by Louise Krieg
Erika wasn’t Kirks associate anymore. Now she was a human shield.
“Kirk,” I said very slowly, very purposefully. “Get your ass out here and stop hiding behind her.”
They took a step closer to me, and now I saw the same shadowy figure in the long, hooded coat that I’ve been chasing all over town. I’ve got a gun, he’s got a knife, and sure that gives me an edge…if I’m willing to shoot through someone to kill him. I want to kill him. I really, really do. My emotions are all torn up knowing the man who murdered my sister is standing right there waiting to receive his final justice. My body is hurt and broken and I can feel my stamina flagging. I should take the shot right now and end all this.
But I won’t kill an innocent person. That’s not who I am. That’s not who my sister would want me to be.
So, for the sake of Cindy’s memory, I use the other weapon at my disposal. I keep talking.
“Let her go, Kirk, and lets you and me discuss this man to man. You know who I am?”
From the shadows within the hood, I hear soft, hissing laughter.
“Yeah,” I tell him, my hand tightening on the grip of my gun. “You know who I am. I’m the guy who’s going to end you. I’m the guy who’s been trailing you from state to state and then right back here to your home ground. I’m the guy whose sister you killed all those years ago.”
When I take a step closer, his hand shoves the knife closer into Erika’s neck. Close enough, I guess. I could probably put a bullet into that hood and kill him without killing Erika. Probably.
One last try at making nice. “Make your choice, you bastard, because this stops today.”
Then Kirk looked up at me, and the hood fell back.
That smile didn’t belong to Kirk Danes. This was a woman. It had been years since I saw her pretty face, but I recognized her right away. My blood turned to ice. I swear my heart stopped when I realized what I was seeing.
Who. When I realized who I was seeing.
Cindy. My sister.
“Hey there, bro,” she told me. “About time you figured things out.”
“You’re…dead.” The words sounded stupid in my ears. Things were already starting to fall into place. If this wasn’t Kirk that I’ve been tracing, if it was my sister, then all those victims…all those dead girls…the serial killer I’ve traced for years was her.
Slowly, Cindy drew the knife gently across Erika’s cheek. It drew a line of blood as my sister laughed. “Of course, I’m not dead, brother dear. I’ve been living. This is the most alive that I’ve ever been.”
My gun had dropped and now I reset the aim on my sister. She can’t be here. There’s no way. She’s dead. She’s dead, damn it, she’s dead! Only…no, she’s not. She’s here, holding a woman hostage. My sister, risen from the dead. “Cindy, let her go. Please, let her go. Let’s talk about—”
She plunged the knife into the side of Erika’s throat as I stood there watching. Blood sprayed. Erika’s scream turned into a gurgle and she crumpled to the floor kicking and dying.
And I pulled the trigger on my gun.
I couldn’t call the bullet back, as much as I wanted to. Here I stood, bleeding and injured by Cindy herself, looking at a person who was responsible for deaths on a double-digit scale, and I wanted to throw myself in the path of the bullet that was surely going to kill her.
In the next instant, Cindy was thrown backward into the room behind her. She was dead. None of this made any sense and now…I’d never get a chance to ask her why she was alive. Why she was killing people. Why she’d tried to kill me.
I fell to my knees. The tears were unexpected, hot with emotion, and uncontrollable. There was no part of me that didn’t hurt. Outside, or in. The gun in my hand felt too heavy, and too hot, and somehow evil. I tossed it aside. I didn’t want it anymore. My whole life had been a lie. Everything I’ve ever believed or ever done has been based on a lie. When would the room stop spinning?
I was going to throw up all over the floor but I needed to get out of here. That shot was going to draw the attention of at least a few of the tenants and then they would call the police and I did not want to try explaining this to anyone else right now. I didn’t even understand it myself.
The scream that filled the room brought my attention up and sent burning cold racing up my spine. The heavyweight barreling into me put me flat on the floor. Arms wrapped around my neck, choking off my air.
“You’re a real bastard,” Cindy hissed in my ear. “You and Mom and Dad were part of why I disappeared. Did you know that? Of course not. You were clueless. Thought we were best friends or something.”
I couldn’t get my fingers in behind her arm to pry it away. What the hell was I supposed to do here? Flopping her over so she was on her back below me was the best I could manage. She was still choking me. She was still trying to kill me.
“I had to fake my own damned death,” she told me, her voice bitter. “I had to find the right patsy to date. A guy who the police already suspected of being a criminal. I had to lead him on and fuck him senseless just to get him to stay with me until I could fake my death. I stored my blood and threw it around the room and then I had to kill him and drop his body down…well. That’s a secret.”
I rolled to my side. No good. Still dying. My fingernails scrabbled at the floor trying to get enough purchase to crawl away.
“Oh, no no no,” Cindy told me. “You don’t get away. You die, brother dear. You die. Just like all these skank women who had to die. They all screwed the wrong guys. Like the first one. She took my boyfriend, and I killed her. I killed her, and the next one, and the next one, and I’ll kill every damned one that I find until it stops!”
My hand hit something hard. Something cold and metallic.
“You should have left me alone,” Cindy said, squeezing harder until stars were popping in front of my eyes. “It was hard to stay away from you. I had to duck my own brother to keep my secret. All this time you thought I was Kirk Danes. Idiot. It was me. Always me.”
I caught hold of my Desert Eagle’s handle. I picked it up, and turned it around and fired.
The bullet went through my shoulder, and into Cindy’s chest. I felt my bones shattering as I finally lost consciousness and passed out.
Chapter Five
The papers called me a hero.
Heroes shouldn’t cry. Or drink themselves to sleep every night.
I’m the best at what I do. Even with one working arm. The bullet had found my sister’s heart. Killed her instantly.
What Cindy did to me shattered my heart as surely as any bullet would have. I have to keep living, though. I don’t get to die.
Not today.
MISTER SLASHER
DUKE MORRISON
John looked out at the kids on the school campus. He had been going to the same school for a few years and it was sickening to see all of them were generally the same. His friends were an odd bunch, with their own special part making them a unique group. Juice, or Jack but they called him Juice, was really good at getting any type of drug the group wanted. Jonk, or Rachel, was more of a book and nerdy type, but she always had money, which came in handy when they were trying to enjoy themselves. Janice was a bit over the top with her weapon's fanaticism and she really liked to cosplay.
John was the muscle of their group and was usually the one people had to contend with if they wanted to pick on Juice or Janice. That suited him just fine because it gave him a good excuse to find and use the martial arts that he had dedicated himself to learning over the years.
"John, you'll never believe this." Juice called out to John as he headed over to his car.
"I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say we're going to have a good weekend," John said as Juice got into the passenger seat.
"Hell yeah. I just found a dealer that's willing to sell us a pound for twenty bucks provided we're the ones picking the buds." Juice said.
John raised his eyebrow. That sounded like a deal and it wasn't uncom
mon to find dealers who were too lazy to pick their own crop. However, Juice was not usually one to travel out of town for any type of product.
"What makes it so special that we need to go in on this deal?" John asked.
Juice smiled.
"Gold Thinker, my friend. It's a farm of Girl Scout Cookies and Kosher Kush." Juice said excitedly.
"Um... aren't those two usually one hundred bucks a gram?" John asked, even more suspicious now that he knew what it was.
"That's the great part. Apparently, the guy offers the price to people who want to hang out with him for a few hours. It's a literal pot buffet, and the only price to pay is a few bucks and some time with a man who is probably baked with tons munchies. He goes by the name Mr. Slasher." Juice said.
"That's an odd name," Janice said as she hopped into the back of the car.
"Well, not really. He says he's possessed by a murderer who used to call himself Mr. Slasher." Juice said nonchalantly as he ruffled through his backpack for something.
"No offense, Juice, but I'm not particularly crazy about visiting a man who says he's possessed by a murderer." John pointed out.
"Oh please, it's not like he's an actual murderer. I did a background check on the man after I had one of my friends look on his computer. The man is completely free of all crimes we know of in this country. He probably just says that so that people who murder over this type of stuff think twice before coming to his place. After all, all he really wants to do is sit back and chill with a few people. He's got a home theater and everything." Juice said.
"You found out about him how?" Janice questioned.
"A friend who went there himself and lost himself for a couple of months. I figured since this was the end of the school year, that we would go down and lose ourselves for a couple of months too. To be honest, this sounds like the deal of a lifetime. Do you think that Jonk would be able to afford the trip?" Juice asked.
"Juice, how many times have I told you not to question how much money I have? I'd have to kill you if I ever told you." Jonk said, slapping him on the back of the head.
"Woah!" John said, jumping slightly because he was surprised he didn't notice her come in.
"Did I scare you, John?" Jonk said, mischievously smiling.
The four of them hadn't met in your normal ways because they were each weird in their own way. John had originally met Juice first because he was a rebelling teenager that was looking for a good time with the rest of his buddies from his Dojo. Juice was the one who pulled him out of a bad cocaine deal that the rest of his buddies fell for, which is why John was not in prison. The two of them had known each other from middle school days and it wasn't until they got into high school that they had met the other two.
Janice was someone he had met through training because martial arts wouldn't be very martial without some type of weapons training. The Dojo had two separate classes, people who wanted to specialize in fighting with their hands and people who wanted to specialize with weaponry. The police force incorporated their people into both classes, which is why Janice was enrolled in the same Dojo as he was. The only difference is that he preferred to hear the skull crack underneath his fist and she preferred to get girly over how many times a piece of steel had been folded over to increase its strength.
The last one was actually quite amusing because each of them were not the best of students at school, primarily because they enjoyed their hobbies a lot more than they enjoyed their teachers. Therefore, each of them had a tutor for the subjects they were failing in that had been paid by their parents or rather each of them had the same tutor; Jonk. Jonk was brilliant and had technically already graduated whenever they had first met in their freshman year, so it wasn't entirely surprising that Jonk didn't actually attend any of the classes. The problem with the school is that they had no form of early graduation for students like Jonk. Since it was a rigid school, all tests, homework, and quizzes were the same as a means of standardization. Jonk had done four years worth of work in just a few months but she had to wait three more years after that to graduate. She used the extra time to charge for tutoring during everybody's free period.
"Alright, so where do we need to go then?" John asked.
"Well, we're here in Coleville and we need to go to Lost Cannon Peak. That's where this man's farm is." Juice said.
"So, we're going to drive like thirty minutes and then hike the rest of the way?" Jonk asked.
"Actually, that's very close to the Marine Corps Mountain Training Camp. We'll just travel there and head up to the peak." Janice pointed out.
"That's what I asked," Jonk said.
"No, we won't need to hike. There's a dirt trail up from the camp so we'll be able to drive up most of the way to him. After that, we should be practically there." Janice said.
"Oh, that's good. I don't particularly feel like walking through a bunch of forests just for a good time." John said, "However, we should probably bring along a bunch of food because I doubt there's a lot of places to get food where we are going."
"Where did you say this place was?" John asked as they went up the side of the mountain.
"It should be up this side of the dirt road." Juice said, looking down at the map.
"We've been out here for an hour," Jonk stated, rather displeased.
"Hey guys, I don't think we're going to see a house on the side of the road," Janice said, as she pointed out of the window.
The group changed their focus to where she was pointing and saw what looked like a massive log cabin that stood somewhere around an hour's walk from the road.
"If that's the house, you think he has a..."
"LOOK OUT!" Juice yelled.
John swerved as he just barely grazed a truck that was parked on the side of the road. It wouldn't have taken out the car, but it would have at least taken out the left side light along with crushing in the metal had it made impact.
"Hell!" John yelled, as he suddenly stopped the car.
"What is wrong with this guy?" Janice asked.
"Well, you might be right Janice. He might not have a driveway. It would be expensive to make a new one and I don't think the people who keep this place safe would look too kindly on it." Jonk said.
"Whatever."
John slowly pulled over to the side of the road and the group got out of the car. Luckily, most of the food they had packed was inside of bags, but that meant they would need to carry it quite a ways before they reached their destination.
"I think we should leave the food here and just make sure that this is the place we need to be. If it is, then we can come back and get the food." John said.
The group made their way up the side of the mountain. The summer heat was usually terrible by itself but with the surrounding of the trees, it was actually rather pleasant for the team and they all joked, and laughed, their way up the side of the mountain. The trip didn't take long, but when they got up there, the mansion of a log cabin they had seen from the dirt road became evidently more massive. It looked as though someone had built a castle out of wood and just called it a log cabin out of sheer humbleness. It was also not the run-on-gasoline type too, as they could see the glint of the solar panels before they had even arrived at the place. There was a pool and it generally looked like something they might have found along the Beverly Hills had they drove around long enough.
John walked up to the door and knocked. The door itself looked as though a giant had made it, or something that a fan of RPG's had custom made because they liked Viking architecture. The group waited in silence as they peeked inside of the window to see if there was visible life inside of it.
"Hello?!" John called out.
"What?!" A gruff voice answered from the back.
The group traveled around the side of the mansion to see fields of growing plants and a small courtyard with plenty of areas to rest. There was a massive man standing in the center of it and he actually did look as though he had killed someone in the past. He had a patch over h
is eye and plenty of scars on his back, but he kept wacking away at wooden blocks.
"Mr. Slasher?" John inquired cautiously.
"Yeah." The man said as he continued to slam down on the blocks of wood.
"We're here with Juice." John stated.
The man lowered the ax and turned around to look at the group. There was a long silence as he looked each of them over. Then he went back to chopping the wood.
"Umm..." John began, looking for words to try and start a conversation.
"If you want your weed, go grocery shopping in the fields just ahead. Remember, twenty bucks a pound." He said, ignoring the group as a whole.
"Hey, I thought you said your friend lost a couple of months up here," John whispered to Juice.
"If you don't mind, I'm working here. If you want some weed, go get it. If you don't, then leave. I have my time and my peace, and I rather like it spent baked." Mr. Slasher stated, "You can wait until I'm done to hang out, but I want to get this done."
John looked at Juice on clues for what to do, but Juice had already started to move with a small bag in hand. He had bolted towards the plants and left the group to fend for themselves. The man continued to chop away at the wood for a long while before he stood up and stretched.
"Ah! That feels good. There's no exercise that's more demanding than a downward chop with some resistance. It seems your friend has descended on my plants. How long are you all planning to stay?" Mr. Slasher asked.
"Well, if you don't mind, sir, we had planned to spend our summer here," John stated.
Mr. Slasher raised an eyebrow.
"That's a really long time. I usually get visitors for a couple of days. You're kids from one of the schools, aren't you?" He asked.
"Yes," Janice said defiantly.
"I ain't had me some kids for a while. The story about me is usually enough to scare off trespassers and children with weak limbs. Only the big and dumb tend to come my way." Mr. Slasher pointed out.
