The Logan Files - Pain Center: The Logan Files

by Marshall Huffman

  “JJ you dirty bastard. Where the hell are you, you pervert?” she yelled at the top of her lungs.

  “Right behind you, admiring the view actually,” he said.

  “Damn you, what the hell are you doing? You cut my hair you shit,” she seethed.

  “I cut all your hair off. I enjoyed it immensely. I think maybe I should have left the eyebrows. It makes you look like a mannequin without them. Not exactly the look I was going for,” he said and laughed.

  “Alright. You have proved your point. What do you want?” she asked.

  “Not what you think at all. I am interested in having you help me with an experiment. I have attached sensors to your head and I want to study how pain affects your brain and more exact, what specific areas are affected. You should be quite honored to be my first subject,” he said.

  “Some honor,” she said.

  “Actually it is. Now what I want you to do is describe each event. Tell me how you feel and I will record your answers. Actually I am recording everything on video but I want your verbal comments as well,” he said.

  “What kind of comments?” she asked.

  She heard the whistling noise before the whip landed across her buttocks. She grimaced but didn’t say anything.

  “What did that feel like?” he asked.

  “Someone hit my butt with a whip,” she said sarcastically.

  “I mean, did it hurt? Did it burn? What did it feel like?”

  “I guess it stung is the best way to say it,” she replied.

  “And this,” he said hitting her across the back so the whip wrapped around her and across her breast. She tightened up and shuddered a little but didn’t yell out. She could take much more than this and had many times.

  “That hurt a little more. More like a burning,” she said.

  Her wrists were hurting her more than anything. For the next ten minutes JJ whipped her on various parts of her body and had her tell him what it was like. She never once cried out but a moan did escape her lips on a few occasions. JJ switched to different types of discipline implements, slowly and methodically beating every part of her body. After twenty minutes she was near her limit.

  “I need to stop,” she said in a whisper.

  “Stop? Why?”

  “It is becoming more than I can take. My wrists hurt and the pain is intensifying,” she said.

  “Yes. I should imagine so. Still, I have more data to collect,” he said and picked up a cane.

  He flipped it in the air and it made a mean swishing sound. He landed the first blow on the back of her thighs and she went ridged for a second and moaned. The second one landed on her calves and the third and fourth one landed on her buttocks. She let out a small yelp. It was the first sign that it had really hurt more than given her pleasure. He was delighted and he continued to beat her on the back and then her front.

  She was now writhing in real pain and begging him to stop. This was what he was looking for. When did it cease to bring pleasure and turn into agony? Finished with the cane, he moved to another method and then another. By this time she was screaming for him to stop but he continued until at last she passed out from the prolonged beating.

  He was fascinated with the results from the brain scan. A long sheet of paper trailed out and collected on the floor. He needed more data. He threw a bucket of ice water on her and she stirred and slowly opened her eyes.

  “Are you in there,” he asked, slapping her on the stomach with his hand.

  She tightened and gradually raised her head. She mumbled something but he couldn’t understand her.

  “What? You’re talking too low. Speak up,” he commanded.

  “Let me down. Please. I can’t take any more,” she said in a whisper.

  “Can’t take any more? Sure you can,” he said and picked up a knotted rope. She screamed for another ten minutes before she passed out again.

  JJ removed the cuffs from her wrists and she collapsed on the floor in a heap. He threw water on her but she didn’t move. He kicked her with his toe but got no reaction. He put his arms around her and lifted her into a straight backed heavy wooden chair. He put irons around her wrists and ankles and a metal band around her head to hold it up. He flicked water on her face but she was still totally out. This would make another great experiment he decided.

  He had planned to wait until she was dead but decided this would be even better. He raised the three pound, diamond bladed autopsy saw and placed it at her temple. The twenty-eight thousand RPM saw blade sliced into the skin and then bit into the bone. Amy tried to open her eyes but they were so heavy. A searing pain shot through her and she finally was able to open them. Her head was a mass of pain and there was a red mist in the air. She started to scream. She screamed for several minutes before she once again slipped into unconsciousness.

  JJ was too busy to notice. He spent the next three hours, probing around in her brain. He was having the time of his life and hardly noticed when she finally stopped breathing. That was when he decided rather than let everything go to waste; he might as well dig around and remove her brain. He put it in a jar with formaldehyde and placed it on a shelf. Having done that, he decided to remove her organs but from the back instead of the usual procedure. He didn’t want anyone to know that he had had some medical training. This would confuse the situation considerably.

  When he had removed her organs he wrapped them in plastic and placed them in a small chest freezer on the back porch. Next, he hosed her down with water and let the blood and gore run into a floor drain he had devised so that it emptied in the woods a few yards further down by the creek. He knew the animals would eat anything of significance.

  When she was drained of all blood and fluids he wrapped her body in a sheet of heavy plastic and put her in the back of an old van he kept in one of the sheds. It was snowing lightly but obviously more was on the way. That would be just fine with him. He drove to a park just a few blocks from downtown. He had the perfect out of the way place to dump the deceased Amy Belker.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  When JJ arrived back home the snow was falling heavily as he put the van back in the shed. He took the heavy plastic and stuffed it in the incinerator. Down in his lab, he spent the next two hours cleaning and scrubbing down the entire place. He used a high pressure washer on the walls and floors. Satisfied, he went to bed and fell asleep immediately.

  When he returned to The Cave he went to work on scouting out his next experiment. He knew it had to be someone that no one would miss right away. He needed someone that came to the club occasionally but wasn’t quite as noticeable as Amy had been. He also wanted to find someone who had not performed and didn’t immediately let it be known she was a bottom. If fact he would like to get someone that was dominant but they usually already had a partner and were very self-assured.

  It took him a few days but then just the right person showed up. He had seen her before but she hadn’t been around lately. She was shy and had been nothing more than a lurker. He couldn’t remember her ever participating in any of the proceedings. He knew he would have to be very careful or he would scare her away.

  * * *

  The two women had worked late and were now sorry that they did. It was dark and the wind and snow were picking up. The path that they normally followed to their cars was covered and had become difficult to navigate in the dark.

  “Are we still on the path?” one of the women asked, her face down against her chest and her scarf pulled up.

  “I think so; I see the street just up ahead,” her friend replied, pulling the collar up against the back of her neck.

  “I’ll be glad...” she started to say but tripped over something sticking out in the path.

  She started to fall and her friend reached out to grab her. It was too late and she went down on her knees, dropping her purse. Her glasses flew off her face.

  “Are you alright?” her friend asked, stooping down to help her back up.

  “Do I look alright
? I scraped my knee,” she said, pulling open her coat and lifting her skirt, “Damn, I just bought these hose yesterday and now look at them,” she said disgustedly.

  “Is your knee alright?”

  “Just scraped a little,” She picked up her purse, grateful that it hadn’t spilled open. She brushed the snow off of it and started looking around for her glasses.

  “Did you happen to see where my glasses went?” she asked.

  “No. I was too busy trying to grab hold of you,” her friend replied.

  “They could be anywhere. I can’t even drive home without them,” she said, looking around.

  The fading light was making it difficult combined with the increasingly heavy snowfall.

  “What did you trip over?” her friend asked, joining in the search for the missing glasses.

  “I don’t know. A log or something. I didn’t really have a chance to see it,” she said, trying to locate her glasses in the deepening snow.

  “They should keep these paths clear.”

  “If we are even on the path. Darn, I have to find those glasses. In this weather, I won’t be able to see five feet in front of me.”

  “There,” her friend said, pointing at something sticking up out of the snow.

  She walked over and tried to pick it up. Suddenly she screamed.

  “What?”

  “Oh my God.”

  “What is it?”

  Her friend just pointed. She walked over and looked down. It was a foot bare foot sticking up.

  “What the hell is it?”

  “A body. Oh dear Lord, it’s a body.”

  “Let’s get out of here. Forget the glasses,” she said, backing away from the body propped against the tree.

  “We can’t just go. Call 911. You don’t have to give them your name. Just tell them where it is,” her friend replied.

  “Oh no! We are going to get involved in all of this. I don’t want to be involved,” she said, digging out her cell phone.

  “Neither do I but we can’t just walk off. What if they found your glasses? It could get worse.”

  “I’m calling,” she said, dialing the 911 emergency number.

  “911, what is the emergency?”

  “Uh, I, I mean we, just found a body in the Capital Street park.”

  “What kind of body?”

  “The dead kind. I don’t know. A person,” she said.

  “Can you give me the exact location?”

  “Just on the north side. New York Street is just in front of me. I would guess fifty yards or so.”

  “Your name?”

  “Is not important.”

  “You said, we. Another person is with you?”

  “Obviously.”

  “Are you willing to remain there until a unit can arrive?”

  “I don’t know. I guess if they hurry. I really don’t want to become involved. Neither does my friend,” she said.

  “I understand your reluctance. I have already dispatched a car to the park. It would help if you could point the body out to preserve the crime scene,” the operator said.

  “Alright, I’ll wait, but tell them to hurry. The snow is getting worse and I lost my glasses someplace out here.”

  “They are only minutes away.”

  “I said I would wait,” she replied.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Snow had started spilling out of the feathery gray clouds just before people started home from work. Light and fluffy flakes at first soon turned into huge, fat, wet ones causing traffic to slow, a plethora of fender benders and general chaos.

  The fresh fallen show covered everything in a blanket and muffled the sounds of the normal evening traffic. As the night progressed, the snow continued to fall, wrapping the city in fresh white fleece.

  Detective John Logan looked up at the streetlight and watched as the flakes emerged magically out of the black beyond the reach of the light’s illumination. He stood like that, motionless, letting the snow fall on his face. It reminded him of his childhood. It was peaceful and pleasant. The feeling wouldn’t last much longer he knew but he wished it would.

  Logan had been a detective with the IPD for the past twenty-one years. His job had lasted longer than any of his partners or his marriage for that matter. Logan was the most decorated detective in the State and perhaps the entire country. While it was impressive on his resume, if he ever needed to prepare one, he couldn’t care less about the decorations. He was not a detective for grandeur and glory.

  Indeed, John was a modest man and always cringed whenever he was recommended for a medal or singled out for his actions. John was the ‘go to’ man when the shit hit the fan. The Chief knew if the pressure was on, he could always count on Logan to come through. Logan was methodical, cautious, and systematic in his approach. It often drove the younger detectives crazy. They considered him a dinosaur, a man not in tune with the present modern methods of tracking down criminals. It didn’t bother John in the least. He seldom worked with a partner unless he was breaking in a new guy at the request of the Chief. That suited him just fine. At five eleven his stature wasn’t intimidating but when he gave you the look, everything changed.

  The snow turned to water on his upturned face. He could hear someone coming up behind him. It was faint and muffled but he could still recognize the pattern.

  “Damn cold. You know we gotta’ quit meeting like this,” a gruff voice said.

  “People are starting to talk,” Logan replied. It was the usual greeting between the two men for the past twenty years.

  “Nice night.”

  “Beautiful.”

  “Until some jackass messed it up,” Myler, the Indianapolis Chief Medical Examiner, said, shoving his hands deeper in his pockets.

  “Someone always does,” Logan confirmed.

  “You haven’t looked at the body yet?”

  “Nope. Just taking in the scene,” Logan replied.

  “You’re not going to get anything. Snow has covered it all up.”

  “I got two things, Mr. Smarty Pants.”

  “Really? Or are you just trying to save face?”

  “The body was dumped here. The murder wasn’t committed here.”

  “Oh, so you know it was a murder?”

  “Yep. That’s the second thing.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  “Look at position of the legs. Totally unnatural. Whoever it is, they were dead when they were dumped here,” Logan said.

  “Hey, have you been crying?” Myler asked, looking at Logan.

  “You crusty old fart, that’s melted snow. I was watching the snow fall,” Logan replied irritatedly.

  “Uh huh. Whatever you say,” Myler said, shaking his head.

  “Cheez, you need more to do. Let’s just look at the body,” he replied, stepping closer to the tree where the body had been propped up.

  It was covered in a thick blanket of snow and looked kind of like an abstract statue. Both men put on latex gloves before gently brushing the snow off the victim’s face. She looked like she was just sleeping. Her face was relaxed and her eyes were closed.

  “Pretty girl,” the ME replied.

  “Pretty dead. Her head has been shaved. What’s that around the top of her head where the hairline should be,” Logan asked.

  “Yeah. I see that thin line. Humm. It almost looks like…Son of a gun,” Myler said, gently fingering the top of her head. The top of her cranium came off with a slight sucking sound.

  “What the hell,” Logan said, staring at the empty cavity.

  “Someone has removed her brain,” Myler replied after several seconds. Both men looked in amazement at the open hollow space.

  “Now what the hell are we up against?” Myler said as much to himself as to Logan.

  “Every time I think I have just about seen it all, something like this comes along,” Logan replied, “It’s almost as if it is a competition to be the sickest jerk on the planet.”

  “Well, they raised the b
ar again,” Myler said.

  He carefully removed more of the snow from the young girl.

  “Looks to be about twenty. Maybe a little older.”

  “What are those marks on her breast and stomach?”

  “I’m not sure. There seem to be a lot of them,” he said, removing more snow until she was fully exposed. The striped marks were evident all the way to her calves.

  “Some broke the skin. Wow, look at that one,” Logan observed, pointing to some very deep bruising.

  “Help me lean her forward,” Myler said.

  Logan and Myler expended considerable energy to get the girl forward so the ME could look at her back.

  “What the hell?” Logan said, startled at the long cut down the girl’s back. She had been stitched up with crude large sutures. Myler poked his finger between two of the stitches and wiggled it around.

  “Something is in there but it isn’t her organs,” he said, pulling his finger out and looking at it.

  “She is stuffed? With what?”

  “Darned if I know. I’m not gonna’ cut her open right here to find out. Did you send for the crime scene team yet?” Myler asked.

  “Nope. Can’t see much use for them, can you?”

  “No, but if you don’t they will get their noses all out of joint,” Myler warned.

  “They always have them out of joint. It’s a way of life with them. They actually believe that shit you see on television,” Logan lamented.

  “Still. I think if I were you I would call them. Then again, if I were you, I might just go ahead and commit suicide.”

  “You know, for such a rickety old fart, you sure are cheeky,” Logan said.

  “You calling them or not?”

  “Or not,” Logan said.

  Myler just shrugged, “Okay then. You ready to release the body?”