* * *
Alex and her mentor took the unconscious body of Edward Kipper down to the Combermere basement, and kept it under the sustained influence of sleep medication. His wrists and ankles were strapped onto a clean bed, his arm connected to an IV stand that steadily pumped sleep inducing drugs into his system.
“Why aren’t we killing him now?” asked Alex, who failed to see the logic behind her mentor’s decision. In what was meant to be a reply, he recited an old proverb.
“All good things come to those who wait.”
“But he’s right here,” said Alex, bemused over her mentor’s sense of logic.
When she was a young child, her parents would often teach her the value of patience. Not because our girl without a soul needed to be taught such a discipline, but because they wanted to tell her the things that normal parents would have told to their normal children.
All good things come to those who wait, was just one of the many words of wisdom they thought to share. And while their daughter failed to learn anything useful from the old adage, tonight, as her villainous, serial killing mentor mentioned these very words to her, Alex took from it one important message.
“You’re senile.”
“I am not senile,” he responded. “I am simply trying to express the fact that the experience gets better the longer you wait. You’ve already had your kill last night. To kill again right now would be too soon. It wouldn’t be as rewarding. By tomorrow, your appetite should return to its fullest. Until then, we leave him here to recover.”
“What do I do until then?”
“You can read a book. My library should keep you busy for a while. Or you can go to bed. It is late after all. And you have school tomorrow morning.”
“But I don’t feel like reading, or going to bed.”
“Dear child, you can wait a day until you kill.”
“I can, but-”
“And you will,” retorted her mentor, in a tone that suggested the conversation over. “Now, I am going to bed. Do with your time what you will, but leave the victim be until tomorrow.”