CSI: Vegas (2021) s02e15 Episode Script

1
Previously on CSI: Vegas
All of these cases, all of
these people are related.
Whoa, whoa.
That file didn't close by itself.
Someone's accessing the
computer and watching us.
Molly, the person who
sent you that dossier
and that card with the silver ink,
they left something on it.
Find him, please.
A few years ago,
Molly confessed to a few
nonviolent crimes to her therapist.
Dr. Auerbach's notes were printed
on the same printer that
produced these cards.
The sick mind behind all of these
murders is Dr. Diane Auerbach.
Go, go, go!
That's no suicide.
What does your grandma
do that makes you so mad?
It can be hard to talk about
things that make you angry.
That's okay.
Sometimes, it's easier to
draw what's on your mind.
Things that make you happy,
things that bother you.
Dreams, maybe.
May I see your drawing?
I was so sure.
I was so certain that she was
responsible for all of these murders.
Some twisted soul was
holding Dr. Auerbach
responsible for something, huh?
Not much of anything inside.
Place has been empty for a
while, so whoever abducted her
and brought her out here,
they didn't set up shop in there.
Nope. They were busy back here.
Honestly, I'm just wondering
how they even got her up there at all.
Dead weight's a bear
to carry on flat ground,
let alone that far up.
I don't know if he used a pulley,
or what, but the killer had to be strong
and determined. Must've taken a while.
Jack says liver temp puts time
of death at about 30 hours ago.
I thought you and Serena
almost just ran into her
- at the house yesterday.
- Yeah, we thought we did.
Stop! But neither of
us actually saw her.
If it was the killer,
then they were here first,
and they went back to Diane's.
Wonder what they were looking for, huh?
I wonder why they
killed our prime suspect.
Seems a bit self-defeating,
redirects our attention.
Canvass was a bust.
Most of the cabins out here
are vacant during the week,
so we're hard up for witnesses.
So whoever did this,
they would have plenty of privacy for
whatever this is.
"The Hanged Man."
The tarot card.
Me and my friends were really
into tarot in middle school.
The Hanged Man is upside down,
hanging by one ankle from a tree,
hands behind his back.
Hope it's not a bad omen.
Last thing we need is
a cursed crime scene.
This guy went to a lot
of trouble to stage this.
If there's something it can tell
us, we need to know soon, Joshua.
On it.
Thank you.
You should check this
out over here, too.
What do we have here?
The greatest hits of
our connected cases.
A mirror shard.
He used to kill Lynn Zobrist.
Chef's knife and what I think is
potassium cyanide solution.
Like the one that took out
our chef, Dario Donnelly.
And our captive bolt pistol.
Like the one used to kill Lamont Moore
and those innocent bystanders.
Blood on the business end.
No prints, though.
But there are some here.
What have you got?
See this vertical defect?
It matches a healing cut on
Diane's right index finger.
The killer had her sitting here?
The way these weapons are laid out,
I think they made Diane
choose how she wanted to die.
Out of all the weapons
in our silver ink cases
she chose the quickest death.
Half expected to find another card.
"Keep your secrets,
cull the rotten fruit."
Whoever's behind all of this,
they had to know how all
these cases connected.
They were connected
because they were ordered
by the same psychopath.
Let's get him.
- Thank you.
- Okay, fellas.
She's in full rigor. So
let's take it nice and slow.
Ladies.
I thought you were in
Hawaii with your daughter.
I came back a day early.
Lindsey was annoyed.
- You got it?
- Yeah.
Hard to stay on vacation
when a serial killer is on the loose.
Wish this killer would take a vacation.
So, Max said that the guy gave her
a choice of weapons
from the Silver Ink case.
Catch me up.
Leucocrystal violet tests
confirmed that the bolt gun was
actually the only weapon used on Diane.
You didn't get anything
else from the other weapons?
- Prints?
- No.
Uh, the shard is from
a broken bathroom mirror
in the cabin, the knife is
from a block in the kitchen,
and the serial on the bolt gun
can only tell us it was part of a batch
sold through an online retailer.
Trail goes cold there.
And, obviously, the cyanide
solution is in an unmarked bottle.
Maybe the victim can tell us something.
So far,
Diane's not spilling any secrets,
just blood, and lots of it.
We only just figured
out how to get her down
without dropping her on her head.
You didn't see anything up there?
All I got was a workout
and more questions.
I had Serena look at the cuffs.
They're not law-enforcement issue.
Could've come from a sex shop, maybe.
Or online. Or anywhere, really.
Another question: Uh, you see
all that old flaky paint
on the crossbar there?
Well,
there's a void here I can't explain.
If you threw a rope up over
that bar and hauled a body up,
you would strip paint on three sides.
Anywhere you pull a
rope around that bar,
there would be way more disturbed paint.
How the hell did he get her up there?
He didn't use a pulley?
No clue. It was hard
enough to get her down,
and she's in rigor now.
Well, if the killer put her up
there before she was stiff
Yeah, he would have
had a hell of a time.
Be easier if he had help.
You think we've got more than one doer?
All of the other Silver Ink murders
have been committed by lone wolves.
Lone wolves who were coerced.
Maybe our man behind the curtain
blackmailed an accomplice.
Something here is gonna tell us.
Oh, hey. Any winners?
Epithelial DNA from the ropes
and cuff come from a single donor.
- Diane Auerbach. You?
- Uh, just some soil.
Matched a sample from the scene.
Looks like the guy used a
rope that was laying around.
There's nothing but
paint from the flagpole
on this side of the cuffs.
So, to recap,
we have four weapons that lead nowhere,
no witnesses, and no DNA
- or trace that point toward any killer.
- Hmm.
I don't want to use the word "cursed."
I don't think the guy was casting
a spell with his silver squiggles.
We'll find something.
You guys collected everything
you could fit into that trunk.
Plenty more bites off that apple.
When in doubt
dust.
It's just partials.
There's not one print
with enough characteristics
to run through AFIS.
That is some tough taffy to chew.
I have a semi-crazy idea.
What if we try to piece
together all of the partials,
build a usable print from what we have.
Like a Franken-print?
Look, I know it's not
gonna hold up in court,
but it could lead to a
person of interest, right?
These aren't even partials,
these are partials of partials.
You think we can cobble together
something substantial
from such tiny bits?
I once built the Taj Mahal out of Legos.
We got this.
Ah, come on.
Do you need a hand?
I think I need all of you.
This guy is
not a great stand-in
for Diane Auerbach.
He's a little too tall, too heavy.
Same goes for everybody
else in my dummy closet.
Your dummy closet? Wow.
All right.
I got to figure out if the killer
had an accomplice when he strung her up.
Either way, it was a tough job.
This guy had to leave a
piece of himself somewhere,
but I don't know where to look.
So, you want to
Run some trials.
Will you donate your body to science?
Whoa. All right.
- You good?
- Yeah.
- All right.
- Oh, Josh,
- I'm slipping. I'm slipping.
- What?
All right.
- No.
- No.
Okay, can you help, uh
Here we go. You got it?
I should not have quit yoga.
Let it swing and over.
- Nice. Okay.
- Yes.
We did it.
Well, I think you mean I did it.
You were more of a handsome tripod.
- All right, you ready?
- Mm-hmm.
Here we go.
- You all right?
- Yeah.
So
I doubt that Diane was
that amenable to her killer.
I doubt that she was even alive.
So, either he had help, or
we're looking for Superman.
Mr. Auerbach, this is Maxine Roby,
the director of the crime lab.
- I'm so sorry for your loss, sir.
- Ah, thank you.
But, truth be told, I'm
surprised you called.
Me and Diane have been
separated almost two years.
I thought she'd have
somebody else for next of kin.
You moved out?
Yeah, well, 20 years of having
your every sigh
psychoanalyzed starts to grate.
Did she grate on anybody else?
I thought you said you'd met her.
Look, Diane worked with disturbed
kids for most of her career.
Lot of them had signs of psychopathy,
and when they got worked up
Did you ever worry for her safety?
She had these creeps
traipsing through our house.
I always thought having a
home office was a bad idea.
She insisted they were safe.
Was she ever concerned about
anybody in particular, or
No, she was always very
serious about privacy.
I-I didn't even know their names.
Mr. Auerbach, LVPD has a record
of a domestic disturbance
call at Diane's address.
Four years ago.
You know the one.
That was before the separation.
We used to argue something awful,
but it was raised voices, that's all.
See, we're pretty sure
we're looking for a big guy.
Your left arm could feed a
family of five for a week.
- Are you seriously suggesting
- Yes, I am.
I'm asking you where you were last night
- from 8:00 to midnight.
- Working out.
I don't skip leg day.
You don't believe me?
Here, I even recorded a
little for my, uh, trainer.
She likes to critique my form.
Mm, okay.
Tell me you got something, Sonya.
I'm starting to feel like the
grand marshal of a dead end parade.
Well, I'm not sure any
of what I have is gonna crack the case,
- but I do know two things.
- Tell me.
So, first thing:
Lividity indicates that
your victim died upright.
See this sort of whitish discoloration
on her buttocks and
the backs of her thighs?
I would say that she was seated
and she stayed that way for a while.
So, the killer turned her upside down
after she had already died.
Yes. But not immediately.
Okay, what's thing two?
Okay, thing two: You see this
sort of adhesive
residue around the wound?
I would verify this with FTIR,
but based off the strength
of this remaining residue,
I would say that is
contractor-grade duct tape.
Why it's there, though, I have no idea.
Maybe the killer wanted to
keep the wound from bleeding
until the stage was set.
Duct tape to prevent blood flow.
That is crude, but it's effective.
It's oddly fastidious.
He's nothing if he's not meticulous.
He needs everything to be just so.
Yeah.
Jack, you got to be more
careful with the specimen trays.
Jack?
Hey.
Hey, excuse me! Hey! Security!
Stop!
He ran out the back door.
Whoever that was, he shouldn't
have been in the crypt.
I mean, unless he was lost.
I don't
He left something behind.
That was him?
That was him.
There.
Okay, we've got to be close.
This is when Max went into
the morgue at 5:17 p.m.
There he is.
You got a different angle?
5:34 p.m. He runs out
the loading dock doors
and we lose him in the alley. Darn it.
We never see his face.
All right, that's just how
he got out of the building.
- How did he get in?
- Let me check.
This reminds me of a Where's
Waldo nightmare I had.
Candy cane striped hellscape.
That's him, right?
Dressed like a delivery guy?
Must be how he wormed
his way past security.
Where's the footage from that elevator?
There isn't any.
Maintenance said that those cameras
are gonna get fixed next week.
But, if he got out at the lobby level
Hold up.
Is that Bryan?
Almost, the chin isn't quite right.
A little bit sharper.
So I think we have a sketch
of a stick figure in a hat.
I don't think my guy has the chops
to get what Bryan's giving him.
Any DNA on the note?
Yes, indeed.
We got a name and a police report.
Modi Subramaniam.
Ooh, a 92-year-old with a record.
Felony assault, 2017.
Hit a teenager in a grocery
store parking lot with his cane.
Okay, you're not telling me
Bad Grandpa outran you, are you?
I think our silver ink-obsessed killer
used an envelope with
this old man's DNA on it.
I think we should find out if
he's trying to show us something.
So, our homeowner, Modi,
he is pretty spry for
a 92-year-old felon.
Lives out in Palm Springs
with a couple lady friends.
Rents this place out.
Any information about his tenant?
Description he gave was
"some young white guy."
- Goes by "Mike Smith."
- Hmm.
- Narrows it down.
- Yeah, a few hundred Mike Smiths in Vegas,
but this one paid six
months' rent up front in cash.
I'm guessing Modi didn't
ask too many questions.
You know, he insisted on a video call
when he heard my voice.
He said "anything for a lady
cop with very pretty eyes."
- Ooh.
- So I have an open invitation to Palm Springs,
and we have permission to look around.
Well, let's not keep you from
that poolside margarita, huh?
Somebody ran a cable to that structure.
Yup.
Maybe an ADU?
I'm over here.
Not much of a view, though, huh?
No, there isn't.
Catherine
These symbols, they're symbols
like those postcards we've been getting.
Homeowner says we can go in.
I think we found your pen pal.
You have any luck decoding this stuff?
Allie's been working on it.
Beau dabbles. But nothing yet.
I mean,
maybe it's just lorem ipsum.
Like it means nothing?
That really would be crazy.
Oh, my God.
Get out, get out!
Come on, get out!
- You okay?
- Yeah. I'm fine. Max?
- Are you okay?
- I'm okay.
I hit the light switch. It was rigged.
Dispatch, I need LVFD
at my current location
in Boulder City now.
I got a case going up in smoke.
Damn it!
I know. Our evidence got flambéed.
I don't want to hear a word
about this case being jinxed.
I never should have touched
that damn light switch.
Oh, it's okay, boss.
It's not as if it's our
first crispy crime scene.
Yeah, if I'd seen it first,
I would've done the same damn thing.
This psycho was probably counting on it.
And his little booby trap
could be exactly what helps us find him.
I want every piece of
this ignition mechanism,
anything that remotely looks
like it belongs to it, Catherine.
Bag and tag it. I'm on it.
This was a controlled burn.
He wanted us to find something.
Allie, I want you to look
at every piece of paper,
everything in the drawers
and anything that looks
like it survived this fire.
Got it. I'll see if I can make sense
of what's left of these scribbles.
Yeah, you do, we'll buy you a steak
dinner at the Palazzo, how's that?
Really?
Hey, you guys.
Penny was right.
What?
The guy who engineered this,
they were watching us.
- Max.
- Yeah.
You need to see this.
What?
You are running trace analysis on a card
that's literally ordering your murder.
That is the job, Joshua.
Not when some psychopath has
put a target on your back.
How many people got
that card with your name?
You wanna end up back in the hospital?
Or worse? I can't imagine that
you want to go through that again.
I know I don't.
My name on one of those
cards is totally off-pattern.
Who's been the target so far?
Every other Silver Ink case has been
one troubled person
being sent after another.
So putting my name in the mix
It's a desperate move.
He's panicking.
We're close,
and he's worried,
and worried people make mistakes.
Max, come on.
You cannot just be chum in
the water for some lunatic.
- You want me to be safe?
- Yeah.
Then let's find out everything we can
about this guy and get
him off the streets.
She has to handle it her way.
You will be an invited guest
at an LVPD safe house
until this is over.
Actually, I have a better idea.
You know, I'm really not too wild about
how often people are
trying to kill you, Mom.
It's starting to feel
like a trend, isn't it?
So, what do we do?
I need you to get two
rooms at the Aurora.
One for me, one for you.
Use fake names, okay?
Like we're in witness protection?
It's not perfect, I know that,
but LVPD is gonna post
unis outside our rooms.
We'll have Aurora's CCTV network
as added security, and
you'll be able to go to work.
Mom? This sucks.
I know.
I'll set it up.
All right. Thank you.
Oh, hey, I got something to show you.
What you got?
I didn't really see much of
this guy's face, but I saw this.
He's got a scar on his arm.
What happened to that stick figure?
Oh, you know I had to do a
little somethin' somethin'.
You want something done right,
you got to do it yourself.
I'm sorry to interrupt, boss, but
you should come take a look at this.
We were able to jigsaw
some usable prints
from the partials we
pulled at Diane's cabin.
Okay, Pen, a judge is
gonna throw this out
at the mention of the word "jigsaw."
No, we know.
But don't you want to meet your matches?
Matches? Plural?
Whatever you think I did,
it's not true, I've
never done anything
We just have a few
questions, Juan Carlos.
Your prints are on file
from your asylum application.
Me and Juan Carlos,
we've been picking up construction jobs.
We've been working all the
time. It's been amazing.
It's been terrible.
Have you met the people that live here?
They're all degenerates.
What exactly were you building
out by Lake Spring Mountain, Mister
Uh, Hester.
Ted Hester.
And it was a boat ramp.
That old dock is in pretty rough shape.
And you just hired a couple
of day laborers to help?
Yeah, I got a bum shoulder,
so I can't do any heavy lifting.
This was months ago now,
but I remember the boss
on this paid in cash.
Said we'd get to work by the lake.
Better than the desert.
How long were you out there?
We didn't see a boat ramp.
We never finished. Barely even started.
Boss said the old lady
that used to live there,
she went into a home.
Not to be a jerk,
but no money, no boat ramp, you know?
Where were you night before last?
Lotería. I'm a cantor at
Señorita Margarita's twice a week.
He's actually very good.
Won a hundred dollars that night.
I was at home watching the Lakers.
They got to trade 'Bron, man.
Blow it up. Get some picks.
Yeah. Uh, well, if you
have anything else
There is one thing, actually.
I remember seeing a
pickup out at the cabin.
It was an extended cab, white.
Had a supertop over the bed.
Saw it a couple times.
If anybody got close, it just took off.
Well, thank you, Mr. Hester.
All right.
I didn't see any scars on their arms,
but the file on Bob
Auerbach says he drives
a white truck that
sounds pretty similar.
Along with a thousand
other Vegas residents.
I was thinking about the boat ramp.
Mm-hmm?
The summer I was 17, I dated
this girl whose family had money.
Oh, I bet her dad loved you.
- No.
- Mm-hmm.
But he had a boat that needed repairs,
and I helped him haul
it out of Lake Tahoe.
I think I need to go find a hoist.
Oh, hey, Al
Uh, hey. No, it's me. Allie texted.
She's still at the white room scene,
but she said you needed help.
Mm, okay.
Ha-ha. Now we're talking.
We might not be looking
for a powerlifter,
just a guy with a powerful lifter.
But I thought you said there was no sign
that a pulley was used,
and wouldn't a hoist like this
have to be pulled from above?
Were there any markings
on top of the flagpole?
Uh
There's no sign of
anything being disturbed
except for that little void in the paint
where Diane was hanging.
Well, maybe he hooked up
a motorized device to
I don't know, something tall
that isn't there anymore?
Maybe.
I think we need to get back to
the crime scene for another look.
Mm-hmm. Yeah, totally.
Could I be right side up for that?
Oh, yeah.
- Hey, Beau.
- Hey.
Anything useful?
You have components of the
ignition device, accelerant.
I mean, it's all stuff that contractors,
repair folk, your odd DIY-er could buy
at a hardware store on a regular basis.
So we'd be hard-pressed to trace
any of it back to an individual.
Yeah, even before it went up in flames.
Damn. I
just was really hoping
this was going to end
our evidence drought.
There's got to be something
that we're missing.
The thing I keep coming back to
are these crazy symbols on the walls.
Allie and I, we haven't
cracked the postcards, but maybe
there's something there we haven't seen.
Like what?
A pattern.
A clue to the cipher. I don't know,
but something that could get us
to the bastard who is threatening Max.
I just I can't really tell.
Well, maybe you need to
get back in the saddle.
I mean, if you think there's
something at the crime scene
that could help Max, you're
not going to find it in a lab
on the other side of town.
Oh.
Well, well, well,
if it isn't a rare sighting
of Beau Finado out in the wild.
Don't get excited,
this is a temporary state of affairs.
Nope. Sorry, I'm getting excited.
You can't stop me.
Look, I'm just here to get a better look
at the stuff that's on the walls.
Yeah, the silver scribbles.
I've been trying to make them
out through the soot all day.
Well, Beau brought something
that might make it a little easier.
You know I love my latex.
Guys I found something weird.
Well, weirder.
Well
it's not exactly a secret decoder ring,
but it's something.
Richard Sloan, Alan Herskovitz
I don't know what I'm looking at,
but I know I don't like it.
Whoever's behind the Silver Ink murders,
this is part of their plan.
We're not just looking
at a few connected crimes.
What do you see, Allie?
It's a wheel.
This whole time, we've been
watching a wheel of death spin.
This is his plan.
This is his whole game plan.
Your big old board of crazy
looks a lot less crazy. What happened?
We found something under
the soot at the fire scene.
Beau's liquid latex trick
gave us a clean look.
That ouroboros and the names around it
helped me realize what it is
that we're really looking at.
- A game.
- A game?
You ever play Assassin, boss?
We used to play it at
university with Nerf guns.
Players are assigned a target,
and once they eliminate
one, they inherit
that player's target as
their next assignment.
It's just a complicated game of tag.
You go after me, I go after Allie,
Allie goes after you
It's fun.
If you're playing with Nerf bullets.
Are you sure about this?
Mm-hmm. The snake eats its own tail.
The wheel rolls until only one remains.
And everybody else ends up dead.
I mean, all these poor, sick folks.
Who would want to kill all these people?
And who dreams up something like this?
You know what?
No more games. Get me a suspect.
No holes, no disturbed earth.
Whatever kind of rig he
used to get her up there
had to be anchored to something,
but I wouldn't even begin to
know where to look for trace.
I'm not the superstitious type,
but even I'm starting to think that
think that this case
is cursed. Hey, Penny,
be careful, that dock
looks pretty rough.
Hey, hey, hey Wow.
Hey, look at this.
The base is rusty, but not on top.
Yeah, you're right, it's
like the top section's
been scraped clean.
Something was on that post.
Like a Like a mount for a boat winch?
A hand crank to pull a
boat out of the water.
Usually, they're mounted on
a trailer, but if there was
If there was one here
Yeah, that's how he did it solo.
There'd be no accomplice needed.
He could just hoist Diane's
body into place from here.
But there's no way her body
was pulled from this angle.
And the friction from a
rope pulling her weight
over the crossbar would have
stripped off more paint, right?
Yeah.
Maybe not, if there was
a different anchor point.
Got something?
I think we already had something.
I think we have the
smoking gun at the lab.
Damn it.
- I thought our luck was changing.
- So did I.
We found a fiber at the scene
from this snag in the bungee.
I know he used it.
There's a couple of rope fibers
trapped in this coil here.
- He didn't have enough rope to haul her up.
- Uh-huh.
So he used that to
make up the difference.
Pretty sure, but there's no DNA here.
So, what happens when you attach
weight to the end of a bungee?
- It stretches.
- Exactly.
And when you stretch a bungee cord,
it expose more surface area
that could catch DNA.
It would be hard work
stretching the bungee that far.
I broke a sweat just doing
a spiral search with Penny.
Maybe our killer sweated, too.
Come on.
Damn.
No match in CODIS.
We're not done yet, Joshua.
Met this fella,
this brilliant scientist
at a genetics conference.
He's from the Netherlands.
And he has new research
that expands what you can
predict from a DNA assay.
How detailed can you get?
Give me 20 minutes with your genome
and I could tell you
whether your hairline
will survive the next decade.
As for our sweaty suspect,
a male of average height
Probably not Diane's ex. I heard he was
a tall drink of protein shake.
And he very likely has heterochromia.
Different colored eyes?
That mean something to you?
Blow it up. Get some picks. Right?
Yeah, it means our guy also has
a bum shoulder and a shaky alibi.
So, when we bring him in,
all I need you to tell me
is whether it's the man
you saw in the elevator.
Yes, ma'am.
You're mighty popular.
Oh, it's just Dad.
He's texting me his flight details.
Where's he going now?
I may have mentioned
that we're hiding out
from a crazy axe murderer or whatever.
- Hmm?
- I was really worried about you,
and it just kind of slipped out.
And you know Dad.
He booked a flight to Vegas
before we even got off the phone.
That's okay. I mean, yeah, it's okay.
It's No
It's okay, it's okay.
You lied to us, Ted.
You told us you were a contractor,
hired to build a boat ramp.
You don't have a contractor's license.
According to the State
of Nevada, you never did.
I guess I'm more of a casual handyman.
That doesn't explain
why the two day laborers
who worked at the property
don't recognize you.
How about you?
You recognize him?
You never worked at that cabin.
No. You just played
along to make us think
you were supposed to
be there. Are you sure?
That's not the guy I saw.
This is what you designed.
A real-life game of
Assassin. You took advantage
of troubled, potentially
violent individuals
and blackmailed them into
taking each other out.
Sounds like a good plan.
I'm sorry, but it does.
I mean, takes out the
trash, does humanity a favor,
keeps everyone's hands clean.
You think your hands are clean?
Whoever did this,
I don't know, should
get a medal or something,
but it wasn't me.
Uh, Ted
You don't have any proof.
Oh, no, that's where you're wrong.
We pulled DNA from this bungee cord.
A man with heterochromia sweat on it
while he was stringing
up Diane Auerbach.
Bet it matches you.
Okay, so, I touched a
bungee cord on a jobsite.
I'm not denying that.
Cut the crap, Ted.
You blackmailed these people
to get them to kill each other,
and when we started to get too
close, you decided to go after
the director of the crime lab, Max Roby.
Is Maxine watching right now?
Gotcha.
How'd you know "Max"
was short for "Maxine"?
You think you're the smartest
one in the room, don't you?
I wouldn't bet on that.
Guess we'll find out
which one of us is right.
Belly of the beast.
Yeah, here we are.
In a serial killer's house.
Sure missed this.
Let's just hope Mr. Hester
doesn't keep his house
as clean as his crime scene.
Hope it's a good omen this time.
Chavez.
What's that?
You saw a flourishing patch of cucumbers
and thought, "Bet there's
a body under there."
Excuse me, nitrogen from decaying tissue
can cause increased
chlorophyll production
in plants growing over a shallow grave.
And, if you'd seen the drawings,
you would've thought the same.
Folsom.
Grandma?
You told your neighbors
that your grandmother moved to Sarasota,
but she never left home, did she?
Did your granny know
about your twisted little fantasies?
She was the one who sent me
to Dr. Auerbach in the first place.
She promised I'd get better.
And for years, I thought I did.
Changed my pattern of
thought, like Auerbach said.
I could control the urges.
Until you couldn't.
She was just skin and bone.
Just one little knock to the head
and she went down so easy.
Why?
Why not?
What about Diane Auerbach, hmm?
Well, she was supposed to fix me.
But she failed, clearly.
But why kill her now?
You.
You did that.
You were talking to
her, making her think.
She called me.
She suspected.
- It was you we saw at her house.
- Yeah.
I had to clean up everything
that she had on me.
It took a little convincing,
but she told me where to find it all.
So we were getting close.
And you had to move fast.
But you still couldn't resist
the urge to stage your scene
just like those fantasies
that you couldn't shake.
I was born with these fantasies.
They're as much a part of me
as your left hand is a part of you.
Death lives inside of me.
Why not use that?
What do you mean, use it?
I knew I could make the
world a better place.
I knew I could
cull the rotten fruit.
You stole files from Diane Auerbach
and other child psychiatrists.
No, these doctors, the Auerbachs,
the-the Sarkisians, the rest,
they think they can help,
but my way is better.
I found people like me,
and I used the death inside
them to solve the problem.
So, you set the wheel rolling.
One kills the next, kills the next,
and on and on until
there's only one left.
Alan Herskovitz, Richard Sloan
It was in them all along.
They all killed with just a tiny push.
I'd hardly call blackmail a tiny push.
Also, what about the other people?
Lynn Zobrist, Lamont Moore.
Molly Tate.
I mean, none of those people
were going to be
pushed to murder. Right?
I'm not batting a thousand,
but none of them were going to
be president of the PTA, right?
No one is going to miss them.
We're missing something.
He's giving us everything.
Not yet.
I would like to ask
you about these cards.
This writing here.
I can't tell you anything about that.
I didn't write those.
I have no idea what that means.
You see this guy?
In the white room,
these squiggly
symbols? That's not me.
That's my MVP.
Okay, Ted, there's no
reason for you to lie.
We're late in the game.
I'm telling you the truth.
And you're right,
I have no reason not to.
I set out to find people like me.
Potential serial killers.
And I did.
I found a real champ.
And even though I'm in here,
he's out there, playing the game.
And he's going to win by a landslide.
He claims the white room isn't his.
I don't think he's lying.
The DNA we found in the white
room doesn't match Ted Hester.
What? Whose is it?
So that was the plan,
to take out the last man
standing yourself, huh?
Of course.
But you made that
pretty impossible, so
I gave my best player a real challenge.
You're all in the game now.
May the best man win.