Montag was twirling a pen between his fingers as he talked to Jake over the cell phone. "Wot? The bruisin' is everywhere?" Grissom leaned back in his chair. "That bloody sceams a beatin'...although I'd 'ave to see the body to make sure. Yeh, we're not workin' on anything at the moment...okay...okay...yeah, we'll be there shortly...yes, it would be better not to disturb the body...See you 'round, Jake."

Grissom ended his call with Jake and dialed the number for Phil. "'Ello, Mister Smith. Looks like we're back in business..."

*** *** ***

Brianna took a few steps away from the dead body. Perhaps she should have stayed with Tiberius at Grissom's flat. "This really isn't my thing."

The other memebers of Vanguard had gathered outside of Jake's Bar for the investigation. The wall faced a deserted street, which was lined with small thin trees and lampposts with broken lamps. Scattered between buildings were long alleyways. A perfect spot for a murder. Brute Force, upon seeing the corpse, nearly fainted. He was now at the bar, eating a mountain of turkey sandwiches. Otto was annoyed. Jake had said Vanguard could eat for free while the investigation was going on. Ben Philips was already cutting into the day's profits, and it was only eleven in the morning.

Robo Squirrel landed on Brianna's shoulder. Brianna was usually pale, she was practically clear now. "Robo Squirrel is detecting abnormal levels of digestive metabolism. What does this abnormality mean?"

"It means I'm gonna upchuck." Brianna nodded to the rest of the boys and ducked into an alleyway. Robo Squirrel jumped off Brianna's shoulder and landed on top of Phil's head.

"Right..." said Phil. It was hard to take him seriously at the moment, what with a robotic rodent on his cranium. "So, I think we can all agree it was a beating. All the classic signs, Griss?"

Montag ducked down towards the body. "Er, yeah. Still wish that bloody alien was here to agree 'ith me." Then again, Adem has a case of his own, doesn't he? "But all the same, it looks like he was beatin' till he was dead. No sort o' trauma after they killed him."

"They?"

Montag shrugged. "Just assumin'."

Phil lifted a finger. "Rule number one of detective work -- never assume."

*** *** ***

Brianna was not going to hurl after all. But something else had caught her eye. She was still in the alleyway, just within earshot of the rest of the team. In one of the trash cans, casually tossed into the garbage, was a kitchen blade covered in blood.

The Banshee was careful not to touch the weapon. It was possible that Jake had simply thrown away one of his own butcher knives. But Brianna suspected she had just spotted the murder weapon.

The smartest thing would have been to call someone from the team, but Brianna was eaten up with her own curiousity. She looked farther back into the alleyway. There was a few tossed-over trash cans against a tall wooden fence. "If I had just finished killing a man," she thought outloud, "I'd toss the weapon quick as lightning and start running."

And with that, the little Banshee jumped the fence using her wide gray wings. There was a small chain-link fence which she leaped over just as easily. And then there was a pile of lumber, and soon, Brianna realized she was too far from the team for them to hear her.

"Hey, pretty birdy..."

Brianna backed into a wall. Some strange voice had called from the shadows. "Um...who are you?"

A few figures emerged from the shadows. Some carried crobars, others carried hammers. They were dressed in the usual punk fashion. All of them looked as though they had just popped out of a grave. They were rotton-looking corpses, a whole gang of them, and Brianna realize that -- not for the first time -- she had bitten off more than she could chew.

"You belong to The Dead now, bitch!"

The Dead? Real smooth, Bree. These are the goons that were on the telly a few months back. Brianna let out one superaudio note before returning her voice to a normal octive. "Not if I can help it..."

*** *** ***

If Robo Squirrel had ears, they would have been pricked up at the moment. Instead, still on top of Phil's head, he made some beeping and chirping noises.

"Wot the hell..." began Montag.

"Robo Squirrel is recieving a distress call from Brianna. Coming point-twenty-five kilometers away from this spot, bearing north-northwest...hey, where are you all going?"