MINDCHANGER

a bitter song (3)

[WICHITA, KANSAS]

"It's still been three days since the anonymous twenty-four year old victim spoke out about her assault. All we know is it was a white man, approximately 5 foot 11, in a white colored utility or work van, who attempted to take her life in the empty back of the vehicle as she somehow managed to grab the latch, and escape. Police are still working on a sketch of the alleged perpetrator as we cover this story today. Please, if you have any information regarding this story, call us at-" Dennis turned off the TV. This is all that has been on the news. However, it's fed into his ego that he still has yet to be caught. The fact that she can't remember it was an ADT van has truly covered his tracks. He smirks.

[CROWN POINT, INDIANA]

"So he still has yet to wake up?" Ford asks a member of Lake County's sheriff's department. "It's a shame."

"Well, we're thankful he even survived." Tench said while glaring at Ford. "What's his name?"

"Craig. Hes fairly young, though we haven't yet found his actual identification card. We just found a work I.D." the employee responded.

"Who found him?" Ford questioned. "We'll start there."

"Just a young boy scoping out the area. Said it's his grandpa's land and he was testing areas of soil to decide whether or not to grow crops."

[Life's Been Good by Joe Walsh begins playing]

Tench is driving their rental through curvy back roads to the site of where the victim was found. There is truly a lot of corn fields to each side, it seems nearly endless. It's a very quiet, rural area. They begin slowing down, as they approach a sharp curve. They hear the sound of a car running its engine nearby. As they take the turn, they see to their left a cleared out field with police tape widely extended between the distance of each tree closest to the road. They slowly pull onto the gravel and exit the car. 

"Special Agent Holden Ford, FBI." Ford introduces himself. "This is my partner, Bill Tench."

"Where exactly was he found?" Bill asks.

"I'm one of the sheriffs, I'm James. Over there is Tommy, my partner. And the victim, he was found right over here." He points to a spot where the grass was more flat, almost in the shape of a body. Tench and Ford slowly approach the area. 

"There has yet to be any clothes found. Not even a sock." Tommy states. "We've covered miles of this land."

Holden faces Tommy. "We're bringing the grandson of the property owner in for questioning-"

"We've already spoken to him. All is well with him, he's cleared." Tommy looks down. "Poor young man was just so frightened."

"Yeah, but we have our own way of questioning. Not to say that he is guilty, but since we were asked to look into this, we want to try things our way."

"Wait," James says. "Why was the FBI brought in anyways?"

"Well, our boss." Tench laughs. "He said it's believed that this crime was sexually motivated. And that's kind of what we are known to focus on. When the boss says go, we go."

"Although I understand that, the victim survived." Tommy interjects. "Wouldn't your boss be more focused on solving crimes after-"

"After what?" Holden interrupts. "It's too late? No."

James and Tommy look at each other. You can see the confusion in both of their facial expressions. "I think Tommy and I are just surprised, I guess. We've never had a crime so bad that the FBI was brought in."

"We are currently running a study," Holden begins. "We are in the behavioral science unit, questioning violent offenders with sexual motives, hoping that the end result will allow us to figure out patterns to prevent continued offenses."

"So this case having a living victim might be able to help our study. We can bring in suspects and find potential similarities to the psychology behind our proven offenders, and if we can match the suspects with similar behaviors to the evidence, we can truly learn a lot." Bill adds in. "We find many dots that are aligned with crimes like these. Many of the people we have interviewed have had similar experiences to each other. And we categorize them as well. Speaking of, Holden, do you think this was organized or disorganized?"

"It's too soon to tell," Holden says. "But we cant allow more to happen, we must instead bring in all suspects for questioning and analyze their behaviors, as well as run tests with the evidence."

"Speaking of evidence," Tommy sighs. "There is none as of right now."

"You've got to be kidding me." Bill says. He then lights a cigarette. "Did you all get a warrant on the farmboy?"

"Well he seemed innocent-"

"Seemed?" Holden laughed. "That's not good enough for us. C'mon Tench. We have to go, before the man who did this can go any further."

The two quickly run to the car, and pull off the gravel. 'Even if he is innocent, we need a warrant and to question him as soon as possible.' Holden begins to think. 'Because if not, he could be guilty and use this time to clean and destroy any evidence he has, then the case will turn cold. Or even worse, the next victim won't live to tell their story.' His thought process is headache-inducing. He takes a deep breath.

"Uh, are you alright?" Bill looks over. Holden is just blankly staring towards the front windshield. 

"Yes, I'm fine. Just thinking." Holden lies. "What about you?"

"I don't know." Bill let out a slight chuckle. "How can some cops just hope and pray everyone's innocent, while wanting to find the perp?"

"I agree." Holden looked at him. "They need a more objective point of view. Though the farmboy's story may add up, and his grandfather could even be an alibi, we can't rule anyone out. Standard elimination procedure."

'Standard elimination procedure.' Bill tightens his grip on the steering wheel. That was one thing he had said to his wife, Nancy, when they took her shoes as evidence in the murder of the toddler. How is she doing? Has she tried to call while hes been gone in this small town? If he could only call her and say anything. He begins to hope he will come home to a voicemail. A phone number, an explanation, some answers at least. Most ideally, he'd like to go home to his house furnished and his wife cooking, with his son playing with toys again. Are they even alive? What is something happened to her? His heart begins to race. "H-Holden?" he stutters.

He looks over and Holden's fallen asleep with his head resting on the passenger window. He takes a deep breath. At least seeing the sunlight reflect on the crop fields is better than the closed curtains. The moving car is better than staying anchored to the bed. And that annoying kid in a suit, asleep next to him, is better than the empty space that Bill sleeps next to each night. He leaves Nancy's side of the bed untouched, so there's an open space when she crawls into bed in his fantasies. The hours he spends daydreaming she will return are nearly unbearable. Will she ever crawl into their bed again?