Chapter 158: Fake Death Syndrome (2/2)

Just then, I received a text message from Xiaotao, which read, “The girl is still dead. I’ve asked someone to track down her identity.”

I spent the best part of the day in the library, trying to get more information on the young woman’s condition, which was something that I’d never encountered before. It was not too uncommon for someone to have symptoms mimicking death. In fact, various heart and brain diseases might cause death-like symptoms. But usually there would be some telltale signs that differentiated these symptoms from actual death. This young woman, however, had a symptom so accurately like death, with no detectable vital signs at all. A case like hers had, as far as I knew, never been recorded before.

I found an author who had written books about uncommon medical conditions and decided to write him an email describing the details of the case and asked for his advice and suggestions.

Even after writing that email, I couldn’t get my mind off the case and wasn’t in the mood to do anything else. It was as if I was in a trance—I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t do anything else but ponder on the puzzling case. Dali, on the other hand, went out and watched a movie with our roommates without a care in the world.

The next morning, I received an email from the author. He explained that there was a disease called Intermittent False Death Syndrome. It had not been included in the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Diseases because only two cases had ever been recorded in history. The pathological cause was never determined either.

The author conjectured that people with this disease had a congenital defect in the center of the hypothalamus, which intermittently brought the body to a state of halt before it fell into a condition of false death.

I thanked the author for the information and asked him how one could awaken the patient. He replied by expressing great interest in the patient that I described and asked me who I was and how I encountered the patient. I told him that I was with the police.

“Ah, so you’re a police officer!” he replied. “According to your description of the patient, she would be resuscitated whenever her body is engaged in sexual intercourse. In that case, I recommend injecting 3% epinephrine into her veins to wake her up.”

Apart from that, he also expressed hopes to obtain first-hand research materials from me once the case had been resolved. I understood this feeling very well, so I agreed to discuss the matter with the other officers.

I then immediately rushed to the police station with Dali. When he learned that I figured out a way to wake the girl up, he got so excited as if he was going to meet the angel of his dreams.

“Get a hold of yourself!” I reminded him. “Did you forget the fact that she’s a murderer?”

“She was clearly defending herself!” Dali retorted. “How could a beautiful angel like her ever have a sinister thought in her pure mind? I think you’re the one who should get a hold of yourself, dude!”

I smiled wryly in response, secretly thinking how flawed Dali’s logic was in assuming that beautiful people couldn’t be sinister.

When we arrived, we found the police station to be particularly rowdy. It turned out that the two gangs were at each other’s throats again. The Black Panthers gang members were so anxious to avenge their boss that they stabbed about three people from the Blood Wolf gang.

“Song-ge!” cried Baldy when I walked in. “What a coincidence!”

“It’s only been a few days,” I said. “How did you get caught again?”

“It was all a misunderstanding, Song-ge!” he explained. “We just had a little skirmish last night after a few drinks.”

“A little skirmish, you say?” barked the officer who was holding him. “People were hacked to death and you call that a little skirmish! Come here!”

Baldy was dragged away. Dali whispered to me, “How do you know a gangster, dude? That’s awesome!”

We then found Xiaotao in another room. She’d been very busy since last night and hadn’t had a single minute of break so she was visibly in a bad mood. I explained what I discovered to her and she responded, “Great! You’d better hurry up and solve this case, Song Yang! Otherwise these two damned gangs will throw the whole city into utter chaos!”

Xiaotao ordered a few police officers to take the ‘corpse’ to a conference room, because all the interrogation rooms were now occupied. The corpse was placed on a chair and handcuffed. The young woman’s body was cold and stiff. Her head was crooked to the side. The sight of her on the chair gave the room an eerie vibe.

“Bring Baldy in!” I ordered.

When Baldy came into the room, he was instantly stunned the moment he saw the corpse.

“That’s amazing, Song-ge!” he exclaimed. “Where did you find her?”

“The way you put it,” I replied, “it almost sounded like you know her!”

1. The emergency number for the ambulance service in China.

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