Int. Police Interrogation Room (Morning) October 23, 2025
After asking Blake for help, Gabriel has spent the last couple of days going over papers in the filing room, in hopes of finding anything that could be connected to the case. Asking other officers didn't pan out as he hoped, which is why he decided to go look at files. Gabriel's appearance is haggard; his normally pristine suit is wrinkled in places as he finally makes his way back to his desk.
While he did go home, Gabriel really hasn't had much time to sleep, overlooking every sheet of paper he could get his hands on. He found it odd how sometimes files for some of the people were missing. The Records clerk mentioned in passing how some files went missing a while back, but there hasn't been a formal search for some of them yet. The files that went missing were very unimportant, or about low-case criminals.
Gabriel let out a deep sigh, rubbing his eyes as he looked down at his desk. The top of the desk is covered in an amalgamation of papers mixed in with sticky notes. Gabriel has been trying to find a new starting point, but he hasn't found a new place to start yet. He went looking for Jacob Ryder's arrest, and found nothing, though he did end up finding his marriage license along with the divorce records. It was said that his wife, Jill, filed for divorce, and Jacob granted it, not contesting anything. Besides that, he hasn't been able to find anything on the rest of the people yet, but he still has plenty of folders to go through. Gabriel laid his head down on his desk, letting his eyes rest after the long stretch of reading over multiple papers.
"How's it going, Rook?" a voice asked. The smell of cigarette smoke was potent in the air as the footsteps stopped in front of Gabriel's desk.
Gabriel's nose wrinkled as the smell wafted towards his nose. "Must you always have to go around the office reeking of the place," he sighed.
Without looking up, Gabriel could already tell who was speaking. Blake either smelt like tobacco or like he just came from a bar. No matter how much Gabriel argued with him about appearances, Blake never took it into consideration.
Blake let out a deep sigh. "You don't know how to cut back and have a good time, Rook, do you?"
"As you can see, I have a lot of work to deal with, so can you hurry up and say what you want then fuck off," Gabriel groaned, not once looking up from the multiple files open on the desk.
"Spin me a narrative, Rook, see if I can give you a hand," Blake joked, sitting down on the edge of the desk.
Gabriel saw some of the files get crumpled from Blake sitting on them. Gabriel pushed Blake off his desk, doing his best to straighten out any of the files that were bent.
Blake shook his head at the scene. "Ugh, you're too uptight, learn to live a little," he complained.
"Don't have somewhere, anywhere else to be?" Gabriel questioned, momentarily glancing at Blake before looking back down.
"I asked the captain to assign yours truly to the case to help you out," Blake answered, putting his fist to his chest as if doing a small salute.
Gabriel rubbed the bridge of his nose in annoyance. "Are you telling me that you forced yourself on another case of mine once again?"
"Forced is such a crude way of putting it," Blake chastised as he walked around the desk, patting Gabriel on the shoulder. "Let's say I just offered my services in a convincing manner."
Gabriel shrugged Blake's hand off of his shoulder. "Look, man, no offense, I'd rather work this on my own."
"Oh, come on, this is a high-profile case, I gotta be on it. Look, if we don't solve it soon, they said the Feds will be all over this," Blake stated, trying his best to convince Gabriel.
Gabriel looked down at his desk, and it was full of case notes. So far, over the past week, he has been making little headway. He hasn't been able to pinpoint a suspect yet. All the victims were from different parts of the city and had different backgrounds in terms of finance and jobs. Even checking call logs, last known locations, things like that, the people didn't cross over.
Gabriel began to think it over and realized having Blake's help wouldn't be that bad. Maybe he could look over everything with a fresh mind.
"After thinking it over, I can admit that your help may be useful," Gabriel started.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I may offer different insight, yadda yadda yadda," Blake interrupted. "Follow me, Rook, I have a way to start narrowing down suspects."
Blake quickly grabbed up as many documents as he could off the desk before briskly walking past other officers' desks, some even looking at him in wonder.
"Hey!" Gabriel called out, frustrated.
"Keep up, Rook," Blake answered back, quickly rounding a corner in the distance.
"Dammit, I knew this would be a mistake," Gabriel muttered.
He quickly gathered any remaining documents, putting them neatly into a manila folder. Straightening up his tie, Gabriel stood up, grabbing the folder. He then headed off in the direction Blake ended up in.
Some of the other detectives in the department greeted him as he walked past. Gabriel gave a small smile and greeting in return. Gabriel admittedly wasn't too familiar with most of his coworkers. Even after working here for the past four years, Gabriel doesn't really spend time with the others, preferring to either work alone or go straight home after clocking out.
Truthfully, if it wasn't for Blake, Gabriel wouldn't have ever been in a bar. For some strange reason, he has always hated the smell of liquor, just wanting to either study, work on cases, or go to the gym. Gabriel has preferred structure since he was a child. Thankfully, his parents helped to accommodate him growing up. Blake always called him a stick in the mud or boring. Actually, Blake always called Gabriel a bunch of strange names.
Turning the same corner Blake did, Gabriel was greeted to a hallway filled with offices. Peering into each one, after the fourth door, Gabriel found Blake. He was pinning stuff on a board with a question mark pinned to the middle of the board. Strings connected the question mark to multiple people with pictures, all with red X's through the face. There were about ten people on the board. To the right of Blake lay more string with scissors and tacks, and an opened folder with multiple papers sticking out.
"How long have you been trying to steal my case?" Gabriel growled as soon as he entered the room, slamming his manila folder on the closest table.
Blake glanced at Gabriel before looking back at the board. "Steal is a nasty word, you should be lucky I even offered to help."
"Yeah, more like trying to take credit," Gabriel snorted.
"No, just put up your damn ego for once and sit down," Blake ordered, glaring at Gabriel before turning back to the board.
"This better be good, or I'll march back out this door," Gabriel lashed out before sitting on the edge of a table close to the board.
Blake just shook his head in annoyance. "Listen, Rook, when you came to me last time for help, a thought occurred to me that some of the dead victims may have been missing prior to their bodies showing up," he explained.
Blake quickly went through the pile of paper before pulling out one. It was multiple papers clipped together.
"Here, take a look at this," Blake said as he handed over the papers to Gabriel.
Gabriel took a glance at the paper before looking back up at the board, noticing the same picture with an X. Gabriel stood abruptly and went to his folder he brought, pulling out two sheets of papers.
"Mark Baker, also known as Andrew Barker. Changed his name after being accused of kidnapping a child. He worked at a daycare before going missing," Gabriel read aloud, looking over two separate police reports.
One filed under missing person labeled a month ago, and one of a criminal line up from five years ago.
"Exactly, so I started digging through some of the missing persons reports. Now, not all of them changed their names like good ole Mark over there," Blake added. "Everyone of the people murdered not only went missing for a month before showing up, but every one of those people were accused of a crime before going missing."
Gabriel didn't say anything as he started going over a single file that was laid in the room, trying to match up any of the words that Blake said because if any of this is true, it changes up how he would look at the case.
Gabriel was in such a deep thought that he didn't notice Blake leaving out the room quietly.