The room was suddenly warm, so warm, and the mask was suffocating me. I wanted to pull it off so I could breathe. I must have made some movement because the doctor grabbed my wrist.
"Don't take anything off. I'm risking their lives with every new person that comes in here." He let go of my wrist. "Make the risk worth it. Tell me what did this."
I shook my head, concentrating on breathing slowly in and out. When I could talk, I asked, "What's the rest of the body look like?"
He stared at me, his eyes demanding. I met his gaze. Anything was better than looking at what lay in the bed. "You're pale already. Are you sure you want to see the rest?"
"No," I said, truthfully.
Even with just his eyes visible I could see the surprise on his face.
"I would like nothing better than to turn and walk out of this room and keep walking," I said. "I don't need any new nightmares, Doctor Evans, but I was called in here to give my expert opinion. I can't form an opinion without seeing the whole show. If I thought I didn't need to see it all, trust me, I wouldn't ask."
"What do you hope to gain by it?" he asked.
"I'm not here to gape at them, Doctor. But I'm looking for clues to what did this. Most of the time the clues are on the bodies of the victims."
The man in the bed made small jerks, head tossing from side to side as if he were in a great deal of pain. Small helpless noises came from his lipless mouth. I closed my eyes and tried to breathe normally. "Please, Doctor, I need to see." I opened my eyes in time to see him rolling back the sheet. I watched him roll it back, folding it carefully, revealing the man's body an inch at a time. By the time I saw him to the waist, I knew that he'd been skinned alive. I'd hoped it was just the face. That was awful enough on its own, but it takes a hell of a long time to skin a grown man's entire body, a long screaming eternity to do it this well and this thoroughly.
When the sheet rolled back over the groin, I swayed, just a little. It wasn't a man. The groin area was smooth and raw. I glanced back up at the chest. The bone structure looked male. I shook my head. "Is this a man or a woman?"
"Man," he said.
I stared down and couldn't keep from staring at the groin and what was missing. "Shit," I said softly. I closed my eyes again. It was so hot, so very hot. With my eyes closed, I could hear the hiss of the oxygen, the whisper of the nurse's booties as she came towards us, and small sounds from the bed as he twitched and strained against padded restraints at his wrist and ankles.
Restraints? I'd seen them but hadn't really registered them. All I could see was the body. Yes, body. I couldn't keep thinking of the man as a "he." I had to distance myself or I was going to lose it.
Concentrate on business. I opened my eyes. "Why the restraints?" My voice was breathy but clear. I glanced down at the body, then back up, giving Doctor Evans the most complete eye contact I'd ever given. I'd stare at him until I memorized the light crows-feet around his eyes, if I just didn't have to keep looking at what lay on the bed.
"They keep trying to get up and leave," he said.
I frowned, not that he could see it under the mask. "Surely, they're too hurt to get far."
"We've got them on some very strong painkillers. When the pain dies down, they try to leave."
"All of them?" I asked.
He nodded.
I made myself look back to the bed. "Why isn't this just a case of a serial ... not killer. What would you call it? A serial ... " I shook my head. I couldn't think of a word for it. "Why was I called in? I'm a preternatural expert, and this could have been done by a person."
"There are no blade marks on the tissue," Doctor Evans said.
I stared up at him. "What do you mean?"
"I mean that no blade did this because no matter how good they are at torture, there are always telltale signs of the instrument used. You're right when you say the bodies of the victims have the best clues, but not these bodies. It's almost as if their skin just dissolved away."
"Any corrosive agent that could take someone's skin and soft tissue like nose and groin wouldn't just stop at the skin. It would keep eating through the body."
He nodded. "Unless it was washed off immediately, but there's no residue of any known corrosive agent. More than that, the body isn't patterned on an acid burn. The nose and groin were torn away. There are signs of tearing and damage that aren't present elsewhere. It's almost as if whoever did the skinning, skinned them then tore off the extra pieces." He shook his head. "I've traveled all over the world to help catch torturers. I thought I'd seen it all, but I was wrong."
"Are you a forensic pathologist?" I asked.
"Yes."
"But they're not dead," I said.
He looked at me. "No, they're not dead, but the same skills that let me judge a dead body work here, too."
"Ted Forrester said there were deaths. Did they die from the skinning?" Now that I was "working," the room didn't seem so hot. If I concentrated very carefully on the business stuff, maybe I wouldn't throw up on the patients.
"No, they were cut into pieces and left where they fell."
"Blade marks on the cut up bodies, I assume, or you wouldn't have used the word cut."
"There were marks of a cutting tool, but it was like no knife or sword, or hell, bayonet that I'd ever seen. The cuts were deep but not clean, something less refined than a steel blade was used."
"What?" I asked.
He shook his head. "I don't know. The blade didn't cut through the bones, though. Whoever cut the bodies up pulled the bodies apart at the joints. No human would have the strength to do that, not multiple times."
"Probably not," I said.
"You really think a human being could have done this?" he asked, motioning at the bed.
"Are you asking me if a person could do this to another person? If you travel the world testifying in cases of death by torture, then you know exactly what people are capable of doing to each other."
"I'm not saying a person wouldn't do this," he said. "I'm saying I don't think it would be physically possible to do it."
I nodded. "The cutting and tearing, I think might have been human, but I agree with the skinning. If it were done by a human, then there would be tool marks of some kind."
"You say tool marks, not blade marks. Most people assume it takes a blade to skin someone."
"Anything that holds an edge can do it," I said, "though it's slower and usually messier. This is strangely clean."
"Yes," he said, nodding. "Yes, that's a good phrase for it. As horrible as it is, it's still very neatly done, except for the extra tissue that was removed. That was not neatly done, but brutally done."
"Almost like we have two different ... " I kept wanting to say killers, but these people were still alive. "Perpetrators," I said finally.
"What do you mean?"
"Cutting up a body with a dull tool that isn't strong enough to tear through bone, then pulling a person apart with, bare hands is something more in the line of a disorganized serial killer. The careful skinning is something an organized serial killer might do. Why go to the trouble of carefully skinning the face and groin, then pulling off the pieces? It's either two different mutilators, or it's two different personalities."
"A multiple personality?" He made it a question.
"Not exactly, but not all serial killers are so easy to put in one category or another. Some organized criminals have moments of savagery that resemble the disorganized killer, and some organized minds become more disorganized as they escalate their killing. The same isn't true of a disorganized killer. There aren't enough brownies in the pan for them to ape organized methods."
"So either an organized killer with savage moments of disorganization, or ... or what?" The good doctor was talking very reasonably to me, not angry anymore. I'd either impressed him or at least hadn't disappointed him. Not yet, anyway.
"It could be a pair of killers, an organized killer being the brains of the operation and the disorganized being the
follower. It's not that unusual to find killers working in tandem."
"Like the Hillside Strangler or rather Stranglers," he said.
I smiled behind the mask. "There have been a lot more cases than just that one where we had two killers. Sometimes it's two men. Sometimes it's a man and a woman. In that case the man is the dominant personality. Or at least in every case I've ever heard of, except one. Either way one is dominant and the other is to a lesser or greater degree in the control of the other. It can be a near complete domination so that the other person is unable to say no, or it can be more of a partnership. But even in more equal relationships one person is primarily dominant while the other is the follower."
"And you're sure it's a serial mutilator?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"What do you mean?"
"The serial mutilator idea is the most normal solution I can come up with, but it I'm a preternatural expert, Doctor Evans. I'm rarely called in when the answer wears a human face, no matter how monstrous. Someone thinks this wasn't done by human hands, or I wouldn't be here."
"The FBI agent seemed very sure," Doctor Evans said.
I looked at him. "Have I just wasted both our times here? Did the Feds come in and say pretty much what I just said?"
"Pretty much," he said.
"Then you don't need me."
"The FBI is convinced that it's a serial mutilator, a person."
"Sometimes the Feds can be very sure of themselves, and once they've committed themselves, they don't like to be wrong. Policemen in general can be like that. It is usually the easy answer when it comes to crime. If a husband dies, the wife probably did do it. Cops aren't encouraged to complicate a case. They're encouraged to simplify it."
"Why aren't you taking the simple solution?" he asked.
"Several reasons. One, if it was a serial anything, a human, I'd think the police, Feds, whatever would have some clues by now. The level of fear and uncertainty among the men is too high. If they had a clue to what was happening, they'd be less panicked. I don't have a superior to report to. No one's going to slap my hand or demote me in rank if I guess and I'm wrong. My job and income don't depend on pleasing anyone but myself."
"You do have a boss to answer to?" he said.
"Yeah, but I don't have to give regular written reports. He's more a business manager than anything. He doesn't give a rat's ass how I do the job, as long as I do it and don't insult too many people along the way. I raise the dead for a living, Doctor Evans. It's a specialized skill. If my boss gives me too much grief, there are two other animating firms in this country that would take me in a hot minute. I could even go freelance."
"You're that good?" he said.
I nodded. "I seem to be, and that frees me from a lot of the red tape and politics that the police have to mess with. My goal is to keep this from happening to anyone else. If I look a little foolish or indecisive along the way, that's just fine. Though I'll probably get some pressure to make up my mind and pick a bogeyman. Not from my boss, but from the police and the Feds. Solving something like this could make a cop's career. Being wrong and failing to solve it could he the end of a career."
"But if you're wrong, you aren't hurt," Evans said.
I looked at him. "If I'm wrong, then no harm, no foul. If everybody's looking in the wrong direction, me, the cops, the Feds, everybody, then this is going to keep on happening." I looked down at the man on the bed. "That will hurt."
"Why? Why will it hurt you?"
"Because we're the good guys, and whoever or whatever is doing this, is the bad guy. Good is supposed to triumph over evil, Doctor Evans, or what's a Heaven for?"
"You're Christian?"
I nodded.
"I didn't think you could be Christian and raise zombies."
"Surprise," I said.
He nodded, though I wasn't sure what he was agreeing with. "Do you need to see the others, or is this enough?"
"You can cover him back up, but yeah, I should at least look at the others. If I don't, then I'll wonder if I missed something by not looking."
"No one else has made it all the way around the room without having to leave, and that includes me the first time I walked in here." He was walking to the next bed as he spoke. I followed behind, not happy to be there, but feeling better. I could do this if I just concentrated on solving the crime and shoved my empathy in a tight dark box. At that moment sympathy was a luxury I couldn't afford.
The second man was almost identical to the first except for height and eye color. Blue eyes this time, and I had to look away. If I locked gazes with any of them, they'd become people, and I'd run screaming.
The third bed was different. The wounds on the chest seemed different somehow, and when Doctor Evans rolled the sheet over the groin, I realized it was a woman. My gaze went back to her chest where something had ripped away her breasts. Her eyes rolled wildly, mouth opening and closing, making small sounds, and I saw for the first time why no one was talking. The tongue was just a ruined stump, rolling like a butchered worm in that lipless, skinless opening.
Heat washed over me in a rush. The room swam. I couldn't breathe. The mask molded itself to my open, gaping mouth. I turned and went for the doors. I walked slowly. I didn't run, but if I didn't get out of there I was going to lose what little I had on my stomach or maybe faint. Of the two I think I preferred throwing up. Doctor Evans pressed the pad that opened the door without a word. The doors opened, and I went through.
Ben the nurse turned to me, mask hastily held in place with a gloved hand. When the doors shut behind me, he let the mask drop. "You all right?"
I shook my head, not trusting my voice. I jerked the mask off my face and still couldn't seem to get enough air. It was too quiet in the little room. The only sound the soft hush of the air whooshing in, recycling. The small movement of cloth as Ben moved towards me. I needed noise, human voices. I needed out of there.
I jerked the plastic thingie off my head. My hair fell around my shoulders, brushed my face. I still couldn't get enough air. "I'm sorry," I said, and my voice sounded distant. "I'll be back." I opened the outer door and escaped.
7
THE HALL FELT COOLER, though I knew it wasn't. I leaned beside the closed door, eyes closed, breathing in great draughts of air. The corridor was full of noise after that silent hissing room. People walking, moving, and Lieutenant Marks' voice, "Not so fucking tough after all, eh, Ms. Blake."
I opened my eyes and looked at him. He was sitting in the chair that had probably been brought up for the uniform guarding the door. The uniformed officer was nowhere to be seen. Only Edward leaned against the far wall, hands behind his back. He was watching my face, watching me, as if he'd memorize my fear. "I made it through three patients before I had to leave the room. How many did you see before you had to go outside, Marks?"
"I didn't have to leave the fucking room."
"Doctor Evans said that no one has made it through the room, all the way through the room without having to run out. That means you didn't make it either, Marks. So piss off."
He was on his feet now. "You ... you witch." He spat the last word at me as if it were the worst insult he could come up with.
"Don't you mean bitch?" I said. I was feeling better out here in the hallway.
Trading insults with Marks was a cakewalk compared to my other choices.
"I said what I meant."
"If you don't know the difference between a real witch and an animator, no wonder you haven't caught the thing that's doing this."
"What do you mean 'thing'?" he asked.
"Thing, thing, monster."
"The Feds think it's a serial mutilator," he said.
I glanced at Edward. "Nice of someone to tell me what the Feds said."
Edward didn't look guilty in the least. He gave me pleasant, unreadable, and I turned my attention back to Marks. "Then why aren't there any tool marks from the skinning?"
Marks glanced down the corridor where a n
urse was pushing a small cart. "We don't discuss an ongoing investigation in the open, where anyone can hear us."
"Fine, then after I've gone back in there and looked at the last three ... bodies, we'll go some place more private and talk about the case."
I think he paled just a bit. "You're going back in there?"
"The victims are the clues, Lieutenant. You know that."
"We can take you to the crime scenes," he said. It was the nicest thing he'd ever said to me.
"Great, and I need to see them, but right this moment we're here and the only possible clues are inside that room." My breathing had returned to normal and the sick sweat had dried on my forehead. Maybe I was a touch pale myself, but I was mobile and felt almost normal.
I walked into the middle of the hall and motioned Edward over to me, as if I had something for his ears alone. He pushed away from the wall and came toward me. When he was close enough, I faked a low kick he looked down for just an instant, reacting to it, and the second, higher kick caught him in the jaw. He went backwards hard. He had his arms up to defend his face. He knew enough to defend the vital areas, and worry about standing later.
My heart was thudding in my chest, not from exertion, but from adrenaline. I'd never used my new-found Kenpo skills in a fight. Trying it out for real for the very first time on Edward was probably not my best idea, but hey, it had worked. Though truthfully, I was a little surprised it had worked that easily. In the back of my head a voice wondered if Edward had let me take him down. The front of my head said that he had too much ego for that. I believed the second voice. I stayed where I was in a modified horse stance. It was pretty much the only stance I knew well enough to go back to once a kick was launched. I had my fists up, waiting, but didn't move in.
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