Total Immersion, page 28
This time he chose number three: CHAPTER SEARCH.
A set of numbers from one to twenty-four lit up in front of him. “Twenty,” he called out at random.
The number twenty lit up.
Sam braced himself and waited for the lasers to strike.
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The bus came to a stop and the back doors split open. Travis exited, the black plastic case held firmly in his left hand. “We’re off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz . . .” he sang to himself, starting toward home. “We hear he is a whiz of a Wiz if ever a Wiz there was.”
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The emerald bed continued to glow green as Kim laid her head across Sam’s chest. He smelled the sex, even though he’d personally missed that chapter. Something he began to regret as he stared down at her naked body.
“That was soooo incredible, sweetie,” Kim said, still a little winded from what must have been one hell of a session.
Sam reached out and stroked her hair. It felt softer than silk. He moved his hand down her back, and with his index finger, gently stroked her sides up to her perfectly smooth armpit.
“Was that fucking wild or what?” Kim added.
“It was pretty damn wild. Amazing,” Sam sputtered uncomfortably.
Kim sat up and leaned against the headboard. “I hate to destroy this wonderful moment, but how ’bout we get in a little work before we get too comfy?”
Sitting up and joining her against the headboard, Sam smiled and said, “You read my mind.”
Sam watched her face closely as it morphed into a reserved, serious expression.
“All right, my great and powerful Wizard, this one’s gonna be a bit tricky. We’re going to have to spend days, maybe weeks, plowing through the details. Do you understand?”
Every fear Sam had ever expressed about Total Immersion came to life before his very eyes. Kim continued, “I was hoping with all my heart we wouldn’t have to do this, but I don’t see any other choice.”
“Who is it?” Sam asked, a lump in his throat.
“He’s that detective. That dirty detective. If we don’t stop him now, he’s going to stop us. He wants to take you away from me. He wants to make it so we can never see each other again.”
Sam wanted to pull the trigger. He wanted to stop the program, go home, and retrieve his Louisville Slugger.
“The one you read about,” she continued. “The one they assigned to the case.”
Sam went numb as he lay there naked, staring at this stunning woman who was about to order his own assassination.
“He doesn’t give a fuck about our cause . . . and he should. Trust me, of all people, he should. He only wants to destroy us. Destroy all we’ve accomplished and separate us forever. We can’t let that happen.”
Sam wanted to slug her. He wanted to take that perfect face and shove his fist right through it. Images of the little old lady in the big green floppy hat stirred in his mind. Maybe she was the sick bitch who methodically turned this poor, lonely man into a killer. When all is said and done, Sam thought, The Revenger would turn out to be the saddest victim of all.
“Do you understand what I’m saying, sweetie? Do you understand why we have to do this?”
Sam whispered, “Yes.”
Kim smiled and nuzzled into his chest. “I want Sam Knight’s death to be as quick as possible. There won’t be any speech this time. That’s very important to me.”
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Travis’ right foot touched down on his porch at exactly 7:34 p.m. He could just imagine the expression on Kim’s face as he entered the penthouse a good five hours early. She would be thrilled, and a little concerned. “Is everything okay, sweetie?” she would ask, and plant a wet kiss on his waiting lips.
Travis pulled out his house key and inserted it into the deadbolt. He could instantly feel it had not been locked. He always secured the deadbolt. He reached down, turned the knob, and the door creaked open. A sick, violated feeling churned in the pit of his stomach. He stood momentarily frozen, not quite sure what to do, then almost subconsciously, he pushed the door open and cautiously entered his house.
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Sam listened with growing dread as Kim continued to spill detailed instructions regarding his imminent demise. Travis Taylor had become a secondary player in The Revenger murders. Sam wanted the head of the snake, not the tail.
“Do you have any idea how much I love you?” Kim asked, maneuvering her body until she was sitting on top of him, her silky blonde hair flowing across his chest.
As Kim bent over and their lips softly connected, Sam pulled the trigger.
The laser beams disengaged, and Sam yanked off the black helmet.
Blinded, he reached into his lap and took a firm grasp of his gun.
It took thirty seconds for his eyes to focus on Travis Taylor as he stood frozen inside the bedroom doorway.
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Nothing could have prepared Travis for the sight that awaited him sitting in his bedroom. It felt like he had been kicked in the stomach; he couldn’t get a breath of air into his lungs as he stood, staring at Detective Sam Knight. It had taken him years to save up the money for his system and even then, Gwen had helped piece together the expensive machinery.
Travis felt paralyzed. Maybe he was dreaming. More like a terrible nightmare.
“He’s the worst of the worst, sweetie,” Kim had said. “He doesn’t give a fuck about our cause. He only wants to destroy us.”
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Even as Sam’s eyes focused on the frightened, bespectacled killer, he hardly believed it himself. In the dim light of that depressing little room, he could see Travis carried what looked like a large cello case, but he knew damn well what hid beneath that hard, plastic shell.
Sam understood, maybe more than most, the terrible pain of loneliness, and his feelings toward Travis were now crystal clear. Loneliness was like a cancer that slowly eats away at the body and rots the mind. Human beings did not function well alone. Loneliness and isolation could lead a man to do just about anything, even kill. The mind had a marvelous way of creating throngs of friends, and lovers, that did not exist, as a form of self-preservation.
Loneliness could drive a man mad.
Loneliness created the perfect killing machine in Travis Taylor, and it had nearly taken Sam as well. The line that separated them was a very thin one indeed, and Sam knew it.
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All Travis wanted was to see Kim. To touch her one more time.
He wanted to cry. To scream out. He wanted to run.
He felt the emotions building up inside like a volcano ready to erupt.
He felt his body tremble. He wanted to vomit.
“I’m not here to hurt you,” Sam said softly. “I’m going to help you, Travis.”
Kim said this man was evil and wanted to pull them apart forever. If he was going to see Kim again, Travis knew he had to kill Sam Knight. It’s what she wanted.
“Who’s Kim, Travis?” Sam asked in that same soft tone.
Travis did not answer. Sam asked again, “Who is she? Who programmed these discs for you?”
Travis felt hot all over. His skin burned. He was confused.
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Sam continued in an authoritative tone. “I want you to set the case down and place your hands above your head. I don’t want to hurt you. I want you to set the case down and place your hands above your head.”
Sam heard Travis barely mutter the words, “Kim, Kim, Kim.”
Sam glanced down at Travis’ leg and lined up a shot. If he blew away the kneecap, it would not be a fatal wound.
He glanced back up to Travis’ dirty, little face, and was relieved as Travis nodded in agreement.
Sam watched as Travis slowly lowered the case onto the hardwood floor. His small, stubby fingers remained gripped around the handle.
“Let it go,” Sam whispered. “Please.”
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She said she wanted Sam Knight’s death to be as quick as possible.
Travis knew what he had to do.
As Sam lifted himself off the chair, Travis grabbed his case and spun around.
By some miracle, Travis managed to get his free hand around the doorknob, and as he made his retreat out of the bedroom, he slammed the door closed.
In that instant, Sam lifted his gun and fired one shot. The bullet blew a two-inch hole through the closing door.
Travis felt the bullet graze his right shoulder blade. Keeping a firm grip on the black case, he ran down the hallway, through his living room, and whipped open his front door. He bolted onto the quiet street and could taste salty tears as they slipped into his panting mouth.
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Sam fucked up. He should have followed procedure. That’s what his father would have told him. That’s what he would have told Tommy.
Sam pulled open the front door just seconds after Travis slammed it shut. He knew that however the next few minutes played out, bloody or otherwise, it all could have been avoided.
Instead of making what would have been a simple arrest, he now found himself chasing The Revenger through the cold Chicago night.
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Travis heard the detective’s footsteps right behind him as he ran into a busy intersection. He heard the screech of tires but was oblivious to how close he came to becoming human roadkill. He was trapped in a nightmare in which an unseen evil chased him, and he couldn’t outrun it.
Travis hated those nights when he’d wake up screaming, soaked in sweat, his ears throbbing in pain. In those terrible moments, all he wanted was Kim, but she was never there. As he ran down the street, his mind replayed the scene in the bedroom.
“Who’s Kim?” the detective had asked. “Who’s Kim, Travis?”
The detective knew his first name. That motherfucker knew Kim’s name.
Even if Travis managed to get away, he knew that son of a bitch would go after Kim next. If Sam Knight knew where he lived, he probably knew where Kim lived.
“It’s all over, Kim,” Travis would say to her. “We’re in terrible danger. We have to leave this place now. Go as far away as possible, and never come back here again.”
Kim will understand, he thought. “What’s important,” she would say, “is that we’re together. That’s all I care about.”
Travis made a fast left onto Hamilton Drive, and he found what he was looking for.
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Sam watched as Travis was nearly run down by two driverless cars. A third car, a huge ten-passenger SUV, whipped by Sam, missing him by inches. He managed to make it through the busy intersection unscathed, but the years of heavy boozing had not turned him into a long-distance runner. He felt the energy leaking away as his legs melted into rubber, and a sharp pain overtook the right side of his body, just below the rib cage.
He made the turn onto Hamilton Drive, and was less than twenty yards away when he watched Travis make a desperate leap for an open sewer drain.
Within the blink of an eye, Travis Taylor disappeared.
Sam approached the gutter. A thin, metal bar ran like dirty braces across the mouth of the drain. He now understood why Travis never appeared on any security cameras. He could get within feet of each home or apartment through the sewers and slither out, undetected.
Sam felt the blood surging through his head. He kneeled and glanced into the sewer. He could only make out vague shapes in the darkness, and all he heard was the steady sound of dripping water. Against his better judgment, he holstered his weapon, dropped onto his stomach, and slipped past the metal bar.
It was a seven-foot drop from the street to the mud-covered concrete below. It took a few seconds for Sam’s pupils to adjust to the darkness. The actual tunnel was larger and taller than he’d imagined it would be. Just over six feet tall, Sam could walk completely upright and still have a few inches of room between the top of his head and the roof of the shaft.
The stench was a combination of feces and rotten eggs.
Pools of white, hazy light emanating from street-level drains lit the long tunnel. Sam pulled his gun and held it out in front of him with both hands. His right index finger wrapped tight around the trigger. Cold water invaded his shoes. He felt his socks soak up the thick liquid. As he took in a breath, he tasted the shitty, dense air.
A thousand drip, drip, drips echoed throughout the tunnel. He heard the roar of cars, buses, and trucks as they passed by the drain openings. His eyesight slowly sharpened, and he could now make out the garbage that littered the tunnel; aluminum cans and bottles, discarded clothes, diapers, used condoms, a tricycle, feminine pads, candy wrappers, and rotting food were a small sampling of the human waste buried in this sea of shit.
He walked about seventy feet when the tunnel curved to the right.
Following the turn, he spotted a figure dart from the left side of the shaft and vanish into what appeared to be a connecting tunnel.
With his weapon held firmly out in front of him, Sam took off running.
As he approached the spot where he saw the figure, he stopped and concentrated on the sounds around him, trying to weed out the drip, drip, drip from possible footsteps.
The tunnel broke off into yet another dark tunnel. Sam could only imagine the maze that must make up this gigantic system. He reminded himself that Travis Taylor knew this shithole like the back of his hand.
He waited a few seconds and spun into the second tunnel.
This tunnel was shorter than the first, and he had to bend over a good two inches. Thin rays of light from manhole covers lit this new shaft. He could vaguely make out the distant sounds of footsteps splashing through puddles.
Not wanting to lose any ground between himself and Travis, Sam took off in a full sprint.
By the time he reached the fourth connecting tunnel, Sam heard the distance between them narrow. He had only seen Travis’ dark figure the one time, but he knew by the echoing sounds of Travis’ uneven footsteps that he was gaining ground.
He started to feel lightheaded and broke from his run into a jog, then stopped to catch his breath. His vision blurred. His head pounded, and he smelled the faint stench of propane gas. That’s what caused the headache, he thought. He desperately attempted to bring oxygen to his inflamed lungs. Beads of sweat dripped down his forehead and into his eyes, causing them to sting. He squeezed them shut and shook his head from side to side. He pulled the bottom of his white dress shirt out of his pants and wiped away the sweat from his face.
Then, he stilled, and lowered his gun to his side. An eerie silence overtook the tunnel.
Slowly, the sounds of footsteps made their way to his ears in a faint whisper. He squinted down the long tunnel that stretched out in front of him. A shadow took shape, and he caught his second glimpse of the dark figure as it ran through a bright pool of light forty yards ahead of him.
Sam took off in a full run.
A few seconds later, he was directly under that same bright light, and made a left into yet another tunnel.
Suddenly, the sounds of Travis’ irregular footsteps disappeared.
This tunnel was darker than the rest with only an occasional thin beam of white light bursting through every ten yards.
In the silence, Sam heard the beating of his heart. His eardrums throbbed to the boom, boom, boom of his ever-increasing blood pressure. He sensed Travis was close. His right hand shook, and it took both hands gripped around the gun to steady his aim. With his finger wrapped around the trigger, he took his first few steps down the dark tunnel.
Twenty feet in, he heard a faint scratching sound. Like sharp nails scratching against a concrete surface.
He quickened his pace, and as he rounded the turn, the strange noise grew louder.
It took Sam a few seconds to make out what was causing the sound. At first, he thought it was a raccoon, but as he drew closer, the sight of two large sewer rats became frighteningly clear. He had seen big rats in his day, but these fuckers were the King Kongs of the rat population. The scratching sound came from their long claws scraping away at a two-gallon can of stewed tomatoes.
Normally, when animals come face to face with a human visitor, they scamper off, but down here, Sam was the visitor, and these two creatures had no intention of running anywhere.
Sam came into the light, and both rats looked up. Sensing no danger, they turned back to their task at hand. They now stood directly in his path.
He advanced, and the larger of the two menacingly looked back up.
Sam wasn’t about to lose his prime suspect in a serial murder case because of an overgrown rodent. He took another step closer. The rat had been challenged and reared up on its hind legs.
Sam was astounded. The rat was nearly a foot tall, and probably weighed in at a solid five pounds. A staring contest ensued. Sam took another step forward, and the rat belted out a loud, guttural hissing sound. The horrible noise echoed throughout the tunnel, and Sam wisely took a step back.
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Travis knew he could lose the detective in the sewers. He knew he could escape, but that would only be a temporary solution.
As he played a game of cat-and-mouse with the detective, Travis forced himself to calm down, to “cool out,” as Kim would say. Maybe Sam Knight had not called in his location; the bastard had been alone in his house.
His thoughts started spiraling. Maybe Keith, that weird, body-pierced piece of shit at the A.I.F. store, had given up his address? Or perhaps this all had to do with Carl Tyler. The guy who was seeing Kim that night at the bar, the homosexual who had fallen to his death.
Kim said Sam Knight was a dirty cop. A troublemaker who wanted to destroy them. Maybe he had been friends with some of the evil scumbags Travis and Kim had justly murdered? It became more and more clear to Travis that the detective was working alone. If Travis could eliminate the sick fuck down here, maybe that would be the end of it.
