Duplicity: Part 1 by Drew Jordan

Prologue       Fred suddenly awoke at 7:00 A.M. He wasn't sure exactly what had woken him up, bit it didn't matter. He didn't want to be up yet, nor did he have a reason to be.       Fred turned over in the bed and pulled the covers over his head. However, nothing he did would put him back to sleep. Fred hated when this happened. You wake up way too early and then no matter what you do, you're unable to fall asleep again. Instead of trying to get comfortable, Fred decided to just think of something random in order to unconsciously lull himself to sleep.       He was only able to think of one thing though. It had been on his mind ever since he had heard about it yesterday. Fred had been watching the television yesterday at around 8:00 P.M. He was watching his favorite show when the news had interrupted it. What he heard shocked him.       A woman had been brutally murdered only a few blocks away from his house. Fred turned over in the bed to check the time after he had felt like he spent a good amount of time trying to fall asleep.       The clock changed from 7:00 A.M. to 7:01 A.M. Chapter 1       It was probably around 7:30 A.M. when Fred walked out of his house. Since trying to fall back asleep had been completely unsuccessful, he decided to go to his favorite café.       It took about ten minutes for Fred to arrive. He ordered a coffee and sat down at an outside table, the one he usually sits in.       Fred wasn't sure how long he was there but it was nice and relaxing. He looked up at the sky as he held his coffee and felt like he didn't have a care in the world. He wasn't sure why, but looking at the sky always put him into a strange, tranquil state.       This state was suddenly shattered by a voice, "So this is where you hide when you aren't at work, eh Detective?"       Fred looked over to see his co-worker and best friend, Jim, leaning over the rail that separated the café's tables with the sidewalk. Fred smiled and replied, "Obviously not."       "How is it obviously not?"       "Jim, I'm a detective, I know all of the tricks in the book. If I really wanted to hide, I heavily doubt you'd be able to find me."       "Point taken." Jim said as he scratched the back of his head. "So why are you relaxing here, anyways?"       "I couldn't fall back asleep earlier, so I decided to get some coffee and relax here instead of lying around doing nothing." Fred replied as he took a sip of his coffee.       "That's not quite what I meant." Jim clarified. "Why aren't you at work?"       "Why should I be?" Fred questioned. "The only time I need to be at work before 9:00 A.M. is when I'm investigating something. The only recent case would be the murder of the lady from last night, but there were no witnesses..."       "Or so we thought." Jim interrupted.       "What do you mean 'or so we thought'?" Fred asked.       "Someone showed up at the office today," Jim explained. "he claims that he witnessed the murder. So get off your ass, Detective." Jim stopped leaning over the rail and started walking down the sidewalk.       Fred finished off the rest of his coffee and looked at the sky one last time before sighing.       "Looks like today might be interesting after all." Chapter 2       Fred arrived at the office about five minutes later. It wasn't that far from the café he was at, so it didn't take that long to walk there.       Fred saw a man standing in the waiting room as he entered. Because they were the same height, it was impossible for Fred to not notice the impatient look on his face.      "I take it you're the witness?" Fred asked him.      "What the hell took you so long?" The man asked, agitated.      "I don't need to be at the office until 9:00 A.M. unless I'm investigating something, so I was out having coffee." Fred replied with a yawn. He was still tired from having woken up so early.      "But you're a detective, that doesn't make any sense!" The man complained.      "Actually, it makes perfect sense," Fred elaborated. "considering witnesses usually don't just show up at 7:30 in the morning."      "W-well I guess that's true." The man mumbled. He knew that Fred was right. "I guess I should introduce myself; the name is Rob." He said as he held his hand out.      "Pleasure's mine." Fred replied as he shook his hand. "Lets start with the basics; what did you see?"      "Well, yesterday around 8:00 P.M., I was walking home from work when I looked down an alley and saw a dark figure stabbing a woman to death!"      "...That's it?" Fred asked. He hadn't even gotten to start taking notes yet.      "It was 8:00 P.M.! It was really dark outside, so I couldn't see anything very well!"      "Well, it doesn't matter too much anyways," Fred commented as he pocketed his pencil and memo book. "even if we could find the killer now, you need at least two witnesses in order to hold a court trial."      Fred walked over to a desk where a co-worker was typing away at a keyboard. "Got a list of all the suspicious folks, Aaron?"      "Yup." Aaron responded simply without looking away from the monitor. He pointed at a paper to the side of him. Fred grabbed it and quickly skimmed it.      "They all live pretty close to each other, how convenient." Fred mumbled to himself. "Alright, lets go, Rob."      "Wait, where are we going?" Rob asked as Fred was already heading towards the door.      "The only thing we can do," Fred stated as he looked back over his shoulder at Rob while he kept walking. "go witness-hunting." TO BE CONTINUED...