Unknown

"Shit," said Roberts, a sentiment which was echoed by everyone else around the table, to different degrees.

"This is quite a professional kill," said Lakely, pointing at some of the pictures laid out before us. "Most people in that sort of position would slit the throat, but there's a few issues with that: your victim bleeds out, they don't die immediately, so they have a chance to cry out, as well as the fact that it produces a lot of blood, which draws attention. Going up for the brain like he did causes instant death, and much less blood. A clean kill."

She pointed at more pictures, but all of her pointing led inexorably to one thing, the document most of us were paying attention to: Prime's note.

Here's what it said:

Hello.

I have a name, which is unimportant and different from the equally unimportant name you’ve given me.

The matter of importance - currently, at least – is that I am a killer, and you all have been assigned to catch me by profiling.

You will not succeed.

In the profiling, at least – I cannot speak as to your success in my capture. You can’t profile me, for one simple reason.

A lack of reason.

I am not killing due to some compulsion, I am not insane, and I’m not ill. I have no reason for my killings, or rather, no steady reason. Some do have reasons, maybe even most, but those are individual and specific.

In reading what I’ve so far written, I realise that it will make you believe that I’m a narcissistic killer. After all, I’m leaving a note, communicating, getting involved, all things narcissistic killers do. However, I’m not one of them.

I leave you this note just to clarify things for you, as I know otherwise some of my killings would go without a defined killer. Nobody knows, for instance, how many Jack the Ripper killed, save for Jack himself. Jack doesn’t care, but it drives police insane.

I wouldn’t want you all to suffer insanity because of me, so I’ll tell you who I’ve killed, along with a few other things.

You are trying to figure out why I kill, in hopes of stopping me. You will (most likely) fail, because I don’t kill for any one reason.

This is not to say that I’m an irrational killer, but rather that I kill for multiple reasons. Sometimes I’m righting wrongs, sometimes it’s to screw with you guys, sometimes I’m just bored. Some days, I don’t want to kill, so I don’t.

You’ll also have difficulty getting me via other profiling methods – victimology, killing method preferred, etcetera - because as with my reasons, I have no preference as to who I kill, or how. It all depends, it’s all contextual.

So far I have killed eleven people, just to set straight your records and give you the best chance of fighting me.

I first strangled an (attempted) mugger by the name of Lawrence Stevens, an african-american male, 5’ 11”, average build, after I let his victim escape.

I then shot two people riding the subway in New York. I used a .44 caliber revolver which had been carried by one of the victims, an older white male, around mid-50’s, Harold Jackson. The other victim was an asian woman, around twenty, named Susan Chu.

I stabbed a pizza delivery boy, Alan Richards, seventeen, while he was on a delivery. I stabbed him thrice through the left side of the ribs, between the fourth and fifth ribs twice, and once between the third and fourth.

I ran over an elderly woman on the streets of Brooklyn, name unknown to me, using the stolen pizza car, which I then abandoned one mile away.

I beat a pair of would-be robbers to death, one Jonathan Rogers, black, and the other Thomas Magnusson, white.

I slit the throat of a Maxwell Stewart, mall security guard. I then used his sidearm to kill his patrolling partner, Sergei Vlatishny.

I shot a woman named Donna Smith through her window, in the head, from a tree across the street, I actually have a question about that one, I think you’ll know – what was she writing?

Finally, this notable (apologies for the pun) victim, Frank Thompson who I, as you can see, stabbed with one of my knives, specifically a Buck Special.

I’m sure you have questions for me, so I’ll leave you a way to contact me – leave messages at this site: www.webstarts.com/PrimesSite/. I apologize for the improper grammar, but url does not allow for the necessary punctuation.

In closing, I’ll say that it is rude and especially unsporting to wish for someone to fail, and as such, I wish you all the best of luck in you endeavors.

Good Luck,
‘

"Normally, anything like this and we'd write it off as narcissistic," said Stevens, picking up the letter in its protective bag, "But I don't think that's what's going on here."

"Me neither," I said, "His wording's all wrong for it. As well, a narcissistic killer could say that they aren't, but they wouldn't. They kill purely for the recognition they receive, so they would take as much credit as they could - much like a terrorist group. They want people to know that they're out there, that's what gives them their feeling of power."

"I agree," said Roberts, "This guys no narcissist. Look at his wording, too, he apologizes twice, and expresses concern for our well-being. 'I wouldn't want you all to suffer insanity because of me,' he sounds kind of condescending at first, but using the word 'suffer'...he actually cares."

Then Roberts chuckled briefly, an action which brought disbelieving and demanding stares from every other person.

He looked up from the note, saw us staring, and said, "Sorry, I was laughing at two things. Firstly, he says 'notable victim'..." he trailed off momentarily here, waiting for confirmation with a slight smile, then after receiving none, he cleared his throat and continued, "..but also, here, at the end-"

"Yeah," asked Lakely, "Why did he sign it with an apostrophe?"

"Well, that's what I was laughing at," said Roberts, "It's a Calculus joke,"

After a few seconds of mixedly blank and questioning looks, he explained. "In calculus, when wou want to find a derivative of a function - let's call it 'f'' - there are several ways you can express this special function," he said, while grabbing a blank sheet of paper and a pen. "You can write this," he wrote d(f)/d(x), "Which reads as the derivative of the function f with respect to the variable x, you can just write d(f)/x, or you can write this," he said, and wrote on the paper F'(x). "This," he said, pointing to the apostrophe, "Reads as 'F' Prime of 'X'. In calculus, an apostrophe means Prime."

After another brief round of confused glances the implications of Roberts' words began to sink in.

Roberts put down the pen, and looked around at us, saying, "He knows the name we've given him."