(EXT: Driveway. beat cops have roped off the area. CSI folk in lab coats and gloves kneel, looking at things. Detective Bacon, bearing a frown behind his whiskers, approaches the lead investigator, Peter "PB" Barilotto.)
Detective Bacon: What have you got for us here, PB?
PB: Well, we got a grim one for you today, Bacon. Have a look.
Bacon: (rearing back) Ew!
PB: We're curious about the cause of death.
Bacon: Cause of death? How about he got smashed to death?
PB: Seems unlikely.
Bacon: But he IS smashed!
PB: A young fellow in good shape? He could have dodged anything coming his way.
Bacon: Unless...
PB: Unless?
Bacon: Unless he was dead... BEFORE he got smashed!
PB: Ew!
(INT: Bacon in a crummy bar; approaches Fluffy Jones, who drops a rag as Bacon approaches and adopts a defiant pose.)
Fluffy: This is no place for you, flatfoot.
Bacon: I'm making it a place for me. You're Fluffy Jones?
Fluffy: What's it to ya?
Bacon: One of your customers got smashed last night.
Fluffy: All of my customers get smashed every night.
Bacon: Like this? (whips out crime scene photo)
Fluffy: Ew!
Bacon: Recognize him?
Fluffy: I never seen him before!
Bacon: He had one of your matchbooks on him, Fluffy, and the newspaper guy saw him leave here last night. Better come clean -- or maybe I should ask my friends in the vice squad to have a look around here. What is that I smell? Catnip?
Fluffy: All right, all right. Look, he was in here last night, but he didn't talk to anyone, he just drank, okay? Must've put away a thimble or more. No fights, nothing illicit. Never seen him before. No idea who he was. He left around eleven, and all his bits were still inside him then.
(INT: At the station house, Bacon with Chief Corleggy, looking up at the board where names and arrows have been written around the picture of the deceased.)
Chief: Ew!
Bacon: Grim business.
Chief: No ID on the vic yet?
Bacon: If he had a wallet, it got stolen.
Chief: You say the bartender's story checks out?
Bacon: Yeah. And CSI says he was dead before midnight. So somehow between eleven thirty and twelve, this happened.
(Officer Rice enters.)
Rice: Detective, we got a call from a woman looking for her missing husband. The description matches that John Doe.
Bacon: Good.
Rice: I mean, before he got smashed.
Bacon: Let's see what her story is.
(INT: A small apartment. Mrs. Ginny Squeaks is on the sofa, trembling. Bacon stands nearby, holding out a photo.)
Ginny: Yes, that's my husband.
Bacon: I'm very sorry.
Ginny: Ew.
Bacon: (tucking away photo) Any idea who might have done this?
Ginny: My Sammy had no enemies, if that's what you mean. I think it must have been a random thug. Or some wild animal.
Bacon: Mrs. Squeaks, if I may be frank, if this had been a wild animal attack we probably wouldn't have found this much of him.
Ginny: Ew again.
Bacon: Did Sammy owe any money to anyone?
Ginny: Not to any criminals, if that's what you mean. Just to the banks, the credit card company... We owed our shirts, but not to the kind of people who would do... this.
(INT: Police station. Bacon and the Chief at the board.)
Chief: I agree with you about the wild animals, Bacon, but maybe some other criminal? Someone who gets plenty to eat, but just likes to kill?
Bacon: I just got a call from PB at CSI. He says no, that the smashing did kill Sammy Squeaks after all. And the huge extent of the injuries, plus that it was in a driveway, would seem to indicate he got run over.
Chief: An accident? Was he too drunk to get out of the way?
Bacon: Maybe but -- Chief, I think this was a suicide.
Chief: How do you figure?
Bacon: His wife says he was an editor for Better Holes and Garbage until he got laid off; since then he's been unable to find work and running up debt. She said he fell out a window last month by accident, or she thought it was, but of course it didn't hurt him at all.
Chief: Of course.
Bacon: He probably knew when the people in the house would be coming home. I think he took a little Dutch courage at Fluffy's to get the nerve, and then just... waited.
Chief: Sad.
Bacon: I'll talk to the coroner.
Chief: Good work, Bacon.
(Both looking at board)
Bacon and Chief: Ew.
(Fade.)
Ew.
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