by Blake Pierce
“Just waiting for the doctor to discharge me, then I’ll be good to go.”
“All right. I’ll be waiting downstairs.”
***
Before Ella made her way downstairs to the hospital foyer, she made a detour to the fourth floor. She didn’t know if she’d find him there still, and she didn’t know if she’d get in trouble for doing so, but she tried regardless.
Most beds were empty, perhaps a side effect of being located in such a backwoods town, where population was low and sickness was considered a weakness. She followed the path from memory until she arrived at the same bed she had only two days ago. She found him fully dressed and ready to leave, much like herself.
“Alex?” she said. He looked up in surprise. The kid looked much better than he had the last time she saw him. His neck was almost free of marks and there was a healthy glow to his face. All of his bandages were nowhere to be seen.
“Oh hey, Agent,” he said. “Wow, you look nearly as bad as me,” he laughed, nodding toward the cuts and bruises on her cheek.
“I’ve been in the wars, just like you. The same war, in fact.”
Alex’s eyes enlarged. He blinked a few times. “What? Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
“Did you…?”
“Catch him?” Yes. I got him. Well, we got him.”
Alex curled his hands into a fist and punched the air. “Yes! Holy shit, that’s awesome. Did you kick his ass?”
“Something like that. You loosened him up for me.” She smiled.
“What’s going to happen to him?” Alex asked, his tone a mixture of excitement and worry.
“At the very least, he’s never getting out of prison. At most, lethal injection.”
“The death penalty?” Alex asked.
“I’m not supposed to tell you this, but I know how it feels to be haunted by something your entire life. The man who attacked you was a serial offender. Before he got to you, he’d killed four people. You were meant to be his fifth, and I was nearly his sixth.”
Alex’s lips parted, his jaw nearly falling loose from his skull. “A serial killer? I escaped a serial killer?”
“You did. Not many people can say that.”
It was clear Alex wasn’t sure how to respond. “Shit me. I guess I should play the lottery tonight since luck is on my side,” he said.
“There was no luck involved. You fought him off. Be proud of yourself.”
“Who was he? Someone who lives round here?”
“A local. That’s all I can really say, but I’m sure you’ll hear everything on the news pretty soon. I hope you didn’t need your car back any time soon because the police are going to need it as evidence for a while.”
Alex chuckled. “That car was a piece of shit so I’m glad to be rid of it. I don’t care about that, but I just wish I could get my key ring back. Do you think I could? Once the police don’t need it anymore?”
Ella saw something change in Alex, like he was suppressing something. “Maybe. Was it important to you?” she asked.
Alex shrugged. “It was a present from my mom when I got my first car. She died a couple of months later.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, the police didn’t find any key ring when they searched the suspect’s house.”
A dispirited Alex shrugged again. “Figures. Ah, well. Shit happens.”
“I understand how hard it is. When I was a kid, someone took something from me too, and all I’ve ever wanted was to get it back. I’ve spent over twenty years dreaming that one day it’d come back, and that feeling when you wake up and it’s not there hurts like nothing else.”
“Sucks, right?”
“It does, that’s why I couldn’t hand this over to the police,” Ella said. She pulled a rectangular piece of metal from her pocket and dropped it on Alex’s bed. The engraving said: ALEX, NO MATTER HOW FAR APART WE ARE, YOU’LL ALWAYS BE IN MY HEART.
Alex saw it and immediately covered his mouth with his sleeve. He let out a sound, half-laugh, half-cry. He moved his sleeve up to his eyes as sobs took over.
“What the…? Where did you get it?”
Ella shrugged. “That’s what a real magic trick looks like,” she laughed.
Truthfully, Ella wasn’t sure. The previous night, as she was being escorted to the hospital, she reached in her pocket and found the key ring there. It was possible she scraped it off the ground as she hunted for weapons during their battle. Perhaps she took it from him as she pummeled him half to death.
“Thank you so much. I don’t think this is an accident,” Alex said, holding back pressurized tears. “This ring saved me. I know my mom was looking down on me when that freak tried to kill me. It was her who intervened.”
Ella smiled. “Do me a favor? Don’t tell anyone I gave you this.”
Alex heartily shook his head. “It’s our secret. Thank you.”
For the first time in the past week, Ella felt nothing but positivity. She saw the fruits of her hard labor. She saw a little of her in Alex, but Alex was now free of the shackles that would have kept him held back for the rest of his life had this killer escaped. She knew she’d made a difference to the lives of the victims’ families, but being able to see real tears of joy, real gratitude in front of her, was a prize like no other. For the first time, she felt like this whole thing had been worth it. Justice had been done.
It might not heal the mental wounds, Ella thought, but it was a token that he’d fought through a hardship and lived to tell about it. No doubt Alex would hear of the recent murders on the news, and perhaps be bombarded with retellings of them for the rest of his life. Hopefully, this small trinket would let him remember his trauma as a victory.
***
She watched Alex leave the ward with his father while she held back, grabbing herself a quick machine coffee to charge her before the long journey back home. As she waited for the machine to finishing whirring, a shadow engulfed her. Someone appeared behind her, too close to be a stranger.
In the reflection of the vending machine, she saw that same blurry profile she had the previous day.
“So, you thought I was a serial murderer, huh?” a voice said.
She spun around and came face to face with Dr. Richards, the man who she’d wrongly assumed to be the killer. Ripley had filled her in on her incident with him the night before. A look of defeat and embarrassment spread across Ella’s face.
“And I was wrong. I’m so sorry,” she said, praying that he wasn’t livid about her predictions. His eyes were inflamed red. She suddenly felt incredibly guilty about ever assuming his guilt. “How’d you find out?”
“My first clue was the twenty notifications I got when my phone got a signal.”
Ella smiled in defeat. “Just that?”
“No. My second clue was when an FBI agent came storming into my dad’s room looking for me.”
“Oh,” Ella chuckled. “Well, I guess that gives it away.”
“Just a little bit.”
“Honestly, I’m so sorry. Your receptionist told me you were celebrating a birthday and that led me down a wrong path. It’s totally my fault. Don’t blame the police or anyone else for this.”
“It’s fine. We get it wrong sometimes. God knows I’ve made a few mistakes in the autopsy room, and you know what? Mistakes are always forgivable if you have the courage to admit them. You have, so thank you.”
Ella didn’t expect such a response from someone she’d assumed was a murderer. “I appreciate you being so understanding. A lot of people wouldn’t be, in your situation.” She smiled.
“It’s cool. You don’t learn anything from being perfect. Anyway, I won’t keep you. I’ll let you get on.”
Ella thought on it. She desperately wanted to stay and talk, wanted to apologize for making potentially life-altering assumptions about someone she barely knew. “Tell your dad I said happy birthday,” she said.
“Thank you, but I can’t. He passed last night.”
“Yeah, I mean, I lost him a while ago, if I’m honest. It’s been a long time coming. I’m just glad I got to spend some time with him before he went.”
“That’s as much as you can ask for. Memories are the diary we carry forever. As long as he’s in your heart, he’s with you. It’s the same place I keep my dad, too.”
“Then I’m sorry to hear that, but it sounds like we have a lot in common. It’s a shame you’re gonna have to leave soon.”
“Right now, in fact. My plane to D.C. leaves in a few hours.”
“Shame. Wish I could come with you. I’ve never been to D.C. What’s it like?”
“It’s overcrowded and it smells like sulfur, but I think you’d love it,” she joked. “You should come out. I can see if there are any coroner positions available if you want?”
“That would be great. And if there aren’t?”
“Then I’ll see if there are any serial killer positions available instead.”
They both laughed. “Do that. I’ve still got your number from last time,” he said.
“Actually text me this time, okay? I’ll be waiting.”
They said their goodbyes and went their separate ways. Ella had no idea if she would indeed see him again, but a possibility was better than nothing at all.
EPILOGUE
Ella opened her eyes and found herself thirty thousand feet in the air. She was sitting cross-legged in a white leather seat, and beside her was a flight attendant pouring drinks for people across the aisle. Opposite her, Ripley was staring narrow-eyed at a laptop, hammering away at the keyboard.
Ripley caught her eye. “Sorry, did my typing wake you up? I hate doing these reports so I type them like I’m mauling an ants’ nest.”
“No, not at all. I guess I’m still exhausted.”
“It’s no surprise. When we get back, take a few days off, then see how you feel.”
The prospect of returning back to life in the Intelligence Unit felt a little strange now. Not like it was beneath her, but that she felt she’d contributed more to the betterment of the world in the past few days than she had for the past twenty-eight years. But even so, with wounds like these, was this the life she wanted for herself in the future? Did she want to end up like Ripley, jetting across the country and consuming the details of the most disturbing crimes in America on a weekly basis?
Until today, she would have said no. But the feeling she got when she told Alex that she’d caught the monster who would have no doubt haunted him forever was something she’d never forget.
Ripley shut her laptop with an unnecessary slam. “Would you do this again, Dark?”
Ella peered out the window and watched the tiny buildings below dissolve into nothingness. Clouds appeared beside her.
“I don’t know. Why? Would you want me to?”
“That’s not my choice. You do remember what I said? About not romanticizing this stuff?”
“Absolutely.”
“I mean what I said. Your talents can be used elsewhere, so don’t think you have to do this again. Edis will want you back out here when he reads my report. I’ve got no doubts about that, but it’s your choice and it stays that way. Don’t let him talk you into anything.”
“I won’t. Thank you for the advice, but honestly, it’s a tough decision. Part of me says yes, part of me says hell no.”
“If you have any questions about it then come to me any time, okay?”
Ella thought about it for a second. “Well, there is one question,” Ella said.
“Hit me.”
“A few days ago, you said you’d only ever chased one copycat killer in your whole career.”
Ripley sat back in her seat, clearly anticipating what was to come. “I did.”
“Who was it? Because I don’t know of any copycat serial killings whatsoever in the US. At least none which have been substantial enough to warrant FBI investigation.”
Ripley chugged a small whiskey miniature and looked up at the seatbelt sign pinging above her. She removed hers.
“Back in 1995, I caught a guy named Lucien Myers. You know about that?”
Ella did. Lucien Myers had slayed five women in the rural areas of Iowa. He was little known outside of true crime enthusiasts, but his crimes remained some of the most sadistic in modern history. “Of course. You got an award for catching him.”
“Correct. Everyone knows Myers, but what a lot of people don’t know is that in 1998, someone was inspired by Myers’s crimes. Inspired enough to mimic them.”
“Oh, no, I didn’t know that.”
“Probably because it never reached the serial stage. But a guy, or more like an obsessed fan, reached out to Myers in prison. Myers gave him my name, and after killing a woman in Iowa, he came for me.”
Ella tried to imagine what life would be like, living day-to-day in the knowledge that you were being hunted by a vengeful monster. Accidentally finding herself in the crosshairs of one had shaken her soul to its core, but being actively pursued by one was a horror like no other. Worse yet was the notion that you didn’t know you were being hunted by someone whose mission it was to torture and kill you. A great deal of sympathy, combined with a newfound respect for Ripley, came over her.
“And he got you?” Ella asked.
“He got me. I was abducted in a van and taken to an abandoned shack. I woke up tied to a chair with a table of surgical weapons in front of me. He told me to pick the weapon which would kill me. He said if I didn’t choose, he’d use them all. Exactly the same as Myers did to his victims.”
Ella quickly realized exactly why Ripley didn’t want to talk about this before. Ella had consumed the details of hideous crimes which went beyond human comprehension more times than she could count, but there was something about Ripley’s retelling of the details that struck her differently. Now, there was no detachment between Ella and the grisly details. She couldn’t keep a vicarious distance. Not only did she have to consume the details directly, she had to also deal with the emotional fallout of the victim. She realized that things were different for her now. Would it be like this with every case she covered from now on?
“Jesus. That’s… I didn’t know, I’m sorry for bringing it up.”
Ripley checked her phone, then laid it beside her and looked out the window. There was a long silence, neither of the agents wanting to break it. Ella worried that she’d upset Ripley by bringing all this up.
“I’ve never told anyone what really happened,” Ripley continued, much to Ella’s relief.
Another silence followed. Ella badly wanted her to continue, thinking maybe that hearing Ripley’s trauma would help numb her own.
But Ella couldn’t bring herself to say anything more.
“Honestly, I should have retired right there and then, but I kept on trying to catch the bad guys. I hoped that if I slayed enough monsters, I’d eventually conquer my trauma, rise above it.”
“But it doesn’t work that way,” Ella finished.
“Not at all. That’s why whenever I hear the term copycat, it brings it all back. For seventeen years, I’ve suffered through flashbacks, nightmares, sickness, hallucinations. It made me feel detached from the people I loved the most. It pulled me apart from my ex-husband and my kids. Like I said, it’s not that I didn’t believe your theory from the start, it’s that I didn’t want to.”
Ella took it all in, now seeing Ripley in a different light than before. She didn’t choose to be how she was, she was made that way through hardship and distress. Ella felt a great affection for her, but one steeped in compassion. She felt like there was an opportunity to offload some of her own grief, but felt hesitant to do so. Ella didn’t want Ripley to think she was trying to outdo her. She didn’t want Ripley to think that her own trauma was comparable to hers.
But revealing her past might make Ripley see her differently. The same way Ella n
ow saw Ripley in a new light, with new sympathies and respect. There might never be a better time to do so.
“A few days ago, you asked me why I became an agent. I didn’t really tell you the truth.”
Ripley turned her attention away from the window and looked at Ella. A look of concern spread across her face.
“No?”
Ella took a deep breath and thought of the best place to begin. Should she tell her what she definitely knew, or what she thought she knew? Should she include the grim details, or just the overview?
“When I was five years old, my dad was murdered. Why, or by whom, I have no idea.”
Ella realized that as far as the facts went, that was all she had. All of the visions, nightmares, and theories she had were surplus. But even so, it was a relief to finally say the words out loud. For all she’d thought about these events over the past twenty-three years, divulging the details actually felt a little strange.
Ripley’s look of concern turned to compassion. Ella saw a sense of realization in her, like she’d known there was something traumatic in Ella’s past all along.
“That’s terrible, Dark. Don’t feel like you have to divulge the details if you’re not comfortable with it.”
“There’s not much else to tell, and even though I have to relive the scene most nights in my dreams, I still don’t know how it truly happened. Some days, I’m sure that I walked into my dad’s room in the middle of the night and saw the killer standing over his body. Other days, I’m sure I found his body in the morning. It’s all a total mess.”
“That’s called an acute stress reaction. You witnessed a life-changing event and your primal response mechanism is addressing it any way it can. I get the same. Sometimes I dream my trauma from start to finish, but certain things are a little different. It’s reached the point where I’m not sure what really happened and what didn’t.”
