Tortured Dreams

That night, I lay awake, tossing and turning. I had been pretty quiet after Alejandro had left. Nyleena had known something was bothering me, but hadn’t asked me what. I wasn’t sure I could explain it.

  It wasn’t the apartment or the weird job offer or the sudden move. It was that in my position, I would have access to my brother. I hadn’t seen him in ten years. He hadn’t wanted me to visit. I wasn’t on his approved visitor’s list. He couldn’t even get my mail.

  Now though, now I had complete access. He could turn me away once I got there, but not before. I wasn’t entirely sure what I thought of that. It bothered me in a way that I couldn’t explain.

  I was terrified at the thought of the new job; it was nothing like I had done before. Before, my life and work had always revolved around a college campus, for the first time, it didn’t.

  I tossed and turned as the digital clock next to the bed continued to count off the hours. I hadn’t slept the night before either. I didn’t feel exhausted, but I would by the afternoon. I was used to sleepless nights. With my stomach in knots, I finally gave up on sleep. It wouldn’t come now, no matter what I tried. Sleep had escaped me.

  Today though, I had something to do. A task. I had to get approved to carry a firearm.

  I had never owned a gun. I had never felt the need to own one. An argument could be made that I was exactly the sort of person that needed one, but not by me.

  I showered until I ran out of hot water. My skin had turned a dark red from the heat. I toweled off, got dressed and exited my apartment. I heard the bolts slide into place as I turned the key in the deadbolt to lock it. A small beep signaled that the alarm had been set as well.

  I waved to the two guys at the security desk. They smiled and nodded back. The doorman had changed, I was unfamiliar with him. He said good morning. I agreed with him and went to the garage.

  Once at the garage, I had to show my ID again. An attendant let me in. I found my parking space and my car.

  Darkness was still upon the city. For an hour or so, I drove around aimlessly. I may not have been born in Kansas City, but I had been here often as a kid and knew my way around. Eventually, I found my way to the address on the card.

  I knocked and showed my ID badge to the camera. Someone buzzed me in. A skinny guy with black hair and a goatee that was well trimmed met me at the door.

  He smiled and showed me to my office. He was the night security guard. No one else was in yet.

  My office was drab and sparse. A utility desk, a high-backed office chair, a laptop with docking station, an empty bookcase and a second, less comfortable looking chair was all it held. The night guard told me to make myself at home. He gave me a temporary password and told me to change it immediately or “The Geek” would be all over my ass.

  I did what I was told. I logged onto the laptop that appeared to be brand new. I changed my password to a long passphrase that was half Russian, half German and then stared out the window.

  At least it had a window. It looked out onto a field. The field was a wasteland. Tall weeds were fighting with prairie grass to see which would win the plot of land. Not a single tree could be seen. Dirt could though, in spots, particularly when the eye moved closer to the asphalt.

  “Around here, we give out nickels for your thoughts,” a new guy entered the office.

  My first impression was not a good one. He seemed out of place. His shirt had a Doctor Who reference that I got only because Nyleena was in love with Doctor Who. His glasses had tape on them. Not on the ear pieces, but a sliver of it on the lens. His hair was strawberry blonde and unkempt. His jeans were faded, but not showing their thread count. And he was wearing Doc Martin boots. I have nothing against Doc Martin’s. I happened to love mine, but they didn’t seem to fit with the surroundings.

  His hand had a nearly invisible stamp on it. Remnants of eyeliner could be seen where he hadn’t washed his face well before going to bed or coming to work. I didn’t know who he was.

  “Aislinn Cain,” I said, not standing up.

  “Michael Giovanni.” He came in and sat down in the chair across from the desk.

  “Ah, pleasure to meet you, you missed some eyeliner.” I handed him a tissue from the box on my desk. Since I didn’t normally keep things like tissues around, they seemed just as out of place as Michael Giovanni.

  “I know, it never washes off entirely. I need new eye-makeup remover or something.”

  “Rave?” I asked, pointing to the stamp.

  “Never too old to get down and party,” he smiled and it made him look older. Deep lines creased his face. Too many late nights and who knew what else.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m here to show you all the cool little toys that we’ve built.”

  “Ok,” I flipped the laptop around to him and scooted my chair out from behind the desk.

  “You’ve changed your password?”

  “Oh yeah,” I nodded.

  “Great, it isn’t some combination of your name, birthday and address is it?”

  “Give me some credit.” I rolled my eyes.

  “You’d be amazed what people do here,” he closed the lid. He opened it back up.

  For fifteen minutes, we sat with him trying to crack the password. When it didn’t happen, he smiled at me.

  “Ok, log on and we’ll be on our adventure.”

  I logged on.

  “The first program I’m going to show you is a database of all violent murders in the US that are unsolved. It has a fancy name; we just call it ‘Victims’ around here.”

  He opened a program that looked like a mix between FoxPro and something I had never seen before.

  “Every murder that goes unsolved for more than two months comes here. I enter the information and make it searchable. I’m hoping you’ll be able to help; the others are useless at it. So, say you are searching for murders that match our current serial killer. Type in something like ‘women’, ‘torture’ and ‘medieval’ in the query boxes and hit search.”

  A list of victims came up. I recognized a face here and there from the photos that had been shown to me. He double clicked on a name. Suddenly, I was being bombarded by information.

  There was at least 30 pictures and three pages of information on the victim and how they died. He had picked a victim that had been drawn and quartered. The pictures were pretty gruesome. I thought about looking away, but this was my job now.

  “Ok, as you can see, we have all her information right here. Autopsy photos, crime scene photos, information gathered about her, information from Xavier’s autopsy, etc.” He closed the screen.

  “Now let’s say, you don’t know if there’s a pattern or not. We’ll type in ‘men’, ’30-40’ and throat slashed.” He punched it all in.

  Three hits came up. I looked at them and frowned. They were all in KC.

  “We have ourselves a serial killer.” I answered.

  “Actually, thanks to this program, we’ve identified five serial killers currently active in Kansas City, Missouri or Kansas City, Kansas. It is part of the reason we are stationed here. Not only is it pretty centrally located, but Missouri has the highest serial killer per capita rate in the country. Even worse though, when you look at the number of serial killers in the state, it also ranks the highest. The only state even close to us is California, but they aren’t that close.”

  “Nice to know I live in a safe state.” I quipped.

  “Exactly,” he looked at me. “Think you understand the database?”

  “Got it.” I told him. I didn’t tell him that I had been working with computers for years and could use a query function and a database.

  “The next is the Serial Killers and Mass Murderers Database. It is a catalog of all captured serial killers and mass murderers. It includes their MO’s, stats, everything. The two can be used together, but it is very technical and we won’t get to it right now.
However, it is a good way to find copy-cats. Next to each offender are a couple of important things. This check box here means they talk to the police. This check box here means they are in The Fortress. If this one is checked, it’s a bad idea for women to talk to them. If this one is checked, it’s a bad idea for men to talk to them.”

  “Got it,” I told him and did a quick search. My brother came up. It called him “docile”, “cooperative” and “easy-going”. Strange words to use about a mass murderer.

  “He’s a mass murderer with a cause. Went after the man that killed half his family. When he finished with him, he started putting rounds into convicts that were in the yard.”

  “I know,” I told Michael. “He’s my brother.”

  “Oh, well then you should be familiar with the story. Any questions?”

  “Not really,” I looked at the screen.

  “Good because you have got a ton of things to learn today. This is just the beginning. I believe Alejandro wants to start training you on firearms. I’m going to teach you to enter victim profiles. Lucas is going to make you sit through a psych interview with a serial killer and Xavier is going to force you into an autopsy room. He even procured a cadaver for it.”

  “That sounds like a barrel of laughs,” I frowned at him. I wasn’t so sure about the autopsy thing. I might throw up.

  “Most of us threw up.” Lucas said, entering my office, suddenly it felt very small. I was betting he could read my mind by the look on his face.

  “Good to know,” I heard more feet enter the office. Alejandro loomed over us.

  “Ready for your first firearms lesson?” He turned and left.

  “He’s a man of few words,” Michael said.

  “I’m getting that.” I answered. I followed Alejandro out of the room. Michael and Lucas at my heels.

  Chapter 12