Marcus was getting a headache. He’d gone over the files a dozen times, looking for that one detail that would make everything fall in place.
He was in the Bureau’s brain. That’s how they all though this room. It had more processors then the rest of the building. He could get almost instant results of comparative analysis between subjects, looking at how ever many factors he needed to confirm if they matched what he was looking for.
Not that they helped in this case. They had hardly not data on the killer to compare against others. One witness claimed he was tall, with wide antlers, while another said he was average height, and didn’t mention antlers. Basically, no two witness saw the same thing.
It could be a disguise, no one had gotten a clear look after all. Someone had suggested they weren’t dealing with one killer, but a group acting in unison. No one took it seriously. Two people had trouble keeping a secret, no group could pull that off, and they’d notice movement of multiple people going along the I70 from city to city.
Then there was the kill site, only one set of foot prints
was ever found at them, although they didn’t always conclusively match. But the method was identical. Each time they found the young man’s skinless body latched to a stone outcropping by vines. The knife marks on the bodies matched from one to the other, although Forensic had yet to identify the kind of knife made.
They’d determined it was curved, with a non-serrated edge, and extremely sharp, but it was also very hard. In places it had notched bone without leaving any pieces of itself. They had called every knife manufacturer to find one who made such a knife, and got no results.
There was now a request with Darpa for anything they were working on. The killer had started in Baltimore, and that wasn’t very far from Darpa’s Headquarters in DC. He could have gotten it there. He might even be a researcher who had snapped.
Marcus looked at the large table before him. All sixteen files were on it, each with the picture of the a victim on top. Sixteen young men whose lives had been cut short by a psychopath. How had they been picked? Serial killers always had a type, a method. What was the common denominator between all of them?
With a curse he slammed his fist on the edge of th table.
“You need a break Bodenman,” The serval at the console behind him said.
Marcus sighed. “What I need is for my husband to hug me and tell me I am going to figure this out.”
“I can hug you if it’s going to help.”
The deer smile and looked at the serval. “Sorry Jeff, without the antlers, it isn’t the same.”
“Where is the boss anyway?”
“There was another reported sighting. This one in Ruby
Hill.”
“That’s what, four this week?”
“Six. That’s why he joined the field team.” Marcus glared at the table. “And why I need to crack this. There’s only been a few times when there’s been multiple reports like this, and not long after a young man disappeared, to be found in the woods, stripped of his skin.”
Jeff shuddered. “I haven’t dared talk about his case with my wife, this is stuff of black magic, and it’s going to give her nightmare.”
“You shouldn’t be telling me you talk with her about cases you work on.”
“Like you didn’t already know. We all have someone to talk with, with the stuff we see we need the pressure valve. We can’t all be lucky and married to the boss.”
“We’d need a larger house if everyone in the bureau was married to Zee.” Marcus pulled his phone out of the table. Unlike with regular tables, the files didn’t vanish. This one had it’s home memory drive, and could take a dozen phone. It was used when they needed to coordinate teams.
“I’m getting a refill.” Marcus grabbed his cup. “I’m be back when I’m able to think again.” He didn’t go to the lunch room next to the Brain. He went up down one floor, where the administrative offices were. They had the best coffee of the building, and so long as he chipped in for the cups he took from them, they didn’t complain.
He sat at the table there, and was ignored by the people walking by on their way in or out of the room.
He called Zee.
“Hello love, how is your thinking coming along?” his husband greeted him. Marcus heard the low purr of the engine, telling him Zee was driving.
“It isn’t. I’ve been hitting my head against the table all morning and nothing came out.”
“I hope you don’t mean that literally, Marcus. That is an expensive piece of equipment, and it took a lot of politicking, as well as leveraging both our very excellent records, to get it.”
“You don’t have to worry, I did not actually bang my antlers against it. It’s just these men, boys really, what was done to them is horrible, and the idea that it’s going to happen to another one if I can’t work out the killer’s patterns is driving me insane.”
“Imagine me hugging you, love. You’ll get through this, I know it, therefore, you know it too. And remember, you are not alone. The whole of the Denver office is working on locating and apprehending the killer. This is not solely on you.”
“Thanks,” Marcus smiled. “How was the sighting? Anything reliable?”
“No,” Zee’s tone was annoyed. “We have so little information, that we have to act on all reports, just in case.”
“Are you going to another sighting?”
“No, I need a distraction. I’m on my way to speak with
Martin Cormoran.”
“Zee, I thought you were going to drop this.”
“Hun, you can’t expect me to stop looking after our favorite cheetah.”
“Just don’t pet him against he fur, please. You’ve already established that they are connected.”
“That are not so connected that I will worry for my position at the Bureau.”
“Just be careful.”
“I always am.”
“I love you.”
“And I love you too.”
Marcus looked at his phone, still smiling. Zee would throw himself in front of a bus if he had to to protect Denton. For that matter so would he. And they knew that Denton would do the same for them. That was the current problem, Denton thought he was protecting them by keeping them in the dark.
Marcus drained his cup and refilled it. He threw fifty cents in the tip pot before heading back to the brain.
“Alright, everyone. I need fifteen volunteers around the table.” He slotted his phone in. Jeff was the first one next to him, but in short order, most of the men and women in the room were around the table.
“Grab the file closest to you. I’m going to read out loud one of the section in the file, Once I’m done, Jeff is going to read the corresponding section of his file and so on. If at any point someone thinks they notice a point of commonality, speak up. The live of someone depends on use understanding the killer.”
He took a sip of his coffee. “We’re starting with the name of the victim. I have Brandon McAlister.”
“Mario Lewiston,” Jeff said.
“I have Andrew Chouteau,”
“Bill Richard”
“Victor Longer”
“Steve Rowling”
“James Saracen”
“Antony Julianno”
“Charlie Cormoran”
The names continued, but Marcus found he wasn’t paying attention anymore. Cormoran, just like Denton’s Friend, Martin. What had been the armadillo’s name? He only remembered him because of the tirade Zee had launched into after the orgy. He hadn’t been able to extract more than one word answers out of him to any of his questions.
He pushed the file aside, noticing the others became silent, but not acknowledging it. He accessed his personal drive on his phone, Zee had given him a copy of the list of names he’d compiled, as well as those his Basement team had added to it. He found that name on it, Colby Rowling, As well as many others.
