Soldiers Field: Prequel to the Octagon Series

by JK Ellem

  3

  Central City – New Los Angeles

  Towers of slanted glass and steel pierced skies of cerulean blue. The morning sun glinted off the crisscross patterns of isometric glass so that the sky was awash with shards of spectrum color. Above the vaulted skyscrapers, sky-gardens and cubic towering structures of Central City, corporate satellites in low orbit hung like huge inverted pyramids with their navigation lights blinking in the clear bright sky.

  Central City was a sprawl of geometric shapes, order and symmetry. Amongst the clean lines of modern buildings sat tranquility pools, expansive panes of glass-flat water reflecting in the bright sunshine, hedged by parks of manicured lawns, fir trees, pines and blossoms. Open public spaces of green, curved pathways and shaded enclaves blended modern architecture, forming a natural veneer. Clean, tranquil, peaceful and safe.

  Huge vision screens on buildings displayed the Octagon logo, its mission statement and a constant ticker-tape of corporate messages delivered by a soothing female voice that ran in a never-ending loop.

  “At Octagon your wellbeing is our priority!”

  “The contentment of all outweighs the greed of the few.”

  “Capitalism for the good of all!”

  On this clear and bright day, Kobe and De Soto made their way to Central Plaza One, a cluster of buildings that housed all the law enforcement agencies of Central City and all of its precincts.

  Kobe followed an impatient De Soto as she cut in and out of the stream of people, most of whom were city workers, rushing to their concrete and steel towers for their next shift, hurriedly downing breakfast as they went. Nowadays, an employed and well-fed society was a content and happy society. Or so said the vision screen that Kobe and De Soto passed under as they cut through a courtyard of manicured grass and topiary spiral hedges.

  Mounting the granite steps, Kobe and De Soto entered the security checkpoint entrance of the law enforcement labs, checked their weapons and travelled down to the basement. The elevator opened onto a stark white corridor of bleached linoleum that they followed through to a set of stainless steel doors. Through the doors was a cavernous room that was completely empty except for a single computer terminal that was mounted on an umbilical arm connected to the ceiling. Busily typing away at the terminal, with their back to them, was a technician dressed in the obligatory white lab coat.

  Kobe and De Soto found themselves standing in one of the eight medical holographic chambers that were housed in the law enforcement labs where the postmortem of the victim, Grace Maleny, was about to commence. All the crime scene data captured by the autopsy drone had already been processed in real-time at the crime scene whilst all evidence was intact and uncontaminated. Gone were the days where crimes scenes were cordoned off whilst an army of law enforcement personnel and first responders trampled all over the place, destroying vital evidence and contaminating the scene with their own residual traces. It was now left to the drones to come in and undertake all the processing in the field and upload the data for later.

  There was also no need for morgues to house thousands of bodies either. Once the drone had processed the body and gather all the data, it would then decontaminate the body and prep it for onsite disposal. No more morgues or holding facilities. It was another sign of efficiency gains and a better use of public resources that Octagon implemented. All body processing and clean up was done at once, saving billions of dollars in staff, resources, valuable space and time. Once you died, all traces were quickly erased.

  Medical Technician Kyle looked up from his computer and smiled. “Officer De Soto, so nice to see you again.” The welcome was genuine, but he regarded Kobe with skeptical eyes. Kyle was lean, mid-thirties, with spikey, short, sandy-colored hair and a boyish grin.

  Kobe held back slightly, unsure why the room was completely empty except for a single computer terminal. Kobe had never been to these labs before. He never had any need to. Grace Maleny was his first actual homicide.

  Sensing his confusion, Kyle came forward. “Ah, I see your apprentice has never been to an actual virtual autopsy before,” Kyle said. “Well, instead of explaining what we do here, why don’t we get started and you can see for yourself?” Kyle smiled like some magician ready to reveal his latest trick. “Bring up Case 263,” he said into a small microphone earpiece that Kobe noticed was inserted into his left ear.

  The room dimmed as four tiny projectors, mounted high in the corners of the vaulted ceiling, came on, each beaming a light stream into the center of the room. The beams converged and formed a shape, lumpy at first, but as the seconds ticked by, they coalesced into something recognizable, and Kobe could not believe what he saw. Noticing his surprise, De Soto just smiled. She had attended numerous virtual autopsies, and it never seemed to amaze her how real the body looked when it was reanimated from the data collected by the drone.

  Sitting, or rather floating three feet off the ground in the center of the chamber, was the naked battered body of Grace Maleny. It was real, or looked real to Kobe. But it wasn’t. They were looking at a total and complete facsimile of her body. An anatomically perfect reproduction of the corpse. Every skin cell, every hair follicle, every feature, bruise and blemish was rendered in full, layer upon layer of flesh, muscle, bone and sinew. The data had been uploaded by the autopsy drone the night before, then reproduced as a holographic, almost physical object. Even environmental smells were collected by the drone from the crime scene, digitized then reproduced. This added another dimension to the analysis because body odors and traces of substances present on the skin could emit clues as to the path to death of the victim.

  Both De Soto and Kobe stepped closer so the body was within inches of their reach. Kyle positioned himself on the other side of the corpse, across from De Soto and Kobe, and brought up a virtual keyboard and floating screen pane to his left. With one hand, he began to scroll through the data captured by the drone. Streams of pixelated data, numbers and text poured down the screen pane.

  Up until now, De Soto had been reserved and disconnected from the victim. But with the full intricate detail of the life-like holograph directly in front of her, she could not avoid the morbid fascination of something so shocking yet captivating. She leaned closer, scrutinizing the myriad of bruises, cuts and trauma damage that had been inflicted on every square inch of the small body. She looked down at the girl’s face, or what was left of it, and something stirred deep within De Soto. She felt a sudden sadness pierce her stomach. What this girl, a child, had gone through must have been horrific.

  Kyle then moved to the feet and, grabbing them with one hand, he twisted his wrist so that the body rotated along its horizontal axis, flipping the body onto its side, revealing the back and buttocks.

  Kobe’s eyes widened in shock and he felt his throat suddenly constrict.

  De Soto could feel her anger swell, and she raised one hand to her mouth, tears clouding her eyes. She had never seen anything like this before.

  At first, Kobe didn’t know what he was looking at. There was a stunned silence, a vacuum, like all the air had been sucked from the chamber.

  Long angry welts of crimson ran the full length of the back, crisscrossing from the shoulder blades all the way down to her tiny buttocks. There was also extensive bruising along the backs of the legs, and what looked like large circular marks on the buttocks and on the back of the upper thighs.

  Kobe uttered a single word that echoed through the chamber, “Christ…” He felt like his stomach was being pulled up his throat and out over his tongue. Blood and gore he could cope with. But this was something else.

  Moving to his left, dragging the display screen with him, Kyle rotated the body again onto its back then lifted both ankles and pushed the knees up and back, parting the legs. He frowned at what he saw then motioned Kobe and De Soto towards where he stood.

  The girl’s inner thighs were covered with the same circular marks that had scorched the soft skin of her back.

  “What the hell ar
e those marks?” De Soto breathed. Her face had turned to stone, a cold stare in her eyes. She felt her stomach bunch in disgust.

  Kyle bent closer to examine the marks. The pigmentation was a violent red where the ringed marks had fused the surface of the skin, and there was a slight blackening just visible along the outer edges of the shape where the body hair was singed. There was a distinct odor here, like burnt fat, that the drone had captured and had now reproduced.

  Looking back at his screen, Kyle confirmed his diagnosis with the data from the autopsy drone.

  Turning to them, he said, “Those are residual burn marks. Left by something that burnt her skin on contact.”

  “What could leave marks like that?” De Soto asked in a flat tone.

  With his finger, Kyle drew a green digital square around one of the marks and said into his microphone, “Weapons matching.”

  Instantly, a larger screen pane expanded above them, and images of various tools, implements and weapons began to rapidly cascade across the screen as the autopsy database began to search through the millions of objects it had catalogued, looking for a match to the injury mark. While they waited, Kyle continued to scroll through the drone autopsy report, finally getting to the cause of death. There was internal hemorrhaging, contusions, various fractures and broken bones. The ligature marks around her wrists, ankles and neck confirmed that she was tied using some form of rough binding, possibly coarse rope, that had cut into her skin. There was evidence of torture, possibly administered over a long period of time, judging from the age of older wounds that had healed, leaving layers of scar tissue.

  Time stretched on as Kyle rattled off the autopsy findings, all in excruciating detail that seemed to slowly grind on De Soto’s mind. She mentally catalogued each and every vile detail, wrapped them in a growing hatred that she felt for the person who did this to this girl, and stored them away in her mind for future reference.

  “Eventual cardiac arrest,” Kyle concluded. “Her body eventually gave up and succumbed to the trauma and her heart stopped beating.”

  The screen pane above them continued to rapidly carousel through images of possible objects, but so far, no match.

  “Can we see what she looked like before?” De Soto’s voice was distant, almost a whisper. She wanted to see the girl before she suffered, how she looked before this hellish nightmare of cruelty was inflicted upon her small, defenseless body. She needed the grounded memory of a happy face, a normal person from a time less traumatic.

  “Sure,” Kyle replied. Touching his earpiece, he spoke again into his microphone. “Reverse render to original state.”

  The holographic projection changed color and intensity, and almost immediately, the body began to warp and alter before their eyes. Like time-lapsed photography, but in reverse, the pigmentations were stripped back like layers of paint. Each bruise, scar and contusion was peeled away from the surface of the corpse, revealing pale, unblemished skin underneath. It was like all the suffering was gradually washed away, scrubbed like dirt from her skin. Bones that were broken became straight again. Deep indentations in the skull began to fill out as the face took its normal shape again.

  It was done.

  De Soto felt her breath ghost over the roof of her mouth. Her shock gave way to silent anguish and then palpable anger.

  To Kobe it was like they were looking at a completely different person, like another unrelated body had appeared.

  Floating before them was a young, beautiful girl. Her skin was smooth, unblemished and glowing with youthfulness. Gone was the blood-clotted hair, replaced with soft golden strands like winter wheat. Her face radiated innocent like a dolls. Her limbs were small but strong and still developing as she grew.

  De Soto stepped up to the virtual body and reached out her hand, touching the emptiness of the girl’s hair, stroking it, calming her, reassuring her that she was now safe and that no one could hurt her anymore. This was the girl De Soto could not save from such a hideous act. Why? What have we become? De Soto felt guilt eat at her. I’m supposed to protect people. To prevent things like this from happening. I have failed. I have failed her.

  De Soto suddenly stopped, crouched closer to the girl’s forearm and lifted it. “What the hell is this?” she asked as she turned to Kyle.

  Both Kyle and Kobe bent closer to look. On the inside of the girl’s forearm, about an inch below the elbow crease, was a faint mark, an image, etched in the skin. Under the bruising and contusions, the image had been hidden from view. The reverse rendering process had now revealed the image that lay beneath the surface of the damage.

  “I don’t know,” Kyle whispered, as though his voice could wake the corpse. “It looks like some sort of tattoo.” He squinted at the mark. Kyle reached over and again, with his finger, and drew an outline around the mark on the skin. “Enhance,” he said into his mouthpiece.

  On the smaller screen pane to his left, an image appeared. It was isolated from the skin as an outlined shape, magnified and under high resolution.

  “Looks like it’s a symbol, like a hand. It’s been partially removed by a laser. That’s why it’s so faint, but some of the image still remains,” said Kyle. He pulled his virtual keyboard towards him. “I’ll see if I can reconstruct the full image from the partial one.” As he began typing, the image on the screen began to fill in, forming lines and a background, fleshing out the rest of the mark.

  “It’s not a hand,” said Kobe slowly, watching the screen as the image took shape. “It’s a fork.”

  Three distinct prongs with sharp barbed points formed on the screen. As the computer continued to render the shape, letters began to materialize under the image. They formed one word, in neat italic script: Infernum.

  “It’s not a fork, it’s a trident,” Kyle said, correcting Kobe.

  The reconstruction of the image was complete.

  “Infernum?” De Soto echoed the word that was under the trident. “What does it mean?”

  As though the computer heard her question, it translated the ancient Greek word and printed another word underneath it.

  Hell.

  The chamber felt colder, and Kobe felt the shimmer of something along the back of his neck.

  The larger screen pane above them that had been scrolling through possible matches of an implement that had made the red burn rings on the body abruptly stopped and settled on an image. A smooth female computer-generated voice echoed through the chamber, “Ninety-nine percentage match.”

  They all looked up as one at the screen pane.

  De Soto’s jaw bunched and she clenched her fists as she stared at the image on the screen, at the implement that had been used, the weapon of torture.

  The female computer voice continued its analysis. “Multiple points of impact, medium charge setting. Non-lethal but used for maximum repetitive pain infliction without victim fatality.”

  In the middle of the large screen pane was an object that both Kobe and De Soto had seen, and recently too. There was no mistaking the distinctive length of hardened black plastic with its bulbous head.

  A shock baton.

  4

  The good citizens of Central City sat in outdoor eating areas among fountains that sprayed plumes of colored water into the warm scented air. Dressed in colorful but functional clothes, they milled around walkways and clustered at the foot of travelators, laughing and chatting to friends and work colleagues, oblivious to the raw carnage and death that Kobe had just witnessed as he emerged from the entrance of Central Plaza One.

  Pausing at the top of the stairs, Kobe took in the breeze, enjoying the fresh air and the warmth on his face for a moment as he tilted his face skywards, relieved to be outside again in the sunshine. The monolithic Octagon satellites followed lazy curves high above, watching him. A thousand eyes above recording a billion pixels below.

  His mind was overwhelmed and spinning. He felt confused and out of his depth. This was a case that needed to be escalated above him and De Soto. Things l
ike this didn’t happen and his training hadn’t prepared him enough for it. Sure, there was the odd stabbing in Precinct 13 or a peak-hour scuffle in the travelator line between co-workers, but not something as brutal as what he had just seen. Crime was supposed to be minimal.

  Kobe took a travelator to his next destination, guided only by the instructions De Soto had given him. It was lunchtime, and looking down from the moving gantry high above, he watched as people drank and ate in the many eateries and communal spaces below. They chewed processed meat, their mouths moving up and down like cattle grazing in a paddock, not a care in the world, laughing, touching and smiling.

  Shapes, long and lithe, clad in bright active wear with headphones on, moved along the glistening edge of the watercourse. Ponytails swishing with each stride.

  Everything on the surface was safe, serene and orderly, Kobe thought. No crime here as people went about their daily rituals.

  Kobe stood on one of the three parallel walkway belts that marked his destination in a digital display on the segmented floor panels. The lunchtime crowd was building and he shared his commute with officer workers who had poured out of their cubicles in the concrete silos to enjoy the sunshine and grab a quick meal box. It was one of the main travelators that looped through Central City, picking up and depositing thousands of citizens daily at various locations. Corporate types stared intently at their data slates whilst teenagers and manual workers were immersed in their handheld devices, thumbs blurring across small glass screens. Messaging between citizens was allowed but still heavily monitored.

  A few people gave Kobe a cursory glance, noticing his formidable-looking sidearm, before averting their eyes quickly. He wondered again if Grace Manley had ridden this exact same travelator when she was alive. He tried to imagine what she did with the hours and days of her life before it ended. He saw her in the faces of every young girl that passed him going in the opposite direction, like produce on a factory conveyor belt.