Chapter Text
Investigative Report 9601
Investigating Officer:
Inspector Vadzim Dzemidovich
Assisting Investigator:
Deputy Inspector Kaciaryna Irina
Agency:
Federal Investigation Agency (FIA)
Personal Notes — Inspector Vadzim Dzemidovich
I’ve worked homicide for over ten years.
Long enough to know that most cases are exactly what they appear to be.
Not this one.
Irina and I arrived shortly after 0700 hours.
Police tape surrounded the city park while uniformed officers kept curious onlookers back.
Less than thirty minutes earlier, Irina had been talking nonstop about Christmas traditions and New Year’s celebrations.
Now we stood over the bodies of a young girl and a middle-aged man lying in the snow.
The man had been shot twice.
Once in the back of the neck.
Once in the back of the head.
The girl had suffered a single gunshot wound beneath the chin.
The girl couldn’t have been older than eleven
Maybe twelve.
The man was somewhere in his forties.
Neither carried identification.
Neither had any obvious connection to the other.
I remember looking at the girl for a long moment.
Something about her bothered me.
At the time I couldn’t explain why.
Years later I still remember that feeling.
The quiet certainty that something was wrong.
Not with the crime scene.
With the girl.
This was one of those cases.