The art gallery, city M

There were very few people in the art gallery, today. Giving the trio enough space to talk normally. Even though the three of them had worked in the same department but now there were in completely different stages of their life. This made it hard for them to communicate, but they seemed to have an unspoken agreement not to address it.

"So according to your description Mr Charles, Z most likely is male. But in a previous case that happened three years ago, Z was said to have a high pitched voice, he can be a woman posing as a guy, too." Grekov wasn't sure if he should trust Charles' profiling blindly. He felt too many flaws in Charles' theories.

But Charles seemed calm despite Grekov's doubt in him. As a psychologist, he kind of understood from where the young officer's suspicion was coming from.

"Puberty, he wasn't an adult back then," Charles explained in a calm voice but he kind of got bored of explaining things all these years. It would have been more fun for him if people could just catch up to him.

"He was a teenager when he hacked in a world-class network." Kira looked at both the men. A professional hacker would have taken weeks before cracking the network. For a teen to show dedication felt surreal.

"A tern with high intelligence quotient, probably higher than 155 and all the boredom in the world." Charles' brown eyes brightened at the sight of the painting in front of him. But Kira and Grekov didn't notice the change in the air around him. 

Kira crossed her arms while following behind, her brows were tense. The only person she knew with that much high IQ was Charles himself who had an IQ of 155. But according to him, Z had a higher IQ than himself. 

She worked in the same field as Z but at the age of 15 to 18, all had on mind was anime and her favourite ships. 'How did a teen became a vicious hacker?'

Charles continued to talk while standing in front of the same painting for a normal amount of time, while Kira was drifting in her little world.

"There is a possibility of Z being a victim or witness of domestic or sexual abuse resulting in trauma."

Grekov note down the points Charles was making in a small notepad. Despite showing doubt in Charles Grekov had respect for the other guy. Why would he? The other person was the current head of the prominent company in their country. George didn't have a business career but his parents were in it all their life.

"But you made a point Z is from a well off family. Isn't contradictory to what you are saying now? Moreover, three years ago, Z was rumoured to have worked in a nearly shutting cafe that won't make sense." Grekov put his questions in front of the psychologist once again. He was genuinely trying to understand the case.

Charles' jaw tensed a little bit, but he kept a straight face.

"The cafe was right across the place he was targeting. If you remember Z was under 3 km the mayor's residence during the previous attack." Charles finally moved away from the painting. 

Confusion was written all over, she bit her nails scratching her head. 'Charles just ignored the point of domestic abuse.' She opened her mouth to say it, but both George and Charles had moved on to another painting. 

The realisation hit her soon and she swiftly decided to go behind them. Her eyes lingered on the painting she was mindlessly standing in front.

A woman with silver hair sitting on a swing with an innocent subtle smile on her face. Kira felt herself getting absorbed in her partial red eyes that felt angelic despite the prejudice against the red colour. She was starting to feel uncomfortable after staring at them for too long. The smile and the eyes showed completely different emotions but were part of the same frame.

The ropes of the swing were decorated with flower wines, each flower was painted separately. Her eyes followed the wines and stopped abruptly after seeing the cuts in the woman's hand from touching the thorns from the wines. Kira was surprised to see such small detailing in a hand-drawn painting without any help from technology.

"Are you not coming?" George touched her shoulder to burst the bubble she was trapping herself into. "Well, that's a beautiful painting but we don't have time for that." 

Did he encourage her to leave the painting to focus on more important topics like, how to save the mayor from Z?

_________

Apartment,

*Alarm* 

Chase opened his eyes only to feel pain in his neck. He sighs after seeing the novel on his side on the bed. He once again slept while reading in an awkward position.

It wasn't that Chase wasn't understanding enough about his sleep schedule. Yet whenever he decided he was going to follow a sleep schedule from the next day, he always failed miserably. 

Chase washed up to find Obi. He needed a break during the afternoon.

"Wh-at?" Obi opened his mouth wide open, he couldn't believe the unfazed guy in front of him. "You are telling me this in the morning." 

Obi put his spoon down, he didn't care if the complex 

was getting soggy anymore.

"Yeah, something came up." Chase smiled mysteriously, Obi put his hand on his forehead. 'His suffering wasn't ending.'