It's not about what you know. It's about what you can prove.

The thought rolled in his mind as he continued chewing onto the last remaining skin of the apple. He wouldn't swallow it for another ten minutes or so. Not until he arrived at the cafe and he could wash his mouth with 

coffee

.

Marc Love didn't exist. The person did, but not the identity. What was identity but just a collection of papers issued by some 

authority

. In the past people could trust such papers, but nowadays you could counterfeit anything. 

Not only were people willing and able to counterfeit any physical material such as papers, audio, video, but because of the ubiquity in fraud people were unwilling to accept such documents as true. In today's world how were you able to prove something anyhow?

His nephew was working in the 

Blockchain

space. Apparently there was a difference between 

crypto

and blockchain. The 

detective

didn't know for sure what the difference was but he understood that the two weren't the same. Last time he had seen his nephew he had been talking about how they were using some method on the blockchain to verify that someone's information was true. The gist of it went over the detective's head, but now as he walked towards the cafe for a coffee and some fried 

eggs

, the conversation came back to him.

In this case how would he prove Marc Love's connection to the real killer? When Marc Love didn't even exist. That was the genius twist introduced by the actual mastermind behind all these 

murder

s. Not only did they hide themselves behind somebody else... they hid the person that was somebody else behind someone who didn't exist.

The detective hadn't felt like this since college. Back when he was cramming for two exams and one group project all due on the same week, none of them he was prepared for and he thought his head was going to explode as he stuffed a salty snack mix into his mouth at the library during late hours.

Damn, he thought.

The only way he could do this is if he got Marc Love -- or whoever Love was -- on his side. This wouldn't be an evidence game, but a personal connection would. He would need to find Love and offer him a way out. Offer him a path away from the mastermind who was controlling all this. Do that without spooking him and maybe they had a shot at catching the real killer.

But even then. Even with Love on his team. It wasn't certain that they could catch the killer in the legal route. Some 

evil

 was just too heinous and crafty to be snared by legal system. Some evil couldn't be captured and contained. Some evil just needed to be exterminated.