Smoke and Glory

•8•

We pull in once again to the dingy morgue and into the spot marked 'visiting police' that is next to the spot marked 'chief medical examiner' where I would normally park since after all I'm the chief. We walk into the morgue and are simultaneously greeted by the stench of death as each body releases its own scent that no amount of air freshener could ever hide but to be honest the scent has now sort of gotten used to me, but to detective griffin she steps back in almost shock at the hight of the scent and it does always seem to be worse at night then day but lord knows why. The office is empty once again all Except me, detective griffin and Luke who at this point should hopefully be getting organised in the autopsy suite for the body to arrive after all I messaged him when we were on our way to organise the suite for me and he should be ready for the arrival of the body. I switch on the light switch in my office and walk over to where there are stacks and stacks of plastic blue overalls and gloves of which both me and detective Griffin really do need to wear hence why we came into this room. I slip into it and tie it up at the back before pulling on the blue plastic gloves that do get caught on my ring before I remove it and place it within the locked draw on my desk and slide the key once again into the back pocket of the black jeans I'm wearing, having very quickly done and got changed once the police arrived at the scene before I then place the glove back on my hand fully and I feel a small vibration before checking my phone and seeing a message from hope, 'love you so much just wanted to let you know.... I'd love to come by but I'm still in Chicago doing the business, but I'll be home on Wednesday. Love you luc, Hope xx' it reads and I quickly skim read it and smile before sliding it back into my pocket and then quickly removing it realising that I can't bring it into the suite for privacy reasons. "Alright you ready Detective Roche just texted said it's arrived and you said the night janitor was going to bring him in, so should We go" detective griffin asks placing the blue glove into her hand as she looks at me, "yeah let's go" I say opening the door and letting her walk out first before I walk out, Turning the light off and once more casting a shadow of darkness over each of the objects in my room as I close the door behind me sealing it off to be alone in the darkness. We walk into the autopsy suite and see the body laying there and Luke standing nearby placing some surgical tools on the table that he then wheels over to be next to me so much so I can use them quickly when needed and when required move it around so I can use the tools from different angles upon analysing different parts of the body. "There you go Doctor snow and the new notebook stack was delivered this morning it's just Over There on the table, is that all you need doc?" He asks pointing the fresh new stack of notebooks I ordered from the bureau a few days ago upon nearing the end of my current collection and we needed things to write down observations on. "Yes that's good thanks Luke, detective griffin do you want to grab a notebook and a pen and then we can begin." I say as Luke exits the room to continue cleaning the offices upstairs and detective griffin rips open the plastic packaging and places it in a bin before grabbing a new notebook, flicking to the first page and grabbing the pen I left laying randomly on the side that in big black letters says 'Morgue' this pen one of the many from this large collection that the bureau sent us a few years back. "Alright the victim is commander Greg Davis, age 43, time of death is 21:30 to 22:00, I think based on body temperature. Signs of visible trauma are the gunshot wound to the head and" I say as I reach once again for the tweezers on the table and insert them carefully into the gunshot wound and I once again pull out a card and upon looking at it realise that it too is the 10 of diamonds and as I unfold the card using another pair of tweezers and a very steady hand I look at it and I realise that beneath all the blood lays the diamonds on the card and the top 3 diamonds are crossed off, something that either wasn't on the 1st card or just went unnoticed because of the amount of blood. "Shit" detective griffin says as she looks at it and too realises that in deep black ink the diamonds are crossed out. "But what does that mean? I mean 3 crosses, 3 victims but when the 10 diamonds are done is that it? And why the 10 of diamonds why not any other card why that one in particular?" I ask the unanswerable questions knowing that detective griffin won't know either but I still want to ask them in order to process each bit of information that keeps getting implanted into my head. "I don't know, I don't know but what I do know is that this is mad and this killer wants us to know his victims but also with the intent to confuse us especially you" she responds while writing down each piece of information she can, "I'll get this analysed and stored with the other card  but I can't promise any results we didn't have any last time and now I'll start the inside examination and see wether my theory about cyanide makes any sense," I say as I grab the surgical tool and cut the Y insertion along the chest and the smell once again hits me somehow overpowering the smell of dead as I lean back to breathe and smell something other then the overpowering scent of cyanide that clouds the room. "You smelling it again?" Detective griffin asks probably because of my reaction and desperation to breath none cyanide smelling air; "yeah but you don't do you, I need to check the liver." I iterate taking a deep breathe before leaning back in to the body and removing the organ of the liver and instantly noticing the scarring, my suspicions seem to be correct, "the liver is very scarred that hints at large amounts of cyanide but I need to run a toxicology test but to do so I need the toxicologist Doctor Adam Smith but he is in  Finland with his brother because his brother just lost his fiancée to cancer so he won't be back for a few days yet I can send it to the other Toxicology expert but it will take a bit longer but if I ask for it to be classified as an emergency it should take 6-9 days at the most I think" I say as I remove a sample of the liver using a knife before placing it into a little metal bag and then it happens, the phone in the autopsy suite goes off, "hello" I say picking it up expecting it to be luke telling me of the arrival of another body or asking me if I need something, "you're welcome, cyanide always is effective" the voice says and as per usual it's robotic monotone voice highlighted throughout the call and detective griffin looks at me and then back at the phone having heard the voice declare its sentence. I feel sweat coming down from my hand as I try to take a deep breath but struggle, and i start hyperventilating, taking short breathes as I start panicking and I feel a few tears fall from my eyes as I try not to let it out as I bite into the top of my lip in order not to cry. But detective griffin looks up at me and I look into her eye too and I can't help it. I freak out. I start crying, crying and crying excessively, the contest fear that has pilled up inside of me has now come crashing down. "You're having a panic attack, hey, hey, hey sit down, sit down" detective griffin says as she takes me out of the room and pass the buzzing refrigerator and into an empty office where detective griffin switches on the light and pulls up 2 chairs of which she tells me to sit on and I do as I wipe away the tears that stain my face, "just take a long deep breath, okay, just breathe slowly." She says and I do, I take a long deep breathe placing my hands under my eyes to wipe away the tears and I try to settle myself down. "Now tell me what's up" she says as she sits down on the chair that she placed next to me, and she puts her hand on my leg in a reassuring way. "I'm.... I'm... well I'm really... scared .... I'm really really scared" I say barely able to mutter it out not wanting to admit the simple truth that no matter how hard I try to push down wants to be known and rises Up inside of me and now I'm struggling to keep it down. "This killer keeps calling me, taunting me, me, I don't know why, he left a body outside of my house, I don't even feel safe there anymore, I don't feel safe in my own house because this killer knows where I live and they know how to scare me as they know these things about me but I don't knew how or why but they know these things and I can't help thinking that what if he comes for me? What then? Or what if he comes for you? I don't know what I'd do if I lost you..." I say before realising what I'm saying and suddenly stopping, looking at detective griffin who looks at me with a level of sincerity in her eyes along with a almost small glimpse of hope, "what do you mean you don't know what you'd do if you lost me?" She says as she looks me, her deep green eyes shining once again against her black hair that is still slicked back into a bun and her hand is still on my leg and she squeezes it reassuringly again, as if to say you can tell me anything. "It's just, you're the first person I've ever met who has listened to me, who I've trusted with stuff I wouldn't normally say and I know what's it's like to suffer, to be told that you couldn't do things or achieve things because of your gender and for me as well because of my sexuality because I'm openly Bi and I'm proud of that and I try hard to not let that completely define me because I know that if I did do that I wouldn't be anywhere close to where I am now, because of the way society views people like me and because you're a woman I know that you just feel the same or at least that's what I hope and I know you won't understand the whole sexuality thing but it really is a struggle trying to prove to people that you are just as equal as everyone else in the world" I say spilling my guts a little more to detective griffin who sits nodding her head in agreement with me and what I've said. "I get it, in more ways you believe, i know what it's like to struggle and not just because I am a woman but because I'm gay" she says as I drop my mouth open in shock, I had no idea that she was gay, I had no clue whatsoever and I mean that's maybe because I've only known her for like 4 weeks but like she's one of the few good people in the world who is actually willing to put everything on the line for her job and yes I feel the same way about mine but I felt as if it were to be a little more obvious and I did not see her as gay hence why it was a massive shock.  "I didn't know" I say still in shock over what was recently declared and I look at her, her green eyes still sparkling and a strange thing occurs as we lean in and kiss, her lips warm against mine before we quickly pul away and sit in silence looking at each other. "I'm sorry" I say biting my lip again as she looks away before looking back at me, I know ive messed up I'm engaged and I just go and do this, but it makes me question, maybe I'm not as in love with hope as I thought I was, "no it's okay, I'm sorry to, let's Just not talk about it." She says and I nod my head blinking a few times to get The tears fully out of my eyes before I wipe my face once more to remove the tears. I stand up and hold detective griffins hand and I look at her and smile, "yeah let's forget it ever happened, and now let's go and finish with what we were doing and please, don't tell anyone about that panic attack moment, I don't need anyone to really find out, actually can we just keep the whole last conversation we had a secret?" I ask and she nods her head symbolising that this little secret will be kept between the two of us, we then walk back into the autopsy suite and continue to analyse the murdered commander.