One by One (3 page)

‘An IP address?’ Baxter asked.

‘That’s right. Aren’t they traceable?’ Hunter asked.

‘Yes. That’s actually their main purpose. They work almost like a license number plate for every computer connected to the net. With that, I can pretty much tell you the exact location of the source computer.’

Hunter frowned. Could the caller have made such a silly mistake?

‘Do you want me to start a trace?’ Baxter asked.

‘Yes.’

‘OK. I’ll get back to you as soon as I get anything.’ He disconnected.

The water was already reaching the man’s waist. At that speed, Hunter calculated that the man would be completely submerged in another minute and a half, maybe two.

‘Operations said that there was no way they could trace the call?’ Hunter asked Garcia.

‘That’s right. He was bouncing the signal all over town.’

The water reached the man’s stomach. He was still trying to wiggle himself free, but he was steadily losing energy. He was shivering even more now. A combination of uncontrollable fear and the water temperature, Hunter guessed.

There was nothing Hunter or Garcia could say, so they both went eerily quiet, watching death rise inch by inch around the man on their computer screens.

The phone on Hunter’s desk rang again.

‘Detective, is this for real?’ Dennis Baxter asked.

‘Right now, I have no reason to believe it isn’t. Are you capturing it?’

‘Yeah, I’m recording it.’

‘Any luck with tracing it?’

‘Not yet. It can take a few minutes.’

‘Get back to me if you get anything.’

‘Sure.’

The water reached the man’s chest, and the camera slowly zoomed in on his face. He was sobbing. Hope had left his eyes. He was giving up.

‘I don’t think I can watch this,’ Garcia said, moving from behind his desk and pacing the room.

The water reached the man’s shoulders. In a minute it would be past his nose, and death would arrive with the next breath. He closed his eyes and waited. He wasn’t trying to break free anymore.

The water reached the underside of his chin, and then, without any warning, it stopped. Not a drop more came out of the pipes.

‘What the hell?’ Hunter and Garcia looked at each other for a second and then back at the screen. Surprise etched on both their faces.

‘It was a goddamn hoax,’ Garcia said, approaching Hunter. A nervous smile on his face. ‘Some nutcase pulling our chain.’

Hunter wasn’t so sure.

At that exact moment the phone on Hunter’s desk rang again.

Six

The sound of the phone ringing cut through the silence like thunder ripping through a night sky.

‘You are very clever, Detective Hunter,’ the caller said.

Hunter quickly signaled Garcia one more time, and within seconds the call was being recorded again.

‘You almost had me fooled,’ the caller carried on. ‘I thought your concern for the victim was quite touching. Once you realized there was no way you could save him, you picked what seemed to be the less sadistic, less painful and quicker death of the two choices I gave you. But that was only half of the story, wasn’t it?’

Garcia looked confused.

Hunter said nothing.

‘I figured out the hidden reason behind your choice, Detective.’

No reply.

‘You realized I was about to pick fire, and you quickly interrupted me and chose water.’ A self-assured laugh. ‘Water would’ve given you hope, right?’

‘Hope?’ Garcia mouthed the word, frowning at Hunter.

‘The hope that when, and if, you come across the body, maybe your—’ the caller put on a silly voice ‘
—super-advanced, high-tech forensics lab
could uncover something. Maybe on his skin, or hair, or a trace of something under his nails or inside his mouth. Who knows what microscopic clues I might have left behind, isn’t that right, Detective Hunter? But fire would’ve destroyed it all. It would’ve carbonized his entire body and everything else with it. No clues left, microscopic or not.’

Garcia hadn’t thought of that.

‘But if he drowns, the body is intact.’ The caller moved on. ‘Death comes from suffocation . . . skin, hair, nails . . . nothing gets destroyed. It’s all there ready to be analyzed.’ The caller paused for breath. ‘There might be a million things to find. Even the water in his lungs could provide you with some sort of clue. That’s why you chose water, isn’t it, Detective? If you can’t save him, do the next best thing.’ The caller let out an animated laugh. ‘Always thinking like a detective. Oh, you’re no fun.’

Hunter gave himself a subtle headshake. ‘You were right the first time around. My concern was the victim’s suffering.’

‘Of course it was. But . . . just in case I’m right, guess what? I was already prepared for it.’

The man on the screen had reopened his eyes. He was still shivering. Despite the darkness, he looked around himself, waiting . . . listening.

Nothing. Not a sound. The water had stopped.

Behind the gag his mouth twisted into a shy smile. A glimmer of hope returned to his eyes, as if it all had been just a bad dream . . . a sick joke. He swallowed hard, closed his eyes and tilted his head back, as if thanking God. Tears found their way through his closed eyelids and cascaded down his face.

‘Keep on watching, Detective.’ There was a proud ring to the caller’s voice. ‘Because you’re about to get the “Cirque du Soleil” of shows.’ He disconnected.

On the screen the water level started decreasing.

‘He’s draining the container,’ Garcia said.

Hunter nodded.

The water drained fast. In a matter of seconds its level had gone back down to the man’s chest.

Then it stopped.

‘What the hell is going on?’ Garcia asked, lifting his palms up.

Hunter shook his head. His full attention never leaving the screen.

The camera zoomed out just a little, and all of a sudden the submerged portion of the pipes sprang back into life. Like a Jacuzzi bath, the underwater jets ruffled the water as they spat more liquid into the enclosure. But there was something different this time. As the colorless liquid exited the pipes and mixed with the water, it was producing an odd effect, as if the new liquid was denser than that already inside the enclosure.

Hunter leaned forward, bringing his face closer to the monitor.

‘That’s not water,’ he said.

‘What?’ Garcia asked, standing right behind him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Different density,’ Hunter replied, pointing at his screen. ‘Whatever he’s pumping into that tank, it isn’t water this time.’

‘What the hell is it, then?’

At that moment something started flashing at the top right-hand corner of the picture. Four letters inside parentheses. The first, third and fourth were in capitals.

(NaOH)

‘Is that a chemical formula?’ Garcia pointed to it.

‘Yes.’ Hunter breathed out.

‘For what?’ Garcia rushed back to his computer and opened a new tab on his web browser.

‘No need to search for it, Carlos,’ Hunter said grimly. ‘That’s the chemical formula for sodium hydroxide . . . caustic soda.’

Seven

Garcia felt a knot tighten in his throat. Years ago, when he was still just a uniformed LAPD cop, he’d responded to a domestic violence incident where a jealous boyfriend had thrown half a pint of caustic soda in his girlfriend’s face. The boyfriend fled the scene but was arrested five days later. Garcia still remembered helping the paramedics strap the girlfriend down to the gurney. Her face was just a mess of raw flesh and burned skin. Her lips looked like they had melted onto her teeth. Her right ear and nose had totally disintegrated, and the solution burned holes into one of her eyeballs.

Garcia looked at Hunter over his computer. ‘No way. Are you sure?’

Hunter nodded. ‘I’m sure.’

‘Sonofabitch.’

The phone on Hunter’s desk rang again. It was Dennis Baxter from the Computer Crimes Unit.

‘Detective,’ he said in an anxious voice. ‘NaOH is caustic soda. Sodium hydroxide.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘Shit, man. That stuff is highly corrosive. Many times worse than acid. If somebody is dumping sodium hydroxide into that much water, for now, the solution will be over-diluted and not very strong, but soon . . .’ He went silent.

‘It will turn that whole thing into an alkaline bath,’ Hunter finished the sentence Baxter couldn’t.

‘That’s right. And you know what that will
do
?’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘Holy shit, Detective. What’s going on?’

‘I’m not sure. Did you manage to trace the transmission?’

‘Yes. It’s coming from Taiwan.’

‘What?’

‘Exactly. Whoever is doing this . . . he’s good. It’s either a hijacked IP address or he stole one from a Taiwanese server pool. Bottom line . . . We can’t trace it.’

Hunter put the phone down. ‘We can’t get him through the Internet transmission either,’ he told Garcia.

‘Shit. This is messed up, man.’

The man on the screen started shaking again. But this time Hunter could tell it wasn’t from fear or cold. It was excruciating pain. The solution was getting stronger and starting to corrode his skin. His mouth opened wide to release an agonizing scream that neither Hunter nor Garcia could hear. Secretly, both detectives were relieved by the lack of sound.

As more and more caustic soda was added to the mixture, the water started gaining a faint, dull, milky color.

The man closed his eyes and started shaking his head violently from side to side, as if having a seizure. The alkaline bath was starting to scrape away his skin like an electric sander. It took only a few seconds for the first pieces of skin to be ripped from his body.

Hunter rubbed his face with both hands. He had never felt so helpless.

As more and more skin started to float around the tank, the water began to change color again. It was now going pink. His entire body was bleeding.

The camera zoomed in on something else floating inside the enclosure.

‘What is that?’ Garcia asked, pulling a face.

Hunter pinched his bottom lip. ‘It’s a fingernail. His body is dissolving.’

The camera zoomed in on another one, and another one. The solution had already dissolved his cuticles and most of the nail beds on his fingers and toes.

The water was getting bloodier. They couldn’t see through it anymore. The man’s face, though, was still above the water line.

The victim had lost control of his body, which was now shaking incessantly, guided only by pain. His eyes had rolled back into his head. His mouth was contorted into an excruciating shape. His teeth were relentlessly grinding against each other, and he was now bleeding from the gums, nose and ears as well.

The water was starting to boil.

The man convulsed for the last time. His chest kicked forward so violently it looked like there was something inside it, trying to explode out of his body. His chin fell to his chest, submerging his face under the bloody water and sodium hydroxide mixture.

There was no more movement.

The camera zoomed out, showing the entire glass enclosure.

Hunter and Garcia couldn’t find any words. They couldn’t look away either.

A few seconds later a message flashed across their screens.

I HOPE YOU’VE ENJOYED THE SHOW.

Eight

The LAPD’s Robbery Homicide Division’s captain, Barbara Blake, wasn’t easily intimidated and, after so many years in the force, very little ever shocked her, but this morning she sat in absolute silence inside her office on the fifth floor of the Police Administration Building with a disbelieving look on her face. The office was spacious enough. The south wall was taken by bookshelves crammed with hardcovers. The north one by framed photographs, commendations and achievement awards. The east wall was a floor-to-ceiling panoramic window, looking out over South Main Street. Directly in front of her desk were two comfortable-looking leather armchairs, but none of the three other people inside her office were occupying them.

Hunter, Garcia and Dennis Baxter were all standing behind Captain Blake’s desk, staring at her computer monitor, watching the footage Baxter had captured from the Internet minutes earlier. The Operations Office had also already sent Hunter a copy of the recorded telephone conversation between him and the mysterious caller.

Captain Blake listened to the recording and watched the entire footage without uttering a word. At the end of it all she looked up at Hunter and Garcia, her face paler than moments ago.

‘Was this real?’

Her stare jumped to Baxter, who was a big man, none of it muscle. He was in his forties, with curly fair hair, a plump face made heavier by a double chin, and a thin mustache that looked more like peach fuzz.

‘I mean,’ she said. ‘I know that nowadays CGI technology can make anything look real. Can we be sure that this whole thing isn’t just digital and camera trickery?’

Baxter shrugged.

‘Well, you’re the head of the Computer Crimes Unit.’ The captain’s voice went hard. ‘Tell me something.’

Baxter tilted his head to one side. ‘I just captured the whole thing moments ago after getting a call from Detective Hunter. I haven’t really had time to analyze it, but at first look and on gut feeling – it’s real.’

The captain ran a hand through her long jet-black hair before allowing her stare to return to Hunter and Garcia.

‘Too complex and bold to be just a hoax,’ Hunter said. ‘Operations couldn’t trace the call. The caller was bouncing it around town every five seconds.’ He gestured to Baxter. ‘Dennis said that the Internet transmission came from Taiwan.’

‘What?’ Captain Blake faced Baxter again.

‘It’s true. What we had was an IP address, which is a unique identifying number given to every single computer on the Internet. With that, we can easily pinpoint the host computer. The IP address used was assigned to a server in Taiwan.’

‘How can that be?’

‘Easy. The Internet makes the world a global market. For example, if you want to set up a website, there is no law that tells you that you have to host it in America. You can search the net for the best deal, and have your website sitting in a server absolutely anywhere – Russia, Vietnam, Taiwan, Afghanistan . . . it makes no difference. Everybody can access it just the same.’