The Serial Killers (Complete)

Kate04/05 N/A

It was the second time I had woken up in the cellar. My eyes peeled themselves open slowly, the dirt walls and naked bulb forming slowly. I rolled onto my stomach, waiting until the nausea passed before pushing up onto my knees. The chains on my wrists rattled obnoxiously.

I could finally see the entire room and I momentarily wished I was blind. There lying on a wooden table beneath a wall of saws and knives, was Alexander's disemboweled corpse.

There was nothing in my stomach, but that didn't stopped me from dry heaving. Each time a new wracking sob tore it's way out of my chest, my eyes would find a new macerated part of his body to study.

I am going to die down here.

My mother's face floated to the surface of my mind. I saw her soft brown eyes and her delicate pianist fingers. Thoughts of her purposeful walk and the youthful glimmer, that I inherited, slowed my pulse and cleared the clouds in my mind.

And like a godsend, I thought of a plan.

My side throbbed as I struggled to stand and with a cautious glance, I saw a bright purple bruise, blooming over my rib cage down to my thigh.

A wave of dizziness had me planting my hand on the table with Alexander's body. I averted my eyes, choosing instead to look for what I needed.

I shuffled across the floor, running my hand along the wall. Dirt came off behind my fingers, leaving a trail of loose rocks and moistened earth. The opposite wall, the one I had stared at for the first hours of my captivity grew steadily closer until my swimming vision cleared enough to make out the distinct shape of pictures tacked to the wall.

My feet stumbled into the table and I thought dimly how Raelyn would have cracked a joke about my klutziness. The pictures faded in and out of focus as I studied them, but one by one, the sickening polaroids branded themselves into my brain.

The first on what appeared to be a timeline, was of a young girl, maybe my age, perched on a wooden chair, curled in on herself. Behind her, the man in the tuxedo and burlap mask stood with a long knife pressed to her neck. He was less defined than the man who had kidnapped me and I knew he was young. The caption below the picture read: Matthew's first kill. 06/05/2000.

The next was a group of people standing together; four men and one woman lined up in a row. The woman was a beautiful, young and lean with bright green eyes and blonde hair, the color of gold. She wore a brilliant red dress smattered with burgundy. In fact, each person in the picture was coated in a fine spray of blood. The caption read: From left to right- Matthew, Claire, Daniel, Jericho and William. Post kill. My head felt like it was floating from its shoulders. Jerico, a murderer.

An overweight blonde haired boy was near the end, his watery blue eyes pleading as Matthew poured gasoline over his head. The barn fire wasn't an accident and it certainly didn't take both boys. 

The pictures just kept coming, each more gruesome than the last. Alexander's lacerated body was on the board, right next to the final picture on the timeline. It was me, hanging from the wooden beam. A hand was fisted in my hair so that you could see the blood oozing out of my temple and down to the base of my neck. I looked dead.

I dropped to my knees, an empty feeling creeping into my stomach. Darkness spotted my vision and I blinked to clear it away, I needed to stay conscious. I reached out a jerking hand to the right of the trophy board and latched onto the crude wooden table, clearly homemade.

The black trunk, which held all of Matthew's weapons, popped open easily, the lock having already been undone by his hasty departure. I thanked the Lord for his carelessness.

My hand bumped against rusted knives, instruments crusted with dried blood and lengths of rope. I shoved each aside, searching for what I was looking for. The pistol was long and heavy with a thick wooden handle and bulky metal barrel. The spinning chamber held six bullets, there were only two left. I held it to my chest, more tears coming to my eyes. Another dim thought occurred to me, I must be PMSing.

I slid so that I was hidden behind the black box, when Matthew returned, I would be ready.