The Lives of Adeline

Vermon

Vermon sat at his desk, his hair nearly black as he went through paperwork— or, rather forging paperwork, a little tax evasion here, some money laundering there. 

It was one of the few things his father let him do without bothering him over. Stardust, as it turns out, is something nearly drug cartels, mafia, and law enforcement constantly want more of, which doesn't help with how rare it already is.

Stardust is something that few can manage to gather. Some people use the weaker dust as a sort of strong cocaine, while others can grab a box of the strong stuff and can do things as small as healing a scratch, to as large as to cure cancer. 

It's not completely magical, as it's mostly used as a healing agent, though some claim that people can gain immortality from it. Maybe not immortality, but in the organ trade? That's where the money really at.

To get it, you need a "l'enfant des étoiles", otherwise known as "a child of the stars." there's technically no way to tell if someone is startouched, other than for the starstriken person to wish on a star, and the dust left behind is, as you guessed it, stardust.

Being interrupted by the phone rigging, he picked up the brass, old fashioned rotary phone, and let out a deep sigh, "what is it now?"

"Adeline struck again," William, Vermon's life long friend and 'coworker', or, as much of a coworker you could get in the mafia.

"What?" Vermon stood up quickly, quickly grabbing his gun. "Where was she? Does anyone have eyes on her?"

"She's dead. Suicide, right in the middle of the fucking ballroom, dramatic as ever too," shuffling could be heard as William opened what sounded like a heavy metal door to Vermon. "The DNA's a match...though..." William paused, "The body looks funny."

"What, does it have fucking clown nose on it?" Vermon put his coat on, already rushing out the door of his office.

"Vermon— it's fine, it's probably nothing." he could hear William let out a deep sigh, "Go back to your work or your father might literally kill you. I have Mista-two-faced-maniac standing in front of me, he's taking a look at it right now." 

Vermon groaned, making William chuckle, "as impatient as ever. How about this, ill tell you all about what he finds at the bar later, sound good?"

Vermon let out a sigh, "fine."

"Chim chim charo as they say," "you fucking weirdo."