Superfreaks/ACRA: Superfreaks Season 3 #13
Martin Phipps
martinphipps2 at yahoo.com
Sat Feb 23 07:26:53 PST 2008
Michael King, Lana Lewis and Mary Bailey: crime scene
investigators. John Phelps, Mark Johnston and Tom
Jackson: police officers. Jack Greenspan and Edward
Bailey: medical examiners. Alan Russell and Roger
Roeper: lawyers. These men and women are truly our
last line of defense. But what about the capes whose
cases they have to investigate? Should they be
considered a help or a hindrance?
SUPERFREAKS SEASON 3 #13
"THE SEX FILES"
PART I
FBI Headquarters,
Washington DC,
9:19 am
FBI Deputy Director B. F. Pavlov sighed and shook
his head.
"This office doesn't handle internet pornography,"
he said.
"It's more than just internet pornography," the man
in his office told him. "This is a federal crime."
Pavlov raised his eyebrows and took another look at
the screencaps that had been printed out and placed on
the desk in front of him. "I see no crime here."
"Look closer. The woman in the picture is a dead
ringer for Jessica Alba."
"So? You said this was taken from a website showing
homemade amateur sex videos. If they aren't even
claiming that it's the real Jessica Alba then why
would you or Miss Alba be interested."
"Because federal law prevents the use of clones in
for modeling, especially pornography, without the
permission of the donor."
"So you think this is a clone of Jessica Alba?"
"I think this office should investigate the
possibility."
Pavlov nodded. "Alright. I'll have a couple of my
agents investigate."
Pepperton Art Museum,
Pepperton,
9:32 am
Detective John Phelps sighed and shook his head as
he looked around the scene. This was a particularly
brutal slaying, the sort of thing even he didn't see
everyday. So lost in thought he was that he didn't
notice Detectives Michael King and Mary Bailey walk up
to him.
"What do we have here?" Michael asked.
John immediately regained his composure. "It's a
Mister Sigmund Jung, the museum curator. He was
stripped down naked and repeatively stabbed and then
left to die in a pool of his own blood. But he didn't
die right away." John pointed to a sentence that was
written in blood. "He had time to write this before
he died."
"Is it possible that the killer wrote it himself?"
Mary asked. "He could have been trying to throw us
off."
John nodded. "Good question. What do you think,
Michael?"
"We can't rule it out just yet," Michael said. "But
misdirection or not, we need to consider it as a
lead." He read the message out loud, "They're after
the treasure."
"The treasure?" Mary asked. "Could he have meant
the paintings?"
"Then he would have said paintings," Michael said.
"No, it seems as though Mister Jung was killed by
treasure hunters."
"Or perhaps that's what we are supposed to think,"
Mary added.
"Exactly."
Jung Residence,
10:34 am
Mrs. Jung was beside herself with grief.
"Please, Detectives, whatever it takes, please find
whoever did this to my husband."
"We're doing our best, Ma'am," Mary told her.
Michael pursed his lips and sighed. "Mrs. Jung,
your husband managed to write something in blood
before he died."
"What did he write?"
"He wrote, 'They are after the treasure'. Do you
have any idea what that means?"
"No," she said. "Not at all."
"Do you know of anybody who would want to hurt your
husband?"
"No, but..."
"Go on."
"Just a few weeks ago he said something odd to me."
"What was that?"
"He said if anything happens to him he should go to
the Pepperton National Bank where there was a safety
deposit box I should open. He gave me a key."
"Do you still have the key?" Mary asked.
"Yes. I'll get it. Do you think it will help?"
Michael shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know. It
could be nothing. Or it could be everything."
The Vault of the Pepperton National Bank,
11:12 am
"Here's the box," the bank manager told them. "I'll
give you some privacy."
Michael opened the box. "It's just a single sheet
of paper with some writing on it," he said.
"What does it say?" Mary asked.
"It says that to find the treasure you need to go
see Murray Fox at the Our Lady of Perpetual Grace
Cemetary."
"Does it give a time?"
"No."
"That's odd."
"Unless Murray Fox is somebody who is always at the
cemetary."
"You mean..."
"Think what we're looking for is a headstone."
PART II
The office of Amateur Shares Incorporated,
1:23 pm (the same day)
"Excuse me, are you in charge here?"
"Who's asking?"
They showed their badges. "FBI Special Agent Oscar
Unger and my partner Special Agent Felix Madison."
"Is there something I can help you with?"
The agents showed him the printed out screen cap
that their boss had given them earlier when he
assigned them to the case. "Is this from your
website?"
"Yeah. So? It's not illegal. Look, it's not our
fault if some kid borrows his dad's credit card and
logs on to our site."
"That's not the issue here," Oscar told him.
"Then what is?"
"Look at the picture closely," Felix told him.
"Does she look familiar?"
"Of course she does!" he told them. "Like I already
said, it's from our website."
"She's a dead ringer for Jessica Alba," Oscar said.
The man shrugged. "She's kinda cute. Maybe not
that cute."
"We think that you're posting videos of clones
without the permission of the original person," Felix
said. "That's illegal."
"Oh, really? Well, see, I wouldn't know because
users upload videos themselves."
"You mean you don't know who these people are?"
Oscar asked.
"No, I don't. And I think people prefer it that
way."
"So you don't pay people for their videos?" Felix
asked.
The man sighed. "Look, people like the idea of
other people watching them. They don't want anyone to
know who they really are." He smiled. "It's like
those videos on DVD, you know Women Who Went Wild.
People are exibitionists."
"So you're not going to help us?" Oscar asked.
"Look, even if I could help you, how would it look
to users if I violated their right to privacy?"
"You're putting videos of them having sex online,"
Felix pointed out. "What privacy do they have left."
"Sorry."
"We could get a warrant," Felix pointed out.
"Then get a warrant."
"We'll do that!" Felix said.
"Fine."
They left the office.
"Actually, that might not be the way to go," Oscar
told him. "Getting a warrant I mean."
"Why not?"
"If he truly doesn't know who they are then he can't
help us."
"So is this a dead end?"
"Not necessarily," Oscar said. "We're assuming that
this is a Jessica Alba clone.
"Yeah."
"So clones of celebrities don't come cheap. Whoever
has a Jessica Alba clone paid a lot of money for her."
"So there'd be records."
Oscar nodded. "Let's go take a trip to Clones R
Us."
Our Lady of Perpetual Grace Cemetary,
2:36 pm
"Michael!"
Detective Michael King rushed over. "Did you find
him?"
"Yep," Detective Mary Bailey told him. "This is
definitely what Sigmund Jung wanted us to see.
There's something written at the bottom of the
headstone."
Michael leaned forward to read it. "Go to the Hall
of Heroes and go up the stairs. What you seek is at
the top."
"The Hall of Heroes?" Mary said. "What's that?
Extreme Force Headquarters?"
"Couldn't be," Michael said. "This had to be have
been carved into the headstone when back when Murray
Fox died, back in 1985. That was a few years before
the original members of Extreme Force got together."
"Well then what does it mean?"
Michael thought for a moment. He took another look
at the dates on the headstone. "Murray Fox was born
in 1920. He would have been in his early twenties
back when the United States entered the Second World
War."
"So 'Heroes' refers to war heroes?"
Michael nodded. "What we are looking for is at the
Pepperton Veterans Home."
Pepperton Veterans Home,
2:56 pm
"We're Detectives Michael King and Mary Bailey from
the Pepperton police," Michael said, showing his
badge.
"I'm Roger Freeman," the man in charge of the home
said. "How can I help you?"
"We just want to take a look around," Michael said.
"Look, Michael," Mary said. "Stairs."
Michael, Mary and Roger walked up the stairs and
found a plague at the top.
"What you seek is in the heart," Michael read.
"What do you suppose that means?"
"I always assumed they were talking about love,"
Roger told them.
"Heart can also mean centre," Mary pointed out.
"What would be the heart of this building?"
Roger shrugged his shoulders. "The common area, I
guess. It's where everyone gathers. And it is dead
centre in the middle of the building."
Michael nodded. "Could you tell us anything about
this place?" he asked.
"What do you want to know?"
"Who built it."
Roger nodded. "It was built by the veterens
themselves back in 1985. They were all old war
buddies and they wanted to live out their last days
together. Some of the originals are still here,
although they're in their eighties now."
Michael nodded. Everything was making sense.
PART III
Clones R Us,
3:12 pm (the same day)
"FBI Special Agent Oscar Unger and my partner
Special Agent Felix Madison. We want to ask you if
anybody has ever purchased a Jessica Alba clone."
Roger Stratham, the CEO of Clones R Us nodded.
"Lots of people purchase Jessica Alba clones. She's
very popular."
"Can you give us any names?" Oscar asked.
"What's this about?"
"We believe somebody is making raunchy video takes
of their Jessica Alba clone and posting them on the
internet," Felix said. "That's illegal."
He nodded. "It certainly is! I'll give you the
information you need!"
Pepperton Veterans Home,
3:45 pm
After Officers Mark Johnston and Tom Jackson arrived
at the scene, they followed Detectives Michael King
and Mary Bailey to the common area. Roger Freeman was
waiting for them. Two of the home's oldest residents,
a Mister Robert Palance and a Mister Jack DeNiro, were
sitting alone in the room, having been called down by
Mr. Freeman.
"What's this all about?" Robert asked.
Michael ignored them. He was looking around the
room. "Wall to wall carpeting, huh?"
"So?" Robert asked. "It's more comfortable than a
cement floor."
Michael went to one of the corners and lifted the
edge of the carpet. "But it isn't a cement floor
underneath, is it? It's a wooden floor."
"Again, so?"
"I'd be willing to bet that there's a hidden
basement under this room, one that you had built when
you built this place."
Robert laughed. "You're going to need a warrant if
you want to test that theory."
"And I think I'm going to get one," Michael said.
"After all, this investigation is in connection to the
murder of Sigmund Jung."
Jack DeNiro scoffed.
"Do that name sound familiar, Mr. DeNiro."
"Don't tell him anything!" Robert said to him.
"Why not?" Jack asked. "He's figured it all out
already. Haven't you?"
Michael nodded. "Let's see. You were in Europe
during the war. The Nazis had stolen valuables from
homes in Germany and hidden them away, most of the
treasure never being recovered. I figure you and your
fellow soldiers found some of that treasure and sent
it back here to Pepperton but because you didn't want
anyone to realize where it came from you kept it
hidden, only selling items when you needed the money.
That's how you were able to afford to build this
place. And you had a room built underneath this room
to keep it hidden away so that you could continue to
enjoy it and not have anybody find out about it."
Robert started clapping. "I'm impressed. But
you're wasting your time: most of the treasure has
been sold off and the money given to our families."
"Yes, most," Michael said, "but not all. My guess
is that you've got some valuable paintings down there,
paintings that would be difficult to get rid of
without arousing suspicion. Now Sigmund Jung, he knew
about those paintings, didn't he? And he wanted them
for his museum's collection."
"They're ours!" Robert said. "We weren't going to
just let him take them!"
"He threatened to expose us!" Jack said. "He
claimed we were dealing in stolen art!"
"So you killed him."
Robert smirked. "I may look old to you but in my
day I was the best. I know how to kill a man. It's
something you never forget."
"We tried to make it look like something religious,"
Jack admitted, "you know, like something out of the
Davinci Code."
Michael nodded. "You're under arrest," he said and
as he read them his rights, Mark and Tom had them
stand up and placed cuffs on them.
FBI Headquarters,
Washington DC,
6:12 pm
"Do you understand why you're here?" Special Agent
Oscar Unger asked a Mister John Harlow.
John Harlow nodded. "I'm here because I put my
girlfriend in a video and posted it on line. I don't
recall that ever being illegal."
"Your girlfriend is a clone of Jessica Alba. That's
illegal."
"Since when?"
Oscar sighed. "It's illegal to use a clone as a
model without the permission of the original person."
John laughed. "But I didn't make any money from
this. It was just me shooting a video of me and my
girlfriend and she just happened to be a Jessica Alba
clone. Is that illegal?"
"Yes," Oscar said. "Yes, it is. And it's a serious
charge. As we speak, Miss Alba is consulting with her
lawyers as to what to do about this."
"I see. So do you think maybe they won't do
anyything?"
"I think they will. She sued Playboy magazine,
remember, and all they did was put her on the cover."
"Oh boy."
Oscar shook his head. "Now that we've confirmed
that you used a Jessica Alba clone for the video, it
will have to be pulled from the website. A judge will
decide just how much you owe Miss Alba in damages."
"Damages?"
"Let's not kid ourselves. There's a good chance
that video could be posted to other sites which claim
is the real Jessica Alba. You'd better hope that
isn't the case or you'll be in more trouble than you
already are."
Pepperton Precinct One,
6:54 pm
"There's one thing I don't get," Mary said.
"What's that?" Michael asked.
"If they didn't want anyone to know about the
treasure then why the clues?"
Michael shrugged his shoulders. "I guess some of
them felt guilty. Maybe they told somebody about the
treasure and whoever they told left the clues. Or it
could have been somebody involved in the construction
of the home and who knew about the secret room and
what it was being used for."
"I guess."
Michael pursed his lips. "It might be worth
investigating some more. Sigmund Jung might not have
been the only one to die to keep the secret of the
treasure. We can look into the deaths of anybody who
might have known about it."
"That would be a good idea."
"But not tonight. I need to get home to Lana.
She's almost due."
Mary nodded. "Of course. I wouldn't want you to
spend any more time away from your pregnant wife than
necessary. And I want to go home and see Jacob."
"He'll be two years old this summer, won't he?"
Mary nodded. "I know. They grow so fast. Anyway,
I wish you and Lana the best of luck with yours."
"Thanks."
They left for home.
NEXT: Kid Warrior
Martin
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