Well, Hannibal thought to himself, that sure as hell paid off.
Hannibal had gotten paid for his latest job, which involved him rescuing a dognapped, well, dog. Paid quite handsomely.
As it turned out, the woman who had hired him to retrieve her "snookums", a woman he had immediately thought of as insane, was incredibly wealthy.
And insane.
She had almost fainted with joy in his office, as she grabbed the dog from his arms. She insisted on paying him way over his asking price, which, Hannibal admitted, he had no problem with.
This, however, I don't think will...
Tonight, as so many nights before, Hannibal lurked in the shadows inside a building in New York City.
A building that just happened to house the New York City Police Department.
Whenever Hannibal could afford it, and that was between Ace Venture gigs, he would sneak inside any give precinct and use his..."abilities", to disappear in to the shadows and listen for interesting cases.
"Interesting" cases, for Hannibal, were any cases involving corpses showing up with two small puncture wounds on the neck, and a whole mess of blood loss.
He never felt exactly right, using his powers to infiltrate a police precinct, but the cops never seemed to crack these cases (God help them if they ever did), and he considered it him giving back to the community.
Everybody has to do their part. My part just happens to be hunting down blood-sucking monsters. No offense, me.
Hannibal had stood in the exact same spot for four hours. Dozens upon dozens of policemen and women had walked by him, but nobody noticed the bearded man standing in the shadow of a particularly large cabinet.
Sure, he had some close run-ins, some included a rather obese officer dropping a penny and bending over to pick it up. A sight Hannibal would not soon forget, wish as he may that he would.
It wasn't often that a vampiric murder, or anything supernatural, fell into his lap, so to pass the time on his many "stakeouts", he had begun to name the people who walked past him.
Good evening officer Should-Pluck-His-Eyebrows, Hannibal thought, amusing himself to no end. And to you, detective Bad-Breath. Oh holy God, it's Would-Give-Anything-To-Boink-Her! Be cool, Hannibal, be COOL.
As fatigue started to set in, his leg-muscles began to feel the strain. That, coupled with the facts that
...I've never had to piss so bad in my entire LIFE..
, and that not much seemed to be going on tonight, in the way of vampires, had finally convinced Hannibal to mark the night as a waste and head home.
But as he inched closer to an open window, the cool air wafting in his face, two voices stopped him cold in his tracks.
"Hey, Vaughan! Listen to this one! I just got a call, I'm headed over to the docks. Seems they found a corpse floating around. Real stinker, too!" called a short policeman, whose glasses and flailing shirt gave a picture something quite less than an action hero.
"Oh? What's so strange about that? We fish out hobos and pimps out of the river every day of the week almost." a voice boomed back in response. This man, Vaughan, was a mountain of a man. He towered over his fellow officers, and his newly polished badge pinned to his chest shone madly.
Holy hell, I've never seen Schwarzenegger over here. I dub thee, detective Could-Snap-Me-In-Two.
Hannibal turned to leave discreetly out the window, when the next words out of the shorter of the two stopped him once again.
"This homeless guy was found dead, right, but get this: He almost no blood left in his body! That's not all, because apparently what killed him, you know aside from being emptied like a ketchup bottle, were two puncture wounds to the neck. Identical in shape, too. What you think Vaughan, we got vampires in our city? Should I call Buffy?" the officer snorted, laughing at his own joke. Hannibal gritted his teeth.
I could kick yours AND Buffy's asses. Although I'd probably hit on her and THEN kick her ass. Alas, jackpot!
Hannibal was glad that he'd finally gotten something to do with his time instead of hunting for lost pets.
His thoughts were interrupted however, as Vaughan responded to his fellow officer's assertion.
"Huh. Yeah, that's strange. You mind if I take the case?" Vaughan asked, but gave the short man no time to respond, "I appreciate it."
There's something off about this guy. Hannibal pondered, measuring Vaughan up.
But as Hannibal turned to leave, so did Vaughan. And even though Hannibal was completely invisible to the human eye and made no sound to mention, their eyes locked.
Hannibal froze. But as soon as it had happened, Vaughan broke the gaze, and exited.
Oh, damn, Hannibal, that was close. Could've sworn he saw me. I should look into that guy, he seemed shifty.
No time for that now, I have an appointment down at the docks.
As Hannibal climbed up onto the window, he suddenly remembered something crucial to his continued survival.
I have GOT to go take a leak first.
Hannibal pushed himself off the ledge. The wind crashed into his face, and the pavement was rushing to meet him.
After a six story leap, he landed on his feet, silent as the cat, and, loud as a barking dog, rushed over to the nearest alleyway.
