First Blood by S. Cedric

arrived.
    “What did you find?” Eva asked, stepping closer to the table.
    “I don’t know yet. There is some matter in the back of the chest cavity that has not been destroyed by the heat. With tweezers, the medical examiner began removing minuscule black particles. Her assistant held out a receptacle filled with transparent liquid. It began to foam, and the particles brightened as soon as they were dropped in,
    “Sodium chloride.”
    “That’s salt, isn’t it?” Leroy asked.
    “Coarse table salt,” the medical examiner responded.
    “How did it get there?”
    “I see only one possibility. The killer or killers left it there intentionally.”
    Chadoutaud dug in the burned flesh and found more salt crystals.
    “That’s what happened. After ripping out his heart, they stuffed the wound with salt.”
    “They replaced the heart with salt? But why?” Leroy asked.
    “Salt increases the pain of open wounds, but not if someone is already dead,” Eva said. “Maybe it’s some kind of superstition.”
    “I don’t have an explanation,” the medical examiner said. “I can only give you the facts. Whatever the reason, the person or people who did this were prepared and knew exactly what they wanted to do to him. Nothing was left to chance.”
    Leroy nodded.
    “A deadly grudge.”
    “No kidding.”
    “Could this be some kind of personal vendetta?,” Eva asked Leroy. “Tearing out his heart because he broke someone’s else’s heart? Or was it a message that this man had no heart? Maybe someone who had been terribly wronged was taking justice into their own hands.”
    Pauline Chadoutaud watched the two of them and then added, “I see what you’re thinking.”
    Eva stiffened. She knew they would get to it at some point.
    “We have finished with the first victim. I would like to proceed with the post-mortem examination of the second victim now.”
    The second victim.
    The child. The baby. That tiny body lying on the steel table, waiting for the scalpel, the saw, the cutter, and the organ scale.
    She suddenly could not breathe.

Pictures flash on the large screen in the lecture hall: children laid out, naked, sacrificed to gods of bygone days. There is murmuring in the tiers. The boys are making jokes. The girls are annoyed.
    “Infanticide is a crime that has been taboo in every culture, alongside patricide and incest.”
    After nearly a year of lectures, the professor in the red jacket still has an unbearable voice. His classes are extremely soporific. The class has thinned considerably over the months. Fewer than a third of the seats still hold students.
    “You must admit that killing your own offspring is one of the most unnatural acts imaginable. Why unnatural? Because the natural order of things dictates that our children are meant to outlive us.”
    Ismael and Madeleine are sitting in the first row. They attend more regularly than the others, although they are not necessarily the best students, according to Mr. Parme.
    He recites the lecture, which he has given for years, at a deliberate pace with pauses to allow the students to take careful notes.
    “When a person kills his own child, he puts his own death into perspective. It denies life and humanity.”
    Madeleine gnaws on her pen. From time to time, she jots down a name or a reference. Ismael sits next to her, loyal to his habit of reading a book. This time, it is a photo album of human bodies preserved in formaldehyde. She admires his ability to do two things at once, like exploring such hard-to-stomach books and listening to the class. Ismael, despite his detachment, is listening to every word.
    He even looks up at that moment. He focuses on Mr. Parme’s lecture, his clear eyes shining. Madeleine has already seen him in this state of excitement when he talks about serial killers and gods, saints and madmen. His enthusiasm is contagious sometimes. And dangerous at others.
    “Modern pop philosophy,” he grumbles. “Ancient indigenous people