The Blacklist

Chapter 366: Arsonist and Resurrection of the Dead

February 2th, Monday, is the 5th day of the twelfth lunar month in the Chinese calendar. Carrie is about to enter holiday mode, but Reddington provides a new blacklist character, "The Chef", through Elizabeth!
Carrie was a little unhappy about this, so he didn't care about it and threw everything to SER and let Donald be in charge.

In the command hall of SER, Elizabeth introduced the situation: "Today's newspaper headline is about a couple who died in a fire, but Lao Lei believes that this is arson, and it was done by someone nicknamed 'Chef'...

"'Chef' is an extremely dangerous arsonist. His method is to disguise murder as accidental fire and hide it in arson cases, making casualties appear to be accidents!"

Donald took the newspaper and read the report. He said, "The fire department found accelerants at the scene, and the police have not found a motive or suspect... Liz, does Lao Lei have any other clues?"

Elizabeth shook her head and said, "Old Ray didn't provide any more clues, but he recommended a person - fire investigator and arsonist Earl Fagan! He said this person has extensive experience in arson and will definitely be able to find the flaws of the 'cook'! However, if we want to use this person, we have to get him out of prison first!"

Hearing this, Donald burst out laughing. Using the arsonist to investigate the arsonist is indeed the best way to solve the case, but only Reddington can come up with this method. If it were just law enforcement officers like them, they would never have thought of it! Now that we're here, let's do it!
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Donald, Elizabeth and Nawabi went to the prison and interrogated Earl Fagan. The other party was willing to help, but he said that he must be released on parole first, otherwise he would not say anything.

To this end, Donald also put forward a condition: first try to see if Earl has real ability!

Later, SER took Earl out of prison in the name of CTU and escorted him to the fire scene...

Earl is a real talent. As soon as he entered the ruins, he saw the multiple fire points and the amount of combustion aids carefully designed by the "chef". He judged that the combustion process was designed in the living room. When the victim couple heard the sound, opened the bedroom door and came out to check the situation, backfire would occur, making the flames burn more fiercely!

Earl even imagined that the "chef" was in the fire at the time, and even sat on the sofa for a while, watching the flames flash and instantly devour the victims, enjoying the perverted satisfaction.

Then, after inspecting the entire fire scene, Earl smelled a smell on the only intact wall. After Nawabi shone an ultraviolet lamp on it, he found an inverted pentagram and an inscription on it: "Order is not faith."

Nawabi asked in confusion, “Why would the arsonist leave a message that we can’t find?”

Earl showed a surprised look for the first time and exclaimed: "Oh my! ... You have encountered an extraordinary arsonist!"
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In any case, the emergence of this new evidence proves that this was indeed a case of arson.

After bringing Earl back to SER, Donald asked Alam to search the FBI crime database for similar cases based on this modus operandi. Sure enough, he found four fires that occurred in different cities. There was a single wall that had not been burned at the scene, on which the same pentagram and inscription were found. Three of the fires caused seven deaths, and only one fire in Terry City did not cause any casualties. The survivor was the emergency doctor Colleen Egan.

Donald arranged for Elizabeth and Dunby to contact Colin to investigate the situation at the time; and asked Nawabi and Alam to investigate the pentagram and inscriptions to see if the "chef" belonged to a cult organization.
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While SER was investigating the arson case, Carrie received a call for help from Tom!
In the office on the eighth floor of the post office, Tom sat on the sofa, holding a cup of hot tea, but his expression was strange and dazed, as if he wanted to say something but hesitated. Kerry did not urge him, but sipped his tea and looked through a pile of documents in his hand. This was the annual reward plan formulated by the finance department based on the 2017 performance of the SLR personnel, which required his review and approval.

After hesitating for a long time, Tom finally said, "Boss, I encountered a very special thing yesterday, and now I don't know what to do!"

"Oh?" Carrie raised her head, obviously interested. "Tell me about it!"

Tom organized his words and began to tell the story...

Before, Tom was sent to Halcyon Shield by Carrie. At first, he thought that because of his past experience, Director Carrie was reluctant to arrange him in SLR, and asked him to transition to this PMC (private military company) with national defense military contracting qualifications... But later he realized the director's painstaking efforts!
When Tom entered Halcyon Shield, the company's founder Howard Hargreave had been missing for a long time and was declared dead. Now the company is controlled by Hargreave's wife Susan...

Before, with Carrie's reminder, he had investigated that his real name was Christopher Hargreave, and his biological parents were Howard and Susan; and he himself was kidnapped and disappeared at the age of five, and there was evidence that he had died that year!
After learning about this situation, he did not recognize Susan because there were still many doubts in this matter. He always felt that it would be better to figure out everything before deciding what to do.

But just yesterday, he suddenly received an unexpected call - a person claiming to be Howard's lawyer, asked him to be in New York before noon, saying that it was about his father's will.

When he arrived in New York on time, he received another call asking him to go to a public telephone booth to answer the call!
After picking up the phone, there was a somewhat old voice on the other end. The voice knew his life story very well and instructed him to find a childhood photo of him and his parents in the phone book in the phone booth, which made him feel cold!
Finally, the other party asked him to return to Washington and meet at Franklin Park at 5 pm...

At this point, Tom's face became even more strange. After drinking a whole cup of tea, he continued his narration: "Yesterday afternoon, I arrived a little early and waited on a park bench. Suddenly, someone sat next to me... Boss, do you know who he is?"

"Howard Hargreave!" Carrie was not surprised at all. He calmly spoke while refilling his tea. "He finally showed up?"

Huh? Tom was at a loss for words. He opened his mouth wide for a moment before he said, "Boss, did you know Howard is not dead?"

"I guessed it." Kairi said, "I sent you to Halcyon, first to let you know about your parents, and second to find out what happened."

(End of this chapter)