Chapter One – Abby #2
Holy crap. I’ve seen this before. Well, not in person, but still. There’s no mistaking it. The way these two guys work, how quickly they do it, like they’ve done it before… because they have.
Only when Brock Hard is tied up does the second man retrieve something else from their bag: two saws.
The old-fashioned kind, the kind you need to put in some elbow grease if you want to cut anything up with them.
He hands one over to the first guy, and he keeps the second one to himself.
Then he pulls out two plastic aprons, which they cover themselves in.
Oh, my God.
Wait, no. Who am I kidding? God isn’t here. This is a bedroom full of killers and one very bad man who likes to drug women and take advantage of them.
Before they make their first cuts into Brock Hard’s body, I know who they are. I know who these guys are and I just can’t believe it. The news has it all wrong. D.D.K. isn’t a single man. No, it’s so much more than that.
The Downtown Dismemberer is a whole-ass team of serial killers.
The sounds of them sawing through flesh doesn’t get to me. How could it when I planned on doing the same thing to Brock Hard? Of course, I didn’t have chloroform or whatever it is they used to knock him out. I preferred the knife to the heart method, but to each his own.
I just can’t believe it. I really can’t. I’m speechless in that closet as they saw away at the man on the bed.
D.D.K. dismembers his victims—or their victims, I guess I should now say.
The main joints on the body: the shoulders, the elbows, the hands, where the neck attaches to the torso, the hip bone, the knees, and the ankles.
I always assumed taking people apart like that took a lot of time—and when you do it by yourself, it does.
It takes so much time. Like, a ridiculous amount.
But, as it turns out, when there are two people doing it from opposite sides, and those two people are strong, muscular men, it takes a hell of a lot less time.
They don’t do it for the screams. I assumed, like most other serial killers, D.D.K. killed to get off. It’s how most male serial killers work. The power, whether it’s carnal in nature or not. The repressed sexual tendencies. Obviously, a lot of things involving sex, in one way or another.
These guys? I don’t see any bulges in their pants. It’s like they’re simply men at work, doing the only job they know. Crazy as it is, it’s also kind of amazing. I have new respect for them, for the Downtown Dismemberer.
When you saw through a body that much, a lot of blood comes with it.
The bed soon becomes a gory, ugly mess of limbs and blood, a sight that would make many people turn away or vomit.
Not me. I can’t look away from the scene before me, and I hate that there are slats between us, blocking most of my view.
If only I was out there, watching from the front row, so to speak. These two guys, their work ethic… I can’t get enough.
Does that make me as crazy as they are? Probably. Do I care? Not one bit. As far as I’m concerned, this world needs more bloodthirsty women.
The two men are making quick work of Brock Hard, who is long dead by now, and just as I’m starting to think I might be able to sneak out of here when these two guys are long gone, I feel something brush against my eyebrow.
I assume it’s my hair or one of the shirts hanging in the closet, a stray sleeve or something, but even after I fix my hair and make sure there aren’t any clothes touching me, that feeling is still there.
And it’s moving.
It’s a slow tickle almost, and then I realize what it is: a freaking spider, the size of a quarter, at least. Just crawling over my forehead like it found a new playground.
I don’t know where the hell it came from or where the hell it thinks it’s going, but I immediately tense up and widen my eyes, momentarily forgetting about everything happening beyond the closet doors.
Oh, no. No, no, no. Me and spiders? Don’t mix. You’d think someone who can stomach a hell of a lot of blood and guts could handle spiders, but there’s something different about spiders that just gets to me. Freaks me out. The eight little legs, the fangs, the multiple eyes…
No. Fuck no.
I react without thinking. I’m not proud of it, and once it’s done I can’t take it back, hit the rewind button, and undo my mistake.
I squeal and lurch forward, busting myself out of the closet, along with said spider.
I land on my hands and knees and then I quickly brush my hands over my forehead and flick the spider off of me.
The spider lands a good two feet away, and I watch as the dastardly thing makes a mad dash toward the bed, where the shadows will hide it from the three currently alive people in the room.
Ah… crap.
Once I realize what I did, once it dawns on me that I’m no longer hidden in the closet, I lean back on my knees and am slow to lift my gaze to the two men on either side of the bed.
The one on the right holds nothing but a bloodied saw, while the one on the left holds onto the saw in one hand and a severed forearm in the other, blood dripping to the floor.
I stare at them. The two of them stare right back at me, and then they stare at each other.
Needless to say, there’s a whole lot of staring going on in that room at that exact moment.
The tension in the air is palpable—or, you know, I guess it could be all the blood.
There is a certain metallic twang there wasn’t before.
My mouth hangs open for a few seconds as I try to think of something to say. Something that would get these guys to not kill me. Anything, really. At this point I’m grasping at straws and I know it, but I can’t give it up just yet.
“Uh, hi,” I say, sounding a whole lot more awkward than I intend to.
“For the record, I didn’t see anything. I don’t see anything right now.
I’m—I’m blind, actually… and I have short-term memory loss, so…
” I wave a hand in the air. “I didn’t see anything, and if I did see a little something, then I’ll forget it in ten seconds, so, um, I’m just gonna go—”
Oh, God, I’m rambling, but I suppose if ever there’s a time to ramble, it’s now, when my literal life is at stake.
Hey, I might be a wannabe serial killer, but I’m not ready to die. No electric chair for me just yet.
The two masked men exchange glances again, and though I can’t see their faces, I can practically hear their thoughts. While they’re busy looking at each other and wordlessly asking what they should do, I’m slow in standing, still wearing that awkward as hell smile.
I step towards the door. “Have a lovely night, fellas. I hope I never see you again—which I won’t, ‘cause you know, blind.”
My heart pounds so fast it threatens to burst from my chest. I’m three steps away from making it to the door when the man on the right appears before me, blocking my route of escape. Still holding that knife, too.
I stop before him, gulping audibly. “Oh,” I ramble on, “hello there. Do I… do I know you? No, I don’t think I do. I have short-term memory loss. It’s a whole thing. There’s lots of movies about it, not very realistic ones but, uh, you know…”
The more I talk, the less I actually say, which isn’t good for me.
I stop myself from saying anything more as I crane my head back and meet the eyes of the man in the old hockey mask.
Seriously, it’s like the mask was taken out of a horror movie, all grungy and old-looking.
If I make it out of here, somehow, I’ll be seeing the mask in my nightmares.
Then again, I’d rather see that mask than what I see in my typical nightmare.
The eyes that stare back at me from beneath the mask are a vivid, bright blue, almost unnatural in their hue. And, God, the man is tall. A few inches over six feet, definitely. Muscular, too, which means he could easily overpower me here.
But from what I know about the D.D.K., he doesn’t kill women. Only men. Ironic that we’d go after the same man on the same night, but stranger things have happened.
Maybe. Definitely not to me, though. This is the strangest, most peculiar, most insane thing that’s ever happened to me. I might actually die here tonight.
I give the blood-covered, knife-wielding, mask-wearing man my most charming smile, which, granted, probably isn’t too charming right now as I feel like I want to puke, but that’s beside the point.
I still try. I grin up at him like a complete madwoman and give an awkward point to the door he currently blocks.
“If I could just, uh, squeeze through,” I say, but it’s clear the guy isn’t listening to me.
Oh, no. They’re not going to let me leave. Why would they? I saw too much. I know too much. Crap.
My luck is legendary, but not in a good way.