Murder Theory Read online

  To be sure, it’s one thing to murder a child for having different genes and another to make a joke at the expense of someone who is dealing with a handicap, but they’re both acts of cruelty and dehumanization. While legal lines sharply define what can and cannot be done, our personal sense of right and wrong doesn’t necessarily hew so closely to them.

  I killed Oyo. If I’d been brought to trial, some courts might have decided that I committed murder. That doesn’t weigh heavily on me. I believe I made the morally correct choice.

  But so did Oyo.

  I think he believed he was morally correct when he killed those children. While he may have gained personal enjoyment from the murders, they followed the same ritualistic patterns of certain sanctioned forms of killing. Does it matter that the executioner likes his job?

  I had a philosophy teacher who gave me one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever received. It was a mental toolbox. While the concept wasn’t uniquely his, the way he used it stayed with me, and it still shapes how I think about things today.

  Professor Rickman—Rick, as we called him—asked us to imagine a toolbox and inside it pairs of glasses that affect what you see and what you think. With each one comes a certain knowledge set.

  It was his way of putting Theory of Mind to practical use—understanding how others see the world. There are glasses for trying to understand minority points of view, glasses for thinking like a Neolithic caveman, a Bronze Age farmer, and so on. Each one helps us understand that our points of view are shaped by what we see, what we’ve been told, and, lastly, how we process it all.

  My favorite pair is the alien spectacles. These are the ones you wear when you want to see things from the point of view of someone from a different planet, a place where mammals never evolved into people and life took a totally different path.

  How would an alien look at Oyo compared to the doctors and people present at the execution of a serial killer? How would an alien compare Oyo to the medieval Catholic Church torturing and killing heretics? Would an alien even perceive much difference between what Oyo did versus a doctor helping to euthanize a suffering patient?

  You can extend this on and on to birth control, animal cruelty, and even the use of antibiotics to kill bacteria.

  I don’t subscribe to the idea that just because two things are on a moral gradient they’re equal. That’s irrational. However, I do believe it’s important to take a look at something from different points of view.

  When Europeans came to the Americas and witnessed Aztec sacrificial rituals, they were coming from a continent with practices that in many ways were equally barbaric, but because they understood the justifications of their own practices, they viewed them differently.

  I’ve been in tactical-operations centers where terms like collateral human casualties are thrown around with the same cavalier attitude that the Aztec and allied leaders of Mesoamerican cultures must have had when they planned the Flower Wars, in which thousands of people were killed in ritual combat.

  When I share these thoughts, I’m often labeled a peacenik or pacifist. I have to assert that I’m not against premeditated strikes or taking lives, I’m simply uncomfortable when everyone in the room gets uptight if they’re even asked to think about the morality of what’s being considered.

  I glance across the road to the church camp Oyo ran and back to Oyo’s shed in the derelict tree nursery. Two different lives, one serving the other.

  Oyo deeply believed that his deeds were part of a religious ritual. Joe Vik simply wanted to kill.

  Both men are evil because they were depriving other people of their lives through their direct actions. But Oyo had a strange justification.

  How different was he from one of my Nordic ancestors who thought it appropriate to throw the living wives of a dead chieftain onto a burning pyre?

  The part of Africa that Oyo was from was as steeped in superstition as my ancestors’ European homeland. Somewhere in my family tree, there may be an Oyo. And because his culture shared his beliefs, he didn’t have to do it in secrecy.

  This is what’s so scary about Oyo to me. With Joe Vik I can imagine that a gene controlling compulsion got switched off and he was raised in a hostile environment that pushed him over the edge.

  While Oyo, too, might have had some genetic predisposition in play, he never dropped the religious veil. Joe Vik killed and buried his prey like a cunning animal. Oyo maintained his magical beliefs through every stage of his crimes, yet he killed for decades without being detected.

  Oyo was extremely intelligent and charismatic. He was also batshit crazy. Any one of his ideas about killing or cannibalism giving him magical powers could easily have been tested and disproven. But he didn’t test them. Trying to test them would have run counter to his belief system.

  Joe Vik knew what he was. He saw that he was a monster in human skin and maintained that facade for as long as he could.

  Oyo saw himself as a normal man who practiced a religion that others didn’t understand. He didn’t see himself as a monster. Neither did the Aztec chieftains, the priests of the Inquisition, or the Third Reich doctors who made a moral justification that led from stemming the spread of tuberculosis to genocide.

  This is what scares me—the idea of becoming a monster without ever realizing it.

  How does a man find himself naked on a blood-soaked floor with the dead body of a child at his feet with bite marks all over its skin and say to himself, “I’m not that fucked-up”?

  Oyo managed to do it.

  And every time I tell myself I’m totally cool with the fact that I killed him in cold blood, I could be taking one step closer to being him.

  I flinch as I realize I’m being watched from the opposite side of my vehicle. A dark figure walks closer and taps on the window.

  I regret not stopping to get a gun until I recognize the outline of Nicolson’s head.

  How long was he watching me?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  GATEWAY

  As he unlocks the gate in front of Oyo’s house, Nicolson asks a question that alarms me. It’s not the question as much as the situation and the person asking it. It’s almost as if he’s been reading my mind.

  “Do you believe in evil?”

  “In a moral or supernatural sense? Yes to the former, and the latter is beyond my point of view.”

  Nicolson points to a small pool of melted black wax near the entrance. There’s also a line of white powder—possibly salt—that runs along the fence. “What about that?”

  I kneel for a closer look. The black candle is associated with dark magic rituals, while the salt is designed to hold back evil.

  “I guess some people take this seriously.”

  “And how does that make you feel?” asks a gravelly voice from behind me.

  I turn to find another man standing there. He appears to be in his fifties, smoking a cigar while dressed in a well-tailored, dark suit.

  “Dr. Cray, this is Joe Gallard. He’s helping us from DC.”

  “I’m just here to observe,” says Gallard.

  Uh-huh. Like US troops in Vietnam.

  “What do you do for the bureau?” I ask.

  “Help out on the occasional case from time to time. Mostly teach.” He stubs out his cigar next to the little shrine.

  Nicolson opens up the gate to the front yard. “This way, gentlemen.”

  “What do you teach?” I ask as we step into the old nursery.

  “Mainly procedure.”

  Okay. This asshole is being intentionally vague with me. I can either ignore that or call him out on it. Old Theo would be blunt. New Theo would use this as an opportunity to observe him.

  I decide to drop the matter.

  Nicolson leads us around the house and into the backyard. All of the trees have been pulled out and the nursery is a series of pits with plywood boards tracing out paths. It resembles an archaeological dig at a sacrificial site—which technically it is. Only the sacrifices were uncomfortabl
y recent.

  “When I was here,” I tell the men, “it was all trees and shrubs. I got lost while Oyo was chasing me. It seemed so much bigger.”

  “We found human remains in the soil, just like at the site in Los Angeles,” Nicolson tells me. “When we started digging, we found an even deeper layer. The way Oyo butchered his victims, the parts were all spread out.” He points to a sifting grate. “Our techs have had to use that on every square inch.”

  None of the work lights is on. We’re looking at the yard under moonlight. Despite the lack of trees, it does remind me of the night I was last here. When I look to the back of the property, I stifle an involuntary gasp when I see the large shed covered in plastic.

  That’s where he killed them.

  “You okay, Doctor?” asks Gallard.

  “Fine. And it’s Theo.” I nod to the shed. “That place. I still see it in my nightmares.”

  “You have nightmares?” asks Nicolson.

  “Of course. How could you not after seeing this?”

  “Watch your step,” says Nicolson as he takes out a small flashlight to light our way.

  We walk out on the plywood to the middle of the excavation. Ladders and scaffolds rest in pits covered by canopies. It looks as if they were abandoned, which I guess they were.

  Close to the end of the yard, police tape blocks off a section covered by clear plastic. It must encompass a quarter of the yard. I assume this is the crime scene within the crime scene.

  Nicolson uses his light to illuminate the area, confirming my guess. “This is where it happened.”

  I realize his it and my it are two different events. Oyo was preparing to kill another child when I stopped him, but Nicolson’s referring to the murder of the FBI technicians. I nod.

  “We found Novak in the pit over here and Shea on the ground just above,” Nicolson explains.

  “Where was Marcus working?” I ask.

  “Same pit. They’d uncovered a small finger bone and were searching for the rest of the body. Just the three of them were here that night. We had a police cruiser on the outside.”

  “Who was the last to speak to them?”

  “We had a supervisor here earlier in the day, but other than texts and calls to family, it was just the three of them until the next shift showed up in the morning. Novak and Shea had been dead for hours.” He pauses for a long moment. “Shea bled out. We think it took an hour for her to die.”

  “And there was no animosity between them and the missing tech?”

  “Did Marcus do it?” Nicolson says bluntly. “We don’t know. That’s why we want to find him. It’s just that . . .” He glances at Gallard, unsure what to say.

  “What?” I prod him.

  “All the weird shit.”

  “The candles? The salt?”

  “The whole place. I was here some nights, pulling late shifts, and there was a strange vibe. This place isn’t right.” Nicolson stares at the ground. “The people in the neighborhood started telling stories about seeing a man in black wandering around the crime scene. Some people . . . some of them say it’s the Toy Man. Especially after what happened to his body.”

  “What?” My heart just skipped a beat. “What happened to his body?”

  Nicolson glances at Gallard. The older man nods for him to continue.

  “It went missing. I mean, they couldn’t find it for a couple days in the morgue. Then it showed up again. It was a clerical thing because of his other name. We still kept it under wraps, though.” His voice falters as he says it, telling me something else.

  “Let me guess, his body went missing the same time that the murders happened here?”

  “Right,” says Gallard. “Normally an unclaimed body is cremated after a certain amount of time. The coroner was holding on to Oyo’s because there was some dispute with family overseas.”

  “Well, I can assure you that Oyo did not kill your technicians. He was very dead the last time I saw him.”

  “You mean when you killed him,” says Gallard.

  “Yes.” I don’t bother to offer my official explanation that Oyo drew on me first.

  “That’s quite an accomplishment. You’ve killed two of the most prolific serial killers ever.” Gallard doesn’t say this as a compliment. It comes across as suspicious.

  “I’m sure if law enforcement had been able to respond more quickly, then the outcome would have been different. But this is the world we live in.”

  “Two serial killers,” says Gallard. “You’re a scientist. What are the odds?”

  I’ve encountered his kind of professional skepticism before. “The odds of what? It wasn’t a random event. I sought out both men. The first because he killed my student and the second because a grieving father asked for my help.”

  “I’ve worked at the bureau for years and I don’t think I know anyone with the track record you have.”

  “I guess my methods are just more efficient. But as a profiler, you know there are always more data and better tools to be found.”

  There’s a long pause in which the only sounds are the Georgia frogs and crickets. From the look on Nicolson’s face, I can tell that I’ve said something he wasn’t expecting.

  “Too true, Theo. Too true. Maybe if I had you on my team, we could get things done a lot more efficiently—but there are always bureaucracies and legal hurdles to navigate.”

  “So let’s cut to the chase. Why am I standing in the middle of a crime scene with an FBI profiler and an agent who clearly had some personal connection to the murdered technicians?”

  “I pushed for it,” says Nicolson. “Do you think Oyo could have had an accomplice?”

  “Another one? It’s possible, but you’d know better than I. I’m sure you’ve already explored this.”

  “We have,” says Nicolson. “It just doesn’t add up.”

  “You mean Oyo’s body going missing and the weird artifacts? I can’t speak to that, but I think Occam’s razor provides a fairly obvious answer to what happened that night.”

  “And what is that?” asks Gallard.

  “Marcus. Your missing technician killed them. What I can’t understand is why you’re having so much trouble accepting that.”

  “You don’t know Marcus,” Nicolson replies.

  “No. And maybe that’s an advantage. Unless there’s something else I’m missing.”

  “There is,” says Gallard. “But unfortunately we can’t reveal that to you right now. Let’s go back to the office and talk about this in a slightly more comfortable environment.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  SWAB

  Nicolson sets a bottle of water in front of me and takes a seat across the table in the small conference room while Gallard types away on his laptop computer. I followed them to the downtown FBI office and found the building still pretty active despite the late hour.

  “So, you think Marcus did it?” asks Nicolson.

  “I have no idea,” I reply. “I don’t even know if there is such a person as Marcus. All I know is what you told me, and my response was based upon prior situations—which is another way of describing a bias.”

  “Would you like to see the case file?” asks Gallard.

  “Sure. But I expect you guys were more thorough than I would be.”

  He slides a thin folder over to me. I’m reminded of the time in Montana when Detective Glenn slipped in an image of a brutal murder to gauge my reaction. I used a similar technique in Moscow. While I was upset at Glenn at the time, I came to respect the man. He died trying to save my life when Vik went on his rampage.

  This folder has diagrams and photos of the FBI techs’ bodies where they were found. There are photos of the victims and some other information, but the bulk of it is pages of genetic sequence from blood found on the scene. Not the whole genome, only the markers that scientists look for that differ from individual to individual. I scan the lines of ATGC sequences.

  “Can you read that?” asks Nicolson.

  “Only a
little.” I point to the numbers next to each sequence. “That tells you where on the genome each sequence is located. Otherwise it’s just like having a bunch of random ones and zeroes.”

  “You ever work with anybody else?” asks Gallard.

  “I have a team back in Austin.”

  “Right. What’s your company do?”

  “We’re a consulting group. We work with other institutions to develop laboratory procedures.” That’s the official description I give people.

  “Yeah. I couldn’t find anything on LinkedIn or Google. Are you in stealth mode or something?”

  “We work with a limited client base and don’t need to advertise, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “Who funds you?”

  “The institutions I just mentioned.”

  “Well, Theo, you didn’t actually name any. You were just in Russia? What were you doing there?”

  “Consulting.” How would he respond if I told him I was in Moscow trying to find a Russian spy? It certainly sounds more intriguing than it actually was.

  “For whom?” asks Gallard.

  “A client.”

  “Did you enter the country with a work visa?”

  He’s pressing hard, and I don’t think he realizes what the real truth is. While I could tell him more than I have, I don’t feel he’s entitled to that. Instead, I’ll just shut him down as quickly as possible.

  “I didn’t need one.”

  “Because of the nature of the work?”

  “Because I entered the country under diplomatic protection onboard a State Department jet.”

  Gallard’s mouth hangs open for a moment. I think he’d been expecting to find out that I’d been consulting for some Russian biotech firm or selling unhackable phones to mobsters or something sinister. The implications of how I got to Russia and whom I work for are starting to sink in.

  “So, you do a lot of overseas travel?” he finally asks.

  “Some. Unfortunately, I can’t talk about most of my work.”

  “I think I see,” says Gallard. “In your other job—as a serial-killer hunter—do you ever work with anyone?”