Rain Rain Go Away 01

Westland in late October still was often entangled in rain, which wasn't heavy but continuous and incessant, making people fed up with it. The bad weather caused a lot of pressure on the traffic department, as well as completely destroying evidence for murder cases.

Bart Hardy stepped off the shoulder of the road with uneven steps, the sludge below his feet loose and slippery. The police line was drawn along the side of a highway in the countryside, where there was not even a house in sight as far as the eye could see; what a good place to dispose of a body.

A passing traveler reported to the police of finding a body in the wilderness: a common case of disposing corpses, which, in Westland, would mostly prove to be a result of conflict between gangs most of the time. A simple case like this didn't need a criminal profiler, so Olga was probably teaching at the university, and Bates also wasn't in the CSI present today either.

But for some reason, Albarino Bacchus was standing outside the police line, beaming.

If Hardy remembered correctly, the Forensic Bureau had given Albarino paid leave until November 1st, as one of the compensations for being wrongfully imprisoned. There was also still the compensation fee under negotiation.

Hardy looked at Albarino, who stood overcome with boredom, and then switched his gaze to the investigators who were preoccupied with the crime scene. He felt mentally confused.

"I'm extremely bored." Albarino told Hardy with a lazy smile, "Asked the Bureau which crime scene you were at, then I came over."

"How about your little girlfriends?" Hardy glanced at him exasperatedly, indeed envious that someone was on paid leave while others were at work.

"Didn't you accuse me of having a messy private life or something last time? I haven't had that kind of nightlife since I got out of prison." Albarino's eyes widened, his expression appearing damnedly innocent. "I've been watching Shark Week documentary replays at home recently."

... Then his days were pretty boring. Hardy, while silently complaining, pulled up the police line, signaling Albarino to duck under and throwing him a pair of latex gloves in passing. "This is a pretty boring case. A corpse was dumped in the middle of nowhere, outside the city – you know, it's usually a gang dispute under these circumstances."

What he did not say was that fifty percent of such cases wouldn't wield any results. The two men walked to the body; the forensic field investigator crouching next to the corpse was a young man who hadn't been in the profession for long, looking up nervously in Albarino's direction, calling him "Dr. Bacchus".

In front of them was an unusually sinister body: it was a tall blond man with his throat slit, blood smeared everywhere on the front of the man's shirt. The killer must have slashed the victim many times in the process of killing, white bones vaguely showing through his torn skin and flesh.

Albarino smiled at the other widely like it didn't cost money, asking in passing, "What have you found?"

"The body has been dead for more than twelve hours, killed approximately last night after the rain stopped," said the forensic field investigator, nodding at the dead man's finger covered in livor mortis. "After he was killed, there is a probability that he was stuffed into a cramped space like the trunk of a car, before the body was left there. The killer must have made him stay in that cramped space, so that when he was dumped, rigor mortis had already formed: perhaps the killer tried to destroy rigor mortis, but you can still see his posture before rigor mortis was destroyed from the posture of his arms."

Indeed, although the body was lying face up on the ground, the hands were not flat on the surface but in an odd position slightly reaching upward to the sky in a stance similar to an embrace. This was likely because the killer had to put the dead person into a position with his hands hugging his knees when he stuffed him into a small space.

"That's a bit strange." Albarino muttered to himself.

Hardy gave him a sharp look, obviously realizing something.

The forensic scene investigator was still obviously confused, Albarino explained very patiently to him, "You see, this is the current situation: it's very likely for the murderer to kill the victim then stuff the victim into a box or the car trunk. His whole body's rigor mortis should have been formed once again after it was destroyed, so the killer may have packed the body into a small space for three or four hours before he disposed of the body. When he disposed of it, the rigor mortis of the corpse, even if it did not spread to the whole body, had very likely spread to the waist and back. The victim kept his arms crossed in the small space, his arms, shoulders and back were rigid. Then, what did the killer do?"

The field investigator blinked and said, in the same tone like how primary school students answer questions, "Uh, the killer destroyed the vast majority of the rigor mortis in order to place the victim flat on–"

"Right!" Albarino snapped his fingers, sounding very delighted. "Why would he put the dead like that? If it was a gangster disposing of the body, like Bart's first guess, then why go to the trouble of breaking the rigid joints just so he could get the body to lie flat on the ground?"

"You mean..." Hardy thought for a moment; this wasn't a scenario uncommon for police officers. "This killer had affection for the dead?"

Albarino nodded, "Most likely. Although the killer disposed of the dead body in such a desolate countryside area like this, he still took great pains to make the corpse into a position where it could lie down with dignity. Not to mention ..."

He reached out his hand and gestured at the deceased's ghastly white face.

"The killer slit the throat of the dead, and you all know what the face of a victim should look like after the blood from the artery spurts out like this," Albarino said. "The face of the body is very clean without any blood at all. Given that the body should have been disposed of after the rain stopped, I think we can suspect that the killer had wiped the blood off the face of the deceased."

Such a conclusion is undoubtedly invigorating: if you can determine the identity of the deceased, and then run through people who were close with him but had conflict with them with a target in mind, the scope could naturally be narrowed down a lot.

Hardy went along with this line of thought, a new idea suddenly appearing in his mind.

His brow furrowed, "... But perhaps there is another possibility."

Albarino looked towards him, perplexed.

"Al, listen to these factors; don't they sound familiar?" Hardy said, staring intently at the body's face. The more he thought about it, the more he thought something was wrong. "Male, handsome and blond, between thirty-five to forty-five years old, died due to having his throat slit. The body was abandoned in the middle of nowhere on a rainy night –?"

"Ah." Albarino gasped lowly.

By then, even the young forensic field investigator realized and said lowly, "Officer Hardy, you suspect that this is a victim of 'Johnny the Killer'?"

"Johnny the Killer", a serial killer who had been roaming around the Great Lakes in recent years, whose victims were all handsome, middle-aged blond men. Johnny the Killer would kidnap his victims and hold them captive for a period of time; some investigations had shown that the killer would provide good care to his victims while they were in captivity – but would also sexually assault them – and then discard the victim's body in a desolate countryside on a morning just after it rained.

The name "Johnny the Killer" was chosen by the news media at St. Lawrence City, evidently because of the nursery rhyme "Rain rain go away, come again another day, little Johnny wants to play". The media might have felt that linking a serial killer with a nursery rhyme was witty and eye-catching, resembling the style of Agatha Christie.

Clearly, if Officer Hardy's deduction was correct, little Johnny had come running to Westland to play after the rain. Albarino looked sympathetically at Hardy, seeing his face turn gloomy visibly.

After all, Westland already had two serial killers who hadn't been brought to justice yet; they really didn't need any more serial killers.

"Okay." That was why Hardy nodded dryly to the forensic field investigator, "Take this body back to the Forensic Bureau. I want the scene investigation report completed as soon as possible, and try to get the forensic pathologist to dissect the body as quickly as they can. If any restraint marks due to unlawful imprisonment and signs of sexual assault are found on the body... I'm afraid we'll have to contact the FBI."

Albarino stood up by the side of the body, legs slightly numb from crouching for too long. He suddenly had the urge to smile.

The sky was a clear blue, but it was clear that the next fall rain would be coming soon.

Herstal had gone to visit a client in the afternoon. When he returned to the firm and parked in the nearby parking lot, it was already nightfall. Under the dim light of the street lamps, he felt like there was always a faintly discernible gaze piercing at his spine.

He was familiar with such gazes, which, more often than not, was from a stalker: a gangster who wasn't sure if he was on the right side, a journalist who wanted to dig up breaking news, a WLPD cop who was investigating some kind of case, a law firm intern who had a secret crush on him. He didn't care much, he had too many things to deal with everyday to be distracted by a single, distanced gaze.

The real distraction was in his office – Albarino Bacchus appeared with his glass tupperware, coming in holding his head high[1], as if someone had invited him in.

[1] 趾高气扬, idiom, meaning high and mighty, swagger.

Albarino smiled at Herstal: "Dinner."

There was a possibility that Herstal's barren refrigerator had deeply wounded some part of Albarino's ego. Since it was Albarino's vacation at the moment, there were times when he even had the leisurely mood to show up in Herstal's office with dinner during his overtime.

An "actual" dinner, without any cold convenience foods, vending machine sandwiches or wilted vegetable salads. A somewhat exaggerated number of glass tupperware lined up next to Albarino's hands, and Herstal even suspected a soup was among them.

"Sometimes, I will wonder if you know what you are doing yourself." Herstal pointed out in a calm tone.

"I think I do: I'm creating opportunities to see each other." Albarino replied, undisturbed. The mint green of his irises looked unusually pale under the direct light, his pupils surrounded by this color were like a deep pool of water. The forensic pathologist, also a serial killer, took a step forward before continuing, "As you know, when raising animals, it is usually necessary to ensure that they are fed a diet that will keep their flesh..."

He paused for a moment, lightly spitting out the words.

"Fresh and delicious."

"Some people also believe in making sure their deaths are painless; it is said that fear will make the taste of the prey sour." Herstal said coldly.

"Indeed. I don't think there's anything wrong with giving prey a painless death, though I suspect you may not think that way." Albarino let out a laugh. "Also, I actually did come on some work-related business too: the compensation for my imprisonment apparently still needs to be negotiated. By the time the negotiations begin, my lawyer should be there."

Albarino had an odd ability to subtly express the words "my lawyer" like it was something which belonged exclusively to him. Herstal let out a sneer, "If you still want to talk about work, I must point out that I charge hourly for my consultations."

"Lawyers also need to pay a fee charged hourly for consulting with forensic psychologists. Perhaps we can cancel out both of these fees." Albarino made this unbelievable statement with a gentle smile as he, without any courtesy at all, settled down in the sofa chair right next to the French windows. "Do you want to come and sit down too? The food is getting cold, and I think you have a little time before you have to continue to work overtime?"

Herstal examined him slowly and went to sit down next to Albarino, keeping a permanent, suitable distance between them, their knees not touching even after sitting down. Albarino pushed the dinner inside the containers at him and spoke, "I know that look on your face; it's always the same expression before you want to express your annoyance[2] on my grasp on social distance."

[2]吐槽, slang, meaning to complain, to ridicule

"Ordinary people would call your behavior into question; it's only human nature to do so." Herstal said as he opened the container, not to mention the fact that he had to give some attention to think about which part of Albarino's body did he carry weapons on, which complicated things even more.

"You no longer belong to the 'ordinary' category," Albarino stared at him. "For the same reason, neither am I, Herstal."

"If you want to find people similar to you, there's a lot of them, I'm afraid. Why did you choose me?" Herstal asked, the food container in his hand was full of sliced fruit, oranges and grapes.

"I didn't want to choose you; it was unfathomable fate –" Albarino said, the numerous teeth he revealed when he smiled no longer made the expression innocent. But he didn't continue speaking, as Herstal threw a grape at him.

"Put away your cliches. I'm not interested in your muse goddess." Herstal replied arrogantly.

The grape hit Albarino's shoulder; he caught the tiny piece of fruit so as to avoid rolling it onto the ground. Albarino looked down at the grape as if he could see the answer to everything on it.

Then he said, "Indeed, you're also not wrong: there's a killer in Salt Lake City who beheads his victims with an axe; there's also a serial killer in Chicago who only kills underage girls with red hair. There are many of them everywhere; these cities are hunting grounds completely lacking in new ideas, flooded with innocent suffering lambs."

"But even though there are many choices available to you, you're still not interested in them." Herstal stated slowly.

"Indeed, because it is beyond my control – despite whatever views Olga had expressed to you – I swear, this is indeed beyond my control; sometimes, I don't think I even have the power to make a choice." Albarino deliberately lowered the end of his words like he was muttering in his sleep. He looked at him through his slightly lowered eyelids, between his pale, light brown eyelashes glowing under the light; this madman who excelled at manipulating others was using this expression in his eyes to gain other people's favorable impressions. "Because when irrational desire, pursuing the enjoyment of beauty, has gained the mastery over judgment that prompts to right conduct, and has acquired from other desires, akin to it, fresh strength to strain towards bodily beauty, that very strength provides it with its name – it is the strong passion called love."

Olga said, as long as he wanted to, he could stop.

"I sense a very dangerous tendency in your words." Herstal said lowly.

"Is that so?" Albarino looked straight at him, revealing a smile. "That's human nature; you'll witness it soon."

"Now a man who is dominated by desire and enslaved to pleasure is of course bound to aim at getting the greatest possible pleasure out of his beloved, and what pleases a sick man is anything that does not thwart him, whereas anything that is as strong as, or stronger than, himself gives him offense.

"Hence he will not, if he can avoid it, put up with a favorite that matches or outdoes him in strength, but will always seek to make him weaker and feebler, and weakness is found in the ignorant, the cowardly, the poor speaker, the slow thinker, as against the wise, the brave, the eloquent, the quick-minded.

"All these defects of mind and more in the beloved are bound to be a source of pleasure to the lover; if they do not exist already as innate qualities, he will cultivate them, for not to do so means depriving himself of immediate pleasure."

When Olga heard the knocking sound on the door, she had been planning to go to sleep.

She felt very exhausted: clearly, driving home from the university after she was assigned the latest session for class was not a good idea. Perhaps Bart and the others had been right in advising her that she should have rented an apartment near Westland State University.

She hadn't thought at all about who would be standing at the door before she opened it. If she had been a Cassandra-like character who had foresight, she probably wouldn't have opened it at all.

But in short, Olga Molozer had no prophetic powers; the door, indeed, was opened. There, in the doorway, stood a tall, dark-haired man with healthy-looking tan skin. He looked both strong and sexy, but he unfortunately was not Olga's cup of tea at all.

"Long time no see, Molozer," said Lavazza Mercader, the head of the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Division who was supposed to be at Quantico.

Author's Notes:

1. The quote from this chapter is a well-known English nursery rhyme:

Rain rain go away

Come again another day

Little Johnny wants to play

2. "When irrational desire, pursuing the enjoyment of beauty, has gained the mastery over judgment that prompts to right conduct, and has acquired from other desires, akin to it, fresh strength to strain towards bodily beauty, that very strength provides it with its name – it is the strong passion called love."

This quote and the bolded words in the next section are from Plato's Phaedrus.

The "love" (T/N: "beloved" in the english translated version) discussed in these paragraphs are discussing the "love" between elders and youths. The second paragraph's quote is mainly expressing that "the person who is loving others would like people weaker than them. Because the love between an elder and a youth is not equal, and clearly isn't a normal romantic relationship in modern society, so that's why Herstal said "I sense a very dangerous tendency in your words".

But actually, these conversations are foreshadowing, not about Albarino's view of love (