SOUTHSIDE PASS WAY, Midnight:

Southside, in one of the many unlit windows dotting the buildings, part of an elaborate crime is happening tonight.

Momentarily idle up on the fire escape, P.I. Ina Jahscovic lights up in secret, careful about attracting stray attention. It's dark here, which would favour her if not for the smouldering tip of her cigarette. The only other light here comes from the blinking streetlights scattered below, and the touches of colour that waft in all the way from the central districts. And then, if you were to peek in between the buildings and over the embankment; in the distance, just about where the sky should meet the raging ocean, you can just barely make out that gold of glittering lights someplace far, far away, dusting the night-time horizon like microscopic jewels.
But anyway, we digress –

Crime waits for no young woman, no matter who said young woman is, and so our young woman must wait for crime. All dressed up in her sleuthing clothes and slowly becoming ever-more miserable in the peaking wind of evening-time, she decides enough's enough. It's surely time to take action; who knows what might happen if she were to keep off her heroic intervention for any longer? –So, she swings her feet back onto the platform, and slides cautiously down the small spell of ladder like a fireman would.

Out on the metal grille walkway that runs along the wall and past the windows (what do they call these things, anyway?), she tiptoes her way –as stealthy as she can- to the apartment in question. Once there, she puts her back to the wall, and catches a breather.

"Ina's journal." the little voice in her head says, whilst she flicks on her little flashlight and gives her equipment a quick look-through. "Midnight, about to stop crime in its tracks." the voice continues. At times like these, she wishes she had something wittier to put in her brain-journal, but she's short on ideas at the moment, and the cold's not helping her either. So, she ignores the voice, primes her mace, and leans closer to the wall to listen in on what's happening indoors. Timing's the better half of an excellent entrance, after all.

She can hear noises through the wall: muffled voices, little thumps and thuds on the other side, all sorts of sounds that give her gut wrenches. She stays put for a while, unsure if there'll ever come a proper moment to make her entrance at: bursting in, mace and flashlight in her hands like twin weapons, face half-hidden under her fancy hat, and with a snarky greeting to boot.

But thanks to the biting wind, she's kicked the window in too soon, bursting into the room without any respect for proper timing. There are loud gasps, cuss-words, and a series of loud, indistinct noises. And then someone goes barrelling out the door in a rush of weather-coat and rain-boots.

A smaller figure follows the first in a rush of smart black clothes. There is a series of rattling noises that runs down the fire escape, a loud splash and footsteps. And right afterward, the sequence repeats itself. But only this time, it ends in the splash – there are no footsteps.

And then, Southside Pass Way goes silent once more.