SHOT in the Back

"Such a tragedy," Malcolm murmured, hanging his head before turning away from the ruins of the building which had been attacked. The Lieutenant had decided he'd be the one to go investigate the scene on behalf of the MCU, but for the life of him as he left MCU headquarters downtown on the otherside of the city he felt like the world was out to stop him from reaching this scene on time.

All his key witness were apparently already gone, but from what he'd gleaned from the less that stellar officer on site they probably wouldn't have been bale to tell him much in the first place. Sighing deeply, he took off his hat and wiped down his balding head with a cloth, it was rather hot despite the flames having since been put out. But as he made to head back to his car and head back to MCU, only to report another utter failure, he spotted Doque having finished with the man trespassing on the crime scene.

"Detective!" He boomed, throwing himself forward, rushing in the much smaller women's direction. "How wonderful it is you see you again!" He announced himself, drawing her up into a bone crushing hug of greeting. But, knowing his own strength, he was quick to release her, "Detective, if I might be so bold, it is wonderful to see you again, but who was that man just now?"

---

Siegrain sighed, staring up at the Ching gates ahead of him. Might as well get this over with quickly, walking up he spotted the guard stationed in the house outside the gate. "I'm here to see Elena Pierce - tell her Siggy decided to pay a visit for old times sake, she'll know what it means." The guard just looked at him as though he was odd, but after a long pause he nonetheless slowly picked up the phone to contact someone.

Doque jumped when she heard Malcolm calling her, turning around only to get hit by a truck. Oh wait, that was just a hug. "Nice to see you, too," she returned politely, straightening her uniform once she was released. At least he had a good understanding of how strong he was, and didn't turn out as some complete blundering oaf. "That was an all-too-curious citizen by the name of Myrrh Fabloue, at least according to his license," she answered, obviously not too keen on the man. "He was just rummaging through the wreck, didn't take anything and didn't resist at all. And he still did a better job of finding evidence than these dumbasses."

Melena watched the two acquaintances talk idly, spacing out slightly. She was already bored; there was no blood or bodies to look at nor was there any de Lucas shooting at her to kill. Freaking boring was what the crime scene was. She'd have a better time at a car wreck or even at a hockey game. Maybe the person was an asshole and Doque would let her kill him. That would be fun. Melena drooled slightly from the thought of blood before quickly composing herself.

"Rummaging through...?" Malcolm intone softly, cupping his chin in though as his mustache dancing whilst he spoke. "With all due respect, Detective Doque, did it ever cross your mind that he might have snuck onto the crime scene to plant false evidence? I mean, with the witnesses ferried away to who knows where it wouldn't be too hard for some to set it all up as though they were victims in all of this."

It wouldn't be the first time one of the families had used such a tactic; the former de Luca head in particular liked appearing as though his family was nothing but the victim of unjustified hate. That said, they'd never done anything like this just to set up the Chings so they could go after them in false vengeance. No, that didn't seem to work at all. Nor did the Chings have any reason to start things up again, though they had flourished in the past few years, the Chings still lacked a lot of the man power the de Luca's had, though they had quality, that was for sure, as did the de Luca's, but they could afford to throw fodder at the Chings to slow them down. Neither family had that power at the moment, nor did they have a way of ending things quickly.

The war to come will be long and bloody... Perhaps there was something larger going on here. "Detective, did you ID this man?" Maybe doing a little background checking and digging would help to establish a clearer picture, it also meant not going back to MCU empty handed - again.

"It's a possibility," Doque sighed, walking over the rubble and gesturing to the empty gas canister. "He was quite adamant that we had that checked out in the lab. The manufacturer is an old favorite of the Chings. So if he was planting evidence for the de Lucas', that would make sense. I suppose we'll have to wait for forensics to figure out the origin of the explosion." She glanced around, brushing a few stray strands of hair out of her face. "Of course I ID'd him. Myrrh Fabloue, age 26. 5'8", according to his license. Looked a bit shorter if you ask me," she recited, rolling her eyes. She had planned on further investigating him once she'd returned to HQ. Hopefully he was just a curious citizen, and not a de Luca. The last thing this city needed was a war.

"What this city needs and what it gets are sadly to very different things, I'm afraid," Malcolm said gravely, taking down the information which Doque had relaid to him about the man on the crime scene. "If it's not to much to ask of you detective I might recommend to the Lieutenant that you act as a ambassador between the MCU and the rest of the police department; I have a feeling we will all be working very closely over the next few months. However, for the time being I ask you leave the matter of investigating this man to me; as MCU takes priority on family related crimes, and it seems this is one such case." He respected Doque, she knew what she was doing and he didn't want to have to pull authority on her, but he would if she resisted his request.

Doque shrugged, scratching the back of her neck and looking over the rubble. "Alright, you guys over at MCU can have fun with all this family shit. Though I hope you're pretty convincing with the lieutenant, because social services thought it would be a good idea to drop one of the Ching kids with me. Don't get me wrong, Mel's a good kid, but the higher ups might be afraid of bias or something," she sighed, looking around and spotting Melena. At least she didn't try to get in trouble.

Karl was at a loss for words as he leaned against the house, trying to collect his thoughts and keep calm. Today couldn't possibly get any worse, it absolutely could not. Or so the man hoped.

With a sigh, he pushed himself off, and wandered back into the house, in search of his family.

Three minutes after entering the bathroom Andrea walked out with Max looking proud as he sprinted out, locking onto Carlotta's leg.

"I'm sure the lieutenant won't personally see a problem with it, it's ability he cares about most," Malcolm replied casually, looking over the child with which Doque was looking at. "Such a shame. How they can destroy a child's innocence and not care I can't fathom. This city would be all the better without either family..."

Melena waved at the two, hugging her bear to her stomach, before giving a toothy grin, eyes flashing with a dangerous amusement. The man was a complete moron in her eyes for even suggesting such a thing and she couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed in Doque for playing along. She'd been watching Myrrh for the entirety he'd been there and not once did he drop or place anything. The fact that he'd been de Luca, however, made her withhold the info. Why should she help a person she didn't care for, that involuntarily had some part in how she'd turned out?

Doque waved back at Melena, forcing a smile, before turning back to Mal. "Mel's a good kid, just a little...off. It might be best if I can get out of the city, and take her with me, but I'd have to find a job, and work things out with social services..." she groaned, leaning back on her heels. She had been sincerely hoping that this family business wouldn't start up again, even if her hours would increase if it did. She missed her job.

"Of course," Malcolm nodded, pulling some plastic gloves from his coat pocket, intending to do a little digging himself since he was still there. "But I've kept you long enough, thank you for your time, Detective Doque; it has been most helpful."

Carlotta combed her finger's through the boy's black hair. Now that she got a closer look at him, he looked really familiar. She couldn't place her finger on it, but shrugged it off. Max sure didn't look like either his parents though.

"Good job," she told him. Then she turned to Andrea. "So, we've got a lot of time to kill. What do you want to do?"

Max shook his head a little bit, but he did anjoy the head rub. Andrea shrugged her shoulders.

"Not sure. I'm guessing you don't have a piano, so maybe watch a movie or something."

Karl came walking back towards them, having plastered a small smile. "Quite a big place," he commented offhandedly, to no one in particular.

A figure was eventually visible emerging from the sprawl of the Ching compound, walking towards Siegrain with an pleasant smile on her face. She was about five feet seven, wearing a white blouse and a tight black pencil skirt, her red hair falling down to her shoulders. When she reached the man, she gestured and the guard raised the bar to let him in. She stuck out a hand in greeting.

"Hi, you must be the eldest Karmts brother," she said cheerfully.

Siegrain looked at the hand that was offered to him, and after a moments thought he took it in an awkward shake. "Uh, yeah, I'm Siegrain Karmts - you'd probably know me better as Stefan though, don't really go by that anymore. I take it you're one of Elena's pieces? She always did know how to pick the interesting ones," he said, easing into the conversation. He was a little rusty, but he could still pick up a little about this women from her stance, the look in her eyes, the way she shook his hands.

It was all in the details: all about getting to know someone within a few gestures so you could offer them what they wanted so they would follow. Is was all about getting into someone's head and finding out how they worked, if you couldn't do that in this city whilst hiding your own intentions and desires you were in trouble.

Elena was the only person he'd meet who he could honestly say was better at that than he was. This was going to be interesting indeed.

"Pieces?" Lauren asked curiously, an amused look on her face, gesturing for him to follow her back into the compound and to Elena, though she wasn't walking particularly fast. She'd heard quite a bit about this man, and she had to admit, she had been interested to meet him in person. She couldn't help but wonder how his time in jail had changed him, either dulled or honed his senses, and how he compared to his old self, though she knew he wasn't as violent.

"I'd call you a subordinate, but that would imply that Elena cares about your well being on some level or another," Siegrain shrugged, stuffing his now free hands into his pockets. "See, the Elena I know only cares about herself, to her, the people around her are only stepping stones - can't say I use to be any better, all that mattered was me and my brothers; but things have changed. Elena, well let's just say she might hide it better, but until I see for myself you're only going to be another one of her little pawns she'll discard when you've done all you can for her."

"You're making presumptions about my intelligence, Sieg," Lauren chuckled, her eyes playful and amused. "You see, you think I just blindly run around doing what she says without ever taking notice of her, or her ways. You see, Elena's doing a very valuable job for me, something that I couldn't afford to do when I entered her service, and something I still can't do now. And, fair warning, there are one or two people Elena cares, or cared about. Things have changed when you were in the can, Stefan."

"Y'know, it's funny you mention change, I made a new friend today and he and I had a nice long chat about change, was interesting, you should have been there," Siegrain rebuked, allowing that old trademark smirk of his to pull at his lips. Elena did always know how to pick 'em.

"But that aside, thanks for the tip. Leverage is always handy to have," he added shrugging his shoulders nonchalantly. "Now, if you could take me to Elena, that'd be swell. I have a few questions for her,"

"Of course, I exist but to serve," Lauren bowed mockingly, a husky voice filled with mirth as she led Siegrain through a warren of streets towards Elena's nice enough house. "I must say, you're looking pretty well for a man rumoured to be eight feet tall with horns growing out of his head. Elena's Just on the next street over."

"Yeah, I also used to shoot fire from my eyes and crap lightning from my arse back in the day, too," Siegrain said in response, humouring her, "but those tricks got kinda boring after a while so I stopped, as for the horns they ain't easy to hide, let me tell you."

When she told him where Elena was, he just nodded. In and out. Sooner I face her again the sooner I can get the fuck out of here. Never liked Ching ground... It made him uneasy being on family turf, but he was skilled enough to hide it easily enough.

"So how long has Elena had you in service?"

"Hmmm, I left the force maybe.... Four years ago, I think? And I started working for Elena a week after after that, so there you go, almost four years now. You know what they say, time flies when you're having fun~" Lauren giggled, her skirt swaying slightly as she turned a corner, walking along the main road that turned off into Elena's street at the next junction. She saw no problem telling him that, since he should have been able to find her detective record easily enough if he looked her up.