City of Human Remains

Story | Author | Future | Words | Buy

The word has a delayed impact.

Coroner. Coroner.

It's about time, says Captain Gutierrez as he rotates.

I'm sorry, apologizes the coroner as he straightens his tie and removes his coat. I was in traffic. What the hell is wrong with the weather? He falls away from the swinging door and lets the guarding policemen outside catch it as it shuts. Hello, Andre, he nods cordially to Doctor DaCosta.

This is Captain Gutierrez, says DaCosta in introduction. He's in charge.

The coroner reaches out his hand. A quick, limp shake and he's off between the gurneys. Tondo Godspeaks is my name, Captain. I don't believe we met. So you have 6 of them? That's what the call said. 6?

6, confirms the captain.

Drain tunnel?

Correct.

Godspeaks snaps on a pair of smooth white plastic gloves he's pulled from his pocket. Then that means they've been exposed to water. And animals. Degradation of the tissue. Fluid washed away in the rain. Only a few days, but they've probably lost quite a bit of their composition.

And quite a bit of evidence, chimes the captain.

Without hesitating, Godspeaks unzips the bag on the center gurney and scoops the sides away from the contents. Looks like this was done with a hacksaw, or something primitive, he notes. We're not dealing with a sophisticate. No lasers. Godspeaks bends close, very close, to a small, severed hand that rests in the middle of the pile. He pokes with exactness at the sinewy end. And, he declares, you'll be glad to know, gentlemen, that the parsing was done after the killing. Not that that's much consolation.

You can tell that for sure?

Godspeaks tugs a dangling small leg from the bag. It bends at the knee with gravity. Yes. For sure. The coroner takes a measurement of the leg.

He thinks for a moment. Do you want a guess?

Gutierrez nods.

The killer knew he was going to stash the children in the drain. Hide the evidence. So he cut them up to make them fit. Those drains aren't very big. Easier to stuff parts than a whole body.

Okay... Any good news?

Some. Godspeaks lays the severed arm back in the bag, draping it over an upturned face of an expressionless little girl with coal-black eyes. To vivisect 6 children is time consuming. Especially without lasers. And this wasn't done with a machine like a woodchopper. This was done by hand. Probably with a saw. That's a lot of work, even for a professional butcher. To do the same process to 75 other children. Well, it'd take more than 2 days, I can tell you that.

2 and a half, the captain corrects.

Still...

So the others might be alive?

DaCosta wanders from the bag. Let's hope.

Godspeaks unzips the bag on the second gurney. I assume these are all mixed up. Here's a torso in a dress and another in a sports jersey.

You've got the girls with the boys, Captain.

I didn't bag them.

How many of each?

5 girls, 1 boy.

Godspeaks makes a sound. Bizarre ratio.

The captain shrugs. Killer had a lot of kids to choose from. Maybe he was sending a message...that girls are more expendable than boys.

Then why kill a boy at all? It's not a very clear message. And, you'll be relieved to hear, first glance shows no signs of sexual trauma. No, more likely this means he grabbed them in a hurry and didn't think about it. Look - this girl here... Godspeaks lifts a severed head from the bag, one with long black hair and jagged at the throat. I could measure her, but I suppose she is 9 years. This is a big girl. Maybe, by the size of the head, a slightly overweight girl. I'll know when I match her to her other remains. So the killer didn't just pick the smallest and most defenseless ones.

Godspeaks rests the girl's head on a side tray and, with a rag, wipes the head's debris, blood, and tissue from his hands.

Carlos can't look. He leans against the wall. You know, Mr. Godspeaks. It's just a likely that there are 5 boys and 1 girl buried somewhere else we haven't found yet. Did you think of that? He's even-ing things out.

True. Maybe he got confused himself about who was in what container. Once you cut up a few bodies, it probably gets awfully confusing. This makes Godspeaks smile, though the other 2 men do not see the humor. I can say this for certainly: whoever did this is a brute. He's no delicate practitioner. He's a barbarian. Sloppy. I doubt, in the end, he'll outsmart us.

Let's hope so. Gutierrez release a great breath. I'm getting some air, he announces suddenly before leaving the doctor and the coroner to continue their foul catalog.

Godspeaks also dismisses the 2 orderlies, who are doing no good standing against the wall.

DaCosta snaps on his gloves, prepared to begin. Worst I had today was stitches and a broken rib, he tells Godspeaks. But now this. I wish to

God this hadn't come into City Hospital. I wish they'd gone to Mercy.

Oh, come, Doctor, says the coroner as he unzips the remaining black bags. You saw worse than this when you were overseas.

No. I didn't. Never have I seen this.

Oh. Well. I've seen much worse, I can tell you that.

You're a coroner. I'm a doctor. I'm involved when there's still a chance.

Then you're still involved. There are 75 more children to be found. I'm not a profiler, DaCosta, but I'd say the police have a very good chance.

Whoever has done this, he's obviously very frightened of being caught. He's hiding them, and not very well. And it only took a short time to find the bodies. He's going to watch the story on the news and think twice about dispatching a few more.

I hope you're right.

Godspeaks slides from the carnage and to his friend the doctor. He has not seen this despair before on Andre DaCosta. He knows the doctor shouldn't be here, so plots other, distracting errands. Do me a favor, Andre. There's an identification team down the corridor. Would you please send them in?

An identification team?

Yes. As I assemble these remains, we will then have to match these bodies to the children on the list.

And inform the parents?

Godspeaks holds his tongue. He gives a tilt to his head to indicate the answer is 'yes.'

DaCosta exits, still wearing his gloves.

3 minutes later, Godspeaks is with his identification team, absorbed in the work - measurements, samples - the bureaucracy of murder. Focusing on the minutia helps him stomach the horrible mess in front of him. He's matching heads to bodies, arms to legs. There's another man photographing everything and a woman who records their conversations on a Scan-Gun. Blood and tissue samples are matched in less than 30 minutes. They know the names. Godspeaks doesn't want to hear them. As long as you are satisfied, I'm satisfied, he tells a ranking team member. (To hear the names makes these ugly doll parts into children.) He asks that the cadavers be tagged and grouped. The easiest way to store the bodies is in hyper-seal bags and placed into portable aluminum canisters. Once the pieces are removed from the room, the procession of orderlies carrying the canisters resembles janitors cleaning out a closet.

Decomposition is light, the coroner mentions in an aside to Gutierrez. The captain again had the courage to enter the room, after the bodies have been removed. Godspeaks drops his blood-soaked gloves into the biohazard bin. As for your evidence, there's a lot of it.

So we should have something to lead us to him?

Hope so.

When can I read your notes?

They'll be ready in an hour.

And the names of the dead?