[SIGNAL]
Campus anomaly registered.
Flesh dispersion pattern exceeds baseline.
Registrant proximity: confirmed.
Passive observation activated.
Zachariah Trohm and Elias Vance crouched by the overgrown garden strip outside Instruction Wing D, the oldest structure in the Rollins Academic Quadrant.
Just staring at each other.
“I asked you at lunch what you thought about the missing cadavers,”Zachariah muttered.
“And now—bam, answer delivered after dark.
You holding out on me or what?”
Elias rolled his eyes.
“You even see the scalp?”
“I get woozy around blood,” Zachariah said.
“Didn't look.”
“And you're a cop?”
“You know how it is.”
Zachariah stood.
Stretched slow.
“Family connections.”
“That wasn't from a cadaver.”
Elias kept his voice low.
“Those bodies?
Soaked in formaldehyde for years.
Poked, flipped, peeled apart by med students a dozen times over.”
“No way there's fresh blood left in any of their scalps.
And that one—soft, intact.
Either fresh, or stored real careful.”
Zachariah stared at him like he was looking at a pervert.
“You pulled it out and examined it?”
“I was there when it was found.
Technically a witness.
You think I wasn't gonna take a look before the cops got there?”
Zachariah groaned.
“So we're talking fresh skin.
Great.”
He lit a cigarette.
Or tried to.
Wind caught the flame—snuffed it out three times in a row.
Elias didn't say a word.
“No injury reports. No assault calls.
Which means this wasn't a leftover.”
Zachariah gave up.
Flicked the lighter.
Tossed the cigarette to the ground and stomped it out hard.
“So I'm stuck here all night, huh?”
Elias looked at him.
Some people heard“fresh human skin”
and thought about body count.
He thought about bedtime.
Didn't bother answering.
“Trohm! What the hell are you doing over there?”
The voice came from the front steps of the building—
middle-aged man, square build, sharp tone.
“That's my brother-in-law,”Zachariah muttered.
“Most guys get praise from their sister's husband.
Mine treats me like a goddamn rookie in boot camp.”
He pulled on his cap.
“Come on. You're with me now.”
He waved as they approached.
“Captain Marcus, I'm questioning a witness.
This is Elias Vance. He was at the scene.”
Captain Marcus Dyer looked exactly how he sounded.
Boxy jaw. Close-cropped hair.
The kind of guy who didn't need to raise his voice to make you listen.
He glanced at Elias.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Gave your statement?”
Elias nodded.
“Yeah. Said everything I saw.”
That was enough.
Marcus turned back to Zachariah.
“Command wants a full sweep of the campus.
We're low on manpower.
Talk to the admin or student liaison board—pull reliable help.”
“Yes, sir.”
Zachariah headed off.
Elias followed without a word.
A few steps in, Zachariah groaned.
“Perfect. Full sweep.
Just what I wanted tonight.”
“You found scalp.
Not some nail salon trash.
Of course they're sweeping.”
Zachariah scowled.
“If all killers were like you—
clean, straight to the point—we'd be fine.
But no.
This one's out here slicing off skin like it's trash.
Now I'm stuck playing janitor for a murder scene.”
Elias blinked.
Once.
That was it.
—
Police led the sweep.
Student volunteers assigned through the liaison board were assigned under each officer.
The school lit up the entire campus.
Every lamp.
Every corridor.
Every exit sign.
Students carried flashlights.
Or used the torch mode on their phones.
They spread out—
searching.
Hundreds of students and officers.
Moving in concentric rings.
The epicenter:
the classroom where the scalp was found.
Reports started coming in fast.
Faster than anyone expected.
Too easy.
Meat in the flowerbeds.
Meat in other classrooms.
Meat in the restrooms.
Meat wedged behind the vending machines.
All scattered.
All real.
Within the first hour—
dozens of flesh pieces.
Which only made them search harder.
Faster.
Like the next piece might explain something.
Or scream.
Yes—
Elias saw it start to spiral.
The students were going harder now.
More focused.
Even knowing exactly what they were searching for.
Finding chunks of human flesh with that kind of frequency?
It gave them momentum.
Like it mattered more.
Meanwhile, Elias and Zachariah barely looked like they were trying.
Zach was a case.
Being forced into the police academy had twisted him.
Rebellion turned inward.
Downward.
You wouldn't even think about starting the Red Index unless you were already broken.
He didn’t hate his job.
He hated the uniform.
Delaney said it once—
All four of them had something wrong upstairs.
She wasn't wrong.
“They're looking for body parts,”Zach said, leaning against a tree.
“Real flesh. Real death.
Why does it feel like a scavenger hunt?”
Elias scanned the area.
Didn't answer right away.
“People get bored easy.”
He turned.
“Don't move.”
“What is it?”
Zachariah froze.
Elias didn’t say anything.
Just stared upward.
Zach followed his gaze—
above the tree he was leaning on, half-covered by branches,
a nest.
Too dark.
Something was sitting in it.
“Boost me.”
Zachariah barely had time to nod before Elias ran at him.
Dropped into a crouch.
Palms out.
Elias stepped onto his hands.
Got launched up.
One hand caught the branch.
The other reached into the nest.
Fur.
But wrong.
Cold.
Damp.
Familiar.
He dropped down.
Tossed the thing straight into Zachariah's arms.
Zach caught it.
Looked down.
His face said what he didn't.
“You've got to be kidding me.”
Elias dusted his palms.
“See? Even when you slack off, you still find heads.”
Zachariah was holding one.
A human head.
Still wet.
Blood leaking from the eyes, the nose, the jawline.
He didn't scream.
Didn't flinch.
Still had enough left in him to crack a line.
Which said something.
Zach talked like a coward.
Moved like a joker.
But this?
This was something else.
You don't join Red Index unless something in you
knows how to handle blood.
He had it.
Whether he liked it or not.
Zachariah pulled out his phone.
Dialed Marcus.
“Hey, brother-in-law.”
“It's work hours. Don't call me—”
Click.
Call ended.
Zach rolled his eyes at Elias.
“Is every cop built like this?”
Elias didn't look up.
He had the head now.
Phone light angled just right.
“Female. Early twenties.
Probably a student.”
That was all he could tell.
He wasn't a pathologist.
And he wasn't in the mood to play one.
The phone buzzed.
Marcus was calling back.
Zach answered.
“You hung up on me? You little—”
Click.
Again.
He crouched beside Elias.
Two heads, one corpse.
They looked like rich kids playing detective—
but neither of them cared about cars or girls.
Their hobbies ran colder.
Stranger.
Louder in the dark.
“How many pieces did they find earlier?”Elias asked.
Zach blinked.
Started counting in his head.
“Seventy. Maybe eighty.
Probably over a hundred by now.”
Elias pressed his lips together.
“Someone's copying.”
Zach gave him a look.
The kind that asked: Do I look like I missed that?
“Yeah. I know the one.
You mean that case—the cut-up one.”
Elias nodded.
“This year's the anniversary, right?
Looks like someone's paying tribute.”
[SIGNAL]
Copycat segmentation detected.
Historical echo pattern identified.
Registrant trace remains active.
Segment classification: contaminated.
