2.2
Our Needler wears a mask. Of course he does.
One of those steel ones, moulded to the shape of the face, with wide slits for eyes. As I stare at the sketch, my eyes follow the bottom line of the steel, where it follows the curve of his cheek, then up and over the tip of the nose. It leaves his mouth bare, and while that should lend something- anything- to identify him by, it doesn't. Black smears across his lips and jaw, distorting anything identifiable, just like it hides what skin would be visible around his eyes through the slits. All that can be defined of his mouth is a straight line. The jawline is attractive, strong, and shaven.
That’s all we’ve got to go on. Not even a hair colour, since the mask sweeps back, a bit like a helmet, disappearing into the shadow of a deep hood. And as for stature, as Grant said, tall, broad-shouldered, good posture. Not exactly enough to issue a description to the public.
I rub my eyes. How long have I been staring at this picture? It’s somehow gotten late.
The sound of footsteps lifts my head. "There you are," Dirk steps up to my desk, his eyes dropping to the desk, the sketch. I spin it towards him.
Picking it up, Dirk tells me, “I went out with Dean to the cellar the Tartan killer described.”
"Anything?"
"Not really. It was set up for the kill, that’s for sure, all the way down to the pictures, and a saw. But nothing that looks like it might identify the Needler yet." With a sigh, he tosses the sketch back onto the desk. It doesn't help us either.
"Come on, neither of us were supposed to even work today…"
"I'm not tired," I lie.
“El, you’ve been at it for over twenty-four hours. Staring at a metal mask isn’t helping anybody. Let me drive you home.”
The drive is quiet except for the pattering rain, which is quickly building back up into another downpour. Dirk can tell my mood is low. “It’s a sketch," he points out to me. "It’s better than nothing. Which is what we had before.”
“You’re right.” I run my hands down my face. “He made a mistake. That’s something. Do you think he was ever in the glass factory? Where did the sand come from?”
“I don’t know. Look, it’s cordoned off now. Just stop thinking about this long enough to get some sleep, huh?”
***
When I get home, my housemate Olivia is in the kitchen, in a man’s shirt that only just reaches the bottom of her butt. She looks around the pantry door at the sound of my footsteps. "Jesus, when was the last time you slept?" Olivia’s large green eyes, almost too big for her slightly gaunt face, grow wide when they alight on me. She’s pretty in an acquired sort of way, with a small pert nose that looks from some angles suspiciously like it might not be the one she was born with.
"I could ask you the same thing," I say, eying her shirt. "Has Ryan been here all day?"
Letting the pantry door tap closed, a horde of snacks to take back to her bedroom bundled in her arms, she grins. "It's Andy, actually. And yes. We're marathoning."
I don't ask what they're marathoning.
"But hey, there's some spaghetti left in the fridge if you haven't had dinner. You feeling alright? You look wiped."
"Long day, that’s all." I force a smile. I've been Olivia's housemate for going on two years, ever since I replied to her ad in the paper. It seems she'd had trouble finding someone to take up the lease with her. I'm not sure why, as although we don't cross paths much, what with my work schedule and her retail job combined with what is apparently a bottomless pool of energy for going out, she's palatable enough to live with, clean, quiet…. most of the time.
"Okay, gotta get back," Olivia says, hugging her supplies to her chest as she scurries out of the kitchen. Her straight brown hair is mussed and messy from the back as I watch her go, and an inch of bright blond regrowth adds to the effect. At least her bedroom is on the opposite side of the apartment to mine, next to the kitchen while mine faces it across an open-plan living room. It’s a small place, with windows only at one end, facing a brick wall bare metres away from the fire escape, but it’s enough considering the amount that I’m home.
No sooner has Olivia's door closed than the sound of giggles and a sudden squeal comes through.
Sighing, I stare blankly at the contents of the fridge for another beat. I should eat and then sleep, I know that. I stare at the bowl of dry-looking spaghetti for another moment.
"Fuck it." I push the fridge door closed and reach up instead on my toes for the cupboard above the fridge. Supposedly, the stash is for emergencies. Not really in practice, though. I pull down the bottle of gin, telling myself it’s been a rough day.
What day isn't rough?
Ignore the question some self-preserving part of my brain tries to ask and take a swig straight from the bottle.
One hour later, or two, or four, I wake up to dead quiet. It's well past midnight. The sleep I've managed has been as fitful as any alcohol-induced slumber usually is, and I lie awake on my bed and stare at the small red light of the fire alarm flashing intermittently on my ceiling. I think it's telling me to change the battery. I close my eyes, my empty stomach churning, the room spinning softly, though not quite to the point where I want to vomit. It's almost pleasant, really, in that space of still-drunk where I don't yet feel bad about how I got here.
Sleep feels far away now, my limbs infused instead with the kind of jitteriness that insists on movement. I try to ignore it, to stay on top of the quilt, still fully clothed, and sink back into oblivion. It occurs to me there's still some gin left, but that would be a really bad idea. Work tomorrow. More studying the Needler.
Today niggles at me. He had a pattern, and that pattern was broken. His victim escaped. So, what now? Leaning, I snatch the small vial off my bedside table. Holding it in front of my face, I turn it, watching the fine grey-white sand slide around. I'd taken it to Rosie the day we found it at the Strangler’s death site.
"Definitely silica," she'd said. "It could be used in glass manufacturing."
"Could be?" I'd pressed.
"Seb knows more about these things—Seb?"
"G-glass manufacturing is one use of silica. But it’s use-used in l-l-lot-lots…. a lot."
"He's right. Aerospace, filtration, moulds, to name a few."
"But… it’s definitely not from a beach?" I'd asked. "Can we match it to the factory?"
Rosie looked to Seb on that one.
"W-with the factories defunct now, -no."
I blow air out through my mouth now, idly turning the vial over.
It could be nothing. Probably is. But without this, then what?
The jitters are getting to me. Thunder rolls close and loud enough to rattle the door in its frame.
Before I’ve had time to think through my impulse, or the alcohol still running strong in my system, or even the last bit of the bottle I knocked back on my way out the door, I'm behind the wheel of my car, headed for Crennick Row.
The media would have a field day with this if they knew. ‘ Drunk Detective’s Midnight Escapade!’
An hour later, and sobered slightly from the cold, my car heater now broken, I see it.
The old wastewater filtration plant, and the hastily erected, thin wall around it. Dirk mentioned it months ago, in one of his dour moods, probably. Something about the standing water not being able to be taken away. Because of the filtration. Filtration, another process that involves sand-silica.
I've turned the car off, and as I sit there in the dark, with the rain pattering heavily on the roof, I stare at that wall. Barely three meters high, thin and already crumbling in places, a deterrent more than any real security against kids who might fall into the vats and come out with something akin to radiation poisoning. Too many chemicals running into it since the explosion, with every rainy day increasing the load. The plant itself is huge, made up of five gigantic circular vats arranged around three main buildings like a star.
I check the glove compartment. My gun is in there. Would I still have gone in? Even without it? Probably.
I tuck it into the back of my jeans, my flashlight sticking awkwardly out of my jacket pocket as I duck out into the downpour and trot toward the wall. There's a pile of old crates stacked against it here, and balancing on those gives me the extra height I need to jump and reach the top of the wall. From there, I pull myself up with some effort and roll over into the somehow even darker side.
My hair is wet enough to cling to my forehead now, and I head away from this, the barren side of the wall, aiming for the shelter of the larger of the main buildings.
As I reach the door, I glance at the sky, dark with clouds, the soft glow on one horizon the only source of illumination- light pollution from the direction of Downtown in the south. No moon still. Realisation of its absence is the first thing to make me question what my goal has been since I left my apartment. I thought I'd sobered up enough. But maybe not.
The metal door creaks as I push it open, and in the harsh beam of my flashlight, I see a wide lower floor, pipes as wide as I am tall, running down the walls, then cornering up against the grated ceiling. My steps echo in the emptiness, reverberating off empty pipes. Reaching the other end of the room on slow, soft steps, ears perked to listen, I find a short corridor and stairs leading up.
That’s when my hair starts to stand on end, an uneasiness in my belly. I can't hear anything, and I haven't seen anything yet, but something in my subconscious tells me that once I go to that next floor, I won't be alone anymore.
My gun fits into my other hand. I take the steps slowly, imagining that my very breathing is making an echo, then imagining that what I’m hearing is someone else’s breathing. Along the outer wall of the stairwell, large windows let in some faint light. The rain has started to ease.
At the top, a grated walkway stretches ahead, separated from the floor below by a metal rail on the outer side. On the right, it branches off into offices. Those giant pipes continue to trace the other side of the walkway, and the roof is low enough that I could almost reach up and brush my fingers along the roughened surface. Old, dusty skylights magnify what little light is coming from the sky, lending eerie shadows to the place. The grate creeks loudly under my steps, making me still and hold my breath.
I’ve flicked my flashlight off before I even process that I’ve heard a noise. Waiting in stillness with only the reverberations of my heartbeat for company, waiting as my eyes adjust, is torturous. All I can do is picture what could be coming at me in the dark. The minute stretches out. Then, just as I was thinking, I imagined the noise too… I hear it again.
At first, I think it is an animal. But animals don't like Crennick Row any more than humans do. And then, when it comes again, a cut-short, muffled sound, it’s distinctly human. My heart rate picks up, jolting strong and fast in my chest. Slowly, I take another step.
If I thought I was sober before, I'm proved wrong by the abrupt clarity that comes to me now. I shouldn’t be here. Dirk is going to kill me. I’m already on thin ice as his partner. I can feel it sometimes in the way he looks at me when we’re talking about our case, about Needler. He wonders if it’s worth it, too, if Tregam isn’t better off without our efforts.
I should turn and run back out to my car. But my feet keep taking me forward. I see light ahead, off to the right, where the floor turns solid and widens out in front of double doors. At the corner, I see light around the edges of those metal doors, orange, like firelight.
The noise is more distinct now. A voice, high and broken, but indistinct, as though through cloth. It comes again, louder, almost a squeak. Then a gargle. Then there's another, this one clearer, too soft for me to make out from where I stand pressed to the corner, peeking around to my right at those doors.
Something scratches the cement floor to my left, almost at my elbow. I've spun back around, torch beam on and gun lifted in reflex.
A rat is caught and momentarily stunned in the beam of my light.
I sigh. Of course, rats will live anywhere. My imagination is getting carried away. The rat squeaks and then darts into the darkness through a slightly ajar door. As I step closer, away from the corner facing the double doors, I see it’s some kind of abandoned rec room. Something on an old fold-out table catches my eye, and I step in, my boot crunching on broken glass. A different rat disappears into a cupboard with the door hanging off.
Still unable to make out what’s on the table, I step closer, squinting. There's a bundle of grey cloth. And a picture frame, a pile of photographs. I'm reaching for them, registering the vague image of bare bodies in those pictures when I see the spikes. They're about the length of my forearm, and of a clean, shiny silver that stands out, reflecting light among the rust and dirt of this place. The spikes are narrow, never wider than my finger, the tips so sharp they could only be used without breaking by someone who's practised with…
Needles .
The scream makes me jump and take an unsteady step back, glass and something else snapping loudly under my heel. The sound takes longer to trail off this time. I spin for the door, hands shaking as I raise my torch and gun.
The Needler. He's here. And he's got someone right now, in that other room behind the closed doors. I turn back, snatching up the top photograph, shining my torch directly on it. The picture is of a death mask, plastered over the face of a dead teenage girl. The Masker, the killer we thought Needler would choose. I drop the photo. Breath coming fast, I lift my gun and step towards the hall.
I need to calm down. To listen.
I hear that muffled scream again, and nothing to cut it off.
There's no other voice, no Needler, not anymore. Which leaves the question… If he's not with his victim… where is he? My radio is in the car. I know I need to get to it, to call Dirk or anyone. I know I should never have come here alone in the first place. But by the time I get out, and back over the wall, Needler could be gone, and Masker could be dead.
I'm hyper-aware of every breath I take as I step out of the room and round the corner to face the short hall again. The screaming has dulled to whimpering. Slowly, I approach. The hair on the back of my neck prickles. He could be watching me, waiting, approaching in the dark. The urge to swing around, shining the beam of my torch into every shadow, is almost too strong to resist. But no, once you start doing that, reacting with panic, it only compounds. Then you lose what little defence you might have had.
Keeping my eyes and my aim on the doors, I move up to them, forcing slow caution in each step.
They don't sit perfectly flush, and through the gap, I can see light. Other shapes hide in the flickering orange glow, and I bring the gun down by my side, bringing my eye against the gap.
There, right in direct sight from the door, in the middle of a large room lined with defunct electric boxes and operating consoles on the walls, is the victim. He's naked, tied to a metal table. His face is streaked with white plaster that has smeared down his neck and chest. A brown cloth gags him. But he's alive enough to be writhing and making those muffled screaming noises.
Other small tables, chairs and anything else that offers a surface are arranged around him. On them are pictures. Victims of the Masker, their death masks white and painted in garish makeup. Which makes the man on the table, Masker, our mild Cocooner copycat.
I'm momentarily stunned, mesmerised by the ritualistic scene. I don't know what to do. If I save the Masker and try to bring him in, what’s stopping him from attacking me and escaping? Or the Needler from attacking both of us?
The Needler. My eye against the gap darts around, checking the sides of the room. But there's no one else in there.
The hair on the side of my neck tickles softly.
“Does this…” The darkness on the very edge of my peripherals takes shape. My breath freezes in my throat, my body at once glued to the spot and fighting the sharp primitive urge to run as fast as I can. If I run, he'll chase me.
“…seem like a nice place to be?” The words are spoken close by my ear, deep and tinny like they're coming through a helmet.
The indecision breaks. I pull sharply back from the door and swing around. My wrist jars as a strike sends the gun sliding across the floor. Behind me now, I’m distantly aware of the man on the table screaming through his gag, having heard the commotion and possible rescue. I still have the torch. My instincts tell me I’m going to end up like him, trussed to a table.
“Uh-uh,” the deep whir of the voice warns. I see him then, a line of yellow light glinting off the metal mask. His chin and jaw are clean-shaven, and black is smeared over his lips and chin like poorly applied lipstick, obscuring the shape of his mouth. His eyes are white glints within the mask and the black smudges around them too. Between the yellow light and the shadows, his eyes could be brown, green, or hazel.
It's not the warning lilt to his voice that stills me, but the slight prick below my breast. I look down at the narrow metal spike pressing to my shirt inside my jacket, the sharp tip catching on the fabric. He's standing close, towering over me and holding the angle of the spike low, directed to drive straight up into my heart. Staying still, I look back up. On his throat, a strap holds a small round disc to the side of his Adam’s apple- the source of his voice alteration. Otherwise, he wears dark clothes, long sleeves, pants, and boots. He’s big and lean. I can see how he overpowers them.
My heart pounds in my ears as I lift my gaze further, back up to that mask, but even now I’m still trying to memorise everything about him in case I somehow survive this idiotic drunken escapade. What the sketch didn't show is the way the mask is moulded, the shape of the brows drawn down, the cheekbones exaggerated as though mid-raucous laugh. His knuckles brush my stomach as he shifts, the tip stinging, and then his other hand holds out, expectantly. He wears shiny black gloves, a thin strip of skin visible between them and the cuff of his black sleeve.
I move just enough to slap the torch into his palm. Immediately, Needler spins it in his hand, and shines the light straight in my face, blinding me. I cringe and turn my face away.
“I know you,” the voice tells me.
Behind, through those doors, the screaming has turned back to whimpering.
“You’re the detective on my case.” His laugh through the voice alteration is like scraping metal. “Aren’t you incessant?”
Abruptly, he turns the torch off, leaving a halo on my vision.
“Eleanor, isn’t it?”
I don't answer.
“Well, El , you really shouldn’t have come.”
I blink, trying to follow his movement. There's pressure against my upper arm, through my jacket. Then the sting. “Wait…” I start to say.
He's stabbed me after all. But when I look down, it’s just a syringe sticking out of my arm. My body tries to panic, and my mind succeeds, but everywhere else there’s a slowness, instead. I’m falling. The last thing I see are those black hollows of eyes. The mask seems to be laughing now. He's lowering me to the ground as my limbs crumple, pushing me onto my side on the hard cement.
Then, the eyes, the mask, the Needler; they're all gone.
***