SEATTLE

2-History

"Residents in the vicinity of Madrona are still recovering from the shock of discovering a mangled, beheaded corpse in the area last Friday night..."

It wasn't the description of the body found that disgusted both Francis and now myself. It wasn't even the fact that there had been another murder, though from Francis's comment the other night and the consistent violence, it looked like a serial killer. No, what disgusted us was the fact that the article was so small and in suck an out-of-the-way spot in the paper. My stomach lurched guiltily as I realized I'd passed right over it myself.

Francis sighed as I pushed the paper back towards him. "We still haven't identified her," he admitted, a look of depression creeping into his eyes.

"Did you check the missing persons?" I asked.

"Of course. Unfortunately, she's either not local, or for some reason no one's filed a report yet. And yes, we checked prints," he said, anticipating my next question as I opened my mouth, "We're still searching the database."

"Geez..." I muttered. Maybe it was just me, but that seemed pretty impressive. If it was that big, it was a pretty food thing computers took care of the screening these days. Still shaking my head, I picked up the papers for the Friday and Saturday previous to the date on the paper containing the disappointing article.

"I'll be back in a moment," Francis said suddenly, rising quickly from his chair and disappearing among the bookshelves. I nodded distractedly, despite the fact he had already moved on.

I was still going over Friday's paper, this time carefully scanning each page for the story I wanted, when Francis returned. He waited patiently while I finished, then pushed over a stack of books to take the place of the paper. Curious, I glanced over the titles of the top three.

"Jack the Ripper?" I asked incredulously, "European Serial Killers? Anonymous Killers?"

Francis shrugged. "You might want to look through them," he suggested pointedly.

I didn't reply; I just opened the top book-Jack the Ripper-and started to flip through. I knew a lot about Jack the Ripper already. He had killed at least five prostitutes in Whitechapel back in 1888 and he had never been caught. I wondered what material the author had to write the book about and why Francis wanted me to look through it.

"A lot of that is just legends," Francis admitted, "but it also has most of the original case file."

I cracked the book open and riffled through the pages, nodding absently. There were diagrams, pictures, and more on various pages. I stopped at one, the infamous crime scene photo of Mary Kelly's brutal murder.

"Does this have all the Whitechapel murder or only the Canonical Five?" I asked, looking up.

Francis, holding the next book from the pile and a sheaf of hot pink Sticky-Note tabs, looked surprised. "Uh...All of them," he replied, "You know about the Ripper?"

I shrugged. "Didn't have much of a life before Ahli and Brittney," I grumbled, feeling heat blossom in my cheeks. Francis chuckled and turned back to his project.

I flipped through the Ripper book for a few minutes. Then Francis handed the other book back to me. Setting down the first book, I glanced over the title of the new one. It was Anonymous Killers again. Curious, I opened it to one of the marked pages.

I couldn't help but giggle at the name I saw. "Charlie Chop-Off" glared at me from the top of the page, crisp black letters on off-white paper. As I scanned the page, my smile faded and my eye began to twitch. Some people are too sick-minded for words, though we try as humans.