Hello again!
Okay, I did say something about shorter chapters, right? Well I guess you just have to deal with these since I don't want to cut the storyline in too little bits. And about this chapter, there is this one thing I guess most of you won't like – The Schäfer. What can I say, I just thought that this guy would look absolutely Stunning with big, clever looking German shepherd. And yes, maybe I like breaking traditions (*writes more clichés*). I already started writing the next chapter so I may be able to post it quite soon. Many, many thanks to those of you who have shown some interest in my story, you made my day. (or more like week) So again, pay no attention to my mistakes in English or point them out so I can correct them. I still don't own all the characters, and I still wish you'll like this chapter.
Chapter 2 – The body
Tiina woke up early in the morning, so early she tried to go back to sleep, in vain. She got up and padded to her kitchen, that still looked like she had moved in yesterday, the whole little apartment did. She had been living in Sweden for three weeks, and working almost two. She was slowly getting adjusted to her new job and environment, but it surely took time. She had never been more happier just because of this little fact her mother was "finlandssvenska"* and therefore Tiina too spoke fluent Swedish. She had her accent, she spoke Swedish just like all "finlandssvenskarna", and it sounded horrible, absolutely horrible, at least that's what she thought, but without that she wouldn't be able to work on medical field in Sweden. So it would seem that everything was just fine, but there was this little problem: She didn't have any money yet. It wasn't a big problem, not at all since the payday was next Sunday, but imagine you wake up at four am, can't sleep, you're hungry and open the door of your fridge just to see that there's nothing else than one tomato, margarine and old cheese. Yes, that's the moment you feel like repeating "Voi vitun vittu, saatana, vittu, perkele!" like a mantra. You can use your imagination while translating that.
Swearing she made herself a cup of coffee, drank it black and stared out of her kitchen window to the yard. Well, at least she had time to go running in the park before she had to leave to work. When Tiina was little she used to be a little chubby kid, not much just enough to be constantly reminded of it. She was always also very sensitive, even more as a young thirteen year old girl, who hated the person in the mirror and didn't have any real, close friends to tell her it was alright and she looked just fine. She'd always been something between a princess and a total tomboy, her dad taught her how to hunt, he used to love horseback riding (in the forests, without a saddle, jumping over logs, of course, what did you expect?) and all that, but she hated competitions and team playing. So she took up running to get rid of her extra kilos, and in couple of years she was the skinniest girl in her class. She wasn't anorectic, she loved good food and chocolate, but had grown to like running, so she continued. End of the story. No admiring classmates, no worried school nurses, nothing dramatic. And what else could she do in mornings like this? Tiina put on her water and wind proof jacket and trainers. Glanced at her cigarettes on the kitchen table, sighed and run out of the door.
She dashed down the stairs her mind already wandering dangerously. She'd always been a little clumsy and running the stairs really was a bad idea. She didn't notice anything before it was too late and the shoelaces of her left trainer were steadily under her right foot. With a tiny, panicked yelp she lost her balance and started to fall forward. Tiina shut her eyes preparing herself for nasty wound in head, at least, and the unmistakable feeling of smashing against the floor. But like it too often happens in the books, movies and daydreams the pain never came. Instead of the floor her hands met solid chest that had just walked out of the door. Feeling sudden rush of shame she deemed it safe enough to open her eyes and found herself looking at black plastic framed glasses, reddish orange hair slicked back and charcoal blazer. The man had dark brown eyes that seemed to look somewhere far away, and his smile was shy, but friendly and pretty charming. And he was her downstairs neighbor called Ahlgren, Otto, Olav or something like that, she'd seen him couple of times but had only spoken to a man he lived with. The Ahlgren guy blinked once, twice and didn't seem to remember Tiina, who suddenly realized she was practically hugging him. "Oh, förlåt, didn't mean to cause you trouble or anything I'm just little clumsy and, well, yeah..." she stammered and blushed. The incident didn't seem to bother the man who just straightened his jacket and said: "That's nothing. You're lucky I managed to catch you. You must be the new one from upstairs, Robban has mentioned you." He glanced his watch and that didn't escape Tiina, but she decided it would be rude to leave without introducing herself. "Yeah, I moved here just couple of weeks ago, Tiina Väinämöinen, nice to meet you", she said and shook hands with him and he just simply stated: "Oliver Ahlgren." They descended down the stairs, not running this time and Tiina felt the need to fill the awkward silence. "So, you seriously have early wake ups if you need to be working at five am every day!" Oliver checked the time again and answered: "Well, my working hours are somewhat irregular. I don't have so many mornings this early, luckily." They came to the front door: "Okay, that's nice. Irregular hours I mean, maybe. Anyway, it was nice to meet you Oliver." Tiina smiled and thought if it was too friendly to use his first name. Oliver fished his car keys, found them and opened the door: "Yeah, and please, just Olle is fine." And he drove away. Tiina stood there in the pavement for a while and inhaled deep before she started jogging towards the park. No smoke before sport, but oh how she craved her early morning cigarette.
Oliver parked his Audi on the grass next to black BMV, new sight in their group, tip-top clean, only some papers and CDs scattered around, no wunderbaum or any air fresheners at all, no funny decorations and no stickers, in the trunk there was one old blanket. So, Berwald had finally got a replacement to his old (or more like ancient) blue Volvo. Oliver sniffed the morning air. Right now the sky was still clear. The sun hadn't risen yet, but the horizon over the sea was coloured a lighter shade of turquoise. No clouds, only the tiniest bit of wind and some frost on the ground. It was freaking cold, but surely it would get warmer and probably rainy too, again.
He walked through the peaceful, silent playground, closer to the seashore where the forensics group had already started working and one policeman tied the classic "polis/police/do not cross" tape around the trees and street lamps. Just inside the line stood a tall, lonely man in a long coat and his Schäfer lying at his feet. Olle lifted the tape and came to stand next to the stern man. "What do we have here today?" he asked, already cursing the sea wind that blew straight through his thin jacket. The tall man, Berwald was his name, said nothing for a while, then: "Unidentified man, found in the water near the rocks by an old lady about-" he shook his watch "-about one hour fifteen minutes ago. Strangled, no obvious signs of fight found yet, so probably drugged. Been in the water for days, difficult to say anything about the exact date of his death yet." Olle considered the information for a while and answered: "Okay, one hour fifteen minutes, where's everyone? And why did you bring that killing machine with you?" The dog said or did nothing to protest the insult, but Berwald looked seriously annoyed for a while, then let it go, Olle didn't come along with dogs that great, everybody knew he was afraid of big, angry looking dogs however friendly they were. "Kling sleeps, has a hangover so it's impossible to wake him up. Magge should be on his way, will take a good while, he was raiding that motorbike club's warehouse with Malmö police somewhere in Skåne." "The previous case? I thought it was closed." The taller man sighed and lifted his glasses. "Ja, but Malmö found the last one of them and also some potential drop offs." Olle nodded and started to walk towards the body and the forensics. Victim was a young man, blond hair, blue eyes, skinny but had some muscles, quite tall. He had clear bruises around his neck, the killer had big hands. No other signs of violence visible, except on his backside, so he'd been dragged to the sea, killed near the shore? Someone should check the docks. Looked like pretty normal case. Oliver nodded to Berwald, they walked to their cars and drove away.
Hours later the sun had risen just to become covered with grey clouds that hung heavy above the city. In the room furnished with big table and plain coloured curtains there were six men sitting, all looking tired, pissed off or very deep in thought. Not exactly the most jubilant group in the city. Detective Inspector Rasmus Kling, antsy man with gray hair and shade or two darker beard was tapping the table with his index finger, clearly annoyed. This case didn't make sense. Or more like, the case made sense perfectly fine, just a strangled man found in the freezing water, nothing new there but Kling couldn't see why in the hell they kept giving these dull, boring and routine-like cases to his group. For heavens sake, Kling himself was one of the best inspectors in whole freaking department and his group certainly was the most promising, all three of them so very young and so very hungry for some respect, something really complicated, something important. Their brains would rot away if all they got to do was drive around the country tracking down fools who didn't even deserve the title "criminal" and raid the belongings of Hell's Angels.
Those three men who formed his group now sat near the windows, next to each other. Olle Ahlgren, reading a newspaper, looking as groomed as always. He head some wit, this lad. Okay, maybe he lived with a man (and not just a friend, mind you) and could be considered little girly he wasn't afraid of the dirty work, well, not afraid but that didn't mean he liked it. Berwald Oxenstierna, who hated his name just sat there and stared at the wall, frowning deep in thought. Every single one Kling's boys (that's how he referred to them, his boys, since he didn't have his own kids and had grown to like his team like the family he never had.) were great at what they did, but Berwald was the one Kling had taken in his group as an afterthought. The best intuitive decision in his life if you were to ask him. Berwald had worked in some more secret, international projects before for a while, and therefore had two IDs. That's why Kling still had some troubles calling him Berwald, not Sten. His given name really caught some attention. Next to Berwald sat Magnus Sandvik, who had just returned from Skåne, and drunk his fourth cup of coffee. Magge was the reckless one and reminded Kling from his own younger self, except Magge was actually happy and cheery, not bitter and frustrated. Magge usually did the right decisions and was brave enough to work pretty independently, too independently sometimes. He and Berwald had been friends for a long time. Kling didn't know how long for sure, but he guessed they must have met each other before the age of 13, and starting from high school the two had always been in the same classes and groups. Hell, they'd even been training in the same police station. At this Kling felt the rare need to laugh as he imagined Magge and Berwald scolding drunkards, vandals and youngsters in some small Swedish town, though even Kling had to admit, those two surely looked impressive in police uniforms. He had witnessed that kind of sight only once, since both Magge and Berwald were allowed to wear casual clothing at work (actually they had to. And wanted too.) and had their own signature clothes, in Magge's case it was his well worn black leather jacket and blue jeans, Diesel, always the same model.
Another two men in the room were Karlsson, who led the search at the docks, practically invisible despite his huge size, and Lukas Bondevik, silver haired Norwegian who was one of the best ones of his field (which was finding missing people and any kinds of information.). After quite long, pretty awkward silence Kling opened his mouth to speak: "Okay, what do we got? Everyone tells us what they know, Olle and Berwald, you start." Berwald glanced at Olle sideways, and the shorter man started to repeat the facts once again. Magge, having just returned, knew next to nothing and Karlsson's findings weren't exactly surprising. "We've searched approximately one fourth of the pointed areas, and for now we've found over fifty needles, pill bottles, suspicious minigrips and so on, from five to ten suspicious enough rags maybe used in, well, something illegal, or maybe they are all just napkins, impossible to say yet. And no, we haven't even started looking around the parks. Oh and yes, some blood stains too. Everything is sent to lab. You know Kling, they'll probably love you there even more after this", the giant of a man grumbled and looked extremely frustrated. Everyone in the room knew that it was in no way possible to find the right needle or substance traces from the docks but well, maybe it was worth a try. Bondevik glanced at his papers, depressingly clean of any colour, no underlined or circled names. He was "the new, silent guy" and worked for the first time with Kling's group so no one knew what to wait for, except they said he was good. "The closest one missing in Sweden who matches the description I was given run from his girlfriend in Uppsala two weeks ago. With this information it takes time to search through all possibilities since I have to do this quite manually. His medical background or something would be helpful, any information from the mortuary would", he said in his quiet voice and then the silence fell again.
This time it took only a minute or two for Kling to start barking orders: "Okay, Bondevik, check the guy from Uppsala again, get his girlfriend's number and address. Then check other countries, start from the east, Baltics, Finland, Poland, try asking Russians. And good luck with that. Karlsson you continue searching, Ahlgren and Oxenstierna go ask if the forensics doctors have already gotten anything, I highly doubt, then Karlsson's needles etc. in the lab. Sandvik you do the Hell's Angels case's paperwork first, then go question the one who found the body and find if anyone else has anything, contact Bondevik and question the girlfriend. And Ahlgren, ask Isberg to make a statement for media with picture, if anyone has seen anything, they must contact us. Okay, that's all, go on now!" The five men stood up, everyone rushing out of the room to their own directions. Kling massaged his temples and took his migraine medicine. Out in the streets the first raindrops hit the asphalt.
A small woman stepped out of the car and walked to the hospital. She didn't have an umbrella and though she didn't have to walk for long her blond hair was soaked when she entered the hall. Her red trench coat felt unfamiliar on her shoulders and she thought she looked silly, she didn't felt comfortable in these clothes. Her high heels clicked as she walked to the desk where middle aged, tired looking woman sat fake smile plastered on her face. "Sorry, I'm looking for my uncle", she said in English and the clerk snapped her eyes towards this tiny, well-dressed foreigner. "His name is Lucas Sardeaux, I was informed that he was brought here last night. He's little psychotic and he has a schizophrenia, but he has his medicine and I just moved here so he could stay home, but he run away once again." The woman behind the desk didn't seem to even listen: "name?" she asked monotonously. "Laura Sardeaux", the little woman in red said and gave her passport to the woman, who searched something from the computer, filled two documents, gave them to Laura Sardeaux and told: "Second floor, corridor three right at your left, give this to the nurse." After that she was absorbed back into the mysterious world of the soap opera in the waiting room television.
It was all so easy, too easy. Nurse in charge was surprisingly young and nervous, probably first time with this much responsibility. She took a look at her papers and her passport and led her to Lucas Sardeaux. "You can use the wheelchair there to get him to your car, you are with a car, aren't you? He has just been given medication for his hallucinations and some sedatives, he'll be sleepy and dizzy for some hours. I suppose you have all his prescribed medicines?" the nurse asked after instructions while pulling the duvets off of the man and helping him sit up. Sardeaux the younger nodded and bowed down to talk to the man in French: "Uncle? Uncle it's Laura here, your niece. Come on, let's go home." And so Lucas Sardeaux, man with diagnosed mental health issues (Schizophrenia Simplex with notable bipolar symptoms, to be exact) was led out from the hospital by tiny woman in the red trench coat and whose passport said "Laura Olivier Sardeaux".
*"finlandssvensk" like you probably guess or already know Swedish is Finland's second official language and Finnish people whose mother tongue is Swedish are called "Finnish Swede" or "Finlandssvensk". That's why Swedish is contemporary in Finnish schools.
And maybe I should say I'm sorry 'bout the schäfer but I'm actually not, and if it helps you may think this story is pre-Hanatamago, as it is actually. You'll get to know Ber's German better a little later, and at least I like the dog a lot, so maybe you'll learn too. (or might be I just panick about your reaction and you think it's just okay.)