"You see, I drove all sorts of folk to the front. Always ambitious about learning something new there. Learning what they could do to end this damn war or being the hero for their group of dumb fucks. But you see, they never were able to bring something back that was useful. Whatever useless shit that was crammed into their minds in basic was forgotten pretty fast by most I bet. Only thing they ever learned in the end was how to die. Not a very useful skill for living now ain't it?"

That quote stuck with Torsti. Work had been slow last week and most soldiers who had been to the front knew of the true situation and also had no care for spilling the truth of how bad it was. Vaverfront was the staging ground for new recruits before being driven off to the front lines not far from the outer city and Torsti had stopped by the military base on the outskirts of town to ask one of the drivers about the war. He answered quickly before shooing him away. Torsti had gotten his answer so he no longer had any reason to linger at the base unless he wanted to be thought a changeling spy, so he left. It didn’t require knowing anything else though with the distant booms of artillery going off that have grown in the past five months.

Thankfully getting back to the inner city was fast nowadays though. Nearly all cars had been requisitioned by the military throughout the country to aid the war effort. Only few remained. The local police in Vaverfront weren’t spared in the pickings though. Torsti had requested to use one of the force's cars today for ‘work’ which was ultimately just his ride to the military base. He’d just have to make sure he scrambled some details here and there if asked what he had used it for.

On his way back though, as he was driving through the residential area of the city, a young buck trotted out into the road, waving down Torsti in what looked like a frantic state. Torsti stopped the car on the side of the road just past the buck and started opening the door before the buck ran up.

“Sir!” The buck ran past Torsti’s door and leaned against the hood catching his breath, almost as if they had just finished their last day of basic for the Blue Antlers.

“Just catch your breath first of all you idiot.” Torsti had stepped out of the car by now and was coating himself up with his jacket that had been in the open passenger seat, all the while he kept an eye on the deer.

The buck looked frustrated at Torsti’s request but took a few breaths anyways, making each inhale bring in the crisp air, “Sir.” He said again, but more collected this time.

“First off, don’t go running off into the street like you did, if cars weren’t extinct, you could’ve been hit.” Torsti said as he stretched his back into a comfortable position in his jacket. He looked around, in search of any other unexpecting deer that might be coming up in a frantic mood, failing to do so though.

“That house sir. They’re my neighbore and I just happened to be checking up on them today to see what they had been doing last night and-- Well fuck.” The buck was pointing with a hoof at the mentioned house. His next words made his whole body shiver ontop of the cold shivering he was already experience due to lack of propper clothing, “Fucking head man.” He looked at Torsti with a scared look, “It’s gone…”

“Gone? What?” Torsti finally gotten around to closing his door as he walked around the other deer to the front of his car before stopping and staring at the house before turning around to face the deer again, “What’s your name first off?”

The deer had pushed themselves off the side of the car and looked between Torsti and the house, pointing at the house again as if it was of more importance, “But that’s more importa--” He was cut off quickly by Torsti.

The deer gave a stare at him only momentarily before taking a quick sigh to calm themselves knowing nothing would happen without his name, “Vesa Reijo. I’m their neighbor, as I said.” He then pointed to another house nearby and said, “That’s my house.” He said everything fast, trying to get any information the Torsti might find useful, “Anything else? My bud was just killed, can we please get to that.”

Torsti let out a sigh and turned to the neighbor's house and said, “It’s good enough for now.” He then turned back again and asked, “Alright then Vesa. Want to take me there or are you some changeling spy out to get the police force killed off?” Torsti then patted himself on the side, searching for his hidden revolver that he had hidden under his uniform and jacket.

“I-” Vesa said before cutting themselves off, “Don’t make me show you again after this.” He then walked past Torsti and motioned for the officer to follow.

The buck guided Torsti to the house, which door was open and took Torsti to an upstairs room, which door was closed and stopped. The house itself was one of the newly built houses in the city that was made during the population boom years ago as deer came in for jobs in the electrical and forestry sectors.

“Here it is, inside this room.” Vesa tapped on the door handle to the room with his hoof before moving out of the way for the officer, “I haven’t messed with anything besides opening the door once already.”

Torsti looked at Vesa as he moved away and took his spot. He put his hoof on the door handle and turned it and pushed the door open, which revealed to him a headless deer in the middle of the bedroom.

“By the gods!” Torsti instencevly said. He quickly turned back but left the door open and looked at the other deer with open eyes. His gaze then drifted away as he thought on a few things before motioning the other deer to go back downstairs, “Outside, go.” Was all Torsti said before pushing him out, whether he was moving or not. Torsti himself was also leaving, following Vesa right behind.

Once the two had made it out of the house, Torsti said, “Alright, listen.” He pointed with a hoof to the house they just left, “Don’t go in. Don’t say anything. Don’t do anything. Just,” he motioned towards the deers house they said was theirs, “Just go there and wait until I come back with more officers. I can’t believe this is an actual case.” He shook his head trying to remove the image of the headless corpse.

Torsti quickly made his way back over to the car and opened the door and plopped himself inside, closing the door and removing his jacket after a few moments of struggle and putting it back in the passenger's seat. He started to rummage around in the back for a bag, finally finding it and pulling out a notepad and pencil. He wrote down some quick notes regarding what he saw, the type of deer Vesa was and the address of both the neighbor and Vesa’s house before quickly getting out with the notepad and pencil and making his way over to Vesa’s house.

Torsti had only been a minute in his car but he quickly knocked on the door, waiting the second it took for Vesa to answer before saying, “So here’s what’s happening right now. As I said, don’t do anything, but most of importantly, make sure no one goes into your neighbors house while I’m gone. And second, what was the deer's name?”

“Nooa Lari. They were about 34 if I had to guess.” He was about to head back inside before he said, “And if you’re wondering, I just found out a few minutes before I saw you driving up. They were alive last night to my knowledge.”

Torsti was writing down what Vesa said before saying, “Alright, more questions are going to be asked once we’re back. I need to get more officers here before we can start getting deep into the investigation.” Torsti sighed and shook his head, “Damn crazy world. How’d it align to be me who had to deal with it.” He then said, “But anyways, sit tight and just make sure nothing else happens.” He then waved the deer off and headed back to the car.

Torsti got in and leaned back into his seat a bit and closed his eyes, “Gods fucking damnit.” he shook his head, looked back over at the house with the dead body in it before starting up the car and taking off down the street. His current heading was the police HQ.

Torsti pulled into the back of the HQ, leaving everything but some ID and headed inside through the back. He was met by another officer who greeted him, but only replying, “Just got a headless body case ten minutes ago. Going to be a busy fucking few days.” He didn’t stop to chat anymore and made his way to the police chief where he informed him about the situation. It didn’t take long before Torsti had gotten a few other officers up and moving back outside where Torsti and two other deer jumped into the car he had been using with four others loading into two more cars. Within ten minutes of arriving at the station, Torsti and the other six were now making their way back to the address of the incident. Torsti telling the two others with him in more detail on what had happened.

Torsti led the way and once they arrived, Torsti pulled in front of Vesa’s house on the side of the empty road, one of the other cars pulling behind with the last one driving past and turning around to park facing the opposite direction.

Torsti dressed up in his jacket again and brought his notepad and pencil again with him as he followed three of the other deer into the neighbors house.

“Nothing looks off besides the open door so far. Was it like that when you arrived?” Aulis asked. He was one of the other officers who had come.

“Yeah, open but I’ve just assumed Vesa had opened it and never closed it. Guess that’ll be one of the questions he’ll be asked.” Torsti responded. He motioned upstairs and guided Aulis and one other upstairs. The 3rd one wandering off on the first floor for whatever might’ve caught their eye.

Torsti arrived to the open doorway to the bedroom that housed the body, stopping before he could turn the corner, “Here it is.”

Aulis looked at Torsti, who nodded to him before returning it, taking a breath and walking past into the doorway themselves to get the first look of the body. After a few seconds he finally started to breath again and walked in, “Fuck.”

“Good luck boys. I’ll be off to start my questions with Vesa. I’ll be over at his house if you have anything to report.” With that, he pounded his hoof on the wall lightly as a goodbye to the other two for the moment before making his way back outside, but passing the 3rd officer who was lurking about downstairs who said,

“Looks like whoever Nooa was, they didn’t have a family of their own here. See nothing that indicates they lived with someone else.”

Torsti nodded to him before going outside again. He looked around and saw a officer outside looking around the house and two others over at Vesa’s house, talking to him at the entrance door. That’s where he made his way to.

One of the officers talking to Vesa saw Torsti walk up and said, “I’ll leave you and Lenni with this. I’m going to start helping with the other house.” With that he patted Lenni on the back with a hoof and made his way over to Nooe’s house.

Lenni turned and gave Torsti a smile and said, “Just getting to know Vesa here a bit more. Gave our greetings and all that.”

Torsti nodded and said, “Well now that we have enough officers for now on the scene, would you be alright with us asking some questions inside?” He motioned to Vesa’s house.

Vesa moved out of the way and pushed the door open to the house and said, “Come in. To the right I have a sitting area.” With that he moved inside and went to the right as he had said. Lenni followed behind quickly with Torsti last.

Vesa’s house was nearly identical to Nooe’s in terms of layout. Their houses must’ve been built the same day if anyone could’ve guessed.

Torsti made his way to a nearby chair, Lenni doing the same, as Vesa made himself quickly comfortable on a couch that faced the two. “So I guess there’s not much to it other than getting into it? Whole war going on and a million other problems in the city, we’ll need to get this case solved as fast as we can so we can move onto other minor things.” Torsti got his notepad in position and was at the ready to write, only awaiting any answers for any questions to be asked.

Vesa pointed outside and said, “Well last night, as I was getting ready to sleep, I saw a car outside on the street in front of Nooe’s house. Dark obviously, I saw a single deer figure go into Nooe’s house last night and leave. The times that it happened exactly I don’t know, but that’s what I assume it was. A single deer. They came and then left. They were around for, fifteen minutes I’d say. Today I get around to going over there only to find his door unlocked after he never answered my knocks so I went in, worried. I know today is a day he has off so he’d be home himself like always. He’s been getting a ride to work on the city bus since the military snached up his car so I know that whoever this person was, it wasn’t someone looking to steal a car.

I go in as I said and don’t find him anywhere about on the bottom floor, so I head upstairs. Whole time I’m shouting his name for him. I then search the room on the right before I walked into the bedroom where I saw Nooe on the ground. I froze before quicking grabbing the door with a hoof and closing it on my way out. I headed downstairs quickly and outside where I panic for a few minutes before I saw your police car driving down the road. From there, it’s been however long. I watched the entire time as well. No one came by, no one left, entered. Nothing.” He ended it off with a single nod.

Both Torsti and Lenni were writing in a notepad, Lenni not being as invested in it as Torsti, watching Vesa and looking around the room.

“So you saw someone with a car come by, enter and then leave fifteen minutes later? All at night when you couldn’t see any details?” Torsti asked for confirmation.

Vesa nodded again, “Correct.” He then put a hoof to his head and rubbed around his antlers trying to think, “From what it looked like. The back of the vehicle looked like it was a military vehicle, turned from a normal car. And it looked like whoever it was had lugged out something cumbersome when leaving.”

“I didn’t search the house yet and the other officers are right now. We’ll see about that once they come by to tell us anything they found.” Torsti said. “But a military vehicle? Potentially. Ok. Not much to go on since if it’s a converted one from civilian standards, there wouldn’t be much of a difference. Something still, none the less.”

Torsti took a second break from writing before asking another question, “Do you know of any reason someone would have wanted to kill Nooe-- And also, how do you know it was Nooe in the first place? Also w-- Actually stick with that question for now.”

“Oh- well, his clothing. I saw the body myself… He was wearing normal cloths he’d wear. Some that I’d seen him wear before as well. And it being his room of all places found dead. I see no reason it wouldn’t be Nooe.” Vesa answered.

“Well I never seen Nooe to have visitors before, well, not since the war at least who also had a car. He’s kept to himself mainly. Talked a few times with him in the past, visited as well but since I have no car either, easy to just walk over and chat sometimes.” Vesa answered.

“He’s on a difference work schedule than me so it’s feen a few days since I last saw him. Physically seen at all. But that’s a normal thing for all deer… With that, I’ll need time to remember anything he did in the past week, or what I saw him doing if you plan on asking about that. Nothing I’d kept to permanent memory without knowing he would be dying.” Vesa said.

Torsti and Lenni kept asking question for the next ten minutes before a knock came at the door with the shout of, “Officer Aulis!”

So Aulis did. He came in, looking around a moment before seeing the three to the right and came over and said, “Sorry to interrupt but thought I’d come by and say what we found so far.”

Torsti shook his head and said, “It’s alright. We pretty much have gotten enough answers from Vesa so far.” He paused and turned to look at Vesa and Lenni and said, “Alright, thanks for the questions for now, but we got to go mindle with the other officers and figure out what it is they’ve learned so far and then cross reference anything we can that we learned between each other.” Torsti motioned for Lenni to follow before saying, “We’ll do it outside Aulis.”

The three gave their goodbyes to Vesa and made their way outside and over to the car Torsti had driven before stopping.

“Well first thing is, we got a deer with a missing head. We have a body but we have no head. We haven’t a clue where it is. Just gone.” Aulis said.

Torsti smacked his lips and looked at Vesa’s house, “Fuck me then.” He looked at Lenni and shook his head, “Well, looks like what Vesa said might be related to that. Somebody came by last night in a car that Vesa says looked to be military. Said whoever it was was inside for fifteen minutes and came out with a cumbersome object. My guess, a head. Vesa also said Nooe had a good size rack.”

Aulis nodded, listening to the information being told, trying to make any connections he could with the whole thing. “Alright. But, so we looked at the body, found nothing to be out of place or missing and it seems like whoever this is, they cut off the head. Knifed the whole thing off. We came to the conclusion that they wrapped it good since we haven’t found any blood outside the room itself. Must’ve carried it off in a bag or who knows what. Must be that cumbersome object. It didn’t look like a head by chance?”

“Nope. Wrapped from what you said. Bastard stole a bucks head and carried it out like luggage… Sick fuck.” Lenni said.

Lenni and Aulis shook their heads before Aulis said, “Can’t tell you if the poor soul was dead or not when their head was taken off… No other notable injuries that would indicate a reason for death. Obvious signs of struggling and such, hoof marks on the ground, some stuff moved or off center, but most of the ground around our victim is covered and soaked in blood. It’ll be a bit before we can determine more. We got photos being taken of everything as well, everything written down, all that. Should have the mess cleaned up by tonight.”

Torsti nodded, “Alright. Thanks. I’ll head back with Lenni for now with our notes. See if we can get any research on this possible military car. See if anyone knows anything about it and all that.”

Torsti was putting his notes away and waved Aulis off as he went around to the drivers side of the car and got in. He waited for Lenni to join before he took off, leaving the five other officers for now. They made their way back to the police HQ where their chance of learning anything would be best.

The Detective Turned Smuggler

by Lamasioux

Chapter 1