by Scott Blade
We leaned forward, weary of an ambush.
Cautiously, my talon hand reached out and grabbed the package. It was very heavy. Whoever lifted it had incredible strength. Not just anyone could lift it, carry it, and then leave it in our apartment. Using my considerable strength, I could barely lift it up off of the table. Even with all of Shane's muscles, I experienced tension when I tried to pick it up.
I clawed the ribbons around the package to shreds. They unraveled and fell to the ground, leaving only the wrapping paper.
I swiped my claws across the wrapping paper and watched as it tore open and unfolded. Quickly, I tore off the rest of the paper.
Resting on our table, one that we had used to dissect more than just a few villains was a large stone tablet. It was a tombstone, artfully engraved, it read:
HERE LIES ELINE KLINE
MOTHER TO A BASTARD SON
The StoneCutter was our mysterious visitor. He stopped by and left us with a serial killer's statement of intent. Somehow, he knew we existed. Somehow, he knew our identity. He knew that Shane was a killer, an avenger seeking his demise, seeking to fill a coffin with the StoneCutter's corpse.
Yet, he had not come here to harm us. He had not come here to warn us. He toyed with us. The demon inside him sensed me. That was how he knew about Shane in the first place. That was how he tracked us down. He left this message to me. He left it to say "Tag you're it."
9
Buried Past
"There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman; some kind of abstraction. But there is no real me: only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable... I simply am not there."
––Patrick Bateman American Psycho.
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The StoneCutter told us exactly who his next target was. Last night he invaded our sanctuary, gave us a clue as to where he would strike next. He targeted Eline Kline. So where ever she was; he would be. He planned to kill her and he wanted us to know. The trick now was to locate and protect the Secretary. We spent the entire night searching for her whereabouts with no luck.
Shane tried calling Eline directly. She never answered. Her cell phone went straight to voicemail. He left two messages, but she didn't respond.
We searched through numerous sources on the internet and nothing.
All we had learned so far was that because of Alex Kline's legal problems, his mother had experienced a number of death threats. In order to better protect her, the Secret Service moved her to a secret location. They guarded her closely, keeping her out of the public eye. No one seemed to know where they held her.
Shane texted Ally. He said:
Ally. I need to find the Secretary of State. The Secret Service has stashed her someplace. It is important that I find her. Ask around. No official channels. In no way is this related to the firm. Stay discrete. I don't want anyone to know that I am looking for her. Get back to me when you have something.
We waited. The morning hours seeped through the night sky. Slowly, it took over the day. The rays of the sun purged the darkness into glowing, fiery daylight. And still Ally found nothing.
We stayed up all night. Shane operated on virtually no sleep. I felt him growing weaker and weaker. His strength diminished. Soon I would have to take over completely just to keep him awake. His weariness concerned me. I needed him in tiptop shape to face the StoneCutter.
Earlier the StoneCutter beckoned us. He wanted a final showdown. Now, his trail grew cold again. I needed to find him. I needed to destroy my maker. Just thinking about the upcoming battle, whet the taste buds that surrounded the sharp teeth that lined my serpent-shaped mouth. My long tongue slithered out from my lips and licked the top of Shane's skull as if it were a delicious treat, a bone wafer. We waited for this day for almost three decades.
Even though we had not yet found the specific location of Eline Kline, we still prepared. We laid out our kill-tools next to the stone tablet that the StoneCutter had left for us. I wrote a mental checklist, literally carving it into the walls of Shane's skull like cavemen did in ancient times. I used the checklist like I had packed for a trip, a serial murder retreat. It read:
Hunting Knife
Scalpel
Utility Knife Garrote Wire Duct Tape
Tranquilizer
Red Scarf
Silver Colt 1911
Leather Gloves
I gazed over each item and scratched it off of my cave wall. Shane grimaced each time I did so. He must have felt a stinging sensation each time I scrapped my claws across his bones.
Each item was accounted for. We were prepared for the kill.
Shane turned to a large mirror on the wall. He barely recognized himself. I exuded through him. I grew in size, absorbing him like a deadly sponge. Soon Shane would have a backseat to my devilish deeds. He would be helpless to my actions.
His iPhone started to ring, interrupting his transformation into me. The caller ID read the number of the prison where Alex was held. He called from the payphone near his holding cell.
Shane ignored the call.
Thank God, I thought. The only call we wanted to take was Ally's with the location of Eline Kline, not our whiny, young client. If we didn't find the StoneCutter soon, I was going to kill Alex Kline for his annoying stupidity.
Ally dated a FBI agent two years ago. Shane hoped that she could use his heartache over their breakup to manipulate him into tracking the Secretary down for us. So far we had not heard from her. No luck there.
All avenues led us to a dead end.
Shane looked at the time. The early morning hastily changed into a working day.
We were supposed to be in court today. We couldn't cancel it. The only thing to do was to completely skip it. In our absence the judge would call a recess. It had to be that way. If we showed up to trial, there would be no way for us to get out of it. We would be stuck, and we couldn't tell Ally our plans to skip out. She might blab about it to someone at the office. Then Terrance would have driven down and showed up at our penthouse and dragged us to the trial. The last thing that we needed was to worry about Shane’s job.
Shane's iPhone vibrated again. Shane's palette had to remain clear.
Finally, a text arrived from Ally. Shane opened the message it read:
Sorry Shane. No one knows where the Secret Service took Mrs. Kline.
Now, we were frustrated. Shane was at the end of his rope and ready to hang someone with it. The Secretary was going to die and the StoneCutter was going to get away again.
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Shane paced his penthouse. I slithered around on the inside of his thoughts. I felt like a snake that had been coiled for far too long. I needed to spring out and use my serrated teeth to inject my venom into the veins of the StoneCutter. If I didn't feed on him soon, I would just take the next person that we saw.
Both of Shane's phones––his iPhone and home phone––rang off of the hook throughout the day. Shane was due in court hours ago. The court, the Judge's office, Ally, the firm, Terrance—everyone had called. Dozens of voicemails waited for us. There were too many for us to listen to at the moment. We focused only on two things: finding the Secretary and finding the wretched StoneCutter.
Ally texted a few more times. We responded with:
Ally the only thing I care about is the location of Eline Kline. Don't bother me with anything else right now.
Ally didn't text again.
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Without realizing it, Shane fell asleep dressed in his kill-suit. My facial features obtruded through his natural bone structure.
He lay on the couch until the door buzzer sounded. He woke up. Peering out of the windows, we saw that the night sky had once again covered the city.
Our hope of finding the Secretary in time faded. Surely the StoneCutter would wait until nightfall to kill her. Nightfall now descended on the city. Shane gazed at his Kenne
th Cole watch; it was 7:30 p.m. The sun had set. We still had time. I was sure of it.
The door buzzed again. Shane studied the intercom near the elevator doors. He debated on answering it or just letting it buzz. He walked over to it and pressed the button.
"Who is there?" he asked.
A moment passed by, and he heard the aggressive voice of Det. Sun Good.
"Let me come up," she demanded.
"Sorry, Sun. I'm feeling under the weather," Shane said, trying to think of a better excuse. The truth was that we were both exhausted.
"The judge is going to hold you in contempt. Shane, buzz me in!"
Shane leaned his head against the intercom and exhaled in frustration.
Then suddenly his iPhone vibrated. He looked down. He got a notification text from his Facebook account. It read:
The StoneCutter
wants to be your friend.
I leapt from behind his skin, moving to the surface. I took control. The message filled us with overwhelming exuberance. The StoneCutter taunted us, but it was certainly a clue.
I opened Shane's Facebook app and accepted his friend request.
The StoneCutter's profile showed a picture of an unmarked tombstone with tomorrow's date on it. A single wall post read that Eline Kline had been checked into Manchester, New Hampshire.
He left us a breadcrumb.
He lured us to him. He wanted us to find him.
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The StoneCutter's tag of her was not an exact pinpoint, but Shane did some research on Google and discovered that the Kline's owned a ranch in Manchester. A densely wooded area surrounded it; it was perfect for the StoneCutter to stage an ambush. Even with Secret Service on the grounds, I was skilled enough to infiltrate the ranch. And if we could do it, the StoneCutter could do it. I only imagined how skilled his demon must have been to have escaped captivity for decades. I wanted to use Shane's bare hands to pry open the StoneCutter's head and pull his creature out of him. I wanted to watch it struggle and whip around as Shane's hands rang its neck.
Shane plugged the address of the Kline's ranch into his Google maps. Immediately we left; driving for hours. In route we received a text message from Ally. It read:
Shane, Terrance's office called several times. He is pissed.....I found out where the Secretary is. She owns a ranch in New Hampshire somewhere. She goes there once a month to spend a weekend. My friend told me that she sees someone. A man. Not her husband.
Shane looked at the message puzzled. She meets someone? Was Eline Kline having an affair? Shane's brain began calculating, scheming. We both thought the same thing. The StoneCutter was going to make Eline's lover bury her alive and then kill the lover, just like he did with Shane's parents.
Then again maybe the StoneCutter was the lover. Maybe he knew all of the victims that way.
Maybe that was how he knew the layouts of their homes; he had been in them. Over the years he murdered numerous families. No one, not the police, not the FBI, not Sun Good, not the reporters, not even I, could ever figure out why he killed the particular families that he had. The police assumed that it was because they were rich that he had picked them.
That never seemed right to me. Killing them in such a brutal fashion just to rob them? No, that wasn't right at all. No. No. He forced the husbands to bury their wives and children alive. He was much more than a twisted thief. He was a mass murderer, a deranged killer, a monster. He was like us.
The creature in his head was my doppelgänger, my exact double. He wanted me dead. He was powerful. His power surpassed mine, but I was younger and youth stood in my corner. The StoneCutter was old and tired, ready for retirement.
Shane drove with a renewed sense of power and exhilaration. After a while we reached the outskirts of Eline's property. The edge of the property line was only a few miles up the road.
Shane turned off the lights and drove slowly down the winding, dirt road. Living in D.C., Shane learned and studied Secret Service protocol. He knew that there was at least a half dozen agents guarding Mrs. Kline. Excitement filled our veins. The Secret Service didn't intimidate me.
The road ended just on the edge of the Kline's ranch. Our mud-covered tires rested in front of a large, swinging gate which led into a grazing pasture for the Kline's horses. Several of them roamed around freely.
Some were completely still, sleeping. Their dark images were perfectly lit by the full moon.
Shane stepped out of the car and retrieved a satchel filled with our killing tools. We left most behind in the car. We took only the items that we needed the most, including the shovel.
Before we left the car, Shane let go of himself completely. In the exalted presence of the moon, of the darkness, Shane transformed into the creature that resided within. Like a werewolf, Shane shape-shifted into me, the hungry beast from within. My talons pierced through his fingertips. My pitch black eyes peered through Shane's eye-sockets. My scaly skin absorbed his to form a hardened shell.
To protect Shane's identity, I wore his blood-red scarf around the bottom of my face. With the scarf pulled tightly around Shane's chin and mouth, my colossal, black eyes peered over the red scarf and into the darkness. I saw with crystal clear vision.
I grabbed the satchel and swung it over Shane's shoulder. His watch read 11:30 p.m. In order to sneak past the Secret Service's motion-sensor flood lights, I would have to tread slowly through the grounds of the ranch.
We hopped the fence and snuck past the horses. I was so careful and quiet, that not a single animal acknowledged my presence.
Past the horse's grazing field, I came to some thick trees. I stayed alert just in case I came across a patrolling Secret Service agent. I didn't want to kill any of them. Killing a federal agent would only piss off the other agencies, increasing their resolve. The FBI would engage in a manhunt just for us. Then I would have big problems. I did not want the kinds of problems that came with a FBI manhunt. They would hunt us down until they caught us, never giving up. Cops were like bloodhounds in this way.
For once, I wanted to prevent death. This was a new policy for us, for me. For once, we were going to do something heroic. The only person that was going to die tonight was the StoneCutter.
The trees grew darker and darker around me. I took a deep breath. With the satchel strapped over Shane's shoulder, we pressed on towards the ranch, on towards the StoneCutter and sweet, destructive vindication.
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The StoneCutter liked guns, but they were never our style. I preferred knives strangulation devices, and hatchets. To keep with my tradition of killing killers using their own twisted methods, I brought a gun. It was a shiny, nickel-plated Colt 1911, the same one that I used on Shutter. Shane had no memories of the day that we were born, only dark snapshots. I could imagine it as I imagined many other events that actually did take place. When I used the powers that I was born with, I could see things that were hidden from Shane. I could witness the actions of others. Their lives fed into my brain like it was a grinder. Their lives were the meat.
I processed exactly how the StoneCutter's murders played out. I could recall each and every one of them. The only thing that I could never see was his face. The faces of the other killers were always blackened out in my visions. It was because I saw his murders in my dreams that I knew exactly what kind of gun to bring.
Finally, we broke through the trees without incident. At the edge of the tree-line I looked at Shane's watch. It was just after midnight.
I watched a Secret Service agent as he rounded the house and walked off towards the guest villa. Using my natural senses, I could hear the radio chatter through his earpiece. They suspected nothing. As far as they knew all was calm.
The agents were lodged in the guest villa. If Eline Kline was meeting with her lover, she would have insisted that the agents stayed out of the main house. She must have forced them to setup in the villa.
I wasn't sure about my theory involving Eline's lover. I had no idea if the StoneCutter
masked himself as her lover or if he intended to kill them both. The more I thought about it, the more the latter made sense to me. If the StoneCutter masqueraded as her lover, then who was he going to use to bury her alive? I felt that Shane concurred as he hid behind me.
The StoneCutter must have intended to use Eline's lover to bury her alive. He planned to shoot the lover as he did my father. He followed this sick ritual, never deviating from it. It was his kill ritual.
We moved closer to the house. The boards on the front porch squeaked underneath Shane's black shoes. We froze and surveyed the house. No one heard us. The lights were off.
A cold gust of wind breezed past us, lifting the back of Shane's jacket along and blowing his tie out of place.
We crept around the side of the house, following the porch as it winded around to the backyard.
Off in the distance a dog barked. I glanced in its direction and magnified Shane's vision. The dog was far away from the house. Focusing on his shadowy silhouette, I saw that he was a German Sheppard, nothing to worry about. He was chained near the end of the barn.
We turned the corner of the house and saw that a light emitted from the kitchen. Candles flickered through an open window.
I approached. From the cover of darkness, I watched as Eline Kline sat at the kitchen table. Someone sat across from her, a well-dressed gentleman. I couldn't make out the details of his face. I had no idea who he was.
Their voices were muffled. I couldn't tell what they were saying, not without moving closer and giving us away. The StoneCutter would strike soon. I felt it.
We stepped backwards into the darkness. Quickly, I leapt up and grabbed hold of the bottom of the railing from the second floor balcony. Using Shane's upper body strength, I pulled us up. Within a moment, we stood inside an empty bedroom in the house.
An eerie, uneven silence fell across the second floor. It smelled of cinnamon and sand. Peculiar, I thought. The Kline’s used those plug-in air fresheners. I hated the smell of cinnamon. Of course, I hated everything that smelled of sweetness.
