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                “Go home. All of you. By order of Gaius Justus Gallicus, Under-Commander of the Sixth Legion, Commander of the Third and Fourth Centuries, Under-Authority of Emperor Tiberius and the Roman Empire, you are all commanded to go home and perpetrate no weird sh!# until I have gotten well drunk and had several days to sleep it off.”

                Gaius Justus Gallicus, Lamb

                The road was windy.

                The two black SUVs drove along the moist post-storm road, the Italian countryside just beyond the windows.  In the lead, Alex sat in the front, driving as Sarah sat next to him.  Behind them sat Irene and Emma.  Alex glanced in his side mirror, into the rear car, to see Eliot driving Jason and Isaiah.

                The two giant vehicles slowed as they approached the mass of police cars blocking the narrow roar.  Flashing red and blue lights as well as yellow crime scene tap marked off the scene of an elaborate crash.

                Alex pulled over and put the SUV in park, then looked at Sarah as she typed on a laptop.  “What are we doing here again?”

                “The chief wants us to take over the investigation,” she said, closing the laptop.  She looked up, for the first time really considering the crash.  “He said there was evidence that this was a paranormal incident.”

                “Paranormals cause crashes and incidental stuff all the time,” Emma said, leaning forward between the two front seats.  “Why’s this case so different?”

Sarah gave her a look, then opened the door.  The four got out, joined by the three from the second vehicle.  “Alright,” Sarah said as the six gathered around her.  “Alex and I will handle the local enforcement,” she said with a glance towards the police already taking notice of the party.  “Irene, you and Jason take a look at the car.  Eliot and Emma, take the crash path.  Isaiah,” she said, turning to the darkly dressed man distanced from the group, “you backtrack along the road and see what you can find.”

                She turned towards the police, her hands in the pocket of her trench coat.  “Let’s go.”  Sarah led the group of seven to the edge of the yellow tape where several uniformed police were waiting to stop her.  She approached them, then slowly held up her badge.  “<Please allow us through, >” she said diplomatically in Italian.

                “<Its okay, >” came a voice.  The police turned to see down into the crash site where an older man in a suit stood from the crashed car as a photographer moved about it.  “<Let them through, >” he called, motioning for them to come in.

                Sarah glanced to the two police, then leaned under the tape as the police held it up.  She navigated down the embankment to meet with the man.  “Hello,” he said in heavily accented English.  “I’m the detective in charge of the investigation.”

                “Now we are,” Sarah said coolly, moving to hand him her badge.

The detective smiled with a paternal appreciation.  “No need to get territorial, my dear,” he said calmly.  “I’m the one who requested your presence.”

                As Sarah nodded uncomfortably, Alex came to stand by her.  “And why was that?” he asked curiously.

                The detective held up a small plastic bag with a golden bullet slug in it.  “Know what this is?” he asked, extending it to Alex.  He accepted, holding it so Sarah could see as well.  The bullet had markings along its narrow point.  “Are these runes?” Alex asked.

                “Not sure,” the detective said.  “If they are runes, they aren’t Celtic ones.”

                “What do you think this means?” Sarah asked.

                “Well, in all my years, I’ve only encountered one use for a golden bullet,” he postulated.  “And that is for a very specific type of vampire hunting bullet.”

                Amongst the flash of the photographer, Irene and Jason stepped up to the car.  Banged up from the repeated rolling, the car was crumpled on all sides, its roof banged down against the seats.  The front end was almost completely devastated, while the wheels were hanging off at odd angles.

                “Wow,” Irene breathed, staring at the car.  “I can’t believe it.”  Standing next to her, Jason stared at the car with a confused look.  He turned around and glanced up to the forest and farmland, then back to the car.  “What is it?” Irene asked.  “Do you feel something?”

                “No, its not that,” he said, glancing around again.  He turned to her, still confused.  “This guy was the mayor of the town down the road, right?” Irene nodded.  “That town’s a small place with mostly farmers.”  He looked at the car.  “Why’s he driving a car this nice?”

                Emma held her hand down over the trees, a hurt looking coming to her eyes.  “Poor trees,” she whispered.  She looked up at Eliot.  “They just got plowed over.  They didn’t even see it coming.”

                Eliot stared down at her, confused.  “Right…” he muttered.

                Isaiah stepped up onto the roar.  His hands in his trench coat pockets, he looked back the way they had come, then down towards the town.  Getting his bearings in relation to the crash, he went to the SUVs, collecting a small case out from the back of the second.  He took out a small walking stick and he began to wave it gradually from side to side over the road as he retraced the path of the car.

                “How long have you been investigating the paranormal?” Alex asked as he and Sarah stood with the detective, watching as the police and the Responders stayed as far out of each other’s way as they could comfortable manage.

                “In another life,” the older man said with a thoughtful laugh, “I was a private investigator. Paranormals were, not a specialty, but perhaps a hobby?”  Alex nodded knowingly.  But the older man turned to the car.  “But this is beyond me.  That bullet was clearly meant for a vampire, but who made it or why it was used is beyond me.”

                “So the victim wasn’t a vampire?” Sarah asked.

                “No,” the detective said.  “If he was, he would have exploded into a pile of ash.”  He stared at the car.  “Clearly, though, someone thought he was.”

                Jason put his hand on the hood of the car, closing his eyes.  In his mind, he saw a flash of action.  He took a breath, glancing at the police who ignored him.  He looked to Irene, then closed his eyes again.  He saw the driver, formless and indistinct, fall forward against the steering wheel and fall to the left.

                Jason’s eyes opened up, his face turning confused.  “Uh-oh,” Irene said quietly.  “I don’t like that look.”

                Jason looked down.  “Its weird,” he said in a hushed voice, moving to stand next to her.  “He fell against the steering wheel before the crash.  And he fell against the left side of the wheel.”

                “Him falling against the wheel before the crash isn’t that odd,” Irene said.

                “Yeah, but to the left?” Jason said.  “He would have swerved the other way.”  He looked back to the car.  “Something else made the car go to the right.”

                Emma stood up from the trees, looking at their fallen trunks and snapped limbs.  Eliot stepped up onto the trunks, studying their fall pattern, but she grabbed his shoulder, yanking him off.  “Show some respect, will you?” she said angrily, staying at the edge of the fallen trees.

                “Uh, okay,” he answered absently.

                Isaiah knelt down to the road.  He looked at his hard plastic walking stick, watching as the end beeped heavily.  He waved it over the ground again, stopping at a small notch in the road.  He folded up the cane and put it back in the case, then leaned down closely over the notch.  He looked at it from several angles, then took out a pair of industrial tweezers from his case.

                Shoving the tweezers’ arms inside the tiny hole, he felt around, finally yanking back.  Nearly falling over with the effort, he looked at the tweezers.  Held between the two textured arms was a smashed up bullet.

                “It looks to me to be a political hit,” the detective explained to Sarah and Alex.  But as he spoke, Emma and Eliot joined them.  “You found something?” he asked hopefully to the two young investigators.

                “Fraid not,” Eliot reported, glancing to Emma.  “The fall pattern looks perfectly normal, given what we know of the crash.”

                “That’s good, yes?” Emma asked.

                “In some regards,” Sarah said, unenthusiastically.

                Jason stepped back from the car, considering its landing against the tree as a whole.  He stared up at the tree suspiciously, scratching his jaw.  As he did, Isaiah came up behind him.  “Hey,” he said quietly, getting Jason and Irene’s attention.  As Irene turned to him, Isaiah tossed the bullet to her.  “Take a look at that.”

                Irene accepted it, considering the bullet.  “It looks like a small-caliber shot.”

                “Looks like,” Isaiah insisted.  “But I bet it isn’t.”

                “Where’d you find it?” Jason asked.

                “Lodged in the road back a ways,” he said, “not far from where the car would have begun to swerve.”

                “You think this what killed him?” Irene asked.

                “No,” Isaiah said.  “If it was shot at him, there’s no way it would have gone through to the road.  But if I’m right, this isn’t a small-caliber bullet.  It’s designed to look one, but its what some snipers call a ‘plane buster’.  We use it to shoot down small airplanes.  It’s a pretty exclusive bullet.  You’re not going to find it at the local sporting good store.”

                “So a pro?” Jason asked.

                “That’s what I’m thinking,” the sniper agreed.

                “But the guy was shot in the face,” Irene said.  “Where did this bullet go?”

                “Given the angle in the road,” Isaiah posed, “could it have punctured the engine?”

                “Why would someone want to?” Jason asked.

                “High class snipers make it look like an accident,” Isaiah said.  “He’d shoot a small, almost-unnoticeable part of the car and you’d only know it was a hit if you looked real close.”

                Jason turned around to the car and put his hand on the hood again.  He closed his eyes.  “Why would someone want to shoot the car and him at the same time?” Irene asked.

                “Two bullets usually means two guns,” Isaiah said coolly.

                “Two snipers?” Irene exclaimed.

                Jason’s eyes opened and he immediately moved around to the front of the car.  Isaiah and Irene followed him, watching as he pointed at a tiny hole in the front of the car’s grill.  He looked up at Isaiah.  “I think this may give your theory some credibility.”

                “If the guy who shot out the engine was the only one, we’d have never known what happened,” Isaiah maintained.  “The engine’s smashed.  We’d never even guess to look for a bullet hole.”

                “Meaning?” Jason asked.

                “That’s the mark of a pro, to leave no finger prints,” Isaiah said.  “The guys who shot him in the face was pretty good, but he probably learned everything he knew from old movies.  No professional goes for a headshot and certainly doesn’t make it look like a hit.  That guy was an amateur and that’s being kind.  But the guy who shot the front of the car was a card-carrying professional with some real skill.  He knew what he was doing.”

                “Two different snipers,” Irene whispered.

                “On two radically different skill levels,” Jason added.  He looked at Isaiah.  “That more than likely means two different employers.”

                Isaiah looked at the car.  “Popular guy,” he said sarcastically.

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