Residual Latency

Chapter 1

Outside, the heavy rain pounded on the window of Avani's apartment as she paced restlessly through the living room.

She had a dilemma on her hands; much more of a problem than she bargained for.

Barely a year into her job and she already found odd similarities in her work that her superiors just... chose to ignore.

"I may be new to my job but is everyone seriously overlooking this?" She murmured to herself, admidst her other ramblings in an attempt to sort her thoughts.

Recently, the bodies she had been assigned to examine had shown similar causes of death with even weirder side effects.

The majority of the victims' seemed to have died of natural causes or what appeared to be premeditated murders.

The victims' medical files had displayed things like early onset dementia and alzheimers, even though most were below the age of 35.

Her co-workers assured her that it had nothing to do with their deaths. Instead, they thought it had to do with the kind of victims the murderer targetted.

However, Avani believed this wasn't true. There was something unsettling about the whole ordeal, even though there were few bodies and large gaps of time between their appearances.

It all felt so wrong, like there was so much more to this case than what met the eye. But Avani was in no position to get a warrant for further investigation.

Even if she somehow managed to go to court, she'd be laughed out in the first 2 sentences.

So on her written report, "cause of death" was listed as an aggravating "unknown" or simply, "1st degree murder."

"I suppose I could at least ask my boss tomorrow," She concluded, sitting down on her couch as she heaved out a sigh.

Right now, she needed to focus on getting herself to bed so she would actually get up in the morning.

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Avani stood outside of her boss's office, staring at the wooden door.

After a restless night of sleep, she decided on bringing it up to her boss. Whether or not he believed her, that would be up to how she presented the facts.

After a knock, she heared a faint "come in" from inside the office. Opening the door, she stood in the entry of a well lit office with a desk, a few filing cabinets along the wall, an overfilled bookshelf and an arm chair infront of the desk.

Her boss motioned for her to sit across from him. She obliged, shutting the door gently behind her and sitting across from him.

"Ah, Mrs. Caditz. To what do I owe the pleasure?"
He said with a calm smile, seemingly filling out some kind of form.

"Mr. Anderson. Ive noticed something odd about these recent victims I've been assigned," Avani pushed down her underlying nervousness, keeping an even expression even under her boss's gaze.

He seemed a little surprised at her remark, putting down his pen and leaning over his desk on his elbows.

"Oh? How so?"

"Well, most of them have shown odd side effects. Almost like accelerated aging. All of the patients had medical files detailing things like early onset dementia and alzheimers even if they were all relatively young. Physical attributes like faint wrinkles, dark spots-" she rambled, speaking quickly, uneven almost. She struggled to put together her thoughts with her little sleep.

In the struggle, she had neglected keeping her tone calm and professional.

"Ms. Caditz, don't you think your reading into this a little too much?" He sighed, his eyes holding something almost akin to concern.