Gods and Monsters

III

Yates' Residence - Wimbledon, London

Yates' office was exactly how Peggy had expected: solid wood furniture, red curtains, and just a small lamp for light, decorated the needlessly large room. In a cabinet on the wall were a large number of trophies that Yates had earned throughout his life, in an attempt to give the room an air of importance it really didn't have. Yates didn't have any family, and most people would assume he never had time to date, due to the importance of his job, but Peggy was now thinking that there was something more suspect about it. Peggy had been forced to explain to Charlie about why she was going to Yates' house, the newspaper clippings, and her suspicion of his involvement in Nick's death, and fortunately, Charlie hadn't thought her too mad. It was a relief to finally get it off her chest, honestly; sharing it with someone else, and at least with Charlie, who already had experience with supernatural occurrences —little was too shocking for him. After being told about Yates looking the same in the 1960s, Charlie had deduced he was a posthuman, with either the ability to slow down the ageing process, or possibly stop it altogether.

Peggy still struggled to get her head around these "posthumans" that Charlie spoke of, with these special abilities that made them different from standard humans. It was something out of fiction, not something she expected to become a common part of her life. Peggy remembered a few months ago where she had gotten slightly tipsy and ended up reading the ramblings of a Mexican professor, who talked about "evolved individuals who were going to usher in a new generation of humans, where these abilities would be standard among us all", but she had just laughed it off at the time. Now it didn't seem so mental.

The duo were currently looking through Yates' drawers and cupboards in the hope of finding something that could help prove what exactly he was and whether Charlie's theory had any chance of being true. It turned out that bringing Charlie along with her hadn't gone too badly, as he'd allowed them to get inside the house with a lock pick function built in with Winnie, as well as helping Peggy to search everything twice as fast.

"Oh dear..." Charlie said causing Peggy to spin around and see what had disturbed him. He held up a picture of a man who looked to be in his 50s, with receding salt and pepper hair, and small grey eyes, with his arm around Yates. Peggy didn't recognise him, but it seemed Charlie did.

"Who's that?"

Charlie's face showed a plethora of emotions at once; anger, disappointment, sadness, to name a few. "His name is Eugene McDonald." He said sombrely. "I guess the best way I can put it would be that he's the Joker to my Batman. He's a posthuman with the ability to temporarily use other posthuman's powers when he's in close proximity to them, and a right evil bastard. He's been responsible for numerous killings and kidnappings over the years and we've had a few run-ins here and there. My friend Scarlett and I tracked him down to Ecuador a few years back where we engaged in a chase ending at Church and Convent of St. Francis. When we went to apprehend him, he set off an explosion which engulfed him, and we presumed him dead. That was in 2010, and this photo has a date in 2013 written on it. Shit!" Charlie smacked his hand down onto the table, the rage and disappointment clear to see on his face.

Peggy had never seen Charlie like this. His usual devil may care attitude had now been replaced with a much more human anguish. "C'mon, let's get out of here. We're not going to find anything else here and this gives us a place to start. If Yates is associated with this Eugene guy, I can't imagine it's just a coincidence." Peggy moved over to Charlie and placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

"I'll call Broderick up and get him to look into it. You should get some sleep for now, though," he said. The pair left the office how they had found it, taking a picture of the photo with Eugene as they didn't want to risk taking it from the office. Peggy drove Charlie back to the pub and headed home herself, this time hoping for a more peaceful sleep.

As they left Yates' house, a mysterious figure in a dark car just up the street looked down at the twosome. "There you are Charlie," they muttered to themselves. "Long time no see." The figure watched as Peggy's car pulled away from the house and began its journey back to North London before they made their own tracks away from Yates' home.

Continued in Part 4