Page 59 of Gem Warfare

“I believe so, yes. The skeleton belongs to a man, Caucasian, approximately fifty years old, in good health. No abnormalities. Two fractures to his fingers on his right hand, which hadn’t healed so possibly from a fight close to his death.”

“Could be with the killer,” I said.

Dr. Barnes rocked her head, uncommitted. “It’s possible and it fits with a theory of trying to defend himself before he was shot, but I can’t definitively say that was the case. I’ll leave that to you.”

“What else can you tell us about him?” asked Garrett.

“Some good news. His left leg had been broken and the pin used to set it had a serial number. I ran it against our database and we got a positive match. I just sent my junior ME to collect the print out.”

“So we have an identification?” Garrett flashed a smile at me.

“We do. Here’s Dr. Kimura now,” she said as a younger man came towards us flapping a piece of paper. It was then I noticed what was tucked underneath his arm. A severed head. The eyes seemed to focus on me.

Before I could even fully register what was happening, I turned, my stomach heaving and lost the contents of my stomach on the tiled floor.

“There’s always one” said Dr. Barnes as Garrett pulled back my hair. “Is she a rookie?”

Whatever was said next was lost to me as the world turned upside-down and then I winked out of existence.

~

“Lexi?”

“No heads, thank you please.”

“Lexi?”

“No. No heads.Iz nawt halloweeeeeen!”

“Lexi?”

“I’mschleeping. Night night.”

“Lexi!” snapped the voice.

I opened my eyes, an acrid taste filling my mouth and blinked under the uncomfortably bright lights in the paneled floor. Or was it the ceiling?

Garrett’s face loomed over mine. “Where am I?” I asked, blinking, the words slurring in my mouth.

“The corridor. You fainted.”

I struggled to sit upright, finding myself lying across several chairs, and planted my feet on the floor. Garrett pressed a plastic water cup into my hand as I groaned. “Sip,” he ordered. “You threw up.”

I sipped and pulled a face. “You can never tell anyone,” I said, wondering about the small wound to my pride.

“It happens to everyone.”

“I will never live this down. Don’t tell Maddox!”

“Why would I tell him?”

I grimaced. “He’ll ask.” No wonder he’d looked so smug when I left him at the café.Happens to everyone, huh?

Garrett squatted in front of me. “How’re you feeling?” he asked.

“Fine.” I touched my head, surprised to find it didn’t hurt.

“I caught you before you kissed the floor.”

---