It was a warm summer day, as Dacanery walked towards the police station. There was a briefing, at 9 'o' clock sharp.

Hopefully there would be the results of the post mortem, but not much else would be said, just the what the mystery was.

Brooks was going to present it to the group, and Dacanery would give a report on the witness interrogation.

Nine 'o' clock came and soon the team had assembled in the meeting room. Detectives and police men greeted each other in a friendly way most would think unknown to the police force.

Once everyone had settled Brooks began talking. "As you all know we have recently found a drained body bearing similarities to the spider killer of 2 years ago. We have had a witness, and detective Dacanery will be giving a report on the witness. We also have the post mortem from doctor Grigaru." Doctor John Grigaru, the best doctor on the police force. "But first we have the report on the crime scene."

A man in a smart suit stood up and Dacanery recognised him as John Walter, a forensic scientist who was at the crime scene the previous day. "Well, the victim was found at 7am Tuesday 4th June. We have identified her as Angela Johnson, 15 years old. We are trying to contact her parents, but so far we have had no luck. As usual there has been no evidence except a spider we failed to catch." Walter sat down and Dacanery stood up. As always the meetings went with the description of the victim, then any witnesses, then the post mortem results.

"For the first time in the known existence of the spider killer we have found a witness. The witness' name is Angelina Shaw, 22 years old. She confirmed the time and location, but apart from that gave us nothing new. She said she couldn't remember the identifying the features of a killer, except that he was a man. That was all she could give us."

"Thank you detective. Doctor?" Brooks said.

"I successfully identified the body as Angela Johnson, 15 years old. There was no sight of outside harm except two puncture holes with some traces of unidentifiable DNA to be found." He paused to pass round some photos of the victim and the puncture holes. "Although there has been another substance left I am examining to find out any extra information. All I have found out so far is they are not man made. I am confident about that. The cause of death seems to be the puncture, although there are broken bones in the neck and spine, like a weight has been pressed to them. But, I found something in her oesophagus. It was a dead spider." Collective gasps erupted around the room, whispering at the possibilities and what the spider could mean. The doctor waited until everyone was silent before speaking again. "It was 7pm before I found the spider so I didnt have a chance to examine it, but I am going to be examining it today. I would be examining it now if I didn't have this briefing to attend."

"Thank you doctor." Brooks said once doctor Grigaru had sat down. "We have new evidence this time, so hopefully we will be able to conduct a better investigation than last time as to this mystery. As we have little time I have sent you all an email regarding the specific jobs you have to do. If there are any questions feel free to email me, I will reply as soon as possible. Thank you for attending this meeting."

Every meeting was always ended with 'thank you for attending this meeting.', when in fact, the meeting was mandatory if you wanted to be kept up to date with the investigation. Force of habit, Dacanery supposed.

Conversation arose as the implications of the new mystery set in. Well, it wasn't new, but the line had been re-opened. The crowd dissipated and Dacanery approached Brooks.

"What do you think the spider shows?" He asked.

"Well, if we can trace the DNA we can hopefully find similarities and narrow it down from there."

"It's momentous this is, isn't it? Finding a spider now of all days."

"Indeed it is." Brooks opened his mouth to speak again when a breathless assistant rushed in.

"Detectives." He said, panting, obviously out of breath, having run from who knows where.

"What is it?" Asked Brooks sharply.

"The witness..." The two detectives went still.

"What about the witness?" Dacanery asked. If anything had happened to the witness... Their only piece of evidence gone. That could completely dismantle the case.

"Murdered... Found dead... Knife wound... Hour ago..." The assistant said.

The three remaining people in the room fell silent, and Dacanery went through what this would mean in his head. They had the witness' report written down, and they remembered it, but that was the only concrete evidence, and that would probably crumble. And why would the witness have been murdered? What had the witness done? And how would someone get into the police station, with a lot of trained police officers without being noticed? There couldn't be a traitor in the police station, could there?

Dacanery's phone ring as he was deep in thought, and he answered it, not really concentrating on what he was hearing. He only caught the last part of the conversation, when the chief detective was telling him there had been another murder. He had noted down the street and town, and then hung up.

"Brooks?" He called out to the detective who was quietly talking to the assistant. Brooks dismissed the assistant and walked over to where Dacanery was standing.

"Yes?" He asked.

"There has been another murder."

"Great. Just great. I guess the chief has put this one of our shoulders?"

"Indeed she has." Dacanery answered gravely.

"Well that's just perfect." Muttered Brooks sarcastically.

"Well, we probably should get going."

They walked out the room, their spirits lower than they had been when they had entered the room. They had suffered a setback. Setbacks were only too be expected, but not like this. This could be a mere distraction from the killer, but more likely had more significance than being just a mere distraction. The witness probably had a high chance of revealing something someone didn't want revealed to be murdered. Just what it was could solve the mystery, if it was the right thing. The witness hadn't been much help, but was a significant milestone in the course of the investigation. Was, being the key word. Now they didn't have a witness, and were only slightly ahead of step one. At least they had all the other evidence from the doctor. It would be classic if the doctor was murdered, and records destroyed and they wouldn't have anything left, Dacanery thought. It would be like everything else that had happened in the course of the previous investigation where they had had so many dead ends they never expected anything that wasn't a dead end.

They drove to the crime scene in silence, both taking Brooks' car to reduce fuel consumption. The weight of the death weighed heavily on Dacanery's back, and the tension in the air was almost suffocating, if one was used to be suffocated by tension filled air.

The crime scene was exactly like the other, the monotonous colour of the white lab jackets and surrounding tents overtaking everything. It was almost hypnotising. It would have been, if it wasn't for the body in the centre.

This one was slightly different. A male teenager, about sixteen. But still  a teenager like all the other victims of the spider killer.

One of the forensic scientists noticed the detectives presence and walked over to greet them.

"Detective Dacanery. Detective Brooks. We have gone over the crime scene, and found nothing different this time to the murders of two years ago."

Dacanery felt his heart fall. Nothing different meant no new pieces of evidence. No new pieces of evidence meant they were still slightly ahead of square one, waiting on doctor Grigaru for the results of the DNA test. Waiting on the doctor meant more time until the murder was solved. And more waiting meant more murders.

The forensic scientist walked away, and Brooks stepped away as his phone rang. Dacanery examined Brooks' attitude towards who ever was calling him. He was agitated and kept looking at the body and was in turns frustrated and annoyed.

When he stepped back Dacanery was curious enough to ask questions, curious enough so that his curiousity overcame his respect of privacy for his colleague.

"Who was calling?" He asked, the words out of his mouth before he even realised what he was saying.

Brooks looked around, in edge. Something was up with him, it was more noticeable up close. "Wrong number."

This wasn't the right answer, but Brooks walked away before Dacanery could question further.

They drove back to the station in silence, the trip having almost been a waste of time, except for the phone call Brooks had received. He was usually laid back, not this agitated. As they drove back to the station, Dacanery formulated a plan that involved stealing Brooks' phone and checking the caller ID, and seeing how things would go from there.

The crime scene had been far away from the station, so it was almost the end of the working day when they arrived back. Just enough time to steal Brooks' phone and hear the reports of the spider from the doctor.

Dacanery noted that Brooks left his phone in his pocket of his jacket. Brooks hung the jacket over the inside of his door, and walked away muttering that he would see doctor Grigaru.

Dacanery nipped inside the door and opened Brooks' phone, having carefully identified the password by noting the keys Brooks pressed when typing his password in. It took a few tries, but immediately he was in the phone.

Caller ID hadn't been blocked, so Dacanery wrote down the number on a scrap of paper and slipped it quickly into his pocket. He turned the phone off and put it back in the same pocket, and walked out the office to find Brooks standing outside the office, with a look of annoyance written all over his face. He was surrounded by two burly police officers that Dacanery didn't recognise.

"I place you, detective Dacanery, under arrest for sneaking around over people's offices and the murder of our only witness for this crime, Angelina Shaw."

"What? That wasn't me? Listen, i didn't do that, I have no reason to do that." Dacanery protested.

"Actually, I have evidence that you are the traitor in the police force I have been looking for. Did you not think someone would suspect you? We never found any leads, and you were the one leading the investigation. You stopped us whenever we were close, protecting your master, the killer. Well, you've been found out, and now we will have success on the case. Officers, arrest this detective. Chief Inspector Masterson will be notified of your arrest shortly. If you resist you will be thrown in jail for aiding the enemy and you will not receive a trial." Brooks said.

"The chief won't stand for this." Dacanery said as he was being cuffed.

"Actually, I think she will." Brooks said, smiling an evil twisted smile.