The Cracked Portrait

○Alastor's Inn Room○

Alastor stared at the case file intensely. He read and reread every single piece of information about the case. Evidence was scarce and the murders were too random to put any suspects into hand. His eyes scanned pages and pages. Something just didn't feel right to him.

The lack of evidence was almost suspicious like it was being tampered with it. Alastor knew better than that but he was getting more and more paranoid the more he thought about this case and the little information they had. It was now night and he poured over his work.

Five murders. And hardly any evidence. This person was smart, he could give them that. The authorities weren't any help either, they all just scratched their heads and then forgot about the case to continue off to handling petty crimes. They were too terrified to actually deal with the case. Corvin was the main person collecting evidence and Alastor was glad for that, he knew Corvin was smart enough to handle evidence in a textbook kind of way.

They didn't even have a weapon to go off of, just the handle to know that the knife that was used seemed like a match to the second and fourth body. Corvin was at a loss and Alastor could tell, which meant that this case was serious.

Alastor wasn't the type to just let things go, he studied until he couldn't anymore. And he collected information until there was no more information to collect. He didn't stop and he didn't plan to stop with this one.

He held the file in his hand, more information had come through since both Corvin and Alastor returned to the crime scene. So, now they had two case files. Normal crimes had more than that. Maybe one folder but with multiple papers stacked firmly, but this case had two folders with each maybe three to four pages inside. The only reason the second folder was taken out was so Alastor's impending anxiety attack didn't amount to the lack of evidence. You could imagine the way that Corvin made fun of him, his condescending smile and all.

Alastor flipped through and then stopped suddenly. There, right in the corner. A thin, little piece of paper was stuck in the paper clip that was holding the papers in the file. It looked like a page had been ripped too hastily right out from under the clip. A ripped-out page.

From a case file.

Now that was suspicious.

Only two people had access to the case file before he did. Corvin, of course, and Oliver, his assistant. Alastor met Oliver a few times, believe it or not, Corvin and Alastor have been assigned a few cases together and Oliver was always there to follow Corvin around like a lost puppy.

Alastor didn't like him. Not just because he tried to act exactly like Corvin did, but because he was entirely too quiet. And because he had an ill temper. At first glance, you wouldn't suspect anything like a bad temper with the boy, but he witnessed it. He had a bad sort of rage, the one that turned into blind fury, he could fill the anger that emitted off him when it did happen. The sweet boy turned not so sweet anymore. He got violent.

He almost punched Corvin straight in the nose it wasn't the fact that Corvin was trained in combat and succeeded in dodging the attack. That was the first time that Alastor realized maybe this kid wasn't fit for the job. His temper was too hot and he was not at all calm in dire situations. He was actually quite frantic.

And this page ripped out was something Alastior didn't want to have on his conscience. Not because he believed it was Oliver who committed the murders, but because he wouldn't put it behind the kid to steal information so he could figure out the case by himself to make Corvin impressed.

He would have to ask Corvin about it later.