I, detective Leo, sat at my desk in the cluttered police station. The aroma of coffee filled the air, but my focus was on the newspaper before me. My eyes scanned the front page, and my heart sank. Slamming my fist on the table, I muttered bitterly, "Another victim."
I got up, grabbed my leather jacket, and went intently towards Alex's desk.
"Come on, Alex," I said, my voice filled with urgency. "We need to go to the crime scene. We need to gather some clues and information."
Alex got up and followed me. To our worst luck, the car didn't work. So we had to walk to the crime scene. What a nuisance..
We started walking to the crime scene. Alex was quiet on the way there, typical. He always was. "You are still quiet. Hm." I commented. As expected, no reply. I chuckled slightly at my foolishness to think I'd get a reply.
Soon we reached the crime scene, the officers guarding the place so other people won't get in. We showed our badges and were let in. The body wasn't a gruesome sight to see but.. For some reason it sent a shiver down my spine.
The body of a male was cut into pieces, the mouth split towards the ears as a permanent grin, and.. A smiling yellow ball, the one you use as a stress ball or a toy. But the thing was, it was blood-stained.
I gestured Alex to check the surroundings while I looked at the body.
I couldnt find.. Anything. What the hell...
No fingerprints, no signs of forced entry, no indication the victim fought back. The room looked nearly undisturbed — as if the man had just accepted his fate. Only the sickening sight of his mutilated body shattered the calm. The mouth carved into a wide smile, his eyes frozen wide, staring at something only the dead could now see.
And then, of course, the goddamned smile ball.
I crouched next to it. A yellow ball, simple, soft, cheerful — or it would've been, if not for the blood smeared across its surface. It was positioned right in front of the body. Like a signature. Like a joke.
I glanced over my shoulder at Alex.
He stood in the corner, eyes scanning the floor, walls, furniture — silent as always. His face unreadable. His hands were tucked into his coat pockets, shoulders slightly hunched like he was trying to disappear. Most days I chalked it up to social anxiety. But standing there, watching him, something about his stillness felt… different.
"You find anything?" I called.
He shook his head slowly. "Nothing. Just… normal stuff. Dust. Footprints, but probably from the victim. No break-in. No struggle."
I stood and walked over to him. "You seem unusually focused today," I muttered. "Creeps you out too, doesn't it?"
Alex didn't answer. Just nodded.
We left the room, stepping back into the hallway of the small apartment building. Officers moved past us, bagging evidence, securing the scene. Neighbors peeked from behind half-closed doors. I hated this part. The gawkers. The whispers. Like we were part of some macabre TV show.
I lit a cigarette and leaned against the wall. Alex stood beside me, still silent.
"Third victim this week," I said, exhaling smoke. "No connection between them. First was a teacher. Then a bus driver. Now an insurance clerk. Random. Messy. Smart."
Alex tilted his head slightly. "Or… not random. Maybe it's something else. Not the victims. The act."
I looked at him. "What do you mean?"
He shrugged. "Maybe the killer doesn't care who dies. Maybe it's about how."
That stuck with me. I didn't like it. Not because it was wrong — but because it made too much sense.
Back at the precinct, I pinned the crime scene photo on the board in our shared office. Three photos. Three corpses. Three smiling balls.
The first ball was clean, almost untouched, placed on a bookshelf. The second had been stuffed into the victim's mouth. And this third one — blood-streaked and placed deliberately in front of the victim like a final audience to the horror.
Alex sat at the corner desk, typing quietly on his laptop. I turned to him.
"Did you ever play with stress balls as a kid?"
He looked up, surprised. "No."
"Me neither," I muttered. "We couldn't afford that kind of crap. But this guy," I gestured at the photos, "he has a fixation. Something personal. It's like a signature, but not for us. For himself."
Alex nodded slowly. "Or to taunt."
"Yeah. That too." I sat down, rubbing my temples. The fluorescent lights above buzzed faintly. Outside, thunder rumbled. Rain tapped against the windows. It was going to be a long night.
I leaned back. "We need to go back to the first crime scene tomorrow. Maybe we missed something. Something small."
"Okay."
We fell into silence again. The room felt colder. Maybe it was the storm. Maybe it was the photo of the third victim's grin — stretched unnaturally, violently, like a marionette with its strings pulled too tight.
I finally broke the silence. "You ever think about how people snap? Like… what it takes to turn a person into something like that?"
Alex stared at his screen. "All the time."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
Later that evening, I stayed behind. Alex had gone home. Or at least that's what he said.
I kept staring at the board. My coffee had gone cold hours ago. My eyes burned from exhaustion, but my brain wouldn't shut off.
I replayed every detail in my head — the crime scenes, the order of events, the positions of the bodies, the placement of the smile balls. I tried to find a thread, some kind of pattern.
But it was chaos.
And that's what disturbed me the most.
I took the photo of the third victim down and studied it up close. Something about the blood smears on the ball — not random. It looked… deliberate. Not just splattered. Smeared.
I walked over to the evidence locker and requested the physical ball from the third scene.
A young tech retrieved it, handing it over carefully, gloved. "Be careful. Still drying."
I examined it under the light.
There were fingerprints — or at least, what looked like them — but they were too smeared to get a clean lift. Not enough to be useful.
But then something caught my eye. A faint mark on the underside of the ball. Not blood. Ink. A barely visible line — like a scratch, or a letter? I squinted. No, not a letter. A curve. Part of something.
A symbol?
I looked at the other balls again. Photos only. But now I wanted to see the real things. Tomorrow, I'd get them all together. Compare. Examine.
Something told me they weren't just toys.
At home, I couldn't sleep. I poured myself a whiskey and stood by the window, watching the rain. Thunder cracked the sky, and I remembered the victim's face. That smile.
It wasn't just the brutality. It was the message. The same message burned into my brain from years ago, from a case I could never close. A case that had started almost the same way — a single death, random, inexplicable. And then another. Until the killer simply… stopped.
Or had he?
I tried to dismiss the thought, but it clawed its way back up. What if this wasn't a new killer?
What if he'd just been waiting?
I picked up my phone. Dialed Alex.
It rang twice before he picked up. His voice was soft, groggy. "Leo?"
"You okay?"
"…Yeah. Just tired."
"I want you to come in early tomorrow. We're digging deep. Real deep. Old cases. Cold ones. From six years back. You up for it?"
"…Yeah. I'll be there."
"Good."
I hesitated. Then added, "You're a good partner, Alex. Quiet as hell, but reliable."
There was a pause. "Thanks. That… means a lot."
We hung up.
And for a moment, I felt something odd. Not warmth. Not comfort.
Something colder.
Something crawling.
I shook it off. Just fatigue. That's all. And then went to sleep.