Rampage

by Roy A. Teel, Jr.

  John reached into his coat and pulled out the note from the Donaldson murder scene. He unfolded it, put it on the table in front of him, and read it out loud. “Once it begins, NO ONE WILL STOP IT!” Jim took a swig of his beer and said, “What do you think it means?” John took a drink of tonic water and said, “I think that it’s part of a much larger manifesto. This is more than just a one off killing of a bully.” “So you figure there will be more?” “Yeah…with a grand finale that’s going to try to take out as many people as possible.” Jim crinkled up his face and said, “What? Like a school massacre?”

  John shook his head. “No. Like a school rampage.” Jim took a bite of his sandwich and said with a mouth full of food as John’s sandwich showed up at the table, “Well, you have no fuckin’ way of knowing something like that, and if you start shooting off your mouth about a possible high school rampage and murder spree, you’re going to set a whole nation on high alert.”

  “And what’s wrong with that?” Jim started choking on his sandwich as he tried to respond. He grabbed his beer, and John was just about to rescue him when he put his hands in the air to signal he was okay and said, “Jesus fucking Christ, John. You don’t see the goddamn problem with that kind of outrageous statement? For Christ sake. In the past several years, school violence has been escalating on all levels and in all grades. You have society on edge. You can’t even start to talk about something so fuckin’ insane unless you have a hundred percent proof. And second, even if you have proof, you don’t take it to the media; you take care of it in house.”

  Now it was John with the strange look on his face. “Take care of it in house? What does that mean?” “It means that you do your police work, gather your evidence, and raid the home of the person or persons that you have evidence on, then release it to the media. Thwart the attacks.” “And if we miss it and it happens?” Jim took another beer from the bucket next to him and said, “It’s fuckin’ police work, John…you try…I try…that’s the best we can do. You start that kind of chatter in the media, and you’re not going to stop what you think might happen. You’re going to give a lot of unstable people new ideas, and the next thing you know you have a fuckin’ nationwide panic, and who knows…killing spree.”

  John took a bite of his sandwich, nodding his head. “You’re right. I’m going to have to go deep web and see if I can learn anything about this note and if there are connections.” Jim laughed and said, “Turn it over to your cyber crimes geeks and let them run with the note. It’s too fuckin’ cryptic. You put those words into a regular web browser, and you’re going to get a thousand hits. This is ultra deep web shit. Fuck, man, you will never find this. There is way too much of this shit out there in that arena. It’s like looking for a goddamn needle in a haystack.”

  The two men finished off their food and drinks, and Jim stood up and said, “Well, I’m going over to your place. It’s half past eleven, and Barbara is hammered for sure. I’ll pick her up, take her home, and maybe get lucky.” The two men thanked Javier, who waved at them from his barstool where he was reading the newspaper, as they walked out the door.

  It was half past one. Tim and Debbie had taken off in his car headed for Billy Stone’s house. He asked, “Are you sure that Rocky will come out for you?” “Yes…he has wanted to get in my pants for a lot of years…I’ve been playing him for about two weeks. That’s why Greta Harold and Beth Sanchez were trying to kick my ass yesterday. Greta has been dating Rocky, and when she found out that I made a play for him it pissed her off. She was even more pissed off when she learned that he wanted to fuck me!” Tim drove down Vanowen Avenue then turned left on Corbin Avenue and parked in an alley two houses down.

  “So, how are you going to do this?” he asked. “Billy is out of town.” Tim got an angry look on his face and said, “And you knew this and didn’t tell me? I wanted to kill two birds with one stone.” “I’m sorry. I just found out today. Billy left Rocky the keys, and, according to Rocky, told him to have fun. I told Rocky I would be at the house around two. I’m just going to walk up and knock on the front door.” “You’re not going to fuck him, right?”

  Debbie looked over at Tim and said, “That’s my business, Timmy…you and I are friends, but it ends there. We have played around, but you are not my boyfriend, and I’m not your girlfriend. We are friends with benefits, so don’t get weird on me now.” “How do you know it’s not a trap? That fucker could be in there with the rest of the guys and girls waiting to pounce you…then what?” She reached into the back seat of Tim’s car and pulled out two weapons that were on the floor, Smith and Wesson nine millimeter M&P Compact hand guns. She took a snub-nosed silencer and put it on the end of the barrel and looked at Tim and asked, “Is this right?” He nodded. She cocked the weapon, putting a bullet into the tube, and then popped out the clip. She put an extra bullet into the clip and said, “One in the tube and ten in the clip. If it’s a trap, the only ones getting hurt are Rocky and his friends.”

  “He’s my damn target, Deb!” Tim said angrily. “I have no intentions of using the gun on him. You wanted to know what I would do if it’s a trap…well, here is what I’m going to do. If it’s not, I will give him head and then ask him to take me for a walk, and you can drop him right here with your own gun.” She handed him his gun, which was the same as hers, and said, “You got most of this weaponry off the deep net, right?” Tim nodded.

  “Rocky is an asshole, unless you forgot the taunting this afternoon when his thug friends were kicking the shit out of you!” “I remember…just go get him…walk him into the alley, and I will take it from there.” Deb opened the car door, and Tim said, “Deb?” She leaned down into the car and had a generous amount of cleavage showing in the ambient light. “Try to get him to take a walk before you start fooling around. The guy’s an asshole, and I’ve heard that he’s a rough fucker with girls.” Deb laughed and said, “I’ve heard that, too. I’m half hoping it’s true. It will give me a reason to shoot his dick off.”

  She closed the car door, and he watched until she disappeared around the corner headed for Corbin and the front of the house. As soon as she was out of sight, he walked to the back of the house and jumped over the block wall into the backyard. There was a swimming pool and two sliding glass doors. The lights were on, and he could see two or three people moving around. He got closer and saw that Rocky indeed was not alone; Greta and Beth were with him, and they were all nude. The lights were low, and Tim was watching and heard low talking and then the doorbell ring. He saw another person head for the door; someone he didn’t recognize. The door opened, and Debbie stepped into the house. He heard Greta and Beth screaming her name as they got off the couch and two other people showed up from the other side of the room. And in a fraction of a second, he saw Debbie hit the floor and her clothes being ripped from her body.

  Chapter Three

  “I remember every FUCKING

  NIGHT IN MY NIGHTMARES!”

  It was half past three a.m., and Tim was sitting on the floor of Rocky’s living room with Debbie next to him, staring at six terrified faces. Tim had shot out the sliding glass door, and in the heat of running into the house allowed Debbie to get her weapon before any of the others could get to it. Tim had ordered Rocky and his friends to sit on the floor where he could see their hands. Greta and Beth were softly sobbing…the man who had answered the door had a bullet wound to the neck but was conscious and bleeding on the carpet in front of the couch. The other two men were much older, and Tim didn’t know them.

  He pointed the gun at Rocky and asked, “So…who are your friends?” Rocky was quiet and in shock. He was just staring into Tim’s eyes. He pointed the gun at his head and asked, “Do you want me to put a bullet between your eyes? I asked you a fuckin’ question. Who are your goddamn friends?” Rocky whispered. “Um…the guy you shot is my cousin, Robbie, and the other two are friends of his. I don’t know their names.” Tim said, “You’re telling me t
hat you are in the living room getting fucked by these two sluts, and these three guys are just walking around the house, and you don’t know them?” Rocky slowly nodded.

  “So, it’s just a fuckin’ coincidence that you invited Debbie here tonight, and Greta and Beth were here as well as these three clowns?” “You killed Brian, didn’t you?” Rocky asked in a soft voice. “Nope…I had nothing to do with that. Brian had his own enemy who took care of him. I’m here to take care of you and Billy, but he’s gone I’m told.” Rocky nodded.

  Debbie had gotten her clothes back on and pointed the gun with a firm and steady grip at the two girls. Tim was cold and steady in his speech and said, “Do you see what happens when you push people, Rocky? Do you see what happens when you beat and torture people? They get pissed off and fed up and sooner or later they come after you.” Greta looked at him and said, “You fuckin’ nerd. You’re just too much of a pussy to fight like a man. You have to use a gun, you fuckin’ coward.”

  There was a quiet pop…and Greta’s head went back and then forward…a puff of blood and bone sprayed on the white curtains behind her, and she slumped over onto Beth who screamed. Tim looked on as Debbie said, “That’s what you get for planning to gang rape me, you bitch. Tim’s not the only one who’s been pushed too far.” Tim stood up and ordered the other three men to face the wall on their knees. Debbie ordered Rocky over to a chair in the corner of the living room, and Tim said, “So, this is your cousin and his friends. I bet they have long rap sheets and that this would not be their first rape party.” Tim didn’t hesitate. He pulled the trigger on his weapon three quick times, shooting each man in the back of the head.

  Rocky started screaming, and Debbie hit him upside his head with the butt of her gun and said, “Shut up, you little bitch. You can dish it out, but you can’t take it?” Rocky kept screaming, “Jesus, Jesus…what the fuck are you two doing? You killed people you didn’t even fuckin’ know. You’re out of your fuckin’ minds, man. You’re both out of your minds.” Tim walked over to the chair where Rocky was sitting and told him to spread his legs. He started whimpering and pleading, and Tim screamed, “SPREAD YOUR GODDAMN LEGS!” Rocky slowly spread his legs, and his cock was shriveled and laying on the seat cushion. Tim laughed and said, “And you’ve been calling me skinny dick all of these years? Do you remember what you did to me five years ago at Boy Scout camp?”

  Debbie looked at Tim with a strange look on her face. “DO YOU REMEMBER?” Tim screamed. “Dude, it was just a hazing, that’s all…it was your first sleepover with the scouts. We were just kidding around.” “Kidding around…you, Brian, Billy, and Johnny were just kidding around when you stripped me nude and fucked me up the ass all night? That was kidding around? You were kidding around when you held a knife to my throat while you and the guys fucked me one after the other, and you kept telling me, ‘Make a sound, and I will cut your throat, mother fucker. If you ever tell anyone about this, I will kill you.’

  “Do you remember? I remember. I remember every FUCKING NIGHT IN MY NIGHTMARES! You were the last one to do me as Brian held the knife, and the whole time you’re were raping me you kept telling me that you were going to kill me if I talked. You all told me that.” Tim pointed the gun at Rocky’s cock and shot him in the crotch, blowing his dick and balls off. Rocky howled in pain and fell back against the chair. Beth stared on in shock as Tim looked Rocky in the eye and said, “You will never tell anyone about this!” and shot him in the head. He said, “Let’s go,” and Debbie didn’t flinch. She just shot Beth at point blank range in the head and walked out the back door.

  LAPD was on scene at the Stone home at just after seven a.m. They had received a frantic phone call from the housekeeper that there were dead bodies. The large Hispanic woman was sitting off in a corner of the front room shaking and praying in Spanish as she rubbed a rosary.

  Jim pulled up on scene along with John. Both had received calls from Jade that they were needed. Jim got out of his car with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth and dressed in street clothes. He called out to John who was walking up to the house. “What the fuck, man…why are we here, and why does Jade want us here?” John shrugged and walked up to the front door with Jim behind him.

  Jade was talking to several CSI team members from LAPD and her office when the two men made their appearance. John went to say something but was drowned out by Jim, “What the fuck, Jade? Why the hell am I here at this hour of the morning?” John looked on, awaiting an answer. Jade walked over to the two men and said, “We have a hell of a mess here. Six dead, three shot execution style, two others shot at nearly point blank range, and one kid with his cock blown off and then his head.” John looked into the room and took a pair of latex gloves from her and started to walk the scene. The house was small, and the bodies of the victims crowded a small living room and eat-in kitchen area. He pulled out his tablet and began to process the scene, taking fingerprints of each victim and running them through the NCIC. He was surprised to get hits on all but one of them.

  Jim was walking the blood-soaked room and said, “Jesus…this was a slaughter.” John was standing with his tablet and putting rap sheets with the bodies. He called to Jim and Jade and said, “Pull out your tablets. I will send you over the IDs on these five.” John did a few tweaks and then sent over the files remotely. He had put the information into individual file folders, and Jim opened them one by one and shook his head as he looked at the information. “Fuck, John. These three over here have all been in and out of prison for everything from armed robbery to sexual assault.” He walked over to where the three men were huddled after their execution and pointed at two of them and said, “These two fuckers just got out of the joint. Home invasion gone wrong?”

  John shook his head and said, “Home invasion gone right.” Jim looked confused. “I don’t get it?” “This was a planned execution, and at least a few of these people were the targets. I think the bulk of those here just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I think the intended target was the Marick kid. The killers came upon the others while moving to take him out.” “Killers? How do you know we have multiple killers?” John laughed and said, “Take two seconds to look around, and you can see that there was more than one shooter. Whoever did this had a grudge against this Rocky kid. He’s the only one who was really brutalized; he had his junk shot off before he got a bullet to the head.”

  Jim looked around and asked, “Okay, Einstein, the Marick kid has a rap sheet but all prior to his turning eighteen, which means he just got a fresh slate three months ago when he turned eighteen. Someone has been holding a grudge.” Jade answered Jim with her back to him as she was looking over the bodies, “Oh yeah…someone had a real hard on for this Rocky kid. I agree with John. This was a planned attack. The others were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and now they’re dead. But…to be honest…based on these reports, outside of the two girls, the killers did society a favor. These guys were bad people who had done a lot of bad shit. Rape, robbery, kidnapping. The list goes on and on. It looks like the Eagle might have some competition.” Jade had said it half jokingly, and then her face dropped, and she said, “Or the Eagle is going to be hunting for his competition.” John said nothing for a long time and then pulled off his gloves and walked out the front door with Jade and Jim following.

  Jim asked, “What the fuck, John? It was a joke about the Eagle.” Jade looked at John and saw a sadness in his eyes that she had never seen before. She asked, “What’s going on, John? I’m sorry. I meant it as a joke. I didn’t mean anything by it.” John walked out into the front yard of the house and stood for a few seconds then said, “We have a very, very, very dangerous situation here…this is something that transcends the Eagle. We have a small group of young adults who are running on raw emotion. They think they are getting revenge or vengeance on people who have wronged them. They have no idea what they are doing.”

  Jim took a cigarette out of hi
s top left pocket, lit it, and asked while snapping his Zippo shut, “And you do?” John walked out to his truck with Jade and Jim behind him. Jade said, “You’re scaring me, John…what the hell do you see here that I’m missing?” Jim said nothing. He just took a deep drag off the cigarette, waiting for the response. John put his giant arms on top of his truck and looked at the two of them standing on the opposite side and said, “Hell is coming…this scene is directly related to the killing at Rosedo High School last night. There’s a small group of bullied kids that are planning to make the whole of society pay for the sins of the few.” Jim said, “You’re confusing me…are you saying that there’s a plot being hatched by some kid or kids to pull some type of school massacre?”

  John looked up at the house and said, “I think there are some kids who think they know what they are planning to do, but they haven’t locked on it yet. I think that the attack is in flux while they each deal with their attackers and those who brutalized them. They think they know what they’re planning, but those plans could easily get disrupted and even bigger and more terrifying situations could arise.” Jade asked, “Another school massacre?” John looked at Jim who was finishing up his cigarette and said, “There is something that has been boiling under the surface for a lot of years here, and it has finally begun to boil over. There will be more killings, and they will be one offs until the personal aspect of the killings is concluded, and then I think that the pathology of these killers will be fixed. They will no longer see humans. They will see cattle, and when that happens, depending on how intelligent our killers are, the situation is going to change from revenge to body counts…high body counts in the hopes of leaving a lasting impression for generations.”