Obsession (2 page)

«This one we found yesterday» Throll announced pulling open the drawer that contained the third and latest victim of what could be certainly classified as a serial killer.

Sylke couldn’t help noticing that it was another human, although a female this time, showing exactly the same signs as the previous ones.

Since she had died recently, the deterioration was almost non-existent. In spite of this, he found himself watching a scene that had already started, as he was already sitting and tied, with his mouth mutilated by strong thread. He saw the tip of the blade slowly reach his left eye, then darkness as he uselessly shut it tight to protect it. Light came back along with pain when his cut eyelid was pulled away like peel from a ripe fruit.

«So, Sylke, haven’t you understood yet?»

He suddenly broke the contact with the body and was back in the present, turning abruptly. Seymourne, Throll and the coroner assisting them stared at him in wonder. Some time passed before the captain started talking.

«Did you see anything useful?»

Sylke didn’t answer. Not exactly.

«Did you say anything?»

«I asked you whether...»

«Not now, earlier. While I was still examining the body.»

Seymourne shook his head. «I know you prefer silence...», but Sylke wasn’t listening. He had been confirmed his first impression, the killer had been talking to him! He had used the sensorial memory of his victims to send him a message. Apparently, not only he had known that he would be summoned for the investigations, but even how long after the first death this would happen. He had timed his words so that deterioration wouldn’t prevent him from hearing what he wanted to say.

But who in the world could know him so well?

The voice hadn’t rang a bell. Maybe he could have recognized the face, if only he had been able to see it.

Suddenly, everything made sense. The unreflecting blade to prevent the victims from seeing in it the face of the killer. The...

«The victims knew the killer!» he said suddenly, making the coroner start.

«How can you say that?» Throll asked.

«He didn’t saw their mouths shut to prevent them from screaming. He did so that they could not say his name... so that I could not hear it.»

* * *

«What do we know about the victims?»

Throll sent him a reproachful look. «Investigations are not your business. You don’t even have a reason to be still here» he told him.

In truth, Sylke had already reported every single detail of what he had been able to see, and there was no other way he could contribute to finding the killer, but by then it had turned from a professional into a personal matter.

«It’s definitely my business. Whoever is doing... that, he’s trying to reach me.»

«Unfortunately he’s killing anyone but you.»

«If you let me help, I’ll give him a chance as soon as we find him» he said ironically in return.

«You haven’t been much help so far, how do you think you will be now that you’ve already done all you could? Or you know any other trick I’m not aware of?»

Seymourne looked askance at the captain, who ignored him.

«I can pull a cylinder out of a rabbit», Sylke answered seriously. Actually, Throll wasn’t entirely wrong. «Maybe, if I knew anything more about those poor souls, I could understand if there’s any connection with me, don’t you think?»

Throll threw three folders on the top of his desk, as if he was doing him a favour. He went closer, without sitting down, and opened the one that had ended up on top. The picture of a girl was stapled to a few sheets of paper. He looked at it cursorily as he tried to absorb the contents of the documents, then his eyes suddenly jerked back to it, and he felt his blood chill. He knew her.

He had never really met her, and would never have been able to recognize her by seeing her tortured body. All he knew about her, actually, was how she had been saved from a rapist by the intervention of a stranger who had literally tore her aggressor to pieces. He had seen all this through the eyes of the dead, or what was left of him, so he didn’t know who the girl was, or what was her name. And most of all, he couldn’t mention that to the police.

In that particular instance, he had decided to lie to Seymourne, telling him that the state of the body had made impossible for him to use his powers on it. He believed that the author of that homicide, as bloody as it had been, had made a favour to the whole world, and didn’t deserve being prosecuted for that. But admitting this now would mean making his position even worse than it already was.

He made sure that nowhere in the file there was a mention of an attempted rape, or anything else that could connect that woman to the events he had indirectly witnessed. Then he moved to the remaining two folders.

He wasn’t surprised to find out that the other two victims had appeared as well, in different times and for different reasons, in some of his visions, witnesses of crimes in investigations he had helped with.

He lifted the pictures to show them to Seymourne.

«They were involved in cases for which my assistance was requested» he said. The detective nodded, to confirm he remembered that.

«What about the third» Throll asked.

Sylke shrugged. «Not that I remember», he said, sustaining without effort the suspecting glare of the captain.

«Not much of an help» Throll muttered, abandoning the intimidation attempt.

«We might re-examine all of the cases you helped with» Seymourne suggested. «Maybe we can find a connection, or at least pick other potential victims.»

«Good luck then» he said. «I can’t help you with this. Next time, call me as soon as you find the body.»

None of the agents said anything. Both, just like him, had no doubts that there would be another victim.

* * *

Sylke didn’t love the idea of hiding from the police a clue that could prove fundamental, and having no other choice tormented him, even though he didn’t regret the decision that had brought him there.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have the skill and knowledge for a personal investigation, not a useful one at least. He didn’t know how to gather information, if not with his power, and even for what concerned using them he was limited. Even so, some details of the situation were quite clear.

Tracing two of the three victims, connecting them to him, was something that many people could have done. But the girl... she was a different matter. Aside from him, and the girl herself, there was only someone else who could know about her part in that story. Someone who, on the other hand, should have known nothing about Sylke’s. Which didn’t mean that somehow he couldn’t know.

Finding that man could, at worst, be a starting point. If only he had known how.

Even though his face was imprinted in his memory – like each and all faces he saw, after all – for sure it wasn’t enough to find out who he was, let alone where.

The signal of the communication crystal took him by surprise while he was deep in these thoughts. He grabbed it swiftly from its resting place and answered.

“
Mr. Sylke?” the mind voice from the other side had something familiar, but he wasn’t able to identify it.

“
Speaking.”

“
I am calling from the police precinct. There has been another victim, in a warehouse of the industrial district. Patrols just reached the place. Could you join them immediately?”

* * *

When he reached the address he had been given, Sylke was surprised to see no policeman outside. In spite of this, he shrugged, rolled up his flying carpet and walked inside the building, passing through the half-open doors of the warehouse.

Even there, though, there was no trace of anyone else’s presence, be it a policeman or otherwise.

The large building was empty, with the exception of some crates stacked against a wall. The only light came from a floating globe which power was definitely not enough, as it barely shed some light on what was immediately below it. Actually, though, what it illuminated was all there was to be seen.

The chair was metallic, as he had guessed. Quite plain, without anything fancy, in a dark grey tint, or better so it had been before the blood had dried all over it. The man sitting on it had his back turned. His head was unnaturally tilted back, and his eyes without eyelids stared at the light globe, unable to see it. There was blood on his face and on every visible part of his body; part dry, part still wet. The black thread that had been used to saw his mouth made an obscene contrast against his bloodless skin, made even paler by the light.

Without further reflections, Sylke advanced toward the victim, starting to pull the glove from his right hand.

«That won’t be needed» a voice coming from the darkness behind him said.

He stopped and turned to look at the figure that stood at the edge of the light. Its skin, as black as the clothes it was wearing, made it all but invisible. Even though his night vision was better than that of any human, Sylke needed some time to make out its features, and realize that he knew her.

So, it wasn’t really true that there was no cop there.

«How come forensics isn’t working already?» he asked in a neutral tone. «I thought...»

«Your naivety is almost as pathetic as your lineage» she answered, completely disregarding the question.

Sylke turned to her a puzzled look.

«You don’t know who I am, do you?» she asked in return.

«The agent who work the night shift at the reception at the precinct» he answered mechanically.

«My name is Talsya D’shilth.»

A new look, showing no kind of emotion, reached her. «Is it supposed to mean anything to me?»

«You don’t even recognize the house of your father», she said, scorned.

Sylke almost started laughing, although it would have been laughter devoid of any happiness.

«I barely know which was my father’s race, and anyway what I know of him is more than I would have wanted to.»

«Our father was a nobleman, feared and respected. You should have thanked him for siring you!»

«Your father,» he answered, stressing that possessive, «kidnapped my mother, imprisoned her, raped her, and he would have killed her if she hadn’t managed to escape before giving birth to me. If you talking about him in past tense means he’s dead... I am only sad it wasn’t my doing.»

«Your mother was reserved a honour she didn’t deserve. Just like you don’t deserve your inheritance.»

«Is this the reason of this family reunion? In that case, I’m sorry to tell you that I only inherited this pigmentation. And if I could give it back to you I would, even though I have no idea what use it could be to you.»

«You have the Touch. The Touch that should have been mine by right. I am his daughter more than you’ve ever been, even though I’m not his firstborn.»

«I have... what?»

«You know very well what I’m talking about!»

«You mean this power comes from him?» he asked, surprised. «Well, if you know how to take it from me, help yourself then. I didn’t like it much even before knowing this.»

«That’s exactly what I want to do. That’s why you’re here. That’s why I set everything up.»

«I was hoping to be wrong... you killed these people to take my power?»

«No, not for that. Only to bring you here and be able to take it back. And to be free» she said, moving a step forward. The light was reflected on the glossy metal of the wand she was holding in one hand, pointed at him, and Sylke doubted that it was a simple stunning weapon.

«Did you ever consider just asking me? And... free from what?»

«I doubt that, if I had asked you, you would have let me kill you to take it.»

«So that’s the plan» he remarked in a flat tone. The news didn’t seem to worry him at all.

«Soon someone will call the police, saying they heard screams coming from here. Officially, I’d be on my way home when the call will be placed, but since I am the closest I’ll be the first to arrive, and I’ll find you still at work. Sure, I’ll have to get a reprimand for not waiting for backup, but that won’t be a serious problem, considering the results.»

«And you think someone will believe you?»

«Why shouldn’t they? I’m a cop. I acted in self defence. And after all, captain Throll already thinks you are more involved than what you’d like to admit, it won’t take much for him to decide you are the killer.»

«But why don’t just kill me? Why them too? What did they do to you?»

«I could no longer stand their existence, And anyway, they were only humans.» She said the last word with obvious contempt, hard to say if for those humans in particular, humankind in general or, indirectly, the only human who had wounded her father, the mother of the hybrid in front of her.

«And all this just because you want to see people die?» he asked, not enquiring further on the sense of the previous remark. «Good gods, girl! I must say it isn’t worth it. It’s not pleasant at all.»

«I know exactly how it is! I don’t have the Touch, but each time you use it, I see everything you see, I feel everything you feel! And I have no control over it! The scenes you see obsess me every day, every minute; faces come back to my mind, day after day, until I am able to delete them... kill them.»

For the first time since that conversation had started, Sylke’s face showed a hint of emotion, being shrouded by a gloomy sadness.

«I’m sorry» he said earnestly. «I can imagine how you felt. But this can’t justify your deeds.»

«I want no justification, especially not from you. I just want what is mine.»

«If that’s what you want...» Sylke let his glove fall, then jumped in the direction of the corpse, stretching as much as he could to reach it «... it’s all yours!»

His hand grabbed the shoulder of the body. He let his perception of what was around him fade, buried under the last living moments of that poor soul, and let down all of his shields, abandoning himself completely to the feeling coming from his power, living every drop of pain, every single moment of the torture his half-sister had inflicted to her last victim.

All in a single, short instant.