Living Darkly II

The assassin arrived on Atlantic Ave and walked the short distance to his hotel a little hole called the Sands Inn. He went directly to his room to his room, opened the rifle case and cleaned the weapon thoroughly. As his hands ran thru the well rehearsed routine his mind wandered.

After he had left the Army he had drifted without direction and purpose the only thing he was good at was killing and it had no place in this world at least so he thought. He could have returned to the war torn Middle East but the conflict disgusted him, Iran was a political excuse the government was using to obtain oil and pumped money into American companies that had ties to the Ex-President and Vice President, Afghanistan was a historic mistake with rebels fighting and living in caves over idiotic religious beliefs.

He ended up in Wichita Kansas working at a bar in the downtown area, he was there for several months when the local paper had picked up on a serial child molester/killer living somewhere in Wichita. Five children had been abducted and killed in fourteen months, the community was in an uproar. The police had no suspects at least not any they were releasing information on. The Chief of Police had broadcast a message asking for help from its citizens on the local news channel.

Out of curiosity he researched child molesters and serial behavior on the internet and at the local library. It took him very little time to understand that serial child predators had specific hunting grounds, Malls, Schools, Churches, playgrounds and any areas where children were at constantly even if parents were present the predator would be watchful and careful but still active. They also had a specific personality and past that would lead them into this behavior.

Now that his presence was know he would either move to a new hunting ground, like a new city close by or go into hibernation mode and it was likely that he had been active in other areas before coming here. As he examined the patterns of the abductions he saw a specific pattern to them they were happening in an ever expanding area from a community called West Gates. In fact they were almost linear, and his researched showed that this predator had been here for quite a while. Over the past ten years five other children has vanished and never been recovered but the abductions had occurred over a much longer period of time.

He began driving to West Gate and then he would park his car and run through its streets. He was looking for a specific type, male because males had a higher instance of molestation and killing, the average number of children abused by a child molester was fifty two in a lifetime. He was guessing based on the timeframe between killings that this predator was in his late thirty's maybe early forties. After several months he had identified six potential's.

Each lived alone, each was male, he learned there habits and routines, since he worked at night his days were free to observe. He quickly zeroed in on one Walter Johnson. He worked in a day care center for children only a few miles from his home. This was less than eight blocks from the first disappearance ten years before. Having Walter's name and address he quickly got a full background check on him. He then checked for missing children in cities the man had lived in before and got three hits.

He next hacked Walter's wireless internet connection, very easily done since he used WEP encryption which using tools like Backtrack could be compromised in minutes. He examined his PC from the street using a laptop. Walter had indeed been a very bad boy the pictures he found were graphic, detailed and disgusting.

Without even thinking Walter was now labeled as the "target", the process of elimination now began. Walter had ordered a puppy online recently, probably to be used as bait. The records on his PC showed that he had purchased three such puppies over the years. This was a way to get up close and personnel with the "target". A phone call to Puppy's Online revealed that he would get his dog Friday between 3:00pm and 5:00pm, perfect.

Walter was home early Friday because he was expecting a new puppy, his anticipation was almost overwhelming, he had identified a little girl only six years old who he had seen several times in nearby Andover that he was planning on capturing tomorrow. His obsession had grown lately and he knew the pressure was on because the police were warning people about him, he had not show the discipline he had in the past and he cursed himself for it.

The doorbell woke him from his musings, he looked thru the peephole and could see a man in a delivery uniform wearing a grey hat. He opened the door and a foot landed in his solar plexus so hard he vomited in the hallway. He was in such pain that he lay on the floor unable to even scream.

A quiet voice said. "Hello Walter we have much to discuss, don't we"?

The real delivery man found Walter an hour later or at least what was left of him. His head had been left on the front porch with his severed penis sticking out of his mouth. The police found all the evidence they needed to identify Walter as their serial molester and killer, someone had put all the evidence neatly around what was left of his mutilated body.