“Go in. I’m sure I won’t have to tell you about the rules this time?” she said as locks clicked free on door after door and then I was in the side changing room. I remained silent.
Inside the morgue, fluorescent lights bleached the corridor white. The smell of deodorizer was in the air and reminded me of every other time I had been here. I had yet to get used to that smell. However, it made me feel a little better to be there again, just like the old days. At least there had been one thing that hadn’t changed in me during the last few months. So many things seemed to be moving around in my life recently. No more job. No more partner. And most of all, my daughter Merric was growing up so fast I didn’t know if I was even going to be a part of her life soon. Did she have plans to include me in her future or would she just write me out? I chose not to think about it any longer and made my way deeper inside the morgue.
I passed several signs pointing the way to the small offices where funeral homes signed in bodies, then the x-ray room and the refrigerator room lined with gurneys. Two steel doors sat like large eyes watching me as I made my way through, and I could hear voices coming from the Autopsy Suite. I pushed the doors open and the darkness of the refrigerator was lit up. Stainless steel tables polished to a shine were arranged in rows on both sides of the room. Dr. Colleens’ autopsy room was a large, well-designed area organized to utilize space efficiently. The five tables in the room were transportable and could be wheeled out of the large refrigerator, and wall-mounted dissecting sinks accommodated both of the right- and left-handed forensic fellows that worked with her. In addition, the table had roller trays so she could save her back from lifting and moving the weight of the dead.
As I entered the heart of the morgue, special dual exhaust duct ventilation was humming overhead. All in all, the city of Seattle had provided more than they deemed a necessity for patients that are dead. But in truth, such buildings have always been inevitable, without question. And that would not change. At least not for the better.
Morgues have always provided a necessary service throughout history, but even though most cultures through time did prepare the dead for burial and public display, the first morgue didn’t open until the 1800s in New York City. Before that, disease and sickness ran rampant through Europe and America from exposure to decomposing bodies. One of the first cultures to develop methods for preserving the dead was the ancient Egyptians, who embalmed the dead in a process of mummification. They believed that preserving the dead empowered the soul forever. Imagine that. Forever is a long time.
Each year, Marty’s team explored more damage done by ballistics and blunt force trauma, and more people seemed to come up with more reasons to blame her and the city for its increasing death rate, as if she was the one out there killing people. Even more ridiculous were the lawyers and jurors who could not seem any less interested in uncovering a real chain of evidence of forensic facts. No matter how many procedural cop shows they watched on television or mysteries they read sitting on their couches at home, they just couldn’t see that logic had to play the main role in an investigation, not sensationalism.
Frigid air rushed past me as I opened the cooler’s massive door, and I walked past body bags and bloody plastic shrouds with stiff, protruding limbs. Brown paper bagged dead hands meant for a forensic analysis of violence waved at me as I made my way through and came upon Kenny and Dr. Marty Colleens. They were talking in hushed tones as I entered. Their conversation halted as they both looked over to me. They seemed as tired and unenthusiastic as I felt.
I couldn’t make myself at home in the morgue—not even in the parking lot, not even in morgues run by people I call friends. It was a place for the dead and I had always feared that one day it would be me on one of those tables or worse, it could be Kenny. And so I had always been kind of out of my element in that building but I had always hidden it from Marty. I had a lot of respect for that woman and I never wanted to offend her.
“Tim, look at this!” Kenny addressed me as if I had always been his partner and nothing had changed. “A nosebleed,” he said, trying to make light of the situation.
“Who had a nosebleed?” I inquired, noting that Marty’s gloved hands were bloody.
“John Doe number three.”
“At the scene?” I puzzled, for the body should not have had any blood pressure by the time he was loaded into the M.E. vehicle.
“He just came in and he began to bleed,” Marty told me. “It is normal for a body to lose fluids over time, but not this soon after death.”
Dr. Colleens was a physician working on her anthropology degree. As a pathologist, she had been trained to know what gave life and what took it away, what was right and wrong with a crime scene. It was disheartening to think that a person like Marty was forced to admit that many of the clichés associated with her career were true. The bizarre and gruesome experiences of the past year made her look at her profession in a new light and she had reinvested herself into a different field—the field of the past, the field of forensic anthropology. She had only just begun, but already she had learned a lot. She enjoyed her new field of bone study as it pertained to history and evolution. She had studied for years to be a forensic pathologist but now felt a new area of study was needed. Marty wanted to move on.
“The body has been dead exactly two hours,” Kenny began as he gave me a pat on the back and shot me a look that told me he was happy I was there. But I could see something in his eye, a kind of nervousness. I thought it was uncertainty, but I wasn’t sure.
“Dr. Colleens has already detected the smell of sweat on his dirty, bare feet, and the faint odor of singed flesh.”
She had the victim’s right pant leg pushed up above his knee and was looking for more signs of skin damage. The victim was a big, powerful looking man, even in death. He had large hands, and his massive shoulders and arms lay motionless on the steel table.
“Dr. Colleens was just about to start the autopsy,” Kenny said.
“Good. I’m glad I didn’t miss the external examination,” I told them.
She pulled apart the button clasps of his blue denim shirt, checking the pockets as she worked to undress him.
“Searching for personal effects has been a fruitless exercise with these deaths. However, I will do it anyway as a matter of protocol,” Marty said.
I was very surprised when she discovered what appeared to be a receipt to a market in his back pocket. The small piece of paper was crumpled and typed on it were letters matching the font of a convenience store’s sign.
“That’s probably from the store he was found by,” Kenny said. I looked at it and was somewhat astonished. I read from the receipt out loud.
“‘Short Stop Grocery, Toledo, Washington’. It has yesterday’s date on it.”
“Wow, where is that?” Kenny asked.
“I have no idea.”
“Toledo is about an hour south of Olympia, Washington,” Marty spoke up.
“That’s a long trip just to come here and die,” Kenny whispered.
I said nothing in response to his claim. I didn’t like being in the dark like I was, and I kept silent while I waited for Marty to find something. It was about a half hour before she spoke about her findings to Kenny and me. And through all that time, Kenny and I really had nothing to say to one another. It seemed that even small talk was not going to happen in the morgue. So I was grateful when Marty finally began again.
“Can’t find any blockage in any major arteries. The heart looks healthy,” Marty told us.
“No way that’s a heart attack then,” I said wearily.
“Definitely no way. Three victims—with all the same marks of violence—go from jittery, to terrified, to dead? All within 48 hours? Doesn’t make sense!” Kenny sputtered.
“Wait. Something scared them to death?” I asked. And I could tell that no one wanted to answer me. No one said anything for a very long time.
Kenny was slowly turning the face of his watch on his wrist, his j
aw firmly set. He wasn’t playing by the rules. He wasn’t sharing information. He was making me wait for him. And I was sick of being in this holding pattern. I deserved more, especially from him. I was not even supposed to be there, and I was about to leave and go back home—to my fireplace and my daughter—when Kenny finally spoke.
“Alright. So what can do that?”
Marty had no answer, but I think his question was more for me than for her.
“Tim, you have been the research guy lately. Do you have any thoughts?”
“Research guy?”
How the hell does he know any of that?
I hadn’t had any contact with Kenny in months. How did he know anything about the textbooks I’d been studying lately?
“Yeah, man. Ever since you retired you’ve been all about reading. Learning about ancient lore and the history of supernatural stuff. Have you found anything in your books or articles that could give us a clue?”
“Is that why I’m here, Kenny?” I asked him. He didn’t answer me and I could tell that this was a conversation for later.
“There are a lot of things I’ve read lately that could shed light on this situation. It’s hard to narrow it down though,” I sighed.
“In Latin, horrere is the root of words such as ‘horrific’ or ‘horror’. It means ‘to stand on end’ and refers to the standing hairs of goose bumps, otherwise known as horripilation. All kinds of things go bump in the night and scare the crap out of people,” I added.
“So make a list and start crossing things off,” Kenny told me.
With that, I used a skill that Kenny and I had kept very quiet. We both had the ability to communicate with one another mentally. Ever since we became vampires for a very short period of time many months ago, our minds had been opened. And even though we were no longer blood drinkers, our minds continued to remain unlocked to one another telepathically. It has been suggested that once the mind is opened mentally to possibilities such as that, it doesn’t go back.
Kenny and I had promised one another just after the death of Cognatus, the Origin of Blood, that we would never violate each other’s minds or the minds of people close to us. We chose to respect each other and those we considered friends. Only in situations where secrecy was called for did we communicate telepathically.
“Why am I really here, Kenny?”
“Because I need you with me on this. It’s not over yet… Vampires,” he told me.
I was stunned by his claim. The mere word got my attention. There were no more vampires. At least not in the way I think of them—immortal and creatures of the night.
“It seems obvious, Tim,” Marty began and pulled me out of Kenny’s mind.
“These victims are distracting us from whomever we’re not supposed to be discussing. They seem to have the same type of findings, just like our last case together, last winter.”
My eyes were now jumping all over the morgue to see what ears of her staff might be listening to our conversation.
“What have you found so far in the others?”
She reached for a file folder and, flipping it open, began to read to us.
“I identified flakes of natron in the first victim. It's a naturally occurring mixture of sodium carbonate decahydrate. It was used as a drying agent in 2nd century BCE. Then I found a wound in her spine. There seems to be a separation between the C6 and C5 vertebrae. Some kind of weapon left trace evidence in the wound, just like last time. I’m having it identified. There is an extra metacarpal on the ulnar side, likely caused by inbreeding.”
“Inbreeding?” I asked.
“Well, the evidence is pointing to the possibility that this victim was a woman from the 2 century, like I said. The wealthy families of that time period usually didn’t reproduce outside of their class; this often meant their own families. She has a flat forehead—elongation of the parietal occipital region—which led me to one conclusion in my research. She was inbred. Now, if I could just confer with other colleagues, I could be certain, but I think he’s 18 dynasty,” she said, indicating the body in front of us.
“18 dynasty?” I asked.
“Egyptian, Mr. Anderson. He should be a mummy or in a museum, but no—he was walking around a few nights ago and dropped dead in front of Green Lake. Now, I don’t know what any of this means, but I have a feeling you do. Care to fill me in?” Marty asked me softly.
I looked over to Kenny and he gave me a reluctant nod as he spoke to me silently.
“Just tell her, Tim.”
I held her reluctant gaze for a long, awkward moment. Her eyes were fixed on me, waiting for me to respond. I did not want to. The pressure that she had received from the FBI to be silent about the other cases from last winter had been great. More than great, to say the least. If she broke her confidentiality agreement and spoke of her findings, she could be charged with a serious crime and all that she had worked for could be lost. I didn’t want to drag Marty into this with Kenny and me, but she was a strong, stubborn woman and she wouldn’t have it any other way. We both knew that.
“One word, Marty,” I told her, “Vampires.”
Chapter 5
7:10 p.m., May 5
The weather was just what Fabiana knew it would be and she woke up thrilled.
Stores all over the city were closing as if Seattle was tucking itself into the coming night, even though technically the sun hadn’t gone down yet. Fabiana was now wide awake, her old sleep habits getting the better of her. The moon was rising, softly nestled amidst grey clouds, and it looked down so gently onto Fabiana, who was lying awake in her bed. Her thoughts were a mix of random images that were far too grim for someone that should be getting close to bed time. And she worried that once more the night would encroach on her and she would still be awake while the rest of the hospital slumbered.
Fabiana reached out with her mind and her thoughts traveled to Rome, to her favorite street where a little café lined with cloth tables and dripping candles colored the walk. The spring plantings had just begun in small pots around the wooden doorway of the café and a woman carried bags of black soil, boxes of plants, and a watering can out the front door. As she opened the door, the sounds of Mozart played softly from inside and slipped out like the aroma of freshly baked bread in a neighborhood bakery.
Great G Minor Symphony No. 40 danced effortlessly on the air and was swallowed by the beauty of the city. The music seemed to be carried on the wings of soaring birds high overhead and played sonnets for the coming warmth of the sun not yet peering over the seven hills of Roma. The picture painted in Fabiana’s mind gave her pleasure for that single moment. It was a nice, soft moment for her, for Fabiana had not had very many of those gentle feelings of late.
A smile was slipping over her face and she remembered the last time she had been there. It had been more than six months ago, and she had sat at one of those checker-clothed tables with Tim on their fateful night together. It was such an important night to her, even now. So much had occurred in just the short amount of time they had spent there. What was it about Rome? What was the magic spell that that city had cast on her and so many others it seemed?
On many a night, she had watched lovers from the shadows of some rooftop over the Piazza Navona. She had witnessed the power and enchantment of Rome. Its strength was not limited to the feeble minds of mortals either. Fabiana had felt its charms too, of course. She had known its influence on the heart. Because Rome had done it to her. Rome had swayed her heart to love again.
But something had changed. And a big change it was. The man that she had always thought she would love had died, and even though the storm had seemed to calm on their time together, she could not shake the guilt that she now had over his passing. Fabiana could not let go of the memory of Cerci, of his touch on her.
Suddenly a voice ripped her back to her reality and the brilliance of Italy was taken from her. The harsh, deeply male, commanding tone that had said her name was now gone. The beauty and the peace she had
felt so vividly was now nothing more than the cold, emotionless whitewalls of her small, confining space. The cell of her room looked back at her. Her bed squeaked as she shifted her weight, her eyes darting from one side of her room to the next, looking for whomever had spoken to her, but she saw no one.
There was someone there though. She could feel it. A presence was in the room and close to her. Fabiana had been one of the most powerful of her kind. Vampires and creatures of all sorts had run in terror from her strength, but not now. Now Fabiana was like anyone else. She was just a woman alone in the dark.
“Show yourself to me!” Fabiana demanded.
Her voice was small but bold. Without a doubt, her tone was delicately feminine, but she spoke with terrific self-confidence now. Fabiana’s words seemed to have the authority of all of her years. And all the confidence she had lost seemed to flood back in an instant. It was a powerful tone, almost like that of her male counterparts.
Weaker minds might have thought her philosophical. But it wasn’t that. It was the ability to think ahead of what was coming and thereby banish panic away from her thoughts. Mortals weaker than her would be consumed by fear, but not Fabiana. Not until now. She had never felt terror while communicating telepathically, so why should she ever fear this new intrusion upon her thoughts? She didn’t understand.
“I know why you really drank that blood, Fabiana,” the voice said, and coldness slipped into her spine. A chill as freezing and sharp as ice was washing over her in waves and her breath frosted in a fog before her. But she had known the visitations of spirits in the past and didn’t want to give in to fear just yet. She knew spirits tented to feed off of one’s past, of one’s history and regrets.
“Just leave me be!”
But her voice was not that of a scared woman. No. Her voice was direct and forceful and would have shocked the manliest of men into compliance.
“Makes you feel strong, invincible. A big, bad wolf in a world of little piggies. The blood, I mean,” the voice told her, seductively.
“You’re wrong,” Fabiana scolded the ghost. And she was sure it was a ghost now, one of her many victims over the years coming to torment her. Coming to take revenge for some atrocity she had unleashed on some streetwalker or mugger all those years ago. And now her confidence seemed to welter away from her.
The Blood Born Tales (Book 2): Blood Dream Page 3
