THE EMPATH

SPY(answers)

"Men, I thought you were going to leave me here to die or something. I was starving, plus I really had to go to the bathroom and all..." Oscar had started as soon as I took off the tape on his mouth. "Why didn't you try to free yourself? Are you in too much pain?" I was just realizing how inhumane it was to leave him all tied up. "I wanted to show you that you could totally trust me," I untied him and he was finally free to move around even though he was not in a position to do a lot of that. As time went by, I could feel anger and tension rising in him. Everything was coming back to him. "Those sons of bitches! I covered for them and followed them everywhere like a cute little puppy even though they treated me like trash. Yet, they never even thought twice before putting a bullet in my stomach, not to mention the one that could have been the death of me were it not for my little Phebe's medal. I am going to kill every last one of them," there was a depth to his words that got me shaking with a mixture of fear and excitement. The fact that he was furious meant that he would be willing to work with me without asking questions. I also feared that he was gonna spin out of control at some point. I had to tread carefully. I figured that if I took the lead, he would know that I wasn't just a guy with a good heart and he would wonder what I was doing outside that late in the night. In fact, I still wondered how he had not thought about asking so far. "Okay, whatever you decide to do, I will help you, but first, you need to tell me everything. Also, it would be better if you really thought about your next move," I said, sounding like I had no clue and that was when he decided to narrate the whole story.

"About two years ago, this cop, Eddy, was transferred to the station. At first, he was seemingly normal and no one bothered to follow up on his past, since he had made friends with everyone by the second week. He was the huge soft guy who brought us muffins and made the best jokes in the office. Everyone was convinced he was a good guy except for his then-new partner Judy. Three months down the line, she came to me saying there was something odd about Eddy, but I never listened to her. By then, Eddy had gotten us all working in the narcotics department, competing over who would bench more weight than who. All we cared about was our newly found training. Judy had been my friend ever since she joined the group seven months earlier and she used to come to me when she needed help. I had never turned her down before, but that time I did. Eddy had told us earlier that week that she had a crush on him and that she had actually tried to kiss him and that had got me thinking that Judy was only jealous that Eddy didn't seem to like her in that way. Either way, Judy was never the girl to let go. Once she had decided to do something, she would never stop until she had seen it all the way through. After I refused to help her dig into Eddy's past, she went on to do it by herself, and one evening three weeks later, she came by my desk and told me that she had found a break. She invited me for a drink that night so that she could tell me all about it.

That same evening, Eddy stopped by my desk as well and told me that he needed some help and he was willing to pay for it if need be. I was in need of some extra cash and so I agreed to do his reports, which got me stuck in the station for a couple of hours. By the time I got to the club where I had agreed to meet Judy, I was met by the forensics department carrying a body that I would later learn was Judy's. Apparently, a masked guy had entered the club, shot her in the head, and took off with a brown envelope that she had with her. Nobody seemed to have seen the guy all that well but they described him as tall and huge. When I got home that night, I thought about everything that had been going on within the five months that we had worked with Eddy and it all finally came back to me. Judy had been right all along and I could have saved her life if I had listened to her, but then it was too late. I was almost a hundred percent sure that Eddy was the masked killer, but I could not tell anyone until I had proof. Early the next morning, I went to the station where I started retracing Judy's steps. It was easy at first as I could easily find her computer's search history. She had been digging up files from Eddy's past for a while and I could tell that she had found something really big as she had deleted some of the entries.

There was also some evidence that she had printed some files that were hidden and I could not access them without her password. I, however, knew how to get her passwords as she had created a crossword game for me to solve if I ever needed to access her personal files. Solving it would have been a piece of cake but I had so much going on in my mind and I was too distracted. By the time I solved the puzzle, someone else had already accessed the computer and deleted everything. My search through the database gave back nothing and when I tried to dig up his files from my computer, all I got were heavily deducted files and those that were not deducted were classified. Only level five clearance personnel could access them and I knew no one with that level of clearance. I was left with only one way to go about finding the proof and that was to follow Eddy around. I had no idea back then that he and four other officers in the department had an illegal business going on and that following them down there was the biggest mistake I could ever make. Anyway, I followed them for a while but could never tell what it was that they were doing in the devil hours. I started feeling like I was getting nowhere at some point and I decided to break into the storage unit they had rented on the other side of town. There, I found dead bodies still in their coffins and they seemed to have been cut open and something stuffed in them before being sewn back. Against all my instincts, I opened one of them and there was a whole load of drugs and a money plate. Their files were still there and I took pictures of them for research purposes.

The next day at the station, I dug up about the three dead people and I found out that they were all newly signed members of some huge a*s medical d**g company owned by the mighty and the rich in the government. They had all signed up for d**g trials but as it had turned out, the company had more tasks for them than they had signed up for. Upon digging up further, I found out that their family members had been paid an insane amount of money to perform empty coffin burials. I even went out and dug one of the graves that night just to be sure and I was not at all surprised by the findings. There was something wrong with my plan though, the fact that there were cameras on all the grave sites and I was caught in one. One week later, Eddy and his boys showed up at my door and offered me a place in the group so long as I never walked out on the group without informing them first. The other option they gave me was a quick painless death for me and my daughter since she had seen their faces. I figured then that joining them was the best option as I could save my daughter and maybe I could even work on an exit strategy somewhere down the line. For the last two years, I have been following them around doing their dirty jobs. They made me launder their money, open up corpses and take out the drugs hidden in their stomach cavities and dispose of them later using chemicals such that none of them would ever be found. Despite all that, I only get two percent of the money, since they convinced me that letting me and my daughter breathe is pay enough for my services.

I agreed to work for them since I thought they were not hurting anyone alive. As days went by, their greed for money rose to the point that they were then willing to take out the competition. They started killing other d**g traffickers and money launderers and all the while, they were hiding behind their badges. Again, I convinced myself that the people they killed probably deserved it and that gave me the reason to keep going. I thought that if the five were satisfied with the money they were getting, they would probably stop all the killing. However, things only got worse. They graduated from killing other dealers to using their bodies to traffic drugs. It was no longer about taking out the competition anymore, it was about getting the most convenient means of transport for the drugs with minimal exposure. They had no need for middlemen anymore and that meant more money for them and fewer people who knew about the business. Sooner or later, someone had to discover what they were up to, and the d**g dealers grew more careful. They upped their security, got more police working for them and my boys had a shortage of bodies. They had a deal with the d**g company so that they were given more bodies than the company could afford. That was when Eddy started recruiting people with terminal illnesses to give up their bodies and, in exchange, he offered to give enough money to sustain their families for a really long time. Again, I convinced myself that it was all working for the best and so I kept on working for Eddy even though I was not comfortable.

I came to learn three months ago that the d**g company had been recruiting healthy people for d**g trials that were not even real, they would then kill them and use their bodies to traffic drugs. That was after I had grown suspicious over the impossibly many bodies that made their way to me in a week. As if that was not bad enough, Eddy has been deceiving sick people by telling them that he will pay them for their service, but all he has been paying is the first deposit. I became furious and told them that I was leaving. Eddy did not protest, in fact, he told me that he also was starting to think that they were walking down a dark path to which there was no return and that he was planning to dissolve the business. He, however, asked me to hold on as the contract was ending in three months. For the last three months, I have forced myself to work for them with the hope that they were finally going to let me go. I planned to quit the force and buy a piece of land in the countryside where my daughter and I would start a new life. I also haven't spent a penny from the money they have been paying me and I figured I would use it to do something good so that I could be able to forgive myself and move on. Yesterday was supposed to be the big day. The contract had ended and I was to take care of the final body shipment. My job, as usual, was to take out the drugs, get rid of the bodies, and walk home. I had taken my daughter to my dad's last week as I still feared that something could go wrong. The boys had no idea that he existed and it felt like a safe bet. I went to the building where the bodies were to be delivered earlier than them as usual so that I could be done by the time they got there. I was not expecting them for at least three hours but they showed up earlier. Junior came rushing in last claiming that someone had told the police about the place and that they were on the way. A debate as to who may have told on them commenced and, as expected, the conclusion was that it had to be me.

Before I could explain myself. Eddy had punched me a few times in the stomach and the five were leading me outside in a hostage situation. I expected to find police outside but then we walked out and it was just the six of us. Eddy had his g*n ready and complete with the silencer. They reminded me that there was an agreement that none of us could leave the group, not unless we all agreed on dissolving it and he explained to me that the others had not agreed. Next, I felt blood on my jacket and I knew I had been short. Eddy then went on to add one more to my stomach even though he had already aimed for my heart. Lucky for me, the first bullet had only scratched my chest since I had the medal my daughter had given me earlier that week for being the best cop she had ever known. As I lay there dying, the only thing I could think about was how I had made my daughter believe that I was one of the good guys while all I was, was a coward and a corrupt cop. I wished for a second chance so I could right my wrongs and live up to her expectations. That is the reason why I will stop at nothing until the five are dead." Oscar finished his story. I knew the whole story now and I was sure that Eddy deserved to die. The only thing that bothered me at that point, was whether I should let Oscar do it or whether I was supposed to do anything about it. He seemed determined and all, but I had a feeling that his anger was not going to be enough to get the job done. I was still going over it in my head when I noticed that Oscar was sweating and shaking at the same time. I could tell that his wound had been infected and I knew there was nothing I could have done about that. He needed a doctor and I was the only one who could get him to one. I had to drive him out of the city since I feared the boys had probably gone through every morgue in the city and realized he was not in any of them. I figured they would check the hospitals next.