Chapter 10: Profiling

The sun was receding slowly. The evening sunlight poured out over the streets like a fine wine.

The Delta Squad members kept interrogating the citizens of the town without any break, trying to find any clue they could about the whereabouts of the culprit. They were too immersed to feel any tiredness.

The teams spread out throughout the town and asked every person about the case. Unfortunately, none of the townsfolk were able to provide them with the information they sought.

None of them saw a person covered in blood or anyone wounded. None saw anyone they considered suspicious. Let alone seeing a person like that, none of them even acknowledged seeing a man whom they hadn't seen before in the town.

There was only one person in the entire town that had seen Lucifer and was still alive. It was the person that had told Lucifer about the whereabouts of the Legion City. He still wasn't interrogated as he was comfortably sitting in his home.

Knock! Knock!

A calm knocking sound echoed through the walls of his wooden house. The knock fell onto the man's ears, breaking the serene silence inside the entire house.

The man stood up from his seat and walked towards the door lazily, taking all his time.

It was the last house that was yet to be interrogated by the Delta squad. So, it was the last hope of finding any information regarding the culprit.

Flourance had personally come to ask questions, followed by two other team members.

Xander wasn't here, though. Xander had gone back to the restaurant with the others, leaving Flourance to interrogate the last house.

A dark-haired man opened the door before Flourance.

"Yes? Who are you?" The man asked Flourance.

After introducing himself formally, Flourance politely and patiently repeated the same questions that he had been asking everyone. The man took some time to think about it, but his answer was the same as the others.

He also shook his head and claimed not to know anyone that might match that description. He hadn't seen a person who he could describe as wounded.\

Though he did find the loose clothes of Lucifer weird, he didn't focus on it much since the questions weren't about that. He had also thought that these people were looking for a criminal. Who would have thought that a kid would be the one they were looking for?

Their description made the person they were looking for seeming like a vile criminal that was wounded and covered in blood or walking abnormally or acting suspiciously. The first thought that came into the minds of people was of an adult. So, Lucifer was automatically excluded from their thoughts.

The man was not any different in this case. He had seen an unknown child, but he never saw a wounded person. The man simply denied it as he said that he didn't see anyone like that.

Flourance sighed in frustration as he frowned in unhappiness.

"You are all useless. This entire town is useless. In broad daylight, a restaurant was destroyed. So many people were killed, and no one saw anything!"

"I never saw such a useless town filled with such careless people. You are all so irresponsible," Flourance complained in frustration before he turned back.

The man scratched the back of his head as he saw Flourance stomping away.

'What a rude guy!' He thought.

****

Flourance went back to the restaurant where he met Xander and informed him about his findings… or his lack of findings.

"It's so strange. Is the culprit even human? Is he a ghost or somebody invisible? Or could it be that he had the power to jump into the shadows and disappear? That could describe why no one saw him." Flourance grunted after he finished his sentence. Honestly, he was quite annoyed and hopeless by then.

"We have so many theories already about his potential powers. All we can do is wait and hope that the forensics would be able to give us some clues about who this guy or girl is," Xander acknowledged, his face darkening at the thought.

"Just who was this person, and where exactly did he disappear?" He wondered with worry.

The day was hot, and the temperature was already over thirty-five degrees Celsius, but the Delta Squad members weren't feeling hot. They had trained in both extremely hot and cold weather.

The team finished collecting all the clues and evidence that they could find. They also collected the bodies and arranged for their transport.

It was at that moment; three armored trucks entered the town.

The armored trucks had moved through the uneven roads of the town before they ultimately reached the restaurant. They stopped right before Xander and the others.

Mayne stepped out with the other team members, who began transporting the bodies to the newly arrived vehicles.

"Mayne," Xander called out to Mayne, who was standing near him.

"Yes, Captain?" Mayne replied as he tried to make sure that his body didn't go tense again.

Xander was standing with his back resting against the wall. His purple eyes were observing every change in Mayne's expressions.

"What do you think about the case? You're an expert in profiling. Give us a profile on this guy from what you observed here."

Mayne clenched his fists as he took a deep breath. It was finally his chance to shine.

Previously, he had gone tense when Xander had asked him a question. It was the time to redeem himself, and he didn't want to screw up again. He took a deep breath before he started answering.

"We don't have any information as to who did it, and there's no CCTV footage either. But we do know his motives. That guy was looking for food. I believe his intentions weren't to kill, but some kind of conflict happened here, which made him do it." Mayne spoke in a single breath, his sentences coming out as if he had memorized them.

Seeing how he answered, some unaware people might have even thought that he had been preparing to answer this all along.

"It's going to be difficult finding him, but I'm sure he will commit a massacre like this again. Even though it wasn't his intention at the start to kill people, the way he killed them all, I feel like he enjoyed the slaughter."

"He got a taste of this forbidden fruit. If he loses himself in this desire to feel strong over others, he will do it again. So we must find him. This experience might have created a real monster."

Mayne started describing how he felt the culprit's psyche worked. Even though he was talking in his usual tone, each of his words seemed to bear much weight and left a chill down everyone's spine, creating a scary picture of a monster in their minds.

Mayne's eyes were fixated on Xander, who had an expressionless face. He was oblivious to how vivid the expressions of others who were hearing his words were.

Mayne continued with his description without even waiting for a second to take a breath. However, he did take short breaths every now and then as if afraid that his chance to speak up would be taken away if he paused for too long.

"What I don't understand is how we didn't know about a Variant like this? He or she must've been over twenty years old, at least from what I can think. But a Variant can only awaken their powers when they are younger than ten."

"So, it doesn't seem like the case of a person who just awakened his/her power and failed to control it," Mayne explained. "But that raises another question. How is it that there has never been an incident like this before?"

In the end, Mayne finished with a question that was plaguing him for some time now. "Why has this person spent over ten years peacefully and just committed a slaughter over something as small as hunger?"

Xander's expression slightly changed for the first time since Mayne had started speaking.

"Maybe he was a hermit who didn't publicize his powers and lived a sheltered life? It's possible that it was the first time someone annoyed him, which caused him to lose control of his emotions?" Flourance guessed as he shifted his gaze from Mayne to Xander.\

Mayne agreed. "Indeed. That's possible."

"It's either that or this thingy with food is just to divert our attention," Xander chimed in with an assumption that no one had thought of yet.

"I thought that it was a similar story about a hungry Variant killing for food, but as Mayne said, some things don't make sense in that story," he continued.

Flourance, Mayne, and the others also fell on deep thought as they heard of this possibility. Their brains churned, storming with different possibilities and causes, but none seem to articulate them in words.

Xander noticed Mayne's expression change a little.

Xander didn't miss it, even though it was for only a split second when Mayne's lips quivered. So he spoke out instantly, "You can say whatever you want to say, Mayne. Don't hold back."

Mayne cleared his throat and nervously pinched the elastic band attached to his long hair before speaking again.

"Could it be some Variant Organization like VU be behind it? They might be trying to make us waste our time in this place for some reason to keep us off their tails while they plan for something big and more threatening. No matter how fleeting the possibility is, I believe we can't ignore it."