[ WP ] A serial murderer who has performed 100 's of inhumane experiments is caught . His research suggests he has found cures for several major diseases and wo n't divulge unless all charges are dropped .

I paused at the entry to the house, where the CSU forensic specialists were slowly stripping off their space suits for the last time, the forensics had finally been finished. I took a hefty dab of the Vics Vapo-rub from the large pot that they had open and hoped it would work. Even now that most of the bodies and remains had been removed, the smell had sunk into every surface within the house; it would need to be bulldozed, ploughed into the earth and burned repeatedly to remove the smell and the memory of what happened here. I rubbed the Vics under my nose and wondered if it would keep the memories out as well as the smell. 
 
 This would be my third time inside the house and while I could happily live the rest of my life without having to consider it ever again, if we were going to get any information from the scumball who did this, then I needed my memory fresh. 
 
 I pushed through the door and into the kitchen, keeping to the narrow strip of paper that CSU had laid even though it wasn ’ t strictly necessary anymore. That first night it had been dark in here when Jim and I had burst in, lured by the screams we ’ d heard, not knowing what kind of a hell we were stumbling into. 
 
 The girl had begged us not to go but as soon as the ambulance had arrived and we ’ d heard the scream, we knew we had to move. She ’ d escaped an hour before, an hour for the sick bastard to start cleaning up, that ’ s what we were worried about then, a lack of evidence. It seems almost funny now. 
 
 The kitchen that night had been dark and the smell only faint but Jim and I were both seasoned, we ’ d both smelled decomp before. It took us only a minute to go through the small house, room by room, by the numbers. Jim had seen it, the crack of light that we might have missed if the lights had been on; so many times when luck and coincidence had led us onwards, so many times in the past it had kept him concealed. If that girl hadn ’ t managed to escape would he have ever been found? If she ’ d bled out in the snow, instead of making her way to the house across the field, would we have ever checked the small farm house with no registered owner? 
 
 In the living room the trapdoor had been taken away now and the hole looked obvious, rigged up with a safety ladder to allow easy access in and out. That first time, clinging to the wooden slats as we made out way into the dark, only our flashlights illuminating the dark, that had been real terror. At the bottom when we ’ d suddenly realised that he tunnels opened up and ran in both directions, now there were signs, lights and still some people pushing trolleys along full of evidence, despite a solid month of collecting. Back then it was dark and quiet. 
 
 I followed our original route, slowly moving along the wall and finding that first door in the dark; now it was also gone, removed to be printed and checked, every inch examined. Inside the cages stood open, the bodies gone and the chains too, but back then they had been full. Girls had begged us, pleaded and screamed as they saw us come in. The arms and the stumps reaching through the bars haunted me and I could see them still, even in this lit, clean room. 
 
 I turned away, perhaps this had been a mistake, coming back here, trying to recapture that night to take it into the interrogation with me. Unthinking I moved along the corridor and entered another of the rooms, this one a clean computer room where he had run some of his terrible genetic experiments. At least it didn ’ t hold any memories for me. A hand touched my shoulder and I flinched and spun, it was one of the techs who shrank back at my reaction. 
 
 “ Sorry! I just need to get past. ” He carefully inched through and I realised that he had been standing behind me speaking for some time, I had just been lost in my thoughts. I watched as he disconnected yet another drive from the huge banks of computers along the wall and pulled out several new ones. 
 
 “ Still downloading this stuff? ” I tried to normalise my voice, make it seem more steady. 
 
 He turned and evaluated me, seeing my badge and recognising me as a detective. “ Not much more now, the guys over at Johns Hopkins say they think we have about 90 % of what he was working on and they ’ re hoping the last 10 % can be reconstructed. If we could get his encryption keys though we ’ d be able to access it all so much quicker… ” He left it dangling in the air, that last great problem, even after all this work, we still needed the bastard ’ s help. 
 
 I smiled grimly. “ I ’ m working on it. ” And I meant it. I ’ d seen enough, I didn ’ t need to go through the tunnels, to see every inch of the place, as I had on my second visit. I didn ’ t need to go back to that room, just down from here where Jim had opened the door to that… that thing and been eviscerated in a second. I didn ’ t need to see every lab, every cage, every sick inch of the place as I had before, walking through in a space suit as they pulled bones from the very plaster of the walls. 
 
 I turned and walked out, back towards the ladder. I had what I needed, I had recaptured the smell of the place in my nostrils and now I was ready to confront him again and get what we needed. 

