Senior Police Officer IV Callon Gallaner looked at the frightened boy, and then continued walking to the burned house. He left the crowd of onlookers. There were fire trucks, ambulances, police cars, and the forensics team. Blinkers flashed in the night as firemen hurried on the wet grounds, carrying hoses and other tools.

The number of the house was 3. The small property was in the middle of two, huge houses that had tall firewalls. House number 3 was now nothing, but a shadow with debris on which firemen focused their flashlights in search for corpse. Gallaner had been assigned to the case only this afternoon. He never left the possibility of a simple accident, but it had happened twice within two nights. And where were the residents? “The neighbors said that the residents had entered the house a few minutes before the fire started, and that they didn’t get out of the house after that,” a Police Officer 1 said as he joined Gallaner. “The firemen have finished the search. No bodies were found.”

                They turned their flashlights on, and stepped into the property. “They were a family. Mr.Don Chrom, Mrs.Matilda Chrom, and their child, Lenon Chrom.”

                Gallaner spotted a broken flower vase in a pile of debris. He could picture how Mrs.Chrom took care of that vase. “Mr.Chrom was 32-years-old, Mrs.Chrom was 32-years-old also, and little Chrom was 8-years-old.”

                Gallaner spotted a bowl with dinosaur patterns in another pile of debris. They carefully walked on the wet ashes on the floor. They moved to the inner part of the “house,” investigating everything that their flashlights could help them see.

The possibility of an accident as the cause of these fires was becoming thinner. Gallaner dreaded what could be next. He had worked on cases of serial murders in the past, and he hated working on another one. Another set of murders, another killer’s game. After so many years in the force, he had developed strength against the most sensitive things, but murder cases still gave him a deep feeling of dread.

Someday, he would just retire, and live a life of simplicity and peace, but it seemed that that day was still too far. As life went on for everyone, evil characters continued to go beyond normal to kill the innocents. It was the job of the police to stop such evil characters. The worldwide fight against crime seemed to be an endless battle. If it ever ended, that meant that one side had won, and who could that side be? Crime was like a disease, and it even managed to infect some parts of the police department itself.

They had reached the back of the property. Some smoke were still left lingering in the air, but there was something else. The odor of death. It was the odor that came right after a tragic death, and before decomposition. For investigators, it was more to the mind than to the nose. Gallaner just frowned at the smell even though the firemen were already grimacing at the smell of it. Gallaner was used to it, it existed in every murder scene that he had investigated in the past. A stench that was a combination of flesh, blood, and some other unpleasant thing. How sure were they that nobody died here? The real question, where were the bodies being brought? The most dreadful thought that Gallaner didn’t want to think of was here: they were against an arsonist.