by Jamal Shakur
The women answered in the affirmative, they both slip away to an adjoining room, and before long they were in a romantic embrace as if they were lifetime paramours. She pulled at his belt and proceeded to try and pulled down his zipper, he held down her head pushing it down for the inevitable pleasure that might prevail but his idea of pleasure and climax was quite different from hers, he took the unloosed belt and tied it around her neck as if it were a garrote and twisted the belt until she passed out. He let out a joyous sigh and laughed, damn it was a good feeling.
This whole affair was somewhat pleasurable but parochial; it was clean almost antiseptic but didn’t sit well with Sinclair the absence of blood wasn’t the ultimate demise he was looking for. Blood with its metallic smell and the afterbirth of confusion was what he was looking for and that would go unsatisfied until he marked in his book of death that type of similitude. Just fifteen minutes had passed and had he seen another mark, there she was and she was the splitting image of the detective Lomax deceased wife. He approached her but was flagged away as if he was some type of annoying fly. He was persistent and followed her to the ladies restroom, the same restroom where he had just gotten finished with his masterpiece of mayhem. He heard a bellicose scream and quickly ran in behind her placing his left hand around neck gripping her larynx and stopping her ability to make a sound. “You rebuffed me just a minute ago, but now you will beg for your life, and regret your negative appraisal of me.” He took out his long carved knife like weapon and began to cut and then chop her head off , the blood splattered to the ceiling and all over her body and his, it was delightful , just what he was looking for, the sublime masterpiece.
There is not to say any rest for the homicide detective, murder these days with the advent of social media expressly the internet has made serial killing fashionable and attractive, the vic is secondary and has become part of the dressing of the kill. I was about to find out true that was. I was down the other end of Center City just window shopping and enjoying the air but the air in this part of town is sometimes deceptive. My phone screams a sound of want and I answered like a fool. “Just in your near vicinity a major murder scene at the Convention Center,” the captain shouted at the top of lungs. I guess the new GPS system was kicking in, that’s the only reason he tracked me down. I was just one block up it felt like my heart started to race with a heavy beat, I started to jog lightly for the Center, I grabbed at my Glock not to shoot it but to make sure it was secure and didn’t fall out my holster. I entered the front, there was major pandemonium in the building, women and men in their upscale finery were nuts with fear. I was directed to the ladies bathroom in the back of the building in a dark hallway which wasn’t too smart of the architect who designed this building. I see a familiar face, its Omar. “I want you to gather yourself for what you are about to see,” he said. His statement very unusual for I thought I had seen everything. The first thing that struck me even before I seen the vic was the blood all over the floor and the ceiling and no sign of a body. The stall was opened and a body was displayed in the customary missionary position as the other bodies previously found. Taped to the wall was a supermarket flyer with the words two for one sale prominently displayed on the flyer? This was obviously a clue to tell us that he took one life and kidnapped the other. We canvassed the hall and interviewed some of the participants of the dating game. I was speaking with one woman who seemed to be more interested in me instead of answering my questions, “Did you see anything strange or noteworthy that you could tell me”. She raised her hand in a seductive flair playing with her hair and stared at me as if she was playing a flirting game and said, “I’ve been to a lot of these things before and this one particular guy just didn’t look like he belonged here. He had a sophisticated appearance and the type of vibe that he didn’t seemed like he would have a problem in the female procurement problem.”
“So that’s all you notice about this fellow.”
“It’s funny that you ask me that but a person like me has a natural curiosity, my friends call it being nosy, but I’m very observant a very attractive woman was going to the restroom and our very handsome man followed behind her, at the time I thought they were having a hookup in the restroom like so many of participants do as result of having a horny attack; hence, I wasn’t surprised at the occurrence.”
Yes her friends were right she is very nosy but helpful to my investigation, I left her in the hands of our sketch artist to give a picture of both the perp and the vic.
We got the drawings back the man was average and not the handsome lout as described by her or the rest of the participants of the event but the woman had a striking resemblance to my late wife Mia, was this intent to torture me. All the other vics were murdered and left where they dropped but this one was subdued and taken with him.
Ch 41
Our tech guy had noticed something strange about his files. It seemed that everything known about the homicide division was hacked from his system, all our personal data was compromised. I rushed down the dudgeon as some of us have nicknamed it. It was actually in the basement of the precinct and I guess no one frequented the place often, so many ominous titles and nicknames were given to it. But Karl Ranger the tech guy didn’t care; he was an introvert who preferred the company of machines instead of human companionship. “So what’s up Karl, what have you got for me,” I said with my most chipper voice that I could muster up handing him a cinnamon latté with sprinkles to break the ice. “ Damn , Lucky you’re the man after my own heart most guys come down here empty handed and demanding information but not you , you are a man among men.” That was the response I wanted, my Momma always taught me you can get anything you want with kindness.
“Now look I was doing a normal security scan of our system which I do at least once a month and discovered something that was disheartening, our whole system has been comprised and it’s not just your department but it’s the police department.”
“So this intrusion is coming from where.”
“It could be coming from anywhere, but my twenty five years as a tech guy leaves a feeling in my stomach tells me that this could be an inside job.” Karl had the opinion that the passwords and the tough inscription code was so tuff to be unraveled that in all probability it had to be one of us. We knew of only one informant and that was one of suspicion with no real proof. Some of the Intel was addresses phone numbers of homicides and our thoughts and directions for major crimes that we were investigating. But he had what he considered good news, “ It’s gonna take me maybe two or three days to track this sucker down , he’s binging all over the place , right now he’s leading us to the Philippines then to Hong Kong and now to the Soviet Union. But I plan to knock down all of those contrived trail and track him down to his true home.
We searched all aspects of the possibility of a mole within the precinct and I have to say it looked to me more and more feasible of being a correct assessment. The first penetrator that we had suspensions of was an FBI agent Yablonski but this was more close to home. And he would have to be implanted to my way of thinking possibly for years giving his superiors pertinent Intel and hence keeping us in the dark, this would hamper our investigation and keep the perp in the loop. We looked at the uncovering of the mole the same as we would look at a murder of a spouse. The first person you would question is the spouse to eliminate he or she as suspect and in our situation the person closest to the whole thing could be our tech guy, Karl. I started off the investigation by looking into his education and social life. He was a graduate of MIT and was valedictorian of his class. He often worked in the shadows and if you didn’t look closely at him you wouldn’t know that he was there. But one curious thing is that he worked for the CIA for a of number years, what he did for them wasn’t something that was known to us and because of a little thing called national security we couldn’t find out anything about his stint with the spook organization. I reached out to some agent friends that I knew who were in the field, needless to say I
could only talk to people who weren’t active in the profession anymore and that guy was Agent Tom Moose. Moose was the kind of guy you wouldn’t think of being an agent, he was head strong and independent, and this was his problem which got him immediately released from the agency after only two years of duty. “I see you were trying to get in contact with me, what’s up,” Tom answered with his famous lazy slurred speech.
“We have a mole and what your expertise in finding info about him, and oh he was an agent in the 70’s.”
“I called in a few favors and what little bit I’ve learned, your guy was a highly dangerous guy, he not only was a tech guy, he was also a mechanic for the agency.”
“I can’t believe that Karl was an assassin, he doesn’t look like he could hurt a fly,” I said.
“Hey, looks don’t mean shit, that’s what would make him an excellent agent the ability to fool you and blend right in.”
Karl Ranger was a marksman and made his bones during the Viet Nam war, earning him medals for bravery and five purple hearts. He was so good at what he did in the war that he trained some of the new recruits in the CIA. His job after his teaching career was to eliminate only special targets in the continental US and around the world. This whole thing was disheartening; the guy that thought I knew all these years was not the person I thought he was. And the person he waswas someone who was quite dangerous. His favorite tool was a snipers rifle, an M-40A1 but he was also proficient in knife fighting, hand to hand combat from which he received a 7th degree black belt in Okinawan Karate-Do - Shorin-Ryu which he studied in Okinawa in the 80’s, it was obvious to me now more so than ever that our mild mannered man of the dungeon was very dangerous. I had to be cautious of the next move that we would make because all we had were allegations about Karl. We would loosely follow him and try to find all the intelligence we need discreetly because a man of such expertise could kill and maim a lot of our men with ease.
Ch 42
May 27
Memorial Day
It was ninety degrees and perhaps the hottest Memorial Day ever. I had used this day to become reacquainted with the family. I had manned the grill and decided to barbeque up a storm and just fill my belly with as much beer and ribs as possible. This wasn’t unusual for most families but it was uncharacteristic for me for the last couple of years. Years of worry about their safety and the deaths of close love ones left me in paranoia which negated my attraction for the hoopla of a holiday cheer.
It appear like the day was going very smooth , perhaps the loonies and the murderers were taking a break and in their secret identities were burning the ribs on the grill and laughing with pleasure with their love ones, but only if one could hope for that type fantasy. But the reality of the whole thing is while we attempted to live and play a normal life the unsubs of the murderess path continued to plot and plan the most dastardly acts of mayhem known to man. I invited Omar and the rest of the squad to celebrate with me, Denise was the only other member to show up. She arrived in a hot pants ensemble that displayed an ample rear end and robust gorgeous legs, I couldn’t keep my eyes off her and she knew it. “I feel your eyes all over me but I have one thing to tell you get all your looky looks today because you might not ever see this outfit again after I burn it.”
I didn’t reply and only laughed and looked her up and down to feast in her beauty. She showed her real self at the cookout. Cookouts bring out the best in people all you have to do is throw a couple of ribs and potatoes salad on the plate and people would open up. I was happy and laughing but I notice Omar in the corner and he was making his customary smirk, which was saying something was up.
“I kept our boy Karl under surveillance and he is a very interesting guy,” he said. Did you know every Tuesday evening he trains a class in karate and he is very proficient? I didn’t know the guy did anything athletic and here he was jumping in the air throwing kicks and people into the air, very surprising.
Interesting indeed after that surprise we stepped up the surveillance on the big guy. According to one of my sources in the CIA, Karl sometimes in the middle of each month would come up missing. He wasn’t anywhere to be found in the continental US but in all probability was somewhere overseas. He worked for the government but sometimes he would freelance, in other words anyone who needed a hit completed he would be the man at the right price. My man informed me that Karl had racked up quite a resume and was considered the best at what he was doing, there was no one that he had any qualms of eliminating. Hence, our interest in him as a prime suspect increased, simply because of his mercenary objectives would make him good as the mole that we were searching for.
With all the info that was forthcoming about him, he kept up with his façade as the diligent tech guy and wholesome co worker, I went down in the basement a couple times and bought my customary gift offering of a tall latté but even he would become suspicious as to my motives seeing as though I only came down there once in a “blue moon” as they say. I found myself self consciously staring at him, he just didn’t look like the type no matter what my source said, but if it was true than he is a master spy because he is playing acting his part superbly.
He started a conversation with me as usual; the conversation was the quote unquote normal guy diatribe but mainly tech talk, the new discoveries of software and computer capabilities and hacking. Someone like him whose main thrust is a hit man and tech guy they both work hand in hand as a professional because they seem to be cold and mechanical machine like professions. While he thought he was perusing the network of the precinct without being observed, he was wrong in that assessment. We acquired help from one of the techies from Quantico to put him under surveillance cyberly.
I returned to my office cubicle the next morning, I had a visitor. There was young woman waiting for me she was a tall athletic blond who was provocatively dressed. “Hello detective Lomax, my name is Isabel Lang, I am the tech that you enlisted to watch over subject 1055,” she whispers. “ I’m sorry to act as if I was startled but when they said tech guy I was expecting a male but at any rate , it’s a new day and you’ve come a long way baby.” She stared and didn’t crack a smile; I don’t think she found my whole monologue to be amusing. “ Well that’s interesting and awkward at the same instance but , I have some thoughts on the case subject Karl Ranger , interesting he has set up interconnecting sites in fifteen foreign countries as if he is trying to hide something . We are presently trying to crack his password code.” He also has Cayman and Swiss accounts that have a sizable amount of activity. “You know without any hard evidence we can’t get a court order to look into anyone’s accounts no matter how active those accounts are.”
We were getting side tracked a lot of recourses was being utilized to watch one of our own men instead of the perps we hoped to arrest. But Isabella did give some bit of Intel that was very interesting a name she came up with that expressed over and over again in correspondence between the sect and someone at the police headquarters, the name was Albatross. Who are what did that mean was unknown to us at this time.
Ten years earlier
Karl Ranger was highly excited about his new gig of teaching the everyday citizen Okinawa Karate. The day to day relaying knowledge to agents and other law enforcement officers became trying and not in the top list of major motivation. There was eagerness and longing for the average person to learn the martial arts more than the agency could know. He became attached to one his students in the evening class that he was teaching; a person everyone knew simply as Sinclair. The gentleman he later found out was a doctor. Karl wasn’t a hard task master as a teacher but he did convey that he taught the martial arts for survival and not just for protection, in other words once you put yourself out there to utilize what you’ve learned you fight as if your life depended on it. Of all of his students Sinclair seemed like the only one to get it at least in class, if he did outside in the real world he didn’t know.
Sinclair often interjected himself in long conversations with Karl
, feeling him out to see how he felt about spiritual things. He was wide open to the thuggie belief an assassin religion for an assassin fit him perfectly. He was hired for some jobs by Sinclair and this was the start of his sojourn into the thuggie culture. At first he found it kind of strange the type of hits that he commissioned him to perform which were usually strangulation of women but in this type of business cash is cash and the customer is always right and the little quirks is his business. He traveled back and forth to Calcutta and entrenched himself into the language and culture, his outlook and direction in life was the thuggie. He was the ultimate thuggie / deceiver; he played his part at Quantico and later at homicide in Philly.
It seem that every time there was something new to report Omar was right on the scene, he began with his customary sigh and then said, “ We got a picture of our boy in the town and mountains, take a look at this video.” What was curious about the video was that Karl did the same salute as the FBI agent we had caught on tape, there he was on tape grasping his neck with his right hand and then holding left hand over his mouth.
Ch 43
My phone was ringing excessively I let it go to vibrate , first thing Monday morning is not a good time for me, it’s a bad habit but sometimes it’s the only thing I can do to keep my sanity. I finally pick up after the umpteenth time it rang. It was agent Crenshaw of the FBI, “We got him he was hacking your network and ours, we gave him some bait and he took it.”
Omar and I took the central elevator to the basement, our guns were drawn, we had to, and from reports on Karl it was imperative that we take precaution that would enhance our safety and survival. Karl’s desk faced the elevator door, upon seeing us he immediately reached down under his desk for a pump action automatic shotgun. He shot at us with post haste hitting Omar in the shoulder, the big guy drops to the floor. I aimed my Glock releasing a magnitude of bullets at him one of which hit him in the leg. He shouted in pain and disbelief, “Aw, you fuckers shot me.”