Indira had stayed late at the precinct that night.

It had been two days since she had the fateful conversation with Raisa Thorne. The tears of the younger woman haunted her still. There was a sheer desperation in her woe, a broken heart that Indira did not know the right words to soothe. She could only hold Raisa in silence, something she had done. Indira had also given Raisa her personal contact number, with the promise of doing a raincheck on her from time to time. It was not the most professional thing to do, and Indira was well aware of this. But before being a police officer, she was a human being who owed it to aid somebody who was clearly in distress. She won’t fail Raisa like she had failed Renée.

She owed that much to the memory of her friend.

Besides, the next day was also Renée’s funeral. Her parents and sister would be there. Indira did not get enough time for how she was going to face them. If it had been anyone else, she would have probably skipped the funeral. But this was Renee. Indira would not bail out on the last opportunity to bid her farewell just because she got cold feet about facing a few people. Wouldn’t that make her a horrible friend?

The clock inched towards ten minutes past twelve midnight. Indira was in her office with the door shut and the air conditioner switched on. Not that it was doing a lot. Like all things in Gwaywe, that AC was also ancient. She was mostly alone in the precinct too; two constables were somewhere within the station. Two other junior officers were on their night patrol. A bunch of files were open on her desk, some of them marked up with a fluorescent highlighter. Indira had scribbled hasty notes on the margins.

She stood facing a soft board which hung on the wall opposite to the desk. Crime scene photos were pinned on it alongside sticky notes. In fact, more than half of the board was covered with the notes. It was because nothing was making sense. And the more Indira looked into it, the more she could help but think that none of the two things suggested by Andrew Starc were correct.

No, these murders weren’t looking like the job of a serial killer, despite the autopsy reports saying that the same weapon was used to do both the killings and possibly by the same person. Indira was not sure about the bog body, but how had the killer come into the hospital, went to the morgue and brutally murdered Renee, with no one noticing that something had gone wrong until hours had passed? How had the killer left no clues at all about themself in the scene?

There was no such thing as a perfect crime, making this situation quite an anomaly.

“How the fuck did he clean up every trace of himself?” Indira muttered. “Why can’t the coroner assess which is his dominant hand?” It was a habit she had inculcated during her training, which never left her. Talking to herself helped Indira keep her mind clear.

“And what sort of cleaver can give you that clean of a cut?” She tapped twice on a pink sticky note that had the name of the murder weapon written on it. “A human body is not the same thing as a chicken breast.”

Too many questions, way fewer answers. She huffed in annoyance before sitting down on the chair with a loud thump. The autopsy reports were supposed to make things clearer, not more confusing. Like the fact that they had found no organs within the bog body. They were just…not there.

As for Renée, the autopsy report said that her organs had liquefied? That was the exact word written. Further tests needed to be done to find out how it was. So the question was, how could a killer internally liquefy the organs of his victims with any signs of trauma from the outside? The toxicology report was inconclusive, too. Nothing was found in the bloodstream of the victim save for high amounts of carbon and an organic acid with a p.H of 5.5. Both things are typically found in a bog. The forensics team at Gwynedd was not sure how these chemicals might have affected Renee or how they got into her bloodstream in such high volume.

So much for saying they needed more time. Indira huffed, annoyed with the lack of information the Gwynedd people had unearthed. The autopsy results were supposed to come earlier, but the coroner had taken more time to study the corpses properly. What good did it do? They still did not answer. Those files kept beating around the bush, when all it screamed was that nobody knew how or what exactly had killed Renée and the bog body who might be Basuki Thorne. How was Indira supposed to investigate with no aid? It was like searching for a pin in a haystack in the most literal sense. She would have to look into all paths, no matter how unhelpful, and then eliminate them. It was time consuming and Indira was worried that the more time she spent, the killer would have more chance of getting away. Worldwide statistics were in her support.

There is something in that bog which is doing all this.

Raisa’s words echoed in her mind. Not a person, but a thing that was behind these killings if the younger woman’s words were to be taken at face value. Something in the woods that was luring people to their deaths. But that was possible. There were no monsters in the real world other than humans themselves. Yes, there were several incidents of locals and tourists venturing into the woods and never coming out of them, but that did not mean there was some kind of boogeyman in the woods that was doing it. There has to be some other logical explanation for all that. Besides, Raisa Thorne did not seem like a position to come to sound explanations.

What about that thing in her walls, huh? That pretentious voice in Indira’s mind whispered. How do you rationalise it, Miss Rational?

“Must be a trick of light,” she mumbled, rubbing her forehead. Indira could not believe that she was entertaining such thoughts. The mind makes one see things one wants to see. Nothing more, nothing less. She ought to not let talks of the paranormal interfere with her work. Such tomfoolery didn’t belong there.

Pushing aside the thoughts of bogs and monsters, she averts her focus on more pressing matters. Though her mind still needled her consciousness, she ignored it and jotted down furiously on her notepad some questions she wanted to ask the hospital staff who were there that night. Another chat with them was long due, and it was the first thing Indira wanted to do after the funeral. She was halfway through the third question when the scream came.

“OH MY GOD!”

It was brief, breathless, and hoarse. A wet gurgle ensued right after, as somebody choked and was desperately trying to stop it. Her eyes grew wide with shock. Who the hell was it? It sounded like one constable. Immediately, she was on her feet, rushing out of her office with the revolver raised. She ran past the empty desks and chairs, file cabinets and darkened hallways. Somewhere behind her a lightbulb shattered, the sound of glass breaking filling the quietness of the precinct. Indira flinched as the darkness swathed her, but did not stop. She knew the layout like the back of her hand.

She found the men, the constables, outside in the courtyard, beneath a tree surrounding it. One of them was on the ground, moaning and rolling about, while the other was holding him by his shoulder, looking as pale as a wraith newly emerged from the grave.

The first one had his arms around his throat and was making those horrible wet sounds. It was sound she did not want to hear anymore, for it brought back a very unpleasant memory from her adolescent years, where a classmate had brought a dead rabbit to the classroom and dissected it during the recession. The groans of the man sounded exactly like the sounds of rabbit's intestines being pulled out. Sloshy enough to make one gag.

“What's happening here?” Indira approached them, gun slightly lowered. There seemed to be nobody else there. “What happened to him?”

The one standing shuddered. “Don't know ma'am. George and I were only talking when started to scream and do…this.”

“Did he choke on something? Were you two eating anything?” Indira asked.

“Nothing. Nothing at all.”

Indira the revolver inside the holster and squatted beside the choking man. “What did you two have for dinner?” She rubbed George's back, wondering if this was an allergic reaction of some sorts. If yes, she would need to take him to the hospital. Waiting for an ambulance might be too late.

“Sammiches, I think,” the other constable’s voice trembled. His words grew more and more thickly accented. “Yeah, must be. Cucumber and ham. Me wife made it for both of us.”

Well, that was that. Could somebody be allergic to cucumber or ham? Maybe not. And if this other guy was bringing dinner for both of them, he would have known if George had any allergies. Besides, he wouldn't have taken them, would he? Nor would the symptoms show up so much later. The hospital was the only place that they could take him. Indira tried to hoist him up on her shoulders and carry him off to a car. But the moment she did it, the man convulsed violently, making them both fall down.

Indira landed on her arse. Yet that was not the worst of it because she gaped as the constable fell face down. In his writhing and thrashing, he got spread eagled. He stretched an arm towards the heavens, beseeching to some unseen force. His fellow mate stood a few yards away, shaking like a leaf and clutching a crucifix pendant hanging around his neck. Not that the lord's prayer could help any of them then.

“St-op,” the man spat out. The veins around his throat had bulged, threatening to burst at any moment and make him choked on his own blood. His eyes were wide saucers that tried to push themselves out of his socket.

And that was exactly what happened.

It was not a sight Indira could forget. A sight that would haunt her dreams for years to come. Both his eyes popped out like corks. Something wet splattered past Indira and landed straight on her lap. Slowly, she looked down to see an eye had landed there. It was still warm, with the nerves and blood vessels attached to it like the tail of a grotesque comet from hell. Blood had splashed against her shirt. Indira did not want to look, but her eyes were slaves to the unfolding chaos. The other eye hung limply from a socket, brushing against his mouth. It hung by a thread. Blood and other fluids dribbled down from twin black holes continuously, wetting his neck and most of his uniform. He screamed now. Loud screams that echoed in the night air. His hands flailed around as his coworker and boss looked on, frozen in shock.

“Ahh!” George tried to sit up but fell again, causing his other eye to rupture in a shower of flesh and jelly. “It hurts! Please! Someone make it stop, please!”

His screams rung in her head in a continuous loop. Indira could not make it stop, let alone his pain. Her head felt so heavy, as if a tonne of bricks had been put upon her head. Her vision swam. She half-registered the sounds of somebody retching nearby. She could not take away her eyes from the struggling man. Neither could she move to help him. Her body remained tethered to the ground even as his screams stopped and his body stilled. That was when the pressure in her head lessened. Goosebumps erupted on her skin. Though by that time, Indira knew he was beyond help. Yet another life in Gwaywe had been snuffed out.

And Indira couldn't shake the feeling that this had been a warning to her.

~•~