Colin T. Nelson
Reprisal
Fairy tales do not tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed.
Prologue
After making a cut from just above the left ear across the forehead to just above the right ear, she rolled the skin up over the top of his head to expose the skull. She smiled at the beautiful glistening glow of young bone.
This was her favorite part.
The skull was such a distinct color and a Divine feat of perfect engineering. The pieces came together in thin jagged lines as tightly as the ancient Greek architects did with the marble in the Parthenon. If her assistant wasn’t standing next to her, she’d love to take off her glove and stroke the smooth, cool surface.
Although a small woman, Dr. Helen Wong was proud of her strength, particularly in her fingers. She reached for the Stryker saw and spoke into the microphone hanging above her head, “I am preparing to cut the skull laterally to expose the brain.” On a boy this young, the skull should come apart easily; she could always resort to brute force if necessary.
She sighed. It was a pity to destroy the beauty before her. The saw whined and Dr. Wong started her cut.
In spite of all the modern tools, Dr. Wong knew that fingers were often just as effective. And what difference did it make to this lifeless body? Because murder was alleged, Dr. Wong performed the autopsy.
She worked as the chief medical examiner for Hennepin County in Minneapolis. Her job was to determine the medical cause of death. She felt the pressure from local law enforcement, the FBI, and the prosecutor to expedite her findings.
She’d already read the police report summary and knew about the case from the media. More than a dozen young Somali men had disappeared without explanation from Minneapolis and St. Paul. A few had shown up in Somalia as “freedom fighters” and had been killed. The rest were still missing. The victim in this case had returned for some unknown reason, only to end up dead in Minneapolis. The suspect in custody was charged with first- degree murder.
As to the body slanting down on the aluminum table before her, there wasn’t any doubt really, as to the cause of death. The young man’s throat gaped open like a quartered watermelon from a cut that started below one ear and slashed across to a spot just below the other ear. The laceration extended down through all the tissue and muscle in the throat to reach the spine. Except for the bone in the spine stopping the weapon, the killer might have severed the head.
“Turn in the tox results yet?” she barked at her assistant and instantly regretted her tone. She’d ordered the minimum tests to be run. He nodded in response. She hurried to finish, mindful of her appointment with the dean of the University of Minnesota Medical School later that afternoon.
Dr. Wong felt she had been cheated. Her male predecessor had filled the medical examiner’s position for the county government and, at the same time, was a professor at the medical school. It meant a double salary and much more professional visibility. She was determined to get the same arrangement for herself during her appointment.
She knew the local prosecutors called her “Chopsticks” behind her back because of the crude surgical techniques commonly used in autopsies. The racism angered her, but she performed expertly and when necessary, she testified in court convincingly. Excellence was her defense.
Prior to opening the skull, Dr. Wong completed the external exam quickly and noted that she found no identifying marks on the body. No other trauma except for the lacerated neck presented itself. Since the cause of death was clear to her, she scanned the body quickly. She studied the young black boy’s skin that had turned a shade of gray, like ashes.
She probed along the body with her long fingers. Underneath the latex gloves, her hands looked delicate but hid an immense strength that showed only when she squeezed muscled parts like the biceps.
The feet were heavily calloused, unlike most other people who lived in Minnesota who wore shoes twelve months of the year. They seemed to be tinged the color of a rotten plum. Hard to tell what that meant since the blood had been drained from his body earlier. She preferred performing autopsies on lighter skinned bodies since trauma to the underlying tissues was easier to spot.
One thing bothered her: the same red discolorations covered both his palms.
Dr. Wong was in a hurry, and she assumed they were simply abrasions, which she noted, speaking into the mike hanging above her. She thought they could’ve been the results of a struggle. It didn’t matter since it had nothing to do with the cause of death.
After the exterior exam, she hurried to perform the usual Y incision in the chest. To assist the team, the autopsy table had a body block, a plastic brick, which rested under the body, lifting the chest area in a high, curved arc while the arms and neck fell away. The incision traveled down the length of the body. Dr. Wong preferred to use a good pair of garden pruning sheers instead of the expensive autopsy equipment. The sheers were stronger and cheaper. A small sheen of perspiration popped out from her forehead.
She measured the subcutaneous fat of the abdomen. Looked at the peritoneal surface. She found both lungs adherent to their respective pleural cavities. After her visual check, Dr. Wong used her fingers to feel around inside the opened cavity. She began to remove the organs. They would be observed, weighed, sometimes sliced like a loaf of bread for further analysis. In this case, she saw no need beyond weighing.
The contents of the stomach revealed the remains of onions, tomatoes, meat, and what looked like pie crust. Dr. Wong and her assistant had become pretty good at guessing what the person had just eaten. It was like a game for them.
“Gyros sandwich?” the assistant said.
Dr. Wong chuckled. “I don’t know.” She sifted through the contents with a scalpel. “There’s no pita bread. Looks like some kind of fried meat, not grilled. This is a new one, I guess.”
She spoke into the microphone while examining the heart, “The atria and auricular appendages appear normal. The valves appear normal in circumference and are thin and delicate.” She droned on until the exam of each of the organs was completed, including the kidneys, prostrate, coronary artery, spleen, liver, pancreas, and thyroid.
Dr. Wong could do this in her sleep. While speaking, she thought ahead to the meeting with Dr. Johnson at the university. When she set her sights on a goal, she seldom missed. Still, her success wasn’t guaranteed yet.
As she lifted the brain out of the skull, she spoke aloud, “The vessels at the base of the brain appear to be intact. There appears to be a very subtle contusion of the right temporal tip in an area measuring approximately one-and-a-half by one-and-a-half centimetres.”
Dr. Wong wondered which outfit she should wear for the meeting with Dr. Johnson. What color would be best? Something serious but also not too formal. She glanced at the sweep hand of the digital clock on the wall.
