Puppet

[Aardvark]

As he went over the coroner's report, Detective Stern tried to piece together the scene in his head. Two murders, one in cold blood, one revenge. Both perpetrators were dead, but there was something wrong with the whole thing. Something bizarre, out of the ordinary. He knew this one would stay with him until he figured it out, or at least came up with a theory that happened to fit the facts at hand.

 

Numerous puncture wounds, fractured bones, ruptured organs, the kind found in any cadaver that comes complete with twenty odd bullet wounds. Standard for any John Doe who was just hosed down with an automatic weapon. Cause of death, ruptured ventricle. But there was something else. Heart and lung trauma, bruising that couldn't be explained away by the event or by the victim's medical background. As if someone had tried to crush his heart and lungs with their bare hands.

 

The motive for the crime also eluded him. No links had been found between the two victims. One was a small time thug, one was a convenience store attendant. Why anyone would just kill a shop assistant without taking anything was puzzling. Why anyone would do it with an automatic weapon and so much apparent prejudice when no obvious link could be formed was disturbing.

 

The ballistics report had confirmed what the crimescene report said. Victim two had fired upon victim one twice during the incident. Once in the store, execution style, once out on the street, in self defense. Thirty rounds left the barrel of the machine pistol. Enough of them found their mark the first time around that there shouldn't have needed to be a second. Blood marks on the weapon suggested he used it as a club in his final moments. Obviously to ill effect.

 

So a smalltime thug comes into a convenience store and guns down the clerk. Who somehow survives, despite having half a heart and an extra pound or two of bronze lodged in his torso. Normal people would've had survival in mind in that situation. Keep still, hope the sheer will holding their tattered remains together would hold until someone could come and patch them up. Not this chap. He decided it was better to, in the shape he was in, vault the counter, run his assailant down a good twenty metres from the store and throttle the life out of him, despite taking several more bullets in the process. Well, that was the story that made the press. Minus the half a heart bit. Gotta make it slightly believable.

 

Stern scratched his head. He couldn't swallow that. Not with the full report. Witness statements confirmed the story going to press. But they all said the same thing about One's movements. Jerky. Almost falling over himself. Zombi like. As if he'd come back from the dead like in one of those old black and white horror movies. Back to reek terrible vengeance upon his murderer. He shook his head. He was way too old to believe in stories like that.

 

He looked over the two background files of the two victims. The only real connection was One worked in the area Two lived. It was possible that Two might've been shortchanged once by One, taken exception to it and decided to come back later and make an example of him or something. He had a few boys going over the store's surveillance tapes to see how often, if ever, Two frequented One's store.

 

He finished the report of One and moved to Two. Six foot two, a hundred and twenty kilograms. Built like a tank was the only thing Stern thought as he saw the estimated muscle/weight ratios. Cause of death: Asphyxiation. His windpipe had been crushed. By One. Stern knew this. He'd been there when they pried One's fingers out of Two's corpse. He looked at the file for One again. Five and a half feet, roughly, small build, healthy, but not very athletic. He couldn't believe that a kid that size could run down a monster like Two, knock him down and choke him to death. Well, maybe he could under normal circumstances. But not riddled with bulletholes. He put down the files and decided he needed some coffee to help him think.

 

---

 

Black and gray images were all he saw. Himself, on the ground. Fading away. His killer, glowing brightly, walking off triumphantly. He felt nothing but burning. It wasn't fair. Life wasn't fair. All his life, picked on for weakness, finally killed by someone who probably couldn't spell his name. No. He wouldn't let it end like this. But he was drifting. The scene was fading fast. He reached out a spectral hand and grappled his heart. Through force of will alone, he pulled his essence back to his body. He could still feel, he still had his memories. His brain hadn't given up yet... there was still time.

 

The corpse jerked. Blood started flowing out of the wounds faster. Fingers were twitching as electrical signals were fired down fast-dying nerves in an effort to get the body moving again. The body flipped, pushed itself up and tried to stand, managing only to fall onto the counter. Still viewing the scene from an outsider's perspective, the essence willed each action, each heart beat. It pulled itself over the counter and almost fell on the other side. Barely holding itself up, it unsteadily ambled in pursuit of it's killer.

 

William White. Old Willy White. WW. He told 'em he'd do it, he did it. He had killed. Not only that, but he had killed someone on a whim. How dare that pipsqueak ask him for ID before selling him cigarettes. Everyone would respect him now, no one would try to talk him down again. He was smiling to himself about how easy it had been, not giving the several witnesses a moment's thought, when he heart something large and wet fall to the ground behind him. He turned.

 

Forcing his corpse up again, the essence that had once been Joshua Smithson focused his ethereal rage on the lummox ahead of him. He saw his killer turn and he felt his corpse shudder as more bullets sunk into his deceased flesh, but he surged on. The killer was moving now. Trying to escape. He forced his legs to go faster, taking larger paces, using any and all objects near him to balance. He was gaining. And fast. If he were still alive, he would have marveled at how he'd never been able to run this fast before. But dead people have one track minds.

 

William fumbled to reload as he ran. He couldn't believe it. Somehow that kid had survived. He'd emptied the machine pistol into him, yet still he surged on. And now the thing wouldn't reload properly. At last he managed to slam the magazine home, cock the weapon and turn to fire. He never managed to get a shot off, as the corpse of Joshua Smithson lunged at him and knocked him down.

 

He could almost smell his killer's panic, even in his disembodied state. He forced his fingers around the ogre's throat and squeezed. He could feel the gun hitting his side, each blow losing strength. It wouldn't be long. He forced his corpse to take a breath, then release it through a vocal cavity shaped by a dying instinct.

 

The last word William White heard was a raspy, gurgled "Die" from the corpse of someone he'd never even thought about until five minutes ago. There was no last thought, no life flashing before his eyes. There was nothing but sheer terror.

 

---

 

Stern shook his head as he filed everything away. Technically, this case was solved before it began. Two murders, two murderers dead. Justice doesn't get any cleaner than that. He sat down, shaking his head more. Grabbing a pen and paper, he wrote down his zombi theory, stapled it to the case report and sent it off to be archived. He was fairly certain that no human hands would ever touch that file again.