Chimera

CHAPTER 9

Police Bureau — Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory, Bangkok, Thailand

Special Agent Gedimin Bulatt and Colonel Prathun Kulawnit waited in the main examination room of the Royal Thai Police Bureau’s Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory as two men in white lab coats rolled a pair of stainless steel autopsy tables into the room through a large stainless-steel double-door.

The two bodies, each covered with a clean white sheet, appeared to be the size of a small child.

As Bulatt and Kulawnit watched, the lab technician uncovered the first body, and then stood back as the second white-coated man — Dr. P.K. Chalermchai, a professor of biology from the local University — stepped up to the table.

“As you can see,” he said calmly, “the carcass is that of a Clouded Leopard; in this case, a very young adult male weighing approximately 25 kilos — fifty-five English pounds,” the professor translated for Bulatt’s benefit. “He was found just outside the boundary of the Khlong Saeng Wildlife Preserve in the southern peninsula. Apart from being slightly malnourished, this particular leopard was very large for its age, lean, fit, and otherwise in excellent health at the time of his death.”

“How did he die?” Bulatt asked.

“A cobra bite, to the right foreleg.” The professor pointed out an area on the creature’s right foreleg where the fur had been shaved away, revealing bare skin and at pair of puncture wounds approximately two inches apart.”

Bulatt whistled softly. “That must have been one hell of a cobra.”

“A King, almost certainly,” the professor said, nodding. “Based on the distance between the fangs, I would estimate its length at about six meters — twenty English feet. And that is the curious aspect of this leopard’s death, as I explained earlier to Colonel Kulawnit. We almost never see a Clouded Leopard killed by a cobra or any other poisonous snake; they are usually very adept at recognizing and avoiding such dangers.”

The professor stepped over to the second table, and waited for the technician to remove the sheet.

“Here again, we have what appears to have been another large and healthy — albeit slightly malnourished — young male Clouded Leopard, also found near the outer boundary of the Khlong Saeng Wildlife Preserve. The weight was probably in the area of twenty-five kilos, although it’s difficult to be sure because of the loss of tissue.” The professor pointed to the left front shoulder of the carcass where, as Bulatt could easily see, the left front leg had been ripped away.

“I assume this one didn’t run into a cobra,” Bulatt commented.

The professor smiled. “No, a creature far more dangerous: a tiger. We were able to confirm the species of the attacker by the saliva saturating the wound area; but the size of the teeth marks and the massive hemorrhaging to the surrounding tissues would have been indicative in any case.”

“And I take it you rarely see Clouded Leopards killed by Tigers?” Bulatt said.

“Almost never. Clouded Leopards are taught by their parents to be very wary of Tigers and other large predators from the time they are cubs. Also, Clouded Leopards are excellent climbers, extremely agile, and see very well at night,” the professor explained. “Given the deteriorated condition of the body, it’s difficult to make a conclusive finding; but if I were to guess, I would say that this leopard was taken by surprise… by a Tiger… and on the ground — a very unusual situation, indeed.

“So,” the professor went on when Bulatt and Kulawnit remained silent, “what we have here are two extremely unlikely deaths of two magnificent specimens of Thai wildlife that should not have been so big — or so hungry — occurring within days of each other at roughly the same location. Which brings us to these interesting items,” he said, turning to the technician who handed him a pair of stainless steel trays. “We found these attached to the necks of both leopards.”

Bulatt walked up to the professor, stared down into the trays, and blinked in confusion.

“Fire-flies™?”

“You recognize them?” Colonel Kulawnit asked.

“I think so. These look like a variation of the tracking devices we use to follow suspect vehicles or shipments at night with night-vision goggles,” Bulatt said. “They kick out a burst of infra-red light every few seconds that you can easily spot miles away. The ones I used worked on small lithium batteries, and usually burned out pretty quickly, especially in cold weather; but these seem to be more sophisticated.”

“The batteries are built into the device and recharged through small strips of solar cells attached to the collar,” Kulawnit said.

“Interesting,” Bulatt said. “So who makes them?”

“We don’t know.” Kulawnit shrugged. “We are making inquiries with our military experts now. The professor is familiar with electronic equipment used to track animals for biological research, but he has never seen anything like these devices; and he’s certain that no Thai research biologists are using them in the southern peninsula. Among many other reasons, the cost would be prohibitive.”

“So why were these cats wearing them?” Bulatt asked.

“Exactly.” Kulawnit nodded. “We think the devices were attached to the necks of these creatures in order to make them easy to find, and to kill.”

“But that would be a pretty expensive proposition, to capture an animal like this, tag it with a fire-fly™, release it, and then what — hope you run across it again? That’s an insane way to run a canned hunt, unless you’ve got money to burn.”

“It doesn’t make much sense,” Kulawnit agreed. “But we are constantly trying to deal with wealthy foreign hunters who bribe their way into Thailand to kill our wildlife as trophies, and we don’t like it when mysterious events like this start occurring in our National Preserves. That’s why, when the second leopard was found, I called your office. When they said you were already in Tokyo for our Interpol meeting, I asked them to divert you to Bangkok, but not to tell you why. I wanted to surprise you, and give you the opportunity to enjoy an evening of Thai hospitality too, of course, before we fly back to Tokyo; but my hope also is that you can encourage some of your scientific experts to help us resolve this — ”

At that moment, the cell phone on Colonel Kulawnit’s belt beeped plaintively.

“Excuse me a moment,” he said as he stepped away and brought the phone up to his ear. “Colonel Kulawnit.” He listened for a few moments. “What?!”

As Bulatt and the professor watched in confusion, Kulawnit’s face turned ashen. “I’m on my way there now,” he snapped, and closed the cell phone.

“Khun Prathun, what — ?”

“Four of our Forestry Rangers have been found dead, shot, in the southern peninsula,” he whispered. “One of them is my son.”