Tracking Evil, a Podcast Pt. 11

Authors note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Tracking Evil, A Podcast: Part 11

Recap:

Erica had made contact with an anonymous hacker, having to preform a strange sex show involving her reading from a Harry Potter book while partially dressed to secure his services. She set him the task of looking for any references to a person linked to spiders in the Alabama region. She had reason to suspect, based on Arlene's investigation, that this person might have a connection to the first of the murders in the file built up by the criminology professors of Rutwell College.

While she waited for any findings from that particular line of investigation, Sondra's boyfriend Destry turned up with orders from Sondra to take Erica out for some fun. The black woman felt her young friend needed a break from murder mysteries at least for a night. Destry took Erica to a club in Durham NC. While there Erica met an older man named Lawrence whom she ended up going home with. After a few hours of passionate fucking in Lawrence's 'man-cave', a small apartment above his garage, the two of them fell into an exhausted slumber.

A killer, eerily familiar with Erica, worked his way through Lawrence's home, past his sleeping wife and daughter. He entered the place where Erica and Lawrence lay sleeping, advancing on them both, knife at the ready.

Arlene and Sondra had dealt with Arlene's two rapists, Arlene executing the two brothers once she was satisfied they had no more information to share about the masked killer she referred to a 'The Hockey Fan'. Communicating with Erica, Arlene used the cell phone belonging to one of the men she had killed to contact the masked killer, offering up some bait that she hoped would draw him out.

Blowing off steam, Sondra and Arlene went to a bar, Sondra picking up a man for sex. Arlene through her own good intentions, ended up taking the man's grown son's Jared and Chance, back to her motel while Sondra and their father were engaged in vigorous sex. Chance then insinuated himself into Arlene's bed, eventually joined by his brother as the two men fucked the beautiful Deputy Sheriff.

Prologue - The Morning After "The mother of excess is not joy but joylessness" - Nietzsche

Sondra had staggered back to the motel room just before dawn broke. The sensuous black woman had let out a throaty chuckle when she had seen Arlene sandwiched between the two young black men, the three of them bone tired from a night of fucking. After the laughter had faded however, Sondra was quick to chase the young men out, everyone's needs had been sated that night except the need for sleep.

"So long boys, enjoy the walk home," she called as Chase and Jared had stumbled half dressed into the gloomy predawn morning, clutching the remainder of their clothes to their chests. Their bewilderment was understandable, they were fresh from enjoying the delights of Arlene's ripe mature body when Sondra had struck, heaving them bodily from the bed and propelling them to where they had discarded their clothes. A force of nature at these times, Sondra had brooked no argument or discussion, simply riding roughshod over their stammering protests.

"Slut," Sondra murmured to Arlene as she stretched out on her bed a minute later.

"Bitch," came the sleepy rejoinder from Arlene.

<<>>

The sun was high in the sky when the buzzing of a cell phone finally cut through Arlene's dreamless sleep, waking her even if it didn't rouse her.

"Wuzzat?" she demanded blearily.

"Mmmphhew," came a reply from Sondra.

"Whu? What did you say?" Arlene dug the heel of her hand in her eye socket, grinding it against the crusted sleep that lay there. "Sondra, what's buzzing? Turn it off."

Sondra raised her face up off the pillow that had muffled her first response. "Phone!" she spat out, head collapsing onto the pillow again.

"I know, I know it's a phone, turn it off," Arlene said irritably.

At that moment, mercifully, the buzzing stopped. Arlene turned towards the curtained window of the room, flinching slightly at the sunlight leaking through gaps in the bland coloured drapes. Last night had been exactly what she had needed, a balm to her wounded soul, but the way her body ached right now was taking some of the sweetness from the memory. The army brat heritage wouldn't let her sleep on now that she was awake, regardless of how shitty she was feeling.

With a burst of energy from some hidden reserve, Arlene managed to sit upright and even swing her legs over the side of the bed. She looked rank, her gaze swept down her front, dried cum flaking from her breasts, stomach, even crusting on her labia and thighs. The redhead gave a mental shudder when she considered how her face and hair might look, the urge to go look in the bathroom mirror fading at the prospect of how messed up she might appear.

"Shit girl, you look fucked up," Sondra said, her head still cushioned on the pillow but now turned to look at Arlene.

"You say the sweetest things, you know that?" Arlene levered herself up off the bed and took a few weaving steps to where Sondra lay, delivering a playful smack to her friends upturned ass. "I'm gonna grab a shower. Who was on the phone?"

Sondra winced, reaching out to pick her phone up from the floor where she'd dropped it the night before. She checked the call history and stifled a yawn before replying to Arlene.

"Destry, rang six times already. See, my Boo knows what I'm worth, been ringing to tell me he misses me."

"No doubt," Arlene answered, glancing at her own phone screen. There was a text from Erica showing as received late last night.

"Yeah, Erica texted as well, hope the two of them had fun at the club last night. Play times over, we need to get back to work."

"Mmmhmm," Sondra said distractedly, already calling Destry back as Arlene made her way to the bathroom to clean up.

"Hey Boo." Arlene could hear Sondra on the phone as the Deputy sheriff splashed water on her face, looking into the mirror at the dried cum on her cheeks and chin.

"Wait, wait, say that again!" Sondra's voice carried through the thin wall separating the bedroom from the bathroom. "Slow down, slow down. What do you mean you can't find her?"

An icicle of fear suddenly formed in Arlene's gut and she gripped the wash basin for support before calling out to Sondra, "Find who? Erica?"

"Destry says he aint seen her since late last night, she aint answering her phone."

Arlene moved fast, the tired sore muscles suffused now with adrenaline as she dashed back to where her own phone lay, punching in Erica's saved number and dialling it. It went straight to voice mail. She tried again, her eyes wide with worry and shock as she gazed over at Sondra, her expression telling the black woman all she needed to know.

"Destry, you had one job. Look after her. What the fuck happened?"

Erica's phone went to voice mail again. Arlene pawed the screen of the phone with trembling fingers, scrolling to the new message received. It was a jpeg file titled 2K93536. Opening the file Arlene saw it was a photo. She gave a shriek of despair, the phone falling from her hands.

Chapter One - Two days later "Patience is bitter but it's fruit is sweet" - Aristotle

The sniper shifted the weight of his prone body. His muscles ached with a low continuous throb having remained still for going on fourteen hours now. He allowed himself a tiny shift every ten minutes. Barely noticeable if you were standing above him staring down at him, from his place of concealment it was almost impossible to detect. Almost was the key word. He had learnt that the moment you assumed you were safe and in control was when things began to turn to shit. Things were already in the crapper and there was no room for any more mistakes. For the hundredth time he peered through the scope, checking there was no obstruction to his view, his finger curled slightly to depress the trigger and the weapon he held gave a satisfying click, working perfectly.

Trent had learned his trade in the army, his ability with weapons earning him a spot on the sniper's course. He had worked diligently at his new trade, impressing his instructors with his eagerness to learn and his natural ability both at shooting and having the patience and capacity to remain immobile for extended periods as he waited for the perfect shot.

As a child he had loved playing hide and seek with his friends and cousins near the derelict warehouses that backed onto the street they lived on. He would always win, squeezing his small frame into the most awkward of crooks and crevices and then remaining still and silent, outlasting everyone, outlasting the game itself. A number of times one or other of his parents were forced to wander through the silent skeletons of the old storehouses, calling his name out, telling him to quit playing and to get his ass home for dinner.

His elders had wondered how the young boy could find any entertainment in this strange behaviour, his mother worrying that it was a precursor to him becoming distant and withdrawn from his peers. The truth was that Trent had been happy in his own company, possessing a vivid imagination to keep himself entertained. As he grew older, he became more reflective, taking advantage of quiet moments like that to examine and review events of the day. As he waited for his quarry to appear, that was precisely what he did to stave off any boredom.

The last two days had been stressful to say the least. He and Lincoln had stayed close by after delivering Arlene's two attackers into her not so gentle care. They had expected a call, supposing that Arlene would want the bodies taken care of. When the call didn't come that first night they had relaxed somewhat, hoping that Arlene hadn't taken a step onto a dark road by killing her attackers. Then just before noon the next day a call had come from Arlene, a panicked sounding Arlene which was enough to scare both men, the Deputy sheriff they had both come to respect was normally so unflappable.

He and Lincoln had been in their vehicle in minutes, speeding to the motel address that Arlene had provided them. It took them twenty minutes and then they were rapping knuckles on the door, entering to the tensely spoken command.

Arlene and Sondra were dressed, if a little ragged looking, both women standing at opposite ends of the room and staring daggers at each other. Thankfully Lincoln had stepped forward to demand an explanation, Trent deciding that discretion was the better part of valour when it came to stepping into the middle of those two formidable women.

Arlene had brought them up to speed with precise, clipped sentences that reflected the worry in her voice. Erica and Destry had been at a club in Durham NC. At some point during the night, she had gone outside to make a phone call, to Arlene it seemed. After that, Destry hadn't seen her again. He had waited around till the club shut up for the night, hanging out then by his car for another hour and calling Erica every so often. Her phone at that point had rung for a while before going to messenger. Destry had tried calling Sondra but hadn't gotten through to her either. Sondra had looked a bit bashful at this point in the story but Trent didn't feel it was relevant and so remained quiet as Arlene continued.

Destry had driven around the area for a while, checking out any coffee shops that were open 24hrs a day. Around dawn he had tried her phone one last time, this time it went to messenger immediately suggesting it was turned off. At about the same time Arlene had received a picture from Erica's phone which she hadn't discovered till hours later. Arlene had then handed over her phone so that the two black men could see for themselves.

The picture had been taken in landscape, the flash had been turned off but the room it had been taken in was well lit. Erica was lying on a couch, naked at least from the waist up from the picture. To one side, almost out of shot was an older black male, also not wearing a top.

Erica's eyes were closed, her head lolling slightly to one side, her mouth slightly open. Her long brown hair had been butchered, long swathes of it cut free, the hairs scattered across her naked body. A knife's blade, the steel catching the light in the room, was in view as it was held poised at her throat.

Trent had handed the phone back to Arlene, wiping the palms of his hands against his pants legs as if he had touched something unclean, his hands soiled from the image on the phone.

"Is she alive?" Lincoln had been the one to voice the question.

"Yes," Sondra had snapped.

"We don't know," Arlene had replied on the heels of Sondra's terse reply. The redhead had held up a finger in warning to Sondra who clearly had wanted to say something more. Clearly the two women were at odds over this.

"What do you need?" Trent had asked softly, eager to help.

"We need to go," Sondra spat, "We've wasted too much time already!"

"It's a long way to Durham, taking five minutes to make the right decision is the smart play," Arlene answered without looking away from Trent and Lincoln.

Before talking further, Arlene had closed her eyes, taking a deep breath before starting over. She outlined two options for the men.

Option one was to load up and the four of them drive like hell to Durham, calling in all the favours they could to search for Erica. The way Sondra was nodding, her heels bouncing off the floor, she was clearly in favour of this option. It wouldn't have surprised Trent if the black woman had added the idea of slaughtering anyone hindering them. Both Lincoln and Trent had nodded at this option, they both considered Erica a friend and if there was chance she was alive then they were coming to get her.

Then Arlene outlined the second option. If Erica was alive or dead, the chances were that the person holding the knife in the photo was connected to the same organisation of killers that The Hockey Fan belonged to. Right now, they had an opportunity to lure him out, to get a lead on his identity. That might in turn help them to track down whoever had hurt or taken Erica.

"Smart, yes, I like it," Trent had murmured, Lincoln giving Arlene a sharp nod confirming his approval.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Sondra yelled. "Fuck this guy, we can go back for him, we need to get everyone we can searching Durham right now."

Arlene's face twitched, like she was biting back on an angry reply. Subtly she signalled to Trent and Lincoln to step outside for a moment. They did so, Trent closing the door to the motel room behind him but leaving it ajar by a sliver. He remained by the door, eavesdropping on the conversation withing.

"You need to stop blaming yourself," Arlene spoke calmly.

"Blame? Me? It's fucking Destry that fucked up. How could he leave her alone?" Sondra's reply was punctuated by the sound of her banging her fist against a wall in the room.

"Yeah, he left her alone. After you had asked him to take her out clubbing. But it wasn't your fault. It was the guy holding the knife who's to blame."

"Arlene, you need to stop talking. Right now! I fucking mean it. Stop talking and start fucking driving. You get me?"

Trent could hear Arlene's exasperated sigh. "Fine, load up the car, I'll tell the guys what to do. We leave in five minutes."

The sniper had then stepped away from the door before Arlene opened it. She had quickly filled the two men in on the plan to bait The Hockey Fan with a fake file of suspects. They would use the phone that Arlene had taken off one of her dead attackers to contact him and then lie in wait for his arrival.

Arlene had then joined Sondra in the car, Sondra driving off at speed, face fixed in determination. The two men had wasted no time, they sent a message to The Hockey Fan, arranging an out of the way spot for him to collect his file. The list of fake names provided by Erica before her disappearance were placed within a plain brown envelope and things were set.

Just before Trent had left to take overwatch on the drop off point, Arlene had reached out to Lincoln. They needed his help in Durham to track down Erica's movements, the bounty hunter being the best in the group at urban tracking. Trent was confident he could handle his role alone so Lincoln had left immediately to join the others.

Pulling his mind back to the present, Trent blinked morning dew free from his eyelashes. He resisted the urge to wipe a hand across his face, the agreed upon pickup time had arrived and his senses strained to perceive the approach of anyone to this remote location, either by vehicle or on foot.

The location was an abandoned farm, most of the building long reduced to just the footings, a few sparse bricks scattered here and there. Only an old pig stye, the walls made of poured concrete still remained fairly intact. The envelope was sitting on the one remaining pillar of the gateway into the stye, a smooth brick set on it to prevent it from blowing away.

Trent had taken up his position eighteen hours ago, confident that he would be in place before any preliminary scout checked out the location. If there was a counter sniper in place, he'd have had the advantage on him as well. Trent didn't know what this killer's capabilities or resources were so he was leaving nothing to chance. Now that The Hockey fan was due, the young black man was one hundred percent confident that there was nobody within three hundred yards of the meeting point.

The low rumble of an approaching vehicle caused him to tense up. His training kicked in and he mentally prepared himself, relaxing his muscles, evening out his breathing so that his aim wouldn't be impacted when the time came to pull the trigger.

An expensive looking BMW, black of course, pulled into what would have been the old farms main yard, slowly rolling to a halt. The windows of the car were tinted and Trent couldn't see who or how many occupants were inside. The engine continued to idle for another twenty seconds before it finally went silent, the driver killing the power.

The sniper swung his cross hairs to the driver's door and waited. Trent wished he was holding the stock of his.308 rifle at that moment but instead he was holding the powerful camera that Lincoln had provided him. 'Not a kill mission' he reminded himself. His task was to get a picture that they could use to find out the identity of the killer, knowledge being power. The driver's door opened and Trent began tapping the button of the camera with his trigger finger, taking digital image after image of the driver as he stepped into view.

The driver had a baseball cap pulled over his face, the brim of it almost touching his nose. Like a fox about to leave the protection of a hedgerow, he scanned about, head twisting left and right, almost sniffing at the air before he began stepping towards the fluttering brown envelope.

Trent kept shooting away, picture after picture, hoping to get enough details between them all. He felt sure this was the man who had arranged Arlene's punishment rape. Five feet six in height, slight build, walked with a slight limp on his right leg. Yep, this was the bastard. Trent itched to put down the camera and draw his handgun instead, but he didn't. Orders were orders.

The killer walked over to where the envelope lay trapped. Gingerly he picked up the brick, tossing it aside as he claimed the envelope. The killer didn't waste time opening it up, instead he folded it in half, stuffing it into an inside pocket of the leather jacket he wore. Then he swiftly turned on his heel and retreated to the car. Opening the driver's door, the man stepped it, pulling the cap free before he slammed the door shut.