Part I. Lessons in Drowning
 

Like in so many other cases, the first body had been found purely by chance — stumbled upon by a young couple on an evening walk along the sand, they had spotted the corpse as they had neared one of the frequent breakwaters that had been placed along the beach, stuck afloat between two concrete tetrapods. 

It could have almost been nothing more than a tragic accidental drowning case, an unfortunate but isolated incident - except that the victim’s wrists and ankles were lashed together with thick industrial level adhesive tape.

(—softly, with hands as gentle as rain,)

The second body, like the one before it, was also a discovery of chance. Accidentally spotted by a small group of primary schoolers who had been birdwatching at the mouth of the river as it entered the bay, they had noticed something abnormal floating some hundred meters out with their binoculars and had quickly notified the police. A successful recovery team had brought the body back to shore where it became glaringly obvious that the death was related to the one before it — much like the body prior, this second body had also been found with limbs taped, arms behind back, ankles lashed tightly.

(— swollen with words you never said,)

One person dead under such suspicious circumstances was enough to generate a disquiet whispering. Two bodies in the span of three weeks in such close proximity, however, rose the whisper to a buzz of fear.

When the third body was found, the buzz turned to a heavy blanket that settled with a heaviness that was suffocating. Like the two before it, the third body was found with limbs taped together — but this time, the corpse was found some five kilometres upstream, not yet having completed its journey to the sea. Three bodies in just over a month, all three dead under undeniably similar circumstances — the headlines released to the public by the press merely reflected what investigators had already begun privately considering — 

SUSPECTED SERIAL KILLER ACTIVE IN THE GREATER TOKYO AREA

All three victims had been male, all on the cusp of adulthood - shy by just a few years at the most. Tied by the ankles and wrists, all with duct tape residue on their faces, their autopsies had found all three to have single needle puncture from above, somewhere to their upper body, and ketamine in their systems. It hadn’t been a particularly arduous task to narrow down the search criteria when going through recent missing persons reports either - the three victims had been identified and named within the month. 

(— swollen with hoarded love)
 

Kyungsoo’s eyes darted away from the case file content he had been examining. The influx of information was overwhelming. The smiling faces in the victim photos (high school portraits, provided by grieving families) stared out at him, immortalised within their matte photo prisons. In life they would have been unique individuals with distinct personalities, habits and traits. 

Not that it mattered to the killer. 

“Anything?”

Kyungsoo started, head snapping towards the source of the voice: Kim Minseok, head of behavioural science at the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department and the very reason he was currently sitting surrounded by photos of drowned teens. As a former Kansai region based criminal profiler, it wasn’t exactly a new experience for him to have to examine rather gory content. 

Former, in this situation, was the keyword. Kyungsoo had retired from his position almost two years ago for reasons he hadn’t divulged to the public and had only just skimmed over to those he had worked with — at the end of the day, he had claimed it was due to the pressure and public attention his involvement in high profile cases had begun to garner. Privately, however, he knew his own limits — which he had accepted were fragile at best — and had come to recognise that his deep and unwittingly personal involvement in the cases he solved was damaging him in deeper ways than he ever wished to admit.

However, the latter reason needed not to be said — he didn’t want to admit it — so he had given his excuses to his superiors as he saw fit and had stuck to the narrative he had painted ever since. 

And for the most part, Kyungsoo had thought he had done a rather good job of it — it being his stepping down from his increasingly high profile position to fade into a graceful obscurity. Obviously not well enough, though —he could only think rather bitterly to himself — the fact that Kim Minseok had travelled all the way to Osaka just to have him examine the kind of content he specifically wished to avoid was proof enough of this, and it didn’t bode well with him. Kyungsoo didn’t bother masking his distaste when answering.

“Your killer loves his victims.”

Minseok appeared unperturbed by his tone. “The killer loves the victims?”

“Well, not the victims, per se, but the person they’re meant to be.” He turned back to the photos laid out in front of him, looking, but not really seeing. The faces in the photos were overlapping, merging and blurring into one face — the feelings behind the motive were so strong that Kyungsoo was already struggling to differentiate them — love, so much of it, expanding, straining the already brittle seams of his chest —

“Why kill them if he loves them?”

Kyungsoo frowned, both irritated by the disruption and discomforted by the sensation of understanding yet not really knowing. It was like trying to put together a puzzle in the dark. He was fumbling, slotting pieces together but still not knowing what kind of picture he was going to get as the final result. 

“Why are you here?” Kyungsoo instead answered Minseok’s question with a question of his own. He no longer felt distaste, rather, all he now felt was unsettled.

Minseok frowned, looking down at the photos spread out on Kyungsoo’s workspace. “At first we thought it was organised crime. Some young kid that pissed off the wrong person, or a runaway that had gotten involved with the wrong crowd and had bitten off something they couldn’t chew. You know how it can be with the Yakuza.”

“But?”

“But it didn’t add up.” Minseok shrugged, answer infuriating in its simplicity. He turned his gaze back onto Kyungsoo. “Why kill them, if he loves them?”

Minseok’s answer, or lack thereof, was more than enough — the unsaid truth was already there in his question.

Let me pick at your brains. Give me access to your mind. 

Minseok wanted him to consult the case.

Obviously, his reputation preceded him. For a moment Kyungsoo felt like a cornered animal. The instinct to bare his teeth in a show of self defence rose in him. He tampered it down, mustering his self control to answer instead:

“I don’t now. You need to find who they’re meant to be, though. Because until you do, they’ll just keep killing”
 

For the rest of the week, Kyungsoo dreamt of drowning. Lying paralysed in his bed, he would watch as water would seep through his bedroom floorboards at a steady rate, increasing until it was pouring from between the lines left in his poorly glued wallpaper, from between the gaps of his closed door, from between the glass panes of his window — a tsunami of murky, cold water that he could not escape. There was a reason he had distanced himself from actively participating in investigations: the nightmares were just one of them.

Nightmares were bearable, though, if for a noble cause. This was what Kyungsoo had always told himself — and he desperately wanted to believe — which was why he had said yes to Minseok.

He didn’t want to look. But once he looked, he wouldn’t — couldn’t —  stop. 

Because Kyungsoo wanted to be good, so much that he sometimes felt as though his heart was not a heart, but an ache. And if being good meant having to endure unpleasant things, so be it. He hardened himself, ignored the parts of him that wept and sung at what he saw, made his heart impenetrable to the horrors he was made to bear witness to and forged onwards, denying and ignoring, always denying and ignoring.
 

It was the sound of his mobile phone ringing on Sunday morning that jerked Kyungsoo into consciousness. He reached around awkwardly in the dim morning light for several bleary seconds, sweaty and panting from yet another nightmare, before finally locating it — he didn’t recognise the caller ID at a glance and his tone was hesitant when he answered.

“Hello?”

“Kyungsoo, this is Kim Minseok.”

“Ah.” Kyungsoo wasn’t yet sure how to feel.

“Aren’t you up?” 

Kyungsoo didn’t fail to note the barely concealed disapproval in Minseok’s tone and he had to bite his tongue in order to stop himself from saying something he would later regret.

“I am now.” He sighed instead. “What is it, Minseok?”

“Another body has been found. Get ready to be on scene.”

Kyungsoo didn’t even get a chance to open his mouth to decline — Minseok had already hung up, much to Kyungsoo’s chagrin. He considered calling back to kindly tell the behavioural analyst to shove it where the sun didn’t shine and leave him alone but Kyungsoo was more than sure that Minseok wouldn’t answer.

Besides, his brain provided him, you agreed to this.

It was with a barely concealed snarl that he dragged himself from his bed, scowl etched onto his face as he haphazardly pulled on socks and reached around blindly under his bed for his boots.
 

“You okay?”

Kyungsoo removed his face from his hands wearily and looked up to see Minseok, who had his arm extended towards him, tinned vending machine coffee in hand. Luckily it was still early and cool, not to mention the fact it was misting lightly. If it had been any other day the summer warmth would have made drinking the heated drink quite distasteful. 

A peace offering.

Kyungsoo straightened from the slumped position he had taken against the police vehicle he stood against and reached out to accept the proffered drink from Minseok.

“No. I mean, not really, but soon. I’ll be fine.” Kyungsoo winced at his own messy answer. “Thank you.”

Minseok looked at him through now the steadily falling misty rain - really looked at him - for a moment before taking the position next to Kyungsoo, unbothered by the water that his clothes were no doubt soaking up. He leaned back on the car, cupping his own drink between his hands. “You know, before I’d even approached you, I’d already heard a lot about you from Joonmyeon.”

Kyungsoo groaned at that - a quick, sharp smile flashed across Minseok’s face at his response. 

“He made you out as some sort of idiot savant-” Minseok sent him an apologetic glance which Kyungsoo shrugged off, no offence taken. “He said you were one of those people who just didn’t function like normal - at caring for yourself, at fostering relationships, at maintaining any sort of healthy balance in any and all areas of life - but when it came to criminal profiling, there was no one else that came close. He told me ‘If you want a case solved, get Do Kyungsoo on it’” Minseok did a surprisingly good job at mimicking Joonmyeon’s manner, and Kyungsoo couldn’t help but appreciate his bluntness. “And I wanted this case solved - I still do - so I approached you.”

“Approached might be putting it a little too mildly, Minseok” Kyungsoo said dryly. “More like coerced.”

“I won’t apologise for getting you on the case, Kyungsoo.” Minseok responded simply. “I will apologise, though, for not taking into higher consideration the effect it would have on you. Joonmyeon described you to me as someone who fell into profiles, as opposed to the rest of us who have to construct them. I didn’t consider that falling in these kinds of situations isn’t usually a comfortable experience.”

Kyungsoo laughed at that - a harsh bark of a sound that quickly morphed into a wince. He wiped a hand across his face, as if to rid himself of the water that had settled lightly on his skin. In truth, he simply didn’t want his twisted expression to be accessible to Minseok’s gaze. “Its not the falling thats the issue, its the process of recovery after the fall.”

Minseok expression tightened - obviously Joonmyeon had said more to him then he had let on. Still, Kyungsoo knew that it was as good of an apology as he was going to get from the hard headed agent, and he acquiesced with a sigh.

“Just promise me you’ll leave me alone after we close this case, Minseok. You know I have my reasons for avoiding active fieldwork and I don’t like being hounded.”

Minseok blinked slowly before giving him a single nod - a bob of his head. “You have my word on it.”

“Well then, thanks, I guess.” Awkwardly, Kyungsoo looked down at the coffee held between his hands (warm, like the victim whose face he had held, lovingly, lovingly, ever so lovingly).  His hands trembled around the can he held, a few accumulated drops of water falling from his skin. He knew that the only reason the contents hadn’t yet sloshed out was because he hadn’t yet cracked the tab to open it. Aware of dark grey sky above him and gradually increasing rain, Kyungsoo tried to tell himself that that, at least, was one small blessing out of a thousand curses to be thankful for.

“Are you sure you’re alright, Kyungsoo? You really don’t look well.” Minseok said, leaning towards him some. 

Kyungsoo twitched, nearly dropping his canned coffee.

“Its a confession. A love confession.” He said, looking down at the water they stood hardly five meters from. The cement embankment to the waters edge was steep, but the sight of multiple investigators down by the waters edge some twenty or so meters upstream - a flurry of disruptive activity in a place usually quiet - was so jarring that he could not tear his eyes away.  “But why kill them, then?” He said, more to himself than to Minseok. 

“Why anything?“ Minseok said darkly from besides him, tossing his emptied can down onto the wet pavement they stood on before crumpling it beneath his foot in a show of distaste. “What makes a person kidnap a teenaged boy, bundle him up and then hold him headfirst in a river once they’ve finished fulfilling whatever sick fantasy they have going? No matter the motive, its senseless.” 

Kyungsoo had to bite his lip to stop himself from playing devils advocate. It was hard, understanding the minds of killers. It was worse because all motive and consequence made sense, if you knew the killer well enough. Cause and effect, cause and effect - the bane of Kyungsoo’s troubled existence. One persons cause would mean nothing to another person. One person’s effect would appear senseless to all others. That was the problem, because at the end of the day it was all just cause and effect, and when you could understand and see both, nothing was senseless and everything held meaning.

“We need to find whoever it is being confessed to.”
 

The air in the morgue was heavy, alive with some sort of oppressive unspent energy that seemed to bear down on Kyungsoo’s head and already too frequently over-tensed shoulders — 

In front of them, a single body was laid out on a stainless steel autopsy table. A large Y-shaped incision extended from each shoulder to meet at the bone. From there it extended, all the way down to the pubic bone. It had been freshly sewn up — a completed autopsy — and an evidence sheet had been pulled up just below the bottom of the closed incision. Modesty, always modesty and respect, even in death.

Kyungsoo found it disconcerting that the two other (living) men in the room seemed not to be affected in the way he was as they observed the corpse with a detached, clinical interest. Perhaps it was because he lacked the necessary ability to separate himself, which was why he felt things so much more acutely than others. He tried not to dwell on it.

“What do we know about our victim?” Minseok asked, voice almost unbearably loud in the chilled room.

“Positively ID’d as seventeen year old Song Kyungil.” Byun Baekhyun, the medical examiner working on their case, replied smoothly. “One hundred and seventy nine centimetres tall, sixty three kilograms heavy. No signs of ual assault or even assault, for that matter.” Baekhyun chewed on his bottom lip for a moment, eyebrows furrowed. "The killer is careful with the victims. It's as if he doesn't want to cause them unnecessary harm."

Kyungsoo couldn’t help but stare blankly at the body, the strange sense of discountenance having settled along his spine at the response. Of course he didn't want to hurt them. He loved them—

“Cause of death the same as the previous three?”

Kyungsoo blinked owlishly as Baekhyun simultaneouslyhummed in affirmation across from him. He had a pleasant tone, Kyungsoo noted absently. 

“A single needle wound entering from above into the trapezius, and blood analyses revealed non-lethal amounts of ketamine in the system. Water in the lungs, like the other three, which meant he was still alive at the time of submersion.” Baekhyun said simply. “Cardiac arrest would have followed shortly after unconsciousness.” 

“Wet drowning” Joonmyeon murmured. 

“But we all know that the forensic diagnosis of drowning is considered one of the most difficult to conclude accurately.” Baekhyun began to say. “It’s hard to say with one hundred perce—”

Abruptly, Kyungsoo was being submerged — pushed down violently — in cold water.

(He thrashed, progress to free himself and reach the surface all but prevented by the tape that bound him and the pressure bearing down on him from above. His movements were strong, though, as wild and uncontrolled blind panic seized him. Still, the water pressed around him on all sides, all angles, swirling and all of his senses around him into the murky depths, rising over his body, a wash of cold, suffocating darkness. His mouth was open in a muffled wail as the water rushed across his face, filling his nose and mouth as it reached down his throat with ease. It blocked his airways, choking him as his lungs screamed in agony, his body weakening against whatever force that held him down. Hardest of all to think around was the mind numbing pain in the back of his nose and throat as the water, seemingly against its very nature in that moment, seemed to sear his insides. Unable to move, to fight, to escape, Kyungsoo felt his conscious leave him, like the air bubbles that floated from his body, upwards to the surface he so desperately wished to reach but was too weak to get to —)

Kyungsoo was pulled out of his mind by Minseok’s stern response. An involuntary inhale of air left Kyungsoo, the sound seeming magnified in the small space they inhabited. Luckily, both of the men present seemed not to have noticed. “There are no other signs of trauma or otherwise so we’ll just have to go off the assumption that the cause of death is drowning.”

“Yes, I believe that’s what we’ll have to settle on.” Baekhyun replied. His tone was softer when he next spoke. “I think the victim’s family is eager to have the body returned to their possession for burial. I’ll wrap this up and have the funeral home contacted for pickup.”

Kyungsoo stared at the victims side profile from where he stood, arms crossed over his chest tightly as if to hold himself together.

In life, Song Kyungil would have been an attractive young man. In death, his pallid skin seemed tight, pulled taut over narrow, too-sharp jawline. His expression was not peaceful — his lips, blue and chapped, were downturned at the corners and parted ever so slightly, as if he had had something to say but had lost the opportunity to do so. Kyungsoo supposed that in a way his observation probably held a great deal of truth.

What did you have to say before the water stole the words and turned them to bubbles beyond your reach? What did you want to say before the water stole the words and swept them away? 

Unbidden, the questions rose in his mind.

All he receives in response is despair.

For a moment Kyungsoo’s eyes burnt. Doing his utmost to calm his breathing so as to not draw attention to himself, he let out a low breath. Inside his head, a dull ache had begun to manifest. He closed his eyes, unwinding his arms from their crossed position to instead rub a hand across his face, willing himself to dispel the unpleasant unsaid words that now crowded his mind.

“Shh, shhh, quiet, be quiet”

The teen, kneeling before him and trembling in terror, nodded tearfully.  

Kyungsoo reached out and tore away the duct tape covering the boys mouth as gently as he could. Still, it tugged at the boy’s skin and left a sticky residue over irritated, reddened flesh. 

“What are y—“

Kyungsoo’s hand jerked forward, covering the teens mouth. His hands were strong, fingers digging slightly into soft cheek — not enough to cause genuine hurt — but firm enough to be heeded. He frowned, displeased. “Please don’t speak. Please.”

It was a request, not a threat, but somehow there was something in the tone of his voice, coiled like a snake in long grass. The unspoken 'Do as I say' needed not to be said aloud to be recognised. 

Like the barely perceptible uncoiling before the imminent strike — there was something dangerous waiting in the tone of his voice, hidden just out of sight. 

The words, despite being spoken gently, served as a foreshadowing of what was sure was to come — a scarcely detectable whisper of sound that warned: you will regret not listening.

The teen let out a small, terrified moan but made no other sound. Slowly, Kyungsoo lowered his hands.

No disruptions, no distractions, the quiet made it easy for him to envision it all — abruptly, his gaze shifted. He reached forwards again, but this time not with the intention of silencing. He cupped the teens face with his hands, spreading his fingers along warmed cheeks and jaw, gently the soft skin beneath the teens eyes with the pads of his thumbs, carefully, gently, ever so lovingly.

Words had been accumulating in the base of his stomach for so long, growing and expanding until he was gorged on them, sick from the words he held, sick on the feelings behind the words poisoning him - there were so many to say.

Drowning in unsaid words, drowning in love, Kyungsoo smiled sadly. He had a confession to make.
 

Kyungsoo jerked awake, clammy and panting. He blinked — he was looking up at his arms which he had extended up as he slept. His hands were curved in the air, fingers spread slightly, as if he were gently cupping something —

The horror hit him a moment later and he jerked his arms down to his sides, trembling slightly. His head was pounding. 

The digital clock beside him (red, blinking) read 5:37AM and Kyungsoo let out a soft moan of pain, knowing full well that going back to sleep was not an option.

A shower it was, then.

Collecting a towel and a change of clothes, Kyungsoo made his way into the bathroom attached to the modest hotel room he slept in and quickly stripped off his pyjamas, stepping into the shower quickly.

Under the scalding water (letting it wash away the darkness that coated his skin, his mind, his heart), Kyungsoo could almost pretend that he hadn’t just dreamt of one of the victims— that he hadn’t just dreamt of the moments before the fall. He felt dirty, skin crawling as if there were bugs tunnelling through his flesh, hidden from sight beneath smooth epidermis. He felt jittery, an ugly kind of energy twisting his stomach.

Kyungsoo shut off the flow of water and stepped out, towelling himself dry efficiently. He dressed himself quickly in the haphazard and unplanned section of clothes he had brought with him - the first things he had pulled from his bag. A quick glance in the mirror revealed to him that nothing he wore matched and that he looked peaky and unwell from lack of sleep. He frowned and turned away. 

By the time he exited the small bathroom it was 6:29AM and the sun was slowly beginning to illuminate his room from the cracks between his curtains. He wandered over to the window and peered out for a moment before cracking open the window. The temperature was pleasant but it was still early and he could sense the all too familiar summer warmth building. It was going to be a hot day, and he frowned. All too quickly, Kyungsoo found his thoughts once more returning to the investigation he found himself tethered to. It had been almost three weeks since the last body had been found and the task force assigned to the case had achieved nothing in that time. Kyungsoo couldn’t help but resent the fact that he was a part of said task force, which meant he too had achieved nothing.

Despite the time that had passed since waking from his nightmare and his attempts at focussing his thoughts, Kyungsoo still felt on edge. He spun away from the window and made for the door, possessed by the need to do something, anything, to work the uncomfortable energy that plagued him out of his sytem.

There was nothing of significance, nothing of value. All that held him was the misguided love of a serial killer.

Starting for the footpath that would lead him along the riverfront, Kyungsoo found himself wishing more than anything to be able to leave so that the love he now felt would stop haunting him.

...
A/N
Just a quick note to those reading:
First of all, thank you to the people who have subscribed, commented and already even upvoted! I really hope you'll find this fic enjoyable - I'm trying out a slightly diffrent writing style from usual - I hope its OK. This chapter was probably a bit boring, so sorry about that. I'm just trying to build things up so it flows decently. Regardless, I'll try my best to write this fic well for everyone :-) 
Secondly, this fic will of course contain descriptions of death/murder/gore etc. I will be marking future chapters with graphic descriptions with an M for a bit of forewarning to those that might not be keen on that kind of stuff.
Thirdly, I have tagged this as a hannibal!au and I certainly am highly inspired by the TV series and a lot of the settup (criminal profiler/psychologist relationship) will be present. However, please be aware that I am not going to be following the series to a T - to put it simply, things that are crucial to the TV series (such as the cannibalism lol) will not be present at all in this fic. Sorry if that's what you were looking for! 
Lastly, the setting of this fic (Japan) might bother some people but I'm familiar with the area which is why I decided on that path. Also, I am by absolutely no means an expert on criminal investigation/medical terminology (and so on and so forth), so if there are things that aren't quite right (which there undoubtedly will be) I apologise. I'm just going to do my research to the best of my ability and hope things work out on paper haha. 

With that said, I hope if you're reading this that you'll give this fic a chance. Thank you as always for the interest, support and comments - it all really gives drive to writing :-) Sorry for the long A/U and see you next update!