“Hey Erika. What have you got for me?” Caroline went straight into the slightly chilly forensics lab in the SFPD precinct she and Jason visited last time and asked, but then she found that she was in the lab with the other lab technician, Jeremy, “And hello to you as well, Jeremy.”

 

“Hi, thanks for coming, where’s your friend? Jason?” Erika asked.

 

“He had some family stuff - so I’ll be taking notes for both of us for now.” Caroline took out her phone and opened a note taking app: “What do you want to show me?”

 

“Jeremy, show her what we found.” Erika turned to Jeremy and said: “I think it’s best you explain it.”

 

“Okay. So from what I heard, Erika already told you that this corpse is actually two different partial corpses stitched together?” Jeremy opened up his laptop and projected his screen on the big TV on the wall, showing a 3-D model of the corpse: “So that is the result of our ultrasound scan, we can’t really use x-ray because that is too expensive and we need to bring it to a dedicated lab for it, and wait at least two weeks. Can you imagine? Only two x-ray scanners for the entire SFPD...”

 

“Jeremy?! Focus. ” Erika had to cut Jeremy off.

 

“Oh yeah. Sorry.” Jeremy operated on his laptop and zoomed in on the crack running through the middle of the corpse: “So, you can see, this crack here is where the two partial corpses were stitched together, it is a very smooth and straight line, and the bodies’ positions were quite symmetric, meaning whoever did this was quite precise.

 

“And one interesting thing we found only through ultrasound imaging is this. Here are the two hands that are still under the chains - take a look at the fingers, it looks like a...”

 

“... pinky swear?” Caroline looked at the screen with a frown: “Is this some kind of sick joke?”

 

“Not sure. But it is kinda awesome… I mean creepy.” Jeremy corrected himself and then zoomed in to the torso of the corpse: “You see these two round shapes? We think it might be the same coin that was taken by Dr. Nguyen from these corpses’ mouths.”

 

“We tried to run some dating tests on the two different corpses. One was older than the other, but they were both at least from three to four decades ago.” Erika explained: “Since we all saw what happened to Dr. Nguyen, we think it might be safe if we don’t touch the coins, and we want you to come help us understand this - before Captain ships the whole thing to some other precincts.”

 

“What? Can he do that?”

 

“He can, and he is already contacting other precincts.” Erika shrugged: “We don’t have a forensic scientist, we as technicians can’t even do an in-depth check on this corpse. We had to borrow forensic scientists from other precincts for a couple of weeks now. Which reminds the - people from the hotel seemed to have stopped pushing so hard to get it back now for some reason. I think the city may have leaned in on them.”

 

“Okay, let me know what else you find. I’m afraid that the longer the corpse stays in your precinct the more danger you will be in.” Caroline sighed and said: “Please share as much with me as possible. I’ll try my best to help. But before that, how are you feeling? Are you guys doing good? Lost any sleep recently?”

 

“Huh, how’d you know?” Jeremy asked, “I just switched the brand of my coffee at home - that stuff is crazy strong, I took a sip two nights before and I couldn’t fall asleep the whole night...”

 

“Not that kind.” Caroline cut Jeremy off: “Like you are tired but something grim and dark is keeping you awake?”

 

“Grim and dark… ” Erika scratched her jaw and said: “Well, when we first found that the body was actually two halves stitched together, I did have some uncomfortable dreams, but now I’m fine.”

 

“And where is that body now?”

 

“It’s in the morgue, one of the frozen chambers.”

 

“Okay, and who has access to it? Other than you two, who will be examining it?”

 

“Yeah, technically whoever has access to the morgue has access to it. But we can ask the Captain to lock it down if you’re so worried.” Erika said.

 

“Wait, do you really think there’s something supernatural about the corpse?” Jeremy asked, “I know the thing with Dr. Nguyen is super weird… but Erika you know her, she’s really into ancient artifacts and antiques, maybe she just had an outburst of nerdom.”

 

“No… that look in her eyes, she looked a bit... deranged.” Erika shook her head and turned to Caroline: “I’ll try to convince Captain to lock it up for a bit longer. But do you have any idea how to deal with it?”

 

“I will need to take a look at it first. Last time we did not get to look at it too thoroughly.” Caroline paced in the lab for a few moments and then raised her phone: “Let me give my friend and teacher a call and see if they can come and help.”

 

“Hmm, you have a teacher?” Erika asked curiously.

 

“Yeah, and he’s also my boss.” Caroline first dialed Jason’s number.

 

“Hey Caroline, I was just about to call you.” Jason seemed to be on some kind of vehicle as there were traffic sounds in the background: “Things are pretty bad - I just killed a fucking ghost that latched on my mother’s traditional dress. I told them to go to the inn and wait for me there. I am on my way to San Francisco, are you still there?”

 

“Yes I am still here in the forensics lab. How soon will you be here?”

 

“I just hopped on a slow train. So it’ll be 45 minutes until I get to the station. So I’d say at least one hour.”

 

“Geez, just try to be here. I’ll wait here, I’ll call Boss as well.” Caroline sighed.

 

“What’s the update? Have they found anything?”

 

“I’ll text you my notes. It’s quite a lot of information.”

 

“Okay, stay safe. I’ve got a bad feeling.”

 

“Yeah, me too. See you at the precinct.”