Chris Carter - I Am Death

As Sanders handed Hunter the file, his gaze moved past the RHD detective and settled on the picture board directly behind him. A second later, his eyes widened.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Sanders whispered under his breath.

Hunter and Garcia followed his stare.

‘You already have a second victim?’ Sanders asked, his eyes moving about the board.

Neither Hunter nor Garcia said anything.

‘When?’

‘Her body was found the day before yesterday,’ Garcia replied.

Sanders’ expression was a mixture of surprise and incredulity. ‘A day after the first victim was found?’

Garcia gave him a single, subtle nod.

Sanders frowned as his eyes focused on one particular photograph.

‘Sharon Barnard... Sharon Barnard... ’

Reading it from the board, he murmured the name to himself a couple of times, searching his memory for a moment before shaking his head.

‘Neither her name nor her face sound or look familiar.’ He looked back at Hunter and Garcia. ‘Was she ever reported?’

‘She was never missing,’ Hunter explained. ‘There was no abduction this time. Her killer simply broke into her house and murdered her in her living room.’

Sanders’ frown intensified, now speckled with confusion. ‘No abduction? The perpetrator broke away from his original MO?’

‘Don’t even get us started on this “MO” business,’ Garcia said, lifting his hands in surrender. Strategically, he moved around to the other side of the room, dragging Sanders’ attention away from the board.

Hunter quickly joined him.

Garcia moved the subject along. ‘So those are the results of a search? What search?’ The question was directed more at Hunter than at Sanders.

‘Just a long shot, really,’ Hunter explained. ‘I had forgotten all about it. I asked Detective Sanders to run a search against the national Missing Persons database for cases where an abduction was perpetrated under similar circumstances to that of Nicole Wilson.’

Garcia thought about it for a second.

‘I must admit that I hadn’t thought about it like that until then,’ Sanders added. ‘But it made sense. The abduction scene at the Bennetts’ house was too clean. Forensics spent two full days in there and they found absolutely nothing — no prints, no fibers, no hairs, no speck of dust that didn’t belong, not a thing. In ten years with Missing Persons, I’d never come across such a sterile scene. That level of perfection isn’t very easy to achieve, especially alone and on your first ever abduction?’

‘Right from the beginning,’ Hunter took over, addressing Garcia, ‘we both had our suspicions that this killer would kill again, remember? That he would become a repeat offender.’

‘But what if he already was a repeat offender?’ Garcia said, already in sync with Hunter.

Sanders nodded his agreement. ‘Exactly. At least when it came to abductions.’ He once again indicated the file he’d handed Hunter. ‘Well, that long shot might’ve paid off. Have a look in there.’

Fuck you, you sick piece of shit.

Fuck you, you sick piece of shit.

Squirm kept repeating those words in his head and he had every intention of spitting them out in his captor’s face, but as ‘The Monster’s’ steps drew nearer and Squirm rolled his body over on the mattress, survival, the most primal of all human instincts, grabbed hold of him in a way it had never done before. Instead of saying what he had rehearsed, the words that came out of the boy’s lips were:

‘I’m sorry, sir. I’m getting up now.’

Still, Squirm had taken too long to reply. Anger had already colored the man’s face. He grabbed the boy by his hair and lifted him off the ground.

In vain, Squirm’s hands shot up to his head, grabbing at the man’s closed fist. Pain once again took hold of the boy’s entire body with the speed of a lightning bolt. He tried screaming, but he was so weak that all his vocal cords could produce was a feeble and muffled ‘Urghh’.

‘You’re going to have to start doing better than this, Squirm. I’m beginning to lose my patience with you.’

‘The Monster’ let go of Squirm’s hair, but with his legs too frail to hold him up, the boy first collapsed on to his knees, then to all fours.

It took all of Squirm’s willpower to block new tears from coming to his eyes.

I’m not going to cry anymore, the boy told himself through gritted teeth. I’m not. Never again.

‘C’mon, Squirm, let’s go.’

Still trembling, Squirm got to his feet and followed the man out of his cell and into the kitchen. As always, ‘The Monster’ had already prepared his own breakfast. This morning it consisted of scrambled eggs, three buttered slices of toast, three bacon rashers, a bowl of cereal with milk and a large glass of orange juice.

Squirm’s first chore of the day was to watch the man eat his entire breakfast. No matter how hungry he was, if Squirm’s tongue left his mouth and licked his lips, even if only for a split second, his face would be slapped so hard blood would usually drip from his lips at the corner of his mouth. When ‘The Monster’ was done, if there were any scraps left he would throw them on to the floor. Squirm was then allowed to use his shackled hands to eat them, no cutlery allowed, before washing up after ‘The Monster’, including all the pans that were already in the sink. After that, the boy had to scrub the entire floor with a brush barely larger than a toothbrush. If ‘The Monster’ didn’t think the floor was clean enough, he would make Squirm lick it in its entirety.

Squirm took his place, standing with his back to the north wall, facing the breakfast table and his captor, who sat at the head of it. What usually happened then was that ‘The Monster’ would begin eating. He would use his plastic knife and fork to either slice or pick up some food, slowly bring it to his mouth, all the while not taking his eyes off the hungry boy. With every mouthful, the man would tease Squirm by making appreciative noises, as if he were eating the most delicious food on earth.

Squirm wasn’t allowed to close his eyes or look away. If he did, he would be punished.

Fuck you, you sick piece of shit.

The words were still playing in Squirm’s mind. They were halfway between his tongue and his lips, but still, the boy’s survival instinct was fighting a better battle than his desire to die.

The boy kept his mouth shut.

As ‘The Monster’ took his place, his gaze moved to the newspaper by his breakfast plate, then to the plate, but he didn’t reach for his knife and fork. His gaze moved once again, this time to the boy standing against the wall, facing him.

Squirm was still shaking. He was unsure how much longer his legs would hold him up. But he had stayed true to his word so far and hadn’t cried another tear.

The man followed the boy’s gaze. Surprisingly, it didn’t lead to the food on the table but to the newspaper.

Squirm’s captor paused, studying the scenario. He then smiled and did something that seemed absurd. He pushed his plate away from him without having touched a single piece of food.

‘You know what, Squirm?’ he said. ‘I’m not hungry this morning. You can have it. You can have it all.’

Squirm didn’t move. He was sure he had heard wrong.

‘Here,’ ‘The Monster’ continued, pushing the glass of orange juice and the bowl of cereal away from him as well. ‘Have the juice and the cornflakes too. I’m not thirsty either.’

A dream. That’s it, Squirm thought. There was no other explanation for the madness that was going on in front of him. I’m right in the middle of some crazy-ass dream, no matter how real this all seems. Soon it will be 5:45 a.m. ‘The Monster’ will unlock the cell door and my real day will start.