by Alex Siegel
"No obvious one." Loose shook his head. "We asked around, and nobody knew of any relationship between the two. We believe she was just a convenient and vulnerable target. She was alone."
"Did she let him in?"
"No. The door chain was broken."
Sheryl was recovering from her bout of nausea. She walked into the kitchen and looked around. It appeared clean and ordinary. A picture on the refrigerator showed the victim with another man, probably her boyfriend.
One of the drawers was open, and it contained knives. There was a bloody thumbprint on the drawer pull.
"He got the knife from here," she announced.
"That's right," Loose said. "It matched the others."
Sheryl went back into the main room. Tawni was staring at the blood with her arms crossed and an expression of frustration.
Sheryl smiled at the detective. "Can we see the perp's apartment now?" She was proud of herself for using proper cop slang.
"Follow me," he said.
Loose led the women back into the hallway and to a neighboring door. It was closed and sealed with police tape. A big, yellow sticker issued by the Chicago Department of Public Health warned of unsafe conditions.
Loose took paper surgical masks out of his pocket and handed them out. "I'm just going to open the door for a few seconds. We don't want a lot of flies in the hallway."
"Flies?" Sheryl whimpered. She sniffed the air and smelled rotten meat. This is going to suck.
He opened the door. "Go!"
Tawni led the way. Sheryl reminded herself that she was a legionnaire of the Gray Spear Society and one of God's fearless warriors. She followed.
And immediately regretted her bravery.
The stench inside the apartment made her stomach clench and her throat tighten. The source was obvious. A pile of animal carcasses stood as high as her chest, and they looked like the remains of dogs and cats. Thousands of flies were crawling over the pile and buzzing around the room. She fought the urge to swat at them.
"Where did he get the animals?" Tawni asked calmly. She didn't look the least bit flustered.
"He bought some from shelters," Loose said. "Others he stole from back yards. There was a rash of missing pet cases around here. Now we know why. He was eating them. That pile is mostly just leftover skin and bones."
"How long has this been going on?"
"Just a couple of weeks. It's hard to believe he ate so many animals. The guy had a hell of an appetite. I guess at some point he decided to try human meat."
Sheryl was fighting to hold down the contents of her stomach. She turned away from the carcasses to investigate the rest of the apartment.
She almost tripped over a barbell. There was exercise equipment everywhere. It cluttered the floor of the main room, and when she looked into the bedroom, she found even more. The collection included everything from simple dumbbells to a high-end elliptical machine.
Tawni came over. "This is brand new equipment. The paint isn't even scratched."
"He was strong." Sheryl pointed at a bench press. "That bar has three hundred pounds loaded on it."
"What could turn an ordinary slug into a super-athlete with cannibalistic tendencies in less than a month? The answer isn't steroids and meth." Tawni turned towards the detective. "Could we have a few minutes alone, please?"
"You're sure?" Loose said.
She nodded.
He shrugged and left the apartment.
Tawni opened her phone and pressed the speaker button. She dialed a number.
"Report," Aaron said.
"We're in the apartment, sir. The guy liked to eat pets and throw the leftovers on the floor."
"How many?"
She squinted at the pile of carcasses. "Maybe fifty dogs and cats."
"It must stink like hell in there."
"Yes, sir, and there is a ton of workout stuff."
"We saw that on the bank statements," he said. "He ran his credit cards to the limit buying food and exercise equipment. That's two symptoms: extreme appetite and extreme desire to exercise. It's like something pushed his body into overdrive and beyond. The cannibalism might just be a side-effect. He became so crazy with hunger, he started eating anything that moved."
"What do you want us to do?" Tawni said.
"Search the apartment," Aaron said. "Try to find the cause. Go through the garbage. It's amazing what people will throw away."
"Yes, sir. I'll call you back." She snapped the phone closed. She looked at Sheryl and said, "You take the kitchen. I'll do the rest of the apartment."
"I guess so," Sheryl said without enthusiasm.
She went into the kitchen and found what she had feared. Dirty dishes were piled high in the sink and more covered the counters. The flies were as bad in here as the main room. She grabbed a spatula and used it to poke through the mess. Mold was growing on some plates.
She found the rotting, severed head of a cat. It was too much. She pulled off her mask and spewed onto the floor. This is becoming a bad habit, she thought. She wiped her mouth with a paper towel and felt a little better. She put the mask back on.
The kitchen cabinets were bare of food. The refrigerator held only a bottle of tabasco sauce and a dried out onion. It was a depressing sight.
Time to do the garbage, she thought.
After a brief search, she found a can under the sink. It was absolutely jammed full, and a blanket of flies covered the garbage. Her stomach clenched, but there was nothing left to vomit.
She stared at the disgusting mess for a moment. Then she went to the kitchen door and yelled, "Hey, babe! You want to help me search through this garbage?"
"No," Tawni replied from another room.
"Come on. I could really use some moral support."
"No."
"Please?" Sheryl said.
"I sleep with you at night. Isn't that enough moral support?"
"What!"
Sheryl stormed through the apartment and found Tawni in a bathroom. She was looking into a medicine cabinet.
"What does that mean?" Sheryl said.
"I give you orgasms for free," Tawni said. "That's a good deal. Don't get greedy."
Sheryl stared in shock. "Our relationship isn't about orgasms. It's about two women who have feelings for each other."
"You have feelings. I'm just having fun. I made that pretty clear several times. Don't blame me if you didn't pay attention. And to be honest, you've been less fun lately. The sex is getting a little stale. You need to pick up your game, babe."
Sheryl felt sick, and this time it wasn't from the stench of decaying meat.
"Get busy on that garbage," Tawni said coldly. "Aaron is waiting for our report."
Sheryl shuffled back to the kitchen. Her chest felt like it had been hollowed out. She grabbed the garbage can and dumped the contents onto the floor. She used a spatula to spread out the mess.
She wasn't really surprised by Tawni's cruel behavior. The woman had as much warmth and compassion as a scorpion. Fighting and killing were her main sources of pleasure. She practically worshiped the legate, who was widely considered to be a living incarnation of death. Sheryl had hoped she could soften Tawni's sharp edges. If anything, they had grown even sharper lately.
Sheryl focused on the task at hand. Most of the garbage was food wrappers. It looked like the cannibal had licked them clean. Towards the bottom, she found some credit card receipts. She spread them out with a minimum of physical contact. One bill was for a gym membership.
Extreme desire to exercise, she thought.
She grabbed her phone and called Aaron.
"Yes?" he said.
"I think we need to check the local gyms. If other people have the same symptoms as the cannibal, we're likely to find them there."
"I was about to call you with exactly the same suggestion. In fact, I have a gym picked out. It's just around the corner from you."
Sheryl read the receipt, "Power and Energy Club?"
"That's it
. After you finish searching the apartment, go there next."
"Yes, sir."
Sheryl and Tawni searched for another twenty minutes without finding anything new. Finally, Tawni put the entire contents of the medicine cabinet into a garbage bag which she would take back to headquarters for analysis. She argued that one of the pills might be contaminated.
They left the apartment. The relatively odor-free air in the hallway came as a great relief to Sheryl. She took a deep, cleansing breath.
"Find what you were looking for?" Detective Loose looked at the garbage bag in Tawni's hand.
"Not really," she said. "Any of you guys have a theory about what might be going on? We heard there were other cases."
He shook his head. "The attacks seem random. Crimes of opportunity. I just heard about a new one on the radio. They found an old woman who had been chopped up with a chainsaw. Parts were eaten. We're hoping to catch one of these cannibals alive so we can question him."
"Good luck. Thanks for your time. We have to go."
Sheryl and Tawni hurried off.
Chapter Five
Sheryl looked up at a neon sign which read, "Power and Energy Club." A cartoonish image of an exploding atom was beside the title. The building was made of red brick like so many others in the area.
"I've always wondered," she said. "Why are almost all the buildings in Chicago made of brick or stone?"
"I think it's because of the Great Chicago Fire," Tawni said. "Everything has to be fireproof now. Come on."
They went from the damp cold outside to the dry warmth inside the building. The sounds of weights banging and machines whirring greeted Sheryl. She looked around as she took off her gloves, hat, and scarf.
It was a big gym. There were many types of strength machines, a large section for free weights, stair climbers, treadmills, and bikes. Doors led to four smaller rooms, and she could see aerobics classes being taught in two of them. The air smelled of clean sweat. It was an aroma she had grown to know well since joining the Gray Spear Society.
"Busy in here," Tawni observed.
Sheryl nodded. It was the middle of the afternoon on a weekday. Either these people were leaving work early to exercise or they weren't working at all.
She walked over to a reception desk. A young man with a very slim body was behind the counter. He was wearing a green T-shirt with the exploding atom logo on it.
"Hey." She smiled at him. "Mind if we ask you a few questions?"
"Go ahead." He shrugged.
"We noticed there were a lot of people in here. Is it always this crowded?"
"Lately, yeah."
She cocked her head. "What do you mean?"
"We had a big surge in membership in the last couple of weeks. Normally, the New Year's resolution rush starts in January. This year it started early."
Sheryl and Tawni exchanged looks of alarm.
"We're thinking of joining," Tawni said, "but first we want to look around. We want to see if we like this place."
"Go ahead," the man said. "Just don't touch any equipment without a membership."
Tawni led Sheryl into the field of sweaty bodies engaged in personal battles with machinery. Grunting noises from the free weights section seemed to catch Tawni's attention, and she walked over there. About a dozen men were straining to lift heavy weights.
Two of them were using a bench press with one acting as a spotter. The other was pushing up 250 pounds with ease. His face was bright red, and the veins on his forehead were popping out, but he was smiling. The muscles on his arms and legs were exceptionally lean and cut. There was a pile of snack food wrappers on the floor next to him, which struck Sheryl as odd. Normally, people didn't eat in the middle of an exercise routine.
She walked over and said, "Hi guys!" She gave them her prettiest smile.
The man on the bench put his barbell on the stand. "What?"
His friend handed him a towel.
"You have an amazing body," Sheryl said. "You must've been working on it for years."
The two men exchanged knowing looks.
"Right." The man on the bench winked. "Years."
She looked at the wrappers on the floor and had an idea. "Do you want to take a short break? I'll buy you a snack. You can tell us about the gym. We're thinking about being members. I also wouldn't mind hearing your workout secrets."
He perked up. "You'll buy us food?"
"As much as you want."
"OK." He licked his lips. "Let's go."
The two men almost ran to a snack bar in the back corner of the gym. Sheryl and Tawni followed at a more leisurely pace.
There was already a long line of people waiting to be fed. They shifted their weight back and forth like anxious children. They were obviously very hungry.
Sheryl looked up at a menu board and was shocked by the prices. The gym was selling individual bottles of juice for five dollars apiece. Energy bars were going for eight dollars, and she knew she could buy them from a grocery store for two if not less. Nonetheless, two cashiers were taking orders as fast as they could.
Sheryl looked at the people in the long line. There was an even mix of men and women. She didn't see a pattern in ages either. The only common feature was they tended to be lean and muscular, even the older people.
"This is really bad," Sheryl murmured. "They could all have the sickness."
Tawni nodded.
"Are you scared?"
"A little," Tawni said.
Sheryl raised her eyebrows. For Tawni, that was a huge admission.
The two men from the bench press finally reached the front of the line. They ordered a pile of snacks and drinks that included ice cream bars, yogurt, potato chips, and fruit cups.
Sheryl went forward to pay. The bill came to 165 dollars. Stunned, she handed over her credit card. Good thing it's not my money, she thought.
The two men and two women found a table nearby. The men started eating before Sheryl even had a chance to sit down.
"We fed you," Tawni said. "Now talk to us. How did you get so buff?"
"OK," a man replied with a mouth full of yogurt. "The secret is we don't know what our secret is. We started working out three weeks ago."
"Nobody can get a body like yours in three weeks."
He shrugged. "It happened, and I'm not complaining. I have so much energy now. I ran a 5K last weekend and almost won the race. I didn't even train."
The other man put an arm around his friend in a very affectionate manner. Sheryl could guess at what kind of relationship they had. She wished Tawni would show her the same kind of affection.
"Come on," Sheryl said. "You must be doing something. A new diet supplement? Drugs?"
The first man shook his head. "I'm clean. All I know is I dropped forty pounds in three weeks, and I'm stronger than I've ever been in my life. I feel like Superman." He showed off his impressive biceps. "It's a miracle."
"I kind of doubt that." She turned to his friend. "What about you?"
The second man nodded. "It happened to both of us." He leaned forward. "The sex is amazing." He winked.
"You seem very hungry. Have you been eating a lot lately?" Sheryl said.
"That's the downside. Our grocery bills are killing our savings accounts, but it's worth it. Look at this unbelievable body."
He stood up, lifted his shirt, and tightened his stomach. His abdominals stood out sharply.
"I guess," she said nervously.
"Both of you are fucking idiots," Tawni said. "This isn't normal or healthy. You need to see a doctor now."
"Hey!" the first man said. "Don't be bitchy just because you're jealous."
"What if you have a parasite or a disease? Maybe you've been poisoned. This kind of thing doesn't just happen. You should be asking a lot of questions, not stuffing your faces like a couple of pigs. It's all good now, but it could get very bad just as fast. It will get very bad."
The men frowned.
The first turned to the second and said,
"Maybe we should see a doctor."
"I guess it couldn't hurt." The second shrugged. "Tomorrow."
Tawni stood up. "Let's move on."
Sheryl also stood and pushed in her chair. She noticed a man standing a short distance away and scowling at her. A tight T-shirt and short shorts emphasized a body that was beefy and ripped. He was shaved bald.
She walked over to him. "Do you have a problem?"
Tawni joined her.
"Yeah." He nodded towards the gay lovers at the table. "Those guys."
"What's wrong with them?"
"When they came in here three weeks ago, they were big puddles of goo. Now look at them. I asked, but they won't tell me their secret."
"Maybe they don't know," Sheryl said. "How did you get your muscles?"
"The old-fashioned way," he said. "Years of sweat and 'roids. I practically live in this gym."
"Really? Have you noticed other people around here with the same symptoms? Excessive eating, extreme weight loss, and muscle gain?"
"Sure. A couple dozen. Men and women. They have insane, three-hour workouts and leave their fucking food garbage all over the gym. Why?" He gave her a suspicious look. "Are you cops looking for drugs? I was just kidding about that 'roid thing." He chuckled nervously.
"We're not cops," Sheryl said. "You can relax. When did you first notice this phenomenon?"
He shrugged. "A few weeks ago. It got a lot worse in the last week. Is something going on?"
"Yeah," Tawni said. "Something really bad. You talk to people. Nobody told you anything?"
"No. They're just happy it happened. Years of diet and exercise crunched down to less than a month, and they can eat like crazy without gaining weight. It's a fantasy training program."
"Be happy you're not on that program. Thanks for your time."
Sheryl and Tawni walked off.
"Let's call Aaron," Sheryl said urgently.
They went to one of the empty classrooms and closed the door. She opened her phone, pressed the speaker button, and called the boss.
"Report," he said.
"We're at the gym, sir," Sheryl said. "A lot of people are showing the symptoms. One local said 'a couple dozen.' We talked to two of them, but they had no explanation. Sir, what are we going to do? If all these people turn into cannibals..."