I think my grandfather might be a serial killer. By Veristal. I don't have the best memory of my childhood. Not that my childhood was bad, it wasn't, but I just don't remember that much of it compared to a lot of people. My grandfather always stood out to me, which was strange, because he was never around very much. The few times that he came around for Christmas or some other family occasion, he seemed a kind but serious man. I remember him talking to me and showing me coin tricks, and I like the sound of his deep rumbling voice as he told me stories about far-off lands and fantastic creatures. I remembered liking him and feeling sorry for him, because underneath it all, he seemed very sad and tired. I knew that my grandmother had died not long before I was born, so I always imagined that was a lot of why he was sad. I say this all to explain that I had a limited but positive idea of my grandfather before a few days ago. Last month, my parents were killed in a car accident coming back from a movie. I lived two states away, but as their only child and closest relatives, I got the call. The next few hours were a haze of travel and crying and shock, but I know that when I got to the hospital, my grandfather was there. Even as an adult, I was amazed at how large a man he was, and when he swept me up in his quiet hug, I cried against him for several minutes, welcoming the comfort. We did the funeral arrangements together and agreed that we would come back in a few weeks to go through all of their things and get the house ready to sell. We'd already made clear that regardless of whether they had a will or not, he wanted everything to go to me, but he would be happy to help and get to know his grandson a little better. The funerals went well, as far as those kind of things go, and I went back to my life. Last week I got a call from my grandfather, and we agreed to meet up this past weekend to start going through all of their belongings. I got to the house on Sunday morning, and the last couple of days have been a bit sad at times, but they've been a lot of fun as well. My grandfather is much like I remember him, a serious but kind man that enjoys talking and telling stories. And he has actual conversations with you rather than just taking turns monologuing, which is a rare commodity in my experience with older people or people in general nowadays. He wanted to know about my work, if I had a girlfriend, if I liked the area I lived in. He told me some about his days in the army as a medic, and then his time as a doctor. I knew he had been a pretty famous surgeon at one point, but that mostly stopped after his wife died. He still had a small practice and would sometimes publish academic articles, but he had saved much of the money from his early career as a surgeon, so he was comfortable enough financially that he could do what he wanted for the most part. Much of our time was spent busy and in separate parts of the house or garage, so we would largely talk at meals and in the evening hours before bed. By the second night, we were more comfortable with each other, and that's when my grandfather started talking about his wife. Even now, some 30 years after her death, it was clear how much he loved her and missed her. He started off by telling a story that involved her only peripherally, but soon he was just telling things about her, funny stories, tales that illustrated how smart or good she was, little saying she used to have. It was sentimental, but it was so genuine and heartfelt that I wasn't uncomfortable. Telling how much he loved her made me love both of them more. I had no sooner finish that thought when his expression turned darker, like a ship entering sudden storms. He started talking about how she was taken from him, how that man, that thing, had killed her. I just listened, but internally I was wondering where all this was coming from. As far as I knew, my grandmother had been killed by a drunk driver, while that was terrible. He was making it sound like it was something else, like she had been intentionally murdered in some way. It was all pretty vague, but I could still see when he realized he was saying something more than he intended. He looked embarrassed and apologized for rambling on, making some passing remark about how he had become the old man at the mall that will talk for hours about nothing. I laughed and was going to reassure him that I was enjoying it, but he was already on his feet and looking at his watch. He had to be going, he said, had to run into town to take care of a couple of things before I got too late, but he'd see me in the morning. I found this all very strange for a couple of reasons. First, we had just gone to town earlier that day and bought supplies and groceries to last at least a couple more days. Second, it was nearing 10 o'clock, and aside from a gas station or bar, I doubted much would be open in the closest town, which was relatively small and a good 30 minutes away. Still, he was a grown man in my elder, and it was none of my business where he went or what he did. Maybe he just wanted to go off and be by himself after talking about his wife so much. In any case, I said good night and he headed out. A minute later I heard his giant SUV rumble to life outside and trundle its way out into the night. I went to bed, but though I was tired, I had trouble falling asleep. Part of it was sleeping in a strange place. This house had not been our house when I was growing up, so aside from visits, I had never slept here for long. Part of it was worrying about my grandfather. My bed was next to a window on the upper floor, so periodically I would peek out to see if I saw any sign of his return.  It was beautiful, and I knew my parents had loved it here. Still, it was too remote for my taste, and if they hadn't lived so far out of town, they probably wouldn't have gotten killed coming back from the movie. The thought made me angry, so I pushed it aside. Picking up my tablet, I started reading, and before I knew it, I was asleep. I'm not sure if it was the rumbling engine, the squeak of my grandfather's driver-side door, or some internal sense that something had changed, but I woke up some time later and looked out the window again. I saw my grandfather standing at the rear of his SUV, looking around for several seconds before opening the back hatch. At first I couldn't see anything due to the angle, but when he reached in and started pulling out the body, I saw more than I wanted. It was a woman, and as I watched, he pulled her out enough to pick her up in his arms and began carrying her into the trees. I know it was night time, and there was a distance of probably 50 yards, but I could see it all very clearly. And with her hanging arms and lolling head, it was also clear that the woman was either deeply unconscious or dead. I felt panic well up in my chest. I didn't know what to do.  What if I had been mistaken or he was trying to help her? Maybe she was drunk. But if he was trying to help her, wouldn't he either carry her to a hospital or at least brought her inside rather than carrying her into the woods? It was also strange, and the longer he was gone out of sight, the less real it seemed. So I did nothing. I sat by the window, looking out for a number of minutes. And then just when I was about to give up, he came back into view, empty handed and picking his way between the trees as he approached the car.  When I first saw the body, I had been careful to stay low and slightly back from the window, but time and shock had led to me paying less attention to how visible I was as I waited for him to return. And there was no doubt that he saw me now. As if to confirm it, he lifted his hand and gave a small wave. Feeling a strange combination of embarrassment and horror, I waved back. Because I'm writing this, it's the next morning and I've spent the last several hours deciding what to do or say to him while listening out for the slightest creak of the floor or turn of the knob. He may not know I saw the woman, and I guess there could be some benign explanation, though that seems unlikely at this point.  I love my grandfather. But I don't trust him. Not anymore. I think I'm going to try to talk to him, but at the first sign of trouble, I'm out the door. If I have more to report and am able to do so, I'll write again soon.  I had considered just waiting for my grandfather to come up and get me for breakfast, but the idea of him in the doorway of the only exit from the room made me very nervous. I wound up just getting dressed, putting my keys and wallet in one pocket and a small folding knife in the other and heading downstairs. He was still at the stove when I entered the kitchen, and despite my fear, I could feel my stomach grumble at the smell of eggs, bacon, and coffee that permeated the air. Not that I could trust eating any of it, but my stomach wasn't concerned with trivial matters like rat poison and antifreeze. He turned and gave me a nod as I made my way to the table. Good morning. I was going to come up and get you in a few minutes. Hope you're hungry. Nah, not too much, I lied. My stomach has been weird this morning, so I think I'm going to have to wait. Smells great, though. I sat down in a chair where I could face him and reach the door outside or the living room quickly if things went south. He nodded his head and kept on poking at the eggs. Well, that's a shame, but it'll be here for you if you feel up to it a bit later. He set the pan of eggs on an unlit burner and turned to face me, his expression slightly concerned. Don't think you're getting sick, do you? I shook my head, weighing different lies and excuses, but finally I decided this was as good of an opportunity as I was going to get to broach the topic of what I had seen the night before. I, well, I've just been a bit worried since last night. I saw you when you came back last night. My grandfather was nodding already, but I pushed on. I saw all of it, not just when you came back from the woods. I saw the woman you had. His expression didn't change at first, but after turning off the stove and taking a seat across the table for me, I saw a mixture of worry and sadness on his face. I thought you most likely had, and I know how something like that must look. I didn't want to frighten you by approaching you about it, and if I'm honest, I was hoping you had missed the first part. Not the way I wanted you to find out about all this.  Still, I was half afraid you'd be gone when I got up this morning, or that there'd be police out there. I know you can't trust me right now, but giving me the chance to explain means a lot to me. I nodded. His words were said in an even and reasonable tone, but I couldn't help but feel a dull dread growing in my stomach. A part of me had hoped he would deny everything and convinced me it was a dream or a mistake. Instead, he was confirming that it happened, and I'd be lying if I said he wasn't intimidating even in his kindest moments. He was very intelligent and half a foot taller than me, and the last couple of days had been proof enough that age had slowed him very little. Last night, he had carried that woman without any signs of real effort, carried her lifeless body out into the dark, come back to me. I know this is frightening. I can tell you that you have no reason to be afraid of me, but how much is that worth right now? Very little, I suspect. So let me explain as best I can. All I ask is that you listen to the entire thing. And if at the end of it, if you want to call the police or leave or whatever you think is best, I will fully cooperate. But I need you to hear the entire thing, because some of it is going to sound very strange at first. Okay? I leaned back in my chair, my head pounding. This was the point where I had to make a decision to give him a chance or not, whether to risk myself even more or not. On the one hand, I could run and call the cops. On the other, I could hear him out, and in theory, still do that if I didn't like or believe what he told me. Still, where did we put the tape? When he raised an eyebrow, I shrugged. I'll hear you out, but I want you taped to that chair before we start.  I could see the hurt in his eyes, but I pushed past it. I want to believe you, to trust you. But you know it's the smart thing to do on my end. He nodded. It is. I'm proud of you for thinking of it. I just hate it, it comes to that. But that's my fault, not yours. It's in the living room, I think on the table by the sofa. Standing up slowly, I backed into the living room and grabbed the tape, fearful for the five seconds he was out of sight. But he was waiting in the same spot when I came back in, and he sat still while I put layers of tape around his chest and arms, securing him firmly to the back of the wooden chair he sat in. Pausing for a moment to consider, I then wrapped the remaining tape around his ankles and the front chair legs just to be safe. The job done, I asked him if he was comfortable enough. When he said he was, I sat back down across from him, my hand sweaty and slightly shaking as I tried to give him a comforting smile. Sorry again, but I'm ready to hear everything you want to tell me. My grandfather looked off in the distance for a moment before focusing his dark blue eyes on me.  I nodded. Yeah, she said she was killed going to visit you at the hospital. You had been working on a patient for hours and she was bringing you some dinner.  Well, the last part was right. I had been working on a girl who had been shot in a hunting accident since early afternoon. The girl wound up living, but my sweet girl, your grandmother, she didn't get killed by a drunk driver. She was taken as she was getting out of her car at the hospital, brutalized and torn apart with what was left of her being found in a field ten miles away. His voice grew rough and crackled with emotion as he spoke. I didn't even know anything was wrong at first. But someone found the covered dish she was bringing me in the parking lot, dropped and broken. They figured out it was her car and then they came to me. I had just finished the surgery an hour earlier, but still had another five hours on my shift. So I went to take a nap, thinking she would wake me up when she got there. Instead, it was one of the admins asking if I had seen my wife that evening. He spread his hands out on the table, long fingered and steady even at his age, staring at them. He continued, your grandmother was a small woman, a good woman. Sure, things were safer back then than they are now, but it wasn't like no one ever got hurt, killed. Even in a smaller town like we lived in, it happened. But she had no real enemies and she was always careful when she traveled anywhere. My point is that no one would have easily gotten a jump on her.  I spent all night looking for her, terrified and half out of my mind. By the next morning the police were there with me. It was just before noon when they found her body in that field. I made the mistake of going to the scene. I had told myself that I was used to blood, to everything a body could show, and that I owed it to her to see how she died. It was beyond anything I imagined. One arm and the opposite leg had been torn completely off and her torso had been stretched to such a degree that, well, it didn't look like a person at all. And that was actually better because it made it seem unreal. But then I saw her long, light, brown hair. I'd always loved her hair so much and even attached to the shattered rune of her face. I knew it anywhere. It was remarkably clean compared to the rest, as though someone or something had taken great care not to mess up or soil that pretty hair. That thought is what broke me, I think. I don't remember much for the few days that followed. I know I was at her funeral, but I couldn't tell you anything about it. When I finally resurfaced from whatever stupor I was in, I was sitting at home with my brother and his wife. They were trying to keep me company. We were watching TV, I think. I wanted to scream at them, to yell and make them understand that this was all pointless now. That my life was over. That everything was over. So why were they trying to prolong things? Instead, I just told them that I appreciated their help and attention, but that I knew they needed to be getting back home and I needed time to myself. They wasted little time in packing and heading out. I spent the next day or so weighing various methods of suicide. I really had no interest in living in a world without her. I believe in God and I think suicide is a shame and likely a sin when done for such selfish reasons. But I was to a point that I didn't care.  I felt like I deserved it for letting this happen to her. But this led me down the path of dwelling on what had happened to her and what had caused it. Who had caused it? I set aside my idea of pills and ropes and self-inflicted gunshot wounds, got a shower and a shave. And I went down to the police station. Over the next few weeks, I continued to harass and harangue them, pushing them to do more while understanding there was little likely more they could do. They had looked for witnesses, there were none. They had looked for evidence of how the attack was committed and had only come up with injuries caused by indeterminate blunt and serrated objects. There were no cameras at the hospital until three years later, and this was before the age of cell phones to track. After bullying them with a threatened lawsuit, I obtained copies of all their photos and reports. I poured through them but found little more of note. The parking lot was paved so there were no tire tracks to follow, and no tire shoe tracks had been found near the field where she was killed. Something about the parking lot stuck out to me, but I wasn't sure what it was at first. After two days of looking at everything, it hit me. The hospital had a separate parking lot for doctors and surgical staff that was blocked by a mechanical arm and a keypad. Rebecca had the passcode so she had parked there when she was taken. The parking lot was on the far rear of the hospital, not visible from the road and without any hospital roads or pass, that would make it a thoroughfare for a casual passerby. What were the odds that someone had just happened upon her as they went by? Or decided to wait in a relatively small and quiet parking lot for hours until they had a chance to snatch someone? I decided it seemed unlikely. In retrospect, I know it was certainly possible I could have been wrong. But at the time I needed answers and I decided focusing on someone who worked in the hospital and or had access to the parking lot like my wife was the best course of action. Among all the complaints I might have had about the investigation of Rebecca's murder, I would never have made it farther without them. One of the detectives had pulled a tissue sample from under her fingernails and had sent it to be tested if they ever got something to compare it to. Understand this was 1986 and DNA testing was brand new. It wasn't even an option at the state crime labs at the time and the likelihood of that sample ever being of use was small to none. But I still had to actually file a lawsuit to get the sample back, so I could send it to Daniel Church, a friend of mine from med school that had gone on to work at one of the foremost labs for DNA in the country. He couldn't do tests for me officially, but he knew what I was going through and agreed to help as much as he could in an unofficial capacity. The main thing that he needed was viable samples from a suspect for comparison. Fortunately, that was the easy part. Hospital policy required all operating room doctors and staff to have semi-annual blood work both as a check for any substance abuse issues, as well as a screening mechanism for any potential infectious disease. After testing, the remainder of those samples were stored until the next round of tests six months later. The tests weren't all done at once, of course. But at any given time, there were 23 samples cooling in a fridge in the serology lab. So I pulled some from each of them and sent them to church. He called me two days later, his tone grave. He asked where I'd gotten so many samples so quickly, and what I was getting him into. I told him I wasn't getting him into anything. At most, he was running some DNA tests with no indication of who was being tested or why. And if anyone ever asked me, I hadn't seen or heard of him since we graduated 15 years earlier. I could tell he was still troubled, but after a long silence, he agreed to run the test. The next five weeks were excruciating. DNA testing was much slower back then, and I understood he was having to go slower than normal to do it in a clandestine manner. Still, every day I was constantly waiting for the phone to ring, and when it finally did, I could hardly hear church over the frantic thudding of my own heart. I asked him to repeat what he had said. The tissue you first sent is a match to sample 17. It's from that person or their identical twin. I thanked him and hung up the phone. I had sent him numbers instead of names on the samples, but I knew who's was who's by heart at this point. Sample 17 belonged to an orthopedic surgeon at the hospital, Marcus Salk. He was a chubby, middle-aged man that was always telling jokes and had a reputation as a good doctor. I didn't know him well, but I had always gotten along with him fine. Why would he do this? My first urge was to find him and torture him until he told me why. I could feel my rage building as the information soaked in. My mind racing to dissect any interaction we had ever had, any scrape of knowledge I had about him. I thought that he had come to the hospital about five years earlier, was unmarried, had a cat maybe? I realized how little I knew and how I needed to learn more before I committed to an act and either hurt the wrong person or gave them an unintentional means of escape. That's when I began studying Marcus Salk. I weighed my options for learning more about Salk. Trying to become closer to him personally was too risky, because if he was actually the man who killed your grandmother Rebecca, he would be looking at me closely for any signs that I suspected him. I was never an overly social person to begin with, so suddenly trying to buddy up to him would stand out. And I also didn't want to be tied any closer to a person that may soon go missing. Because even at that early stage, I was resolved that when I was sure who took Rebecca from me, I would kill them. In some ways, my lack of equivocation on that point made things easier to plan. But it also meant I had to be extra careful. For instance, using a private investigator to tail him was out. I couldn't have a third party knowing about my interest in Salk, not even Daniel Church at his name, and his involvement was a necessary evil. Also, what if the PI saw Salk doing something illegal and called the police? I understand how that sounds, but you need to remember that I had no idea what his motive was if he was the killer. Was it an isolated incident or part of something more? The brutality and the transporting of the body to the field pointed towards someone who had possibly killed before, but the inherent risk in taking someone from the place you work, even in a small and isolated parking lot like that, made me wonder if he was either an amateur or at very least impulsive. Also, being honest, I didn't want anyone between me and the person that took her away. That left watching him, myself. While I was no expert, I knew I would need three basic things. Opportunity, ability to observe and concealment. For opportunity, I slowly shifted my work schedule at the hospital to mirror that of Salk for the most part. This had to be done over the course of a month so I didn't arouse suspicion. Even then, it wasn't perfect, as I would be on call at times and I couldn't watch him constantly in even the best of circumstances. Still, I managed to develop a routine of watching him over 40 hours a week, which was the best I could manage by myself. As far as ability to observe, I bought the best binoculars and parabolic mic I could afford, along with some tools for getting into places if I needed to. Planning ahead, I also bought a 45 pistol, five bundles of rope and three rolls of tape, two knives and a stun gun. I wasn't planning to act yet, but I wanted to be prepared just in case. Obviously, I had to get these items over time and with cash only. Concealment was simpler but more expensive. I bought two older model cars that were cheap, reliable and common. I had to look at the number of cars before I found two that had no distinctive damage, trim or color combination that also weren't likely to break down on me. I then found four places to park them where they wouldn't be towed so long as they didn't stay in one spot more than a few days. As long as I rotated them a couple of times a week, everything was fine. I considered disguises but I saw too many pitfalls. If I got pulled over, it would look suspicious. If Salk saw and recognized me in some getup, it would alert him right away when coincidence might explain us intersecting otherwise. I also wanted to keep up with any similar killings that might have occurred and this was before the World Wide Web so that meant newspapers. I got a dozen subscriptions from a roughly 500 mile radius around and began pouring through them looking for murders and disappearances. By the time everything was in place, two months had passed from when I got the DNA results. The first night I set up down the street from Salk's house, I felt a stir of excitement mixed with my constant sadness and rage. The preparations of the last few weeks had preoccupied my thoughts somewhat, but it had done nothing to ease my sorrow or cool my anger. Sitting in the shadows on that quiet neighborhood street, I strained at every sound and movement like a racehorse waiting for the gate to drop. Just let me have something to confirm what this man had done so I could set to tearing him apart. But of course nothing happened that first night or the nights that followed. I would trail him from his home to the store, to the movies, to a coffee shop. Or a bored girl 20 years younger than him tried to gamely fend off his awkward flutations. Between the binoculars and the mic, I could see and hear a surprising amount. And as time went on, I got better at positioning myself at the best angles while hopefully staying in conspicuous. Three weeks in and I felt like I knew Salk fairly well. He seemed to be a lonely but harmless man that did nothing out of the ordinary. But of course, that was outside Salk. I needed to see what inside Salk looked like. I had explored the exterior of Salk's house one day when I knew he wasn't there a month ago and the safest place to enter seemed to be the back door. I had ordered a pick set and the same model lock as he had, a cheap four-pin lock with no security pins. I had actually read a book on lock picking when I was a kid, but I had been reading more lately in preparation for this. I practiced on the duplicate lock for hours, mainly using a small tension tool at the bottom along with a rake pick to trigger the pins. I knew the real lock would be keyed differently, of course, but with practice I could unlock the dupe in less than 30 seconds. I picked a rare night that he was working and I was not, and then I went to his house. Parking two streets over, I cut through backyards quietly, wincing at the bark of a nearby dog. As I crept across his yard and onto his back porch, I had an image of him popping out of the door with a shotgun lowered at his chest. I shook off the thought and crouched down at the door to begin picking. Every scrape of metal sounded enormous in the still night air, and I soaked my shirt with sweat and the two minutes it took me to open the lock. Without hesitating, I swung open the door and eased inside. The air inside was stale and cool, with a faint smell of cleaning agents and paint the only notable aromas. I was entering through the kitchen, which was very clean but also completely bare. No food, no furniture, not even appliances aside from an oven that looked rarely used. I knew the house should be unoccupied, but I still moved quietly and made sure that my small flashlight stayed well below any windows. Moving farther into the house, I found empty room after empty room. No furniture or boxes or decorations. Then I reached what I supposed was Salk's bedroom. There was a bare mattress on the floor and a tall standing mirror in one corner. The closet contained a handful of clothes that were the same things I saw him wearing every day. I saw something on the mirror, and I went back to it. It was a picture of Salk, ten years younger and fifty pounds lighter. He was at the beach with a woman, and they were in some kind of joking volleyball and jock pose. He looked like he was really happy in the picture, and it lit his. I heard the front door click and froze. It was unlikely it could be anyone other than him, and regardless, I didn't need to be caught in his house. I went to the second closet in the room, fearing I would find it full with items he regularly used. Thankfully, it was empty, and I eased the door closed a moment before he entered. I could see some through the levered closet door, the wooden slats providing the little slashes of vision as he moved around. My heart pounded as he opened the other closet and hung up his jacket before changing clothes. I found out later, he had asked for a half shift at the last minute, which explained how he was home six hours early. Apparently he had decided to make the most of his evening because he was dressing to go back out. In blue jeans and a t-shirt, he looked almost normal, except for when you saw his face. It was completely devoid of expression as he silently moved around the room. After putting on different shoes, he stood in front of the mirror, staring at himself, motionless. For several minutes, his stillness was almost mesmerizing. When he finally moved, I almost chomped. He was reaching for the picture, holding it closer and studying it before studying his own face again. His eyes went back and forth, back and forth. As a facsimile of the smile in the picture took form on his face. Watching the expression slow birth across his lips was weirdly grotesque, but worse was the realization that came with it. He was practicing. He was practicing how he should look when he smiled. As I watched Salk study himself in the mirror, I kept waiting for some sign he knew I was there, a glance in my direction or some indication he was preparing for a fight. But there was none. He continued to practice smiling for a few more moments and then he replaced the photo on the mirror and left the room. When I heard the front door open and shut again, I assumed he'd left, but even after I strained and heard what sounded like his car cranking up and driving off outside, I waited a couple of minutes before easing open the closet door. I was tight with tension, with every creak of the floor sounding like a gunshot in my ears. I crept to the back door, constantly looking around for some sign that Salk had silently doubled back to trick me into thinking he had left. But no, he seemed to truly be gone. Peeking out the back door window, I made my way out onto the back porch and across his yard. When I was back to my car, I drove around to a street and Salk's car was gone. I had no way of knowing where he had went, but I decided that was okay. While I didn't have definitive evidence he was a killer yet, the strangeness I had observed that night made the idea a lot more credible. Tired, I went home and tried to get some sleep with little luck. Two days later, I received one of my distant newspaper deliveries. A 20 year old girl had gone missing the night I had been in Salk's house and he had left for parts unknown. It was nearly 200 miles away from here, but based on the timeline of when she was last seen, he would have had plenty of time to get there if it was him. Even not knowing if he were to blame, I felt terrible. Responsible, if I had done better, been smarter, I could have stopped him already or at least tracked him so I would know if he had gone to the girl's town or not. As it was, I was left with continuing to observe that and trying to find out more about Marcus Salk from his past. I pulled his file in the admin office at the hospital and found that prior to coming to our town he had been at a hospital outside of Olathe, Kansas for a number of years. Not much other information behind his curriculum, Vitae, which contained nothing out of the ordinary for an orthopedic surgeon. Still, it gave me a jumping off point. I called the hospital in Kansas and worked my way to someone in human resources, telling them that I was with a large medical practice in Seattle that was considering extending an offer to a former doctor there and was checking through his references as part of the potential hiring process. The woman on the phone was friendly from the start, but I could tell there was a brief hesitation and change of tone when I mentioned the person in question was Dr. Salk. Well, I can put you in touch with the chief of staff if you want. He was chief back when Marcus was here too, so he can talk more about what kind of doctor he was. But I, well, I shouldn't say anything. Her desire to gossip was almost palpable. I understand, and I'm not trying to put you in a bad spot, but I don't want to make the wrong choice on the guy either, so anything you could tell me would be off the record. But it'd be a big help if you could give me any insight you have into him. There was a moment of contemplative silence, and then she went on. It's just, look, Marcus was a nice guy when he first came here, right? Joked around a lot, patients loved him. He had a sweet wife and he fit right in. Then him and his wife go on vacation to Europe one summer. This was six or seven years ago now. And when they got back, he was different somehow. Different how, I asked, trying to keep the intense curiosity out of my voice. I was supposed to be a mildly interested businessman, not an obsessed stalker. I could almost hear her shrug over the phone. I don't know how to describe it. He was still nice and would joke some, but it seemed forced. He was off from how he had been before. Within a few months, him and his wife were divorced and he had moved away. I guess he's on the move again. Yeah, we'll see. You've given me a lot of food for thought. Hey, was his wife okay?  I could sense her hesitating again, and I was worried I may have pushed for more than she'd give. Luckily, the gossip in her went out as she let out a small sigh. Yeah, I guess so. Bless her heart. She still lives around here, so I see her from time to time. She doesn't look happy though. I think Alicia really loved him and whatever came between them. I think it hurt her a lot. I could feel the rage building in me again as she spoke. Yes, losing someone you love like that, it kind of destroys you. I thank you. Thank you for your help. You've given me a lot to go on. Don't you want to talk to the chief? I gave a small laugh. I didn't feel, no, I think I got what I needed right here. Thank you again. When I hung up the phone, I sat with my head in my hands for some time. My thoughts were swimming in the blackness of my mind like pale, blind, cave fish. I would catch glimpses of their pallid scales and hear the occasional ripple or splash as they stirred the water. But these ghost impressions left me with little in the way of a solid idea or plan. The things that felt most real to me were my pain and my anger, and it was getting harder to hold them in check. Still, I had to be sure. I took a few days off and drove to Olafa to try and track down Salk's ex-wife. She wasn't going by her married name any longer, so the phone directory was of little use. I called the Kansas Medical Board and got a residential mailing address that he had never changed. This led me to a nice brick home in a small suburban neighborhood, not far from Salk's former hospital. As I went up to the front door, I could see that the paint around the door and on the shutters was peeling. And the air of disuse and being unoccupied grew so strong as I approached that I felt sure I was knocking at the door of an empty house. But only seconds after I knocked, a woman in her 40s opened the door. She looked at me warily as I fought down the urge to tell her that I knew In a way, it was true. She was the girl from Salk's picture. Swallowing, I pushed forward with my story. Hi ma'am, my name is Peter Elliott. I was hoping I could ask you a few questions about your former husband. I tried to smile and seemed non-threatening, but I could see her running the mental calculus of the likelihood I was a thief or rapist. After studying me farther, she nodded and stepped aside. Come on in, I guess, is Marcus in some kind of trouble. We stepped into a foyer cluttered with stacks of books and magazines. And as we spoke, she led me down a path to a living room that was even more filled with rows after rows of books. I gestured around, you've got quite the collection. She had moved a stack of newspapers off a worn looking sofa and gestured for me to sit down. She shrugged, looking disconsolate. I think I slipped from being a collector to a hoarder about two years ago. I need to clear all this junk out. She looked used up and small in her pale blue bathrobe as she sat down in an old recliner. Her sad eyes look thoughtfully distant for a moment before coming back to me. So is he in trouble. I smiled. I don't know yet, honestly. I'm just looking for him for an interested party. And my understanding is that the two of you were together for years. A brief look of pain crossed her face. Yeah, we were. Childhood sweethearts, if you can believe it. I thought we'd always be together. I leaned forward. If you don't feel it's too personal, can you tell me what changed? Did Marcus change? She picked at some dried skin on her lip nervously. She suddenly seemed very uncertain.  He changed all of a sudden. Do you know when or why? She nodded. Her eyes focusing on me as anger lit the edges of her face. I know exactly when. We had just come back from a trip to Europe. Something we had wanted to do since high school. Had a great time too. We had landed in Atlanta and were waiting for our connecting flight to Topeka. That's when he got sick. Got sick. Sick how? She shook her head. I don't know. He had gone to the bathroom near the terminal. And when he came back, he said he didn't feel well. His head and neck were hurting a lot. He felt nauseous. By the time we landed in Kansas, he said that it had passed. But she sighed. This is pointless.  I grimaced slightly. I will. Please. I can't go into detail. But this is really important. And I'll listen to anything you tell me with an open mind. She looked at me for several minutes. Again, weighing. Finally, she nodded and went on. He was different from that on. At first I thought he was just sick or jet lagged. Then I thought he was stressed or having a mid-life crisis. But those were all just excuses, really. Because I was thinking it from the night we got home from the airport. Thinking what? That it wasn't Marcus anymore. She held up a hand. I know how that sounds, believe me. But I knew that man. I had known him and loved him since I was 10. It was like whatever happened between us landing in Atlanta and taking back off. It swallowed him up. He still sounded like Marcus and I could see him trying to act like him. But it was wrong somehow. False. It felt like someone who knew a lot about Marcus was trying to impersonate him. She gave a harsh laugh. I swear to God, he even smelled different. I told my mother that and she set me up with a therapist right away. I didn't know what to do with all this. What she was saying was incredible in the literal sense of the word, but I found myself believing her. Even if she was wrong, I didn't think she was lying to me. So what are you saying? You don't think it was him anymore? What does that mean? I don't know, believe me. I've spent years wondering about it and I still don't know the answer. But something changed and it's not in the normal, oh people, change way. He was not right. I would see him sometimes when he didn't know I was around and he was entirely different. His face would be slack. His eyes would be dead. He looked like some kind of terrible doll. I thought about the night in the closet and suppressed a shutter. Was he ever violent or abusive towards you? She shook her hand. No, never, never said a harsh word to me. Actually had less of a temper than he had before but he'd always been sweet back when he was himself too. She rubbed it her eyes for a moment before continuing but it didn't matter. I tried talking to him about it at first, tried to see if I could help but when I finally accepted that it wasn't him anymore, I found myself just getting more and more withdrawn, more and more afraid of him. What made you afraid of him? She stood up, jamming her hands in her pockets of her robe as she began to pace around the open patches of floor in the room. Have you ever been to an aquarium with sharks? I nodded. You know how they'll swim by looking at you all calm and placid but you know that behind that black eye they aren't calm or placid.  That's the way I came to feel when Marcus was here. He would glide around me silently in the mornings and at night his eyes seeing and not seeing me at the same time and he was always calm, always grinning his fake shark grin and maybe it was my imagination but I felt like whatever hunger he had, it was growing and the glass holding him back was getting thinner. I realized I had been holding my breath and I let it out so you divorced him. She gave a small sad smile as she sat back down. Yes, it was very easy. I told him I wanted a divorce. He said that sounded just fine and he moved out the same day. Aside from signing papers in a lawyer's office, I never saw him again. Okay, but why did you stay here? Stay in the same house. Weren't you worried he might come back? Her smile grew slightly. Well, that's the thing, isn't it? On the one hand, yes, I'm scared of seeing Marcus showing back up one day but what if it was the real Marcus that came back? What if I had moved, changed my name, made sure he couldn't find me and then it was the real Marcus, somehow back as randomly as he was taken away and he came looking for me. What if he couldn't find me? Her voice grew thick at the end and I reached out to grasp her shoulder. I didn't have any real words of comfort or wisdom for her and being around her pain just reminded me of my own. Standing, I looked down at the girl that had once been Alicia Salk. It made me hate Marcus even more to see what he had done to her. I don't have any easy answers for you, Alicia. I just, I don't think that Marcus, your Marcus is coming back. I don't know if that helps or hurts you but maybe it'll make it easier for you to move on. She looked up, her expression bitter, it doesn't help and I know you mean well but I'd like you to leave. I nodded and headed outside. I turned to say goodbye but the door was already closed behind me. When I got back home the following morning I found a follow-up article on the missing girl. She had been found behind a middle school a few miles away from where she was abducted and she had been torn apart. Sound travels farther in cold weather. It's called refraction. Essentially the sound waves that are in the higher, warmer air that is farther from cold ground move faster through the more excited air molecules and get pushed back downward so sound gets amplified closer to the ground. I knew that at the time though I didn't learn the science behind it until later. That night I was just wondering how far away the screams of the little boy were coming from. It had been five weeks since I'd returned from Olafa and in that time I had found out little new beyond some information about the last girl who had been killed. A pretty blonde girl in her sophomore year of college she had two parents and a brother that the newspapers bled for grief and drama for a couple of weeks before moving on to the next tragedy but it wasn't over for them. It would never be over for any of us. It would have been an easy thing to add their imagined pain to my own and use it all as the justification I needed to end this now, to end him now. But for all my circumstantial evidence I had nothing definitive. Even the DNA from your grandmother's nails while compelling didn't eliminate any other explanation. And given what I intended on doing to him I needed to be sure. I had stayed busy in the intervening weeks both in surveilling Salk in my work as well as in more fully preparing for when I finally took him if it came to that. I purchased again slowly and with great discretion a variety of medical supplies and tools. I found an old moving truck from a defunct company that I got cheap with cash. The container body of that truck is where I set up Salk's room. I bolted a table to the floor and attached straps and chains to it. I attached lights to the interior corners of the container and added a row of shelves and a chair to one side. I even welded an IV stand to the wall so I could keep him fed with whatever cocktail of saline and drugs I needed to keep him alive. I planned on torturing him for a long time and I didn't want him dying from shock or infection. I told myself I was going to do all these things to get information, to get answers to the hows and whys of what he had done but that was only partially true. In my heart of hearts, I knew I was going to do it whether he gave me answers or not. I hated that part of myself but if I was going to control it, I had to accept it. So I prepared the room Salk would slowly die in while salving my conscience with the knowledge that I was being thorough and fair before I took him. Of course, that's not how things played out. One night, the night of the screams and so much more, I was watching Salk's house with a dull-eyed enthusiasm of a century who always guards the same post. I had been there for close to eight hours and was close to packing it up to go get some rest when Salk suddenly came out of his house and got in his car. This was strange for him. It was nearly eight in the evening and he never left the house after six except for the time I had been in the closet. The night the girl was taken. Feeling my pulse pounding in my head, I waited until he was almost out of sight and then I pulled out and began to follow him. We drove for well over an hour and despite the darkness of the hour and the other cars on the road, I couldn't help but feel conspicuous. I hung back as much as I dared but I couldn't risk losing him again. After going through town and traveling up the interstate over 80 miles, he got off in an exit full of rundown shopping centers and closed restaurants. At first, I thought he had a particular place he was headed but he just turned into the first large parking lot and began cruising through it at a low speed, even circling around the backside of what looked to be a defunct electronic store and a couple of clothing outlets. After he had made a complete circuit, he moved on to the next one and then the next. Once I understood what he was doing, it made it easier for me to hang back and observe. I would stay up near the street and park waiting for him to finish looking for whatever he was looking for before easing back behind him and into the next lot. It was nearly 10 now and many of the places were closed but there were still enough cars around that I should have been hard to notice at such a distance. That distance was a mistake. We were in the fourth parking lot and as I waited for him to come back around from driving the backside of the grocery store and smaller stores that made up this latest decaying shopping center, I realized I was taking too long. I put the car back and drive and eased around to the back mimicking the direction he had gone. As I turned the corner, in the distance I saw him shoving a boy of around 10 into the car. I began to speed up but he was fast and far away. By the time I reached where the boy had been taken, Salk was already pulling out onto some back road that led away from the lot. I followed, abandoning any pretense of stealth now. I worried that me chasing him could cause him to hurt the boy sooner rather than later but I had to take the chance. If Salk got away, the boy was going to die. The road we were taking was small and winding, leading through a neighborhood and then farther away from buildings and lights. My little spy car, while reliable, was not equipped with the best headlights or any great speed and it took all my concentration to keep to the road while not losing ground as I pursued them. We were 10 miles out of town now, fields of lightly frosted farmland reflecting the ghost glow of winter moonlight as we threaded our way through the darkness. We passed a home that was brightly lit with twinkling colored lights and molded plastic reindeer and it occurred to me that Christmas had been the week before and I hadn't noticed. Farmland began to give way to woods and I noticed with a rising panic that I was running low on gas enough to get back to town to get the boy help but just barely. This needed to end now. I stomped the pedal as far down as it would go and the car jumped forward with a protesting line. I wasn't sure how long I could maintain this speed without wrecking or the engine blowing up but I didn't need long. Gripping the wheel tightly, I readied myself as the nose of my car reached within a foot of Salk's back bumper. At the next curve, I moved into the left lane long enough to gain half a length more then swung the front fender of my car into his back tire. The effect was immediate. He began to spin out but then so did I. I tried to regain control of the car but it was too late. I jumped the shallow ditch on the right side of the road and then everything went dark. When I woke up, my car was somehow still running. Its hood crumpled from going head-on into a medium-sized maple tree. Judging by the car clock, only a few minutes had passed but that was more than enough time for Salk to get away. I tried to look out my window but it was fogged up beyond any visibility so I just opened the door and slowly got out. My head was swimmy and I had a small gash right hit my head on the steering wheel but otherwise I seemed okay. Studying myself against the car, I looked around and saw Salk's car wrecked in the far deeper left ditch 50 feet down the road. The front doors to the car were open and there was no sign of anyone. I started making my way up the road to the car and it didn't take long before I saw the drag marks leading away into the woods. I patted my pockets. I had my gun and a folding knife on me and that would have to do. Following the path wasn't hard at first with the moonlight throwing the thick ravines of ice, snow and dirt into sharp relief. As I got deeper into the woods, however the shadows and undergrowth began to slow my progress. That's when the boy began screaming. I picked up my pace again moving at a loping unsteady run as I tried to gauge direction through a combination of sight and sound. The boy's cries were becoming louder but they were also becoming more shrill and frantic as they moved from fear into terror. I pushed through a last thick stand of pines and then I saw why the boy was screaming. This is where I have to ask for your patience more than anything that's come before. I understand I'm giving you a great deal of detail to explain everything fully but despite the strangeness of much of it I don't know that anything so far has fallen entirely outside of what you understand as possible. This next part I will do my best to describe it but you need to understand that I will fail to really do it justice and it will sound unbelievable. Just try to bear with me as best you can. I pushed through those trees and stumbled into a small clearing the cold white moonlight shining down like a spotlight over the scene. The boy, he looked closer to eight now that I was closer was down on his back and trying to scramble away from the thing towering over him. The sulk was nowhere to be seen as for the thing itself. It stood on two legs and was half again as big as a man. From behind I could see its leg were digitigrade like the legs of a dog or cat though they reminded me more of rat legs. It had no tail I could see but just relatively small hips as it swiftly expanded into a large muscular torso. The back of the torso was largely covered with matted gray hair though it became patchy and seemed to transition into some kind of black chitin as it moved towards the head. I took all of this in quickly and while still moving forward slowly then it turned to face me. Its head was a strange mix of reptile and insect reminding me of a cross between a large beetle and a snake. A hard black shell hooded a long face set with burning yellow eyes and a mouthful of long curved teeth. The strangest thing about it was its arms. They were different from each other. One was heavy and thick made out of that same black material and shaped like some kind of savage club that tapered to a spiky lump at the end. The other was a slender furry hand with fingers that were long and almost graceful looking. Each tip punctuated by a hooked claw. As it regarded me, I involuntarily took a step back. My mind was having trouble reconciling what it was seeing. How was I supposed to deal with something like this? Still, I had to try. I fumbled and pulled the gun from my coat pocket, leveled it at the creature and fired. I saw the round strike just before hearing the wet thudding sound it made. The creature seemed unfazed. I fired again and again. I emptied 13 rounds into that thing and it didn't stagger, didn't bleed. It just took it without complaint. Then I realized it was making a sound after all. It was low at first and I couldn't identify it. When I did, I felt my bowels loosen. It was laughing. The sound was terrible, like wet meat and rocks being tumbled in an old dryer. But I could tell that's what it was. Whatever this thing was, it was laughing at me. I looked back to the child who had been transfixed by all of this and I yelled for him to run. I still don't know if that is what killed him and I try to tell myself he was going to die regardless. But as I yelled, the creature turned back to him and brought its massive club arm down on his stomach. The boy, well, he burst open. The arm was brought down a second and a third time but he was well dead before then. The force from the blow shattering his bones and sending jets of blood and ruined flesh shooting off in streams from the point of impact. The thing turned back to me, still laughing its awful laugh and I swear I could see that mouth of knives smiling at me. So I ran.  Over the sound of blood in my ears I could hear the terrible thudding crash of the monster pursuing me. I tried to go faster but my vision was beginning to swim and I found myself struggling to keep my feet. I felt more than heard its hot ragged breath on my back and I was turning to try to fight it off but suddenly I was flying through the air. Pain flared through my neck and shoulders as I struck something hard and then I was out again. When I came to, I was in a room of some kind. It looked like a basement with cinder block walls and the musty air of disuse. The room was fairly large stretching out into a darkness that was not illuminated by the single pool of light the overhead bulb afforded. I was tied in a chair, ropes at my wrist and ankles bungee cord around my chest. I tried to rock the chair but it was either very heavy or secured somehow because it didn't budge. Next I tried to listen for any sign of noise any clue as to where I was or who might be around. Nothing. Finally I went back to studying my surroundings peering into the dark for any farther information I could find. That's when I saw his eyes Salk's eyes were reflecting the light from the overhead bulb and as I stared into the blackness I could slowly make out his still form. He said nothing but after another few seconds of studying me he stepped forward into the light his eyes still fixed upon me. He was smiling and it looked very genuine. The reason you're alive in case you were wondering is I need to know what you know and who you've told. Salk's voice had lost any forced jocularity that I was used to hearing the times we intersected at the hospital. He stood in front of me hands on his waist and the unpleasant smile still on his lips as though he was getting ready to punish an unruly child and savored the idea. I understand you can lie and I understand that torture is not foolproof but I have to try, don't I? I looked up at him fear and rage warring in my heart.  I know you killed Rebecca. Salk gave me a fake wince as I said her name. Yeah, that was not my best choice. I knew that taking someone from where I worked was risky but I needed someone and she was just there, like a gift.   He smiled again and I was reminded of Alicia comparing him to a shark. He was apt but let's move past that. What do you really know? I felt my jaw clenching as anger went out.  I've told you the only thing that's important.  Dead eyed and silent. He bent down and began pulling off my right shoe. I tried to struggle briefly but I didn't budge. I needed to save my energy for when I could make it count. My left wrist seemed to be slightly looser. Salk reached back into the pool of darkness surrounding us and I heard the sound of metal being drug across concrete a moment before the hammer came into view. He brought the hammer up to my face for a moment but he didn't ask another question. Instead he brought the head of the hammer down on my right pinky toe with enough force to burst the flesh and pulverize the bone. I know I screamed but I don't remember it. I was too concerned with the bomb going off in my head as the pain reached my brain. I felt myself slip towards blackness and then back out again. My head was spinning as I gasped for breath and I realized I was flailing and voluntarily as though my body had decided it was time to escape regardless of any plan I might have. With great effort I slowed my breathing and movement. It was hard to think about anything but the pain but I had to try and hold on. I couldn't see my foot but I could tell from the force and the spray of blood that it shot across the floor into the dark that the toe was crushed if not torn off completely. That meant I would be slower if I had to run but it might possibly make my foot easier to slip free if I didn't black out. Of course, that was always assuming he ever left me alone long enough for me to try before he had broken me too badly for it to matter.  His expression still blank but his voice cold and angry. Pay attention, this is your next chance. What else do you know? I knew I needed to cooperate at least partially to minimize any danger and slow things down.  I don't see how you could be but who knows? That's what else I know. He nodded, so you don't know much it sounds like if you're telling the truth which you probably aren't but still a good start. He suddenly slammed the hammer down again on my foot a bit farther in. My world exploded into red and black and this time I heard myself screaming for a moment before I blacked out.  His eyes rolled towards me when I opened mine but he didn't move yet. Just stood there, statue like, watching me for a while as I tried to get my thoughts together. When he spoke, his voice was still flat but sounded lighter as though he was happier than he had been before. Glad to see you're back. You're down three toes now I'm afraid. In my expert opinion, they're beyond saving. His gaze flicked down to my feet for a moment. Two of them are pretty much not there anymore if I'm honest but hopefully this is making my point. This is how much I hurt you when you cooperate. Imagine how much worse it'll be if you don't. I know how to break nearly every bone in your body without you dying from it quickly.  He waved the hammer towards my feet like the scepter of a bored king. Seem like a pleasure. I was barely listening to what he was saying. I was too focused on trying not to look at his bloody finger. I had been watching him closely since I first woke here and I hadn't seen any signs of him being faster or stronger than I would expect. If he typically hid some pre-natural strength or agility, it seemed unlikely he would hide it now, particularly when he was trying so hard to frighten me. But it wasn't much hope by itself. Even normal Marcus Salk was perfectly capable of torturing and killing me as he was to say nothing of that monster I had seen, whether it was tied to Salk or somehow spraying from the man himself. But then when I woke up, as he gave his best intimidating monologue and waved his hammer around, I saw it. His right index finger was bleeding. That was the hand he was using to hold my foot when he hid it. That told me two things. First, he wasn't especially coordinated. Second, he could still be heard. Ready to answer my next question? His voice remained lifeless, but it still had that lighter almost merry edge to it. He was enjoying himself. I nodded, making a point of moving slower and more warily than I felt. Yes, water, please. I rassed my voice as much as I could, which wasn't hard in my current condition. It was hard to see what Salk was thinking, his face and emotionless mask as he seemed to consider my request. I felt my heart sinking as several seconds seemed to pass. Then his eyes shifted up in what might have been a look of exasperation. Fine, be right back. Don't go anywhere. He turned around and moved into the dark. A door opened and a light came on in the adjoining room. I could see much more of the basement now, including stairs at the far end that he had not taken. That meant there was water down here and he would soon be back. I frantically began tugging at my left arm, ignoring the pain and protest of my wrist as I yanked and twisted with all my strength. I had been right. The rope on my left wrist had some play in it, but I wasn't sure it was enough. I started sawing the rope back and forth across my wrist quickly instead. And within a few seconds, I saw blood beginning to well around the rope. At the same time, I was aware of the light turning back off in the adjacent room as Salk returned. After a frantic motion to smear the blood more thoroughly on the rope, I gave a last pull to free my wrist. I felt something pop in it, but the blood had provided enough lubrication that it slipped free just as Salk stepped back into the light. Good, just in time. Seriously. His voice was still too strangely flat to convey sarcasm well, but he punctuated it by throwing the glass of water he had brought in my face. He sat the glass itself down on the floor and then bent forward, gripping my left arm roughly with his left hand as he began undoing the rope around the chair arm with his right. This is what I was waiting for. I knew he favored his left hand and that he would favor it more with his right one injured.  An adult human male can bite down with over 200 pounds of pressure. Given the proper placement and force, it's more than enough to rip out the left internal and external carotid arteries in one bite. I had thought of the best angle if I got the chance, but I couldn't waste time trying to be perfect. In one movement, I leaned forward and down and then shot my face up into his neck. My mouth is wide as I could make it. Distracted with my arm and the rope, he couldn't react in time. I clamped down, grinding my teeth together as I felt skin, muscle, and then tendons give way. I shook my head as I pulled him towards me and I felt the arteries begin to shred as new volumes of blood sprayed down my throat and out into the room around my lips. I still didn't let go, but I realized that Salk had been squealing, not really struggling or fighting back, just squealing like a dying animal. I didn't even hear it until it started to fade away. As his body went limp, the weight of it did the rest of the work for me and with a wet snap, I was left with a mouth full of the man's throat as the rest of him crumpled to the floor. I spat it out and began working to get free. Even with my injured wrist, it didn't take long. I kept an eye on Salk the entire time. He had lost more blood than any person can lose and live, but I had seen too much already that night. When I was free, I took the hammer and beat his head until there was very little left. When there was no question about him coming back, I began to explore the basement. The room next door was actually a full living space with a cot, a small kitchenette and a bathroom. I found some bandages and antiseptic doing the best I could to protect my foot in the short term. Salk had been telling the truth. The last two toes on my right foot were gone. After I was done with first aid, I began looking for any information that Salk could have left behind, any clues about what was actually going on, what that creature was, but there was nothing that I could find. I felt my strength waning as the adrenaline started to wear off so I got to work getting out of there. I quickly pilfered his pockets and found his keys as well as my own. Moving up the basement stairs, I found the door at the top was locked, but after a tense moment, I found the key on Salk's key ring. I tried to move quietly as I went upstairs, images of that terrible creature in the woods filling my head as I hobbled along. I was in a small ranch house and when I opened the exterior door, I saw my battered little spy car outside. Apparently, Salk had been forced to take it when his was wrecked and by some miracle had it actually made it this far. I hoped it could make it a bit farther. Standing in the doorway looking out, I saw I was out in the middle of nowhere. There was a dirt road leading away into the distance, but no sign of other lights from houses or cars. I could tell that the sky was starting to lighten as dawn approached, but it was of little comfort at this moment. Aside from the terrible pain, I also felt exposed in this strange place where anything could be lurking about. I quickly went back inside to spread around the contents of a gas can I had found in the basement, making sure to saturate anywhere I had traveled in Salk's body as I went. Going back outside, I tried my car and it cranked up with a groaning wine so far so good. I had actually forgotten to find something to light the gasoline in my adult state, but the cigarette lighter from the car and a scrounged up piece of paper from my floorboard did the trick and in a few minutes I was driving away. Having no clue where I was, I saw the tracks on the dirt road seemed to show Salk had come from the right, so that's the direction I headed back in. Driving was awkward as the car had no cruise control and I couldn't use my right foot to accelerate. Thankfully it was an automatic and while it wasn't comfortable, that inconvenience was the least of my worries. More troublesome was my consciousness which was dipping in and out as I drove. Gritting my teeth, I bumped my right foot against the interior of the car lightly, the surge of pain making me groan but bringing me back for the moment. I had a panic fought and looked down at the gas gauge remembering how low I had been before the wreck. Apparently Salk had to stop and get gas to get me all the way out here because now there was over half a tank. I had the unironic thought that it was a lucky break and then I started crying.  I sat there in my dingy little spy car for some time weeping. Part of it was the physical and emotional toll of the last few hours but most of it was because it was over. Salk was finally dead.  I had meant it. The monster, the mystery, none of that mattered. He had taken my life from me, my sweet wonderful baby and now I had ended him. But while that was a relief in one way it terrified me and another. For months I had been preoccupied with studying Salk with preparing my revenge. Now that it was done I found myself standing at the edge of my black despair. The ground weakening under my feet as the new reality set in. I had nothing left to do. Nothing left to live for. Salk had taken my gun and knife but there was still a box cutter in the glove compartment. I took it out and held it for a while testing its feel in my palm and the accompanying idea in my mind. It was tempting but I kept thinking of what Rebecca would want me to do and of that terrified little boy in the moments before he died. I wasn't done. I couldn't even say whether or not killing Salk had killed the monster or if it was still out there and I hadn't come this far to quit on any of it. Myself included. I cranked back up and drove on hitting pavement in a small town with a hospital nearly three hours from home.  Just stop. He frowned and nodded.  I stood up and began pacing to try to rid myself of some of the nervous energy I had been accumulating.  Is that the short version? I realized I was yelling but I didn't care. My grandfather opened his mouth to respond but I talked over him.   I paused to take a breath and seeing the abject sadness on his face I forced a calmer tone. How does any of that explain what I saw last night? What you did to that woman? I was getting to it. There's a lot you still don't understand. I shook my head. No, what you're saying doesn't make sense. I get that you've been through a lot I do and maybe you can't see how crazy some of this stuff is but if you really believe all this stuff you need help but I can't know what kind of help you need until I know what you've done. I tried to prepare myself for the question I had been dreading asking all morning, grandpa, did you kill that woman? He met my gay solemnly looking older in that moment that I had ever seen him. I did, but again there's more to it. I raised my hand. Sure, aside from Sulk and that woman, have you killed other people? He nodded, not even trying to explain farther at that point. How many? His eyes didn't leave mine. That woman makes 87. I felt my knees going as I stumbled back against the kitchen counter. What? How? Why? He looked dejected. I've been trying to tell you why. It's not an easier quick thing to explain. I dug into my pocket as he was talking. Yeah, I guess not. Pulling my phone out, I tapped out 911 and hit call. After a moment of silence, I heard it ring and then a woman's voice was on the line. 911, what's your emergency? My throat was suddenly dry as a bone. My grandfather sat silently staring at me from the table without protest, just watching. I finally managed to croak out. I think there's been a murder out here. I think my grandfather killed someone. The 911 operator wanted me to stay on the line, but I told her I needed to go, that I would be looking out for the patrol cars, hanging up my phone. I stuffed it back into my pocket and looked again at my grandfather, who still sat silently staring at me. Okay, this is your last chance, for real. They're on their way. You need to tell me what's going on right now before they get here. We can still fix this or at least help it. I need to understand what you've done. He glanced at the clock up on the wall and then back at me. It's better we wait, actually. It shouldn't take them more than 10 minutes to get here, likely less. I wouldn't get very far in that amount of time and you need to hear everything for you to understand any event. He smiled at me. We'll just wait till they've left and we can continue if you want. I was confused and frustrated. Grandpa, if they come here and find that body, they're going to be taking you when they leave. There won't be any more story time. Maybe you need to go with them if what you're saying is the truth, but I'm trying to help you. Talk to me before you have to talk to them. He gave a laugh. I know you're doing what you think is best, Jason. I appreciate it. If I were in your shoes, I'd probably do the same thing, but don't worry about me. Everything is going to work out just fine. I wanted to protest more, but what was the point? Instead, I just stood by the counter, my gaze roaming between the window and the floor. I couldn't look at him anymore. I felt myself feeling more and more guilty and disquieted by his reaction to me calling the police and I tried to stop second guessing myself. I had done the reasonable thing after listening to hours of his insanity and I needed to remember that. There they are. I looked up to see my grandfather looking out the window and as I followed his gaze, I saw three sheriff's deputy cars pulling up outside. I went to the back door in the kitchen and opened it calling for them to come around that way. They asked me to step outside and tell them what was going on, which I did, focusing most on the large, mustached man who was doing most of the talking. Hey, thank you for coming. I, well, my grandfather, I saw him last night moving a woman's body out of his car and carrying it into the woods. I talked to him about it this morning and he was telling me all kinds of crazy stuff and he admitted to killing that woman. I don't know what really happened, but I'm worried he's had some kind of break. He's close to 80 and he's still real sharp, but I broke off as the lead deputy raised his hand. Hold up, son. Is this Dr. Barron we're talking about? He's your grandfather. I nodded. Yeah, he is. He's, he cut me off again. Okay, where is he now? I wasn't sure what to make of his reaction, but I turned it pointed to the house. He's in there. I've got him tied to a chair in the kitchen. When I turned back, the two backup deputies had guns drawn on me. The deputy mustache pointed a finger in my face. You stay here. Anyone else in there with him? I shook my head in stunned silence. Glowering at me, he pulled his own gun and moved towards the door going into the kitchen. The two deputies outside guarded me like I was Hannibal Lecter, their eyes flicking nervously to each other as they waited. After several minutes, I heard footsteps and turned to see my grandfather coming out of the house in front of the deputy. He was smiling and talking with the other man in low tones. My stomach clenched. As I noticed the deputy had put away his gun. What was going on? Mustache gestured to the other two deputies. You can stow your guns for now, boys, but keep them ready. We've still got some things to sort out. He turned to me, his expression hard. So your grandfather explained that he gave you a prescription for, he pulled a brown pill bottle out of his pocket to read the label, clenazepam. Just 10 pills because you were having a lot of stress and trouble sleeping, what with being back at your deceased parents' home and all, which is understandable. He had handed the bottle to my grandfather and now had his thumbs hooked in his gun belt.  I started to respond, but he raised his hand. Pardon, the less you say right now, the better. You listen instead. Your grandpa is a good man, a respected doctor. Ever since your parents moved to the area, he's made a point of coming around and helping out this community as he could even though he lives hours away. And that's good for you. He said, pointing his finger at me again, because he's convinced me to not lock you up today if you act right. He tells me that, what was that word? My grandfather smiled, Benzodiazepines. He supplied helpfully. Mustache nodded, yeah, that. That it can sometimes cause nightmares or hallucinations.  He paused, looking hard at me to accentuate his point. So how does that sound to you?  I tried to keep myself from yelling, no, that doesn't sound good. I haven't taken any pills, he's lying. Deputy Mustache shook his head, sport. The problem there is I counted the pills and two are missing just like Dr. Barron said they would be. And that prescription is in your name.  I know what I saw. He carried a woman out into the woods. He admitted to me that he killed her. My grandfather stepped forward and headed off the deputy's angry response. Look, it might help him accept that it was just the drug. If you go ahead and look in the woods, show him there's nothing there. I know it's a hassle, but Mustache was already nodding and smiling at him. No, no, doctor, it's fine. You feel up to coming with us. Sure thing. Jason, you wanna lead the way? My grandfather grinned and tipped me a wink. I led the deputies in the direction he had carried the woman, walking as far from my grandfather as I could. I kept imagining him suddenly attacking one of the deputies and getting his gun or bolting off into the woods. But he strolled along as calm and pleasant as if we were on a midday stroll. I could tell the deputies were barely looking around, but honestly, there was very little to see. To their credit, they went along with me for close to two hours before I gave up. I don't think he could have carried her out farther than we went in the time he was gone the night before and there was no trace of anything. As we headed back towards the house, my grandfather was suddenly beside me, patting me on the shoulder with his big, strong hand. I stifled a yelp and tried not to flinch away. Acting more crazy wasn't going to help anything at this point. See, he whispered to me, I told you it would all be okay. 10 minutes later, the deputies were gone after making my grandfather promise he would call them if there was any more trouble. Any more trouble from me, the crazy druggy. As soon as they were out of sight, I turned on him. How did you do that with the pills? He looked a little sheepish, his hands in his trouser pockets as he shrugged. It wasn't hard. I came up the day before you did. When I went into town, I ran across that woman at a gas station. From that encounter, I knew I would be hunting while I was here. So I went ahead and called in the prescription for you on the night voicemail of the pharmacy so it wouldn't be filled until the day you arrived. When we went by the grocery store, I picked up the prescription and kept it tucked away in case I needed it. After last night, I moved it to a kitchen drawer so it'd be ready. What? Ready for what? Why did you get the pills in the first place? Now he looks slightly disappointed. Well, for this, what we just did, he gestured around to where the deputies had been moments before. It was a calculated risk that you might see or hear something if I took that woman while we were here and I needed a way of explaining what you saw if you called the police. A bad dream from a drug side effect seemed a good solution. I began to pace. My fists clenched at my side.  Not crazy. Just stressed and taking a legally prescribed medication that didn't sit well with you. Better than them thinking I'm some kind of serial killer. I stopped, turning to scream at him.  What do you think you are? He shook his head. I don't think it needs a name, really. I look at it like hunting and the people I hunt hardly deserve to be counted as human. When I kill them, they're not even entirely human biologically and they are certainly far removed from any moral or spiritual definition of the word, but serial killer. No, that term carries way too much baggage. And while technically correct in some ways, I think looking at me as a hunter is far more apt. I started to respond, but he continued. Look at it this way. In some parts of the world, sometimes you have a lion or a bear go bad.  He chuckled.  So the local people have to get together and hunt the bad animal down because that animal is an anomaly. It's not natural. And by killing it, the people aren't just saving themselves, they're restoring balance. He gestured towards the woods where he had carried the woman. These people I kill. They aren't really people anymore. There's a lot more I need to explain to you, but the short answer is they are unnatural and they are tied to things terrible beyond your wildest dreams. Looking up at the sky, he took a deep breath. Jason, I know this is all hard to believe. And I know you don't know me as well as you should. That's my fault. I tried to be a good father, but your mother was grown when Rebecca died. And to my shame, I was selfish in my grief. I isolated myself much of the time from her and your father and from you. If I hadn't, you'd likely trust me more now. He looked back at me, his eyes glistening, but I was trying to do good. I still am trying to do good. And my hope is you'll come to see the value in it. If you can be patient and listen to all I have to say and see what I have to show you. I felt so tired. I wanted to believe him, but how could I? I didn't know what to say anymore. Finally, I muttered, what are you gonna show me? Where you hid that poor woman's body? He shook his head, smiling ruefully. Oh no, that woman's body doesn't exist anymore. Literally, at least not here. Noticing my confused expression, he waved his hand. Sorry, he ain't gettin' ahead of things. Let me tell you about that woman, but after that, if you're willing, I need you to go with me on a little trip. The wind was picking up and I suppressed a shiver. Trip, to where? The afternoon sun was high in the sky and shining down through the trees overhead, it left my grandfather dappled in shifting patches of light and shadow. He looked strange in the penumbra, both young and old, menacing and beneficent at the same time. I could see him grinning at me when he spoke, to where I study them. Like I was telling you outside, I first ran into that woman you saw me toting into the woods at a gas station in town. That was the afternoon before you got here. Bear in mind I'm trying to focus in on the past few days and wait to tell you all the rest when I can show you things as well, but there's some things I need to explain as we go so it will make more sense. For instance, how I can tell an outsider, that's what I call them for reasons that will be clear in time from a normal person. When I bit out Salk's throat, I must have swallowed close to a quart of his blood in the process. I didn't think about it at the time, but it's the best explanation I have for what happened next. I went for nearly two months after killing him without reading about any strange murders or having any indication that the creature I had seen was still out in the world. I was starting to think that it was either truly over and some things would just remain a mystery or at the very least my ability to intervene had ended with my lead on Salk. Then one day I was walking down a hallway at the hospital when I passed an old man. He appeared to be there visiting someone and was coming out from the downstairs cafeteria as I was about to go in. There was nothing remarkable about him at all and as our eyes met at a distance, he gave me a polite nod and kept moving forward. But within two more steps of him, I was hit with a painful wave of nausea. My first thought was that I was just sick and the first symptoms were hitting, but then moments later I felt fine again and I looked to see the man had moved past me by a little more than the distance that we had been when I first felt sick. I pondered it for a moment and then decided to follow him. He had meandered into the nearby gift shop to peruse the handful of magazines and crossword puzzle books on offer amid the stuffed animals and overpriced snacks. I waited a few seconds and then entered behind him, careful to stay out of his line of sight. I edged closer. Again, when I got within about five feet of him, I was struck with nausea, not nearly as strong this time, but very distinct and unpleasant. I tested it several times, moving back and forth out of the invisible demarcation between well and unwell. It was as regular and reliable as flipping a switch. Something in Salk's blood had stayed with me and become a huge asset in my work. Whenever I get close to one of those things, these outsiders, I feel that same familiar sick feeling. The range varies, but it's definitely grown over time to an average of about 20 feet. The first time is always bad, though I've grown accustomed to it enough that it isn't incapacitating. After the first time I make contact with one of them, from then on it's much weaker, though it never goes away entirely. And the feeling is unique to that particular outsider. Every first encounter with a new one is always strong. So going back to the other day when I encountered the woman, I was picking up some candy in the gas station, debating on whether I wanted to just eat junk food that night or actually get some kind of substantial dinner, and that woman walked past me on the next aisle over. I knew right away what the feeling I got was and the store was empty enough, it was easy to tell where it was coming from. Of course, I didn't react in any way. I've been doing this for a long time and I learned years ago to be careful and you never tip your hand to one of them. Surprise is one of the few advantages we have so it should never be squandered. Instead, I waited and listened. When she went up to the counter to pay for some kind of soft drink and chips, I heard the conversation between her and the cashier. They knew each other. Apparently went to church together. That meant she was local so she would be easier to find later. As I pretended to look at a bag of chocolate covered peanuts, I looked out the window to the only other customer car in the parking lot. It was a gold colored sedan. With some kind of back window decal I couldn't make out from that angle. I waited. Hearing the cashier call the woman Susie as she said goodbye. Putting down the candy, I picked up another brand and made a show of studying the nutritional information on the back which was a horror in and of itself. Susie was slow pulling away but when she finally did, I saw two more things. The window decal was for Mid Creek Community College which was only 20 miles away from here. And she had an educator tag on her car. Smartphones as disturbing as they can be in some regards are wonderful tools for the things I do. Obviously any internet research or phone calls I make in connection with hunting is done with what they call burner phones but they have come a long way, haven't they? Before I left the gas station, I had already found her picture and all. Susie Averredi, Associate Professor of Economics at Mid Creek Community College. A couple of more searches and I had her home address. When I went out last night, I went to her home first but no one was there. Next I drove by the college but there was no sign of her car there either. Then as I was coming back through town, I saw the gold sedan at that late night diner near the interstate. Slowing down, I could see her inside at a booth eating some kind of waffle as she sat by herself. That is the hardest part, Jason. You see these people, these things, living their public lives, showing their external face. If you're doing it right, they don't even know you're watching them and they seem vulnerable, mundane, human. It is easy to forget that the woman sitting alone in the dingy diner, morosely gnawing on a waffle late at night, well, she isn't really a person, not entirely. At best that's only part of the truth and the only part, well, believe me, if you ever let yourself forget the other part, you're liable to wind up dead. So you have to close yourself off from feeling sorry for them or seeing mercy as some kind of virtue. That kind of thinking almost killed me twice early on in all this and while it's the hardest lesson to learn, it's also one of the most important. I parked across the road from the diner in the shadow of a rundown pawn shop that had gone belly up years earlier from the look of it.  I followed her and soon it was clear she was most likely going home based on her route. It was an educated guess, but worth the risk to get the jump on her. I turned off to take a different slower route, making up the time and distance with speed and getting to her house three minutes before she did. From all signs, she lived alone and I had unscrewed her porch light before she pulled up. As she was reaching into her purse for her house keys, I stepped out, slamming the syringe into her neck and pushing in the mixture it contained all within a couple of seconds. She made a small noise of surprise and flailed around for a couple of seconds, but she was already lost. The cocktail I give them contains a mixture of sedative and paralytic and for the most part they're on the ground within 10 seconds. The trick is managing the dosage and judging how much time you have. The right dose is enough to put a normal person into a coma or respiratory failure, but an outsider will push through it and come to in around an hour. As much as they share human frailties when you catch them by surprise, if you aren't done moving them and dealing with them before the time runs out, well, you better be ready with another dose or you have a major problem. But with her, everything went smoothly enough. I loaded her into the back of my SUV, brought her back here and I had her in the woods all within 45 minutes. Then I just had to finish her off. I know that sounds cold. It felt very cold to me the first few times I fought about it in those terms, but when you see the things they do, it's not all brutal killings like Salk would do. Many of them are far more clever and insidious. When you face the realities of that kind of evil, your sensibilities start to change quite a bit.  At the best and worst of times, it becomes righteous. And that's one of the dangers too. You have to understand these things to kill them, but you have to keep yourself separate too. When I perform a surgery, I want the patient to live very badly, but I can't let myself care about them or worry at a personal level. That emotion would get in the way, making me hesitate or make a mistake. It's the same thing with this. You cannot do this out of a sense of revenge and you can't let yourself become like the thing you're hunting. In any case, the best and cleanest way to kill an outsider is to destroy what I call the seed. All of them, when they are alive and for a short while after they are dead, have this small black, well, it looks like a pebble usually. It's tucked just beneath the left hippocampus most of the time. The hippocampus, as you may know, is part of the temporal lobe of the brain and is tied to creating memories as well as complex emotions. I have a theory, that's why the seed is so close by. It makes it easier for it to influence the outsider's perceptions and reactions to things. That's also why when the pretense is not needed, such as when I was in Salk's closet or when he had me tied up, they're quick to revert to an almost emotionless default state. But we can talk more about all that later. For now, back to the point.  It may take three or four tries, but a moderately powerful cordless drill works just fine with some weight applied to pushing it in and assuming you have a long enough drill bit, of course. The seed itself is fairly fragile and when the bit hits it, it will shatter. Then something remarkable happens. There's a low vibration that you can feel in the air. It reminds me of the rumble hum you feel in a subway station sometimes and then the body is just gone. More accurately, it collapses in on itself like some kind of dying star, but it is too fast to see with a naked eye. I've managed to catch some evidence of it on special cameras, but for reasons that will be explained, that's a difficult process in and of itself. But when it goes, it all goes. The body, the clothing it was wearing and anything else that is inorganic and on it or inside of it. I've taken to leaving the drill in when I hit the seed as it removes the need for me to dispose of a bloody tool later. Even the blood from the drilling, if it is still physically connected to the body, will all go away. That's why I make sure to drill through a folded up towel. If I keep pressure on and do it quickly enough, I can finish with no trace of the person ever being there at all. That being said, my grandfather stopped. His face looking concerned and angry as he looked out the window. We were in the living room now and as I turned to look outside, I saw a pickup truck flying up the road to the house. It was hard to see in that distance and speed, but it looked like several people were in the bed of the truck, all of them wearing hoodies and mask.  Apparently someone at the sheriff's office is part of the house and figured out who you were talking about when you said I had a woman last night. I was standing myself now, looking between the road and my grandfather, feeling more and more bewildered. The house? What? My grandfather shook his head, the house of the claw. It's a cult. They're human, but very deadly. No time to explain now. We running or killing. Your call. I could barely breathe. Running? He nodded, reaching under the chair he had been sitting in to pull out a semi-automatic pistol. Fair enough, stay close to me and don't stop unless I say so. We're going for the truck. Now go. We headed to the kitchen, my grandfather gesturing for me to keep low, flinging open the exterior door. He glanced outside and then beckoned for me to follow. We weren't very far from his SUV, but we still had to round the corner of the house and I could hear the pickup sliding to a halt in the front yard. We moved to the corner of the house and stopped, my grandfather turning to whisper to me. Here's the key fob. When I say go, you do three things. First, you unlock the doors with a fob. Second, you count to two. Third, you run to the passenger side and get in and down. Got it? I nodded, my hands trembling as I took the fob from him. Good. Go. I unlocked the car, wincing internally at the loud honk it gave as the locks disengaged. But then I realized no one was going to pay much attention to it with my grandfather shooting at them. It occurred to me that I wasn't counting so I bolted after what felt like two seconds and made it around to the passenger side. I felt a moment of sharp panic as my hand fumbled at the door latch before getting the door open. Once inside, I tried to ball into the floorboard as much as possible. I had just enough time to take in the smells of the SUV, a mixture of my grandfather, some kind of oil and a metallic scent before he was opening the driver's door and getting in. Without saying anything, he punched the ignition button and threw the SUV into gear. I heard two more gunshots and something made a loud pinging on the outside of the car but we kept going. And as I eased up into the seat, I saw that we were clear of the yard and headed down the road. Looking back, I saw three of the four men clustered around a fourth that was on the ground but still moving. My grandfather looked over at me, you hurt? I shook my head, I'm fine, what about you? What happened? Nah, I'm fine. I think I got a couple of pellets of buckshot in my leg but it was from a ricochet, nothing major. He gave me a tight smile. As for what happened, I shot two of them, one in the arm and one in the leg. Can't risk killing them at your parents' house or anywhere they can be linked back to us. What? Why? They already know who we are. He took a turn down a sandy dirt road and gave me a shrug. They do, but they're likely the only ones that do. Turning to glance behind my seat, he nodded to himself. Look, while we talk, I need you to do a couple things. Grab the box of stuff behind your seat. You should also see a small blue bag behind mine. Get both of them up here with you if you can. I did as he asked, pulling a medium-sized cardboard box up to find it contained six glass jars with sealable lids. The jars were all full of nails and ball bearings. I thought about asking questions, but I knew there was no time. He'd tell me what I needed to know. I found the blue bag where he said it would be. It contained a variety of items and as I look through them, he told me what to use. There were little rolls of taped up face towels on the bag and following his instructions, I unwrapped three of them to find small glass vials with rubber stoppers in the middle. The vials contained some kind of fluid, but he told me to be careful not to open the vials. Instead, I was to slide them gently into the middle of the nails and bearings in three of the jars. After I did so, he told me to take a specific plastic bottle from the blue bag and squirt it on the metal in the jar until the three prep jars were two thirds full of the liquid too. Then I had to screw the sealed lids back on. When I was done, he gave me a grin. Congratulations, you've just made nail bombs. Now be very careful with them. Don't drop one and try not to tip them over. We'll need them in a few minutes. His cautions made me feel queasy. Why will we need them? Because you think they're going to track us down? He nodded, oh yeah, they better. That's why I didn't try to kill any of them. These cultists, they are very dangerous but sometimes they lose their stomach when they see a buddy get killed. We can't warrior types, I guess. And we need them to follow us. He looked up at the odometer. We're about 10 miles away now. We need to be at least 10 more. Anyway, back to what I was explaining earlier, this cult, the House of the Claw, I didn't know they existed at first. Looking back on it, there were signs of their influence.  And I learned later that he lived with his parents over 50 miles from where Salk snatched him. What are the odds of that happening? I can't prove it, but I suspect the House dropped him back there and had tipped Salk off as to where to look. His expression was growing angrier as he talked.  They help the outsiders, facilitate their plans, worship them. Not every outsider has any cultists around them. In fact, only about one in three or four do as best as I can tell. But where the House does exist, they operate like some terrorist cells. There's usually four or five working together and they don't know the identity of anyone else in the cult outside their cell. Of course, those higher up in the chain know who are in the cells so they can send directives down as needed. But if a cell member gets caught, they can't give up their bosses or details about the larger organization. It's clever in some ways, but it has its flaws too. He looked over at me, his face stony. For instance, these men that are after us, they have no way of telling people outside of their group who we are unless they get contacted by their bosses. That does happen periodically, but not often. So as long as the entire cell dies, our identities are safe. I felt my skin going cold. Even if we kill them, how will we know we got them all? He nodded, it's always a risk, but the most likely source of them finding out is a house member in the sheriff's office. If that person isn't among this group, we know there's likely another person. If they are, odds are good, this is all of them as they tend to do things as a full unit most of the time. There's no sure answers though. We just have to do the best we can, be smarter and better than them. We drove on for a couple of minutes in silence and then he spoke again. Put your seatbelt on if you would. After I clicked it on, he continued, you good with all this. I know it's a lot and I hate you're at risk especially having not signed up for it. Believe me, I know this is hard to adjust to, but this is as serious as it gets. He turned, studying me for a moment. Life or death, good and evil even. These are bad people that do terrible things and they will torture and murder us if we don't get them first. I met his eyes, I, I believe you. I get it, I'm freaked out, but I get it and I'm with you. Good, because I think this is a good spot. Hold onto those bombs, it's gonna be bumpy. With that, he yanked the wheel to the left, then back to the right, sending us down the sandy shoulder and into a stand of bushes. I held the box containing the jars in a death grip, my muscles tensing at every clink of glass. When we came to a stop, he smiled at me. Good job. Okay, let's go.  I did as he asked and when I reached his side of the SUV, I saw he had a long bladed hunting knife in his hand. He pointed it at the tire as he talked. Now, as you may have figured out, we're trying to make it look like we wrecked. We took this sandy road because even if they're idiots, they should be able to track us on it. But just because they aren't all brilliant doesn't mean you should underestimate the least of them and some of them are very capable. Either way, we need a visible reason why we should have wrecked here. He took the knife and slammed it into the crevice between two tire trends. When he pulled it free, I could immediately hear the angry hiss of air escaping. My grandfather tapped the outer wall of the tire. It's easier to flatten a tire on this side. The rubber's weaker, but it's also very obvious that it was cut. So when you need it to look like a blowout instead of a cut tire, you have to hide the cut in the treads. If they saw a cut tire, they might suspect an ambush. Now, hopefully they'll just think we had bad luck. He patted my shoulder and laughed. Lots of teachable moments today, I guess. Now go get those bombs. He guessed we had about three minutes left before they should be on us. In that time, he grabbed a scoped rifle out of the back of the SUV and got me into a position across the road with my three nail bombs and some final advice. Way these things work is that they have to hit something hard enough that the vial inside breaks. When it's contents mix with what's in the outer part of the jar, you get an explosion filled with metal and glass shrapnel. So what that means is this. First, you throw it against something hard or hard enough it will break on landing. The jars at this point should weigh about seven or eight pounds. So if they land on asphalt for more than 10 feet up, they should break. Throwing it hard at the road or the truck will work too. But try not to directly hit a person or you run the risk of it bouncing off and not breaking. And above all else, do not throw it where it goes off close to you or you'll be caught in the shrapnel too. He had me positioned in an elevated spot behind some bushes about 20 feet from the road. You're far enough away here and in good position. And hopefully they will be focused on the wrecked SUV for a bit. But wait until they start to get out or the pickup will protect them a good bit. Take your time and aim. And when your third one is thrown you slowly work your way farther into the woods. Do not wait for me and keep going straight back from the road. I'll find you when I'm done with them. He seemed to be debating something internally and after a moment he pulled out the semi-automatic and handed it to me. Have you fired one of these before? I nodded a couple of times in college. I know how to shoot and this is the safety, right? He looked grave. Yes, keep it on but keep your finger away from the trigger unless you mean to fire. There's one in the chamber and it will keep feeding them in unless it jams which it shouldn't. You have 13 shots. Do not lock your arms. Do not pull the trigger. Squeeze it. Hold it tightly when you fire and remember it will recoil. For both the gun and the grenades accuracy is always better than speed. Slow is fast and fast is slow and you do not fire this at all unless you have no alternative. My goal is that they never see you at all, okay? I could see by his expression he was scared and I realized it was fear for me. I felt a wave of love for him and guilt at how I treated him. I'll be okay. I'll play it safe and do what you told me. He gave me a half-smile and reached forward to pat the side of my head affectionately. Gotta go. See you in a few minutes. With the ease and agility of someone half his age my grandfather moved down the embankment and back across the road before disappearing into the woods on the other side. Less than a minute later, I saw a cloud of dust as the cultist truck made its way towards us. As they approached, I felt anxiety gripping my stomach and I fought it down. I was worried I'd make a mistake but I still had to try. I would do what he told me and trust that it would work out. As they approached the wreck, they slowed to a crawl and then stopped. From my vantage, I could see one of the men was stretched out in the bed and I guess that was the one he had shot in the leg. His companion and the passenger in the cab got out to investigate the SUV. I hesitated, wanting the driver out as well but he wasn't budging. Time to do it. The first jar hit the top of the truck and while the explosion wasn't as loud as I'd expected, the carnage was impressive.  The driver was looking around terrified but seemed unharmed and I couldn't see the third person any longer as he had dove down after the first bomb went off. Not sure of my next best target, I ultimately aimed one for the bed of the truck. My aim was off but lucky. It hit the driver's side window and shattered the glass detonating as it did so. I heard the driver scream but he wasn't dead from it. Instead he was frantically putting his truck in drive and trying to get away. I felt a thrill of panic but then I heard my grandfather's rifle. One crack and I saw the cultist who would dove for cover and near the SUV lose half his skull as the truck pulled away. A second crack and the one I had knocked down with the first bomb flinched as the bullet went into his torso. 50 yards down the road I saw my grandfather step out onto the road and line up another shot. The truck had surged past me now and any idea of using the third bomb seemed fruitless. I was worried he was gonna get away but then a third crack came. I saw the back windshield break and suddenly the truck veered from the road as though swept aside by some invisible giant's hand. It crashed into a small culvert on the left side of the road and what I could see of the driver's head through the broken side window was a ruined mess. I was about to stand up and say something to my grandfather when I heard another gunshot. The man in the back of the bed had either been flung out or crawled out as soon as the truck came to a halt. He was down on his belly in the culvert some kind of revolver in his hand. The gunshot had come from him aimed at my grandfather. I glanced back at him and saw he seemed okay and was taking cover down the opposite shoulder. Still, I felt anger welling up inside of me.   How could that be allowed to go on?   I stood up throwing the remaining bomb at him. My aim was too good that time and it pelted him in the shoulder bouncing off him without detonating. I kept moving towards him shifting the pistol to my dominant hand and taking aim. The first shot went wild. So did the next two. And by then he had gotten over being struck and figured out where the new shots were coming from. I saw him turning and aiming towards me and forced myself to slow down. I lined up a shot on his chest and squeezed the trigger. He fired a second before me but it went wide, mine didn't.  He dropped the gun with a shriek but I kept firing, emptying the clip into him. I looked around to see my grandfather approaching. He looked at the bullet riddled body and then at me, looks like you got him. You okay? I nodded silently trying to keep my hands from shaking in front of him. My grandfather moved past to check the driver before coming back to me. They're all dead. I don't know if any of them were tied to the sheriff's office or not but we may get lucky and be able to find that out. Believe it or not, these guys carry their wallets on them most of the time when they do this stuff. I guess they're worried about getting a ticket. He gave me a serious smile and squeezed my shoulder. I know what we just did wasn't easy and you're still in shock now. That's okay. But I need you with me. Can you change out our flat tire for the spare while I check their bodies? Get rid of that last bomb and get our shell casings. I smiled weakly and said I could. 20 minutes later, we were back on the road and headed away from the carnage. My grandfather had found wallets on three of the four men and one of those men had an ID card identifying him as a dispatcher for the sheriff's office. It was a small comfort and it wasn't a guarantee that the house of the claw wouldn't still be after us but it was something. I asked him where we were going and he hesitated. It's time I take you to where I do my real work. I need to tell you more and there are things you need to see. He paused as though picking his next words carefully. Some of it is going to be hard to hear and hard to look at. I think we may be past you not believing me or trusting me and that's great. But it also makes it harder when I have to show you things you aren't going to want to believe. I felt fear creeping back in past the staticky shell of shock and adrenaline. What do you mean? Just that there's more to all of this and it's a lot worse than some random monsters occasionally killing people for fun as though that wasn't bad enough.  For now, try to rest some, we've got a ways to go. What troubled me more than his words was the way he said them and the haunted look in his eyes as he studied the road. For all that had happened he had never really seemed rattled or afraid aside from worrying about me but whatever he was thinking about now I could tell he was shaken. I don't know my grandfather well but I know him much better now than I did just a day ago and whatever is able to truly worry or scary that man well, it terrifies me. We rode silently for some time with my initial assumption being that we were going back to his hometown for him to tell me the rest. As we drove, however, I began to realize that we were going north rather than east taking the highway for two hours before he turned off onto a small paved road that later led to a gravel one. Another few miles and we turned onto a concrete driveway that led up to a metal gate and a chain link fence topped by razor wire and several surveillance cameras. A sign next to the gate read, Jagger Solutions Incorporated. I looked over at my grandfather perplexed. What is this place? Why are we here? He smiled at me as he tapped a remote attached to his visor and the metal gate began to open. We're at the back cave. I couldn't do research and other things related to all this close to home. So I bought this place. He was pulling through the gate now and gesturing to the three large warehouses contained within the fence's perimeter. This used to be a warehouse for an importer. Guy sold rugs and a carpet, I think, but when he died, the place sat unkempt and unsold for years before I found it. Got it for a song, though the repairs and modifications did take some time and money. He pointed to the farthest building. That's the main building there in the back. Those other two are mainly for storage and some fake inventory in case the place ever got audited or broken into. Most people don't even know it's tucked back here, though. As we drove past the first two buildings, I saw relatively new looking signs cautioning forklift safety rules and the importance of always wearing a hard hat and gloves. I pointed at them. Safety first, huh? My grandfather nodded. Yeah, me and my non-existent workers have never had a workplace death since I bought the place. He paused, well, except for outsiders. We parked outside of the building and he led me to a door with a keypad making a point of showing me the code before we entered. Inside was largely empty except for a pickup, an SUV and a corner of the building that had been converted into a workshop of sorts. Filled with work benches and tools along with a heavy oak desk, I looked at him questioningly. The Batcave? He let out a chuckle. No, not this. He walked over to a far corner that was largely in shadow. And as I drew closer, I saw that it contained a stack of what looked like corrugated roofing tin. He went to a spot at the edge of the tin and stepped on it with his foot, with a loud hiss. A portion of the tin lifted up to reveal a growing slit of amber light. As it expanded, I realized that a large hydraulic hatch had been camouflaged by the pile of scrap and was now opening to reveal a set of concrete steps leading down into the ground. My grandfather pointed at it proudly. Batcave. He led me downstairs, which consisted of a short hallway with a small living area, including a shower, sink, and toilet on one side and a larger room that was clearly a lab of some kind on the other. At the end of the hall was what looked like the door of an old bank vault. When I mentioned that to my grandfather, he nodded. That's because that's exactly what it is. As you can imagine, after I got this place, I had to have all this underneath added in. I convinced the contractor I was some kind of doomsday prepper. He was into that stuff too, so he actually gave me a discount, but it was still ungodly expensive. He pointed to the vault door, but this, this I actually got for free, kind of. He took two large metal keys from his pocket and stuck them in the door. They turned with a large metallic funk that made me think of bank robbery movies I had seen. He then gripped the wheel in the center of the door and gave it two full turns before tugging the door open. Lights came on inside as the door swung aside and looking inside, I could see he had more than just a vault door. He had an entire vault, safety deposit boxes lined the walls. And in the center, a heavy metal table had been bolted to the floor with several smaller tables on rollers surrounding it. Some were filled with medical supplies or tools, others were filled with items you would find in a garage, drills, pruning shears, hammers, knives. Along several places on the wall, I saw what looked like metal mesh cages that seemed to contain something, possibly cameras. Everything was immaculately clean, but it did little to make the room seem less sinister. It looks like a cross between an operating room and a torture chamber. Speaking the thought before I realized it and looking quickly at my grandfather, afraid I'd hurt his feelings, but he was nodding as he looked into the room before meeting my gaze roofily. That's pretty much what it is, if I'm honest. I got this vault from a defunct bank in Arkansas after I had started work on this place. The bank building was being converted into a restaurant of some sort and they just wanted the vault gone. So I had to pay for the removal and transport, which was quite a bit even 20 years ago when I got it, but it was worth it. He pushed the door back closed and led me back into the living space. Aside from a cot against one wall, it contained an overstuffed chair and a sofa along with a pair of small tables. Sitting on the sofa, he gestured for me to sit in the chair. Before I try to tell you anymore, I think I should show you something. As I sat down, I saw he had picked up a tablet from the small table next to the sofa and was tapping at it. After a moment, he handed it to me. It was a video and even before I hit play, I could see it was taken with a camera in the vault room. It looked very similar to how it looked now, except for the little girl tied to the metal table. I felt my stomach lurch and I had to fight to resist the urge to ask more questions before hitting play. But I'd come this far and I needed to see it through and have some faith. When I started the video, I could see the girl struggling at the straps that held her. The video was not of the best quality and seemed to have been filmed through some kind of mesh like those small cages I had seen in the room, but I would have guessed she was no more than 10. After a couple of minutes of tugging at the straps, she became deathly still. I leaned closer to the video, squinting to look for any signs of life. Nothing. I glanced at my grandfather. He pointed to the tablet. Keep watching. Returning my gaze to the video, I waited and watched. Several minutes passed. Suddenly, I saw the briefest glimpse of her entire body seeming to flicker or jump. And then the video went scrambled for half a second. When the image returned, it was in infrared mode and I almost threw the tablet down. Where there had been a little girl, there were now strings of coiled, stringy flash that stretched out across the room in all directions like some kind of macabre spiderweb of gore. My first nonsensical thought was that the girl had somehow exploded and that the image had frozen mid-destruction. But then I saw the strands of meat moving out of their own volition, running together and pulling apart like chewing gum as they explored the walls. This wasn't that little girl at all, or at least not the version of her that had been there moments ago. I looked back at my grandfather. This is one of them? He nodded and began to explain. Two years after Salk's death, I had three more hunts under my belt. I had already learned that many of them behaved differently from Salk and that the outsider's human form and the monsters were one, or at least inextricably linked. But I had only seen one of the three actually transform and he was radically different than the thing that Salk became. He was a young guy named Stephen Kolchak and he worked construction in Atlanta. I had taken to going to medical conferences, different places to have a reason to travel and widen my net in search for more outsiders. I'd encountered him at a diner near his current work site and decided to extend my stay a few days. I trailed him back to work and found he was working on a high rise apartment building that was going up nearby. He knocked off at four that afternoon and I kept up with him all the way out of Atlanta proper and into one of the suburbs where he lived with his parents. I followed him for the next three days and nights as best I could and on the third night he left home and headed back into the city. At first I thought he might just be going out somewhere but he headed right back to the work site. He didn't seem to have a key to the gate but he scaled the fence nimbly and ducked into the shadows of the partially constructed tower. I went down the fence a couple hundred yards and followed suit. It took me a couple of minutes to find him in the dark but then I saw him in the dim illumination of a distant streetlight standing just inside what would one day be the lobby of the building. He was looking up at one of the walls as though trying to decide something. His face half hidden in shadow but the portion I could see was as blank and emotionless as socks had been. Then he changed. In the blink of an eye where Stephen Kolchak had stood there was a much smaller creature. Two feet tall or thereabouts it had a barrel of a torso with two arms and legs all covered in something that looked more like bluish moss than any kind of hair and a flat thick head that looked like a snapping turtle except for having six eyes on each side of its long sharply beaked snout. It gave out a small contemplative clicking noise as it shuffled back and forth still looking up at the wall. Suddenly it leapt up 10 feet and clung to the spot it had been considering. As I watched it began to lick the wall with a long black tongue each lash leaving a blue gray trail of slime on the spot that quickly blended in with the concrete. I had no idea what he was doing but I knew it was nothing good. Still I remembered shooting at the thing that I now felt sure had been sulk and the bullets doing nothing. So I waited in the shadows for him to finish his work. It took close to two hours. He moved from place to place throughout the outer shell that had been constructed so far and I felt guilty for not moving against him trying to stop whatever it was doing. It was too great a risk without knowing more about what if anything might hurt or kill him in this form. When the creature was finished it climbed back down to the ground and just as quick the young man was standing there again fully clothed no sign of having just turned into a monster. This was food for thought but now wasn't the time for theorizing. Trying to move quietly I left the shadows to intercept him from behind as he went to leave the building.   I was already reaching into my jacket pocket for my stun gun but when I pulled it out and hit the button it was dead. This was strange because it had been fully charged and working when I got out to follow him over the fence but again, no time to wonder. There was another flash of movement and the man was replaced with the creature. Without missing a beat it leapt at me slamming me to the ground. I managed to get the baton up in time to catch its sharp mouth diving for my face. With the iron bar of the baton wedged into the creature's maw I felt like I was just delaying my death rather than preventing it. It was surprisingly heavy on my chest and its hands and feet ended in hard claws that were already digging into my clothes and flesh pushing my arms down and minimizing any leverage I had to push the baton and the creature farther away from me. Then I noticed it was stopping. It pulled its head away swiftly and I thought at first it was going for another lunge but then it jumped off me, shaking its head. I rolled to my feet, ready for the next attack and saw that it was glaring at me. Light gray smoke coming from the edges of its mouth. I could see the yellow brown of its beak blackening slightly where the smoke touched. I could tell it was considering its options looking at the baton in my hand and then myself. It was afraid of it more than me. It suddenly leapt into the shadows and for a moment I thought it might be retreating but then I heard the scrabble of claws behind me. I spun around with a blind swing and managed to catch it right before it landed on me knocking me back down. The baton had hit it in the side and done remarkably good damage caving in part of its torso and causing it to immediately begin trying to roll crawl away. But I was quicker this time getting back up on my knees and bringing the weapon down again and again until I was certain it was dead.  Some of these things are very weak to iron and naturally so. If it had been made of steel, I would have died that night. And there was a time later on where my reliance on iron nearly did me in. There are rules to these things but you can never assume they will always apply. There are always exceptions and you always have to remember that they have most of the advantages.  More clever. I'm still learning now but back then, I still had a lot to learn. One of the things that I wondered early on is what the nature of these things truly are. First of all, are these people transforming directly from their human forms into monsters like a werewolf or some version of vampires? But if that was the case, I reason, then what are the limits of how much they can transform? Look, there's no denying the supernatural component of all this and even early on I understood there would be some aspects of it I could never explain fully. But at heart, I'm a scientist and I always start from that framework in trying to understand what I can. I considered mass, for instance. Once I understood more of how the human and creature forms were connected, I started looking back at earlier encounters. Salk, for one. That creature was over half again as large as him as a man and while you can displace mass to some extent if he was less dense in spots, I can tell you from the sound of it chasing me and the force with which it knocked me out that the monster version of Salk weighed significantly more than the man did. And this creature I just told you about, it was less than half the size and weight of Steven Kolchak. Even if his physical body was somehow transforming into that thing, where did the rest of the meat and bone and fluid go? And then you have examples like the video I just showed you. These things take all kinds of forms and sizes and then go back to looking like people the next instant. But the biggest sign was the clothes. They weren't shucking off clothes or ripping them apart as they changed. They would turn back into being human with hardly a wrinkle or smudge. So they aren't transforming. They're swapping places. It was a theory at the time, but since then I've managed to get some footage slowed down enough that you can see the transition happen if just barely. It's similar to when you drill through the seed, though it happens even quicker. One moment the person, next moment the monster or to be more accurate, they are both the monster just with different strengths and weaknesses inherent to each form. Both are capable of doing a great deal of harm and I've seen more than a few that seem to rarely change at all to their other form. Their goals don't require it, I guess. When I had this place set up, I redoubled my efforts to learn more about them and those goals. I have a very secure closed circuit filtration system running into that room so I can control if there's air or not and pump in gas to sedate or kill if I need to. The system has no ties to the other ventilation down there so even if one of those things turned into a mist it couldn't get out once the room is sealed. Though I doubt that's a possibility in any case. One of the consistencies I have found between all these outsiders is that their non-human form is always at least semi-solid and is never so small that it can't house the seed. The seeds do show up on MRIs if you know what to look for but for obvious reasons I've never been able to scan one in creature form but I believe the seed is the key. It acts like a gateway between this reality and wherever those things come from.  That's by design I think just like most of this is by design. As he had talked, my grandfather had been animated telling about his encounter with Kolchak but that life had drained away as he talked about all he had learned. Now he was silent a moment staring off with a melancholy expression before looking back to me and forcing a smile he leaned forward and tapped the table. Did you notice the wire mesh in front of the camera in the video? Did you see those wire boxes in the vault? I nodded and he went on. When I first captured one and put it in the vault I set up two camcorders to record what happened. I didn't think there was any real risk of it getting out and I had gas ready if I needed to knock it out or kill it at least assuming that gas would work because again you can never assume anything is certain with these things. In any case, I lock it in, it wakes up it transforms for a while and tries to get out. I can hear it beating against the door then it tries swapping back to the person a pretty woman who ran a wedding boutique in Memphis and I can just barely hear her screaming and crying as sympathetically as she could muster through the wall. I hit the gas, go in and deal with her a