IC-Chapter 2-Friday on my Mind(Bill/Yeager)

[Mr. Handy]

Police Headquarters, Franklin Square - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
3:00 PM - Friday, July 18, 1969

John Yeager drove back to HQ with Bill Johns in the Mustang. They parked in the lot and proceeded upstairs to the first floor, where they returned to the office. Charlie, Harry, Amy, Detective Jim Hendricks, and Detective Gus Stoker were all present. They saluted when he walked in.

"Right," said Yeager. "Let's all have a conference and share what we've learned today, see what we can come up with. That experiment starts tonight, and we may have more than Harry on the inside. With luck, we can stack the deck completely and get to the bottom of all of this."

[Philulhu]

Bill pulled up a chair and sat down. He pulled a pad of paper over from a nearby desk and took a pen from his pocket, ready to make notes. He started by jotting down some of the names, drawing lines between them as he pondered their relationships. Dr. Anderson, Brian Anderson, Mary... ...

He looked up. "Any news about Brian Anderson?" he asked.

OOC,[i]Sorry for my absense, real life stuff got in the way :( Hopefully back to normal now.[/i]

[Mr. Handy]

"I put Stoker and Hendricks on locating Anderson," said Charlie. "Only fair, since they lost him in the first place."

"It could have happened to anyone!" protested Hendricks. "The twerp got a buddy of his to dress up like him, with a baseball cap to make his face hard to see. He-"

Stoker raised a hand, and Hendricks stopped speaking. "Look, we don't want to make any excuses," said Stoker. "We just want to find this guy again. It's like he's dropped off the face of the Earth. So far, he hasn't surfaced. He cut all of his classes today and nobody's seen him at the frat house - at least nobody who'll admit to it. We did corner Gary Brown, his friend who decoyed us, but he said Brian asked him to do this because he thought there were some dangerous characters after him. Brown didn't break any laws, so we can't really lean on him."

"Damn straight there are dangerous characters after Anderson," said Yeager. "Me, for one! Dropped off the face of the Earth my ass! He didn't hitch a ride on Apollo 11. He's somewhere, and I want him found!"

"We'll track him down. Someone must have seen him, that's for sure. Someone's sheltering him. It doesn't look like he skipped bail and split town. No sign of him at either of the airports, 30th Street Station, or the bus terminal."

[Philulhu]

"Have we got anyone on his father's house?" asked Bill. "We can't discount the possibility that he's gone home and he's being sheltered there."

[Mr. Handy]

"First place we checked," said Detective Stoker. "He wasn't there at the time. Sergeant Rawlings did assign someone to keep an eye on the house."

"So far, no sign of Brian there, either," said Charlie. He got a glint in his eye. "The professor left the house this morning, probably to go to campus. He hasn't returned either, and with that experiment of his tonight he's not likely to. His wife just left the house half an hour ago. Which means it should be empty right now..."

[Philulhu]

"We gotta warrant?" asked Bill, thinking of his most recent experience, "Or are we 'responding to the call of a concerned neighbour who saw some people hanging around the house' if anyone happens to come home?"

[Mr. Handy]

"The second one," said Yeager. "We don't have time to get a warrant, we don't have a basis for it, and we don't want the professor ever knowing we were there. That means we're going to have to be subtle about this. This guy isn't some street punk we can toss around. That's his son. We'll need someone who's good with locks. Hendricks, you're with us."

"I'm not that good, sir," said Detective Jim Hendricks.

"Well, you're what we've got. Go get some tools. Anything else before we get started?"

[Philulhu]

"Nope," said Bill, "I'm good to go." He stood up and checked his shoulder holster. He didn't think he'd need it but you never knew.

[Mr. Handy]

"Right, let's go," said Yeager, leading the way out to the parking lot where he had left the Mustang.

Dr. Gregory Anderson's Home - Pine Road, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
3:35 PM - Friday, July 18th, 1969

Once again, Bill and John arrived near Dr. Anderson's house on Pine Road, only this time Detective Jim Hendricks was in the back seat and it was daytime. Now Bill could see the house more clearly. The walkway to the front door was lined with stones of a variety of colors on either side. The door itself was flanked by a pair of bushes. John Yeager parked the Mustang behind an unmarked black Buick. Detective Daniel O'Hara sat behind the wheel, munching on a jelly donut.

The three men got out of the Mustang and walked up to the driver's side of the Buick. "Anything to report, O'Hara?" asked Yeager.

O'Hara chewed and swallowed, a bit of jelly dripping down his chins. "Nothing new, sir," he said.

"All right, keep an eye on the place and alert us if Mrs. Anderson or anyone else comes home. The three of us are going in." He glanced at Bill and Jim. "Front door or back?"

[Philulhu]

"Well, we ain't gonna win any prizes for subtlety," said Bill, looking at the line of cars pulled up outside the house, "So we might as well go in the front."

He paused and looked down the side of the house. "We have got someone watching the back, haven't we? Just in case Anderson is holed up inside and makes a break for it..."

OOC,Apologies for my absence. Just got caught up in real-life stuff and haven't found the time of late. Hopefully I'll be a bit more on the ball from now on.

[Mr. Handy]

"Not yet," said Yeager, "but that's good thinking. O'Hara, go watch around back. Hendricks, stay with us for now. Once we get the door open, you'll sit in O'Hara's car and watch the front."

O'Hara reluctantly opened his door and got out, carrying a box from Dunkin' Donuts in one hand and the half-eaten donut in his mouth. He waddled around behind the house while the other three men approached the front door. Yeager slipped on a pair of gloves and tried the door. "Locked," he said. "Not surprised. Hendricks, go to work."

"Yes, sir," said Detective Hendricks. He took a folded length of leather from his inside jacket pocket and opened it up, revealing lockpicking tools of varying length and shape. He tinkered with the lock for a while before withdrawing and shrugging his shoulders. "It's no good, sir. It's too good a lock for me."

OOC,That's okay, and welcome back! [b]Bill[/b], please roll Idea.

[Philulhu]

OOC,Does this do it? [url=http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/4043418/]Bill puts on his thinking cap... (1d100=42)[/url]

[Mr. Handy]

Bill realized that the back door might prove easier to get through than the front door. It also occurred to him that sometimes homeowners hide a spare key near their doors in case they lose theirs.

[Philulhu]

Bill stepped back, studying the door and it's surrounds. Nothing looked like an obvious place to hide a key and most people wouldn't leave one on the street side of the house anyway.

"Back door?" He asked, and following Hendricks directions, found himself by the back door. "It's an invitation to get burgled," he said to O'Hara who was standing by the door, "But you'd be surprised how many people leave a key outside..." He knelt by the door, moving any stones or plant pots before standing and running his fingers along the top of the door frame.

[Mr. Handy]

"O'Hara, back around front and watch there," said Yeager, following Bill. "Send Hendricks to the back when you get there."

Bill looked around the back door, but there weren't any plants behind the house, and there was nothing on the door frame. There had been those bushes and stones out front, however.

Hendricks arrived and started working on the back door. "This one's as good as the one in front," he said, frowning. "This guy really takes his security seriously."

OOC,[b]Bill[/b], if you want to try to search for a spare key in front, please roll Spot Hidden.

[Philulhu]

OOC,Nope... [url=http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/4058605/]Bill goes looking for keys. (1d100=89)[/url]

Bill gave up, returning to front of the house. There wasn't any obvious place to look so he randomly started turning over rocks in the rockery by the door.

[Mr. Handy]

"Keep working on it," Yeager told Hendricks. He followed Bill around to the front and began to poke around as well. However, his search was fruitless too. After a while, he checked his watch. "It's past 4:30 now."

OOC,If you want to keep searching, please roll Spot Hidden again.

[Philulhu]

OOC,[i]Bill, it appears, is unable to find his own arse with both hands and a map... ...[/i] :( [url=http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/4075917/]Bill tries to find the keys again... (1d100=94)[/url]

[Mr. Handy]

Yeager began poking around in the dirt by one of the bushes. "Hmm, this looks like it was turned more recently," he said to himself. He dug in it and immediately found a small, unlabeled key. "Bingo! Right, let's head inside." He led the way to the door and tried the key in the lock. It fit perfectly, and the door opened to reveal a vestibule with a white tiled floor containing an empty canister used to hold umbrellas and a hat rack, also bare. Beyond it, the living room opened up before them. It was elegantly decorated, with a brick fireplace in the right wall, a large red rug in front of it, a leather couch and matching armchairs, a large television set, and a tall brass torchiere lamp, which was not lit. He recognized the Escher print and the Dali painting he had seen the last time he was there. A wide staircase led upwards, leading to a balcony above. A hallway with a few doors was visible on it from down here. There was a door in the near wall of the living room on the left side of the vestibule that probably led to a closet. An archway at the back led to the dining room.

[Philulhu]

Bill pushed open a couple of the doors, looking for a study. He'd been in the property before but his memory of the inside of the property was vague.