Discoredia, page 15
A scream was rising in her throat, but the sight that greeted her stopped it in its tracks. Looking at her, with piercing blue eyes, was a young boy.
“I was not expecting anyone today,” said the boy whose face suggested he was, at most, a couple of years her senior.
“I thought this was hell. Don’t people die every day?” The question was cocky but the freshness of the youth’s face invited such bravado.
The boy grinned, showing a set of perfect white teeth. He raised the bones of his right hand, bones held together by some unseen force, and brushed his blond hair from his brow. An innocent gesture made sinister. Her bravado faded at once.
“Time is different here. Did the gentlemen outside tell you this was hell?”
“Yes.”
“It’s not. Not yet. This is the gateway. Hell is further on. And you should be neither there nor here. Which is very peculiar indeed.”
Shelly’s curiosity overrode the nature of her situation. “Who are you, Death?”
“No. The image of Death as a person is a false concept, generated for artistic purposes, and I? I just am. I have no name, though I have been given many. I keep watch down here and send most of whom I meet on their way. It is very rare for me to send anyone back.”
“Why am I here?” Perhaps she would finally get some answers. For a part skeleton, part teenage guardian of hell, the boy seemed quite chatty. And a little cute.
“So many questions. I chose this countenance to put you at ease, and see it has worked a charm. For most who visit me, I choose something a little more intimidating.” He brushed his hair back again before continuing. “Exactly why you are here, I cannot say, but since you are not due to come to hell, as that I would know, I can only assume hell has come to you. In your world. You must be wary, be vigilant. If one of hell’s generals is near enough for you to have slipped in, as they slipped out, then you, and those close to you, are in grave danger.”
The bravado was gone now. She was scared, a young girl being told she was in danger. And not just her, but those around her. Carmen? Her father? And hell’s generals? She doubted they would be as charming as the boy sitting in front of her, with his blue eyes and freckles. “What should I do?”
“Possibly nothing. I honestly do not know, for I am not privy to their dark and mischievous games. I am neither good nor evil, I just am. All I learn, I learn from those who pass by, and for those it is always too late. Those travelling the other way rarely deem it necessary to stop by for a chat. I suggest you take this as a warning; at least you are aware that they are near. Be careful child, you must be both strong, and in some way, blessed with a powerful gift to have made it here whilst still alive. Such power may be your savior, or may make you a target. I know not. Now go, you do not belong here. I have enjoyed making your acquaintance. I hope for your sake never to make it again.”
With that she was outside facing into the desert. Brightness, even though there was no sun to be seen, made her squint. It was hard to see, but from the snores to her right, she could tell that Baldy-man was asleep.
“You saved me from the demon’s blade, and I thank you.”
She blinked and there was the druid, the one from her previous dream. She’d had her fill of these strange characters and wanted to wake up. She wanted her Dad. Wake up, she thought. Wake up. Shouting did no good. She resigned herself to the fact that her dream was not over.
“Thou shalt awaken soon,” the druid, Etopey, was talking to her properly this time, rather than the telepathy of her previous dream. “First, let me thank you again. Thine intervention spared me from a nasty and untimely end.” He bowed as he spoke and his beard brushed the floor.
“It’s okay. Anytime. Can I wake up now?”
“In a moment. Did the watcher warn you?”
“The watcher? You mean the young boy?”
Etopey raised his eyebrows, clearly taken aback that the watcher had presented himself in such a way. “Young boy. An unusual shape for him to shift to, yet appropriate enough in the circumstances.”
He seemed to study her before continuing. “The demon whose plan thou didst foil had his revenge, but it appears he left his mark, and another picked up on the scent. It is your father who is in danger, he has sold his soul and it may be too late to win it back. The game is drawing to its inevitable conclusion. I wish I could help you but I cannot. I can merely wish you well. Thou may rest assured that thine presence here has been noted by both sides.” He waved his staff and at last, she awoke.
CHAPTER 23
Fifty miles to the northeast of Discoredia, Arthur George sat on a bench, completely unaware of the fact that if it hadn’t been for him, there would be no such club. His plain black baseball cap was pulled down as far as it would go to shadow his face. Should anyone glance toward him the only visible flesh on his six-foot plus, well built frame, would be the area between the tip of his nose and the square jut of his chin. Despite the cold, he felt warm, partly due to the thermal suit he was wearing, partly due to the growing excitement of the act he would soon be compelled to carry out. The adrenaline building within him was like a central heating system, starting to heat a previously cold house. The suit provided more than warmth; it was his shield, a second skin to prevent his own from giving him away. Oh no, no incriminating DNA to be left; that’s why his head was closely shaved. He couldn’t afford to lose a hair now; this was it, the end, the pinnacle, the climax. For three years he worked toward, and planned for, tonight. Three whole years before he could complete his masterpiece. The Painter was ready.
He looked down at his shoes. Plain black, a size too big, but filled out with extra socks and lead fishing weights in the toes to keep the balance right. That’d fool the cops if they tried tracing him from his footprints. He had all the angles covered. He’d been planning this for what seemed like an eternity. His jacket was reversible, black one side, beige the other, and fastened high up the neck. His black jeans were non-descript. His leather gloves, also black, were brand new, just out of the packet today, and were so comfortable he almost forgot he was wearing them. Shame they would be gone tomorrow, a pile of ash in the grate at home. Everything he was wearing, even his boxers, even his watch, the £1.99 digital he’d bought off the market, would go in the fire, like the clothes he’d worn on the prowl before. No evidence equals no conviction. Jury service had taught him that.
The Old Bill were bamboozled. He liked that word, and wondered where it originated; perhaps he would look it up when he got home. Well, after he’d taken care of business, no time to get sloppy and lose focus. Plod had eight unsolved murders on their books thanks to him, and not only was it going to stay that way but it would soon become nine. Nice number nine, a good number to end on. It was always like this, waiting, mind-racing, jumbled thoughts. A clear head would be better, focused, alert, but that would come. For now his mind could wander. Was everything covered? Surely. How to solve a crime: lesson one, establish motive. Well what if you can’t find one? What if it’s so obscure only one person knows it and isn’t going to tell? That was the simple beauty of Arthur Herbert George’s plan. It was so extreme no one would figure it out. To kill eight random innocents just to make the ninth victim look like one of a sequence, when really they were the only target. How many man hours were being wasted looking for a pattern, a link, a profile, that simply wasn’t there? Hundreds? Thousands? Perhaps he should give himself in and save the taxpayer a few pounds.
Eight murders, not a bad haul, exceeded Jack the Ripper, didn’t it? Each one, the same routine. Leave home in the dead of night, dressed to be virtually unnoticeable. Hang out in town until morning rush hour. Catch a train (pay for the ticket in cash of course) to somewhere he had never been before. Blend into the crowds, wander the streets, wait for dark. If nothing turned up, go home. It was a hunt after all, and happened at least four times, but if he spied his quarry, that weak member of society, that lonely individual lost from the herd and all alone, then he would strike. A cut throat, quick, easy, deadly; a pause to pour black paint over the victim’s face then run like the wind. Why the paint? The fuzz wondered that, but wasn’t it obvious? So they knew it was him, so they linked the victims, so they followed his trail, so they were thrown off the true scent by his decoys. Voodoo, satanic ritual, all the theories in the press and online were rubbish. It was a marker, simple as that. And hadn’t the paint given him a new name, a cool moniker to be remembered by? The Painter. He liked it, not as much as the Zodiac Killer he read about as a child in his Murderers’ Who’s Who, but he liked it. Liked it even more because the coppers didn’t. They didn’t want him glamorized, the nutters on the ’net felt differently, and the name was his.
The spread of his victims across the country meant that he had done four before the link was made, but that was fine. That would be when the peelers would have really started wasting their time and the taxpayers’ money. Trying to connect the victims, there wasn’t a connection, deduction––they were the random killings of a wandering psycho. Perhaps the work of a sociopathic vagrant, a mad tramp, or that old standby: the long distance truck driver. Elementary, my dear Watson; exactly what you were supposed to think. Random, motiveless, killings with tonight’s poor victim to add to the list. Another person in the wrong place at the wrong time, what a tragedy, what an oversight. This wasn’t random, it was as pre-meditated as they come, murder in the first, your honor.
And what if he was questioned as a suspect? What if they did check her past looking for those with grievances against her? After all, they may not be as incompetent as popular opinion suggested. Well, he was covered, wasn’t he? No alibi, he lived alone, but didn’t that mean no one could say he wasn’t at home either? How could you prove it either way?
“So what did you do all night Mr. George?”
“Well Officer, like many a lonely singleton, I watched TV.”
“What was on?”
“Well…?”
He would tell them, because he would know. How? The Samsung video in the living room was recording, and had been since the tape in the Sony upstairs ran out at 11 p.m. A full eight hours of TV, on tape, to be watched and then burnt. The final of World’s Strongest Man was the only thing he would actually have watched if at home, but what the hell, needs must, and it was recorded anyway.
“What if I said you’d taped it?” They may ask.
“Suppose I could have.”
He would have to agree but wouldn’t the argument provide the jury with doubt? Remember jurors; you may only give a guilty verdict if beyond reasonable doubt.
“What of the phone records for my mobile? I sent my brother a Happy New Year Text at 11:30, to get in before the networks got jammed, and can’t you work out where it was sent from? I’m sure I read somewhere that you could.”
Then again, best not be too cocky, act naïve.
“Phone records? From my mobile? How clever, I had no idea you could do that.”
And how could he have sent a text if he was forty miles from home waiting to cut open someone’s throat? Easy really, but who would think of it.
Step 1: Write a text and set phone alarm for time you want it to send.
Step 2: Attempt to send, but balance your phone on a ruler between two chairs with a tin can over it to block the signal.
Step 3: Leave phone (attached to charger just in case) to keep retrying to send while you go on your deadly business.
End result? Alarm goes off, phone vibrates, falls to the floor, free of the can, and gets a signal. SEND COMPLETE.
There you have it. Beautiful. Dispose of apparatus when you get home and let your network confirm the location of your phone if asked. Same set up at home every time, and he texted his brother a lot, not to keep in touch, of course, but to set the precedent. And if they suggested someone else could have used his phone? Well, that would be a result, nothing more than a blind alley heading for a dirty brick wall, Mr. Flatfoot old son, as an accomplice was something he didn’t have. His plan was meticulous. He often reflected how it would be interesting to put all his planning to the test, how satisfying it would be for him to witness the little piggy’s stumble across him, a real big bad wolf, only to be convinced that he was innocent through the methods he had devised and employed. Then again, maybe best not to tempt fate.
There she was, leaving the Golden Lion Public House. Probably aiming on getting to The Crown to see in the New Year. Bitch wouldn’t make it. Short brown hair and her best years well behind her. Mutton dressed as lamb, but cunning like a fox. Not as cunning as him, though; he would have the last word. Why had they listened to her? A bowed head, a crocodile tear, a short skirt and a low cut blouse. That’s why they listened to her over him, with his decade and a half of good service to the company.
The allegations were laughable. Stalking? Inappropriate touching? All lies, which had cost him the promotion he deserved. The promotion she took from him, leapfrogging from the position of his assistant to that of his superior in one easy bound. So much for gratitude. He should never have employed her, but she had so wanted the job to support her sick son. Bullshit. Lies upon lies. How could they have been taken in by her? If they were so convinced, why no disciplinary? Why no investigation? He had his theories: they’d seen him as a threat, wanted rid of him anyway, and hadn’t she become very close to the boss after her promotion? Was probably fucking him all along. At least the lack of official action meant no hard evidence of his “issues” with the slut. Just a quiet word to steer clear. But he HADN’T EVEN DONE ANYTHING! And then the cold shoulder for six months while she acted as if she didn’t have a care in the world. He’d been left with no option, forced to leave due to the injustice of it all, eating away at him like a cancer. Forced to move away never to return… until tonight. Fucking bitch.
He got up, size 11 footprints left in the mud (look Cunt-stubble, I’m only a 10!).
She’d taken his job, taken his friends, driven him out of his hometown. He ended up with a better job––well Mr. Policeman, I hold no grudge, all worked out for the best in the end––that wasn’t the fucking point.
He was close now, close enough to smell cheap perfume, close enough to take the carving knife from his coat, close enough to grab, slash, stab, slit, tear, enough. Roll her over, grab the bottle full of paint, and pour it over her makeup, a black death mask. Then run. Not easy in the wrong size shoes, but he was free, free to run, free to live.
* * *
The job was done. Just another “random” victim. His jacket was reversed, his cap sported a badge on the front, he was heading for the station, and the train home. Full of New Year’s revelers, he would blend into the crowd. Just a little fire to have, a mobile to check (MESSAGE SENT) and some TV to watch before stashing the video recorders back in the garage. Probably a spot of gardening, too. Sieve the ash from the grate, dig it into the garden, dispose of the buttons and zips somewhere quiet, maybe a drive to the coast, and toss them into the sea. After three years of purgatory, he could move on. Revenge is sweet.
For the first time ever, he felt sorry for his other eight victims, but hey, you can’t make an omelet without breaking some eggs. The prostitute down south was his first, useless smackhead. He’d done her a favor. Then the old dear ten miles away, sat in her garden reading a paperback, White Noise it had been called. Then there were the students: one blonde, one brunette, done eighty miles, but only two nights, apart. The bender in the public loo in Edinburgh four months later. The homeless kid in Liverpool. The paperboy in Barnsley. And what about his second victim, the one who looked at him at the wrong time? Strange how the old fellow he was following disappeared into the alley, but there she was, an easy target. To some extent he was sorry he killed her; her eyes pleaded for mercy, but she’d seen him by then.
She had lovely green eyes. He couldn’t remember her husband’s name; hers had been Elle, the millionaire’s wife. Something to do with raves and nightclubs. He wondered what her husband would be doing right now. Perhaps he could go clubbing next New Year’s Eve. He may even try one of the bloke’s clubs.
CHAPTER 24
The confused state of mind that accompanies those seconds between being asleep and fully awake clouded Shelly’s mind like a heavy fog. Had Etopey made her wake up, or had it been Carmen’s phone belting out Robbie Williams’ Angels? She didn’t know, and had no time to care. The door to her left was closed and she realized that Carmen had headed inside to speak to her boyfriend. Shelly knew it was him by the aforementioned ringtone. She had to warn her father, of what she didn’t know, but had to warn him anyway. Forewarned is forearmed had been one of her mother’s favorite sayings, one that was usually accompanied with a little wink, which she never really understood. The fact that she received no warning to save herself sent a pang of loss through Shelly’s body, but her mother was gone and she couldn’t bear to lose her father, too. She must warn him, and there was no time to waste.
Fully awake, she jumped down from the porch and began to run. Perhaps she should have spoken to Carmen, but there was no time for explanations, particularly ones that a sensible girl would rationalize as another nightmare. Halfway down the road, which led to the main road to the club, she noticed a track through the trees, which judging by the lights and noise emanating from Discoredia, would provide her with a quicker, route. She hesitated for a moment and decided to gamble; the road she was on linked to the main road but headed in the wrong direction for some distance. She felt that somewhere a clock was counting down, which she simply had to beat.
