RP Log: It Gets Worse

Roleplay Log
Participants: Sawyer	Coil
Location(s): Medical Complex Stardrive - USS Phoenix Morgue Stardrive - USS Phoenix
Stardate: 126214.0
2023-05-05 05:34

[Sawyer's Commbadge] Coil says, "Coil."

Sawyer says, "Kellen, Phill Sawyer here. I have a stupid question. Ready for it?"

[Sawyer's Commbadge] Coil raises an eyebrow, "Is it about my stash of bloodwine?"

Sawyer chuckles. "Not this time," he says. "Besides, Kentucky bourbon's better. Anyway! Security's kinda tied up, and I was thinking. Do you know a smidge about knives, or hand to hand fighting? I'm trying to tie up some threads here, and I thought of ya."

[Sawyer's Commbadge] Coil considers, "I hold my own in hand to hand, I think you've patched me up a few times after sparring, Doc. And what kind of knives are you wanting to know about? The ones used for sculpting? Woodworking? Survival? Or since you're asking about hand to hand, used in fighting?"

Sawyer says, "Maybe some, maybe all. If you're not busy, you able to meet me in the stardrive morgue? I would like to show ya some wounds and pick your brains. Both of em."

[Sawyer's Commbadge] Coil shrugs, "I guess I can try to help you with that, Doc."

Sawyer says, "I'd be much obliged."

[Sawyer's Commbadge] Coil says, "So where am I going? I haven't been down in that part of the ship before."

Sawyer says, "Ok, deck 27, medical complex. I'll meet ya there."

[Sawyer's Commbadge] Coil says, "On my way then, Doc."

Sawyer says, "see ya there."

Medical Complex - Stardrive <USS Phoenix NCC-170100-A>

The stardrive corridors of the Medical Complex are not quite as spacious as the saucer section's, but still allow for easy access to the various compartments. The walls and bulkheads are a dark titanium colour, with vertical inlays every meter of a dark burgundy colour matching the carpeting. The carpeting down the center of the corridor is dark burgundy with a light pewter-coloured outer edge. Recessed lighting in the ceiling and along the floor boards provides slightly muted illumination, adjusting in colour as the alert status of the vessel changes. Black, glossy panelling runs intermittently along the bulkheads at shoulder height, allowing access to the LCARS interface.

Sawyer is just exiting from the medical lift which brought him down from the saucer main sickbay.

Coil steps into the medical complex in the belly of this beast. He glances around, "Bigger than some sickbays, like Buran's, isn't it?"

Sawyer smiles. "It sure is. I appreciate ya coming." he approaches and speaks in a more confidential tone. "You might have heard we had a murder aboard. It's nasty. Thing is, I'm trying to see about a few details, maybe one of em will help. Autopsy's still going on. But I don't know if you need to see the actual body to help, or if scans will do for ya. That's why I asked ya to come here."

Coil shrugs, "I can take a look at the body and at least tell you my thoughts before you tell me the details, Doc."

Sawyer says, "Alright. Let's do that. Come this way."

Morgue - Stardrive <USS Phoenix NCC-170100-A>

This room differs from the majority of rooms aboard the vessel in that the standard colour scheme is absent. Carpeted in dark grey with white bulkheads, this small room is completely barren but for several panels of uniform size set into the bulkheads, as well as a glossy black LCARS interface. The panels open into compartments, used to store the bodies of the recently deceased until proper burial can be arranged, or until an autopsy can be performed (should an autopsy be warranted). One panel houses an antigrav bed, upon which the cadaver can be placed for transportation.

Sawyer enters the morgue. Punching in a few commands and verifying his med clearance, he causes a stasis chamber to descend onto the nearst table. He sets it to full transparency, revealing the body of a human woman. Her body is apparently covered in many knife wounds which would have bled copiously, and the neck's at an odd angle. The doctor explains. "Kellen, she was tortured. These knife wounds were painful, but deliberately nonfatal. That blow to the jaw, fractured the neck, that's what did it. If I could match these knife wounds to anything, it'd help. If we could understand something about who could break a neck like that, it could help."

Coil looks over the corpse dispassionately, "Tortured? Any idea why?" He walks around and frowns at the location and considers what the Doc said, "You're looking for a smaller knife, not something used for butchering or cooking."

"No, don't really know. There was a note on the victim. It basically said something like, traitors to the humanist cause must die, or words to that effect. Jim has a copy. Could be the real mccoy. Could be a faint." He notes what you said. "Small blade. Like our combat issue knives you can get from a weapons replicator? Or smaller?"

Coil shrugs, "Depends on the skill of the user, but the smaller the blade, the easier precision gets. The difficulty is in whether your material is trying to move away from you, and what your goal is." He looks at Sawyer, "What's the depth of the cuts? Are they all shallow, or do some go into the inner organs?"

"The killer was pretty good about stearing clear of the organs, major arteries, anything that would be critical or fatal in and of itself. I mean, some of them are deeper than others, but it looks like they knew where not to cut."

"What's the depth of the deepest cut?" Kellen asks as he walks around the corpse again, "It sounds like someone familiar with human physiology. I'm not sure I could avoid your arteries or organs beyond your heart and throat."

Sawyer hunts through the scan readings. Then he points to one. "This one. Left buttock. Lots of muscle there, but not fatal. About, 3 inches long, and something extremely sharp. ALmost like an old time scalple." Then he goes pale. After a moment he voices his thought. "You're right. It'd take an expert in human anatomy to cut so exactly and not to slip up. Someone like, a doctor."

Coil takes in the news, "Knives are built differently depending on their use, Doc. A butcher knife is usually heavy and thick spined, doesn't need a razor sharp edge because the mass of the blade is what pushes the edge through the meat. While a fillet knife is skinny and thin with the edge very sharp so you can slice off thin strips with minimal effort." He frowns, "3 inches in the ass? So you're looking for a fairly small blade length, 2 inches or less, since the buttocks would give allowing for the blade to push deeper. Some scalpels would have a blade length that long, but it sounds more like a hobby knife, something easier to replicate without being traced."

"What kind of hobbies would use a knife like that?" Sawyer asks.

Coil shrugs, "Mara had some paring knives for detailing fruit or vegetables that were shorter blades, but are sharp. Useful for adding some enhancement when presenting a dish. Let's see, Selor had a variety of knives for sculpting clay but they weren't particularly sharp since clay is forgiving. Woodworking does use extremely sharp edges, but the blades tend to be thicker as most wood are rather hard, but you could get some very thin blades for the softest woods." He goes to look at the scan readings, "I'd say it's a thinner blade, maybe for leatherworking or scrapbooking, papermache, softer materials."

"Well, that'll give security something to look for. I mean, the replicators and reclamators keep patterns and records of what they make. Assuming our killer didn't delete the replication or reclamation records. Which they could have. Damned handy with the computer, too."

Coil shakes his head, "It's extremely concealable, Doc. Even more than my knife. If they're intelligent, they'll have brought a full set of tools for whichever hobby it's for with them, so that security won't be able to trace them."

Sawyer nods. "What about the killing blow. Any insite into that? I mean, it was obviously effective, but it's not the surest thing they could have done if ya ask me."

"That's not making much sense to me," Kellen admits. "All that torture and with precision cuts, and then suddenly someone hits them crudely with a fist?" He looks at the scan readings, "Broken neck, was it? A lot of torque needed for that, isn't it?"

Sawyer nods. "Sure. Ya can do it that way. But there are more surefire ways to break the neck. I was thinking maybe one person cut, another person punched, but I can't prove that."

Coil frowns thoughtfully, "That does make more sense. Having a bruiser on hand does make controlling a prisoner easier. She must've done something to piss this one off though."

"You think maybe he lost control and let her have it?" Sawyer asks. He runs a closeup scan of the blow.

"Bruiser types aren't always known for their ability to think," Kellen points out. "They tend to react, not act."

Sawyer nods. "Alright, Kellen. I'm gonna be frank with ya. I don't often do murder investigations. What haven't I asked yet that I shoulda?"

Coil shrugs, "I've never been a doctor or a cop, Doc. While I haven't exactly lived a lawful life per Federation laws in the past, I haven't got much more to contribute." He considers, "I'd do a scan of her teeth, wrists, and ankles."

"You're thinking she was bound?" Sawyer inquires. He taps in a series of scans, not neglecting the dental.

"Ever butcher a Targ, Doc?" Kellen asks.

"Always meant to get around to it, but never have," Sawyer quips.

Coil gestures to the corpse, "Precision cuts are impossible if what you're cutting on is squirming and moving and fighting you."

"Now look, here, here ... and there," he points, though doesn't touch the body. "Notice how the contusions are opposed? Fingers on one side, opposable thumb on the other. Someone held her down I think. That makes it definite at least two people."

Coil nods slowly, "Likely the bruiser."

"What were you thinking about the teeth? Think she bit one of 'em?" He asks, remembering that part. Coil shrugs, "Torture usually means they want something from the victim. How do you stop yourself from saying anything?"

Sawyer looks closely at the dental scans. "Bite down on something? You're having a brain wave. What?" He steps forward and pries the mouth open.

Coil gazes off into the distance, "Not the first time I've been around torture, Doc."

"Look. These incisors, canines. There's some wear there, and Starfleet does better dentistry than that. These linguals and molars, cracked. and," he taps into her file. "Her last physical was a few months ago. You don't do that kinda damage naturally. Lordy Kellen, what was she trying not to say. Trying so hard that she was biting down on ... or just grinding her teeth, maybe? Keeping her mouth shut so tight. If you have even a slight overbite or underbite, you can crack teeth that way."

Coil pulls his thoughts back to the present and shakes his head, "I have no idea, Doc. She obviously knew something that she didn't want to reveal, whether it was what they were torturing her for or not."

Sawyer nods. "I agree. She wasn't just screaming her head off. She was holding it in, because there was something to hold in. Or she thought there was. And she died for it." He sighs, rubbing one hand up his cheek. "Then there's the computer sabotage. That's out of my area. But we already got two killers in the room. How many working outside it to sabotage the life sign sensors in the stardrive."

"Not that hard to sabotage internal sensors, Doc," Kellen says. "Especially if you have access to the command codes or even were involved in the design or building of the ship. If it's the Humanists behind this, then both are possible."

Sawyer nods. "Yeah, yeah. That's way beyond me. Better talk to Jim about that one I reckon," he says tiredly after a beat. "Listen, Kellen, I can't think of anything else to ask, and if you don't see anything else that sticks out to ya, I'm gonna put the crewman here back. I still need to finish the DNA forensics later. Maybe one of these bastards left a trace, something we can hang a name on."

Coil shakes his head, "This was too methodical and thought out. Up until the blow on the jaw anyway, Doc. She was going to die either way since they wouldn't have been able to keep her from telling someone, but from the reports I've seen, it sounds like they got interrupted."

"By what, I wonder," Sawyer muses.

Coil shrugs, "The red alert, most likely. But why was the alert called?" He heads for the door, "The note suggests that after they were done with her, they were going to leave her as a warning. If it was an internal matter, whoever was being warned likely would've disposed of her and we never would've known. If it was a warning for us, then she would've been left publicly somewhere, possibly with the signs of torture covered up by more crude slashes and cuts."

Sawyer nods. "Jim's report doesn't say who called the alert." He sighs. "Kellen, thanks. I'm gonna write this all up. But thanks for the help."

"Next time, try to ask me about pottery or woodworking," Kellen says as he pauses at the door. He glances back at the corpse, "Even cooking. Stuff like this is something I would love to forget about."

"You and me both," the doctor says. "Night, Kellen."