Chapter 65 Investigation Team
In city B, in an ordinary three-bedroom, one-living-room restaurant, several people gathered around a hot pot, looking at each other in bewilderment as they watched the various ingredients rise and fall in the hot pot.
The man in his thirties sitting at the main seat greeted them warmly, "Come and eat. What are you all standing there for? You didn't eat before you came, did you? In the middle of winter, hotpot is the most exciting thing."
The others picked up their chopsticks hesitantly, and seeing that the man had already put a full bowl into his own and started eating it in big mouthfuls, they were tempted by the rich aroma and finally started eating one after another.
The dozen or so plates of meat and vegetables slowly placed on the table were quickly cleared out, but only two bottles of beer placed next to them were opened - everyone drank moderately, basically just taking a sip or two, and most of the beer was drunk by the host, a man in his thirties.
After eating and drinking their fill, everyone put down their chopsticks. The man took the colander and scooped twice from the bottom of the pot. When he saw that there was really nothing to scoop out, he finally put the colander down with regret, wiped his greasy mouth, and said, "Now that we've eaten, let's get to know each other."
——Are you just remembering this now? The introductions should have been made at the beginning, jerk!
Several people complained in their hearts at the same time.
“Then let me introduce myself first, although I think you all should know me.” The middle-aged man poured himself a glass of beer and said, “I’m the leader of this investigation team! My last name is Shu and my given name is Qi. Shu means comfortable and Qi means get up. It means getting up after a comfortable sleep. Of course, it would be better if you could not get up, hahahaha…”
The silence at the table and the expressionless faces showed that they did not appreciate the poor joke at all.
Shu Qi touched his nose awkwardly and said, " Well, I know you are all elites in the industry. Although I was appointed as the team leader by the higher-ups, I don't have any special skills. I've worked in all departments and done a little bit of everything. I know a little bit about everything."
Although they said so, none of the people at the table showed contempt. They knew their own abilities and strengths, and they also knew that the leader who was appointed to lead them would not be a fake. Even if he looked like a fake, he was probably just pretending to be a pig and eating the tiger.
Shu Qi had an ordinary appearance, at best he could barely be called a bit handsome; he was neither tall nor short, about 1.78 meters tall; he had a well-proportioned body, neither fat nor thin. The only thing worth mentioning about him was his eyes, which were clearly black and white, and had a lively and cunning look, revealing a youthfulness and vitality that did not match his appearance.
The young man sitting on his right coughed and said, "My name is Jiang Quan. I used to be the deputy captain of the Criminal Investigation Team 1 in City A. I received a secondment order to join the investigation team two days ago and just arrived in City B this afternoon. I am good at investigation and criminal psychology."
This small gathering is actually an investigation team for a special investigation on crows. There are very few members, only a few people sitting at the table. But they are not the only ones doing this work. Now, the public security bureaus of various provinces and cities have received notices about the crow incident. The public security bureaus in various places will collect the data and files they have found and collected and submit them to the investigation team for analysis. At the same time, if necessary, the investigation team can temporarily mobilize a certain number of police officers from any police station to provide assistance.
In fact, in terms of his familiarity with crows and his pursuit efforts, Ouyang Rui was a better candidate than Jiang Quan. However, as the captain of the first criminal investigation team in City A, Ouyang Rui had a heavy responsibility and could not get away for a while. Therefore, Jiang Quan was transferred here in the end.
The man with glasses on Jiang Quan's right then said, "Cheng Xuguang, a forensic doctor from City A. He has some experience in autopsy, forensics, and treatment. By the way, I'm very interested in the killing methods of the Crows. I personally think that there is a high possibility that the killer among the Crows is engaged in medical work or is a graduate of a medical school."
——The autopsies of Wang Chunshan and Parasa Brute, who were suspected to have been killed by the Crow Organization, were performed by Cheng Xuguang. He was also the only person who took the initiative to apply to join the investigation team.
Sitting next to Cheng Xuguang, that is, directly opposite Shu Qi, was Zhou Yunze. He smiled and said, "I'm Zhou Yunze. Please keep my previous identity a secret. Some time ago, I was undercover at No. 1 Middle School in City A under the alias Alan Neil. As for my expertise, well... fighting, driving, and firearms, that's basically it."
He said it simply, and basically everyone can do these things. But since they were specifically mentioned, there must be something unusual about them. Being good at fighting and driving is fine, but being proficient in firearms... In the peaceful and stable Sugar Country, many police officers never have the chance to fire a bullet in their guns in their entire lives. What kind of job did he do before? Everyone instantly guessed a dozen possibilities.
To the right of Cheng Xuguang was a tall beauty with short brown hair, cold eyes, pale pupils and lips, revealing a kind of intellectual coldness. She introduced herself: "He Xin. Specialties are electronics, maintenance, and network intrusion."
She did not mention what she did before, and everyone tactfully did not ask, instead turning their attention to the last person who had not spoken yet.
This is a woman whose age cannot be determined.
She has a baby face, tender skin, long hair, curly eyelashes, a petite stature, and bangs cut to the same level as her eyebrows. She looks like a well-behaved girl. When she smiles, two small dimples appear on her cheeks. She is very sweet and cute. Even if you say she is just in junior high school, some people will believe it. The "girl" smiled sweetly, twisted a strand of hair with her fingertips and said, "My name is Shao Baoer. I have no formal work experience before. I am an intern. What are your specialties... Does interpersonal communication count?"
…
After getting enough sleep, Rong Yuan washed himself, packed up, took his money and keys and went out to eat. When he passed the gate of the community, the old man guarding the gate looked at him several times.
The guard, whose beard had turned gray, was very conscientious and called out loudly, "Xiao Rongyuan, when did you come back?"
"The early morning train on the first day of the new year is supposed to come back at six in the morning. Didn't you see it?" Rong Yuan asked, glancing at the barrier at the door and said, "I remember when I came back, there were two cars rear-ending each other!"
The old man in front was still a little confused, but when he mentioned the rear-end collision, he suddenly remembered and nodded, "Oh, yes, yes. You came back that day. I remember... you were pulling a suitcase, right?"
"Yes, you have a good memory." Rong Yuan said goodbye to the old man and went out to have breakfast with a faint smile on his lips.
——On the morning of the first day of the new year, he went directly to the hospital and naturally never came back. The rear-end collision was reported to him by Wandou after he hacked into the surveillance video of the community. Of course, there was no trace of him in the video, but the surveillance had blind spots, which was not difficult to explain. Moreover, once the retention period of the community surveillance expires, it will be completely deleted.
Rong Yuan deliberately went out in the morning when there were many people coming in and out. He deliberately slowed down his pace when passing the gate of the community and made eye contact with the gatekeeper for more than a second, intentionally or unintentionally letting him talk to him, in order to give the other party the impression that he had returned a long time ago during the conversation.
The gatekeeper had not seen him in the past few days, but when he mentioned the rear-end collision, he thought he was also a witness to the incident and formed the impression that he was at the scene. Then he felt that he had indeed seen Rong Yuan that morning, and subconsciously based on the word "train" mentioned in his speech, his brain automatically constructed the scene of him pulling the suitcase back.
Human memory is like this. With proper induction and suggestion, a memory that has never happened will be implanted in one's brain. Even if one has not seen or done something, one will think that one has seen or done it, and will even automatically fill in various details. In addition, Rong Yuan has been in and out of this community for more than ten years, and the same scene has been repeated too many times. He can easily extract a scene from the past and integrate it into the memory of the day.
Rong Yuan did this, of course, to be prepared for the event that someone would want to investigate his whereabouts that day. When he woke up and washed up in the morning, he reviewed his actions during this period and found that there was an obvious flaw in his return home, so he came here to patch it up. He didn't know if it made sense for him to do this, or if it would work one day. But he executed his plan seriously and rigorously, and as long as he found a loophole, no matter how big or small, he would remedy it immediately.
…
"Please help me take a look, thank you... Please take a little time to take a look, thank you... If you have any clues, please contact us. The contact number and email address are above. Thank you very much..."
Li Mei was holding a thick stack of flyers, and she would pass a piece of paper to every pedestrian she met on the road, thanking them and begging them to read the contents of the flyer. She put aside her pride and reserve, and shamelessly stopped every impatient passerby on the road, thanking them constantly, bending down and bowing, and anxiety and worry were almost written on her face.
She is smart and beautiful. At a young age, she became a senior executive of a foreign company. Her husband is a lecturer at a prestigious university. She has a high salary and good benefits. When she got married, she had a house and a car. Her parents-in-law are kind, her husband is considerate, and she has a smart and naughty five-year-old son. Originally, her life was a happy life that made countless people envy and hate her. People who know her think that she has always been so elegant and refined. When has she ever been so embarrassed?
She put on some mismatched clothes, no makeup, not even lotion, her hair was tied up in a ponytail, her face was rough and cold from the cold wind, and her nose tip was frozen red. She sucked her frozen snot, and handed flyers to passers-by with some despair and hope, even though she knew that they might not even look at them and would throw the flyers into the trash can, but she still handed them out unremittingly.
The flyer contained a picture of a chubby little boy with big black and bright eyes, grinning happily at the camera. Next to it was the boy's name, date of birth, physical characteristics, time and place of loss, and clothing.
This boy is Li Mei's only son, Zhuang Ziyu. A few days ago, when Zhuang Ziyu's grandmother was taking this little grandson for a walk in the park, she accidentally let the child run out of sight because of her slow legs and feet, and then she couldn't find him. In the past few days, their family is almost going crazy.
Li Mei couldn't remember how many flyers she had distributed. She was walking and distributing them, when suddenly a gust of wind blew a piece of paper toward her face. Li Mei took the paper off and saw that it was her son's smiling face . She looked down again and found that the ground was full of flyers that had been thrown away by people after they had been distributed, and there were countless flyers stuffed in the trash cans on the roadside.
She was stunned and tried hard to blink her eyes to hold back the tears. She bent down and picked up the flyers one by one. She smoothed the smiling faces on the paper with her stiff fingers and wiped off the dirt and footprints. As she picked up the flyers, she saw her sons' bright smiles facing her from all directions. She couldn't help but feel sad and burst into tears while holding a pile of flyers.
The child's grandmother fainted due to anxiety and remorse for losing her grandson. She has been lying in the hospital for the past two days and her illness has become increasingly serious. She almost died. His grandfather was also hospitalized for a sudden cerebral hemorrhage. The child's father called the police but got no results, so he took a long vacation from school and began to search for his son everywhere in the city. He forgot to eat or sleep, and when he was very tired, he would just find a place to take a nap. He was determined to find his child no matter where he went. Li Mei had to take care of the two elderly people on the one hand, and wait for news from the police on the other. Apart from posting information about finding relatives on the Internet and handing out flyers everywhere, she didn't know what else she could do. A good family became miserable overnight. Everyone expected to find the child in the crowd on the roadside in the next second, but the harder they searched, the more they realized how difficult it was and became more and more desperate.
In the cold winter wind, on the busy street, Li Mei hugged a pile of papers and cried bitterly. The world was so prosperous and the flow of people around her was so dense, but she felt cold and isolated.
"Ding-ling ding-ling... Ding-ling ding-ling..."
The text message alert on the mobile phone rang crisply.
Li Mei cried for a long time before she realized that it was the sound on her cell phone. Hoping that someone might have found her son, she wiped away her tears hastily and tried to open her red, swollen, and dry eyes to look at the message on the phone.
