 | Accountant | Target parking @ 6pm |
| Joan Goodacre | F | Caucasian | 24 | May 3rd | Ebay Consignment / Folk Artist | Viet open-air market @ 5pm |
| Anh Phan | F | Viet | 33 | April 19 | Stay-at-home mother of two | In car on side of road @ 11am |
| Bao Vu | M | Viet | 18 | April 1 | Mechanic | At bar: Empty Chamber 12am |
| Father Nguyen Van Hung | M | Viet | 51 | February 18 | Catholic Priest | His house @ 3pm |
All of these deaths happened within the Chamblee/Buford area of inner I-285, all within a couple miles of each other. All involved the vine-tentacles ripping the face off. All cases flagged as “Decapitation. Possible gang-related.” All cases were forcibly closed by the District Attorney, Nichole Vaughn, upon receiving the video footage for Dung Mai's case.
Not sure where we should go from here. I don't know if this is Fey-related activity, but it could be since all cases seem to have the vines. If some of the cases involved weird, unexplained deaths by things other than decapitating vines, I would have felt safe in declaring this non-Fey-related, but now… now I'm not so sure. Massimo may indeed be correct. Either way, it was worth looking into. But the people being “chosen” for this? Seems inconsistent. Unless it just happened to be “who happened to be around at the time” or something along those lines. In an area that is heavy Viet population, if the victims were “random” then most would probably be Viet, but not necessarily all of them. Such as Joan, who was presumably caucasian.
I think, for now, I will consider these crimes to be “random” based on who was around at the time when the perpetrator decided to strike. Fey involvement reasonably probable.
In other news, apparently the Summer Court is going to hold a Freehold shindig on August 6th at Glamour Shots. It would be interesting to meet the other denizens of the Atlanta area that are just regular court members as opposed to the politicos we've met so far. I plan to attend.