Rachel Freeman
"N-no! Please! What are you doing?" Her eyes darted about in a panic, judgment tainted by hallucinogens. She screamed as he cut into the back of her wrist, digging into the bone.
Blood spilled out, steaming against the cool concrete floor of the basement.
"Wh-why?" She choked out between sobs, "Why are y-you doing th-this?"
The man stood, soulless eyes glinting through slits in a stark white mask, "I'll be back," he told her roughly, "Tomorrow."
X X X
"Morning," I mumbled to Jay, still half asleep. I shuffled past him to the old coffee machine in the corner that only the police stationed here knew how to use, loaded five packets of sugar into a cup of coffee (the real stuff, not the artificial sweetener crap), and stirred it lazily until it all dissolved.
"They always give the early shift to the newbies, Maxie, as soon as they warm up to you you'll get better hours," he chuckled in his husky voice, eyes crinkling with a smile. When I say "husky", I mean like the dog. He's a giant furball whose bark is worse than his bite, like his police dog, Jeathrowe.
The oversized German shepherd puppy came bounding from the depths of the police station at the sound of my voice. Between pushing the dog off and removing my dark hair out of the way, It would be impossible to get him off. This would be my morning wake up call.
"Jeathrowe, off," Jay commanded with an amused tinge to his voice.
The dog obediently trotted to his owner's side and sat with dignity on the tile, tongue happily lolling out of his mouth. I wish I could be a dog. Most people already see me as one, being nineteen and working as a police officer full-time. They think I'm just doing it for attention. Switching places with Jeathrowe would be nice, everybody loves him.
I stood up grumbling and crossed my arms, "give me my job for today and I'll be on my way."
"If you say so, Maxnome," He tossed me a folded map off of his desk that looked like it had been drawn on with a red marker, "An officer from the Chesterwood District went missing. She's been gone for about a month and you're going to help look for her."
"Sure, Jay," I muttered, half to myself. The last thing I want is to have to deal with a missing person's report, wailing relatives and panicked children. Spare me.
"Yeah, Thad is waiting for you outside in the car. Get moving or you'll be late," he told me, his tone commanding me to move as fast as I could. There is a reason why Jay is chief of police.
"Hey, Thad, let's get going." I smiled tiredly at him. Thad is a young, blonde-haired, blue-eyed heartthrob that every female officer except for me falls so hard for it's funny.
"Hey, Maxnome, Jay finally chase you away from the coffee machine?" Gorgeous smile followed by a gorgeous laugh-if I was five years older he would so be mine. Now though, I could care less.
I sighed, "Yeah, I s'pose." The car started. "Any ideas what might've happened to this girl?" I asked after we were on the road.
"I hate to say it, but Spade probably got her." Spade: a murderer and popular topic of conversation among law enforcement, nobody has found a decent lead and any decent-looking lead was just followed through to a dead end. To make matters worse, his victims were usually women working in law enforcement as young as he could find them. That would make me the prime victim for a horrific murder. Wonderful.
I chill ran through me, "That… Uhg, hope I never have to go through that."
"Yeah, me too. It'd be a shame to lose you up here, Maxie, we'd really miss you down at the station." Thad sounded deep in thought, and deeply worried.
"Don't worry. I can take care of myself," I reassured him kindly.
"I don't doubt that." He laughed, loud and melodious. Too loud, like he really did doubt it.
We were silent the rest of the ride there, awkward and strange between us. I almost leapt out of the police cruiser when it stopped, not eager to begin searching, just wanting to get away from the weirdness of it all.
It was the street the officer had disappeared on, an old suburb lined by quaint rainbow houses each capturing the personality of its residents. It was just like every other one of his crime scenes, happy and innocent, but hiding something just beneath the surface. The first place to look would be the unoccupied homes. One in particular seemed to draw the officers. You have to follow your gut feeling with this kind of stuff.
Or you could use some logic.
Spade's thing is the number 14, so find something that has to do with that number and start searching. 329 East Carcos road: a tiny light gray house that beckoned with a broken window and toppled "for sale" sign. It had been abandoned for over seven years, according to what we had been told by the neighbors. Only recently had lights been seen inside the house. One older couple even said that they thought they heard muffled screaming coming from somewhere inside. At least, that was what they had told us at briefing.
I hung back from the scene until an ambulance arrived, or rather, a one-way bus for the morgue. A body bag was wheeled out on a stretcher, which was my signal to enter the house.
"Hey, so, what do we have here?" I murmured, scanning the spotless room. There wasn't a drop of blood on the dusty white carpet or a stench of death. There was no indication of a murder.
"They're looking for the second victim," an older officer replied solemnly. Her raven hair was gray at the roots from stress and years on the job.
"If that wasn't… Who was that?" I stared at her, feeling myself shrink at the thought of a second body.
"That poor man was just a clue to where the other is hidden," she sighed and turned down a darkened hallway.
I followed her, watching her trace her hands along the wall until her fingers froze, "Go get the
others," she ordered. I complied quickly.
When I returned, the woman had her fist through the drywall and was tearing out chunks of the material. A horrific smell floated through, emanating from the watermelon-sized hole in the wall.
"You," she gestured to me, dusting herself off, "Come with me."
I followed her without argument; the hideous smell was enough for me to know what had just been discovered. I slipped out the door, shocked and a little scared.
The woman finally turned to me, "What's your name?" She inquired with a steely expression and pained green eyes.
"Maxnome." I replied.
"Well, Maxnome. You need to quit your job for a while," Her voice sounded worn and cracked, like the bark of a wise old tree that had weathered the most violent storm.
"No," I snapped instinctively.
"It doesn't matter how determined you are, you're just putting yourself in danger," she argued calmly.
"I have never given up on a job, no matter how dangerous it may be. I can take care of myself, thanks," I retorted, storming back into the house.
"Wait," her voice held a slight tone of pleading, "Maxnome, do not go back in there. Did you know that every one of his victims has been at the scene of the previous crime and disappeared directly after they left. They were all found dead two weeks later-"
"Nothing is going to happen to me," I defended.
Back at my apartment that night, the ordeal still circled my mind. I wouldn't be taken, and even if I was, I wouldn't die. That's a one-in-a-million chance. I reclined on the couch and flipped the switch to turn on the television. A sitcom came up on the screen. I didn't necessarily care what I was watching. Right now, sleep sounded good.
With the voices in the TV lulling me into dreamland, I hardly noticed what seemed like a harmless prick on the inside of my arm.
My head throbbed and the reddish light of the room made the walls twirl about me. I groaned, reaching up to rub my forehead. Am I getting sick? I wondered as the spinning slowed to a stop with the realization that I couldn't lift my hand more than two feet above the ground.
"What…?" I shuddered with a blast of cold air. Even from my confused point of view I could see that my situation looked hopeless. Completely hopeless.
"It took you longer to wake up than it did the others," a voice growled. A jolt ran through me that wasn't influenced by the temperature.
"What's going on?" My voice shook slightly.
A man in a white mask that gleamed brightly bent down to me. He held a horrific syringe that looked like it had ruined too many lives to recall them all. It contained a thick clear liquid. Soap, I thought, noticing the bubbles slowly drifting as he tilted the syringe. It reminded me of overturning a shampoo bottle. It wasn't soap.
Monsters floated before me, laughing at me as I cowered in fear. My body shook with the endurance it required to quell the pain coursing through my body. In the midst of it all, him. He stood in front of the terrible militia of hideous demons, leading them with the bloody syringe in his hand. His weapon. Now my blood stained it, too. My blood had joined that of thirteen other victims.
Fiery claws dug into me. One took hold. The back of my left wrist. Scratching the bone. Fear grew inside me.
Escape. I need to escape. There is always a way out, isn't there? Of course there is. I don't need help. I do. I don't have it, though. I'll have to make it on my own.
Get out alive, or die trying.
Sometime during the night, I passed out. When I woke up, everything seemed more or less clear, considering where I was. The drugs wore off. My wrist throbbed painfully, but everything relaxed since the previous day.
Day? Night? I didn't even know. There weren't any windows.
I took the opportunity to breathe deeply, something I had been prohibited from doing previously due to fear and pain until a psychotic laugh sent me through a vortex of fear. I recoiled into a terrified ball as much as I could against the chains' restraint's.
"Well, well, it looks like we're ready for the second day." A hand gripped the back collar of my shirt, restricting my neck.
"Wh-what are you going to do now?" I choked.
He just laughed at me, pulling my shirt up over my head. A wave of electricity ran through me and I screamed. My fingers contracted and expanded with the flow of electricity, wringing themselves out. I could bear the pain, but the shocks to my nervous system made it impossible to remember anything except what was happening to me. It went on like that for an eternity.
A short pause between pain and I tried breathing again. It was impossible. I took in too much air too fast and ended up coughing blood. I swallowed hard. Something worse would come soon.
I felt a section of my back leap into flames. I shrieked with surprise and sheer terror. My skin sizzled against hot iron that wouldn't move no matter how much I struggled against the chains that held me.
It ended with salty tears dripping to the floor below me. My eyes were glued wide open with shock and my body trembled with the heat still ghosting over my skin. My shirt was pulled back over the new wound, making it seethe.
One more thing to come: I didn't resist, tried not to react, as the second cut was made in my arm. The beginnings of a sick, twisted ladder.
That night, I planned my escape between bursts of burning sensations in my arms and back. The chains were anchored in the concrete, but not anchored deep enough. I could shake one free if I worked at it long enough. Once I got out of one, I would be able to reach the loose nail on the boards just out of my reach and pick the other locks. This man wasn't as careful as he seemed. All the while he was gone, I wiggled the base of the chain in the concrete with my right hand.
I needed to win this in eleven days, or I would die.
My rude awakening came from my right hand being placed in a bucket: a mixture of scalding water and acid. He held my hand there until I gathered enough sense to splash the volatile liquid up onto his hand, burning more of my arm in the process. He released it with an angry yelp and I curled into a ball, cradling the injured hand as closely as possible. I growled, it was much easier to bear pain when fury overwhelmed any other emotion.
I wasn't going to die, and he certainly wouldn't be the one to kill me.
"Hm, I don't mind a fighter. You've given me more of a challenge than the thirteen others. I suppose it's fitting, considering that you will be the last message." He muttered, placing one hand on one shoulder and dripping acid slowly over the other.
I pulled myself tighter together, tears of rage and fear streaming down my cheeks.
"Mary Jensen, 32," I heard a sound like a bottle cap popping off, acid spattered my arms, "Tiara Kater, 31, Allison Kutcher, 30," He smeared the scalding liquid on the back of my neck, "Bennadette Rosetti, 30, Sadie Peterson, 29, Amaya Takahashi, 28," Three more finger-shaped acid burns across my lower back, I winced, "Vera Keig, 26, Rose Della, 25," agony spread across my shoulders, "Devin McNell, 24, Serena Tergo, 23, Vanessa Elys, 22, Errisa Templor, 21," Each name was punctuated by a blast of heated water and searing acid all over my body. I stayed curled in a ball, "Terra Velo, 20," Another pop, "Alice Parker, Maxnome, 19." I shrieked as what felt like claws tore into my back, followed by massive amounts of acid-water solution.
He disappeared and left me whimpering as the pain began to fade as it did when exposed for long enough. As soon as I could bear to move, I continued to gently work the chain free of its concrete prison. Now, there was a definite looseness to it as the concrete began to give way. I would have to wait for a chance to escape, anyway.
X X X
What felt like a millennium locked away, facing rape, iron claws, burns, drowning, horrendous infections, and injections, it had finally paid off. The thirteenth day of torture had just ended and he had disappeared from the house with the sound of a shutting door. My thirteenth scar still bled down my arm, mixing with the pus from the others. My tired fingers fumbled for the base of the chain and yanked it from the ground.
The concrete gave way with a quiet cracking noise and I could finally reach the nail. I picked the locks on my hands and ankles before doing my left hand. I stumbled blindly in the darkness on weakened legs towards anything that might offer escape.
An opening covered by nothing but a curtain, my escape to the outside world. I tumbled onto carpet, resting for a moment before bracing myself against the wall and limping out the front door. Fresh air hit me like a subway train. I loved it, almost passing out with relief when I finally smelled air unpolluted by the stench of blood.
I saw a house with one light on next door. My ticket out of Hell.
I tripped over to it, struggling to stay conscious. I fell against the door with a loud thud and banged my fists against it. An older gentleman opened the door.
He gasped and backed away when he saw me, "G-get me to a h-hospital. That's all I ask. Please!" I panted. He didn't hesitate a moment longer to carry me into his car. I blacked out in the backseat.
X X X
After three major surgeries, a skin graft for third degree burns, and massive amounts of antibiotics, I recovered. Almost. It was expected that I would develop mental problems. I did: PTSD. Just one of many motives to lock Spade away. I would testify against him the day after I was released from the hospital.
As I spoke on the witness stand, Spade's expression turned to flat-out hatred. I could see the desire for revenge, burning inside him and I basked in its heat. My own triumphant grin spread across my face as I watched him led away in handcuffs, his eyes drilling into mine with rage.
I silently mouthed the words: "I win."