The Traveling Killer and Jason Smith

by S Jay Starring

  They met Piper, who was working. She immediately remembered Jason even though he was wearing thick glasses. She asked about the case and Kate took this role.

  Didn’t understand, where’s her ability of talking came from, both reasonably and above suspicion. No one doubt that she came from another parallel universe or the strange things that happened was unnatural. And it also be this way, when Kate talked to Bella West, they were obedient without asking a word.

  “See? Mr. Detective. They understand easily,” Kate said and smiled victoriously at Jason, who was sullen. Geez... now, she could speak well but silent when forced with Julia.

  “Detective Smith?” A young woman's voice greeted and Jason stopped bewilder. There shouldn't have anyone he knew say hello to him this time. Jason gradually turned to find the owner of the voice with paranoid.

  There was one of the witnesses, she was on the second compartment of the sky train when Bella West's body was found. The woman wore a white brimmed hat. “Well... Hello, you ...”

  “Isabel,” she replied with a smile.

  “Oh ... yes, Isabel, I should remember your name,” Jason replied embarrassingly.

  “Are you investigating the case?” Isabel asked.

  Jason nodded. “Yes. Yes. We ... investigating the case. Well, are you sure that you don't see any suspicious or strange things happened in the first compartment?”

  Isabel shook her head. “I'm sorry. I was on the phone so I didn't see anything, but a bright light,” she replied with guilty.

  “It’s fine, don’t feel guilty. We knew enough about what had happened. We think after this, there may be a kidnapping of women who look like those bodies. We’re trying to warn them,” Jason said and Kate elbowed on his rib to make him stop talking about the case.

  “Um... we can't tell you more. Thank you for your cooperation with the police,” Jason said, quickly ended the conversation and backed to work.

  “Well, well, well,... Looks like today, you are some kind of hot,” Kate said sarcastically after departing from Isabel. “Meet your underlings and beautiful woman,”

  Jason glowered at her. It was coincident to meet these people. If he hasn't traveled to another parallel universe with Kate that day, then today, he would have a normal life without having to disguise and didn’t have to avoid from anyone.

  “We should go back and make a plan, where to find the killer. Or which building is probably his hiding place, Kate. And one more thing I don't want to hide from anyone because of your stupid disguise stuff,” Jason replied sarcastically and took off his glasses and waved his hair back to be messy like the same.

  Kate made a sulky face before called Emma. And Emma wanted them to go back to the same building because it's easier to no one notice when they were traveling.

  “Want to get something from your universe, Jess?” Kate asked.

  This morning he had heard two agents talking about him and that made him upset all day, but the question from Kate was a wonderful thing he’d heard today.

  Jason wanted to go back to his rental apartment to get his clothes and necessities. But the problem was the apartment’s manager who could remember him.

  Kate must be the person who did it for him... “Well, well, I shouldn't ask you this, right?” Kate complained.

  Kate walked into Jason's apartment and waited for a moment when the manager was bent down to writing something. She quickly went to combine with the three to four teenagers who just walked in. Then took the elevator to the 3rd floor and walked to find Jason's room. Jason was on the phone to tell her the way.

  Room number 318 was only ten meters away from the fire exit door, but almost 40 meters away from the elevator. Kate used the key that Jason has given her to open the door. But suddenly she had to stop because of something inside.

  “Jess .... Your room is so stinky,” Kate said on the phone. Jason, who was waiting on the first floor near the fire exit outside the building laughed amusing. He couldn’t use the fire exit to go up because the door could only open from the inside.

  “Come on, I’m not here for almost a week, Kate. Probably the garbage. Can you just clean it?” Jason said. He made a warped face as if he could smell it.

  “Do I have to clean your room?” Kate complained frustratingly looked around the old 20 square meters room with a bed in the middle. She looked for a trash can; the cause of the foul smell that reeked all over the room. Finally, she found it in the area that should be called the kitchen because there was a sink, microwave and refrigerator were placed together.

  “Oh, Kate. I think the bread that I bought would be molded, you just drop it. And then the stuff in the refrigerator, sandwiches or pies you can also throw it away. I think it’s far from over I’ll back home,” Jason said.

  Kate took care of the garbage in his room, put rotten food in a garbage bag and closed it then quickly put it out of the room. At least the smell would be less. She planned to throw away the garbage bag when leaving the room. Then, she went inside to collect what Jason wanted.

  Kate opened his wardrobe and started picking up clothes; T-shirts, socks, boxers and piled it on the bed.

  “Are you sure these clothes have been cleaned?” Kate asked.

  “I have cleaned it, Kate. Just put a little detergent, it's almost run out. Why you’re so grumbling,” Jason replied via the phone speaker. “There’s a suitcase under the bed. You put the stuff in there. I could carry only one bag,” Jason continued.

  Kate made a tired face with his orders before bent down to pulled the suitcase under the bed and dusted, then put his clothes inside.

  “Can you take a soap and toothpaste in the basket? In your universe, it’s very expensive, and the shampoo near the shower, I haven't used it, yet,” Jason said. Kate rolled her eyes for his fussy.

  “Oh my... Kate, I saw Ted and Todd walking into the apartment. You have to hurry to get out. But you have to hurry to take ... um ... books in my bedside drawer before get out of my room,” Jason said.

  Kate hurriedly walked to take all things Jason wanted from the bathroom and ran out to open the bedside drawer, tried to speed up because Ted and Todd were coming and she has to hurry to get out of the room before they arrived.

  Why Ted and Todd came back? But the stuff in the drawer caused her to stun.

  “Jess.... I won't touch your porn books,” Kate said not satisfied.

  “Come on, just take it,” Jason said insisted. “At least just one,”

  “I don't want Ted and Todd catch me when I holding your porn book, it’s embarrassing,” Kate said in an angry voice.

  “Hurry, Kate take it, close the bag and get out,” Jason rushed and Kate quickly followed.

  She took a few porn books from the top put in the bag and closed. The zip was a bit stuck, but she finally closed and quickly ran out of the room as fast as her shoes could do. She closed the door very quietly.

  But she’d heard Ted and Todd walking around the corner of the corridor. She quickly turned back in the opposite direction, pretended to be only an owner of a room that had just arrived and walked toward her room at the end of the floor.

  She heard Ted was talking.

  “We should wait around here often. In case he comes back,” Ted said.

  “It was a week he disappeared. How could he vanish? I still confuse, that day, I thought I had closed all the entrances. And that woman she missing without a trace,” Todd said.

  They stunned a bit because they saw Kate was walking. She tried to walk normally to the fire exit door as quickly as possible.

  “Are you looking at her hips, Ted?” Todd whispered. “Be polite she may be the chief's neighbor,”

  “I think I remember her butt. She’s that woman,” Ted said.

  “Remember my butt?” Kate muttered and twisted her face, feeling both disgusting and unbelievable. Then she tried to speed up.

  “Excuse me, lady,” Ted said. And Kate stopped.

  “Wenkroy police investigating. Could you please put that ba
g down and turn to us slowly,” Todd said, but Kate didn’t do as he had asked. She stood still, it was only two meters to reach the fire exit door.

  Todd beckoned Ted to see the door of Jason's room. The garbage bags that Kate had put it there, which made them suspected. Because at noon they didn't see it.

  “Raise your hands up, lady, then turn to us,” Todd repeated, but she stood still, silent. Then she heard the sound of pulling guns out of the gun cases from the back.

  “Kate, Kate, Kate answer me. What happened?” Jason said to the phone anxiously. The phone line still on but Kate was silent since she got out of the room and Jason heard Ted and Todd’s voice. He hoped they wouldn’t suspect her or couldn’t remember her because of the glasses and bun hair.

  Bang!! Bang!! Bang!!

  A gunshot sound from the upper floor. Jason was pale and heart racing.

  Chapter 13

  Jason heard the gunshot sound from his apartment. His heart’s racing and he tried to open the fire exit door, using both hand and foot to open but nothing happened because it could open only from the inside.

  That’s the worst situation, he couldn’t enter from this door. He decided to enter from the main entrance in front of the building. Didn’t care who would see him.

  But then he heard someone running down the stairs. Maybe someone who was panic by the sound of gunshot, and then escaped. This time would allow him to go inside.

  But the person who opened the door was Kate. She pushed the door so hard and jumped out with his small suitcase almost bumped Jason.

  “Jess, run!!” Kate blurted out and Jason quickly took her to run for a taxi that was passing. They hurriedly got inside. Didn’t look back to see the fire exit door again whether someone following them.

  The non-driver white taxi took them out of the apartment for a while.

  “What happened? Kate, I heard gunshots,” Jason asked when he was sure that Ted and Todd didn’t chase them.

  “Ted and Todd found me. They tried to catch me and I shot at them too,” Kate replied.

  “Shot them? You use a sonic gun to shot them? They’re my man,” Jason said worriedly.

  Kate nodded. “I’m sorry, but they will be fine, Jess. Sonic gun just made them stop,” she said.

  “But ... maybe there was one shot that hit lower than Ted's belt. I don't have much time for aiming at them because they shot me, too,”

  “Lower than the belt? ... Oh my…sorry, Ted,” Jason felt hurt for Ted’s crotch. “Are you injured, Kate?”

  Kate shook her face, but Jason saw her eyes still panic and trembling. “I should go to take my own stuff,” Jason said.

  “I'm okay, Jess. Just a little bit of shock because of their guns ... It's ... very loud. The sonic gun doesn't sound like that. I’m just unfamiliar,” Kate said, rubbed her ear. “It was right I did that job, Jess. It's better than let them see you,”

  Jason made a thoughtful face looking at her frightening eyes. “But at least they won't shoot me, Kate,” he said.

  The taxi brought them to the tallest building in the city and they went up to the rooftop. Make sure that no one was on it. Kate then contacted Emma to open a wormhole to pick up them.

  When they returned to Emma's lab, it's time for Jason to do his own business with a sick bag. Kate rubbed his back automatically.

  “I think I want to sleep, now,” Jason moaned after attacked by wormhole-sickness.

  Kate gave him a cunning smiled. “You will spend your time to have fun with those books, right?” She whispered as she knew what he want to do.

  Jason was just silent, couldn’t argue anything. Looked like Kate was recovering from the panic and she could scathe him again.

  Kate took Jason to have dinner before led him to the room with the precious small suitcase.

  “Tomorrow, the same time. Good night, Jess,” Kate said before separated from him.

  “Are you sure you okay, Kate?” Jason asked for sure. “Well…hope you can sleep. When we encounter horrible things, we tend to sleepless. Today Ted and Todd might make you nervous,”

  Kate smiled at him and giggled. “I think we don't have a problem with sleeping, Jess. We just travel with wormhole,”

  “Oh ... yes ... you’re right, that‘s very tired,” Jason replied before closed the door and then took a shower.

  He thought his body became more familiar with traveling with wormhole because he wasn’t very tired like the first day. Today he could take a shower and then took the stuff out of the suitcase. Arranged everything in the closet and didn’t forget the books that Kate had risked her life for it.

  Jason thought in his mind, didn’t believe that Ted and Todd shot a gun at a woman.

  @@@@@@

  A few days passed, Jason still trained his body for familiar with traveling with wormhole many times. Ted told him that he had improved at almost 0.9%.

  Jason almost feeling happy that Kate shot sonic gun at his crotch, but realized that it was the other Ted, who didn't unfriendly with him.

  And every day after the training, Jason and Kate planned and searched for areas that the killer would hide and watched their victims from distant.

  “I think the areas of kidnapping that going to happen are probably like the pattern of previous triangles from other parallel universes. The hexagram is unlikely to be a coincidence,” Jason said.

  Kate nodded. “I agree, Jess. And I try to make a scene map with other parallel universes map that the crime happened. There are hexagrams, but it is something I have noticed. Those hexagrams have become more symmetrical. If we look at the map from the universe B09, both triangles still distorted but at B02, the triangle started to look more beautiful until at B13, which become a perfect equilateral triangle,”

  Jason looked at the pictures on Kate’s tablet thoughtfully. “Because of this, he dropped the corpse in the sky train’s compartment while it was running and stopped at Longtime Station. Because it is the spot that he wanted and could make the police confuse.

  “Look like he love to tease the police,” Kate joked.

  Jason snorted, feeling a bit amused. He was also a policeman who has been teased by the killer.

  “Yes. Besides, he’s also crazy about the hexagram and trying to express himself to those women that he’s superior and also scared them. A woman who found herself became a dead body probably felt like it was a bad sign like Harry the freezer rental manager at the harbor had said,”

  “They were probably frightened. If I were them in non-wormhole technology universe I may can’t sleep for months,” Kate said.

  “I think we can predict where the kidnapping will happen next time. But the important thing is to find out where he hiding. I wonder what his wormhole connector looks like, so he can easily go anywhere,” Jason said.

  Kate made a thoughtful face. “Yes, I will ask Emma or Ted. They may know this kind of tool in other parallel universes,”

  They went to Emma’s lab and found that Lily and Nora were preparing for travel to another parallel universe. They greeted each other, Lily and Nora blinked at Jason before disappeared in the wormhole.

  “Looks like you are Mr. Charming,” said Kate sarcastically.

  “Well…obviously, it's useless to stop me from flirting them, Kate. Looks like they like me,” Jason said proudly.

  “Are you going to take this young man to travel again? It's Friday afternoon and I hope you don't come back late,” Emma said.

  “No, Emma. We just want information about the wormhole connector. We think the killer might kill and kidnap the victims from the same universe of each group of women. It means he must have a carry wormhole connector that he could bring to everywhere,” Kate said.

  “The killer traveled to my parallel universe and dumped the dead bodies at three places. And he will kidnap the women there and kill them there too. It's easier to track and calculate traveling time. He can follow them until he knows the daily routine and waited for the time. After killing them he moved their bodies to another pa
rallel universe,” Jason explained.

  Kate nodded in agreement. “We still don’t know what his journey pattern is but we have the assumption that he started from here and went to B09, then B02, B04, B11 and B13,”

  “If we know what model of wormhole connector he uses, we should be able to know which universe he came from and we will know more about him,” Emma said.

  Jason and Kate nodded.

  “That’s clever. I'll find a brochure for you. A couple of months ago, a salesman from B01 brought a new model of wormhole connector brochures, but Prompt wasn’t interested. So I just kept it on my desk. Maybe I haven't thrown it away, yet…I think,” She made an unsure face. After looking for something in the desk drawer for a while.

  Jason and Kate tried to help, but they only found the powder case that Emma lost it two months ago and she was very happy to see it again.

  “There you are,” Ted cried out after came into Emma's lab. He looked a bit nervous.

  “What's wrong, Ted?” Kate asked.

  “I just watched the news from B13. The kidnapping’s happened,” Ted said.

  In that split second, Jason got a bad feeling. “Jessie Lee?” He asked quickly and Ted nodded.

  “Yes, Mr. Smith, it’s happened last night,” Ted told him with a serious voice.

  From the day that Bella West’s body was found at the sky train compartment until today, it’s only two weeks ago. Usually, the kidnapping would begin after one month, wouldn't it? What exactly happened? Why did he do it before the time?

  “He saw us go to see them,” Jason said. “He’s speeding up the process because he knew that we’re close to him,”

  “It’s because of us, they... get caught faster?” Kate said anxiously. This was something they wouldn’t expect.

  “How could you know the news, Ted?” Jason asked suspiciously, turned to look at Ted. This was a parallel universe B07 why did he know the news from B13?

  Ted shrugged. “I kept monitoring for important news in other parallel universes. In case something happens. You must not believe it, last week, the WHOLE Central Court has just erased the memories of a man from B14 who has strayed into B04. When he was sent back home, he told the story of the other parallel universe to everyone until the reporter met him for an interview,” He looked at Jason’s face.