Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest #10

by Apex Authors

Just down the road, there'd been a holdup a few days before. Couple of teens, a boy and a girl, raped and butchered in the woods behind the store.

  He was getting closer.

  "How'd you get that?” Jeffrey asked, pointing at the scar that ran the length of Becker's arm.

  "Christ, kid. Read your book. Take a nap or something."

  "I thought you liked the noise."

  He heard the playful taunt in the boy's voice and turned. He'd found him the very first night, hiding in the closet of Dr. Jacobson's house, where, it seemed, the boy had been secretly raised as a surrogate son by the geneticist.

  Another damn piece of the grand experiment. First, the kids that were still at the facility. Then, the original six who'd escaped so brutally. Finally, there were another dozen like ‘Ed.’ Like ‘Jeffrey.’ Boys who appeared only on the secret inventory, the one only Dr. Jacobson had known about. While most of the clones had been raised on the grounds of DSTI where they were carefully monitored and influenced, raised in a variety of test groups of abuse and non-abuse, the doctor had also slipped several away to be raised by adoptive parents in authentic environments outside the DSTI walls.

  All in the name of science. For the betterment of man. Etcetera. Etcetera. To understand what caused aggression, violence, evil. Isolate it. Cure it. Control it. Then to one day unleash it again. The Xp-11 gene. Was it really all just a matter of chromosomes and enzymes?

  If so, Becker wasn't stupid. He'd read Scientific American and had watched enough SciFi channel to get the big picture. He could easily imagine biological weapons that would infect the enemy with a murderous hate so they'd turn and kill each other. Or provisional injections of rage to boost aggression and strength in battle-fatigued troops.

  After he'd almost wrapped his head around the human cloning and experimental abuse, it was no surprise the assignment to fix the escape of DSTI's homegrown killers had come straight from Major General Durbin and the Department of Defense. Or that Becker was one of the best and most trusted operatives Delta Force had.

  Most trusted. Yet, he kept this clone of Jeffrey Dahmer hidden in motel rooms most of the time. At first, he'd brought the boy along to fill in some of the gaps. To gather intel on Dr. Jacobson, DSTI and the other boys. But he had all that now, and still he dragged the boy along. Hadn't told DSTI or the Major General about him yet. The kid had become Becker's secret. His insurance, he finally admitted. If the Major General or anyone else started getting too squirrelly, if Becker ever felt a screw job coming, he had the boy. He had some leverage. A clone of Jeffrey Dahmer, paid for, in part, by the United States military. The New York Times or Fox News would sure have some fun with that.

  "So...” the boy pushed, “how'd you get it?” He spoke a touch effeminately, and Becker had always assumed the kid was gay. Just like his parent DNA. It wasn't a choice, he'd ‘just been born that way.'

  So, then, was it safe to assume he had ‘just been born’ a psycho killer, too?

  "War,” Becker said, unwilling to chase after that debate again. He fixed his sleeve to hide the scar. “Someone cut me."

  "And the others?"

  They'd roomed together for almost six weeks now. The boy had certainly seen the other scars. Six weeks.

  "Yeah. Those too."

  Six weeks of the dreams. The nightmares.

  "Did you get the guys who did it to you?"

  Becker adjusted the rearview mirror.

  "Did you?"

  "No. I don't know. Got rescued. Don't remember much."

  The boy moved in his seat, looked out the window at the car they'd just passed. “Missouri again,” he reported. “What do you suppose they're doing with Ed now?"

  "No clue. He's not my job now.” Becker moved again for the radio. Behind a chain link fence, several grubby children waved at him as they passed. “He's DSTI's."

  "Sure,” the boy nodded. “I guess he's okay."

  In the dreams, ‘Jeffrey’ stood over Becker's bed, his face continually morphing between the boy and the man Becker knew only from the file photos. The man who'd murdered, raped, and partially eaten at least seventeen men. Both faces were always slick with dark, dripping blood.

  In the dreams, Becker could never move. He could not look away as the inhumanly-sized teeth eventually widened, stretched even longer, and then sank deep into his flesh. He could only scream. And pray it was just a dream again. That he would wake.

  That the thing sleeping in the same motel room each night, just ten feet away, had not finally revealed its true self.

  "Alabama,” Becker said, nodding at the car on their right.

  "Thirty-three!” The thing beamed.

  * * * *

  4 Nov—What lies behind and before each of us is only a tiny matter compared to what lies within. Iacta alea est.

  When I initiated the XP11 project twenty-one years ago, I feared this. Today, after all the tests and reports, the various splicings, mechano-synthesis and STR markers, I wholly embrace it. Reason, Observation, Experience; the Holy Trinity of Science.

  This one was prettier than the others.

  When I cut her, I thought again of the Buddhist monks who practice bhavana asubha. Those who meditate in isolated graveyards, mounting fresh corpses bloated with putrescence, or merely rooting through the muck and sickness of a living woman. Contemplation of the body's true foulness. Seeing ourselves for what we really are. Genuine monsters.

  The spit and snot. Her tears. Piss trickling down her legs. Putrid, soft, yellow-brown-colored shit. The bile of her vomit as she puked in fear. The sweat on her skin. Lymph slick. Just inside, the synovial fluids greasing her joints, the mucous and phlegm lining the insides of her throat and stomach. And the blood. Always the blood...

  For a hundred dollars, she'd danced thirty minutes for me. ‘Misty’ said she. ‘Jacobson’ said I. What do I do? ‘They say I'm a doctor now. Ha. Ha.’ I directed a company called DSTI that clones humans, creates bioengineered killers. Silly? Yes, I suppose so. Science is an edged tool, with which we play like children. Cut our own fingers. Yes, I have lots of money. She touched herself for me in a dark motel room while I watched TV. Five hundred more. Her real name was Gail, Abigail. Where once there was an alluring girl...

  The pretty smile, the teeth now broken, jagged and bloody. Gaping fetid sockets. I found two rotting wisdom teeth still lurking in the back of her mouth. Her hair, highlighted and long like an Olympian goddess, had, only an hour before, lain across my waist. Now it was sticky with bloody stumps at the ends from where I'd torn it out. The tight, tanned flesh across her young stomach, once stripped, became dripping meat.

  Her mesentery, like a baby's blanket over her intestines, slips between my fingers. It reeks. All of her reeks. Long legs are nothing but bones. They are painted in blood and graying flesh is stuck to them. Breasts are no more than fatty tissue and two bags of saline. Where once there was an alluring girl...

  Another illusion that baits such unspeakable things. In one Sutra, the female bodhisattva becomes a rotted corpse to release her lover from his lust. In another, a woman gouges out her own eyes for the same purpose. Sweet Abigail. I held her liver, uterus, and heart, fingers pushing through the membranes which held each in place. Like reaching into a pumpkin to make a Jack-o-Lantern. Her intestines spilled more vomit and fecal matter over my lap. They were like large worms squirming in my hands before I lay them across the floor.

  A genuine monster.

  Samvega, the monks call it. Samvega. The dreadful awakening that surely comes from such sudden awareness. That it is ALL an illusion.

  Science is one thing, wisdom another.

  Is this why I have been summoned again? Fata viam invenient. Funny little games. I wonder each day how the others are doing. Jeffrey, especially. To what have they been summoned, I wonder. Now that I've set them free in every possible way.

  * * * *

  The car held five comfortably, which worked out well enough. Al did most of the driving, said it was relaxing. Henry sa
t in the back with John and Jeff, took turns at the wheel and napping. Ted always rode shotgun. Liked to hog the radio and follow their journey on the map with each town they passed. “Beaufort,” he'd announce with some secret satisfaction. “Mt. Sterling is next.” They kept the nurse tied in the trunk.

  Left the heat cranked and the windows cracked a bit unless they were hot-boxing. A new Jay-Z CD in the player. The floorboards were covered with candy wrappers and crumpled Taco Bell bags. A couple of empty beer cans. Missouri moved by in a blur of barnyards and strip malls.

  There was no particular destination anymore.

  All the others, the list Jacobson had given them, had been freed. Mission accomplished. A dozen more kids, clones of psychotic killers, each one scattering into the four winds. Though, Henry supposed a bunch hadn't gotten very far. A couple of the kids looked weak as shit. Just didn't have it. Not that he saw. Hell, they'd killed the one kid themselves. Richardson. The Hillside Strangler clone. Total pussy.

  Some seemed pretty cool, though. It was nice to know they weren't in this alone, that there were others. The kid named ‘John’ had joined ‘em early in Maryland. Wore the goofy clown suit his predecessor had made so infamous. Funny. Version 2.0 had only killed four. So far...

  Then there was Berkowitz. He'd headed east with Dennis and planned to pick up a couple of other guys.

  But this road trip was westward. See the Pacific. Maybe find one of those porn stars to party with. Or try and visit some old stomping grounds in Texas.

  "They named a highway after me."

  "Who did?"

  "Cops did.” Henry looked up from his book. “Pretty cool, yeah?"

  Ted shook his head. “Stop reading that shit."

  "Jealous?"

  "Ancient history, faggot. That guy, the one they named the highway for, that guy is dead and buried. He killed a hundred people. You didn't. They ain't named shit for you."

  "Whatever."

  "You guys gotta stop obsessing over those old files and gay true crime books. Getting boners for shit you didn't even do. And this guy...” He pointed. “You and that stupid fucking clown outfit."

  "I thought you liked it."

  "Dude, I love it. It's funny as hell and scared the shit out of that mom, but it ain't you. You're not John Wayne Gacy. You are the John Wayne Gacy. Get it?"

  "No."

  "Man—” Albert laughed, looking over “—I don't know what the fuck you're talking about."

  "The kids like the suit. I like it."

  "Then fuckin’ wear it,” Ted spat. “I don't give a shit anymore. Assholes."

  Henry retreated to his book.

  Maybe it was time to finally cut loose. To ditch the others once and for all and go his own way. They were bound to get caught eventually, traveling together. A guy in a bloody clown suit buying Gorditas and Mexican pizzas at the drive through. Maybe they should have kept the Emily girl around a bit longer. And killed Ted instead, maybe. Emily, at least, had been up for anything. But then her mom had shown up and things had gotten ... weird. Ted had flipped. Emily hadn't made it.

  Still had Stacey, at least. Nurse Stacey had always liked him best. Maybe the two of them could take off together.

  "Fine,” he blurted out. “Where we at? What's this road?"

  "We're still on 50, retard. About thirty miles to Jefferson City. What do you care?"

  "Maybe they'll name this highway for me."

  "What for?"

  "We could stop for a little bit, you know. Maybe have some more fun."

  "What kinda fun?"

  "Best kind."

  "Now you're talking, Henry. That's the shit I wanna hear. Stop living in the past, girls. This is our time now, our life. Someone wake Jeff up."

  "What about that house?"

  "Which?"

  All their voices had become one voice.

  "There. With the swing set."

  "You and the fucking swing sets."

  John squeezed his clown nose and made a HONK HONK sound with his blood-crusted mouth.

  "Okay. You heard the man. Let's have some more fun."

  * * * *

  "Remember, they're sociopaths,” Kristin said. “Lacking almost every benchmark of ordinary human social development."

  Becker knuckled the headache from the side of his head opposite the phone. “But I got five of ‘em together. Ten maybe. Could they get along? How long?"

  "Sounds like a bad joke. Five psycho killers and a Rabbi walk into a bar..."

  "Funny, Romano. How long?"

  "I told you, spree killers aren't usually classic sociopaths. You're talking something new here."

  "You have no idea."

  "Most serial killers work alone. I don't know, Becker. Those reports you sent me ... these guys are textbook cases otherwise. They all have massive egos. God-sized narcissism and a grandiose sense of self. How long before an ego like that wants its own way?"

  "Even for a teenager?” Becker looked over at Jeffrey sitting on the motel room's other bed. A book in his hands, a half-eaten box of pizza at the foot of the bed. The latest Harry Potter movie on HBO. “They need the pack."

  "Typically. Are we officially talking teenagers here? Becker?"

  "What? Yes. Maybe. If I were...” He reached over and took a slice of pizza. “I need to get in front of these guys."

  "Is this the girl on TV? The one in Decatur. Killed her family and her roommate. Looking for boyfriends of some kind?"

  Right, Becker thought. Decatur. But don't forget the family in Maltoon, the Lehmans. Or Emma Bradeholts in Sparksville. “Maybe,” he said.

  "Um, damn.” She drew a quick breath. “Okay, good. The more info you give me..."

  "Yeah, I know. So?"

  "So if these are teenagers you're talking about now, this could get much worse. Most serial killers commit their first murder in their late twenties, finally acting out on one of the specific elaborate violent fantasies they concocted as a child. The same fantasies all of us have as children."

  "Okay?"

  "Where the rest of us grow out of such fantasies, only because we've developed socially and are afraid of how society will respond, these guys don't. They still don't give a damn what other people think. Their social development, naturally prone to limitations, will suffer even more thanks to their age. Freud often said a child would destroy the whole world if he had the power."

  "Freud's a funny guy. So, why is this worse?"

  "If these are teens, they're still in that first stage of sociopathic behavior. Withdrawing from reality, entering a fantasy world. But, this one is a prolonged fantasy world shared by others."

  "So you don't think they're coming out."

  "Would you?"

  "I don't know."

  "Adult psychopaths pick just one, maybe two, fantasies to develop, to plan, to perfect over the years. Get it right. Making a fantasy real takes preparation, precision, and time. Even a psychopath understands this part when he's twenty-eight. But a kid..."

  "Yeah."

  "These guys you're after. The very moment they think of a fantasy, boom, they can make it come true. Instant gratification for their childish godlike appetites."

  "And getting away with it."

  "The best part of any fantasy, isn't it?"

  "I guess. So how does this help me?"

  "From what I see in these reports, ‘Ted’ will probably go where the girls are. Teen nightclubs, I guess. Friday Night Lights. The Mall. Start there. ‘Al’ and ‘Henry’ are classic loners, but Henry seeks approval. Inability to take criticism, and he needs more recognition than most."

  "Wants an audience."

  "His dreams. His fantasy. Yeah, something like that. He'll go for the older women. Looks like his mother did a real number on him, poor kid."

  "Yeah. Go on."

  "'Jeffrey’ is most likely homosexual..."

  Becker glanced at his own ‘Jeffrey,’ sitting just a few feet away. Two duplicates of the exact same person. One quietly reading a paper
back and eating pizza, the other on a whirlwind killing spree. “Right, right. You get anything more on Tumblety?"

  "More Jack the Ripper, huh? I'll have more for you by your next call."

  "Thanks, Kris. Really."

  "Hey."

  "What?"

  "You sound like hell."

  "Thanks a lot, pal."

  "Seriously."

  "Seriously.” Becker laughed weakly. “Remind me again why I didn't ever whisk you away."

  "That's easy, Becker,” she said. “Because you always play by the rules."

  "Hey, Kris, I—"

  "Get some sleep.” The phone went dead.

  "You guys used to date?” the boy asked.

  Becker tossed his pizza, half-eaten, into the box. “Shut up, kid."

  "Thought so."

  Becker collapsed into his own bed, stared at the TV for a while.

  "How come you—"

  "She was already married,” Becker stopped him and stood to retrieve his murder map. Had to get ahead of these guys. “What the hell you reading now, anyway?” he asked, laying out the map on the small motel table.

  "That vampire book.” The boy tilted the book down so Becker could see.

  "I asked you not to buy that one.” A shiver ran across Becker's back. “Retribution? Looks stupid."

  "It's actually pretty good.” Jeffrey thumbed his page. “The vampires are real, real nasty."

  "Yeah,” Becker said. “But how's their social development?"

  * * * *

  The man who finally came into the room didn't look like the guy from the pictures. The one with the dopey eyes and the crazy hair. This guy was balding with a grey mustache. Much older. He wore the same dark blue prison suits as the other guys. He smiled. He looked nice.

  David knew the same man had once murdered six people with a .44 revolver. Blinded another. Paralyzed an eighteen-year-old girl. On and off for a year, just walked about the streets of New York and shot total strangers.

  David knew this because it was all in the file. The one Dr. Jacobson had given him.

  All about David Berkowitz, the “.44 Caliber Killer."

  The Son of Sam.

  David was another son. Cell for cell and genome for genome. Just thirty years younger. Sam, whoever the hell that was, apparently had been quite fertile.