Tuesday Afternoon
He was about forty, forty five years old, very tall, almost gaunt, and not very well groomed. The man was, in fact, slothful looking in a peculiar, potbellied sort of way, and was wearing greasily tattered green chinos and an old, untucked plaid short-sleeved shirt. His sneakers were foul looking, and probably even fouler smelling, Officer Amy Breedlove thought as she watched the suspect through binoculars from her unmarked patrol car, a battered, twenty-six year old silver Pontiac Grand Am coupe. She was parked beside a fragrant trash dumpster off Harry Hines Boulevard, deep inside the industrial wastelands of central Dallas, Texas, in an almost war-torn district full of taquerias, strip joints, peep shows and barren industrial warehouses. She had been following this 'perp', a guy named Bruce Walker, who was a 'just released from prison' pedophile-rapist, for three days, ever since CID had received an anonymous tip that Walker was downloading kiddy porn and had been seen roaming around schools and playgrounds.
Yet here he was in an area full of homeless addicts, scabby-legged hookers and tired old gays cruising glory holes for their next load – and not working the parks and playgrounds the detectives in CID were hoping for. Still, Breedlove had her orders, so she pulled a battered old Canon 1Ds from the seat beside her and slapped a 400/5.6 on it, then swung it to her face. She lightly depressed the shutter and centered the guy in the viewfinder, then fired off a five frame burst when his face was clearly visible.
It was around two in the afternoon, two hours to shift change, and it was hotter than Hell outside – maybe '110 in the shade' hot, and of course the air conditioner in this stinking, fucked-up old car had seen better days – 'like maybe ten years ago,' she thought. Breedlove was baking in the afternoon heat, sweat was pouring from her neck down her back, and she wanted an ice cold Coke in the worst sort of way. She leaned forward and tried to pull the water-logged bullet-proof vest away from her skin, sure the goddamn thing was adding about ten extra degrees to her internal temperature, when she caught sight of really odd looking person following the suspect.
"What the fuck! Is that – a woman?"
The woman was short, dressed in black fatigues – including a black hood covering her head – and every instinct Breedlove had screamed "wrong!" – that this woman was following the suspect. Breedlove raised the camera to capture this woman, but just then she stopped, turned and looked directly at the unmarked car. Breedlove instinctively fired off a burst with the Canon – and the woman turned and ran off into shadows between two buildings. Breedlove noted the time and location on her notepad, started the engine and slowly made her way over to the area where she had seen both the suspect and the woman, and when she came up empty she started to drive around the area looking for any trace of them.
"I don't fucking like this," Breedlove said to the hot air in the car, so she picked up the mic dangling from the radio and pushed the transmit button:
"317 to 310 on two," she said, calling the district patrol sergeant on the tactical frequency.
"310, go head."
"Uh, 310, I've got a female over here in what looks like a black ninja suit, including a hood, following a signal 7 suspect."
"317, what's your 20?"
"Harry Hines at Freewood."
"10/4. 247, are you clear yet?" the sergeant said on the primary frequency.
"247 to 310, 10/4, clearing now."
"247, back up 317, Harry Hines at Freewood on a signal 13. Contact 317 on Tac2 for information."
"247, code 5."
"Central received, 247 en route at 1420 hours."
Breedlove circled the area, was driving north on Harry Hines when she saw someone running west from a Church's Chicken a block ahead, so she jumped on the accelerator.
"317 to 247, got the suspect running west on Mrytle Springs, away from the chicken place, black fatigues, black hood, looks like a large knife or machete in hand."
"10/4, almost code 6."
"310 to Central, get me some units heading to 317s location, and notify CID."
"Central received at 1422 hours."
"317, suspect running south on Maybank, through the trees!"
"247, code 6 in the area."
"247 at 1426 hours."
"247, this is 310 and I'm about a minute out."
"Received, uh, 247, Signal 33, officer down, repeat, 33, officer down on, on Maybank, just south of Myrtle Springs..."
"310, get some air support headed this way, and all responding units go Code 3, now!"
"1426 hours."
"310, code 6, oh, crap! 310, two officers down, repeat two down! I want a full tactical callout, now! Advise Watch Commander...oh, shi..."
"310, received at 1427 hours."
"141, Code 6 in the area." '141' was Ben Acheson, a traffic officer assigned to motorcycle patrol in northwest district, and as he was close when the call came out he headed to the area to provide extra back-up. He was the next unit to roll up on the scene, and he nearly vomited when he saw the carnage.
He jumped off his BMW R-1200-RT-P motorcycle and let it fall to the ground while he drew his Sig-Sauer P-226 from his holster and covered the scene.
"141, I've got three officers down, decapitated, no suspect in sight."
"141 at 1429 hours."
Acheson kept his 9mm moving, his senses acutely tuned to pick up the slightest sight or sound, but all he heard now was a rolling avalanche of sirens, then a helicopter overhead. Within a minute he was relieved to hear a herd of patrol cars approaching, and he knew a mobile Command and Control Unit would be on the scene soon. He holstered his weapon and walked over to the three slain officers; their bodies were artificially positioned, leaning against one another, the heads placed neatly in their laps. He fell to his knees and vomited just as the first back up units screeched to stop behind him.
+++++
Acheson could hear several helicopters over the crime scene now, and he knew the entire area was being cordoned off as detectives and Crime Scene Units from the department arrived. He saw techs from the Medical Examiner's office looking over the bodies and his stomach lurched again. Looking around, Acheson guessed there were more than fifty patrol cars searching the area now, as well. He had poked his head in Breedlove's unmarked car, looked it over, read her notes, and now was back on his BMW, trying to trace 317s route from where, he'd read on her notepad, she had first picked up the suspect.
He circled around a particularly seedy area on Harry Hines just south of Lombardy Lane, looking around a cluster of adult bookstore/video arcades that were usually full of gays and hookers worshipping cocks on their knees, when he thought he saw something odd behind a tire store on the corner. He motored over and saw a leg sticking out from behind a pile of old, worn out truck tires, and got on the radio.
"141, out on a possible Signal 1 at 10499 Harry Hines, believe this is related to 317s case."
"141 at 1455 hours."
"105, get some backup and CID over there, Code 3!"
"1455 hours, 309, 315, respond Code 3 to 10499 Harry Hines, at Lombardy, back up 141 on a possible Signal 1."
Acheson got off his bike and walked over to the tires, looked down and suddenly felt like vomiting again. There on the ground lay what was left of an old man, his head severed and his green pants pulled down past his knees. The man's penis had been cut off, his abdomen cut open from the sternum to the pubic area, and his intestines were spread out randomly on the dirty concrete. He walked around the tires, heard sirens closing in on his position when he found the man's head.
Acheson fell to his knees again and vomited uncontrollably when he saw what he assumed was the man's severed penis lodged in a hideously contorted mouth.
Wednesday Morning
Captain John Wayne Dickinson, usually called "The Duke" by his team in CID, was in charge of the investigation, and he was tired, dog-tired, having been at the scene on Maybank since late afternoon the day before. He picked up another glazed donut and took it down in one bite, then downed a pint of ice cold milk in one long pull.
"Look, I want to get some sleep sometime this month," he said as he looked over the crime scene photographs one more time, "so let's summarize what we know so far.
"First, Breedlove was assigned to tail this perp, Walker, and had been for three days;
"Second, she had him near the cum-palaces on Harry Hines, south of Lombardy;
"We also know she was detailed to photograph the perp, so she had one of the department's Canons with her, a 1Ds with a 200 and a 400, and those are missing;
"Third, she calls in and advises she has a suspicious person, dressed in some sort of ninja get-up, stalking the perp, this Walker guy...
"So, do we assume she got some images of this suspect?"
The Duke looked around his briefing room.
"Sounds reasonable to me," Ben Acheson said.
"Remind me, Officer Vomit, just why you're here?"
"Watch Commander assigned me, sir, in case I can fill in any gaps."
The Duke sneered derisively. "Fine, but if you barf on my floor, you'll be working Animal Control for the next five years. Got it, Meathead?"
"Yessir."
"Well, again, assume she got some images of the suspect, as well as the perp she was tailing. So, where does that leave us?"
The Duke looked around the room. "Anyone have any ideas?"
"I do," Acheson said.
