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20:01 Sunday 14 March 2077
“What do you mean, there was no warning that this might happen?”
Michelle was furious. She knew – and One Life, the resistance organisation, also knew –that seven years old was the point at which Recarns began to regain the memory of their past lives. The twins’ parents, Janice and Paul, had been comprehensively trained in observation and behavioural analysis techniques and had been providing daily reports on their young sons. Nothing had raised any red flags; those daily reports had been studied and analysed by experts and any problems had been put down to sibling rivalry or simply normal child behaviour that could be seen in any family unit. There had been no recorded instance of a Recarn regaining past life memory until after his or her seventh birthday, but special attention had been paid to the twins’ development since their sixth birthday. They appeared for all intents and purposes to be normal healthy children.
Yet there they were. Michelle, her second-in-command Danielle, and Zafar, along with other high-ranking One Life officials looking stunned as they surveyed the scene of utter carnage before them.
Strewn around the garden were the limp lifeless corpses of several children. A couple of hours earlier they had been enjoying themselves at the twins’ birthday party, stuffing their faces with ice cream, jelly, and cake. Now it looked like they had fallen into a threshing machine and been spewed out in pieces.
The scene was surreal; half a dozen miniature superheroes were scattered about the garden in varying positions of death, most killed by stab wounds, although Wonder Woman was suspended from an apple tree, hanged by her own Lasso of Truth. Sprawled across the table were the bodies of the twins’ parents, Janice and Paul, crushed food and a pool of blood congealing beneath their bodies. It was quite macabre how the birthday cake had soaked up the blood and was now a mixture of yellow and red sponge. Michelle turned to her colleagues.
“I’ll ask again. Why was there no warning? How could we not have seen this coming?”
A bespectacled man with a shock of grey hair was the first to attempt to offer an answer.
“We know that Recarn memories only kick in after the seventh birthday. There’s been absolutely no recorded instance of a Recarn regaining past memories before this age. And we have been paying special attention since the twins turned six years old.”
“Well something has obviously gone wrong, hasn’t it? I mean, we’ve been watching them, haven’t we? Was there no hint that something was wrong?”
“None. None whatsoever. We’ve been studying them meticulously and comparing them to a very large cross-section of normal – well, non-Recarn – children, and they’ve been completely typical. We included twins in that number too, just to be sure that being a twin wouldn’t affect the results. Nothing, absolutely nothing, gave us cause for concern.”
“I want the records of these two boys to be dissected, analysed, and gone through with a fine tooth comb. We need to know what we missed.”
“I don’t see how we could have missed anything, Michelle. We had not only our best behavioural analysts on the case but the latest profile analysis software too.”
“Well, the mess that we’re standing in now would rather suggest the opposite, don’t you think?”
Michelle made her way over to where the lifeless body of six year old Alice Sedgeley was still hanging from the outstretched branch of the young but healthy apple-tree.
“What does this tell you?”
The investigators looked at the body of the girl, her body limp as if she were a marionette whose strings had been cut. The confident voice of a new arrival broke the murmuring.
“That branch is about ten feet off the ground. The girl is about three foot ten inches tall. The average height of children between the ages of six and eight - which is the age range of the children at the party - is between three foot ten inches and four foot two. Even if Liam and Connor worked in unison, they couldn’t have done this by themselves. They couldn’t have hauled the girl up there and left her hanging without help.”
Michelle was impressed how her younger sister, Caitlin, had turned her life around after her ordeal at the hands of Marcus. She had been left emotionally crushed by his abuse but had come out of the experience a stronger and more determined woman, mainly thanks to the intensive training to be a field agent like her older sister. The training could have broken her even further but she had managed to come out the other side a remarkably strong and well-balanced individual. Maybe there was something in the genes that she and her sister shared that had given them this strength.
“Not only that, but there are only six bodies, six children’s bodies anyway. Has anybody checked the house?”
A scene of crimes analyst in a too white plastic jump-suit raised his hand gingerly. He was very good at his job but there was something very intimidating in the air when the Boone sisters were together.
“Yes. The house is empty. No blood anywhere and no other bodies. We did find two cake slices hidden inside the piano though. Do you think that may be relevant?”
“I don’t know, but highlight it in the report anyway. So, there were twelve guests and only six of them are accounted for?”
“Yes.”
“I think it’s safe to say that Liam instigated this.”
“Why Liam?”
“Because Liam came from the embryo into which we placed Marcus’s soul. We’ve always known which twin had the soul implanted, even though Janice and Paul didn’t.”
“Do you think that Liam forced Connor to help him?”
“Maybe, but I doubt that he needed much persuading. They’re twins, remember. They’ve been together since the womb.”
Caitlin joined her sister in front of Alice’s body.
“Can we get the poor girl down now, please? Let’s give her a little dignity in death.”
The scene of crimes officer beckoned a colleague to help him and they cut the cord that was keeping poor Alice attached to the tree. Whilst the child’s body was zipped into an oversized body-bag and placed alongside the body bags of her fellow party guests, Michelle took four plastic garden chairs from a stack of unused chairs after coming to the conclusion that she wouldn’t be contaminating the crime scene. She placed them on the patio and beckoned over her sister, Zafar, and Danielle. The rest of the investigation team carried on with their work.
When all four were seated, Zafar leaned forward on his seat, being careful not to move his weight too quickly in case the flimsy chair legs gave way.
“These are the facts as we know them. This evening, six children and two adults were brutally murdered at a seventh birthday party for twins Liam and Connor, a party organised by their parents Janine and Paul Hillary. The parents are the two deceased adults.”
Danielle had a question.
“How many children were at the party?”
“Twelve in all, including the twins. Six were found dead. They were all dressed in superhero costumes – it was a fancy dress party. The deceased children were Grant Roberts and his sister Marcia aka Superman and Supergirl. David Hawkes aka Thor. Philip Clarke aka the Flash. Ronan Peters, the boys’ cousin. He was dressed as Captain America. And the poor girl who was dressed as Wonderwoman, who was hanged, was Alice Sedgeley. That leaves Jeremy ‘Jazz’ Fairley aka Iron Man, Rebecca Walker aka Catwoman, Martin Dier aka Wolverine, and Stephen Tufnell aka Robin, the Boy Wonder, all unaccounted for.
“Now we know that Liam and Connor are the instigators of this massacre, particularly Liam. Michelle and Caitlin already know, but – for Danielle’s benefit -– I’ll reiterate that Liam Hillary is the reincarnation of Marcus Gallagher.”
Danielle pretended not to know, although Michelle had already told her this a couple of years earlier. She didn’t want to get Michelle into trouble. Zafar expanded on the details as she hadn’t been present at Marcus’s final demise.
“Long story short, when we had him detained we couldn’t terminate him – much as we would have liked to – so, thanks to information that we received from our scientists, we were able to neutralise him, take away his Recarn properties, and transfer his soul into a fresh embryo, thus cutting him off from his past life memories and giving him – and us – a fresh start. Unfortunately, tragically, it looks like we screwed up. But I must emphasise that it was the only solution that we could see at the time. We have no reason to believe that his twin brother Conner is a Recarn, but he may be helping him out of a misguided sibling bond.”
“These other kids. What do we know about them?”
“We believe that at least one of them is an accomplice, maybe more. Jeremy Fairley is quite a big lad for his age so he probably helped in the hanging of young Alice Sedgeley. Rebecca is a bit of a wild child and suffers from Tourette’s, so if she starts swearing at you don’t take it personally – she can’t help herself. I can’t see her being an accomplice though. Martin Dier, well, he’s a bit of a lad. Doesn’t seem to be scared of anything, a risk-taker, says he lives for adventure. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, and I don’t know what side of the fence he’s fallen. His mother says that she has wondered sometimes if he might be a Recarn, but she’s never had him tested.”
A memory drifted into Michelle’s mind; she’d once known a young boy who thrived on adventure.
“That just leaves Stephen Tufnell, who was dressed as Robin. A quiet boy, by all accounts. Definitely not a scrapper. I’d be surprised if he put up much of a fight. Probably ran off.”
Philippa, Caitlin’s clone came into the garden, her right hand gripping tightly the arm of an undersized Wolverine.
“Look who I found spying on us in the woods.”
Martin protested.
“I wasn’t spying. I just wanted to know when it would be safe to get my backpack.”
The group looked at Philippa’s prisoner. Michelle looked at him even more closely. Something about him seemed familiar but she couldn’t quite place where she might have seen him before.
“Who is he?”
“Says he’s Martin Dier, one of the party guests, and insists he wasn’t part of all this.”
Michelle directed her next question at Martin.
“Why were you doing that, Martin? It is Martin, isn’t it? Did you come back to admire your handiwork?”
The questioning was interrupted momentarily whilst three ambulances arrived to take away the bodies. Michelle continued.
“Well? Why did you come back?”
Martin broke his silence.
“You can’t really think I’m responsible for these murders? I’ve already said I had nothing to do with this.”
“You may have helped Liam and Connor. They couldn’t have done all this by themselves. Especially hanging the little girl from the tree.”
“As soon as it started I did a runner. It wasn’t just Liam and Connor. There was a bigger boy with them. Dressed as Iron Man. The last thing I saw before running away, he was helping Liam kill the kid dressed up as Thor. Me and Stephen ran into the woods.
“Stephen, where is he?”
“They started chasing us. The twins, this Iron Man kid, and a girl dressed like Catwoman.”
“Rebecca Walker.”
“I don’t know her surname. Anyway, they caught up with us and killed Stephen. You’ll find him in the woods. Iron Man killed him. The kid gave up his life for me. He was always picked on at school for being a bit of a wimp, but he saved my life. It’s usually the other way around.”
“What do you mean, it’s usually the other way around?”
“You don’t recognise me, do you, Michelle? But then again, why would you? I don’t look like I did when we first met.”
“We’ve met?”
“Yes. We climbed through the sewer together to rescue Caitlin.”
He looked at Caitlin as the penny dropped. Caitlin’s eyes widened.
“That was you? You’re Buzz?”
“Yes, Caitlin. It’s me. Back from the dead, sort of. We didn’t get much of a chance to be introduced – what with you being all groggy and then me getting killed.”
Michelle gestured to Philippa to remove the handcuffs, who looked over at Zafar for confirmation that it was okay to do so.
Zafar nodded.
“Without him, Neither Caitlin nor Michelle would be with us now.”
Michelle stood up and gave Martin a hug.
“Hello, Buzz. Good to see you alive again.”
Whilst the reunion was going on, Zafar made a call on his smartphone and arranged for Stephen’s body to be collected. He turned to his team.
“Right. We have agents combing the area for the fugitives. It’s best that we get some sleep and start afresh bright and early in the morning. Say five o’clock? We’ll debrief Martin then.”
Michelle was surprised that she, Caitlin, Danielle, and Philippa were being sent home.
“It’s still early Zafar. We’d be better occupied helping with the search.”
“I know. But I want you to go home now. You’ll find out why tomorrow. Just get some sleep. That’s an order.”
Martin pointed at his fancy-dress costume.
“Can I change out of this? My regular clothes are in a backpack in the dining-room.”
Zafar nodded.
“Of course. The bag will have been taken away but we can get it back. In the meantime, what shall we do with you? For all intents and purposes, you’re a seven year old boy, a minor, who can’t be left alone to fend for himself.”
Michelle took hold of Martin’s hand.
“Martin can come home with me. The others may still be looking for him. It’ll be safer.”
“Okay. Five o’clock. At the office.”