Case Files 013

The accidental comment by the manager shed a new light on the investigation, it might even be able to solve some of the loopholes. However, the sun was setting and it was too dangerous to verify my hypothesis, I had to settle with the day after. On the way back, Captain Zhao engaged me in conversation while Mary kept on chiding me about the failure of my paranoia, as if to take revenge on me causing her to vomit.

Things were going fine when suddenly Captain Zhao asked me a question that got me stumped, "I know you've always been wishing to be a police officer but you can't due to your unique background, but can you tell me why you are so insistent on joining the law enforcement?" Mary's interest was piqued. "Unique background? What do you mean?" Captain Zhao had always been amiable with Mary but this time he warned sternly, "Mary, you'll eventually find out. Now is not the time to dig through the man's history." Mary pouted as if miffed. Seeing how this 30-year-old woman was still acting like a teenage girl, I couldn't help but wonder where did the legendary officer find the courage to marry her.

I shrugged and said, "My background is not anything confidential. My dad was a criminal, my mom left me at the gate of a prison when I was 1 and ran. The laughable thing was she got the wrong prison, that was not the prison where my father was incarcerated." I continued self-deprecatingly, "So until today I have no idea who my parents are. Before I was legal age, I spent my childhood inside a prison."

Upon hearing my history, Mary's mouth fell open as if she could not believe her ears. To be honest though, I was already used to it. I was called a bastard child since I was a child. The prison master only allowed me to explore the world on my own after 18.

"You still haven't answered my question." Captain Zhao pulled one hand off the steering wheel to light a cigarette. I didn't know the answer and I couldn't give an answer. Due to my childhood, I grew up around thieves, prostitutes, robbers, killers, rapists and so on. According to behavioral science, I should grow up to join their ranks so why would I have the urge to be a police officer? I answered as honestly as I could, "I cannot answer that question at this moment."

Captain Zhao took a hit of the cig and he laughed. "I couldn't answer that question when I was your age either."

"But what about now?" I pressed.

"There are people who are born for crime and vice versa, there has to be those born for law enforcement as well. Some are partial to darkness, while others like to seek light among the darkness. I am lucky to find my among the latter, what about you?" Captain Zhao answered.

"I think I'm half in darkness and half in light." I scratched my head and said.

Captain Zhao appeared to have heard this answer for the first time. He glanced at me through the rearview mirror, "So half evil, half good? That's interesting."

"Have you met a natural criminal before?" I asked.

"Yes," Captain Zhao answered.

"Where are they now?"

"In prison." Captain Zhao answered matter-of-factly.

…

When the first ray of the sun fell on the ground, we found ourselves back at the crime scene. Today we were here to test out my theory. I wanted to conduct a crime scene simulation. After sharing my thoughts with Captain Zhao, he agreed. I would play the killer, Mary played Zhang Xutong, Captain Zhao played Luo Yongjun and Gu Zhen played Lee Chunzhuang. To make the simulation as authentic as possible, I even invited the two electricians who discovered the body. I told them everything would progress similar to that rainy night, using the timeline provided by Lee Chunzhuang's testimony and Luo Yongjun's last writing.

…

I was currently standing before the door of the wooden hut. I saw a woman through the yellowed lights, a woman with a delectable body. I smiled and pulled on the electric brake. Interestingly enough, all the streetlights went out. Mary was startled but she did not panic, instead she continued to move ahead. I crawled into one of the underground passages which I found due to my once familiarity to this place. There were supposedly a lot more underground passages like this but I never stumbled across anymore of them. However, this passage was already good enough because it allowed me to approach Mary without being noticed. As I reached the end of this passage, I raised the lid a small gap to observe Mary, eventually she stopped above me. I reached out to grab Mary by her legs and dragged her down with me. She screamed but not louder than the thunder.

Gu Chen followed Mary from far behind. But suddenly he could not see her anymore. He was confused and was looking around for her trail. I stayed inside the passage for about 10 minutes with Mary. Then it was time to emerge from the ground alongside Mary. We appeared on the outside of the fence.

I placed a wooden board on the muddy ground and moved over a chair to place Mary on it. The aim was to tip the body over the fence but the fence was too tall. It was impossible to climb over the fence with Mary on my back unless I didn't want my fingers anymore. Then I came up with a brilliant idea. I climbed onto the electric pole and severed some of the lines. I tied one of them around Mary and threw another line over the fence. Climbing down from the pole, I hooked the line on the other side of the fence through the fence link and made a tight knot, a makeshift rappel was thus formed. After maneuvering myself down the rappel with difficulty, I was already exhausted but my work was not yet done. I yanked on the end of the electrical wire that was tied around Mary's waist.

The top end of the fence chafed into my inner thighs as I pulled on Mary's dead weight. To ensure that Mary would not slip back down and ruin all of my progress, I stuck her solidifying hands through the iron links to act as stopgaps. Of course, the living Mary would not cooperate with me on this.

Then lightning lit up the night and I saw Gu Chen walking this way. In my panic, I fell on the other side of the fence where the train tracks were. I knew I was trapped then because the only exit on this side of the fence was through the backdoor of the wooden hut. Gu Chen was coming closer and closer. I ran to the tracks and lied down in the middle of it. The rain and night provided me with a good camouflage as I witnessed something that I would never forget. After Gu Chen left, I slowly stood up from the ground. I had to get over to the other side of the fence and deal with the body. I undid the knot on the fence and intended to use it to pull myself over the fence when I heard a rattling sound. It was particularly hair-raising in the dark.

"Yes, that was indeed the sound that we heard that night!" The two electricians confirmed.

My fingers slipped from being frightened. Then I saw a familiar face. He shushed me with a gesture and pointed at the two points of light in the darkness. Then we heard screams. The points of light disappeared and got swallowed by darkness. After the echoes of their voices couldn't be heard anymore, the familiar face waved at me, he told me to follow him. I did as I was told and he led me to a spot where another one of those underground passages could be found. Unlike the one I used earlier, this one connected the areas outside and inside the fence. If I had known the existence of this passage, life would have been so much easier for me!

When we crawled up from the hole on the other side, he went to untie the wire around Mary but he did not pull her down from the fence. She was left hanging on the fence. He used the wooden board to clean away all of the footprints. While he was picking up Mary's internal organs, I used the chair to mark the entrance of the new underground passage because it would be useful to me in the future. I picked up the chair and the wooden board as I followed him to the wooden hut. He found a shovel and buried all the mess under the tree. Then he sat down before his desk and started to write. For reasons unknown to me, he told me to grab all the alcohols and to come with him.

When we left, we could hear the police sirens already. We decided to hide back underground to avoid detection… or at least that was what I thought. He tossed me a bottle and he opened one for himself. Then out of a sudden, he said, "I will help you surrender to the police."

I panicked, I would never surrender, the police had no way of telling I was the one who killed the woman, I didn't ejaculate inside her. Right, this man doesn't know how to drink, he doesn't handle liquor as well as I do. If I can push him to drink more, he would drown in this passage, then no one would know I'm the killer anymore. As I expected, he had horrible tolerance for alcohol. After finishing a mere bottle, he collapsed and fell into the water that was only ankle-deep. However, the water level was continuously rising.

I left, I wore gloves when I committed the deed, yes they would never find me.

…

The one who fainted was Captain Zhao, or more precisely Luo Yongjun, then who am I? The answer was very simple.

At that moment, Captain Zhao received a call. After he hung up, he said, "We just received a tip from outside the district. It was a female caller, she said when she took the train yesterday night, she saw a terrifying scene. It was late at night and most passengers were sleeping. She, though, was woken up by the rain. She pulled back the curtain to check how heavy the rain was but she saw instead a young man carrying a woman standing outside the fence. He was trying his best to throw the woman onto the tracks…" Captain Zhao continued, "The caller searched the map for a long time before she confirmed that the incident she saw probably occurred in our district."

Justice prevailed after all. Whether that person was the culprit, we only needed to show this tipster the picture of him.

"By the way." I asked, "What did you find on the alcohol bottles."

Xiao Liu said, "I was about to tell you that. Half of the bottles had fingerprints that matched Luo Yongjun, the others were clean. Either they had been wiped off or the person was wearing gloves."

I snapped my fingers. "I know who is the killer."

Captain Zhao shook his head. "What has the world come to? Go and investigate Luo Yongjun's family home address and apply for the warrant."

When we got Luo Yongjun's home address, we also started searching for the criminal. However, when we arrived at Luo Yongjun's home, something unexpected happened. A grown man collapsed on the ground. He had no breathing left in him and on the table beside him, there were several bags of white powder. Captain Zhao strode forward and used his fingers to pinch the residual powder on the table. He frowned and said with an expression of disbelief, "Guys, we might have snagged a big fish this time."

"Is that…" I let my question linger.

Captain Zhao nodded. "Yes, it's the devil's dust!"