Chris Carter - Gallery of the Dead

It was Garcia’s turn to scratch his nose using only his right middle finger.

Agent Fisher ignored the gesture. ‘So what if for his first piece, the killer selected a place where he didn’t need to paint the walls, or the floor, or anything else because the location, a disused shed by the river, already provided all the crazy “modern art” he needed — food wrappers, dirty rags, discarded drug paraphernalia, graffitied walls and so on. All he needed to do to make it his own was place the main piece — the victim’s body with a disfigured face — at the center of it.’

She once again indicated the printout with the perfectly made bed at the center of a messy room.

‘Then,’ she continued, ‘for his second “piece”, the killer moved from a dirty shed to a squeaky-clean room and from a young female victim to an old male one; can you see?’ She did not give Garcia any time to reply. ‘If you disregard the fact that these are crime scenes, the two “pieces”, just like you’ve said, are practically opposites of each other. Maybe that was the effect that the killer was going for.’

Garcia had to chew on all that for a second.

This time it was Agent Williams who selected a picture from the crime-scene pile. Another wide-angle shot, but this one from the Los Angeles crime scene, where Linda Parker’s skinned body could be seen on blood-soaked sheets, against a background of blood-smeared walls.

‘His third “piece” needs no introduction,’ the agent said. ‘Here he ups the shock factor, skinning the body and smearing the walls with blood.’

He handed the photo to Agent Fisher, who once again took a few steps back. Just like with the photo of the first crime scene she had shown everyone, from a distance, the picture she had in her hand looked almost like a gallery painting, where crimson red clashed headfirst with brilliant white walls and bright bed sheets.

‘But the best part,’ Agent Fisher said, reclaiming Hunter and Garcia’s attention, ‘is still to come.’

Pima County’s Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. Keith Morgan, had received the surprise call from FBI Special Agent Mike Brandon just as he had finished eating dinner. Once he disconnected, he placed a couple of calls of his own to find out exactly when the body of Timothy Davis would be arriving to the coroner’s office downtown. With that taken care of, he prepared himself a strong cup of coffee, took another shower and got dressed.

Dr. Morgan didn’t mind starting early or finishing late. As a matter of fact, he did both almost every day. Since his wife of twenty-five years had passed away four years ago, his job was all he had to keep him from constant loneliness. Dr. Morgan would gladly grab any opportunity he was offered to keep his mind busy, to keep him from losing another night to solitude.

At that time in the evening and with very little traffic to speak of, it took the doctor just ten minutes to cover the almost five miles between his home in the neighborhood of Southern Heights and the Pima County’s Office of Chief Medical Examiner on East District Street.

‘Have you forgotten something, Doc?’ the tall, Hawaiian-looking attendant sitting behind the reception counter asked, looking up from the comic book he was reading. He didn’t look very surprised to see Dr. Morgan back so soon.

‘Not quite, Nathan,’ the doctor replied, approaching the counter. ‘How’s the comic?’

‘It’s not a comic, Doc,’ Nathan replied, his tone of voice almost defensive. ‘It’s a graphic novel, but this is a really good one. You would probably enjoy it.’

‘Yeah, maybe I should give it a go sometime.’

‘All you have to do is ask, Doc. I’ve got a room full of these.’

Dr. Morgan smiled passively. ‘We should have just received a body in the last hour or so — African American male, thirty years of age, identified as Timothy Davis?’

Nathan put down his graphic novel and turned his attention to the computer on the counter in front of him.

‘We have indeed,’ he replied after performing a quick search. ‘Apparent homicide. The body came in about fifty minutes ago.’

Dr. Morgan nodded. ‘Yes, that’ll be the one. Can you please get somebody to take it to theater one for me?’

The attendant checked the clock on the wall behind him. ‘You’re going to autopsy him now?’

Usually, when Dr. Morgan stayed late or came in early, he dealt mainly with paperwork.

‘That’s the idea.’

‘But... the body hasn’t been prepped yet,’ the attendant announced, looking slightly surprised.

Before any post-mortem examination, every body needed to be properly prepared. That meant undressed, if the case called for it, then sprayed with fungicide and thoroughly washed with disinfectant soap before being moved into an autopsy theater. That job usually fell to morgue orderlies, but since Timothy Davis’s body had arrived after closing time, it had simply been moved into a cold chamber.

‘Do we have anyone around who would be able to prep the body while I get ready?’ the doctor asked.

‘Sure. Minika and Ralph are on night duty tonight. I’ll get one of them to prep it for you, Doc. Theater one, you said?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Consider it done.’ Nathan gave Dr. Morgan a firm head nod. ‘Would you like me to find you an assistant for the autopsy? I could give Patrick a call.’

Patrick Wilson was the intern who usually assisted Dr. Morgan with his autopsies.

‘No. No need to bother anyone, really. I’ll be fine on my own.’

As the private jet finally crossed the invisible line that separated South California from West Arizona, the stars that so brightly encrusted the night sky seemed to acquire a different kind of shine, hazier perhaps, less full of life, as if their brightness lost a fraction of its strength the further east they flew.

Hunter and Garcia both waited for Agent Fisher to continue, but she offered little else.

‘The best part is still to come?’ Garcia pushed. ‘What do you mean?’

‘The carvings the killer makes to his victims’ backs,’ Agent Fisher finally clarified. To emphasize her point, she called their attention back to the photo she had just showed them moments earlier, the one where Linda Parker’s skinned body could be seen against a background of blood-smeared walls.

‘Regardless of how much experience anyone has,’ she began, ‘this is without a doubt one of the most vicious-looking crime scenes any investigator could’ve walked into. Everything about it screams “brutality and sadism”.’

Garcia chuckled. ‘You don’t have to tell us, we were there.’

‘But despite what this looks like,’ she advanced, ‘pathological evidence tells a very different story — no pain... no suffering... no torture. Death came fast and through suffocation, which doesn’t make a lot of sense, not here... and not with any of this killer’s previous victims either.’

‘Until you look at it from a different perspective,’ Hunter added.

‘Absolutely.’ Agent Fisher smiled at Hunter as if they shared some sort of telepathic bond. ‘It explains why, despite how brutal this killer’s crime scenes may look, he’s actually merciful toward his victims. He has no reason to hurt them or make them suffer because he’s not after them as people. He’s after them as objects.’

Garcia made a face at Hunter. Despite him not uttering a single word, Hunter could read his expression like a book — Is she late to the party or what? We’ve been through all this yesterday. It’s like she’s repeating everything I said.

‘One thing is for sure,’ Agent Fisher carried on. ‘This killer isn’t dumb. Far from it. Delusional, maybe, but certainly not dumb. He knew that no matter who you were, no matter how much experience you had or even which law-enforcement agency you worked for... no one in their sane mind would’ve looked at any of these crime scenes in any way other than a sadistic shitshow.’