Deadly Nightshade

“Everyone listen up!” Tim shouted over the collision of voices in the meeting area of the police department, “He… struck again; this makes it his sixteenth victim.”

I was observing from the back, thinking, “I really don’t get it”, how a person can just kill and kill for some reason, for no reason. It just dawns on my mind that these kills where nothing more than a fantasy or a release sexual desire, a killer trying to fill an endless abyss in the depth of his stomach, it bewildered me.



“Up to now the evidence is poor and the trace is cold, people we need some leads and we need them now. Shit this is only one man someone out there has seen him, probably even talked to him, and it’s our job and duty to find him but not next month when the fucking body count has doubled but fucking now, we need a lead, so let’s all do what we do best and catch this cocksucker.”



I don’t know what it is with old people and cursing, maybe they feel that they have held it all to long and might as well let it out before they close their eyes permanently or maybe they just think they know best, whatever.

         

“Let’s go Kione we don’t have all fucking day,” Tim yelled at me from the elevator closing his Jack Nicolson eye brows together trying to look mean, trying. It’s hard to take a man serious when his hair is gray and they have so many wrinkles that could be stretched out a mile long or maybe it’s the fact that he just might drop dead any second, oh well, he’s my partner and if a bullet doesn’t kill him, his worst enemy will, time.

         

Reaching the elevator I looked at the flashing numbers in the ceiling and finally asked, “where we going?”

         “To your mamas house, where else do you fucking think we’re going, to the god damn crime scene another damn body just surfaced in a hotel down by the beach,” Tim said as he continued to frown, this case was really getting to him. It was getting to all of us, the only reason I couldn’t listen is because I drifted in thought and that only happened because I haven’t slept since this case started.

         “Sorry, I have to clear my head,” I said stepping behind him walking toward the car. 

         “Fuck! Kione I need you here, so don’t fucking drift away again,” Tim said.

         He drove like a maniac, I didn’t care, actually my pulse never even jacked once, most people would be having a heart attack or be gasping for air but for some peculiar reason I found myself, relaxed.

         The hotel seemed normal, the room was nice, except for the blood, it covered everything from roof to walls even the door, all the way to the window where it clearly said:



CAMELEON WHY DON’T YOU COME AND PLAY

CAMELEON OPEN YOUR EYES TO THE LIGHT OF DAY

GOD IS NOT IN MEN, SO LIVE LIKE GOD MADE YOU TO BE

CAMELEON TEAR OFF THE SKIN AND LIVE WITH ME



I just let the tech guy’s deal with it, I usually like a good puzzle but right now my head hurts like a Red Bull and vodka hangover, even my mouth tastes like shit.

“This is definitely him, the MO fits, we got the damn riddle in blood and the flower was jammed down his through I guess that makes seventeen, fuck,” Tim walked out, he just wanted to clear his head, I think.

Belladonna, the ambiguous flower, on one hand it’s beautiful and on the other it can kill a person, interesting enough the flower was not used in that matter, the victims cause of death was mostly pertaining to suffocation from the contractions in the throat than that of the actual poison from tropane alkaloids.

Before I saw the body I looked around tried to get a feel on what happened if there was a struggle or maybe the victim knew the killer, all clues that might lead, well, to a lead. Everything else that is common to any other murder case won’t be found like that of DNA or finger prints, they might as well not even try.

My heart rate is a hard thing to get moving, only after hour of strenuous running can my heart rate be jacked, but when I glanced at that body it stood still and then spurred like that of drums of war, raging in fear. This son of a bitch just made it personal, he killed my best friend.

Richard was a young engineer, a promising one at that, he also always happened to be there for me like a brother, the only other person that I trust besides my wife and partner. And now he’s dead.

         I went down, almost to the fetal position, defensive from everyone in the room trying to keep my cool. If anyone found out I was emotionally attached I would be re-assigned to another case and that can’t happen, not after this. I can just picture his wife crying hitting my chest in tears trying to figure out a way to tell his five year old son that his dad is dead, I can already see the long endless glasses that are filled with regret and sorrow. I can already see the pain.

         He had all the signs of the serial killer even his signature, the Belladonna down to the stomach. Experts that we have consulted say that it’s supposed to symbolize when juxtaposed with the puzzle how every person has an alternate life, a reality hidden inside them, someone different from the one outside that is sprung when survival is at hand.

         Richard did have another him, he had a bad habit of doing hookers and no matter the therapy he wouldn’t stop, I was the only person who knew about, it at least that’s what I thought, guess I was wrong. How come screwing hookers and cheating on a wife is deeming with the punishment of death, it just seems barbaric. From the looks of it, he knew the killer for the only thing that was out of place was the blood the rest was just where it belonged.

         Richard’s body looked poetic, that’s what the forensic lab rat said at least. The lab rat told me that the right arm on the heart and the left arm over the stomach symbolized a picture of Saint Mary Magdalene, of course the odds that it was just coincidence were enormous so I told him but he quickly pointed out that the skin that has been carved out his face to the bear bone, and the adding of long hair and then placing the mask of face skin in the alabaster jar all symbolized Saint Mary Magdalene. I passed and walked to inspect the jar.

         It was so decomposed that it could no longer be distinguished as Richard but for some reason the first time I say it my heart dropped and was being stepped on by a stampede of horse-men. I was never the one to believe in God, and I’m not sure if the killer does either because up to now he is mocking him, leaving the bodies naked, mocking us, telling us he can expose any one and we can’t do anything about it. God I hate him.

         After I managed to get rid of a single tear that ran down my cheek I went back to the car where Tim waited patiently for me. I had the same feeling of rocks in my stomach all day and it just got heavier.

         “Just take me home, I need to lie down. I can’t do this today,” I told him pushing the seat back.

         “None of us can,” he repeated depressingly, “who could…”





         “Want some ice?” Eli said. She’s my wife, my beautiful white orchid, her eyes is the closest I have ever gotten to the sky and her lips work as if I was a negative and she a positive, we make each other like Ying and Yang.

         “No, I’d rather take it dry,” I said looking down the endless glass of clear vodka, sometimes I think alcohol makes it worse because any restrain that I might have had is unleashed by this drug. Every night I become bibulous, I go to sleep bibulous and sometimes wake up bibulous.

         I lay down in my bed with my drink next to me; she dove in the sheets like an angel into a divine pool. Ever since we got together we have had this habit of sleeping naked, she would lay her soft breast on my chest and smooth legs on mine and it’s gotten to the point that I don’t feel capable of falling to sleep without her wrapped around me, like a vine to a house.

         “Any new lead?” she asked trying to get me to talk to her, it’s not that I don’t want to or that it bothers me it’s because lately I have been losing myself in thoughts.

         “Not really.”

         “How’s Denise doing, with what happened to Richard?”

         “She’s doing the only thing she can do, drink. But she’ll manage she’s a strong one,” I said it but didn’t mean it, I knew she was in for a life of memories nothing more, living in the past forgetting the present. Eli needs to know that if something happens to me she needs to move on, I can’t really put it that way just because she would do what she always does, burst in tears to the point of imprisonment.  Childish if you ask me.

         I don’t sleep, at least not as much as I should mostly I just watch her sleep. Her breathing calms me it makes me feel like if I was far away with no one around, only her and that subtle beat of her heart that my chest so presently feels.

         Tim is a military man, so every morning at five exactly he is outside my house waiting, that old geezer gets grumpy if I’m even a minute late. It doesn’t bother me, it’s not like I was sleeping.

         Before leaving my house there is one thing I always have to do, like a ritual. I stare at Eli as she is sunk in those blue sheets and her naked body is sculptured to perfection, it’s the gasoline that keeps me going all day.





Another day. Another failed day with no leads and more bodies. I wish that every human had a monitor that detected their location at all times that would make my job so… easy.

         Revenge is a good motivator, after finding my best friend in pieces for a killer’s pleasure I’ve been working twice as hard, which in its own way is messed up, because the other families deserved all of my energy but I guess it doesn’t really hit you until it actually hits you.

         It fucking hit me and hard.

         The inside of my house seemed like the inside of a tomato, blood everywhere. A rush of adrenalin overtook me. I panicked. Ran through the halls and opened every door, blood everywhere. I reached it, the last door, the one I didn’t want to open, the one I had to open.

         My hand gripped the handle, it was covered in blood and it was still warm, my body was sending cold shivers that made me close my eyes. Tears were already rushing out. I opened them.

Dropped to my knees, clenched my fist, gnash my teeth.

There she was against the wall, crucified. My throat was clogged by a ball that felt like metal, I couldn’t breathe.

She was against the wall upside down as her throat was slashed, by now she had stopped bleeding, there wasn’t any blood left for her to bleed. Her arms extended in each direction and her feet against the wall through them all knifes. Knifes held her up. Her naked body seemed empty. In that moment I lost it.

“NO!” I shouted in rage punching the ground as blood exploded from the impact. At least one inch of blood covered the floor and I felt I was drowning in it. Blood covered me now, her blood.

Tim rushed inside the house after the screams; I couldn’t stop screaming I needed to let it out.

He bent down and grabbed me, held me, as if trying to pull me back from this hell I have submerged in, but it was too late I already reached the bottom.

The scent is something I will never forget and that color, like in a bull’s eyes I will never forget.

I compressed myself to the fetal position and started crying, letting all emotions out, once I’m dry of tears and love, hate and anger will take over and I will kill him.





Three months later I checked into a medical center, I couldn’t bear to see anyone any more I even started hallucinating.





At night the room is dark. I have a small bunk bed and a desk; I sit on the floor in the far left corner. By this time Tim would come and talked to me, sometimes he didn’t say anything he just sat there and watched.

“You know it wasn’t your fucking fault, how many times do I need to tell you this shit,” Tim said looking down on me like God must do, look down on me. Fuck god.

“Yeah, yeah, not my fault bla, bla, bla.”

“I’m serious the sooner you fucking figure that out the sooner you can get the hell out of here and help me out there with all of the bullshit in the cock sucking world,” he said looking at the bared window like a bird in a cage.

I gave him a smirk and tucked my head in my arms knowing the next time I looked up Tim would have already left, figures; he was never much the one for goodbyes.





I’m still sitting in the same corner, not closing my eyes for fear of red, and not looking up for fear of conversation with one of those damn doctors that think they know everything just because they have spent most of their lives sitting in a classroom listening to other people speak never really doing anything.

However that night I realized something, I realized something I overlooked because people tend to miss what is obvious to others but blinded to them. In every crime scene that we got there the only other person to know everything and see everything was Tim.

Specks of ice ran down my spine, Fuck me. This can’t be real this can’t how could I miss it, it was right under my nose, damn.

I looked up, Tim wasn’t there, it gave me some relief but I had to come up with a plan I couldn’t just confront him without anything to actually say, and my gun I wish I had my gun.

“What got you out of your fucking corner and wind up like a cheerleader who just found out she’s pregnant,” Tim said as he walked into the room.

“Oh, nothing, I’m… I’m fine; it’s all good I just… remembered a joke.”

“Is that right, care to share with the class?”

“No I guess I could, um, it’s hard to put in words it was much simpler in my mind but I’ll give it a try,” I paused, “there were two dogs right and they did everything together, right, and one day one of them fell in love and found other friends while the other dog didn’t want love or other friends he just wanted to keep playing, so, here comes the funny part” I said smiling, “so the other dog kills all of the dogs in the town and forces in a way back into play but the other dog is to hurt and doesn’t want to play.”

“This isn’t much of a joke it’s actually a pretty fucked up story,” Tim said sitting on the bed.

“Yeah, its fucked up indeed,” I paused, “ this is the best part, when the dog found out what the other one had done and confronted him, of course the other dog denied it but there was no blinding him any longer, the truth was out and so was the anger.”

“Why do I get the feeling we’re not talking about dogs anymore.”

I took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eyes, “because it was you, it all makes sense, it was you,” I started laughing hysterically and tears starting coming out.

“What?”

“It was you! It was you! It was you!!!” I turned to pure rage, “It was you!”

“Wait? No.”

“The time for talking is long gone, now the bad dog must be put down,” I said gripping his neck.

We wrestled around the room, despite his appearance he was really strong but I had something he didn’t, motivation to kill.

I punched him.

I bite him, took of his ear, laughed in the process as blood sprinkled everywhere.

Smashing his head into the payment floor, over and over to the point of flattening.

It was great, like a Mozart concert, blood in the air, joy, revenge, death.

It was almost over, I did it. I killed him.





The room was completely dark, to the point of blindness.

This room is ten feet squared, no windows, soft walls, and a dim light that outlines the door at the far corner.

Gleaming the outline of a man, a doctor, I didn’t look up I kept my eyes from him, from the light.

“You are one messed up human being, if you’re even human at all,” he said, I could hear him but ignored him.

“First, you kill seventeen people just because they beat the system, then you step it up to the next level killing your best friend, after that you went on to splatter your wife’s blood all over your house and crucify her, upside down draining her to the bone. And now you have killed your room mate clamming he was the one who killed your wife, Tim, Tim, Tim, who the hell is Tim. Oh, I know that double personality of yours, well you can’t kill him, at least not by killing others.” He paused almost to hold himself back from rage, “you are a killer and if it were up to me you would be put down, like a dog.”

The doctor left the room.

I looked up and smiled, said with such joy, “It’s just that… oh, it’s just that it is so beautiful, the way it moves and how it smells and the texture… Blood is just… delicious.”