Disclaimer= I do not own Degrassi.

There will be a flashback towards the end of this chapter. For the sake of the story sequence, I had to add some filler (i.e. the flashback) to smooth things out. I expect at least two more chapters will be posted that will complete this story.


The dumping of the carpet that contained the body was complete. Rick told the people to douse the carpet with Anti-freeze spray so that it can become more solid, which would then enable it to sink faster to the bottom of the lake. One of them asked if he was going to retire to the compound, to which he said he was not.

"I'm going back into the city. Eli needs my help." Before the carpet was doused, Rick received a text message from Eli, telling him that "he might need some backup."

"Fucking incompetent moron. I always have to come in and clean up your messes." Rick was livid, claiming that this was the last time he would go in and finish up one of Eli's jobs for him. He took his usual arsenal plus a "special gun" that would end things quickly and quietly.

xxx

The masked person looked like he left. Clare's eyes did not deteriorate with the smokescreen. Unseen by the masked person, Clare got a look at the silhouette of the person- didn't seem like he was a really tall man, maybe just half a head taller than she. The way he carried himself was something that she could have sworn she's seen before in somebody. She was thinking about possible suspects when the faint cries of Imogen were heard. Imogen was lucky to be alive, having only received a concussion from the force of the gun whack. Glasses slightly cracked, she opened her eyes to bright lights and smoke, swirled together to almost make sight opaque. She tried moving her body- she was not paralyzed. Clare went beside Imogen to try and pick her up.

"Thank above that you can still move Imogen... we should probably get out of here,"

"Your boyfriend?"

"He's not my boyfriend- ex boyfriend, but not a current one." Imogen could feel the awkwardness coming from Clare. It was none of her business as to how they broke up, but she surmised that it must have been very painful for the girl.

"I'm sorry hun, I won't ask about it again."

"No its okay, um..."

"Imogen Moreno."

"Right, don't worry about it Imogen. I need to talk about stuff like that with more girls. The only people that know about it are my mom and my friend Alli Bhandari, who has a sensationalized outlook about boys."

"Sen what?"

"She watches a lot of movies. Anyways, let's get you out of here,"

"What about the boy?" Clare shook her head, telling Imogen that KC was unresponsive. She had to fight back some tears at the thought of him being dead, but now was not the time for such a thing. It was a struggle, but Clare helped Imogen get off the table and together exited the diner from the front.

"How adorable, you two are going to walk right into my arms!"

"Rick Murray!" Clare almost dropped Imogen when Rick, in a ski mask, yelled. She remained defiant as she took a giant gulp, chiding Rick into taking off the ski mask.

"This is the last mess I'm cleaning for E-" Rick was tackled by KC, who dashed around Clare and Imogen to get a good angle at him. They struggled on the floor, Clare yelling that he has a gun. Rick immediately tried going for the gun, but KC went and broke his wrist, rendering his gun useless. He punched him in the side of the head, knocking him down. KC took all the guns Rick had and tossed him on the table. He was sweating, satisfied that a threat was taken care of.

"We all better get out of here and call the police. We found the killer, he is going to prison forever."

"KC!" There was no time to react to Clare's scream. Rick had gotten up and with his left hand, grabbed his army knife to make a huge puncture in KC's shoulder. It was like the tips of bamboo sticks were being seared with acid and driven underneath his fingernails- it was too much pain to deal with.

"I thought you were unconscious,"

"Fuck you for breaking my wrist, where's my fucking guns!"

"I'm not telling you." Rick kicked KC in the ribs and heard the satisfying crack, allowing him to search for the guns in order to finish the job. He was tripped up by the long legs of KC, almost stabbing himself with the knife. That right there further enraged Rick, who kicked KC in the temple, knocking him out effectively and producing another round of screams from Clare. Rick got to his gun and approached the unconscious basketballer to finish him for good.

"Don't kill him! He has done nothing to you,"

"Eli was supposed to do it, not me."

Eli? Eli Goldsworthy?

"You mean to tell me that Eli Goldsworthy is also responsible for the murders?"

"That's right. Your psycho ex-boyfriend is mostly responsible for the murders. After I kill you three, I'm going to find that guy and kill him too for pissing me off so much. He can't kill a fly without getting all emotional. He had to get all emotional before killing the likes of Mark Fitzgerald and Jenna Middleton,"

"Eli killed Fitz and Jenna?" Clare could not contain the emotions- so sad, irritated, disappointed and shocked that Eli would stoop so low and actually take someone's life away was too much to bear. It didn't lessen the pain at all when Rick told her that he killed Jenna and torched her apartment with her in it.

"Her brother was taken care of long beforehand,"

"Why did you do this? Why are you killing people? Why is Eli doing this?" Rick quickly explained to Clare what Eli had told him when they got high one night. His life story was a dark one, he said, and Clare chimed in about how he already knew certain things about it. Rick took an oxy and with the rush of that, grabbed his guns and pointed them at Clare and KC.

"Everyone always laughed at me. They never gave me a chance, not one damn opportunity to prove my worth. I tried everything. I simped to the point of no return, and it yielded no results for me. My loneliness grew since from as far back as I can remember. It has made me kill scores of people."

"Is killing weak and innocent people going to make the pain from those lonely years go away?" Rick could not take it, closing his eyes as he did that day, both fingers slowly feeling the trigger as the push begins. Clare accepted the fact that she was going to die, that she and KC were going to leave the world when they have not even begun to live it. A funny thing happened though-

8 years old he was. A young Rick Murray had not made any friends at this juncture of his life, and it really started to get to him. He would get his lunch, find people that were nice to him on a particular day, and attempt to have lunch with them. They scattered like ants when Rick sat down. He didn't understand it at first, but then he was told in a not so nice way that "nobody likes you man." He ran home during afternoon recess and was absent for the rest of the week, not one person from his school even bothering to check on how he was doing.

His mother gave his some savvy advice that she did not realize until after the recess incident, was applied.

During an autumn morning in early August, the first recess of the new year was in progress. Every student swarmed the swings and all the equipment was thrown in a pile, decreasing the chances of getting something to play with. The playground was huge, with the slide being surrounded by trees in the far right side, making it partially unseen by faculty. There was a throng of grade 6 boys and they had a victim, a scared well-dressed grade 4 student who did not dare to scream aloud, for that would bring more torture.

Rick was playing catch with a tennis ball that he found, catching a glimpse of the kid that was going to get severely bullied. He dropped his tennis ball without thinking, and slowly followed the crowd to the slide, wondering what they were going to do to the frightened kid. Rick desperately looked at the faculty in charge for the first recess- they were surrounded by several little kids starting school for the first time. He had to save the kid from the bums whom drew satisfaction at causing those with worth pain. They were all kids, but the bullies were not dumb- having planned out their bullying long before the year started.

The school had a lax policy on the slide, talking about no groups could slide down at once. That is exactly what the bullies did- two of them grabbed the frightened kid and held him by his legs, dangling him over the slide so that he could fall head first into a pile of sand that was made into a little mountain.

"You're going to eat sand and LIKE IT!" they said, loosening their grip on the kid. He started to cry, pleading with the bullies to not drop him. He claimed that he was allergic to sand, that it caused him to severely rash, which explained the paleness of not getting much sun.

"Stop it guys, that's not right!" Rick said his plea with as much force as he could muster. It went unheard as the boy was dropped, screaming as his face smashed into the sand, breaking both cheeks and blinding one of his eyes.

Clare expected to drop to the floor in her deathly posture, but no slugs entered neither her or KC. The shots shattered glass from the refrigerator that encased the beverages.

"I can't do it... I cannot kill you three. It would not be right...you three are going to be something. Forgive me." Rick got his stuff and calmly left the diner, much to the shock of Clare and Imogen, who seemed to fully grasp what was going on. Clare called Rick's name, wondering what he was going to do.

"I'm going to run as far away as I can, knowing the very second that I stop, I'm going to die."

"You don't have to die. Granted you'll likely spend your life in jail, but you don't need to die,"

"Eli is going to find me and then put a bullet in my brain. It's inevitable, and I'm scared shitless of death, but it is something I have to accept for not taking your lives. Goodbye, and have a nice life." Rick left Clare and Imogen crying, but he knew that they could no do anything that would alter what was going to happen to him. He accepted his finish.