The Lengths That I Would Go To

[abrightboy]

The killer was moving around the country. Malcolm Bright could see the pattern, but he wasn't working for the FBI these days and they weren't exactly taking his calls. Short sighted of them, but they did fire him on suspicion of being crazy. The NYPD's jurisdiction was New York. With the killer beyond its borders, they handed it upwards and left it at that.

Let it go, Bright, had been Gil's sage advice. You can't catch every killer in America single-handedly.

Challenge accepted, some part of him retorted, though he'd only nodded mutely and forced a smile. Gil knew he hadn't simply let it go, but he wasn't going to have him followed to stop him doing anything stupid, either. He didn't have the will or the resources to keep tabs on Malcolm Bright 24/7 and Malcolm Bright knew it.

His mother, on the other hand, had extensive resources, so he simply didn't tell her he was leaving town. He did arrange for Ainsley to feed his bird, so the truth would come out eventually, but he'd be several states away by then.

He rode the bus. There was something oddly comforting about the anonymity of being in a crowd of strangers who had no interest in him whatsoever. He stared out the window and watched the country go by. When he stepped off the Greyhound in Lexington, Kentucky, he walked to a nearby hotel and checked in, then headed straight to the US Marshals office. There was no point in trying to talk to the FBI. If he was going to stop a killer from killing again, he needed someone in law enforcement to listen to him. The pattern suggested the next murder would happen in one of the rural communities around Lexington and it would be precipitated by a young woman's disappearance. He needed law enforcement with local knowledge, specifically.

He wandered into the Marshals' offices in a tidy three piece suit, charcoal grey with a burgundy tie perfectly knotted at his collar. He got a few suspicious sidelong glances but nobody asked if they could help him. He cleared his throat.

"Um, hello? I'm wondering if there's anyone here I can talk to about murder." He held up his hands. "Stopping murder, specifically, not... like... smalltalk."

Comments

[tinstar]

Raylan's eyes didn't waver from their target but if he were a cat, one ear would have been tilted back towards Malcolm for his opinion. Silence was acceptance, in this case.

"If this leads to a dead end, you're gonna be our first stop," Raylan promised. "Where else would he have gone for now? What other friends you got in this area that'd take him in?"

The guy listed off three different names, three different streets and Raylan nodded again.

"You remember my promise now," he said, head dipping a little with a nod of his brim.

[abrightboy]

"Thank you for your help," Malcolm told him, with a little wave, as they left. He was somehow tucked between Art and Raylan and missed the sneer in response.

Back in the car, Malcolm leaned between the front seats eagerly.

"Whoever his prison friend is, it's someone he feels safe confiding in. It has to be someone famous enough that their crimes are known. Quarles felt a kinship with him - enough to write a letter to a stranger - so either this person committed crimes against children, or else their crimes are so deranged that they're just as bad. And this person is in prison in New York. Granted it's one of the twisted crime capitals of the world, but that should help narrow it down."

[tinstar]

Sliding into the car, Raylan sat there for a long handful of seconds, doing a thousand yard stare out the window. There were so many things he didn't like, so he focused on the next most prominent step. More fucking driving.

Raylan itched to have Quarles in front of him, for this dog and horse race to be over with so he could go back to workin' on Boyd. But no, Quarles had to go and stick his nose in and lead them all up and down the east coast. Raylan couldn't wait to get a few fingers of whiskey into his hand.

The engine turned over, Raylan tapped the next address in and pulled the car back out onto the road.

"How many prisons you guys got here? Alls I know is Rikers Island and that'll be a hellva search."

[abrightboy]

"There are actually thirteen active prisons in New York City," Malcolm told him. "Riker's Island is probably the most famous, but so are Fulton and the Tombs. But don't forget hospital prisons for the criminally insane." His tone became slightly more subdued. "Claremont tends to host the worst of them, but Bellevue and Elmhurst have their share. If we're looking for someone really sick, we have to look at those too," he said fidgeting a little in his seat and then sitting back.

[tinstar]

"Gonna be up all night, up to my ass in files. Can your precinct get them? Or access to them? I figure we hit up these three places, ask the same kinda questions, see if we come with any different answers."

Art nodded. "He's quickly running outta rat holes to hide in and we'll close these off too. Boy, I tell you what, I cannot wait to get back for dinner though, you see that restaurant on the corner from the precinct?"

Art was kind enough to fill the silence with his daydreams of fried chicken or New York Pizza as they arrived at the second house and as they made their way to the third, only stopping once Raylan put out a hand and pleaded for a little peace. "I ain't eaten all day Art, you're killin' me. If you aren't gonna waste away in the next 40 minutes, we'll get you a steak, stat."

[abrightboy]

"That place on the corner is popular at the precinct," was Malcolm's only contribution to the food conversation. He didn't eat there. He could stomach neither pizza nor fried chicken. Nor steak. The third house was a bust as well, but on the way back, he called Gil about the files.

"We can bring the boxes back to my apartment," Malcolm told Raylan as he hung up the phone. He thought the Marshall might be in the market for two fingers of scotch to go with his steak. "Also, if he sent his first letter through conventional means, the prison would likely have opened it. There might be a record of that."

[tinstar]

"Your apartment certainly got the room, doesn't it. Sure you don't mind?" Raylan briefly met Malcolm's gaze in the review. "We'll need those records too, I guess."

It was going to be a long night.

35 minutes later, they were back in New York and while Raylan was driving, Raylan and Malcolm were the ones technically getting dropped off, back outside the NYPD precinct. Raylan pulled off his ball cap and scratched his head with a sigh, squinting up one side of the street.

"Well, I don't know about you, but I could eat a horse." His head bobbed. "Except I do. How about I go get something to eat and meet you back at your place." It was a question, despite the lack of up-pitch, Raylan's eyes on Malcolm for confirmation. He didn't know how Malcolm felt about having to watch people eat or the smells of it and frankly, it made Raylan uncomfortable. Like he was being impolite - the south had rules and one was that you didn't eat in front of people that weren't eating with you. Or at least not without offering.

It was the only reason that he'd not work while eating.

"Unless you know a place with good soup you like that also serves something.. a bit more substantial?"

[abrightboy]

Malcolm was used to other people eating. They kind of needed to, after all.

"I know a place we can order in," he said. "I've been told the steak dinner is good." He gestured to the precinct. "Can we put the boxes in your car?"

[tinstar]

Raylan glanced up and the building and nodded. He was hungry and so it made the argument easy to get over. With a sight jerk of his head, he started them in.

"Any idea how many of these things we're gonna be hauling?"

[abrightboy]

"Eight. They narrowed it down to eight with prisoners high profile enough that Quarles might have heard of them, but we'll have to weed them out by hand. Also Dani is running down any records of letters from Quarles to inmates at any of the prisons; she'll text me if she gets a name," he said, slipping past Raylan to lead the way deep into the precinct.

[tinstar]

"Great. That's only one dolly. Assuming you guys have even got one." He followed Malcolm further in. "Seems like a pretty tight team Gil's got here. Solid people." The lack of title attached to Dani's name had been noticed - Raylan was no profiler, but he was not deaf.

[abrightboy]

"I.... assume we have one," Malcolm said. "Gil said JT would have the boxes at his desk." He looked over at Raylan at the remark about the team. "It's the best team I've ever worked with," he said sincerely. "But Gil handpicked it." As though that made the reasons obvious.

As they reached Major Crimes, Malcolm led Raylan over to where JT sat next to a pile of boxes, looking nonplussed.

"Hey, JT. Um. Do we have a dolly?"

"Supply closet," JT said, not looking up from his computer. Malcolm lingered, shifting his weight from one leg to the other. JT seemed to feel his gaze and rolled his eyes. "Of course you don't get your own post-it notes," he observed dryly. "Around the corner from Gil's office, on the left."

[tinstar]

Raylan hummed as they stepped into the unflattering light of the precinct, letting his ruminations and assumptions about the lot of them simmer in the back of his head as he watched JT call Malcolm out on his desk supply ignorance, smirking.

He didn't know where Gil's office really was so it was best Malcolm go get it, leaving the cowboy alone in an awkward silence with the Detective who sized him up in a look and a half before disinterestedly looking back at his computer screen.

Raylan wasn't good at small talk and wasn't going to try to strike up a conversation with a guy who looked like he wouldn't be impressed if the second coming came. He was grateful when Malcolm returned; moving boxes onto the dolly was a useful task for idle hands.

[abrightboy]

Once they loaded the boxes into Raylan's car, Malcolm slid into the passenger seat, directing Raylan back through the maze of New York streets to his apartment in SoHo.

Once they got the boxes upstairs, Malcolm called the restaurant and ordered their food, then poured Raylan a glass of scotch while they waited.

[tinstar]

Raylan was glad for the direction - he would have quickly gotten lost and his face reflected his slight discomfort at how narrow and full every street was. He was even more glad to be parked again and doing something that felt significantly less dangerous - lifting.

Once the last box was up, Raylan could finally pull the slightly abused ballcap from his head, scratching his head as he tucked it into his back pocket and flipped the lid off one box. He could hear Malcolm ordering and what, making him smirk a little bit as Malcolm came back with a drink. Raylan arched his eyebrows, smile curling a little more to one side.

"Best thing I've seen all day, thanks. This the stuff you were talking about when you were down in Harlan?"

[abrightboy]

Malcolm nodded and poured himself two fingers as well, tilting his fine crystal tumbler towards Raylan's.

"Cheers," he offered, before taking a sip. He set his glass down and took the lid off a box as well.

"We're looking for someone whose crimes were both horrific and well-publicised," he told Raylan. "Likely someone older than Quarles as he seems to picture this person as a mentor of sorts."

[tinstar]

Raylan lifted his glass before taking a shallow sip and sucking in through his teeth slightly with a sound of approval before nodding and pulling out a stack of files.

"Time to thin the herd." With that, he started and the first file was dropped onto the counter with a wide look and a sigh. "I hate paperwork. I guess we get a stack of old guys, let you start on them while I sort the rest?"

Teamwork made the dream work.

[abrightboy]

Malcolm considered that and then nodded. "Seems reasonable." He set two folders in Raylan's pile and then four to his other side. "If we don't find something promising this way, we'll have to start again with tweaked parameters," he noted, sorting a few more files into the piles. He looked at Raylan. "But I'm hoping it won't come to that." He spent a couple of second sorting through a few more files, then looked at Raylan again. "Do you know anything else about Quarles? When did he leave New York? Even seemingly insignificant details could add to his profile."

[tinstar]

His old guys were set off to the side and thankfully, the age field was almost always in the same place.

"I hope not, but I guess I'm a little lazy," he admitted, "If it does, we're gonna need more than one bottle," he said, nodding towards it passively as he dropped another file into a stack.

"Yeah. He was orphaned as a kid - you'll have to ask Sol why he took him in, and once he was all grown up, he became Sol's little fixer. The muscle for Sol's biological son. He's dead now too - gunned down in a fight between his mob and the Memphis Mafia, after Quarles threw a jealous temper tantrum and got on Sol's shit list. He was working with Winn Duffy, another 'fixer' kinda guy, though 'fixer' is generous for Winn."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm raised a finger. "He's an orphan? So he's spent his life searching for a father figure. This whole mentor thing makes even more sense now. He's found someone who encourages his interests; nurtures them, even. It's not even about his friends rejecting his lifestyle as much as it's his search for a family. Depending on who this mentor of his is, if he knows Quarles' background... well, a 'fixer' with no qualms about violence and desperate to please you would come in pretty handy if you're stuck in prison, wouldn't it?"

[tinstar]

Raylan nodded again with a faint lift of his eyebrows, eyes busy with another 3 files as Malcolm talks.

"It certainly would, if you had the mind to use it. Love is a powerful drug. Acceptance is a close second and I'm sure some of these sickos would eat something like that up like Christmas dinner." He hated how ordinary and routine that line of thinking was but he'd long set aside his daydreams of what ought to be.

"It's hard not to know what goes on if you've got a lick of sense about you. Pretty sure you could watch his climb in Sol's rank in the newspapers here, if ya looked hard enough."

[abrightboy]

"I wonder how long he's realized he had these... interests," Malcolm remarked idly. "I wonder how long it took him to give into those urges; whether it started with an accident or a coincidence that pushed him to escalate or if his violent appetites sent him pursuing them aggressively on his own. Because usu..."

The door buzzed.

"Oh." The food. "One second." He headed out the door and down the stairs, paying for the food and bringing it back up and making a space among the files.

"Steak, baked potato, steamed broccoli," Malcolm told him, setting the container in front of Raylan. He turned and opened a drawer, picking up a set of cutlery, wrapped in a linen napkin, held together with a brass napkin ring and held it out to Raylan.

[tinstar]

He could already tell the conversation was going to continue over dinner; it was lucky his iron stomach was well proven. It wasn't the first time he'd poured over distasteful subjects while he ate tasty things and it wouldn't be the last.

While Malcolm fetched the food, Raylan started the clearing process, opening up a wide bit between them for it all to fit.

"Thank you," he said, eagerly breaking into the container and putting the lid under the plate itself and smirking a little at the neat bundle of silverware that Malcolm was handing him. "You keep 'em prewrapped? This got a knife worth a damn?"

[abrightboy]

Malcolm held up a finger and reached for a block full of knives, grabbing one from along the side and flipping it around to hold the handle out to Raylan. He turned again and got a plate down, setting it beside the plastic takeaway container before pulling his bowl of soup out of the bag, fetching himself a soup spoon from the drawer.

"I only really use that cutlery for company, so may as well keep it wrapped," he said.

[tinstar]

Raylan's crooked smile spread as Malcolm moves around the kitchen, taking the knife when offered. It was really a shame that he didn't eat like normal people; Raylan could almost imagine him flitting around a kitchen cooking. He raised his eyebrows with an impressed little sound at the plate, eyeing Malcolm with an amused expression as he unwrapped the cutlery and started moving food onto the sturdier to cut on plate.

"I guess that makes sense. You don't get annoyed wrapping it back up after each visit?" He expected that Malcolm had plenty of company through such a sweet little loft. "No girlfriends to keep it unwrapped on a more permanent basis?"

Once the broccoli was off the tray, Raylan got off his stool to find the trash and throw it away before returning to his seat and starting to cut many a bite off his steak.