by Donn Cortez
God, is there something wrong with me? I mean, I haven’t even kissed a boy yet and I’m thinking about my uncle like he was my boyfriend or something. This is seriously weird, Electra.
Did I mention he rides a motorcycle? He lets me ride behind him sometimes, and I put my arms around his waist and my face close to his neck. He smells like leather and cigarettes and something sweet.
It’s just not fair.
CHAPTER TWO
Jack was no stranger to computers. He didn’t know quite as much as Stanley had, but he’d known enough to ask the right questions. And once Stanley had started talking, Jack had known enough to put a new cassette in the tape machine—one he didn’t leave behind for the police.
Jack wound up taking two things from Stanley Dupreiss’s house: his laptop computer—and the right hand of the corpse in the freezer. By that time he knew all of Stanley’s passwords, knew how to disarm the booby traps Stanley had built into his system to erase certain files in case he was arrested. He knew what he was supposed to do with the hooker’s severed hand.
He knew about the Stalking Ground.
He’d set Stanley’s computer up in the motel room he and Nikki were staying in. The motel was near the Seattle airport, so it was popular with traveling businessmen; each room had its own internet connection. The laptop was top-of-the-line with all the latest bells and whistles—connecting to the net was just a matter of plug-and-play.
Nikki was out getting a bite to eat. Jack was hungry for something else.
He found the website without any problem. The background screen was an off-beige, with the words The Stalking Ground in a blackish-brown font; it took him a second to realize the letters were branded onto a piece of human skin.
He logged on with the name he’d found in Stanley’s files: Deathkiss. A prompt asked him for a verification code. He typed in Dachau.
There was a message waiting for him. A black screen replaced the first one: at the top, a photo of a blindfolded woman tied to a chair. Her mouth began moving, and blood-red letters etched themselves onto the screen.
Got your trophy in the mail drop today. The fingerprints were a match. Congratulations on a successful kill, Deathkiss—and welcome to The Pack.
“Thanks,” Jack whispered. “I’m sure you and I are going to be real close …“
Jack agreed with what Pablo Picasso once said: “Computers are worthless. They can only give you answers.”
Jack’s specialty was questions. He’d gotten very good at them in the last two years—but then, he had a special way of asking. He’d learned a lot in his interrogation sessions, and now that knowledge would be put to the test.
He surfed through the Stalking Ground’s various areas. The website was set up on a give-and-take basis; the menus and subheadings were all readily accessible, but if he wanted more detailed information he was expected to contribute some of his own.
He clicked on a heading that read Territory. A map of North America popped up, and then an inset block of text.
It read: Okay, so you want to know who hunts where. Fair enough. Don’t worry too much if your Hunting Ground overlaps somebody else’s; as you’ll see, that’s pretty common. Plenty of prey to go around, right? The important thing is to respect the other Hunters. If you’re planning on moving into somebody else’s territory, it’s to your advantage to let them know—after all, they know the terrain better than you do, and can let you know about any possible problems. Remember: it’s Us against Everybody Else. The Pack Hunts Together.
Below the text was a button labeled Mark Territory. He clicked on it, and the cursor transformed into an icon of a little wolf with an evil grin on its face. When he moved it around, it raised its hind leg and left a yellow line behind it.
He started to mark off the area around Seattle, then expanded it to a zone that went as far north as Vancouver, Canada. He hit Done when he was finished.
A crazy-quilt of colors and patterns superimposed itself over the map, each a territory claimed by a killer. Jack clicked on Nevada. It belonged to someone called the Gourmet, with eleven kills. Jack clicked on the Link button, and a text bar informed him that he would have to fill in his own profile before he could link to the others.
He spent the next hour doing so, making up most of it. He didn’t use the victims Stanley had told him about, except where Dupreiss’s files showed he’d already mentioned a particular kill; he wanted to distance Deathkiss’s identity as far as possible from the corpse he’d left for the police. The website actually encouraged this, warning him against using details that might reveal his true identity but asking for specifics concerning the location of bodies.
Remember the Clifford Olsen case in Canada? a prompt asked. He traded the location of bodies for a hundred grand in cash for his family. Knowledge is power. If you’re arrested, you can use this knowledge to your advantage.
It works like this: use the locations of bodies as a bargaining chip. Trade them for a reduced sentence, or extra-dition to a state that doesn’t have the death penalty. Then, don’t give the cops the location of your kills—give them someone else’s. Claim you did them. Not only does this confuse the hell out of the cops, but if you can later provide an alibi that contradicts your original statement, you might even get off!
He clicked on a button marked Gravesites. The form that appeared was configured to look like a baseball card, with empty spaces for a photo and statistics on the victim. The logo at the top of the card read Collect ’em All!
Trading cards.
Jack just stared at the screen for a few moments, clenching and unclenching his fists. “You sick fuck,” he murmured. “You’re the one. The one that designed this website. The one that brought all the others into the fold.”
He reached out and pressed his hand against the screen, as if he could reach through it and wrap his fingers around the throat of its creator.
Stanley had given him his name.
Djinn-X.
“You’re the one,” the Closer said softly, “I’m going to kill first.”
“Advertising execs or stockbrokers,” Djinn-X said. “I’m really not sure which one I hate more.”
Djinn-X sat on a skateboard with his knees drawn up. The man he was speaking to was bound to a lawn chair with cheap packing twine and gagged with a strip of white duct tape. The chair was in the middle of a corridor that ran a hundred feet in either direction. The floor was rough plywood, the walls on either side stacked cages of wooden slats, three tiers of tenby-ten storage lockers. Industrial fluorescents thirty feet above buzzed like a prison full of bees. It was just after three A.M.
Djinn-X tightened the laces on both inline skates of his captive, then started winding white duct tape around one of the ankles. “Both of them are parasites. Leeches. The advertising exec finds different ways to lie to people so they’ll buy his client’s product, and the stockbroker finds different ways to move around little pieces of paper so that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Neither one produces anything of value, but both suck big honking wads of cash out of the economy.”
His captive blinked sweat out of his eyes. He was in his forties, handsome, with a jogger’s lean body and neatly trimmed black hair. His name was Michael Fitzpatrick. Besides the skates, Djinn-X had dressed him in a white paper coverall, the kind used by painters.
“Of course, being an advertising exec, you’re probably biased,” said Djinn-X. The laces of both skates were now sealed under a thick layer of white tape that reached from the prisoner’s ankles to halfway up his shins.
Djinn-X stood up and kicked his skateboard to the side. The board was decorated with logos of bands Fitzpatrick had never heard of. His captor wore a black T-shirt with a green skull on it, ripped jeans and scuffed army boots.
“But you know what? I think you guys are actually worse. I mean, the money-shufflers built this toilet that passes for a society, but you’re the ones that keep it filled with shit. It just keeps pouring out, TV and radio and magazin
es and billboards, twenty-four-seven. I went to take a whiz the other day and there was a fucking Gap ad over the urinal. Even when I got my dick in my hand, you’re pissing in my eyes.”
He reached down and picked up his gun. He’d taped a machine pistol to the barrel of a shotgun and strapped a palmcorder to the top of that; the weapon looked like it belonged in a science fiction movie.
Djinn-X stuck the shotgun barrel between his prisoner’s legs, chuckling at Fitzpatrick’s sharp inhalation—then pulled a utility knife from his pocket and cut through the twine binding Fitzpatrick’s legs and arms to the chair.
He stepped back and let the man pull the tape off his mouth himself.
“What do you want?” Fitzpatrick asked. His voice trembled.
“Know what I really hate? Video games. Not playing them; fuck no, I love that. It’s the idea behind them. Doom, Quake—they’re like drugs, man. You put a gun in a kid’s hand and turn him loose, tell him to blow away as many people as he can—then you’re surprised when he shows up at school with his dad’s hunting rifle and an itchy trigger finger. But you’re not responsible, right? You’re just giving the people what they want.”
“My firm doesn’t have anything to do with video games,” Fitzpatrick said carefully. “We promote retail chains—”
“Shut up,” Djinn-X said cheerfully. “This isn’t a debate. People like you created people like me, my whole generation—now I’m gonna show you what we’ve learned.”
He flipped open the viewscreen of the palmcorder, a square videoscreen that jutted off to the side like an open page. He tapped the power button and it blinked to life.
“Get up.”
Fitzpatrick did. His legs were shaking so bad he lost his balance on the skates immediately and crashed to the ground.
“Try it again. Carefully.”
Fitzpatrick managed to get to his feet.
“Turn around.”
The walls of the corridor behind him had been lined with black plastic to a height of about eight feet, on both sides. “That’s the start of the maze,” Djinn-X said. “You’re going to blade your way through it. I’m going to chase you on my board. You stay ahead of me, you live. You fall down—you die. Pretty simple, huh?”
“You can’t be serious—”
“Serious as a pit bull on crack,” Djinn-X said. He nudged his board into position with his foot and raised his gun to his shoulder, using the videocam as a sight. “Now get rolling.”
Fitzpatrick turned and started off, awkwardly. There was a small glimmer of hope beneath the panic in his gut; it came from the fact that he rollerbladed every weekend, was in fact damn good at it. Once he was around the first corner, he planned to put on a burst of speed that would leave his pursuer far behind.
Djinn-X let him get about fifty feet away before he shot him.
Three sharp pops. Three separate impacts slammed into Fitzpatrick’s back. A wave of fear so great he couldn’t even scream exploded up from his stomach. He crashed to the floor, the smell of plywood filling his nostrils as his face smacked into the rough wood.
He lay there, twitching—but somehow, he was still alive.
“I’m gonna give you the first one for free,” Djinn-X called out as he pushed off on his board. The polyurethane wheels thrummed on the wood. “See, this fancy machine pistol I have here isn’t a MAC-10 or even an Uzi; it’s a paintball gun. Shoots little plastic balls filled with dye. They make a real nice red splash on your white suit, but they won’t give you more than a bruise.”
There was another pop and another stinging impact.
“Better get going, adman,” Djinn-X said. “The shot-gun part of the package is for real. And don’t try to fool me with that I-don’t-know-how-to-rollerblade shit. I’ve been watching you for a while.”
Fitzpatrick scrambled to his feet and took off. This time, he went all out.
With a whoop of joy, Djinn-X gave chase.
Later.
Djinn-X was playing with the digital footage he’d downloaded from the videocam to his laptop, and bragging about it online at the same time via his regular computer.
Wait ’til you see the new level, he typed. Major mayhem. Here’s a little preview.
He uploaded the image he’d been working on: Fitzpatrick bombing away from him down the corridor. Djinn-X had digitally painted the black walls, making it now appear that Fitzpatrick was racing down the narrow streets of a city. Wisps of vapor streamed off the ugly red blotches on his coveralls.
Nice, was the reply a few moments later. How’d you add that vapor effect?
Chemistry. I doctored a few of the paint pellets with a syringe and some epoxy. I thought a little hydrochloric acid might make things more interesting.
Bet he really “felt the burn,” huh?
Djinn-X grinned.
No, I saved that pellet for last.
What pellet would that be?
The kerosene-filled one. With the phosphorus core.
Beautiful! Who needs special effects when you’ve got the real thing?
That’s what this whole trip is about, man. The Real
Thing—and I don’t mean fucking Coca-Cola.
I hear you.
I know you do. Just like I know you’re for real, and you know I am. Just like everyone else in The Pack is. The Initiation, it’s not just some bullshit ritual. I pick out a sheep, ask you to kill it and mail me a hand for proof—there’s no way that can be faked.
That’s why every member of The Pack goes through it. It establishes trust.
Does it?
Djinn-X frowned, then tapped out,
What do you mean?
You know I’m a killer. How do I know you are?
You have any doubts, visit one of my dump sites.
Don’t forget to bring ashovel.
Any graverobber can plant bodies.
Djinn-X leaned back and studied the screen, his eyes narrowed. A smile slowly surfaced on his face.
Okay, then—pick somebody else’s dump site.
They’re all over the country. Even if I’m some kind of online wannabe, you don’t think I’d be able to fake them all, do you?
It seems unlikely. But that doesn’t prove you’re a killer. It proves the other members of
The Pack are.
Unless they’re a bunch of grave-robbing wannabes, too. I know they aren’t, because I have a freezer full of severed hands that say otherwise—but you only have my word for that.
Yes.
There is one thing you know for sure. I picked out a sheep and told you to kill it. You did. In the eyes of the law, that makes me as guilty of murder as you.
Except you didn’t get blood on your hands.
The law is meaningless—you should know that.
“You’re really starting to piss me off,” Djinn-X muttered.
All right. I’ll give you the same deal you gave me.
Pick a hooker, lift her prints and tell me when and where. I’ll send you a little present.
I’ve got a better idea. Crisscross.
Explain.
The most ironic part of being who we are is this: you can never kill anyone you know.
Anonymity is our biggest asset.
But I could kill someone you know—and vice versa.
“You sly devil, you,” Djinn-X murmured.
Who’s the sheep?
A real-estate agent. Don’t bother sending me anything—I’ll know when she’s dead.
You got it. All I need is a name, a city and a phone number.
Djinn-X grabbed a pen and jotted down the information that appeared on the screen. “Looks like I’m going back to Seattle,” he sighed. “Airplanes and rain. Fuck.”
You’re going to owe me, Deathkiss.
Don’t worry. I always pay my debts.
“You’ve been glued to that thing for twelve hours now,” Nikki said. “Learn anything, or you just surfing for porn?”
“This isn’t what I’d call pornographic,” Jack said. �
��Obscene is a better word.”
He leaned back and stretched. The kinks in his neck sent a sharp bolt of pain into the base of his skull. “Ah! Goddammit,” he said, wincing.
Nikki came over and put her hands on his shoulders. She dug into his trapezius muscles with her thumbs. “You need to loosen up,” she said. “You’ve got knots the size of golf balls.”
Jack closed his eyes, tried to relax. Images from the website kept flashing through his mind: dismembered bodies, a row of severed heads, graphic descriptions of rape and mutilation. He shook his head and opened his eyes.
“Can’t. There are still a few areas of the website I haven’t reviewed yet.”
Nikki let her hands drop from his shoulders. “And you still have to eat. Come on, I’m sick of takeout. Let’s hit a real restaurant.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Well, I am. And I hate eating alone.”
He finally gave in because arguing didn’t seem worth the trouble. Nothing mundane did, anymore; he wouldn’t bother to shower or shave if Nikki didn’t remind him. Food was fuel, sleep simply the absence of consciousness. He sometimes forgot to urinate until his bladder began to ache.
Nikki picked a restaurant called Chantarelles, a French bistro in Seattle’s Capitol Hill district. She insisted they take a cab instead of the van.
The restaurant was small, quiet, elegant. Somehow, it didn’t seem quite real to Jack; he kept glancing behind him, as if he could catch the truth behind the illusion.
“Cut it out, Jack. You’re making me nervous.”
Nikki asked for a table with some privacy; the maître d’ gave them one in the far corner. There were only two other couples in the place, both of them seated by the window near the entrance.
Jack sat with his back to the wall.
A busboy came and filled their water glasses. He was young, eighteen or so, Asian. Jack wondered if he played video games.