Shadowplay

Murder

The last sane thing Walter Junior remembered doing was receiving a call from one of the Congressmen he was tasked with protecting. His heart was racing as he had runup the stairs of the uncompleted building only thirty minutes ago, but now his heart was cold as he sat in a warm pool of crimson red blood. The harsh scent invaded his nostrils, causing him to wince slightly, but then he grew accustomed to it. No, he loved it!

There was a constant hammering ache at the back of his head, that ache came with an eerie voice that felt like a cold hand creeping up his spine.

“Don’t you just LOVE the smell of death, Walter!” The harsh voice bellowed, making him shut his eyes firmly.“You always have, the stench of blood, the look in their eyes as life slips away from the people you kill, you’ve always loved it, Walter!” A faint cackle trailed these words.

What the hell is going on? Walter wondered, his fingers twitching slightly as his eyes groped about the dimly lit room. To his left was an axe, its blade was covered in blood that dripped to the wooden floor and next to that bloody weapon, was a saw. Walter felt a tight grip on his heart as he gasped…whose tools were these and why were they covered in blood?

“Oh no, no, no, no, Walter! Don’t you get scared now…” The voice in his head drawled. There was a bitter feeling in his mouth, his gaze was blurry and the dimness of the room made it everything he saw appear ghostly. “Embrace it…this, this is you! Not that slimsy whackass detective who runs around hunting everyone down, ugh!” The voice snorted. “Disgusting!”

“A cold blooded murderer! That’s who you are…no, that’s who we are!”

Walter raked his fingers through his short, thick black hairand his nails scraped against his scalp. The ache was becoming unbearable and he let out a loud cry that reverberated through the room. “Shut up! Just shut up and let me think!”

Silence gripped the room.

His limbs failed him at first, but he managed to drag himself up to his feet, grunting painfully. Blood dripped from his clothes and he staggered slightly, almost crashing into a wall. He groaned slightly as something sharp pierced through his skin and when he turned around, he saw knives of different sizes and purposes hung on the wall. He squinted into the darkness and realized that all the walls were lined with different weapons, it was a butcher’s dream, but not Walter’s.

Where’s the congressman? The question flew into his head.

“What f*****g congressman?” Came the voice again, plunging Walter further into a state of confusion. “Look!” The voice commanded in a rasp voice. “Look over there!” Walter’s eyes travelled to a large, wooden table at the center of the room. “Doesn’t it look beautiful…” A cynical laughter erupted in his head, “Go have a look!”

Walter’s heart stopped for a second when he saw a severed arm on the ground. Behind the table, he saw the battered body of a woman, her throat had been slit open and blood trickled out from the cut. Her arms had been cut off and one of her legs, her tongue, bloated and purple, dropped out of her mouth. Walter’s eyes widened as a wave of shock ran through his body, shaking his spine.

“My wife!” He yelled and dropped to his knees beside her dead body. His shaky hands tried to hold up her head, but his grip wasn’t steady. It couldn’t be, for his fingers were cold and the blood that gathered around the base of her head like black molasses made his grip wet and slippery. “Oh God! How…what…why?!” He screamed, unable to gather his thoughts together.

A fierce rage boiled in his chest and his bloodshot eyes became teary. “No!” He screamed. “No!”

“No?” The voice in his head scoffed, “No? But you killed her! So, what is this display of false penitence! You killed her!”

“I did not!” Walter whimpered weakly, a pang of guilt hit him firmly like a juggernaut and suddenly, he found himself gasping for air. “My wife…I didn’t kill her…I didn-”

“You did, Walter…” The voice cooed. “This is what you’ve always wanted…she was never a good wife to you anyway! The s*x was bad! She never paid attention to you! And your child…are you sure the little girl is even yours?”

Walter froze instantly. Thoughts of his innocent baby girl raced through his mind. His wife had only been delivered of his beautiful daughter barely two months ago…and now…Something creepy pushed him to turn around and he slowly craned his head. His lips quivered, his daughter…lying next to her body was a hammer, bathed in blood and lying next to the hammer, was his daughter’s head.

Walter’s head was spinning again, and the room, which he had come to realize was a carpenter’s shop, grew darker. He tried to collect his thoughts, but the voice wouldn’t let him.

He had received a call from a congressman…

“You killed your wife!”

Then he had rushed to this location on the outskirts of the city, as he was told, to rescue the congressman who was about to get killed…

“You murdered your daughter!”

And when he had arrived, that was when the throbbing pain at the back of his head and a white light had flashed in his head…

“And you loved every second of it like the psychopath you are! The psychopath we are!”

The bitter taste was still in his mouth. He crawled over to where his precious daughter laid in bits, he couldn’t touch her head. He had done this? How? This was all the family he had…his wife was the only person in the world he trusted and he had…murdered her?

“Yes!”

“Shut up!” Walter’s deep bellow shook the tensed air in the room. “I didn’t kill them...I did? No! No! No! No!” His hands dug into his air madly, he screamed again, a shrill cry of pain. But suddenly, that scream transcended into a creepy, menacing laughter and his gaze became blurry again, this time with a gray cloud above his eyes. “Maybe I did! Maybe I did kill them! Maybe!”

“Yes…Walter...”

“Yes!” He concurred, then dropped to his knees as a shocking pain in his kneecap made him cry out with pain,“I’m so sorry! Please forgive me…” Tears ran down his cheeks uncontrollably and he crawled on his chest to his wife. “I’m begging you…please forgive me…forgive me for not being with you when you needed me the most, my darling. I’ll avenge whoever did this to you…” He placed his hand on her head as he rubbed his cheeks against hers, further smearing his face with blood. “I’m so sorry…my darling.”

Suddenly, a bright light from a powerful torch made him squint as his eyes burnt. He squinted and blocked his face with a bloody hand and when he looked up again, he saw dozens of shadowy figures running around him and slowly, he detached his hand from his wife’s hair. He rose to his knees, panting heavily while his bloodshot eyes darted around like a trapped animal.

“Freeze, Detective, Walter!” A deep voice boomed in his ears.

“Here we go…” The voice in his head trailed off slowly.

He squinted and noticed that it was a junior officer, one of the ones that worked in the station he normally operated him. The officer had a menacing grin on his face as the lights in the room were suddenly flicked on. The entire room was stained with blood and the police officers that surrounded him with their pistols pointing directly at him.He rose to his feet slowly, now irritated by plipping sound the blood that dripped from his body made when it fell to the ground.

The triumph in the junior officer’s eyes made Walter’s blood curdle as he came to the full realization of what was going on. The bitter taste in his mouth was familiar now, a mixture of cocaine, Hadol and another substance he couldn’t recognize yet. The full realization of his family’s death hit him and a line of blood dripped from his forehead and fell onto the bridge of his nose.

The officer grinned, “You have the right to remain silent, Detective Walter,” He shouted and made gestures at the other officers to close the circle around Walter. “You are under arrest for the murders of Ada Walter Junior and Priscilla Water Junior!”

“No…” Walter mumbled weakly as the officers jumped him, bringing him to the ground as they put cuffs around his wrists. “No! No!”

His shrill cries went unanswered. “I didn’t kill them…I swear…”