Hunter's Challenge

Hunter's Challenge part 1

Hunter's Challenge part 1
6:55 a.m. found Parson at his kitchen bar with a well crafted omelette, side dish of hash browns, coffee with enough creamer too be white, and the local newspaper on his tablet. He sipped coffee, read through the article, and toyed with a lock of long, pale hair. A frown line was pressed hard between green eyes that seemed to not understand what they read.
Another body had been found in an alley in the Germanic Quarter with tell-tale signs that it was related to the recent string of serial murders. From sternum to pelvis the bodies were split wide open with the ribs pulled apart like the gaping maw of a horrendous beast. The woman they'd found was a perfect match for the others, but for her gender. This was the only female. All others were male. All eight other bodies were male. Why was there suddenly a female?
The article speculated that maybe the killer was thrown off by her short hair and flat chest. She had been a bit on the slender masculine side, so it could have easily been a simple mistake. An unfortunate mistake. An unlikely mistake.
A serial killer simply didn't glory in mistakes. Especially not that way. If it were accidental the girl's body wouldn't have been treated in the same manner. Most likely her corpse would have been thrown in pieces throughout the city's ample supply of dumpsters. The killer would have never left such a mistake out in the open to be linked to the proper, well organized kills. The original killer was too much of a perfectionist. A screw up that big wouldn't be allowed with the perfect order already established.
No, Parson knew better. This was more of a message from a copy cat killer to the real one. Almost like a challenge. It was as if the copy were mocking how easily they could duplicate the original's style. As if it weren't a difficult process to hunt out a target, get them to the right spot, and, even more complicated, split open the torso. Those tasks were nowhere near simple.
Annoyed, Parson admitted defeat to his lost appetite. He packed the remaining 90% of his breakfast into little storage containers for lunch later.
Parson left the kitchen, moving to the large sun room across the back of the apartment that served as his home office. He sat at the long sturdy table that took the place of an average desk to start work for the day. Sitting in front of his monitor with instruments and recording equipment helped to ease his mind off the troubling article.
He  turned on his pre-set camera to film a daily vlog for his Youtube channel. Updating his subscribers on the progress he was making on his new album, letting them know how frustrated he was about his waning energy as melancholy settled in again was his personal therapy treatment. It always helped to tell others his issues and later read all the encouraging comments and stories that people told in relation to him. Those people were the support group he needed so badly in his life. They kept him grounded when he expected himself to implode.
“Thank you guys. Thank you. For everything,” Parson said with so much sincerity into the camera. “My fans are everything right in my life right now.”
Parson uploaded the vlog as-was without any editing as he always did. Vlogs never seemed to require manipulation like other videos. Maybe that was what was so cathartic about doing them. He could just push record and talk without ever needing to go over a script, never even reviewing what he'd said.
The open, relaxed feeling gained from the vlog followed Parson through the rest of his morning routine. The Mario fan song he was working on for his new retro-gaming album seemed to write itself across the screen without any outside input needed from him. By early that afternoon the song was complete, and Parson was incredibly pleased with the results. The first three songs he'd written for the album had been so difficult to get out, but this one was so smooth and simple. He wished every day of work could be so easy going.
Parson grabbed his tablet to brows Twitter for a few minutes when every ounce of perfection he'd experienced that morning dried up. Two more women had been discovered while he worked. Their short hair and boy-like appearances mimicked the first. The copycat had again broken open their torsos, pulled apart the rib cage, and left the bodies in the German Quarter.
Parson set the tablet safely aside. He tried to calm the tidal rage building only for it to make a surging rip current in his chest. More and more effort went into controlling such an internal storm, but it was for nothing. Every vein in Parson's body throbbed painfully, threatening to all burst at once.
Hands shaking, he gripped the edge of the desk in an attempt to hold onto reality even as it expanded away from him. Every color in the room inverted to neon hues. He pushed the keyboard and mouse further up towards the monitor, then slammed his face into the sturdy blue wood.
Blood sprayed from his twisted nose. Leaning his head back to face the ceiling caused the flow to seep into his eyes, changing the neon room to hazy, opaque red. Throbbing pain and flowing heat across his face was barely enough to distract himself from the over whelming emotions that had so completely consumed him just moments ago. It was just distracting enough for him to let the moment pass, counting his heart beats until he noticed the rhythm slowing. By the time he was counting his heartbeats in seconds his face was totally numb.
Parson knew he had badly broken his nose and needed to have it set. Blinded by the blood in his eyes, he groped his way to the bathroom where he carefully flushed his eyes. When he was once again able to see Parson inspected his poor nose. It was bent in the middle so that it pointed more to his left. He grabbed two bottles of bodywash, holding them on either side, and quickly shunted the snapped cartilage back into place.
Instantly the numbness was gone. For a few moments he was once again blinded, though this time it was from pain rather that blood. Parson gingerly cleaned the rest of his face and filled his still bleeding nose with gauze. His pale green eyes were already bruising.
He sighed heavily. Something would need to be done soon about that copy killer before Parson did real damage to himself.