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CHAPTER TWELVE: ANGEL OF DEATH ( aka 03x15: a higher power )
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"HEY, SO EMILY WAS looking for some narcotics, my burning love hunk," Garcia said to Derek as he approached Dallis and Rossi the next day. "And I scored humongously."
The corner of Dallis' mouth raised up in a smirk. "Brave of you to admit it so openly, Garcia."
"I know, right?" she giggled. In the background, they could hear the loud, chaotic sound of her acrylics tapping away on her keyboard. "Anyway, I ran every toxicology panel known to man on the victims and came up with zilch, which means he must be knocking them out with a neuromuscular agent."
"With a what?" Morgan blinked.
"A paralytic," Rossi clarified.
"Yeah, something like Succinylcholine or Vecuronium," said Garcia. "Something that would metabolise in the body so quickly it wouldn't be detectable. Plus, I also called me up Mr Coroner, and said 'how would you do this?' and he says 'by injection.' So I say 'hey guy, wouldn't that leave a mark?' and he's all 'hold up.' Then he goes and looks at Beth Smoler's body and he finds a mark, a hole right in her hairline."
Dallis' eyes widened. Well, she hadn't expected that.
"Okay," Morgan said. "So you'd have to be in the medical profession to get a hold of those drugs, right?"
"Not necessarily. You can get almost anything online these days."
"And this drug leaves no trace?"
"None," she confirmed.
"Even if the coroner was looking for something, the evidence is gone," Rossi pointed out. "Then Smoler didn't see anything coming."
"No, sir," answered Garcia. "She completely saw it coming. They all saw it coming. Neuromuscular blockers only paralyse the muscles temporarily while you remain very much awake."
"It fits the profile of this guy," Dallis remarked. "He wouldn't be satisfied if they were oblivious. He needs them to feel everything he does."
Rossi let out a tired sigh. "So he sedates them, then quickly engineers their suicide."
"Well, if that's true, then it means this unsub isn't looking for the glory of the kill," Morgan declared.
"No, but unfortunately for his victims, they're wide awake when he decides it's... time for them to move on."
"Still begs the question of how he's getting close enough that he can inject something into their hairline without them struggling," Dallis frowned. That part didn't make much sense to her.
Neither Rossi or Morgan had an answer.
By sundown, they were called to another crime scene following reports of a gunshot being heard. They found Curtis Fackler dead in his living room, the carpet soaked with a crimson stain. Beside him was a pistol just out of his reach that the police had highlighted with a yellow cone. Dallis kneeled beside it and Curtis' body, careful to keep the flared hem of her pants from dipping into the blood puddle. The positioning of the gun wasn't quite right. What chance would the victim have had to drop it if he was already dead?
