Part 1: https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/1796yuq/a_serial_killer_is_copying_horror_movies/
Word gets out, especially in a town of less than 5,000 people. Yesterday morning, we held a small conference. We don’t have a dedicated conference room at the station. Whenever something big happens, which isn’t often, we hold conferences at Janice McCarthy’s inn. It’s the closest thing we have to a hotel. It has a dance hall for events. Mark and I had our wedding there, as did most of the people in the room.
Janice helped up set up the podium and snapped her fingers at Bob Nowicki, Mariana Castro, and the other young waiters that work at Anne Marie Jackson’s restaurant, which is part of the inn too. Janice and Anne Marie are best friends…and I’m stalling. My mind’s racing. The worst thing about being from a small town is that you know everyone and everyone knows you. You can’t hide, especially when you’re the sheriff and someone is murdered. Two people, which makes it even worse. Two young people, which makes it catastrophic.
When we were done setting up, Janice handed me the microphone and then stood next to me, in front of Jordan and a few of the other deputies. I shot her a look and she took a few steps the right of the podium, but she stayed up there throughout the whole thing. I hate that. She does it at the weddings too, hovers near the priest and the best man and the wedding planner, like just because she owns the place she’s gotta be a part of everything. I’m stalling again. Sorry.
“Yest-” I started, then everyone in the room cringed under at the sharp shriek of the speaker’s feedback. Janice snapped her fingers and her waiters fiddled with the thing.
“Do a mike check,” Janice said.
“One. Two. One.” I sounded like an idiot. I looked around the room. “Can everyone hear me?” They didn’t answer, but I could hear myself just fine so I kept going.
“Sorry about that,” I said. “Yesterday, we lost two of our own.” Cliché, I know. But I’m not a writer and not much of a public speaker either. I’m a cop. “Becca Campbell and Dylan Russell. There’s no easy way to talk about this, to say that two young, bright…two good kids were killed.”
There was a murmur of agreement in the crowd. Anger too. I noticed some of that anger was directed at me and the deputies around me.
“I know there’s been a lot of talk,” I continued. “Someone…” I turned around and looked at my deputies, then at the dozen or so members of our local paper. “Took pictures of the crime scene and shared them in a couple of group chats. Some of those pictures were posted online too. The police department’s own technology team has reached out to other authorities and has gotten a lot of those pictures down. Luckily, most of them had already been tagged and flagged and taken down by the platforms themselves.”
I swallowed, suddenly remembering that I shared the case myself, on this site. I reminded myself that I had done it in desperation, in the hope that maybe someone online could help me make sense of it. I have no doubt that, when this is all over, I’ll probably be let go for doing it. I’ll probably be run out of town. I think that’d be for the best.
“We haven’t had a murder in this town in close to twenty years and, back then, this social media stuff wasn’t an issue. I’d like to remind you that sharing details of an ongoing police investigation is a crime.” I wasn’t sure of that, actually. I’m not sure of it, even now. It’s probably bullshit, but I felt it gave me a little authority in the face of the online monster. “It’s obstruction of justice, but I’m not here to tell you not to share photos of the crime scene because you’ll get in trouble with the legal system. No. I’m here to tell you that sharing those photos is disgusting. I can’t stop small town gossip or morbid curiosity, but I will do everything in my power to stop people from gawking at two dead kids like they’re some kind of sick attraction.”
More murmurs. Some nervous glances, too.
“Please disregard any rumors. Don’t believe anything you hear unless it’s from me or a member of our law enforcement team. I’ll take a few questions today. Please remember to respect the privacy of the families involved.”
I answered a few questions as best I could. Whether we were considering this a homicide (yes). What time were the victims killed (we’re still waiting on word from the coroner, probably in a few hours). Where were the victims killed (same answer as before).
Luckily, no one asked me about horror movies. No one asked me about Scream. I think that only my daughter made the connection, and I don’t think she’d share it online. She wants to be a cop, like me. Wants to be in on the investigation. The more confidential, the better, as far as she’s concerned. Like being part of an exclusive club.
She told me as much a few hours later, at the station.
I gave her one of our awful coffees then put her in my office, then I walked into a conference room with Jordan.
“Sit,” I said.
Jordan sat down.
“I’ll only ask this once,” I said. “Did you take photos of the crime scene?”
“With the department’s camera,” Jordan said. “You told me to.”
“Not crime scene photos,” I said. “Cellphone photos.”
“No,” Jordan said.
“Do you know who did?”
Jordan shook his head, but he looked nervous. Pale. Guilty.
“Was there anyone hanging around the bodies, maybe you turned your back, or another deputy did.”
Jordan told me a few of the firemen did, some of the first responders.
I sighed.
It was my fault for not being there sooner.
“Do me a favor and keep an eye on my daughter. I’m going to see Paul Warren.”
“I should go with you,” Jordan said.
“What’d I just say?”
Jordan nodded.
Our town doesn’t have a morgue or a medical examiner, but there’s one the next town over. Paul Warren’s a local. Friend of the family. Friend of my father’s. He was like an uncle. I trust him.
When I walked into the room where Paul does the autopsies. I don’t know the name for it. It’s a smaller room. Cold. Smells awful, like chemicals and something dead underneath.
“Ana,” Paul said, mimicking the act of pulling me into a hug. He was wearing a full body coverall. Me too. His assistant had told me to it on before walking into the room. A hair net too. A mask. The whole nine yards.
I tried not to look at the two dead kids on the table.
“What should I know about…” I said, motioning to the bodies.
“The male victim—”
“You know it’s Dylan,” I said. “You can say Dylan.”
Paul smiled sadly.
“Dylan suffered multiple injuries to the cranial region. Examination revealed evidence of at least 12 separate strikes with what was most likely a metal object. It’s my opinion that these blows were done to render him unconscious, but the blows were so strong they actually shattered the cranium and caused severe intra cranial hemorrhage. The evidence points to the fact that he died from the blows to the head.”
“He didn’t die from the cut on his stomach?”
“No, the wounds on his stomach came after.”
“Wounds?” I asked. “It looks like one big slash to me.”
“His stomach was split horizontally, which took considerable effort. I found evidence of eighteen different cuts, in several different directions, some of them as high up as his sternum. Whoever did this wanted to disembowel him, but I don’t think they imagined how hard it’d be.”
“Not as easy as it looks in the movies,” I said.
Paul shot me a strange look.
“I guess not,” he said.
“She died before being disemboweled too. At least a dozen stab wounds to the chest, a few of them severed her aorta.”
“Anything else?” I asked, eager to change the subject.
“The phone in her hand,” Paul said.
“What about it?”
“It was super-glued to her palm. Post mortem. That’s strange, right?”
“Not if he wanted her to be found with the phone in her hand.”
“He staged her,” Paul said. “Theatrical.”
“Not theatrical,” I said. “Cinematic. Thank you, Paul.”
I was on my way back to town when I got the call.
Luckily, it was on my way, right on the edge of our town. There was nothing else lucky about this one.
There’s an old well on the Harrison’s farm. When I was a kid, we’d sneak onto the property and drop coins into it. Make wishes. I actually believe they’d come true. Kid shit. After we did it a couple of times, old man Harrison chased us off the farm with a shotgun in his hand. My father almost had a heart attack when I told him. I thought he’d be angry at me. Instead, he drove over and knocked Harrison on his ass, said if he ever took a gun out in front of his daughter or any of the kids in town they’d find his body in the well.
It was Harrison’s daughter who made the call. There was a girl reported missing two towns over. There was a conference, held by the police and her parents a few days ago. They asked people in the surrounding area to check creeks, holes, old fridges or washing machines on their properties. Wells, too. Harrison’s daughter looked out of her window and saw the well. She told us she was sure there’d be nothing in it. It was an old thing, anyway. They kept it covered with a heavy piece of wood because her own daughter had almost fallen into it once.
She went out and got one of the Miller boys to help her take the cover off.
That boy said Mrs. Harrison damn near fainted when she saw it, but she insisted on making the call anyway, because it was her property.
I got there just as Jordan and a couple of our other deputies were pulling up.
I made my way to the well, took my flashlight off my belt, and shone it down the length of moldy stones all the way to the bit of water at the bottom.
The girl was wearing a white dress with long sleeves. Her long, black hair was draped over her face. Her bare legs were bloated. Green and blue and gray. She had to have been there since she went missing. A couple of days, at least.
The girl’s name was Samantha.
“Sheriff,” the Miller boy said. “We found this in the well’s bucket. Damn thing almost fell into the well but I caught it just in time.” He smiled proudly at that.
He handed it to me.
A black box. No.
A black VHS tape.
I turned it over to check the label. Force of habit.
There was a white label on it, faded yellow.
On it were two words.
“Seven days.”
Part Three: https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/17b5ls3/a_serial_killer_is_copying_horror_movies_part_3/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf