Creating A Serial Killer

The young couple had an awesome plan, one they conceived of after walking out of the movie theatre, having just seen the remake of Friday The Thirteenth. Well, it wasn’t entirely conjured up then, no, the idea sort of went back a ways, but that was the exact moment when it became clear to them that it was something they were actually going to do. And hell, the timing was dead on because Misty was pregnant, seven months along actually.

They began by renting every slasher flick they could get their hands on and, when this didn’t seem to offer much help, they then opted for ‘real’ biographies of serial killers. They wanted to get an idea of what went on in such a mind, what went wrong at what point to drive someone to such acts of violence. They rented ‘Gacy’ and ‘Dahmer’ and ‘Bundy’ and ‘Son of Sam’ and ‘The Hillside Strangler’ and ‘Helter Skelter’ and ‘Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer’ and ‘Gein’ amongst myriad other titles, but there was little in these films to show what caused these men to act as they did. What was it that warped them in such a fashion as to rape and torture and murder countless victims?

So they took their search to the library, this young couple so madly in love with one another and life and art and death. They checked out books about their favorite serial killers and found the answers they were looking for, the missing puzzle pieces that had eluded them. It was then that they set out to create their very own monster, their very own serial killer, because surely there was a way to construct one, just as one could construct a building or bridge. You just had to follow a specific set of blueprints, making sure you took the time to tweak the right nuances, and viola! A maniac is born.

Their newborn son arrived at approximately two thirty A.M. on a Sunday morning at Our Lady of Peace Hospital on the city’s south side. The husband-a nineteen-year-old kid named Trent-videotaped the whole thing and intended to take the footage and put music by the Butthole Surfers over it and post it on You Tube. He also intended to announce to the watching public what it was they aimed to do, so that the audience could tune in each day and watch as the process took shape, as the child’s psyche became altered.

What they’d learned from their studies was that they needed to treat the child with as much cruelty and indifference as humanly possible to make sure that they gummed up his works good. They decided to start right away.

“Ya cain’t breast-feed ‘im” Trent told Misty when they got home from the hospital. “That would make him too dependent.”

“Alright.” Misty agreed. She didn’t really like the thought of the little creature gnawing on her tits anyhow. It was sorta creepy.

“And we cain’t feed ‘im too much, just enough to keep him alive.”

“Okay.” Misty put the kid down on the floor and fumbled through her drug box for some speed. When she found the packet she shook some onto the back of her hand and snorted it.

“Hey, gimmie some.” Trent said, stepping foreword and almost landing a size ten boot on the baby’s head. The kid began to cry.

“I don’t like that sound at all, not one bit.” Misty said, pinching a nostril shut as she held out the packet to the other.

“Me neither.” Trent agreed, taking a hit. “Let’s put him in the basement.”

Picking the baby up and holding him as far away from him as he could, Trent took him downstairs and tucked him into an old trunk that his dad had used when he was in the army. His father was long dead now, which was all right by Trent. The old fuck had been a total bastard.

“So, like, let’s go over our plan.” Misty said when they got upstairs and Trent nodded.

“Okay, according to everything we’ve learned from all them books, a lot of the people who grew up to be serial killers was treated real bad as children. Neglected, starved, ignored. We gotta keep that kid scared and hungry and confused and depressed for at least the first four years, and after that we step it up a notch, ya know, take it to the next level.”

“All right.” Misty agreed, taking another blast of speed. And then, just like that, four years went by…

* * *
“Ya gotta watch out for his teeth when ya do it though…I’m warnin’ ya. He’s an ornery little son of a bitch.” Trent was saying to the guy he met out behind The Saloon, some homeless man who’d been going through the dumpster. He was dirty and he smelled like a rotten cadaver. Trent thought that was perfect.

“You ever done anythin’ like this before?” Trent wanted to know and the homeless guy grinned, his mouth wet with spit, his gums pale, his teeth as crooked as rotten tombstones in a long forgotten cemetery.

“Oh yeah, I done this before-I’m real good at this.” He drooled and Trent smiled.

“Go get ‘im tiger!”

The boy had a chain wrapped around his neck keeping him in place and he wore nothing but a ripped, dirty pair of girl’s underwear. His pale skin was a roadmap of scars and cuts and bruises and running sores. His teeth were brown from lack of care and his hair was a greasy lump on the top of his head. Trent cut it every now and then with a dull knife. The boy had black bags under his eyes, which were dull and glassy. By the time he was two and a half Trent thought it would be a good idea to get him hooked on opiates so that they could withhold the drug and induce even more pain. When he was in the throes of withdrawal and everything seemed much more surreal and painful, that was when Trent would administer his daily beating.

“He is one scary looking little bastard.” The homeless man said and Trent grunted laughter in reply.

“That’s the idea.” He eyed the other briefly. “You sure ya’ll know what to do?”

“Oh yeah,” The homeless guy rasped. “I been down this here road before…”

“All right. Like I said be careful ya don’t get bit. When he locks on he don’t let go. And don’t be gentle with him neither. He needs to know that this is what life is doing to him every waking moment. Ya can use a little spit but not much. The dryer the better.”

“You just let me handle this,” The homeless man said, unbuttoning his shirt, unzipping his pants. “I do believe I’m going to enjoy this.”

“Fine. As long as he don’t.” Trent eyed the boy up and down, the other looking back at him with a numb gaze that betrayed little more than fear and pain. “Take yer time. You come and find me upstairs when yer done.”

And with that the little boy’s father left him alone with the dirty, smelly man…and, somehow, more years slipped by…

* * *
“It’s yer turn to go down and slop the boy.” Trent told Misty, knocking back a good hit of Kentucky Bourbon and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“I don’t know if I want to be alone around him no more Trent.” Misty said, lowering her eyes when she spoke, keeping them trained on the cheap linoleum floor. “He kinda scares me.”

“Then we’re doin’ our job, ain’t we?” He croaked, taking another hit of the bourbon, and when she didn’t answer soon enough he threw the glass at her. “I said ‘ain’t we’! Ya got shit in yer ears woman?”

Misty cowered by the sink. The glass had sailed harmlessly over her head, shattering against the wall behind her, but her nerves were shot, her mind a complete and total mess.

Too many years sucking the glass dick did it to her, and here she was, a frail, hopeless human being who’d slowly siphoned her brains out of her head one drip at a time. The worse their boy got, the more useless she became.

Trent got out of his chair, approaching her slowly.

“Yer gonna go down there and slop the boy lest I have to take my belt to ya. Is that understood?” He clamped his hands around her throat loosely, then slowly squeezed, the pressure building until she couldn’t get any air. Her eyes bulged in their sockets and she tried to nod, to say ‘yes’, to agree with him in some way but she couldn’t move, couldn’t breath, couldn’t do nothing. Finally he let go and she sat there gasping.

“Now git!” He hollered and she skedaddled quick, before he could do something else to her.

She pulled the bucket of fish heads and guts out of the fridge, trying not to breathe in its pungent fumes. She didn’t want to vomit, not here, not while Trent was around. Holding it as far away from her as possible, she went to the basement door, opened it, walked carefully down the steps. When she got to the bottom she could hear him breathing, ragged tearing gasps through his mouth because his nose had been broken so many times that he could no linger draw any air through it. She heard the clink of the chain, heard the sound of his feet rubbing against the cement floor.

Years ago he had tried to communicate with her, had tried to plead with her to let him go, to stop the torture. Since they’d never formally taught him to speak it was rather grotesque to hear how he garbled the English language, and at the time she’d been so high on speed that she just laughed and laughed, hurling large scoops of guts at him with a ladle. That was a while back, before this whole thing had begun to make her sick.

He stepped forward and into the dim light created by the lone sixty watt bulb that hung unprotected and swung lazily back and forth from it’s bare cord. His grossly pale body was a mass of scar tissue, his adult teeth rotten and chipped, his gums bleeding. It had become too hard to cut his hair over the years so they had let it grow long and wild. But the worst part about him was his eyes: they no longer showed fear, no, instead they displayed a burning hatred, a homicidal glint that took Misty’s breath away.

“I got yer grub.” She said, setting down the bucket of guts and carefully pushing it forward with one of her sandal clad feet. He didn’t move, he just stared at her with that blank look that suggested he would like nothing more than to tear her to pieces. She backed up a few paces, her eyes locked on his.

“Maybe we took this whole thing a little too far.” She said cautiously, wondering if Trent would beat her for talking kindly to the boy. Well, fuck him. The experiment had gotten out of hand and what they had here was nothing but a savage. Maybe they should have given him a chance at being somewhat normal, at least let him sleep in a bed at night. But it was too late for regrets now. What was done was done.

She turned away, taking a couple of steps before he made a sound that caused her to turn around.

“Did you say something to me?” She asked, eyeing him warily. He nodded, cleared his throat.

“Muh…muh…mom…” He sputtered, his eyes drained of the murderous glee they once possessed and now filled with what appeared to be desperate longing. Misty’s heart pounded in her chest, pride welling up within her. Maybe there was hope for redemption after all. Might it be possible that he could forgive her? She stepped forward, her arms outstretched.

“I’m so sorry for all of this boy, I really am. I don’t know what we was thinkin’.”

He extended his arms to her, a child of about twelve years old who just wanted a hug from his mother…

She stepped within range of the boy, her fear slipping away as motherly concern filled her. She went to him, her only son, to give him a hug and take him in her arms.

“There there,” She comforted, reaching out and laying a hand on his arm. “Your mother is here for you…”

As soon as her hands were on him he jumped forward quickly, mouth wide, clamping what was left of his teeth on her neck and ripping it open in a spray of warm arterial blood. She had no time to scream, in fact made only a small mewling sound as her blood drained from her. She tried to push him away but for someone who spent all his life chained in one spot he was strong, awfully strong. He held on to her fiercely and shook his head, digging his decayed teeth in even deeper. Blood droplets spurted wildly, and when he got it in his eyes he blinked rapidly to clear them. In a few minutes it was all over and Misty no longer fought. He let her fall to the cement floor, then knelt down next to her and sniffed her lifeless body. She smelled good. Better than the bucket of fish guts. He lifted one of her arms and took a tentative bite. Then another.

* * *
Trent awoke from a wicked drunk, his head pounding, his mouth tasting like someone took a crap in it and then barfed all over that. He smacked his lips and carefully lifted his head, squinting into the dim light of early evening. What fucking time was it? And where the hell was Misty?

He sat up slowly, his head throbbing as if every vein inside were swollen with thick, slow moving blood, and gingerly got to his feet. He wanted to call out Misty’s name but knew that doing so would bring about more pain. Maybe she was upstairs taking a nap herself. When was the last time he saw her? He had trouble recalling, but he thought it might be somewhere around the time he told her to go feed their experiment in the basement…

“Oh shit.” He muttered, getting to his feet. He knew that Misty had been getting soft lately, but would she be stupid enough to get near the boy? Was it possible that she was out of her gotdamn mind?

Taking hesitant steps, trying to be as quiet as possible, he made his way to the basement door. It stood open, which it shouldn’t have. They always kept it closed so that it was as dark as possible down there. Trent didn’t know for sure, but he thought that the darkness would help. Either she was down there right now or she had forgotten to close it. Either way, he would find out in a moment.

Forgetting the urge to be silent, he clambered down the steps, taking them two at a time. The dim light bulb was out, and when he fumbled along the wall for the switch at the bottom of the stairs nothing happened. He flipped it up and down several times but it wouldn’t turn on. Shit. He fumbled in his pocket for his lighter, a silver Zippo he’d had since he could remember. Flicking it on, he took another step forward.

“Holy fucking Jesus!” He gasped, seeing Misty laying there, the boy crouched over her. “What the fuck is going on here?” He demanded, and the kid looked up at him with eyes as devoid of feeling as a stuffed moose head. The kid was awash with blood-Misty’s blood-his face smeared and greasy. Misty’s stomach was ripped open, her entrails spread out on the ground beside her. The kid had what appeared to be an almost thoughtful look on his face as he sat there chewing, wistful maybe, but the eyes were still dead.

“Well I’ll be gotdamned!” Trent said, stroking his chin, marveling. “It worked, it really fuckin’ worked!” He sat down on the cold concrete, keeping his eyes on the boy who continued to feast on his mother. “I was gonna put some wild animals down here in time, ya know, to see if you would kill ‘em, but I guess I don’t need to trouble mysef with that. This is all the proof I need.”

Suddenly the lighter grew hot in his hand and he had to put it out. Getting back to his feet, he decided that what he needed was a flashlight and drink to celebrate. Lurching upstairs, he found what he needed, then he went back down in the basement and watched his boy proudly until the last of the bottle was gone.