• Steel law    

                    Chapter One

 Michael woke up with a start; his phone was beeping. He didn't remember what he was dreaming about, but it had been a good dream—something about fields and meeting new girls. He reached for his phone blindly in the darkness of his room, trying to get to it by feeling everything on his bedside table. He eventually got it, but not before a few things fell off the table.

 He held up the phone; it was 5:30 a.m. He saw he had received a text from Kunle; it read, Body discovered, DPO wants you on site ASAP. A location was attached to it. Michael looked up the location on the map. It was somewhere at the University of Ibadan.

 He pulled the covers back and got out of bed. He switched on the light; his room was a mess. There was a pile of clothes at the foot of his bed, as if he had discarded them there as he got into bed.  There was a plate of food on his bedside table, and all the items on the table were fallen and strewn about. 

 Michael entered the bathroom and started brushing his teeth. In a minute, he was done and was deciding on what to wear. He had no time to take his bath; he would do that after he returned. He just had to put on a copious amount of deodorant.

 He pulled on a plaid shirt and Chino trousers. He wore a black boot. By his bedside was his holster that held his standard-issued Wells and Cott 358; it was a robust, electric one. Finally, a rapid-fire gun. Michael caressed it as he put the holster on. Finally, he sprayed a mist of perfume on his body and took his car keys from the table.

 He got out of his apartment, and in front of the house was his car, a red 2035 Toyota Nirvana. His mom had bought it for him as a present on his 27th birthday. It was a compact car, though Michael preferred a bigger car, especially a truck, but he accepted the car with all graciousness and thankfulness. He would rather have this than nothing at all. 

 In the early hours of the morning, there was almost no traffic, but the city was already starting to rise. He could hear the mosque calling for prayers and light shining from the windows of the roadside apartments he passed in his car. Michael uploaded the location from his phone onto his car's navigation system. 

"Five minutes until destination," the car said

 As he drove, he found out that the location was not actually in  UI itself; it was just beside the school. It turned out to be some sort of motel that had an event area for students to hold parties in. Michael found someplace to park. He got out of the car and walked to the crime scene. Already, four police officers were there.

 The crime scene was situated in a space between two buildings in the motel that were joined together at an angle. The place looked free of dirt, but the blue paint on both buildings was starting to come off.

Kunle broke away from the officer he was conversing with to greet him. Michael waved at the other police officers. He looked Kunle up and down, then scratched his head. 

' So what do we have here, Kunle?'

' Body of a Girl, officer Deji found her at 4:30 this morning on his patrol, and we have identified her as Tomi Akeredolu'.

As he talked, they both walked up to the body. Kunle brought out a flashlight from his pocket and shined it on the figure on the ground. There was a tarp over the corpse; Kunle took it off so Michael could get a good look at the body.

 The body was that of a young, pretty girl who would have been in her late teens or early 20s, Michael guessed. Wearing a thin-strap orange gown in the style that was common among young adults at the time, it had frills. She had a look of permanent horror on her face, and she had bruises on her neck.

 Michael procured the flash light from Kunle and shined it on her face. He could see the burst blood vessels in her eyes.

She had been strangled.

There were little cuts on her wrist, which showed signs of the struggle she must have had with her murderer.

Michael looked to the side,away from the body, and then looked to the sky. He scuffed his boot.

"Has the forensic team collected tissue samples from under her fingernails?" He asked

"They have tried, but apparently there was no tissue to collect on her finger, and her body has been scrubbed clean; this was a premeditated murder."

Michael looked away again and whistled. He saw the CCTV camera at the edge of the block.

"What of the CCTV?" He asked

"No luck there either; the CCTV has been non-functional for some time."

Michael scoffed at this.

"Of course, this would have been too easy; there has been no murder in years, and our first murder is what we get."

 Kunle looked at him and breathed deeply.

 "What a shame; she was a pretty thing."

Michael shrugged. It wouldn't have been any less of a shame if she wasn't pretty.

The police department here didn't see murder often, even though it was a student area. There was little to no gang activity. They still burst students with drugs, and from time to time for drunk driving, but there was little crime, so this murder was an outlier.

"Has anyone contacted her parents?" Michael asked.

Kunle looked at him, shaking his head."Thetoday,

"The Dpo said she would handle it. it's going to be a sad day in a house today," Kunle said 

"Well, it's our job to alleviate their pain a little by bringing her killer to justice," Michael said.

But he didn't believe it. When you lose a daughter, what justice can take the pain away except to have your daughter returned to you alive? No amount of justice could bring this girl to life now—another promising life squashed out.

"She is a student in the school, second year; going by her ID card, she is studying accounting. It seems there had been a party here last night."

With a nod, Michael acknowledged.

Kunle kept on regaling him with details about the victim.

Michael stood back and watched the sun rise. It was a beautiful sunrise; it splashed every corner with a bright hue; the yellow from the sun blended with the vibrant blue colour of the sky, lighting it up and banishing the stars to obscurity. It was indeed going to be a bad day for the victim's parents, Michael observed. The rest of the morning was spent noting minor things. Michael jotted down on his pad the concrete information they had, as little as it was, though it was clear she was strangled. The forensic team came in and confirmed that she was strangled. Furthermore, they said she had died the night before, between 8 and 6 hours ago. They also retrieved her cell phone and took it for analysis.