“This is case number TX01/20160615, unidentified subject Two. The body is”—she checked the markings on the table and the display of the integrated scales—“fifty inches tall and weighs 132.121 pounds. It appears humanoid, but the skull is elongated and the knee joints appear inverted.
Either that or we are dealing with an animal-type of bone structure, which would make this the tarsus. The body is badly burnt; dermis and epidermis appear mostly carbonized except for parts of the upper back.” She nodded at her assistant, who was in charge of taking pictures, and pointed. “I want close-ups of this and this.”
The camera clicked quietly as Elaine Rockford moved around to find the perfect angles for her pictures. Dr. Butler let her work for a minute or two, then moved in again and continued her initial assessment. “The tissue along what appears to be the left shoulder blade and about halfway down the spine is in better condition than the rest of the body. The texture looks organic in the upper section, metallic in the lower.” She reached up and pulled down the mechanical arm holding the magnifier to zoom in on the area. “Huh,” she grunted, surprised. “This is no shell armor or piece of clothing. It appears the metal is fused to the body on a sub-dermal level.”
She frowned a little and squinted through the lens, intrigued. “This might have been caused by the high temperature and pressure generated during the explosion, but….” She shook her head and trailed off, knowing they’d have to do a full autopsy on the body to make it yield its secrets. They’d get to it.
They had time.
“Last box,” she ordered. “Let’s see if number three has something else to tell us before we go in.”
The third corpse, as it turned out, was special indeed. More damaged, for one. Despite their utmost care, it broke in two when it touched down on the metal surface of the autopsy table. They tried to stabilize the halves, but the scrawny, crispy neck couldn’t take the pressure and snapped like a little twig. Dr. Butler’s basketball training kicked in and she managed to catch the skull before it could shatter. She frowned down at the fragile, fire-
blackened ball of bone, noting how tiny it looked in the cradle of her big, bright-yellow gloves. Dainty as a child’s. But then, they’d already picked up on how much lighter than the other two bodies this one was when they’d lifted it from the container. The sound it had made on impact had been that of an extremely burnt carcass, not that of an extremely burnt carcass suffused with metal.
The team crowded around the table, puzzled by the differences, pointing out how this corpse was all stretched out instead of curled up; its overall condition much worse than the others’, fractures visible in the blackened skin, bones splintered badly, some of them looking as if they’d been bust open from the inside.