"Mercury Falling" cslatton17@yahoo.com
Part 9 of 27: Dazzled

3:22 p.m. West Wheeling Precinct Interrogation Room Two.

"I don't get it," Harris grieved for the third time this afternoon. "No one heard anything. Paper thin walls and a damned .22 pistol firing point blank... Even if the clown's made himself a silencer, that only muffles the detonation-- nothing muffles a muzzle blast--"

Purdue crossed his legs and stared at the scuffed toe of his shoe. "Hell, Nat, people even rig silencers for those damned paintball guns, now. It wouldn't surprise me one way or the other, anyway. Maybe ballistics can find some indication. I don't think the killer would necessarily need one though. A .22 fired that close... the target'll soak up most of the blast. Of course, that would come closer to the technique of a professional hit--"

Harris was nodding-- he knew all this, of course, they were simply brainstorming, tossing around the facts and waiting to see what fell out. Purdue glanced briefly at his profiler silent across the table and frowned. "Hell, Harris, you know how people are. They don't listen or they think it's the TV. Or they just don't want to get involved--"

"Nah uh," Harris grunted. "Maybe in New York. Maybe in DeeCee. But this is Wheeling. People aren't like that here--"

Purdue shrugged. "People are people, Nat."

The detective shook his head, adamant, and like Purdue, he looked to Mulder for support.

The profiler must have felt Harris' plea peripherally; he hadn't looked at anyone directly since Purdue had ordered him to take off his shades.

"Don't ask me," Mulder murmured. "I have it on good authority that when it comes to people I don't know shit." He rubbed at his eyes, missing Sauceda's glare. "These aren't professional hits. I think our killer's just had enough practice to know how to play with his toys by now." He scanned the room vaguely, meeting no one's glance. He looked tired. Old. "Anybody find a slip cover for that record on the turntable?"

Harris frowned, watching the profiler. He'd seen less severe cases of fidgets in four-year-olds at Sunday services. "Why?" he asked. "You're thinking the killer brought the record with him?"

"Would put an interesting spin on things, don't you think?" Mulder studied the scratches in the table, using his thumbnail to add a few more.

The detective considered a moment, uncertain where the younger man was going with this. "We found some Quaaludes in the jewelry box," he noted.

Mulder, eyes down, shook his head. "Can't dance to that."

Harris scanned the table again. Purdue and Sauceda were watching the young prince furtively and looking nervous. Neither man had spoken privately with Mulder since his arrival back at the precinct all of a half hour ago and Harris would be damned if he could figure what was getting everyone's dander up.

Still, for a man who'd apparently been off to take a nap, Mulder was looking pretty worn. Without the seclusion of his shades, he was suddenly vulnerable and reticent, a far different man than the cocky SOB Harris had picked up at the airport yesterday. Hell, this wasn't even the same man that he'd spoken to this morning.

Leonardo Sauceda, at his partner's side as constant as a shadow, scowled at the detective's cool perusal. Harris blinked like he'd been caught in the glare of headlights and quickly found something else to focus on. He wound up staring at the crime scene photos scattered on the table.

"Okay," the detective offered, pushing back one of the photos in disgust. "Not that we're exactly small town here but even I get the thing with the hanger. 'Object rape' they call it. Postmortem. Right?"

Mulder chewed the inside of his cheek. "Not that simple," he said. And said nothing else.

After a minute, Purdue took up the point with a shrug. "An obvious association with back street abortions. Maybe." He frowned, analyzing his own statement. "But this is the Eighties, so who needs to go to the back streets? Abortion's legal."

"Maybe it's a protest against abortion," Sauceda offered. "Or maybe this is an old wound the killer's protesting, from before abortions were legal."

Mulder sighed, tiring of the discussion. "Oh, it's an old wound, all right. It's festering and incurable. But this is not a social protest." He drummed his fingers on his unopened laptop and Sauceda frowned, squinting at the machine so hard he missed Purdue's question.

"Any evidence the victim had an abortion at some point? Sauceda?"

"Huh? Uh, no sir. None. Ditto on the prostitute. Goes without saying for the male victims." He looked back at Mulder and pointed accusingly at the computer. "You got a profile, don't you?" he hissed. "You little shit. You couldn't just wait for a chain of evidence--"

Purdue cut the man short with a growl. "I requested Mulder to start work on a *preliminary* for us, Sauceda. He knows his job. I trust his judgment."

The ASAC was using that tone of voice parents took when they were trying to spell out their arguments in front of the kids. Harris didn't need Sauceda's sudden guilty glance in his direction to tell him who was the alleged kid here. The pathologist mumbled something indistinctly submissive and took a sudden interest in a water stain in the ceiling.

Harris had done his research: a dozen phone calls to five different states, faxed photos and reports, even a few e-mails. And twenty-three lawmen in seven jurisdictions had confirmed one singular fact: Purdue's new pet profiled off the invisible, the unknown. And then waited for the evidence to line up and back him. The kid was cagey about it, certainly, tossing the profile out as a "preliminary report" subject to change as lab reports and witnesses became available. Only there never seemed to be any changes. Because the "preliminary" was always dead on target.

Harris had decided he could learn to like that in a profiler. And he was more than willing to play whatever games Mulder deemed necessary to maintain his cover.

"How about it, son," the detective asked. "You got something for me?"

Mulder shook his head. "Let's talk about this first," he insisted. Sauceda's brows made a climb for the back of his head but he kept his comments to himself. Purdue prompted levelly, like a teacher working a third grader through the multiplication table: "Mulder, you said last night that something was off, that you felt something wasn't right." "Yeah, well," the young man answered, apparently uncomfortable with this game. "It hit me, now it's on. But I don't think it's going to be too popular."

"It hit you when?" Sauceda asked warily.

Mulder gave him a withering look. "During my nap," he snarled.

Harris had been watching Mulder's eyes since the shades had come off. They were red and bloodshot like he'd gone a few rounds with some bad tequila. Only he walked too steady for that and word was the kid didn't drink. That just left a crying jag but Harris had sat through some serious horror stories on the phone last night; after some of the tales he'd heard from Shreveport, the detective wasn't ready to concede that Fox Mulder knew how to cry-- not after three hardened cops had sworn the kid had walked dry-eyed through shit that had given them nightmares. Still, they *had* mentioned he had a tendency to wear those shades a lot, maybe--

Mulder caught Harris' open stare and jerked his head down abruptly. He dragged his hands through his hair and left them resting on the back of his neck, arms forming a shield of sorts against prying eyes. "You want the report?" he asked Purdue.

"You in a hurry?" Purdue's voice was quiet.

Mulder didn't bother to look up. "I have a headache," he admitted.

"If the shades help that, put them back on," the ASAC offered.

Mulder pulled the shades from his pocket, paused and then sat them on the laptop. It was a small act of defiance but Harris was damned if he could tell whether Mulder was directing it at Purdue or if it was a self-inflicted assault. The profiler spoke, his voice flat, his vision focused on the shades.

"The weapon of choice is interesting. A .22 isn't likely to be someone's old service revolver--"

"Great," Harris spat, "at least we don't have another one of guy-gone-nuts-in-Nam things--"

Mulder shook his head. "A .22's more in line of what men buy their wives for protection. To carry around in a purse or something. Most women I know pack at least a .32 if they've got a choice. It's not too bad on the recoil and it's more accurate at a greater distance--" He interrupted himself, shrugging off his own lecture apologetically. "Anyway, the point is, a .22's can be a killer if you use it right, but it's not an overkill like a .45 or a .357. Of course, it's also easier to handle if your upper body strength is not particularly well-toned or you're not used to handling firearms--"

Mulder paused, actually pulling away, as Sauceda leaned past him, grabbing a can from the soda collection sweating rings in the center of the table.

"Geez, Marty, so the killer's not a professional, fine." The pathologist shrugged. "Given our victim array, I can buy that. So maybe the killer's some young punk like Harris' friend Albert--" Sauceda offered the detective a derisive grin across the table, "--just out to make a name for himself and he's borrowed momma's gun to do it. Right?" Sauceda snickered and popped his beverage open for emphasis. Harris chose to ignore him.

Mulder, indifferent, continued blandly. "The victimology suggests that the killer is Caucasian, late forties, possibly early fifties. Long-time victim of emotional and physical abuse including sexual abuse by at least one family member. There is a strong attraction toward men, and an equally strong hatred and distrust of them. The hatred also extends to women the killer sees as weak or flagrantly provocative. Diagnostically, the perpetrator is a paranoid schizophrenic, a functionally delusional psychopath."

Harris raised a critical brow. This was more the man he'd dueled with yesterday. "So loosely translated," he noted wryly, "my APB's gonna be for a middle-aged white male? That narrows our suspect list down to, what, several hundred thousand people in this state?"

Mulder sighed and flipped through his photo collection before tossing Harris a chosen Polaroid. "The victim's positioned on the table facing the door," the agent pointed to the photo. "The killer wants to leave the body as exposed as possible. As humiliatingly as possible."

Harris nodded.

"Only, the killer can't quite bring himself to do it."

"Could have fooled me," Sauceda growled.

"The hem of the skirt was left down. Not up," Mulder continued, oblivious. "The tablecloth was placed over her head. The killer doesn't feel good about the crime. There's begrudged deference. That's important. There wasn't any such concern for the others. Not even for the prostitute--"

"The prostitute was mutilated but not exactly gutted. And there was no object rape," Purdue conceded.

"The latest victim endures far more profanity than the rest," Mulder nodded. "But then at the last... Why the final courtesy? At that point Ms. Kelly's nothing more than a piece of meat. What does the killer care?"

Harris frowned. "Shouldn't we be asking you?"

"You *are* asking me," Mulder insisted. "I'm just trying to lead you to see something here. Okay?"

"See what?"

Mulder rose, went round to Harris' office and reappeared with a hanger from the detective's coat rack. He peeled off the cleaner's paper wrap and stared at it a minute before handing it to Sauceda.

"Show me what you found, Lenny."

Sauceda's eyes went wide. "You've got to be kidding."

"It's okay, Len. Please. It's important."

Sauceda glanced round the room looking for a rescue that wouldn't come, apparently, but finally resigning himself to set to work. Disgust fueled his muscles and with each twist and pull he glanced up at Mulder standing over him. Mulder waited patiently, eyes hooded, emotions masked. When at last, Sauceda had approximated the shape of the weapon in the body, he handed the bit of wire back to his partner.

Mulder didn't take it. Mulder just looked at it and then regarded Sauceda expectantly.

"What!" Sauceda exploded.

"Look at it, Len."

Sauceda gave both the wire and his partner the same disgusted expression.

"No, Len," Mulder sighed. "Think. You're the killer. You're angry enough to kill. To kill quickly, kill relatively painlessly, a quick shot through the heart, but angry enough to kill all the same. Then you decimate, desecrate the body because you're so full of rage, killing is not enough for you. You gouge out her eyes with a spoon. Rip her intestines out with a barbecue fork. You rape her, but not with your body, you don't want to get too messy here--"

Harris grunted.

"--not too personal. Everything you've done past the shooting has been done with something you've found at the scene. You've got an apartment full of objects. Now, you're going to rape her. What are you going to use?"

Sauceda stared at Mulder, his eyes wild. "I'm not raping her, Marty," he hissed. "I'm not killing her and hacking her up, either. To hell with you." He threw the wire at the table like it had caught fire. "I'm not going to even think about what he--"

"No, you're not, but you expect *me* to, goddam you." Mulder's voice was dangerous and razor-edged. Sauceda flinched against his glare. Mulder squeezed his eyes shut suddenly, as though pained by the sight of his partner's fear. He spun quickly, jerking his eyes open again, a slight hesitation betraying a passing attack of vertigo. He recovered before Harris could rise, however, and reached for his shades. Harris spared a quick questioning glance at Purdue, stone still across the table.

"Is anyone working with me here?" Mulder asked quietly, shielded once more behind the mirrored gold.

Purdue stared at his agent, stared at the wire. "I wouldn't use a hanger." He looked up and found Mulder regarding him. "I'd use... I don't know... that kind of hatred, that level of violence-- I'd use something... bigger?" He shook his head. "A broom handle. A bottle-- God, I can't believe I'm even imagining this."

"Welcome to the wonderful world of profiling, sir," Mulder grimaced. "Now. Why bigger?"

Purdue couldn't seem to answer his own reflection in the shades. Mulder gave him a sad smile and a nod and slipped back into his chair. "Harris?"

The detective shifted uncomfortably. "This must be one hell of a profile," he sighed. "A bigger object? Yeah."

"Why?"

Harris looked around the table, embarrassed. "Because... size matters?"

Mulder nodded; he suddenly looked like he wanted to spit. "Because you're a man. Size dominates, size conquers. Size wounds." Mulder slapped his open palm against the table and it echoed like a bullet slamming into concrete. All eyes jerked up. The shades were off again; his pupils were dark and dilating by the second. He pointed at the hanger.

"That's not a man's weapon," he threatened. "The eyes," he pushed another photo across the table, setting it spinning to the floor with a little plop. "A man takes out your eyes in rage, he gouges them with his thumbs. He doesn't rummage through the kitchen looking for a damned teaspoon." He slapped away a third Polaroid and it went sailing to join the other. "A man slits you open with a knife, guts you like a deer. He doesn't grab a barbecue fork and scrape away at you--"

Purdue was blinking rapidly. "You're saying we're hunting a woman? Mulder, statistics prove the incidence of women as serial killers is next to nil--"

"Next to," Mulder emphasized. "There have been several apprehended--"

"Always operating with a partner, usually male--"

"Usually--"

"And when we sat down at this table you said this was a solitary killer--"

"Don't interrupt," Mulder requested blandly. "I hate that."

Purdue stared at him.

The profiler seemed to concede a silent point before rubbing at his face wearily. His hands were trembling. He placed them flat against the table and took a deep breath.

"Listen," he pleaded. "The incidence of serial killers of the female persuasion can be expected to rise as the population of serial killers rises. It's inevitable. This is the hip disease of the eighties. I think they're out there. Their numbers are not as high as their male counterparts perhaps, but they're out there."

"Marty, that's just speculation--"

"Perhaps, they're not being caught as frequently because they're smarter," Mulder continued doggedly, "more adaptive. But mostly I think because they're not *expected*. Most men don't believe them capable. And the majority of law enforcement is, unfortunately, male. Case in point: why is it I'm the only person at this table who believes it's even possible?"

"Why would any woman want to do this to another woman?" Harris demanded.

"Why would any man want to do this to a woman? Or another man? It happens every day, Detective. This isn't a rape, it's an experiment. She's playing out fantasies of revenge, lashing out against people that are probably long dead."

Sauceda looked at the remaining photos on the table. His face was thoughtful. "And covering the head, the skirt... She couldn't quite leave her there like that. Exposed. Even after all she did..."

Mulder nodded. "Gender courtesy. She's still adapting. Still able to be touched on some level with the guilt of what she's doing. And that's our trump. She'll make a mistake at some point, give herself away. She's already left at least that clue. Problem is, it's also our problem. As long as she's capable of perceiving how we see her work, she's not developed tunnel vision. She can still see part of the big picture, though the edges are terribly fuzzy."

Purdue shook his head. "I don't think I follow."

Mulder spun another of the photos to him gently. "Look. She's still capable of turning from that door and looking back at that body and seeing what we see. Not just what she wants us to see, but what we actually will see. And it scares her. She's still shape shifting. She can be anyone she needs to be. Do and say anything she needs to live with herself. She's adaptive to her immediate situation. You could interview her right now and she'd pass through your net and you wouldn't give her a second glance. Probably help her with her coat and hold the door open for her."

Sauceda had a distant look on his face. "Man walks down a dark street, sees a woman, wonders why she's out so late alone. Keeps walking. Sees a man, he pays attention, considers his options: flight or fight. A woman walking down the same street. Sees a man, same thing. Sees a woman... wonders why she's out so late alone. Keeps walking."

Mulder smiled sadly. "You're a woman, alone in your apartment. Another woman knocks on your door, asks to use the phone--"

"I let her in. Next thing, I'm gutted on my own kitchen table." Sauceda shuddered. "Jeezus, Mary and Saint Joseph, help us."

Mulder slipped on the shades. "Why is it you start praying every time I get turned on?"

Sauceda glared at him. Even Harris could tell, though: this wasn't turned on. This was Fox Mulder, hiding behind his SOB shades and kiss-my-ass attitude.

Sauceda played along for the sake of the assembled audience. "You're sick, Marty."

Mulder inhaled deeply, "Like you can't taste it."

Sauceda's frown deepened. "Taste what?"

"The hunt. For the most dangerous prey of all. The wounded animal. The one that thinks and reasons. Serialus killeria. The female of the species. Angry enough at last to leave her lair for vengeance."

Harris regarded the twin mirrors. "Wounded?"

"Geberth's Practical Homicide Investigation," Mulder noted, quoting: "'No one acts without motivation.' Not even serial killers." Mulder's voice was distant. "It's taken a long time. And she's definitely out to get her money's worth." Mulder stared down, unseeing, at the photos. "She's even trying out new surgical instruments, going from a hunting knife to cooking utensils. More familiar territory. Maybe she'll keep the method. Maybe she won't. But she's trying it on for size."

He removed the shades again, rubbing at invisible pressures behind his eyes.

Harris was chewing his lip, now, reviewing the discussion. "What about that record on the turntable? You think she brought it with her, don't you? What? She likes to hum along to the tune while she works? Like you?"

Mulder's eyes were hard and dark as they focused on the detective. There were too many years of pain locked away behind that hostile stare; Harris felt he could count centuries if he could just force himself not to look away.

Mulder settled the dilemma for him, however, retreating back behind his Ray Ban armor. The profiler's voice was civil enough, though. Dead, actually. Lifeless and cold.

He said, "Her mother would listen to the radio until late in the night, listening to it while she lay alone in her bed trying not to think about where her husband was and what he was down the hall doing; listening to the music so she wouldn't hear her daughter pleading for mercy."

Harris licked his lips distastefully, comprehending the image Mulder's words were painting. "How the hell," he whispered, "would you know something like that, Mr. G-man?"

The profiler had looked away, however, nodding to himself. "Man. Woman," Mulder insisted to the wall beyond Purdue's head. "They've each betrayed her in their way and she's capable of hating both equally. There's still a great deal of confusion in her mind: who to love, who to hate; the conflict between the normal sensations of sexual desire, and the anger and fear of a child who's been violated repeatedly and given no voice to protest." He frowned, staring down at his hands, his voice quieter. "She's the type of child I profiled in Shreveport and Seattle: abused and silenced. Only this one didn't die. This one has endured the abuse of a father. Of a husband." He nodded solemnly. "For years she just wanted to be left alone. Now, she just wants justice."

Even through the shades, they could feel the storm roaring. Purdue opened his mouth and formed the word "Mulder." The word was availed no voice, however. No one spoke. No one moved.

Sauceda squeezed his eyes shut, mouthing a silent prayer as Mulder's world-weary voice whispered, invoking supplications of his own.

Bridgeport, Ohio."

Mulder glanced up from his distant perdition, hesitated. Then the mask slammed back down. He raised a sardonic brow at Harris. "So," he demanded, "where the hell did you hide my ashtray?"

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Photo courtesy of TexxasRose's Fox Mulder Gallery

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