Larry Johnson Jr.'s photos appeared on screen. The body was shriveled with age, a sad, slack-jawed raisin of a man.
"There," Doug said and pointed to the old scars on the right arm. "Does anyone else want to bet we'll find needle tracks on all of the others?"
The whole team dove to the terminals to confirm what Doug already knew. Within minutes, Doug pointed at the updated display.
Match-2 Arrested for drug possession (1,7)
Match-3 No pre-1980 medical records (4,5,9)
Match-4 Pre-1980 patient at S. Manhattan Municipal H(1,3,6,8)
Match-5 Lived in NY City (1,4,5,7,9)
Match-6 No matches
Match-7 Matches deleted
Match-8 No matches
Match-9 Former intravenous drug user (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9)
"That," Doug said, "is not a coincidence."
"Actually, it technically is," muttered Carl.
"Holy shit," Marty said with a huge grin. "They're all junkies!"
In the excitement of the new find, no one noticed Paul Renner brooding at the wall screen.
"Guess what?" Sam said over the COM. "Until 1982 the South Manhattan Municipal Hospital ran an affiliated methadone clinic in SoHo. The building was used for a couple of years as a document storage facility for the hospital. It burned down in 1984. Arson. Unsolved. I'll have RiC look into it."
Paul raised an eyebrow at Carl. "Who's Rick?"
"Research and Information Processing Center. Big 'R,' little 'i',' big 'C.' RiC. They make the phone calls and ask the questions for the Special Operations Units. Us."
"Gotcha," Paul said.
Work continued for several hours without finding any more leads. The familiar frustration known to investigators everywhere set in. Finally, Sam's voice broke the monotony.
"Hey, Gene?"
"Go ahead."
"RiC's got something for us. All of the clinic records were destroyed in the fire." There was a pregnant pause. Gene rolled his eyes.
"But…," he prompted.
"But an old maintenance guy there, Seth Hawkes, says that quite a few of the files were moved to their Records building shortly before the fire, when they started transferring their records to computers. Said he thinks they might still have them in a box somewhere."
"ROAD TRIP!" Carl, Marty, and Jerri shouted at once. The team scrambled to grab laptops, PDAs, jackets, and briefcases. Paul followed Gene out the door.
* * *
January 9th, 6:15 PM EST; Houston Street; New York City, New York.
Less than five hours after Doug's revelation and Sam's find in D.C., the team crawled through Manhattan traffic.
"Oh, come ON!" Carl yelled at traffic from the passenger's seat. Although years of ruthless traffic enforcement kept the intersections reasonably clear, and the now genetically inherited knowledge that a cabbie will run you over if you're not where you're supposed to be kept the pedestrians on the sidewalks and crosswalks, no law of man or God could compete with New York City traffic on a weekday at six PM.
Gene had arranged for a warrant on the plane, just in case they needed it. They pulled up to a five-story brick building that looked a lot more like apartments than a warehouse or office building. A blue-shirted NYPD officer walked up to the passenger side of Gene's SUV. He was already talking, so Carl rolled down the window.
"I'm Officer Mullins. Here's your warrant." He handed the paper to Carl through the window. "Go ahead and double-park right up there." He gestured to a stretch of road a quarter of a block away. "Leave me the keys so I can let people out if I got to, you know? I'll make sure no one messes with the vehicles."
"Thanks, officer," Gene said. He pulled up to the indicated spot, Marty right behind him. The team walked through the only door into a sparsely furnished lobby. Gene followed on his crutches. Fluorescent lights buzzed above a small security desk, and a bored-looking twenty-something girl with a gaudy gold badge pinned to her dark blue uniform served as a guard.
She glanced at them and continued typing on her phone. Gene stood at the desk for a full ten seconds before he cleared his throat.
"Yeah?" the girl said without looking up.
Jerri held out the papers. "We have a warrant to enter the South Manhattan Municipal Hospital offices located in this building and to examine the documents contained therein. Your cooperation is required."
They waited while the guard called the main office, faxed a copy of the warrant, and received authorization. Gene chose not to point out that the team couldn't legally be denied access. The guard handed Jerri a key-card.
"It's the whole fifth floor. There's no elevator, so you'll have to hoof it," the girl said. She smiled sympathetically at Gene, gestured toward the door to the stairwell and went back to texting.