"Fire resistant paint, according to the husband."
Drapes had been too far away to ignite, and the floor was tiled. Carpet was better in some ways than tiles because it did not allow blood to spread; splatter patterns remained fixed. Didn't matter in this instance. There was no blood, not even bodily fluids. Just a desiccated corpse with its chest cracked wide open. Still, the residual malevolence was obviously creeping out the youthful cop standing nearby. "Relax," Rebecca assured him. "The perp got all he came for. He's not coming back."
The cop exchanged nervous glances with Ramirez, who shrugged. On the floor, dressed in the kind of disposable plastic suit that everyone present should have been wearing, the ME was kneeling beside Jamie Cabal's body, poking around inside the open chest cavity like someone digging for treasure. Rebecca turned her attention to the coagulated mass of chemical fire retardant, charred leather, slimy balls of polyurethane-cushions, most likely-and a couple of indefinable lumps mashed together in the middle of the room.
Although accustomed to such sights, Rebecca had never entirely been able to inure herself against the childhood terror this particular smell evoked. No matter; it would not interfere with her job. It never had. "Lungs and liver are over there, on the couch," she observed, pointing. "Heart's been souve- nired."
The ME glanced up at her, his thick black eyebrows con fined behind his protective glasses, then sat back on his heels to get a better look at the couch. Using the back of one latexcovered wrist to push his glasses further up a bulbous nose, he began detailing what she already knew.
Rebecca paid only scant attention to the ME's familiar monologue. She'd heard it all before, in several languages. Eventually he'd shut up, and then she could be alone in the room, alone with the body, listening to the tale it had to tell. For now, she examined the display.
Something sharp-a single blade, not scissors-had been used to slice into Jamie Cabal's sweater, leaving the shoulders and sleeves in place while the front had been torn away. The remains of a bra, flesh-colored, had been pulled up; the upper abdomen had been sliced open with a single, unhesitating cut that appeared surgically precise. The body itself otherwise was intact, mouth open wide in a permanent silent scream, eyeballs bulging from sunken sockets, the entire corpse neatly displayed inside a turquoise spray-painted symbol on the pale patterned tiles.
"Very controlled," Ramirez said, spouting off a textbook interpretation.
It was the same symbol every time. A slim isosceles triangle, its apex pointing due south, bisected a pair of concentric circles. Between the circles was a repeating set of geometric shapes: eight rounded chevrons and sixteen squares.
Rebecca managed to ignore what sounded like a growing argument outside until Wilson yelled, "Hey, Lieutenant Ramirez!"
Looking up and out between the half-drawn drapes, she saw shadows moving rapidly. Why the hell was a SWAT team being deployed around the house?
Ramirez had barely taken a step when a bunch of military goons in camouflage, helmets and flak jackets came tearing inside through the front and back doors, P-90s pouring light in the already well-lit room. Paying no heed to Ramirez's stream of invective and the ME's demands to know what was going on, the troops swarmed through the house, yelling `Clear' from every room.
She might have expected the military to poke their noses into this, but a special cps team seemed a tad melodramatic, even for them. Then another man strode into the room, sporting a pair of wire-rimmed glasses, a slightly distracted expression-and, most interesting of all, black Velcro patches where his unit insignia should have been and nothing on his jacket to indicate his rank. Ignoring Ramirez's repeated demands for an explanation, no-rank G.I. Joe brushed past Rebecca, took one look at the body and muttered, "Oh… great."
His tone told her he wasn't altogether shocked. "And you would be?" Rebecca demanded, pulling her hands from her coat pockets and planting them on her hips.
Eyebrows knitted, he barely spared her a glance. "I'm sorry, but this is a matter of national security, which means that anything you've seen-here-
Rebecca's patience finally snapped. She barked out a laugh. "Oh, right. That's a good one. National security." Hoping to tease out information, she added, "You clowns don't have any idea what's going on, do you?"
"I "I know you," Ramirez said to G.I. Joe. "You work with Colonel Carter-Sam Carter."
Rebecca could hear the resignation in the detective's voice, but she wasn't about to fold so easily. "He got a name?" she asked, directing her question to Ramirez.
"Yeah." Ramirez sighed. "Jackson."
"Dr. Daniel Jackson," the man elaborated. "Nice to meet you. Sorry about this, but it's like I said-"
"Actually, it's like I said," Rebecca interrupted. "I'm betting you don't have a clue what's happening here." She tugged her ID from her pocket and thrust it under his nose. "This is the twelfth case in the U.S. alone, Doctor Jackson. Then there's the six in Europe, one in Australia and three in New Zealand."
That popped his bubble of self-importance.
"And to answer that question you're just itching to ask, the only reason you haven't heard about those cases before now-" Rebecca snapped her ID wallet shut and gestured through the windows toward the television vans "-is because the finer details haven't been leaked to the likes of them."
Jackson's expression didn't change, but the tension level in the room instantly rocketed. Rebecca glanced around at his men. It was several degrees below freezing outside and not much warmer within, but beads of perspiration had broken out on the foreheads of two of them. Obviously they'd already gotten more than they'd bargained for. She had little sympathy. When it came to this case, everyone was getting more than they'd bargained for.
Chapter two
"I didn't say I was complaining."
"No need," commented Radek Zelenka as John Sheppard slid into the pilot's seat of the puddle jumper. "Rarely are your complaints so understated as to require identification."
"How droll," Rodney McKay snapped in reply. John glanced across at the copilot's seat to see Atlantis's chief scientist direct a withering glare over his shoulder at his colleague. "The intergalactic gate bridge was my design, if you'll recall, and I have no reservations about acknowledging its value. I'm simply pointing out the fact that there are advantages and disadvantages to having ready access to and from Earth. I'm very much in favor of the shortened turnaround time on our supply requests, but the tradeoff is being at the beck and call of any governmental bigwig who wants a report presented in person. They've already got Elizabeth under their thumb for a few days. Was it absolutely critical for them to drag us back as well?"
"Ah," Radek pointed out, "but is it not worth the trouble when you can bring back Colombian dark roast and Cadbury's chocolate each time Stargate Command asks you to drop in?"
"Elizabeth's visit was scheduled ages ago. You know how the IOA loves its biannual reports." John frowned as he ran an eye over the jumper's control panel. "Is it `biannual' or 'biennial'? I never can keep those straight."
Rodney's wordless grumble could have been directed either at John's linguistic failings or at the practices of the International Oversight Advisory; it was impossible to say which. "That in no way explains General Landry's reasons for summoning us," Rodney said. "You could at least have waited until I'd had a mouthful of breakfast. My glucose levels were already severely diminished from pulling yet another all-nighter, and you know how that hampers my ability to function. The glucose, that is. All-nighters are a depressingly frequent occurrence."
John chose not to interrupt his teammate's griping. If he let the others in on his thoughts, he'd end up having to peel Rodney off the ceiling. No sense in getting the perennially excitable scientist any more spun up than he was already.