Rock Creek Park, Washington DC, December, 2077, Sunday…

The severed head had a bloody cross painted on the forehead. It sat perched on the flat stomach of the naked female body, just below the breasts. The dead eyes were open, gazing up at the black clouds hanging over DC.

Asako O'Brian stared only a moment, shivered and drew her parka hood more tightly onto her head, and then began to methodically walk the murder scene. Although her forensics kit contained the usual investigative tools, all she had out at the moment were chop sticks, which she used in place of tweezers, and evidence envelopes. Her assistant, Joe Turner, handled both the video cam and the still camera and offered an extra pair of eyes in case she missed anything. Either she or he would make comments about what they were finding as they surveyed the scene.

The DC metro police, the first on the scene, had already taken fingerprints and made a preliminary identification. Their ME had also determined the time of death.

The metro detective in charge had known immediately that this was a case too big for them to handle, not that she would want it anyway. The various agencies had all been notified through the central switchboard located at the DHS. All those agencies as well as police departments in nearby municipalities in Maryland and Virginia now had the initial information from the crime scene which included the police data and full color stills taken from multiple angles and in gory detail. The case files were already extensive.

Asako knew all that. She also knew that this was just the beginning -- solving the case was something much more difficult. Moreover, the cops probably had not walked the scene in detail since the determination had been made to turn the lead over to the FBI.

She stopped from time to time and with her chop sticks picked up a piece of paper, thread, or some other evidence and bag it, hoping that subsequent analysis in the crime lab would eventually make some sense out of it all and lead to the identity of the killer or killers. She then turned to examine the body.