Richard was troubled. He’d fallen into a dark place and, like a child stranded at the bottom of a well, knew not how to save himself. He clawed in vain at the walls of his prison and wept openly when he realized how utterly lost and desolate he was. Until moments ago, his soul had been, for the most part, smooth and clear. Like any man his age, there were a few blemishes. He consoled himself with the belief that no one could live a completely blemish-free life.

A lie to his father about who’d broken a window here. A neglected dinner appointment there. Over time, Richard had built up more than a few dark acts on the rap sheet of his conscience, but they were nothing compared with what had happened. In a moment of passion, he’d opened his palette to a darkness so consuming that he’d lost his sense of right and wrong. In a moment, his conscience was completely squelched by his thirst for vengeance.

He’d reached out and ended the life of another. He’d thought himself God and taken a life as his own. Even as the last flicker of life had begun to fade in the other, he’d tried to take it back. Just as Richard had willed the man dead, he tried to will him back to life. His memories flashed back to a childhood friend’s broken arm and how he’d tried to will it back to some semblance of whole.

“It’ll be OK. Just don’t tell your Mom.”

In the here and now he had done more than just harm another, though. He’d wholly and completely destroyed them. Consumed their body with fire and ended its ability to go on living. As a last act of selflessness he’d opened himself. Trying to take back the act and unwittingly opening his own body as a host for the other’s cast aside soul.

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IT wandered aimlessly down an alley, akin with the darkness and aimless in ITs tasks for the night. IT still didn’t fully understand not just what had happened, but what IT was at all. IT remembered standing above the one that had killed ITs wife, waiting to taste the sweet nectar of vengeance. Yet IT also remembered cowering in fear at the feat of the one whose wife IT had killed, dreading the biting sting of a husband’s wrath.

The two images were one and the same, yet so different they tore ITs mind in opposite directions. Thus IT had given in to ITs remaining urges and set upon ITs task with the bound woman on the palette. Yet before IT could finish, a tiny voice in ITs mind had taken control and dealt pity and mercy.

Again, an irreconcilable difference – murder and mercy. Both coming at once from ITs mind, yet battling with one another in execution.

IT tore at ITs head in frustration, wanting at once to silence the schismed voices in ITs mind while willing them to speak louder at the same time. Driving them to battle would result in one vanquishing the other, a more lasting peace of mind than if both merely silenced for a time.

The part of IT that was John reveled in ITs victory over the police. Somehow, IT had died yet escaped the icy grip of mortality to continue ITs game with the woman. IT didn’t care so much how, but IT was mildly curious why the world looked so different. As if looking out through a new set of eyes, taking in every sight anew.

The part of IT that was Richard writhed in agony over what IT had done. IT had murdered a woman IT had intended to protect and had consumed the being of a man so black in soul that ITs own was mortally tinted beyond recognition. IT knew exactly what had happened, understanding the events not through ITs own reasoning, but through the blessed curse of Akasha’s infinite knowledge. IT had reached out with a thought and bound John’s soul to ITs own, consuming his vessel with fire and forever removing his individuality.

IT became one with the one IT had destroyed, binding his soul to ITs vessel and intertwining their ties to the library. IT was stronger than before, able to summon visions and information from lifetimes distant to ITs own, but IT was weakened by the very nature of ITs new strength. IT had destroyed a human life and by that act become unworthy of the collective knowledge of humanity.

Akasha rejected ITs reach, but was powerless still to prevent it. IT knew all that IT willed to know, and IT knew the other was as yet unaware of this.

The part of IT that was John walked the earth as a human, displaced from his circumstances and given new life with which to wreak havoc on the world. The part of IT that was Richard was bound in its resolution to protect what little humanity remained in IT – knowing that to surrender to ITs duality of being would be to loose an unfathomable evil upon the world. Read the rest of this story »

Alan had more evidence than anyone had ever had in one of these cases. The forensics were astounding! They proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the victim was in fact Mary Drake. They were also able to match fingerprints found on the scene with the fingerprints taken from Rick’s wine glasses. The best he could put together, the man involved had been the primary butcher – the prints on the surgical instruments all belonged to him. The woman had helped hang the plastic sheeting and apparently had set up Mary’s restraints.

It was the most horrific crime scene the department had ever seen, so they called in help from the FBI field office, who flew in the agents that had investigated the other killings. They’d never found the actual crime scene before, but Alan quickly figured out why.

The building where they’d found Mary’s discarded corpse had been scheduled for demolition by implosion the week after her disappearance. From what he gathered from the contractors who were hired to perform the demolition, their team would never have had to enter that particular room. Their charges would have primarily been set around the perimeter of the building, depending on its weight to pulverize and destroy the interior.

After showing the foreman the location of the room where they’d found the body he was confident the scene was well planned. There would have been a large charge placed on the other side of the wall – Mary’s body and everything else in the room would likely have been vaporized in the explosion.

“That explains why they didn’t bother with gloves. The explosion would’ve covered everything up perfectly.”

He had started piecing together bits of information from the other disappearances. In each case, there was a building somewhere in town that had been imploded within the same week. Of the ten different cases they were aware of, four only had one implosion within a week. Of those, only two of the sites were still accessible. The Feds dispatched agents to sift through the rubble. It took a few days, but they managed to uncover fragments of human bone at each site.

The DNA matched the missing women. Read the rest of this story »