The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 7

For the previous chapters in the series, click here.

"Lovely night, isn't it, Ferris?" Horatio asked his surly companion as the strolled the gas-lit streets of London.

"Quite," Ferris said distractedly.

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Part 6

"Well, this is quite the odd-ball little group we've assembled here, eh Thaddeus?" Horatio said as the four of them took a seat around the table in his workshop. "A werewolf, a robot, a hulking metal-worker, and a dashing detective. I'm feeling quite confident in this team's murder-solving abilities."

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 5

About a mile south of Horatio's house was the Thames River. Accompanied by Thaddeus and Ferris, he walked to the river and then turned west. Walking along its banks, he passed under the London Bridge and quickly came to a part of town that was worn down, but still bustling with activity. The streets were lined with ragged looking merchants selling all manner of items, and various craftsmen occupied the street-facing workshops. There were makers of horseshoes, tables, guns, wagon wheels, and of course, bullets.

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 4

I started writing this 45 minutes ago. It still counts.
"I won't tell you anything," growled the werewolf through his clenched teeth. "And you'll gain nothing from killing me. Stop bluffing."

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 3

Horatio drew his gun and pointed it at the nearest werewolf.

"Unless that thing is loaded with silver, you're wasting your time," growled the werewolf. "Hand over everything you took from the crime scene and we'll let you live."

Horatio backed up to a locked wardrobe in the corner of the room near the window.

"Very well," he said, calmly unlocking it.

"A wise decision," said the werewolf.

"You were right, you know," said Horatio, fiddling with something hidden in the wardrobe. "This isn't loaded with silver. But I'd imagine it will hurt anyways."

Horatio spun and fired two shots into each of the werewolves. They howled in pain as Horatio pulled a harpoon gun out of the wardrobe and leaped out the window.

"I hope this works," he muttered as he fired it into the top of the roof of the tavern across the street. The harpoon stuck firmly, and, using the rope attached to it, Horatio swung across the street and through the tavern window.

Back in the study, the wolves were still writhing in pain. One looked out the window and informed the leader that Horatio was gone.

"You bastard," mumbled Thaddeus. "I suppose I'll deal with the werewolves alone then."

Thaddeus rolled to his feet and grabbed one of the werewolves by its shoulder. Catching the monster by surprise, he threw him back threw the annihilated doorway and tumbling down the stairs. The other two spun and faced Thaddeus.

"Go catch the man, he has the bullet!" barked the leader, and the other werewolf flew out the window.

Thaddeus pulled his gun out of its holster and opened the chamber.

"See this?" said Thaddeus, holding up the silver bullet that Horatio had removed from the body, "it killed one of you already."

Thaddeus slid the bullet into the gun and cocked it. He raised  the barrel to the wolf's forehead.

"How did you get that?" said the stunned werewolf.

"Horatio tossed it to me while you were busy being shot. Now tell me what's going on."

---------

Horatio stood up and brushed the broken glass off of his shirt. The tavern was completely silent, its few patrons snapped out of the drunken haze, staring at the newcomer. He looked around, then picked up his hat and put it on.

"Dreadfully sorry about the mess. I'll pay for the damages," he said to the bartender. Horatio then stumbled out through the backdoor and into the narrow alleyway. It was overrun with garbage and dirt. He turned right and began walking towards the street. He was about fifty feet from the end of the alley when a werewolf turned the corner. Horatio spun around and sprinted back the other way, and the werewolf pursued him, bolting down the alley on all fours. It quickly caught Horatio and tackled him to the ground. They both rolled through the dirt and stopped with Horatio on his back and the werewolf on top of him, baring his enormous teeth.

"Give me the bullet," it growled. Horatio could feel its thick breath on his face, and its eyes shown red through its dark grey fur.

"I'd love to help you, but I don't  actually have any more. I think you might have some of mine lodged in your chest, though," Horatio retorted.

"The silver bullet. Now."

"I don't have that either," said Horatio. He grabbed a wooden plank with his right hand and swung it as hard his he could, shattering it across the predator's face. The werewolf howled and fell over, leaving Horatio an opening. He got up and sprinted towards the other end of the alley.

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 2

"A... what?" Horatio said. "I don't believe I heard you correctly."

"My name is Zylphia," replied the woman, "and my husband and I, we are werewolves."

"You are in shock," Thaddeus stated bluntly.

"Tactful, Thaddeus. Ma'am," Horatio said gently, "I believe you may be in shock. You just told me you are a werewolf."

"Your partner is made of metal. Is it so hard to believe I might be different as well?"

"Fine," Horatio said after a pause. "We'll come back to that. What were these other killings you mentioned?"

"You may have noticed, but this neighborhood is a bit... different. Most of your neighbors are zombies, werewolves, vampires, a few ghosts, a witch, and others. The past two days, a zombie and a vampire have been destroyed."

"You are in shock," repeated Thaddeus.

"Thaddeus, do shut up. So, Zylphia, was it? How did these murders stay covered up?"

"Our people don't want to be discovered. We are all very peaceful, but that would be a hard thing to maintain if our true natures were to be brought to light. We had no choice but to hide the bodies and tell no  one."

"Interesting," murmured Horatio.

"You are in shock," Thaddeus said once more.

"Dammit, Thaddeus!" Horatio smacked the robot's chest to fix his voice pipes. "Better?"

"I wasn't malfunctioning, sir," Thaddeus said, unfazed. "But if you insist on taking on this case, I suggest taking a blood sample from the victim to verify her outlandish story."

"Good thinking. Would you object, ma'am?" asked Horatio.

"No, not at all, whatever helps."

Horatio took a needle and drew a vial of blood from the body. He the placed the sample back in his bag. He instructed Zylphia to hide the body and told her that they would be in touch. He and Thaddeus then returned to the house and climbed the stairs to Horatio's study. Horatio removed the blood sample from his bag and put a few drops onto a glass slide. He placed the slide under his microscope and examined it for a long while.

"There's certainly something wrong with it, Thaddeus," Horatio said without looking up from the lens. "However, it isn't necessarily a werewolf."

"How do we confirm her story then?" asked Thaddeus, who was carrying armfuls of books back and forth across the room in an attempt to organize them.

"We can't unless we catch a live one. And, assuming they're real, we'd have to wait for the next full-moon. No, we just have to go on the assumption that she was telling the truth, and focus on trying to find the killer. Either way, we know a man was murdered, and that's all that matters."

"So I suppose then that our next order of business is to find the maker of that silver bullet?" asked Thaddeus.

"I will take care of that. I need you to go back to the crime scene and go over it more carefully for evidence. And pay a visit to the mourning wife to see if you can examine the body for further information. Holmes won't be getting this one, Thaddeus."

"Very well s--" Thaddeus was interrupted by a crash from the ground floor, followed by rapid foot steps pounding up the stairs.

"Bolt the door!" barked Horatio. Thaddeus rushed to wooden door, but was knocked backwards as it flew off of its hinges. Three creatures walked into the room. They were all well over seven feet tall, and covered in brown or gray fur. Their faces were long canine-esque snouts with prominent and razor-sharp teeth. They had long claws, tails, and wore tattered human clothing.

Werewolves. They growled and stepped over Thaddeus, and moved quickly towards Horatio.

"Shit."

To be continued...

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 1

Victorian Era, London, England, Dawn, Autumn:

"Those bastards!" exclaimed Horatio Morgan, slamming the day's edition of "The Times" down on the scratched wooden table, spilling his coffee. "Thaddeus, listen to this headline: 'Holmes and Watson Foil Robbery in Progress.' They happened to be in a bank at the right time and they get all of the attention. I swear, if those two phonies keep hogging every crime in London as they have been, I'll be out on the streets!"

"Too true, sir, too true," replied Thaddeus in his metallic, hollow voice, as he wiped up the spilled drink.

Horatio Morgan was London's premiere detective. That is, until Sherlock Holmes came on the scene. Now Horatio is old news and can't find work anywhere.

"For God's sake, Thaddeus! I invented a robot, and no one even knows. Those two could get a cat out of a tree and make the front page!"

"Too true, sir," replied Thaddeus, who was scrubbing Horatio's dishes in a sink already piled high with them.

"Thaddeus, I believe your voice pipes are malfunctioning again."

"Too true, sir."

Horatio walked over to the sink, nearly tripping over piles of books, and smacked Thaddeus in his cast-iron back.

Thaddeus is a robot.

"Much obliged, sir," Thaddeus said.

"My pleasure. Now what can we do about this lack of business?"

Horatio paced back and forth behind Thaddeus. He was wearing black trousers held up by overalls and a white button-up shirt. He had shaggy black hair that jutted out in different directions and a short but full black beard and moustache. Thaddeus was made entirely of iron and ran on steam heated by coal. His body was a huge cylinder with a hatch on the front for putting more coal in. His head was a dome on top of the cylinder with two round eyes indented into it and a grate through which exhausted steam poured out constantly. He had two bulky cylindrical arms and two legs of the same description.

Thaddeus was responsible for the general upkeep of Horatio's extremely narrow five-story house. The house was one of the strangest pieces of architecture in London, and therefore Horatio could live in no other dwelling. There was a spiral staircase that went straight up through the middle of the circular house, which consisted of a kitchen and dining room on the first floor, a bathroom on the second floor, a library on the third, Horatio's bedroom on the fourth, and his study on the fifth. Due to the stairs going through the center of the house, it was impossible to get anywhere above the first floor without walking through the middle of the bathroom, which would have been an extremely uncomfortable situation if Horatio wasn't the only human being in the house. Horatio was an avid reader, and every iota of free space in the house was taken up by books, paper and pens.

Horatio was still pacing back an forth in the kitchen when a gun shot rang out. Both Thaddeus and Horatio grabbed their belts with with their holstered guns and ran out the door. Horatio snagged his black bowler's hat and bag off of the hook next to the door as he shut it behind him.

Running in the direction of the sound, they both came upon a narrow alley where they found a man's body with three bullet wounds in it and a pool of blood forming around him. The sun was just starting to spread its fiery light over the distant horizon, bathing the scene in orange.

"Thaddeus, search for the shooter, quickly!" Horatio ordered. Thaddeus darted off around the block. Horatio knelt to inspect the body. He lifted the left arm and felt for a pulse.

"Already dead," he murmured. He took a pair of tweezers out of his bag and set to work removing the bullets.

"No sign of anyone," said Thaddeus, returning to the alley.

"Well maybe these will help," said Horatio, holding up a blood-drenched projectile. "Any idea where one can acquire silver bullets, Thaddeus?"

At that moment, a woman in her nightgown dashed into the alley.

"Oh God," she whispered. "No. Roderick, no!"

She fell to her knees as tears began to fall in tragic torrents from her eyes. Her gown was a deep purple and her hair a jet black. She sobbed into her hands.

"Ma'am," Horatio said gently, "who was he to you?

"My husband," she choked.

"I'm sorry for your loss. Do you have any idea who might have done this? I'm a detective, and it's imperative that we act as swiftly as possible to catch the murderer."

"I don't know who. Must be the same as the other killings," she mumbled.

"What other killings?" Horatio asked, alarmed.

"Someone has targeted our people. We thought it was a coincidence with the first two, but this confirms it."

"Your people? Who do you mean?"

"He never hurt anyone. He was always in control. Why did this happen?" she said, now getting louder.

"Ma'am, you're in shock. Please tell me, who are your people?" Horatio asked urgently.

"My husband," said the woman, "he was a werewolf."

To be continued...