Chapter Text
Johnny had always been the heroic type, even when he was young he was often on the receiving end of angry fists. Standing up for those who couldn’t defend themselves. Justice, morality, the likes.
He thought his pursuit for making those he could touch with his life better wasn’t that uncommon. He found it was the opposite once he joined the FBI academy. Starry eyed recruits being broken and bent back into crooked unseemly shapes of their former self by jaded Detectives and Professors with coffee stains on their shirts and soles on their shoes that have tasted blood beneath them.
He watched the moment a part of his dream died, he watched him walk through the damn door.
He was only supposed to be training on profiling a suspect with a guest mentor, Special Agent John Price. He seemed to take an interest in the Scott, maybe it was his unusual accent, maybe it was the little hope for childhood wonder still in his steely blues. But he became his little project per say. That's just the best way John can put it.
“I hear they call you Soap among these halls, that right lad?” He strolls up to him, smelling like cigar smoke, tie askew. He's got his hands in his dress pants, casual, laid back, easy to approach.
“Ah thas’ right sir.” Johnny replied, smirk on his face. So wide people would call him down right charming.
“How’d a lad like you get a name like that huh?” He asks, head cocking to the side as if he truly is interested. Johnny know’s hes just being civil, it's how everyone is in the FBI. He never sees any of them smile, it makes him the odd one out.
“Ah for cleaning out house durin’ drills the fastest.”
“That so?”
“Aye sir.”
“Good on ya son, not many as good with a gun as you are so fast.”
“Just dumb luck is all.”
“Ain't so, takes skill to grip a fresh pistol trigger like that with both hands. New cadets always struggle using their left hand on the trigger drills.” Price is smiling at him and it makes Johnny smile back at him, doesn't shy away when the older man clasps him on the back of his shoulder.
Price isn’t fond of stragglers, for the most part. He picks up strays that catch his eye though. Johnny finds out he's not the only one Price has his eye on. A man named Kyle in the forensics department is often seen under Price’s wing, Johnny notices. He's a spunky man, and Price seems to like him enough to let him jab him in the ribs with his elbow sometimes.
By the end of his first year at the academy Price has him tagging along with him on mundane things like paperwork in his office or checking out long cleared crime scene locations where Johnny isn't at risk of contaminating anything. He has always been a tad clumsy and lead footed.
Johnny cracks jokes with the man that he doesn't seem to grasp all the time, but he snorts most of the time and jabs back at him in a timely fashion. They work well together, Price’s wise old attitude reigning in his young buck nature. Johnny in turn brings a more modern and fresh perspective to the table maybe the older Agent hadn’t thought of.
Soon Johnny is going on solo questioning assignments without the backup of the older man, finding out information and viewing closed crime scenes with a temporary permit from Price even before he's graduated from the academy. He’s on the perfect path to building good relations with the local PD and FBI agents stationed in the areas he allowed a visit to from Price.
It wasn’t all easy forward steps though. Johnny’s newfound bond with the Agent garnered questioning looks from other trainees, seeing how much extra time Johnny was putting on the clock with him.
Johnny was a kind soul, but not a pacifist by any means. Several times he had gotten into scuffles and full born fist fights with other peers in his field. Out of jealousy of seemingly getting the easy way out of department hopping post graduation or for much more petty and far dafter reasons.
Price walks into the infirmary to see a bruised and bloody Johnny sitting on the cot, hands bandaged up and bleeding through as his face is covered in blood from the nose under. White shirt stained and rumpled.
Johnny looked away from him the moment he met his eyes, feeling a hot trickle of shame run up his spine at seeing his superior, and now mentor and even maybe a friend.
“The hell happened to you?” Price is gruff, and straight to the point. Makes sense, he was ex military. Johnny was sure he was much more of a hard ass when he was enlisted.
“Nothing, don’ worry bout it.” Johnny grumbled, tenderly rubbing at his nose as if it would fix the blood stained skin of his lips and chin. He winces as he feels it flake off at the movement.
“Certainly wasn’t nothing, went through the ringer there.”
“Guy jumped me while we were switching out of cruisers. Tried to beat me to a pulp so I fought back. Ended up locking him in one of the damn things and tossed the keys into the bushes.” Johnny looked at him, he couldn't help the snort that exited his nose, painfully.
“Took admin all bloody afternoon to find the damn things, man was fuckin’ fuming cookin alive in the sun I bet. Like a damn oven in those things.”
“He pressing any kind of legal action? I can’t really get you out of something like that, especially if it's a domestic case.”
“Nah,” Johnny shook his head. “Probably got his own skeletons he can’t afford to dig up. Or maybe daddy’s money aint cut out for a private court case.” Johnny huffed out, head hanging.
He expects to be chewed out for bad behavior, hell he’s afraid he'll get kicked out of the academy. Bar fights and petty squabbles don't belong here, but disobeying a direct order and locking a teammate in a car for an afternoon? He was sure the board members were discussing his suspension as he was sitting here.
“You’re off the hook by the way.” Price says as he pulls out a pack of cigarettes, fishing for a lighter in his suit jacket. Johnny whips his head to the side, eyes slightly wide in stupor.
“How do you know that?” Price shrugs, holding his lighter up to the cigarette hanging loosely in his lips.
“You’re training to be a detective, why don’t you do a little detective work.”
“That’s yer worst joke yet.” Johnny sighs, smile on his lips.
“Don’t make me revoke my letter of recognition to the admin board Soap.” He says, ire in his eye. Johnny knows he's only joking, he's started doing that more lately.
Price isn't surprised when Johnny graduates from the academy with honors, says as much to him as he nods his head at him, eyes crinkling up from his smile.
Johnny can’t believe he's made it this far, his mother coming to his graduation managing to bring his sisters along for the boring and tedious ceremony. She's hugging him and wiping away tears, saying praises in English that slips into Gaelic every other sentence.
He hugs her tight, hoping his watery eyes aren't noticeable to his peers, he can’t help it, he swells with happiness at his own accomplishments. Accomplishments he isn’t sure he deserves, but he's happy nonetheless.
Johnny doesn’t expect his first year as a detective to be mostly drudge work, he's essentially working an office job with a fancy title. He knows it's because he's fresh out of the government womb, but he can’t help the restless bounce of his leg every time he has to sit there for five hours straight looking over field reports and case files.
Doesn’t even have his own office, his co-workers banging on his cubicle telling him he's shaking the floor with his foot bouncing. He apologies with a small smile and sees them grumble to themselves as they sit back down in their chairs. The smile doesn’t stick long on his face. He's starting to see why this system breaks other detectives, their sense of good in the world slipping away every time they clock in to look at more petty crime files.
But he's not like them, he's different. Not special, but different.
Sometimes as he's sitting there -chin in his palm as he's twirling his pen between his fingers- He wonders if graduating with honors at a prestigious college that he worked through to pay for and damn near killed him with how little sleep he was getting, as well as graduating top of his class in the Academy was for nothing if all he gets is an office job that pays only slightly more than civilian one.
His personality has been robbed of him, he feels like another cog in the machine, how stereotypical can it be. Little Johnny thought he’d be fighting bad guys with guns and being the hero on Hotline Miami.
He supposes not even he was immune to the propaganda that is the american dream.
He pulled on his jacket, eyes feeling tired as he's grabbing his bag, hoping the local burger joint is still open at such a late hour so he doesnt go to bed hungry when he gets a call. He pulls out his phone, the vibrating making his interest peak.
He answers it immediately, “Price?”
“Hello son, sorry for the late hour-”
“Not a worry, what you need me for?”
Johnny had never been more giddy than when he was walking into Price’s office in the PD he was stationed at.
Price had asked him to come in to help him with a new case he was working on, and if he performed well he could be offered a position. That night he made his way to his apartment, shutting the door behind him with his foot, burger in hand as he took a bite out of it.
He had put his laundry away, putting new clothes into the washer as he ironed out his suit as he did every night. Turning on his small old tv and putting a tape in of his fave box set of old 80s and 90s TV shows he used to watch when he was a kid back in Scotland.
Before he showered he looked at his hair cut, he had grown it out since the academy, the mohawk he once had and had been made fun of during his schooling, had been grown out to a more professional low cut. He hummed to himself as he leaned down to open up his bathroom drawer and pulled out his electric razor.
He plugged it in, the buzzing loud in his ears as he began to shave the sides of his head, going back to his roots. When he was done he shaved his face a bit, trimming his beard so it was closer to stubble than actual facial hair. He took a shower, feeling better already as if a weight had been lifted from his head and shoulder.
Johnny adjusted his tie, letting it hang looser around his neck as he walked through the almost maze of hallways towards Price’s office. Catching a few stares as he walked by from others walking by him, he could care less as he saw the door he was headed for.
He rapped against the door with his knuckles, hearing Price vaguely through the door as he took that as a sign for him to come in. He opened the door, chatter filling his ears as he looked up, seeing Price wasn't alone in the room.
He was leaning against the front of his desk, legs slightly crossed and arms crossed over his chest. His suit jacket off and laying on the armrest of his desk chair. Johnny wasn't as interested in him as he was to the brick wall of a man standing in front of him.
“You’re late Soap.” Price said as the man turned to face him, looking him straight in the eye as Johnny closed the door behind him.
He was tall, taller than him and Price even and they were not small men by any means. He was dressed in an off white button up and a barely put together tie, his collar crooked and popping up slightly over his black overcoat. He had his hands in his overcoat, an air of casualness to him as Johnny noticed his dress pants looked a little too loose on him, they seemed to drape over the back of his dress shoes that were scuffed at the tips like he dragged his feet a lot.
But it was his face that caught Johnny’s attention the most. He was pale, with a chiseled jaw. Stubble running along its edge to his hairline like he forgot to shave for multiple days in a row on a regular basis. A crooked angular nose you get from genes and getting socked in the face a few too many times.
Dark deep set eyes so dark he can't tell what color they’re supposed to be, with just as dark eye bags to match. High cheek bones with subtle old and healed scars on his face, almost pouty dainty looking lips with a scar cutting up his pallet. Leaving his gums and part of his teeth slightly exposed. Messy shorter cropped hair like he can't stand the feeling of it on his skin, its blonde that's darkened with age. Johnny was sure he had cornstarch blonde hair in his baby pictures.
Johnny is sure he's been staring too long but something tells him this man, this beast, is used to oddball stares directed his way. Used to taking curb balls and throwing them right back at the sender.
“Sorry sir, you know how traffic is on 86th and 145 Southbound.” Johnny chuckles, hands in his pockets as he rocks slightly on his feet. The back of his shoes biting uncomfortably into his achilles heel at the action.
“A fuckin’ Scott huh.” The man replies, voice gravely and low, and distinctly fucking British.
“Who dragged this queen's lap dog all the way overseas.” Johnny retaliates almost instantly, it's pure instinct, he can’t help it. He watches the slightest twitch in the man's eyes at the comment. Johnny holds back a triumphant smirk.
“Now now boys, Soap this is Special Agent Simon Riley, Riley this is Detective John MacTavish, graduated top of his class in the FBI Academy last year.”
“The hell kind of name is ‘Soap’?” Simon responds. Eyebrows arched in question.
“Got it in trainin’ back in my academy days. Cause I whipped the floor in the marksmanship classes. In other words, I ‘Cleaned’ house.” Johnny replied.
“You act like your academy days were so long ago rookie.”
“They were for you, ye look like you’ve got one foot in tha’ grave already geezer.”
Simon stares at him for a moment before he snorts, sizing him up before holding out his hand to him. Johnny is taken aback but shakes it firmly anyways.
“He’s got spark I’ll give him that Price.” Simon says over his shoulder towards Price.
“That he does, little firecracker aint he.” Price chuckles, Johnny feels like a child whose parents are showing off to family friends.
Simon pulls his hand away, his knuckles are scared and the palms of his hands feel like old leather. He’s not afraid to get his hands dirty it seems.
“His hair cut is still bloody stupid though.”
“Aye I’m right here you-”
“Alright that's enough boys!”
***
Johnny’s foot bounces as he sits in a chair across from Price, who's monologuing behind his desk. Elbows on his desk and sleeves rolled up, he picks up small reading glasses and adjusts them on the bridge of his nose as he opens a manilla folder in front of him.
He notices out of the corner of his eye Simon keeps glancing down at his leg, it obviously bothers him but he hasn’t said a damn thing, just silently listening to Price. Humming a reply every once in a while to situate himself within the supposed conversation happening.
“Now John, Simon here has been working out this case for a few months as well as Gaz from forensics. I brought you on because I trust your judgment and I’ve worked with you before, so I feel more comfortable having you out on the field for this.” Price explains, peeking Johnny’s interest.
Price closes the manilla folder and reaches over his desk, holding it out for him to take. He leans up, taking the folder from him and settling back into his chair.
“Gaz?” He asks.
“Kyle, from forensics, you’ve talked with him before.”
“Ah I remember now.” Johnny says as he looks down at the worn folder. It has a bright red stamp across it reading ‘Classified, Authorized Personnel Only.’
“The ‘Ghost Files’? What is this a copy of the fuckin’ Phantom Menace?” Johnny asks as he opens up the file, unsure of what he's about to see.
“I’m tasking you with the help of Gaz and Simon here to work on this case file. It’s gotten bigger than just the Local PD’s can handle. I talked to Laswell, director in chief and she gave me the go to assemble a team to tackle this one.” Price explained, sitting back in his chair as he pulled out a crumpled cigarette box once more.
Johnny’s eyes scan the first page of the file, it’s a bunch of local PD reports held together by a paperclip. Theres barely information, theres not even a fucking suspect in half of these reports. But that's not what worries Johnny, that’s more common than people think.
It’s the fucking crime scene photos that make his stomach churn.
Johnny is used to blood, he has to be, he's seen people's brains on walls and decapitations. He’s seen the worst of the worst in the academy as exposure training. He’s seen tubs of body slush from being dissolved by acid.
But this…he's never seen something as cruel as this.
Several victims positioned almost artistly in a kneeling praying position, hands before them and heads hanging. There's blood all over the floor, over their body’s, nothing is the same color it was before the crime, everything is painted black in oxidized blood.
Their back is skinned alive, he can see their spine out in the open as their rib cage has been broken in half. Twisted backwards and held out by what seems like fishing line and hooks to make them seem like praying angels. Their organs have fallen into their laps and onto the floor, gutted.
They have been relieved of sin, they are holy, they're empty .
The room is silent, smelling of cigarette smoke as Johnny looks through the other photos. He sees their eyes and mouths have been sewn shut with fishing line, their ears cut off and before them like offerings for the sins they have shown in their life.
“Price…what the hell is this?” He can't help but mutter.
“We’re calling him Ghost for now, nationwide serial killer, we’ve had Alex try and psychoanalyze him, see what type of person we’re dealing with here. He says he's never run into someone like this, a psychopath that seems to feel an almost empathetic connection to his victims.” Price says.
“He leaves a mark on them, a crudely cut ‘G’. So we’ve started calling him Ghost because that's about the only bloody evidence this guy’s left behind.”
“About?” He asks, Price looks over to Simon.
Simon pauses before standing up, silently walking over to the small older TV that has a VHS player still in it. It reminds him of the one he has in his apartment. Simon picks up a bag off the corner of Price’s desk. He recognizes it as an evidence bag.
Simon opens it, slowly pulls out an old VHS tape. Johnny goes to speak when Simon cuts him off, he doesn’t know how he knew he was going to speak.
“It’s already been dusted for prints, and there was nothing. It's been handled by detectives and forensics for months. I'm cleared to touch it with my bare hands.” He replies softly as he turns away from Johnny, turning on the TV as well.
Johnny can see it's the type of VHS tape you were able to put your own film onto, a simple 1 written onto the blank label in what he assumes is black permanent marker.
“This guy’s using an old film recorder?” Johnny asks, turning to Price. He simply nods towards the TV as Simon puts in the tape.
He pauses it, moves out of the way so Johnny can see the screen and presses the play button.
Johnny watches the black static screen for a few seconds until the TV flashes bright at what he can assume is the lights turning on in the room. The footage is blurry, as most home footage of this era is. It's a victim, he recognizes them from the photos, the oldest one, the first one .
It’s a man, or was, just like all the other victims he is already dead and has been put in the strangely beautiful angel sculpture of a human. Then out of the corner of the screen he sees legs walk into view. They’re in all black pants, heavy black boots that look like rain boots. They walk into view and suddenly Johnny can make out a man in the footage.
Not a single part of his body is showing, locked away in a sarcophagus of dark clothing, long black sleeves, long black gloves, an apron that looks heavy and made of rubber, liquid resistant. A man that's well prepared for his craft, a man that sees this as an art and not some evangelical freak on a murder spree.
The man kneels in front of the victim, his face comes into view and Johnny pauses at what he sees. It’s not a face at all, but a mask. A mask that looks to be made of a skull, he's terrified it's a real human skull on this man's face. There’s what looks to be a black ski mask under the outer layer of the skull, he is completely covered. The footage is too grainy for him to make out his eyes, they're dark empty holes. Holes that allow darkness to peer back into purgatory.
The man reaches his hands up, lets his fingers caress the dark blood splotches on the man's head where human ears should be. He watches as the man gently slides his hands forward, dragging dark blood across the man's face as his gloved fingers slide over the man's sewn shut eyes. A twisted part of Johnny wonders if the man was alive when the face mutilation happened.
The fingers bless him, drawing a cross of blood over his face as if he was in mass, praising Mary and God above. The man's thumb swipes over the sewn shut mouth and then reaches into his apron, and Johnny realizes he's got pockets on it, for tools.
He pulls out something from the pocket, his hands feeling it up as he reaches up and puts it around the man's neck and he realizes it must be a rosary or cross of some kind. He had seen bloody rosaries in evidence bags in the crime scene photos.
The man straightens the rosary around the angel's neck, he's being gentle, it shocks him at how kind he's being to the dead body. Kinder to them than he was when they were living. But what shocks and disgusts him is what the man does next.
He holds their face in his palms, lifts the dead weight of their face upwards and then the man leans down and kisses them. Hes gentle, soft, almost pecks the victim on the lips with the skull mask, as if he is the grim reaper sending them off to heaven.
He gently places the head back down to its hanging position and stares at the camera. Johnny is sure he is staring directly into the eyes of the devil himself as the man stands up, walking towards the camera and blocking the view as the tape cuts out.
Johnny’s mouth is dry as Simon takes the tape out of the TV, putting it back into the evidence bag and sealing it closed once more.
“How many of them are there?” Johnny finally asks, looking at Price. He stares at him, he looks tired.
“Six so far, a tape for each victim.” He replies.
“How…How long has this been goin’ on?” Johnny manages to get out.
“About seven to eight months now.” Simon replies, sitting back down in his chair next to him. He is completely unphased by the entire situation.
“Suspect has no set timeline, sometimes it takes him up to three months to kill again and other times there's been two killings in the same month. He’s impossible to read, and I’m sure he's doing it that way on purpose.” He says, voice calm and monotonous.
“One thing is for sure, that he’ll do it again, and I want you to help me catch this son of a bitch.” Price says, putting his cigarette out in the ashtray on his desk.
“Simon and Kyle have been working with me and others to identify this killer, but it's getting dangerous now, people are panicking. The murders have crossed state lines and the tabloids are getting wind of what's going on.” Price says.
“So, I made some calls, and got you officially signed onto the case. You’ll be helping investigate with Simon here. I trust you’ll do good.” He said.
Johnny nodded, “Aye sir, I’ll catch this slimy bastard if it's the last thing I’ll do.” He said. Price smirked, leaning back into his chair.
“Thatta’ boy. Simon, collect the evidence we have and send it home in boxes with Soap. Exchange contact information, you guys are gonna be partners now so I want you both on your best behavior.”
“Aye.” Him and Simon say in unison.
Simon isn't a talker, a man of few words. He barely talks to him as he shows Johnny where the evidence is stored in the evidence room. Johnny tries to talk to him, cracks jokes and laughs. He gets the cold shoulder and a glare from the older man.
Johnny frowns, it seems Simon is upset that he's being paired with a partner for this case. Probably used to working alone. Johnny is used to the cold shoulder and the sour attitude, he’s determined to be as annoying as possible then.
Simon is carrying some boxes with Johnny down to his car in the parking garage, he hasn't said a thing to him as Johnny reaches into his pocket and fishes out his car keys, precariously balancing heavy boxes of reports and field evidence. Simon doesn't even lend a hand to steady him as he walks by him, waiting by the car.
Johnny contains his contemptment for his childish behavior but unlocks his car anyways. He puts the boxes securely into the back seat, seeing Simon do the same on the other side of the car. He wipes the sweat from his brow and sighs, smiling and beaming back at the other man over the roof of his car.
“Thanks for the help Simon.” It’s a dig and he knows it. But he's on edge, he feels sick, and he needs to take a nap and an Aspirin for the headache forming in the back of his skull.
Simon barely makes a grumble as Johnny sees he's got a cigarette in between his lips, he pulls a lighter out of his trench coat. He watches him light it, covering the flame with the palm of his hand before shutting the lighter with a harsh click, looking out at the busy city below.
“You smile too much.” He finally speaks, though he's not looking at him Johnny knows his words are aimed at him.
“I think you don't smile enough.” Johnny says, walking over to the drivers side where Simon is smoking near the metal guard rail.
“I hate when people smile.” He cuts him off, Johnny looks at him.
“It’s like people are showing their skeleton, and it’s seen as a form of greeting, fuckin friendly even.”
“Everyone has a skeleton they hide…I guess whenever people smile it's like they are showing their true selves to others, expecting to be shown the same back.”
Simon looks at him, his eyes show so much and so little, and Johnny is sure he’ll never be able to understand him.
“A form of public intimacy, showing one's demons to a stranger.” Simon mumbles, eyebrows arched.
“I guess you could see it like that. Everyone is afraid to show something about themselves to others, even people they trust and love.” Johnny opens the driver's door to his car.
“You should try smiling, get those skeletons out of the closet you keep hiding.” He says, smiling at him as he gets into his car and shuts the door.
It was just friendly banter, trying to tease the man but when he looks at him out of his window he sees something has changed in his face. Like he’s staring at a predator and is going to be eaten alive.
He feels a vivid heat light alive in his body as he drives away, knowing Simon is still staring at him from afar as he finishes his cigarette.
It feels like he’s back in the academy, and he's the one locked in the hot police cruiser on a summer July afternoon. A dog left in their owner's hot car.
His teeth begin to ache, he should cut back on drinking soda.