Chapter Three
Shooting her a look, Zhubin frowned and then glanced around, "Uh, there's no one else here," he said quietly. Turning the computer to face her he started the vehicle, "And I'm also pretty sure I told you where we were going." Shaking his head he pulled out of the spot and got up to street level before looking her way again. "You sure you're feeling okay, Agent Rose?"
"Yep, just a bit of a headache." Lacey tried to replay the previous conversation and said, "McKinney Warehouses, had a bit of a brain-fried moment." She was fucking losing it and she knew it. She was slowly forgetting everything that she should do and should know because of these men. No, she really couldn't blame them. It wasn't their fault that she had the hots for them, at all.
Nodding, he shot her one more look before his focus was fully on the road. The ride was silent to the warehouse district. Pulling in, Zhubin parked where the rest of the vehicles sat, their lights flashing an odd blue glow on everything. Climbing out, he looked to her, waiting for her to join him and precede him as always. Lifting the crime scene tape for her he ducked under and followed slightly to her left, half a foot behind.
Entering the warehouse he stopped with her and looked around, inhaling deep. A low growl rumbled from him. Shaking his head when she looked at him he took the booties one of the officers handed over and slipped them over his boots. Pulling out a pair of gloves he tugged them on and headed for one side of the warehouse, knowing she'd take the other. They would each work a side, switch and then meet to discuss.
Lacey's eyes caught everything. Lifting a gloved finger, she raised her mini cam and snapped images. The fur caught in the loose boards of the wall and then the blood that was captured as well. Using flags she marked the areas and made sure that the CSUs would bag the fur and hopefully get a DNA match if there were follicles still attached.
Without speaking to Zhubin, she moved to the other side of the warehouse as he moved to her side. She looked and caught a couple additional images before meeting back with him in the middle, passing him her mini cam as she did so. "What are you thinking happened?"
Scrolling through the images after plugging her cam into his datapad he sighed. "Nothing good," he muttered. Tipping his head, he led her over to a spot on the floor, "Tell me what you see?" he asked. When she looked around and then shook her head he pointed up on the wall, nearly twenty feet in the air, "Now what do you see?" he asked of the very clear pawprint in blood on the wall.
"Son of a bitch," she muttered. "How could he or she have gotten up there? You guys can't fly can you? So how the hell could that print have gotten all the way up there?" She moved closer to the wall and added, "I found tufts of hair ten feet that way." She pointed. "And if you look the dust looks like it's been disturbed, but in an arc more of a straight line."
Looking around, he waved her over to a spot before throwing another look around. Crouching, he leapt straight into the air onto a girder nearly thirty feet up. Balancing there he lifted a brow before dropping straight back down. "That"-he pointed to the print-"is nothing more than a push-off point. What is bothering me, I don't see one other print leading up to it, not one. If you look at the floor all around the bodies there are boot prints but not a single paw print. Besides, if it was an actual push-off point, why isn't it smeared? Blood is slick, that's metal, it would have smeared no matter how a Luhpyne hit that wall. But it's perfect, completely clear." Zhubin shook his head.
"Unless the print was made with a body part," Lacey whispered in horror. "Vhampires can hover in the air, right? I know we have several on the task force. Ask one to come in and take a bloody glove up and make a print. It's the only thing that I can think of and if that is the case we have one hell of a freaking case on our hands." One that would cause ripples in every aspect of society.
"Only other problem is I can smell Luhpyne in here and Vhampire as well as something else. I don't know what it is, it's being clouded by the blood which is annoying." Cracking his neck he looked around. "Let's go and see what the ME has found since she's been here. I'd like to get the scene clear and then look around some more."
"Sounds good. Maybe once we have the scene clear and the blood cleared up you will be able to use your sniffer and find something else, something that will help us out here." Closing her small data pad she placed it in her jacket pocket and looked at him. "You okay, Zhubin? You are looking a little wolfy at the moment." His eyes were glowing, his hands were curled and the claws were clearly visible.
He closed his eyes and a moment later, when they opened, they were back to normal. "Fine," he said before spinning on a heel and moving toward the ME. "For future, note the term ‘wolfy' is considered highly derogatory by my people. What do you have, doc?" he asked, stopping a few feet from the woman.
"We have six casualties, possibly another given what the officer has been letting me know from the hospital." She looked at them. "Agent Rose." She tipped her head to her. "Two non-human, I'm guessing from what I can see with a visual is they are likely Spirytes. The other four are humans. Of the three that went to the hospital, two are human and the third is Spiryte. He's the one that may not make it through surgery given the extent of his injuries."
She bent and lifted the edge of a tarp. "All their hands were removed. Cleanly and post mortem from what I can determine here on site. Looks like a sharp single-bladed tool with some weight. Again, can't be positive until I do the autopsies. Obviously without the hands and corresponding wrists we will need to go old school and use dental records to identify the humans. The Spirytes, if they truly are Spiryte, will be a little harder to identify as I'll have to contact their embassy and get permission to access the records."
She didn't even look to Zhubin or ask for his assistance in that but continued on. "From what I can determine and from body positions, they were all surprised. Two were hit in the back, unknown weapon at this time. The other four turned and were hit by the same unknown weapon. The three that are in hospital were likely on the fringes of this meet and were running. One was by the door where you came in and the other two were near a fire exit at the back."
"From the hits, do you think we have one unsub or multiples?" Everyone hit differently, it was a signature in and of itself because no two people held a weapon the same way or hit the same way. It was unique to each person. "Why would so many have been gathered here, of all places? There are much more secure and safe areas in which to meet, even if it were for some nefarious purpose there would be a better place to meet than here," she asked, to herself more than anyone else.
"I would, at a guess and the autopsy will confirm, I would guess three, perhaps four. As to why they gathered here"-she straightened and waved in her people-"that is up to you, Agent Rose, to discover. I will have the preliminary autopsy sent to your datapad by morning but this will take a bit of time to sort out so it will be at least a day or two before I can give you anything more. All right, lads, nice and gentle with them. They have a story to tell us and we need to respect that." Stepping away from them she moved over to another body.
"Thoughts?" Zhubin looked to Lacey.
"Honestly?" Lacey looked up at him and at his nod said, "One thing that Spirytes are really, very good at is creating new identities for people. Some of them have the tech to replace the receivers behind the ears as well as the chips in the arms. If I had to guess I would say that the Lhupines that were here were trying to get away from something. I don't know why I think that, but those are my thoughts on it."
Nodding, he folded his arms over his chest and looked around. "Once they have the bodies out of here we need to work this from the start. See if we can figure out anything else, because I have to admit, something feels off to me. Let's take a look at the personal effects before the lab boys take everything back. Might be a clue there."
She nodded and when they were alone she looked up, "I wasn't trying to be offensive. How long have we been partners, Zhubin? I've said that to you before. I've called you ‘wolfy' before and you have never taken offense. I swear I wasn't trying to be mean or rude or anything like that, just letting you know so that we didn't scare off another tech."