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Post by Rick T.Nash on Aug 16, 2003 14:02:53 GMT -5
"You say to me that there is nothing in the swamp or near it which could form the setting of that frightful episode. I reply that I knew nothing beyond what I saw." - H.P.Lovecraft, The Statement of Randolph Carter Alan Warwick opened his eyes and was fully awake... He had not really slept for months now, since his encounter with The Guide. The sun was still low on the horizon, he checked the alarm clock, 6:30AM, still plenty of time before he had to take his shift. He got up, yawned and went to the bathroom to take a shower. The hot water on his body made him feel more alive and he stayed under his shower for quite a long time. It was 7:15AM when he walked out of the bathroom. He walked, naked, to the kitchen and looked through the window. The reflection of the rising sun on the water of the bayou made it look like it was on fire. A grey heron, surely disturbed by an alligator, flew away crying and took Alan off his reverie. Everything was nice and quiet outside, yet all was dark and chaotic inside his mind... He turned the radio on. Always the same country crap. He switched it to another station. The News Speaker was talking about the five headless corpses found in the marshes during the last three days, how the Lafourche Parish Sheriff's Office had no clues and had to call for the help of the FBI, to catch the serial killer that all Louisiana now knew under the name Guillotin. They all knew nothing, Alan thought. He grinned. He took a light breakfast, a coffee and a cigarette, and got dressed. Before going to work he had one thing left to do... Feed "it"... He went to the freezer, took something inside, walked to the back door and opened it. He walked toward the well in the backyard and, as he came closer to it, he could hear "it" whine at the bottom. Sheila had woken up in that dark well, cold and wet, not knowing where she was and how she got there. After a few hours the sun had risen and what she saw almost shattered her sanity. What she had thought to be wood on the bottom of the well was actually bones... She had no medical background but she was almost sure it was human bones. She took one of the biggest ones (she was sure it was a femur) and let it fall on the muddy floor almost immediately. Did she just saw what she thought she saw? No, it can't be! It can't be teeth marks she saw on the bone... Or at least not human ones! She heard a cracking sound, a door had been opened somewhere up there. She felt a chill going down her spine when she heard the heavy footstep coming closer to the well and could no longer retain her tears. The footsteps stopped. She looked up to see who was the maniac responsible for the horror she was going through, but was blinded by the sun's reflection on a metallic thing on the man's torso. She could only see his shape, she might be fooled by her position at the bottom of this well, her Horror Pit, but she was almost sure this man ("monster" she heard herself scream in her mind) was the biggest and strongest bastard she had ever saw. "Time to eat!" His voice was deep and raspy. He threw something in the well. "Wait till it's defrosted or you might break a tooth!" He said before bursting into a manic laughter, so loud Sheila had to cover her ears. He turned to walk away and then she saw what had been blinding her, a golden star. Suddenly everything came back to her... The cop knocking at her door late at night yesterday, claming to have received a phone call about a lurker in the neighborhood. How she opened her door, how he assaulted her, how she lost consciousness under his blows... While she was recovering memory of last night's events, she heard the noise of a car being started and driven away. He was gone. Sheila got on her feet and got closer to the food he had thrown to her. She didn't know what it was, it was too dark in the well to see clearly; but whatever it was, she had better keep her strength if she expected to get out of here. When she was close enough to see it, she stepped back in shock and vomited. On the muddy and oily floor of the pit, on top of what she was now sure were human bones, was resting a frozen human arm!
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Post by Agent Kafka on Aug 16, 2003 17:07:53 GMT -5
He just sat there watching. Vapour was coming out of the trunk of his car. Or was it smoke? Maybe the damn thing was ready to explode. Maybe that was just what cars do when they are 10 years old and you drive them from Washington to Louisiana. He couldn't tell because he knew nothing about cars. So, he just sat there watching, soaking in his own sweat.
Quentin Ferri was in one of the busiest streets of New Orleans. Just ten minutes from the local Bureau. The guys at the bureau even offered him a car but he wouldn't take it. Why would he? He had his own. And now he sat in the middle of the street looking at people driving by. They all stared at him and he felt like a stranger. He was one, no doubt about that. Was it not for his reassignment, he may have never in his life visited Louisiana. And truth is he would have missed lots of things. But not now, not today. Right now he just wanted his cup of coffee and a newspaper. And then he would have to find a place to stay.
He sat on the pavement looking at passers by. The smoke kept coming out of the car. He gaze fell upon a small coffee shop in the corner of the street. He stood up and removed his jacket and tie. "Ah, f**k it!", he said and paced slowly towards the coffee shop. The car was parked half on the sidewalk, blocking part of the street, nearly congesting traffic. It looked like a gazer and children had already started playing around it. But he was going to have his cup of coffee first.
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Post by O.H.Lee on Aug 16, 2003 19:33:46 GMT -5
Marcus Questor was driving down Wisner Boulevard. He liked to drive along the City Park when going back home, this way he could let his thoughts wander while watching "normal" people living their "normal" lives. He was thinking about the case of the psychopath that the media already dubbed "Guillotin". He wasn't at all sure this guy Ferri was the one for the job, but he had been assigned under his command with the express order to put him on the case... Someone high up must either love him or hate him. He took a turn into Orleans Avenue, he had just decided would stop in the French Quarter by his favorite French baker to buy "croissants au jambon" for his dinner. Questor was used to follow several trends of thought at the same time, a professional gift...
Questor first saw a cloud of smoke rising from somewhere on the sidewalk, then, after passing the van that blocked his view, saw the car that left the Bureau's parking a few minutes before him, Ferri's car. The guy was in trouble. He stopped his car behind Ferri's and looked around. He saw him through the window of the Starbuck's. Questor shook his head in disbelief; the Starbuck's was next to the best coffee shop in New Orleans and his subordinate's choice showed how little he knew the city. How could he manage to solve such a case without any knowledge of the place?
He stayed in his car, where the air conditioning kept him cool, and waited for the poor guy to come back to his car. He watched Ferri read the local newspaper while drinking his coffee and wondered whether this assignment was a gift for him or a torn somebody who didn't like him in D.C. had put in his side... (A big nasty torn for sure.) He'd help the guy as much as he could he finally decided. It's at that moment that Ferri got out of the coffee shop. Questor opened his car's side-window and waved.
"Need a drive home?" He said, suddenly realizing that Ferri had just arrived in New Orleans and probably didn't even knew where to sleep. "I can take you to a comfortable hotel if you want" he added without waiting. He had tried to sound friendly, but, when he heard his own voice, there was undoubtfully a touch of irony to it... Heck! He was not good at human relations, so what?
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Post by Agent Kafka on Aug 17, 2003 10:02:11 GMT -5
"Well, what do you know", Quentin thought to himself. A cup of coffee and then everything falls into place. This is the agent-in-charge that he met in the office, the one that he is supposed to work under. Suddenly the murder cases rushed back to his mind. He only had a quick read through the case files but their details seem to be stuck deep in his head. But this is Louisiana. It's probably a small case that the local police can not handle. How bad can it be?
He waved at the guy popping his head out of the window. Such a nice fellow... He walked towards the car. "Sure, thanks! This piece of junk broke down on me. Any hotels near the bureau?". He opened the door without waiting for an answer. "God, I need a shower", he said and entered car, at the same time thinking of cold running water. The children were still playing around his own car, running and laughing. He thought: "How bad can it be?"
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Post by O.H.Lee on Aug 18, 2003 6:56:25 GMT -5
"There's a good hotel near the City Park, it's only a few minutes of walk away from the Bureau... I'll take you there, okay?" said Questor. He knew that hotel was not the cheapest one but it was the closest to the office and he was not ready to wake up earlier tomorrow morning just to pick up his subordinate.
"It's fine with me", said Ferri, "as long as there is a good bed and a shower I'll be the happiest man in New Orleans!" And he laughed. Questor wondered how someone could be so jolly, and made a mental note to himself to keep relations with this guy to a minimum. All this small talk and optimism were really a pain in the ass to him. He did not answer and started his car, made a forbidden U-turn and drove silently. "Could you tell me more about the case while we're on our way?" asked Ferri. Questor simply dismissed that proposal with a cold and short "It's no time for business talk." Ferri seemed to have understood that he should keep silent and didn't say another word. Now that there was finally silence in the car, Questor was really bothered by his subordinate's smell, the acrid smell of someone who can't bear tropical temperatures and sweats a lot. But he didn't show it; he simply stopped the air conditioning and opened both side-windows of the car... Oh, Yes! He would help the guy, he already took that decision and would not change now, but he would surely not cross the line again: The guy would have to help himself from now on for non-business matters.
Two minutes later, they were in front of the hotel. "There you are! Make sure to be at the office by 8AM tomorrow, the last victims of our psycho should be transferred to our facility tonight. I want you to be there for the autopsy, you have to know 'what' you're up to." "Yes, sir" was the simple answer Questor expected, but instead Ferri started to thank him for the drive... ("Shut up and get out of the car now!" he thought.) Thankfully Ferri finally stepped out of the car, yet still thanking his superior for the ride. Questor quickly waved and drove away. This guy was darn too extravert to his own taste.
It was now too late for him to drive back to the French bakery... Well, he'd call to order Chinese food instead. He cursed himself for stopping when he saw the guy's car, why did he do it anyway? It was so unlike himself...He swore to himself he would not make that mistake again. He then switched his mind back to the trend of thought he was on when he saw Ferri's car, and drove back home. On his way he decided he would call her, he really needed to.
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Post by Agent Kafka on Aug 19, 2003 17:36:34 GMT -5
Quentin turned on the cold water and decided that he would never turn it off. He just stood in the shower, the water running all over his body, for what seemed like an hour. When he decided that his body was ready once again to face Louisiana's climate he left the shower. He didn't bother with atowel. He approached the window and gazed outside. He could see the federal building from his room.
That is where his job is now. And he would have to go there next morning and deal with this case.
Questor mentioned the autopsy. And Quentin realized that he felt awkward. But he's done all that before. It's not new to him. So why was his mind fixated on the idea of those headless bodies? No matter. All that will come after a meal and a good night's sleep.
He wondered around the city a little bit. Everything seemed to be "cajun" around here, like his chicken sandwich. He bought a newspaper and headed back to the hotel. There was no much else to do.
He missed his friends. And it seemed that there was noone to talk to. Catching a movie by himself was something that he never managed to bring himself to do. So, he simply went back to his hotel. And there, he slept.
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Post by O.H.Lee on Aug 20, 2003 11:33:16 GMT -5
Questor was finally home, living out of New Orleans had its advantages, it was calmer at night and he loved calm and peaceful places, but it had one big disadvantage, it meant waking up early and getting back home late at night. But Questor actually enjoyed the one-hour drive; during that time he could slowly clear his mind from the Bureau's stuff...
He walked towards his house's door and it's only when he was on the doorstep that he realized that he had left his keys in the car. He cursed out loud and saw a squirrel run away, scared by his cursing. He almost laughed, "Even squirrels can be shocked by rude language," he thought, and this time he really laughed. He trotted back to his car, picked his keys and trotted back to the door.
As soon as he entered he walked to the TV set and switched it on. The News speaker was talking about the Endron Wonder's oil spill with some scientist who basically stated that the spill was not a threat to environment. "No wonder where this guy takes his money from" he heard himself say out loud. It had always surprised him that most human beings tended to talk to themselves when they felt alone. Yes, he was feeling alone right now, and the only person he would have liked to see was up there, in D.C., darn too far...
He picked up the phone and dialed. He let the phone ring ten times at the other end, but no one answered. She was probably still at work. He hung back the phone and picked it up again and this time dialed a direct number inside the Hoover Building. He didn't even have the time to hear the first ring when she picked the phone.
"FBI Assistant Director Cynthia Forrest, may I help you?" she said. He could guess she was deep in her work to the tone of her voice. "Hello darling, do you have a few moments to talk to your far away lover?" he said with a husky voice. She sighed, "Excuse me mister, but I can't help you right now." she said with her business tone. "I guess your not alone, the Director's there?" He knew some of the Agents under her had screwed up lately, really screwed up; she was surely going through hard times. Yes, exactly, we'll talk about all this later if you don't mind, I'll call you back ASAP." And she hung up without even a goodbye.
"Well, so much for the comforting other", he thought. He turned his attention to the TV, it was now showing a seagull glued into crude oil. The same image TV showed each time there was an oil spill. He switch the TV off, picked up the phone again and was about to call the Chinese restaurant when he realized she would not call back tonight, no need to stay by the phone. He hung back the phone, grabbed his car keys and walked out.
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Post by Rick T.Nash on Aug 23, 2003 9:17:10 GMT -5
Alan was driving back home, his mind was focused on only one thing: would "it" pass The Test? He highly doubted it. He would have to finish the ritual once again. The first time it had made him sick, but that time it was not an "it", it was a "she". Knowing her had made it far more difficult for him, but The Guide had told him he had to, and so he did...
It was already quite late at night when he arrived home. He stepped out of his car and, almost immediately, he heard the whining sounds coming out of the well. Some of the words he heard made him grin, the ritual had started, will "it" pass The Test? He had other things to do for the moment; he reached inside his car and took a brown paper bag from the passenger seat. He then entered his house, walked to the kitchen and from the paper bag unpacked the food he had bought at O'Tooley on his way back home... He enjoyed their fried chicken wings, not that it was particularly good or anything, but he had always had a preference for O'Tooley's products since he had undergone The Change.
When he had finished his dinner, he walked to the living room; he moved the table and rolled the rug that was under it to a side of the room, revealing a hatch in the floor. He opened the hatch and looked in the darkness beyond for a few seconds, he stepped inside and climbed down the ladder. He had dug the first few meters of this tunnel himself, but most of it was more ancient, older than anyone could imagine. He walked through the maze of tunnels, the mix of mud and oil that covered the floor squishing under his feet, and finally reached a larger room.
He slipped long rubber gloves on, the same kind of gloves veterinarians used when a cow was about to calve, and walked toward a large plastic container filled with a foul smelling liquid. The stench made him grimace; he nevertheless reached in with his gloved arm and took a rotten head out of it. It was perfect, the skin and muscles were peeling away easily. He brushed it all off with a metallic brush. Then he reached for a bleach can on one of the shelves he had installed a few months ago, and poured bleach on the skull. Satisfied with his work, he took the gloves off and carried the skull to another room.
This room was circular, not unlike the well in which "it" was trapped, which was only a few inches away of this room. He thought how things could have been different if his grand father had dug the well just a foot closer to this place years ago and had discovered the underground caves. He dismissed the thought and added the new skull to the pile lining up against the room's round walls. Only a few of the skulls present here were his addition, most were so old that it escaped his comprehension, but now it was his duty to add the skulls of those who had failed The Test and, thus, add to the power of The Guide. Through the wall, he could ear "it" moan and whine in the well, he got closer to the wall and listened for a few seconds... What he heard surprised him, "it" might pass The Test after all.
He made his way back to the entrance of the caves, climbed back in his living room, put the rug and the table back in place and walked to the bathroom to take a shower. While he let the hot water take the stench of the caves and of his homemade "skull cleaning mix", he decided he would not interrupt The Test tonight. He would go check how "it" was going only the next morning... He stepped out of the shower, dried himself and went to bed. He didn't slept at all that night, but he stayed there nevertheless, on his back, staring at the ceiling.
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Post by Agent Kafka on Sept 15, 2003 11:05:30 GMT -5
Quentin flipped through the pages of the TIMES. He was standing against the wall of a building right next to the bureau, with a cup of coffee in his hand. He didn't manage to find another Starbucks and ended up in this tiny place which was more of a closet than a shop, ordering something which he could hardly bring himself to drink. It had a very weird smell, strong, like stuff they usually put in food. But it was coffee and he wanted to be wide awake when he entered the bureau for the first official time.
He drank the rest of the coffee, trying not to taste it at all, and threw the empty cup in the trash. Folding his paper under his arm, he walked towards the bureau. There was a guy standing in a small booth near the entrance, also reading a paper.
"Good morning", Quentin said with a smile ïn his face. He looked at the guard who did not seem to notice him. He was wearing an old uniform which seemed desperate to be thrown away and replaced by a new one. There was no answer so Quentin tried again: "Do you happen to know where the morgue is?"
The man finally raised his head and stared at Quentin right in the eyes, as if trying to figure out his real intentions. The guard's bulbous nose twitched and sniffed, like he was trying to smell something that bothered him. He finally said: "You 're new."
"Yes, I was just assigned here", said Quentin. He waited for a while, thinking that he might receive an answer to his earlier question. A few moments of awkward silence passed.
"Second basement", the guard finally replied, and lowered his gaze to his newspaper again. Quentin was not an interest to him anymore. "Thanks", said Quentin and walked towards the building, thinking: "NOT a nice guy".
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Post by Cannibal Monkey on Sept 15, 2003 14:25:37 GMT -5
Mike Luder leaned back from his desk and sighed heavly. Removing his glasses he rubbed his eyes, had a good stretch and a bit of a yawn to boot. Too many late nights combined with too many early mornings. Not good.
He really wished he didn't have to go to those drinking nights with the other agents, but if he dodged too many of them the bosses would be peering over his shoulder looking for breaches of conduct constantly. And he breached enough for them to not have to look too hard. So instead of outright missing those damned pub crawls, he tended to just sit in a corner nursing a single pint, usually with a clipboard and some notes on. That way, if any of those Americans got too close he could just flip to the page with the beheaded woman found recently. If the lack of head didn't put them off then the neat, almost picturesque, slicing in the skin usually did.
But he was distracting himself from the work at hand. Too much paperwork. He never joined the FBI to fill out forms, only to rewrite them without the technical terms in so the others could understand it. They thought he was just used to his forensic phrases, but he really did it just for the fun of feeling superior. To the Americans. But of course, in theory he was American himself... born to American parents and having lived in America most of his life... But off he went again on a tangent.
Replacing his glasses on his nose, Michael pulled the papers toward him again and forced himself to start writing. Several times he had to go back to the corpses he was filling out reports for. His underlings seemed incapable of the proper standards... Luckily he had relocated his office to the morgue so he didn't have to go across the site just to check a minor detail.
He was about to get up for the fourth time when there was a knock at his office door...
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Post by Rick T.Nash on Sept 19, 2003 11:41:03 GMT -5
Sheila was gnawing on the "meal" she had been offered when the sun rose on her second day inside the pit... When she felt the warmth of the sun's rays on her face she suddenly stopped eating, and wondered how she could have let her get so low, unleashing her animal instincts of survival, in such a short period of time. "You have to eat to survive," said a voice inside her head that she didn't recognize as her own mental voice. She shook her head, let the remnants of the human arm fall on the floor and threw up. "I can't" she heard herself say out loud. "I don't want to live at that cost." "You are stronger than this, you know it's necessary" said the inner voice again. Suddenly Sheila realized this voice was not at all hers, it was someone (something?) inside her own mind, trying to twist her, and almost instantly she saw it, the thing lurking in the shadows, darker than the shadows themselfves. It was talking to her mind, directly to her darkest side, to the beast inside. She tried to fight it, to push it out of her mind. She had just started to offer a prayer to God, in whom she had never really believed, when the Thing attacked her physically; she struggled against it with all her physical and mental strengths. From the outside of the pit, it would have appeared as if she was struggling against herself, tearing her own clothes into pieces, kicking and punching into thin air, but inside the pit, the fight was real... The Thing pushed her back against the wall; she knocked her head and fell on the floor, unconscious.
Alan opened his eyes, he was in this semi-conscious state he now called sleep when he felt something was wrong. He stood up and ran to the well, not even taking time to cover himself. In the darkness of the well he could see "it" ("her" some part of his mind said) lying half naked on the bottom of the pit. ("She's hot!") He shook his head, he didn't want to have sexual urges towards "it", but he could feel the blood rushing to his penis... "Go down and kill her," said the same voice Sheila had heard in her mind, "You can do what you want with her before, but kill her, she's of no use to me." "Yes Master, I'll do as you wish," James said. He grabbed the rope that was rolled outside the well, unrolled it and climbed down, with lust in the eyes and a grin on the face...
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Post by O.H.Lee on Sept 29, 2003 12:27:09 GMT -5
When Questor saw Ferri exiting the elevator with a newspaper under one arm he was baffled. How could this guy dare to come down here like if he was a tourist? Questor checked his watch... Just in time, he would have liked the guy to be late, just to have a pretext to reprimand him, how irritating.
Questor didn't say a word, gestured Ferri towards the door to the Forensics Lab without answering to his all too jolly "Hello". He would have to find a way to put the guy "back in line", he was really too familiar for his own good. Ferri was apparently still waiting for an answer, his hand offered. After a few seconds, He simply shrugged, walked past Questor, knocked on the door, waited till a muffled voice answered from the other side and walked in.
Questor took his handkerchief out of his pocket. He always took one (on which he had poured several drops of menthol) with him when he had to go to the Bureau's morgue. The sight of death was something he never got used to but could bear, not its smell... He followed his subordinate in the room and stood there in the doorway, his eyes wide open in shock. Seeing the corpse on the crime scene photographs was one thing, seeing them in the crude violent light of this room was another.
He suddenly felt his stomach on the verge of emptying itself on the white tiled floor. He gulped as hard as he could and turned his attention to the lab guy. He promised himself he would not look directly towards the corpses again.
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Post by Cannibal Monkey on Sept 30, 2003 11:14:05 GMT -5
As Questor's face turned a pale green, Mike smiled inwardly. He took a deep breath, hardly noticing the scent of putrescent flesh, and pulled out the second corpse, the female who was found recently.
"Just breathe deeply," Grinned the forensic scientist, "The nausea will soon pass. I assume you're here about these pair?"
On the murmurs of agreement, Mike handed out rubber gloves and surgical masks to the pair of agents and began.
"Right, let's start with this fine figure of a man, he's probably between 20 and 30. As you can see, the corpse is too far degenerated to show us much, but I got some info for you. The head was cut off post-mortem, as shown by lack of sufficient haemmorhaging about the neck. We have some scarification in the flesh, barely visible due to the enhanced stage of decomposition, but it appears to be a spiral shape. Nails are broken and traces of crude oil were found beneath them. Traces of oil were also found in the flesh. Stomach of the victim contained raw meat, we haven't determined from what yet but we're working on it.
"As for the woman, well, she is far less liquefied, so we got more from her. She's between 40 and 50. Same as with the man, the beheading was performed post mortem, probably with a chainsaw. Scarification in flesh is far more pronounced, so we can tell it is post mortem as well. Notice these spiral shapes, and this weird design," Mike gestured to a weirdly shaped scarification on the torso which somehow looks like a schematic man with a curved line in the place of the head, "I don't know what to make of this to be honest. The victim's back is covered with ante-mortem contusions - she probably fell about 5 metres somewhere rocky. Her fingernails seem to support this, you can see they are quite clearly abrased, probably after attempting to either dig through or climb on rock. We found more traces of crude oil in both her flesh and under her fingernails. So it seems definite it was the same killer. Or else some weird coincidence wherein both where killed at the same place. Once again, raw meat found in stomach, probably from the same animal, and there are no traces of any sexual activity, neither ante or post mortem."
Mike stepped back and ceased his monologue, breathing steadily behind his mask. As he pushed the corpses back into the morgue, he looked back up to the two agents.
"Of course, there's more to be found. But we don't have any of it yet. I'll keep you posted. Anything else you want to know?"
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Post by Agent Kafka on Oct 16, 2003 12:59:24 GMT -5
Quentin wore the rubber gloves without thinking about it. After the first look at the two corpses his eyesight just blurred. He mechanically put on the mask and walked towards the two bodies. He looked without seeing. The whole room blurred and the voice of the doctor was not coming from the man standing next to him but from inside his head.
"... he's probably between 20 and 30. As you can see, the corpse is too far degenerated...". There was a buzzing coming from somewhere but he couldn't tell the source. A buzzing which seemed to echo louder than the doctor's words.
"... head was cut off post-mortem, as shown by lack... ". Quentin could see the killer in the dark. It was in his head and he knew it. The lifeless body on a hard surface, holding a saw. Slowly and meticulously sawing the neck. It was in his head. But it seemed so real.
The buzzing continued and was getting louder. "...more traces of crude oil in both her flesh...". He didn't hear the rest. He felt a strange acidic liquid filling his mouth. And then suddenly he fully regained his senses.
He gulped twice as if he was going to throw up. The other two men turned their heads toward him. "I' m alright", he said and wished it was true.
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Post by O.H.Lee on Oct 29, 2003 11:27:22 GMT -5
"...Anything else you want to know?" asked Luder. Questor had somehow regained his composure but was still feeling like he was on the verge to throw up. He felt like if he opened his mouth to answer he would loose the fight against the up-going contents of his stomach. He thus simply shrugged and shook his head negatively and turned towards Ferri.
The guy was pallid (just like Questor was sure to be) and was apparently about to pass over. Ferri must have realized everything had gone silent, he looked and let out a pathetic "I'm alright" which was not at all convincing. Questor turned his head back towards Luder and could swear he saw a grin of contentment on the forensics expert's face.
"That will be all!" said Questor, fighting against the acidic taste in his mouth. "Contact us immediately if you find anything new..." He then walked out of the room as quickly as it was possible without looking like if he was running away. He heard Ferri's footsteps following him.
He was halfway down the corridor when he felt Ferri's hand on his shoulder. Heck! Couldn't he wait until they had made their way to the upper levels of the building, where things were "normal"? Questor tried to continue walking away but felt the grip on his shoulder strengthen...
Questor stopped and turned towards Ferri. "What?" he almost barked, the rising anger was somehow washing away the uneasiness he was feeling.
Ferri was out of breath, he took a few gulps of air. "I've...I've got a few more questions..."
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