The Investigation Begins

Two days pass, and the city is in mourning. All in all, thirty-eight people, twenty-two of them police officers, lost their lives in the incident that the media had dubbed the "22nd Street Massacre." Among the lost was Jim Stazzo, an eighteen year vet of the Miami police department and Daniel Sihn's partner.

The young detective was currently at his desk going over notes on the incident. He had been offered a few weeks time off due to his involvement, but he refused. He owed Jim, as well as the other officers who died that day, to get to the bottom of just what the hell had happened to cause some homeless druggie to gain super powers and **** over thirty people.

His desk was clean and immaculate like his appearance, a vast difference from the untidy mess of papers, open files, and half-empty food containers of the desk next to his. Daniel tried not to look over at it, but it was difficult. He kept expecting to see Jim still there, eating a donut and complaining about politics.

Atop the clean surface of his desk were two items: the paperclip he had taken from the old bum's dying hands, as well as a rubber band. Although the items were very ordinary looking, Daniel knew in his gut that they were definitely anything but.

He had received the rubber band after getting a somewhat frantic call from the coroner, asking him to meet at the morgue as soon as possible. The detective and the coroner had been on friendly terms for a while, and the old doctor knew that David wanted to know everything about the bum that was brought in. Especially since the homeless man had been responsible for Jim Stazzo's ****.

"This is the weirdest thing I've ever seen," the old coroner told him as they stood over the bum's pale body. "When they first brought this guy in, I tried to do my thing, cut him open, you know? But I couldn't. I tried a scalpel, bonesaw, anything, but nothing could get through his skin. Well, until I found this." The old man passed Daniel a thick piece of rubber band, the type you'd use to hold together thick files. "I found that wrapped around his wrist. When I took it off and tried cutting the body again, well, it worked. Damn freaking strange, all this." The coroner wiped at his pale face, obviously bewildered at the strange events. "In case you wanted to know, the bum died from massive internal injuries, i.e. his insides were crushed. Whatever kept him bullet proof obviously didn't keep his organs car proof."

Daniel nodded and left, taking the rubber band with him. The coroner probably expected him to put it into evidence, but he never did. Must have slipped his mind.

At home that night, Dan wrapped the rubber band around his right wrist. He then took a kitchen knife and tried to cut his finger. As hard as he tried, he couldn't get it to even scratch.

"What the hell are you two?" the detective asked silently as he continued to stare down at the two items on his desk. He reached down and picked up the paperclip. During the fight, the old bum had used this to hurl cars and debris with deadly results. He looked over his desk and saw a mug filled with pens. He raised the paperclip up, as he saw the old man do, and concentrated. After several tries, nothing.

Feeling frustrated, and somewhat foolish, Daniel cursed and looked over at Jim's desk. He saw a small plate filled with paperclips. Dan concentrated and, to his surprise, three paperclips jumped out of the plate and flew across the room. The detective gasped, then looked around to see if anyone noticed. Thankfully, the room was empty.

Daniel tried the paperclip on numerous other items. Through his experimentation, he found that whatever it was that the paperclip was doing, it could only do it on objects made of metal. Plastic, wood, anything not made of metal wouldn't even budge no matter how hard he tried. In contrast, he managed to get paperclips, scissors, and a AA battery to dance across his desk.

"This is too fucking weird," he muttered to himself as he put the items away.

"Excuse me, Detective Sihn?" a voice asked from behind him. Daniel turned around and saw a uniformed officer holding a cardboard box.

"Yes?"

"I'm Pullman, from the evidence locker. You put in a request to see Edward Jewel's personal effects?" The officer held up the box full of the homeless man's possessions.

"Oh, yes. Of course." Daniel signed the forms before the officer handed over the evidence box. "Thank you."

Edward Jewel was the name of the murdering homeless man. He was 53 years old, though he looked years older due to all the **** use and hard living on the streets of Miami. According to his record he was a veteran of the first Gulf War, and had a long record of **** related offences. He was never considered a violent offender, not until two days ago when he tried to rob a bank and ended up killing over thirty people.

Inside the box was all the things Jewel had on him when he died. They were all stuffed inside his backpack, along with the money he had stolen from the bank. Daniel looked inside, seeing a dirty garbage bag filled with typically useless, ordinary items. He began pulling them out.

A house key. An expired condom packet. An old map of Miami. An old porno magazine. Ear plugs. An airline ticket.

Daniel stopped when he set down the airline ticket on his desk. To his great astonishment, the slip of paper began floating several inches off his desk.

"What the hell?" Daniel picked it up and looked it over; it looked and felt like an ordinary piece of paper. He set it down again, and yes, it continued to float off his desk. He grabbed it and looked at it again.

Unfortunately, the ticket was very old and seemed to have been dunked in water. Thus, much of the ink had been washed off. What he did manage to get was the United Airlines logo as well as the name of the passenger it was from: Joseph Hunter.

Daniel sorted through the evidence box again, taking note of every item left inside: Two more keys, one a car key and the smaller one looking to be for a locker; a credit card, name on front was Joseph Hunter; two photos, one of an infant, the other looking to be a wedding photo of a dark haired man and a beautiful brunette; the last item was a driver's license, this one belonging to Joseph Hunter. The picture on the license matched that of the dark haired man in the wedding photo.

It was obvious to Daniel that all the items Jewel had belonged to this Joseph Hunter. Whether the old bum found them or stole them from the guy was anyone's guess. Right now Daniel had to find this man and quick. Not only was he worried that Hunter may have suffered the same fate as the rest of Jewel's victims, but he was (or had been) in possession of several very dangerous items. One maniac had managed to kill over thirty people and hold off an entire police **** with just two of these items. Imagine the devastation an organization like Al Quada could bring if they got hold of such things.

Detective Daniel Sihn knew what he had to do. He had to find these items, whatever they were, and keep them out of the wrong hands.