Work Text:
Every crime scene had a story, unfolding out of the viewers’ eyes like a puzzle; dazzling and fearsome, calculatedly incomplete. And it was the journalistic job to deliver, to inform, to tell the world of tragedies and enlighten the world of the horrors of others. Maybe remind everyone that no matter what sort of fiasco they’d encounter, they won’t be alone.
One would think the cover of the day was a structured fire from the way that there was an amber glow from the corner of the shot.
“That looks good.” Becky’s assistant nodded impressed, surveying the wide-angled scoop, assuming dollars from the symmetrical splendor of it all. Struggling cable news sites paid a fortune to anger its viewers “How much do you think they’d buy it for?”
Becky packed the camera. “Whatever price I want.”
They were supposed to retreat back in the car, run about their damn daily business of bodies and death - all the material for desensitized crap. The police had started to arrive and the empty side of the road thickened with clumps of bystanders. Meaning, it was time for them to go.
The thing about being a Nightcrawler was that you had to treat the rising action as the climax of the story, moving about the streets like a voyeuristic shadow, ready at any given moment. Most ‘respectable’ journalists gave them crap for it.
For instance, this one.
“What. Are you. Doing here?” Sasha matched the pace that Becky sped by, taking small steps in quick succession. It was amusing to look at frankly, the credible reporter always opted to wear heels. The joke was that, ‘ethical reporting’ was just an excuse to compensate for the fact that she wouldn’t get into the crime scene fast enough.
“I’m doing my job.” Becky calmly stated, plucking her car keys from her pocket as she sped close to where her car was parked. “You?”
Sasha scoffed. Yeah, if a job meant standing by while the whole world starts to fucking burn . “You’re gross.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me, I’ve had enough of you guys.” Sasha was, of course, frustrated if there were such a thing as a journalistic food chain, Nightcrawlers were its decomposers. And recently, with the sketchy introduction of Becky Lynch as the newest vulture in the game; they might have just turned from decomposing to preying. “Come on, tell me I’m lying. What time did you even get here? I bet you didn’t even fucking call the cops.
“Lady.” Becky turned around to face Sasha. “I’m just trying to work here. Now if you would kindly ride your high horse off somewhere else because you’re blocking the road. I’m starving.”
“How can you sleep at night knowing that you could’ve saved a life?”
“I take sleeping pills,” Becky said from behind her car’s window as she sped off. Unlike Sasha, it was the only thing she could afford.