"Age unknown, sex unknown, DNA not registered", Colibri hammered through the morgue's impersonal corridors. "Only the upper part of the trunk was found underground by a homeless man near the Picpus subway station. The jaw was torn off, the skin was almost completely scratched and there were fourth-degree burns as a result of lesions compatible with chemical burns. That's a hell of a case, at last something exciting."

Sophie Colibri is a tiny scientist, as I explained in the previous chapter. However, despite her size, she will always be the first to receive advances from young men in nightclubs. She is very young, bright, energetic – an euphemism not to say hyperactive – and has a very seductive face if she deigns to take off her enormous glasses. In spite of this, and for perfectly valid reasons, she has become attached to solitude. The only issue with her remains a total absence of tact and delicacy. This absence plus her detachment from the need to build a family made her terminally single despite her twenty-seven years of age. With time, I learnt not to judge this aspect of her life.

"I hope you didn't eat too much sushi on the plane", Jayvart grunted to me.

"Were you worried about where I was, commissioner? I'm deeply touched."

Jayvart growled again. I suppose it is safe to assume that this man despise me deeply enough to hate me.

"The analysis of the rare traces of charred stomach contents came back two hours ago. They, of course– gave nothing", Colibri sighed.

"Colibri, have you considered looking into–"

"– his mouth? Heath, you're not listening carefully enough, the jaw has been ripped off. This is even worse than The Grudge! And this time, our Ichiko didn't leave the jawbone in place. According to the technicians who went on location, it was nowhere to be found."

"The Grudge is a Japanese horror movie", Jayvart muttered into my ear in a smooth tone.

The police captain knew one thing about me: my general culture in terms of contemporary arts is particularly shaky. And the French captain didn't pass up an opportunity to point that out. Inside the morgue, we were all wearing disposable blouses of indefinite color. We put on hideous azure charlottes and slipped some sort of royal blue plastic bags over our shoes. This was enough to detract from the natural beauty of a person like me.

"Incoming! Get ready", Colibri said, sliding her magnetic key over the detector to open the door of her laboratory.

Instinctively, Jayvart and I raised our hands to cover our noses. The smell of roasted pork and rotten food was particularly foul, and only Dr. Colibri was able to keep it out. The chest that had intrigued the forensic scientist so much was on a metal table, surrounded by a set of medical instruments. Colibri sat down on a tall stool and turned on the surgical light, lighting up the half-body.

"I couldn't determine the cause of death", she added in an almost depressed tone, waving a scalpel handle over the charred body. "But all the lesions you can see there were made postmortem. I mean–" she added by tapping the former tip of the scalpel handle against her nose. "I believe she did."

"Any other peculiarities?" I then asked.

"Well, actually–"

Sophie Colibri had the flaw of all geniuses: she loved to keep the suspense going, just as her fictional colleagues Hercule Poirot or Sherlock Holmes. Saving her best conclusions for the end. Her green eyes sparkled and she gave Jayvart and me a condescending smile.

"See that?"

She was pointing to a crude suture on the sternum.

"As usual, after the usual introductive examination, I opened this individual up. And– wait, it's loading–"

She had turned on an absolutely overpriced touch-screen tablet that indicated the unbearable 'buffering'.

"Shit, the password", Colibri swore, no doubt infuriated by the fact that high technology delayed her extraordinary revelations.

"And there I am, poor fool who believed the mark of original sin was the best there was in the world", I laughed, gently. "That high technology and Steve Jobs would save us all from the chaos and demons of–"

"Heath, shut it."

Did I ever tell you that Sophie Colibri can be a real mastiff when she's in a bad mood? Jayvart sneered and the coroner's photographs finally popped on the screen.

"There you go. Here, you see? You too, Jayvart, you can take a look if you want. See, Heath? There, there, and there, there, there, there–"

She was scrolling through the images quickly and I have to confess I couldn't notice anything in that magma of charred flesh.

"But what's to be seen!?" Jayvart eventually pestered. "By Jove, Colibri, you'd better go back to kindergarten with your tricks!"

"Without pointing out the particularly hurtful nature of your remarks, captain, I'm going to enlighten my dear friend Heath. Jayvart, old chap, why don't you go make us some more coffee?"

Jayvart and Colibri exchanged a deadly glance.

Are you wondering why the doctor and I would be bothered with this idiot? Precisely because he's far from being a simpleton. He's just rude, insulting, misogynistic–

"I don't see why I should go and make coffee. I'm not the unemployed Romanian here", he grumbled.

– and deeply racist. Nevertheless surprised by his outburst, I raised an eyebrow at him and swallowed:

"Well, I was left with the idea that you thought I was English."

"When you're not around, Colibri spends her time you and you keep sticking your nose where it doesn't belong. I am a detective. I've done my research."

"Oh, did you find anything for once?"

"Why do you call yourself Heath, for that matter? It's not even your real name!"

"It is supposed to be short for 'Heathcliff'. Besides, I never asked to bear that nickname. It was forced upon me by–"

"Well, apparently no one cares about my extraordinary discovery–" Colibri grumbled.

Jayvart gave me a mocking grin, no doubt delighted with his little revelation.

"On the contrary, please go ahead, Colibri," I sighed.

- Thank you," I sighed. "So, there, you see, we can follow the pulmonary artery. There, there– Hop, here, a little part of it– And bim! It's out! Cut with a blade. And guess what's at the end of the pulmonary artery?"

I suddenly understood the real reason for my early return. I frowned, feeling my heartbeat racing. This physiological state was anything but positive, I explained the reasons above: I was at risk when any emotion would become too intense. Luckily, brave old Jayvart was ready to take the pressure off by lowering the room's average IQ by taking a guess:

"A lung?"

Colibri fluttered her eyes and stared at me desperately before sighing, examining the Frenchman as if he was a particularly interesting teratology subject.

"Aren't you in too much pain, Commissionner?" she asked. "This lack of intelligence– it must be very painful."

Jayvart growled with discontent.

"Perhaps you should be put to sleep, this plus your comment on my dear friend Heath: we're in a clear case of mental pain."

"You're still mad at me about kindergarten, aren't you?"

"Yes. A tiny little bit."

"All right, I take it back", the police captain finally sighed. "Please, you made me pick up your Romanian from the airport and I'm tired. I want to go to bed."

"A proper apology would be appropriate", Colibri insisted.

Jayvart answered only with a grunt. I never heard Jayvart apologize. Or at a game of tarot. And I am not even absolutely positive about that.

"Let's move on", the young woman said, rolling her eyes. "What should be at the end of the pulmonary artery that we don't see in the picture, captain, is the heart of our dear client. I mean: victim."

"The heart. And where did you put it, again?" Jayvart grunted as he scanned the room. "You know the Human Resources don't appreciate your way of–"

"Jayvart, you're useless and killing the vibe. I think I'm going to have to insist on you making us coffee."

"Colibri!"

"The heart wasn't present at the opening of the corpse. Judging by the lesions, there was indeed a hemorrhage when the arteries and veins connecting it to the rest of the circulatory system ruptured – or rather, were cut. This means that the victim was alive during his cardectomy. Or that he was just cerebrally dead when it happen. Either way–"

"So we have a loose heart fetishist in Picpus?" Jayvart grunted.

I'll have to admit it to you: I was pretty close to saying the same thing to myself.

"How nicely said, captain!" Colibri laughed. "The fetishist of hearts. You could make it the title of a book, if you knew how to write. Well, yes, we went from 'off with the head' to 'off with the heart' but that's not the most worrying thing. What bothers me the most is that the heart has been taken out of the body. And that I didn't see a single opening on the body until I made one myself."

There was a moment of silence. Jayvart mumbled:

"This can't be happening. The heart has been extracted, it must have gone through somewhere."

"Through the throat, isn't it?" I murmured.

"Perfect! Heath, that's why you couldn't stay on your damn island!" Colobri exclaimed in a delighted tone. "Yes! At first, I had simply put the jawbone in the same box as the burns and skinning: the murderer doesn't want the identity of his victim determined! That's still true, of course, but it would have been enough to pull his teeth out, which actually takes less time – fun fact."

Maybe Colibri never found the right shoe because of her way of looking at life, all things considered–

"No one can get a heart through there!" captain Jayvart growled.

"Of course they can! I even found traces of melted latex on the trachea, there, on that very spot: the guy who did that is a sick man! For once some interesting case. It's ideal."

"Colibri, get yourself on medication– Heath, if you're feeling sick, don't throw up on my shoes, they're new."

"Are you having a seizure, Heath?"

"It'll pass", I just said. "It's the jet lag."

"That's right", Jayvart laughed.

I didn't know why, but an inflection in his tone of voice made my hair stand on end, if you'll pardon my French. Reality was that I knew what had happened to the de-half person on the dissection table. And that the observation - obvious - had seized me so much that I was on the verge of a cataplexy crisis.

*

Sorry about all the mistakes I made and didn't see... don't hesitate to tell me anything you want in the comments. I realized while translating this chapter that the medical vocabulary was very difficult for me to grasp ^^

Have a nice day and thanks a mil for your time!

Sea