Sweet Dreams

"That guy was pretty easy to talk to," Hancock remarked after they left the woods and returned to the trail.

Nick found that easy enough to understand. "After all, how many years has it been since there was a murder in Forest Park? Twenty?"

Hancock looked up and thought for a moment before nodding. "About that. It must have been 1999. I was only eight then.

"The TV news said three women's bodies had been found one after another near Saltzman Road in Forest Park. It scared everyone pretty badly. My grandmother strictly forbade me from going out on the streets."

Nick actually remembered the case more vividly than Hancock did. He had only recently transmigrated into his current body then, and while pretending to have withdrawn into himself from the shock of the car accident, he had secretly practiced spoken English behind Aunt Mary's back.

Back then, they had neither a computer nor, much less, internet access at home. His only two sources of information from the outside world were television and newspapers.

The trouble was that he had to read newspapers in secret. If he was caught once or twice, he could explain that he was interested in the pictures, but if it happened too often, people would find it strange. After all, what seven-year-old barely knew a handful of words yet kept staring at newspapers?

That serial murder case had caused an uproar in peaceful Portland. The investigation had lasted nearly two full years before the PPB finally caught the killer with the help of DNA testing.

The repeat sex offender, named Todd Reed, had pleaded guilty before trial after his arrest to avoid the death penalty, and ultimately received three life sentences.

Perhaps the serial murders had brought something to mind, because Hancock suddenly started in alarm. "This case looks a little like the one at Manson Falls last month."

Nick had previously been a patrol officer, with no access to cases outside his patrol area, let alone homicides. At that, he instinctively pressed, "Tell me more."

Hancock scratched his buzz cut, trying hard to remember. "I wasn't responsible for that case, but I saw the crime scene photos. They looked exactly like what we just saw.

"An unlucky hiker attacked by a wild animal on the trail. Except they found neither shoe prints nor animal tracks at the scene."

"Whether it was an animal or a person, we need to solve this case as soon as possible." Nick could already imagine how the media would make a huge story of it once they learned about the case.

Forest Park's extensive network of trails was Portland's pride. Throughout the year, nonprofit organizations and the forest management authorities organized volunteers to enter the woods, clear invasive ivy, and maintain the trails and native plant species.

Once word got out that the trails were no longer safe, the police would inevitably face enormous pressure, along with a deluge of criticism.

The two worried men were about to follow the trail back to where they had parked when Nick suddenly stopped. "Did you hear something?"

"Huh?" Hancock, who had nearly walked into his partner from behind, stumbled, but then noticed something too and turned to look toward the sound.

Faint singing came from beside the trail. Nick went back inside the police tape and soon found its source-a pink iPod, close in color to the women's Nike shoe they had found earlier.

This classic but single-purpose music player had been discontinued for years in Nick's previous life, replaced by a new generation of electronics such as tablets, smartphones, and smartwatches.

A song was playing loudly on repeat through the earphones connected to the iPod. It sounded somewhat familiar to Nick, but he could not identify the title. Apart from a few classics, he had little familiarity with most Western pop songs.

"Sweet dreams are made of this, who am I to disagree..." Hancock, however, began softly singing along beside him, bobbing his head.

"A Eurythmics classic, 'Sweet Dreams.'"

Seeing the man showing off, Nick, who had been tone-deaf in both lives, could only shake his head helplessly. He liked listening to music, but his lack of musical aptitude was one of his few shortcomings. He was the sort who would get kicked out even if he managed to slip into a choir.

After getting an evidence bag from the forensic team and putting the iPod inside, the two drove back to the PPB's Central Precinct downtown, which also housed PPB headquarters.

The nearly century-old building had once housed city hall. Though its interior decor now looked slightly dated, it was still very imposing.

Enormous chandeliers paired with corridors featuring semicircular vaulted ceilings gave it a grand appearance. With a little touching up, the well-maintained walnut staircase could easily serve as a filming location for a movie set in the nineteenth century.

It was already afternoon, and working overtime that night was a certainty. Given that this was Nick's first case since becoming a detective, he had little to complain about. He even volunteered to take on the tedious background investigation.

"Good luck with that, then. I'll go keep an eye on the fingerprint processing for the iPod. Hopefully we can identify the victim tonight." Hancock held up the evidence bag.

"Bring me something to eat on your way back," Nick reminded him without looking up as he reached his desk and turned on his computer.

Though Nick was a rookie detective, he was not entirely without ideas about investigating a case.

He had majored in criminology in college, not only earning excellent grades in his major courses but also building up a considerable body of related reading in his daily life.

He had long since worn out professional books such as Vernon J. Geberth's Practical Homicide Investigation, the FBI Behavioral Science Unit's "bible," Crime Classification Manual, and the classic forensic science textbook The Language of Evidence: The Discovery and Interpretation of Physical Evidence in Criminal Investigations.

Related bestsellers such as Mindhunter: Inside the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit and Stalkers and Their Victims also frequently sat on his desk for repeated study.

The development of criminal investigation science in America was inseparable from the country's high crime rate. While their counterparts in the country across the Pacific ran themselves ragged under the slogan "every homicide must be solved," most detectives here had long since resigned themselves to giving up.

Things were somewhat better in a low-crime city like Portland-at least around 2008. But even in this relatively "good era," the homicide clearance rates that renowned departments like the NYPD and LAPD published each year, after inflating them as much as they could, rarely exceeded eighty percent.

After 2020, they had even hovered around the failing mark of fifty percent for a time, which could only be called disastrous.

Behind the high crime rates were overburdened forensic laboratories and medical examiners' offices, forcing American detectives to rely more heavily on traditional investigative methods.

For something like DNA testing, even if a homicide case allowed them to jump the queue, the laboratory could not produce definitive results in less than a week.

Naturally, Nick and Hancock could not simply sit around waiting. They had to establish the possibility of murder through other means first. Otherwise, even if they confirmed a week later that the scene was not the work of an animal, the golden window for solving the case would already be long gone.

Fortunately, although the limitations of current technology meant DNA testing could not be sped up, fingerprint comparison technology was already highly developed. Before dark, Hancock hurried back with the results and a tub of instant noodles.