The Monster of Mitchum

“This way,” Lee directed the three teenagers towards the zebra crossing that led to the park.

They walked in silence at a brisk pace, weaving their way along the winding pavement which cut into the heart of the park. John thought it was strange that they passed several joggers and cyclists going through their morning routines. You’d think a corpse lying in a very public space would attract attention, yet there wasn’t so much as a hint indicating they’d seen a gruesome sight that morning. That being the case, there had to be some sort of magical shielding or barrier around the scene, John reasoned.

The path rounded a corner and broke out of the treeline that formed a perimeter around a large central field. Lee immediately directed them to the left and disappeared in the time it took John to blink. He shrugged and simply followed suit, the world around him blurring for a moment before a grim scene appeared around him.

A mix of Order Knights and forensics were scattered in the vicinity of a body, busy bagging evidence, taking photos, or noting things down on small tablets. But John’s eyes skimmed over them as he focused on the corpse. It was torn completely in half at the waist, leaving two bloody and bony sacks of half-eaten meat. It took several seconds of **** observation for John to even recognise the body as male. His nose and upper lip had been ripped off, exposing the skull underneath, wet with wine coloured blood. His hair and scalp had been shredded like strips of paper which now lay clumped on the floor and one of his eyes had burst open leaving an empty socket. The other eye vacantly stared up at the sky, leaving John to wonder what he’d seen in his final moments.

The man’s shirt had been torn to shreds; whatever coloured it was replaced by a reddish-brown. His chest, much like his face, was torn and broken. The ribs on one half of his chest had been pried outwards so his attacker could get at the organs hidden underneath. John didn’t count but was certain the corpse was missing a few.

The lower body was just as unpleasant. The man’s pants had been bitten through and torn away to expose his legs. The meat of his left thigh had been gnawed like a chicken drumstick. Likewise, several sizeable chunks had been ripped from the right leg, leaving the immediate flesh surrounding the gaping wound shredded to a fine slaw.

The whole scene was uncomfortably reminiscent of the horrifying **** John had been met with in his own home not long ago and it made him squeamish to be in the presence of such a confronting image once again.

“The victim's name is Peter Keaton, a respectable member of the City Park Patrol. He was on shift this morning when he was attacked and killed by an unknown assailant. He was found by his shift replacement not long after.” The Detective paused and gestured for them to line up next to one another a good three metres from the body. From his side pocket he produced four pairs of rubber gloves, handing one out to each of them to put on. “Tell me, you three, what do you see?” Lee asked, his lips curled into a grim frown as his cold eyes scanned the body.

There was a long and awkward silence as the three of them glanced among each other and the corpse beside them, not knowing what to say or where to look. From where they stood it was difficult to make out fine details on the body, leaving them unsure of what Lee wanted from them. John tried to take a step closer to get a better view but Lee blocked him with his arm.

“Stand back and look,” the detective said sternly. “It’s not a trick question, each of you name one thing you see. Lady Brighton, you first.”

“Oh… uhm… a severed body,” Moira answered, nervous embarrassment causing her to avert her gaze.

“That’ll do. Newman?”

“Uh… blood?”

“And plenty of it,” Lee agreed. “Lastly, Charlene?”

“Claw marks? And bite marks too.”

“Perfect,” the detective nodded. “Your answers are among the first things you see when looking at the victim, but they’re no less important than the finer details. From them we can make several important inferences already. So, based on what you’ve observed, what do we now know? Lady Brighton, you first again.”

“I-I’m not sure… but it’s not terribly easy to cleave a body in two.”

“Indeed,” Lee replied with a small nod. “To separate a body at the waist would take either a great amount of strength or some form of magical power. The former seems likely given the lack of magical traces in the area.”

“What do you mean?” John frowned.

“Well, for the most part, magic will leave a subtle trace behind where it’s cast. With the right kind of spell, anyone can detect and possibly even identify the spell cast,” Lee explained.

“Is there any way to hide the trace?”

“Somewhat,” the detective replied. “There are spells that prevent identification but only time will wash away the lingering trace of magic.”

“Good to know,” John replied, determining learning such spells would be useful for the future. Perhaps Detective Lee would teach him them later, else he could always turn to the Abyss Auction.

“Alright, then,” Lee nodded before gesturing to the corpse. “It’s your turn, John. There’s a lot of blood, what does that tell us?”

“Well… it still seems somewhat wet so this happened recently?”

“True enough. Anything else?”

“I’m not sure at the moment,” John shrugged.

“Understandable. We’ll come back to the blood in a moment. Charlene, anything to add?”

“T-this looks like a hunt to me,” Red grimaced. “Something was starving and has made this poor sod its meal.”

Lee’s eyes almost seemed to sparkle momentarily. “That’s an interesting choice of word there: ‘starving’. What makes you say that?”

“I guess because it all just seems a little too vicious,” Red replied. “I mean, even the most feral wargs don’t make this much mess. It’s like whatever did this had no self control or was incredibly **** to get at his flesh; just look how he went at the thigh.”

“I agree,” Lee’s eyes turned back to leg of the corpse. “Whatever did this was incredibly hungry, but as John observed, there’s still plenty of blood. That means we can rule out bloodsuckers like Vampires and Lamias.”

“I don’t understand. If an Abyssal creature did this, then why didn’t Gaia smite it?”

“Well, there are several possibilities... “ Moira hummed. “Some kind of illusion magic or other form of camouflage that kept it hidden would work.”

John’s eyes turned questioningly towards Detective Lee. “If it was illusion magic, could you trace that?”

“Only if the body it was cast on were present,” the detective replied.

“Oh, fair enough then,” John sighed.

“In any case, illusion magic would be typical for Vampires, not beasts. Camouflage or a keen instinct for remaining hidden seems more likely,” Lee continued. “Still… to do so at the heart of the city is remarkable if alarming.”

“It had to have left tracks,” Red observed. “They’ll go a long way to identifying whatever did this.”

“Perhaps. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Lee replied. “There are many avenues of investigation to pursue, but we don’t have the luxury of selecting only one. We must explore them all else crucial details may be missed. First and foremost, the body. You all can step closer now,” the detective gestured them forward as he moved around to the other side of the corpse and knelt down.

John’s face curled into a grimace as he stepped forward to get a closer look at the stringy morsels and splintered bone that the monster had not eaten. Moira was stone-faced as she stepped closer, but John could tell by the white of her knuckles she was no more thrilled to be part of this than he was. He wondered what was going through her mind given that he’d seen her hammer reduce enemies to a bloody puddle on the ground, not too dissimilar to what lay before them.

Red, upon stepping closer, immediately covered her nose and turned her paling face away. “Meaning no disrespect to the dead but he smells foul,” she said squeamishly.

John sniffed the air, his brow furrowing in confusion. The body was still pretty fresh and didn’t show any signs of rotting yet. A slight metallic smell hung in the air mixed in with wet grass and the vaguely unpleasant stench of a populated city.

“What are you smelling?” Detective Lee asked curiously, understanding that Red’s nose was much more sensitive than her human companions’.

“I-I’m not sure,” she squirmed uncomfortably, still plugging her nose. “Just give me a moment.”

After several deep breaths she took her hand away from her face and took a few tentative sniffs of the body. Her eyes gradually honed in to the dead man’s severed waist and she leaned forward before pausing and glancing towards Lee. “Is it alright if I touch?” she asked the Detective, who simply gave her the go-ahead with a brief gesture and watched on curiously.

Red leaned forward again, now uncomfortably close to the corpse’s severed waist. John could tell by her face she was ready to go home, throw up, and then drown herself in a scented bath. “Do you have tweezers?” she voiced, to which Lee quickly snapped his fingers at one of the nearby Knights, who had been busy snapping pictures with a sizeable camera.

“Cheers,” she hummed as she was handed a pair before she carefully dug them into the corpse’s bloody body and plucked out what looked to be a needle. “This is poisoned,” she declared, holding the needle aloft with the tweezers.

“Bag,” Lee snapped his fingers once again and the same knight quickly produced a plastic sleeve, opening it for Red to place the needle inside. “Do you know what kind of poison it is?” the detective asked.

“No clue, I’m not a toxicologist,” Red shrugged. “But there’s plenty more like it still buried in the flesh,” Red observed. “Looks like whatever sliced through the poor sod’s belly left a parting gift. As if he wasn’t dead enough already. My guess is they’re some sort of detachable barb that break off a tail or some other limb.”

“Hmm... that could explain why the area around the waist was left uneaten,” Lee frowned and rubbed his chin.

“Pass it over, will you?” John asked. “I can take a look at it.”

“By all means,” Lee gestured for the knight to hand over the bag.

John held the bag at eye level as he glanced over the barb. It was about as long as his index finger and coated in a thin layer of red blood. John involuntarily shuddered as he imagined dozens of the small pricks piercing his skin. Not fun. And the poison? Extra not fun.

“It’s a paralysing venom,” John told the group.”Still unclear on what from, though a manticore is a firm possibility.”

“Interesting,” Lee nodded. “I’m unaware of any manticores in nearby barriers but it’s possible one was imported. If that’s the case, it may be that it escaped from a hidden facility. I’ll have the Order sweep for the usual suspects: the Cabal, Black Velvet, 33 Scions, Communists…”

“Communists are a threat to the Order?” John raised one eyebrow in amusement.

“The Soviet offshoot group I’m thinking of are,” the Detective replied. “Although they’ve been strangely quiet recently. In any case, Newman, Perrault, I’m impressed. It would have taken the boys at the lab to find and identify these. Well done.”

“Sure,” Red hurriedly stepped away from the body. “Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to go puke now,” she apologised while scuttling over to the nearby bushes.

John stood up and followed her over to hold back her hair. A kindly forensic soon came over to them with a bottle of water in hand to help wash away the taste of bile before hurrying back, leaving the two to themselves.

“How are you feeling?” John asked.

“Nauseous,” Red sighed. “And maybe a little traumatised.”

“Yeah,” John muttered in agreement. “I’d hoped the Abyss had thrown the worst of its shit at us, but here we are now seeing the results of a man turned into spaghetti.”

“Whatever creature did this needs to be put down,” Red grumbled darkly as she straightened herself and spat out water she’d just finished sloshing in her mouth. “Starving or not, nothing should get away with killing a man like that.”

“Think it was a manticore that did it?”

“Maybe?” his girlfriend shrugged. “Only ever read about them, though, so I’m left scratching my scalp with wonder and uncertainty. Anyway, our new sitter’s calling us back over.”

“Right,” John nodded and matched her step back to where Lee and Moira were waiting. “What’s up?”

“Look at these two wounds,” the detective pointed between a large claw markings across the dead man’s chest and the strangely different slashes across the uneaten thigh. “I’m curious what you make of it, Perrault.”

“Huh,” Red hummed, kneeling down to take a closer look at the thigh. “These look like bird claws. See how there’s three distinct lines and they cut rather deep? But the scarring on the chest has four lines… they seem like cat claws to me.”

“Interesting,” Lee’s cold eyes glanced between the two wounds. “Two attackers?”

“If I may,” Red voiced. “Let me have a look around for tracks. I might be able to identify whatever was here from them.”

Lee looked up at her and thought for a moment. “Alright. You,” the detective snapped his fingers to grab the attention of the Order Knight with the camera again. “Show her to the tracks we found earlier. Newman and Lady Brighton, stay with me here, I will need your assistance shortly.”

“Sure, what with?” John asked as Red walked off with the Knight.

“We’ll be speaking with our only witness,” the detective replied.

“There was a witness?” John’s brow raised as he scanned the area, expecting such a person would be attended to by Order Knights nearby.

“Of course,” the detective allowed a brief smirk to appear on his lips, but it quickly disappeared.