Tick Tock Part Four - The Mouse Fell Down

Discarded

"They think the body was dumped here a week ago, but it's hard to say with the weather turning." Miller was right. It was an especially cold September. They were more than halfway through. Nines tried not to think about the fact that it would soon be Gavin's birthday. The second birthday they hadn't spent together. He would be thirty-nine. His LED blinked red at the thought as he pushed it aside. His current task was to assist Miller with this latest victim. It was a curious case. The body had been left fairly carelessly. Unimportant. The victim meant nothing. Little effort had gone into placement besides it being a less travelled area. Did the killer intend for the victim to be found? Clearly not with the lack of foot traffic in the warehouse district. However, he was not hidden either. He'd been dumped. That suggested either extreme carelessness or the killer believed he could not be traced.

There were many things he could draw from the latter. The killer clearly believed there was nothing on the victim's clothing or body that could be traced back to him. That suggested the killer wore extensive or high-quality protection while dealing with the body, or that he was an android with no need to worry about such things. Thirium dried and turned invisible to the human eye, however a scan revealed no traces. From the state of the victim's clothing, he could tell he hadn't been cleaned up first. Cleaning up the body was hardly an option, considering the state of it. That the body had been discarded so carelessly also suggested the killer either believed they couldn't trace any evidence back to the kill site, or that the site itself was unimportant.

"Forensics may give a more accurate assessment with insect activity..." There didn't seem to be much in the cold weather, with the body being inside in an abandoned warehouse. Even the rats hadn't touched it. That was perhaps unusual, but with the general landfill not too far away, they likely preferred to stay over there. Or perhaps this victim tasted foul...That was possible. Perhaps there was a drug in his system.

"Right. They're on their way, maybe twenty minutes." Nines nodded at the news as he crouched to examine the man. He was unusual for a human. Well over six feet tall, and that was without the head that had been dumped a few feet away. Miller busied himself with his notes as he noticed Nines reaching out to take a blood sample. He'd seen Connor do that enough times to know not to look. Licking his fingers, Nines' brow furrowed as he analysed. Decomposition had started, but there were no toxins in his blood. The bio popped up in his HUD.

"Our victim is Malcolm Wright. Forty-seven years old...He lived alone, and there are no reports of him being missing." There was nothing else notable about him in his record. He'd been arrested for fighting a few times over the years, but nothing stood out. He'd never been married or had children, and had no relatives to speak of. Miller noted it down with a nod and rejoined Nines as he scanned the body. The killing strike had obviously been the one that removed his head, but there was also a deep vertical wound that went all the way through his neck, just above the notch in his collarbone. "From the dimensions of this wound, I believe the weapon was some sort of long blade..."

"Like a sword?" The cut was thick, but swords were fairly rare in these parts. They were rare in general, usually owned by registered collectors outside of museums. There was something else unusual. The edges seemed odd, as if the skin had been ripped. A sharp tipped sword would usually be much cleaner. Nines' brow furrowed as he tilted his head this way and that for different angles.

"It is more like a machete of some sort..." He turned his attention to the decapitation wound, noting the cleanness of the slice. Few things could cut so cleanly through a human spine. "A machete is likely accurate looking at the neck wound here." Miller nodded along, taking Nines' word for it. When it came to matching wounds with weapons, he'd trust an RK model any day. So what happened? Was it a fight of some sort? More than likely, but did that mean there was evidence? It seemed unlikely the body would have been left so carelessly if that were the case.