This is from the Reedsy.com prompt: Write the origin story of a notorious villain.
“You don’t have to kill me.”
“Everyone dies. No witnesses.”
The serial killer the FBI has been warning everyone about has me tied to a post in an abandoned barn. The reports have said he used this approach before. After killing his victim, he sets the barn on fire to destroy evidence. His most common burn platform is a car doused in gasoline.
I recognize this barn even though I’ve only seen the outside. This is the Philips family barn. It has been sitting unused for something like twenty years. They cleaned out everything worth money and left simple tools and junk.
I need to ask him questions. All the TV shows talk about engaging to get them to see you as a person. I ask, “How will anyone know your story? What makes you tick, what makes you so successful?”
He is wearing a white painter’s jumpsuit. Probably to prevent leaving evidence. “You’re trying to make a connection so I will be reluctant to kill you. It won’t work.”
“Why not? You’ve been in prison? You’re so hardened as a killer you have no emotions left?”
He smiles, “Yes, I was in prison. You keep trying. My motivation is to make them understand, really get committed to changing the system.”
My heart skips a beat. He just opened up, just a crack, but it is something. “What does a good system look like? Tell me how I can explain it to someone else.”
Every question has a pause. Like he is debating internally if he will answer. He has been moving gas cans around the barn. The old barn still has some decayed straw in spots. He puts gas cans close to those and close to support posts. He puts down a gas can and looks at me. “A system that doesn’t let children be abused, doesn’t let bad adults keep abusing.”
“Is that why all your victims are taken at seventeen and die the day they turn eighteen? They call you the birthday killer. You are making that point. But does anyone really get what you are trying to say?”
He has been looking at me. Now he walks over to a bench in the barn and picks up a knife looking at me. “You are obviously intelligent. More intelligent than most of the young ones I’ve taken. Tell me about you. How was I able to take you if you are so smart?”
“I made a mistake. I am smarter than all the others in the high school. I can be safe with them. I wasn’t ready for you. That is my fault, especially with all the stuff in the news about you. But why would you ever come to this little town? There is nothing here.”
“There are complacent people. There is a broken system.”
He seems interested in me now. I didn’t realize it at that moment, but he was toying with me. He wasn’t really interested in me. He simply wanted to mentally torture me. Something to spend his time on until midnight.
I ask, “What is your name? What can I call you?”
“Call me Jeff.”
“Just Jeff?
“That should be a name you know from the news.”
“Jeff Epstein? Obviously, you aren’t like him, you don’t traffic kids. You’re smart, probably off the charts. No one will know your story, no one will know why you did this, why the new system is so important. Let me tell your story.”
He calmly looks at me and says, “You will turn eighteen at midnight. That means about three hours.”
“Let me write your story. Let me record something. You know how this will end when the police find you. If you are simply killed your story is lost. You will simply be a crazy person who became a killer. Is there something I can write on? Paper and a pen? Anything?”
After about twenty minutes he looks around at several old boxes. “I will humor you while we wait.”
Rummaging inside he pulls out an old English class essay writing blue book. There is a zippered package with pencils. He tosses them to me.
Shifting my tied hands, I say, “I can’t write when I’m tied to the post like this. I won’t run away. I can’t run away.”
He smiles saying, “You are smart. But not smart enough.”
He gets some rope and his gun from the bag. I’m told to shift so I’m stretched out in the dirt on my stomach. My arms are tied to the post and my legs are toward him. He walks up and ties my ankles together, then with the long end of the rope loops it around the post. He has me sit up as he pulls the rope tight and knots it.
Stepping back, he pulls the gun and says, “Now you get to write.”
He puts the gun to my head and pushes my head to the post.
My heart is racing, beating so hard I hear it. No one has ever put a loaded gun to my head. He could pull the trigger at any moment.
Using his foot, the blue book and pencils are pushed to be next to the post. He cuts the rope holding my tied hands to the post.
He steps back and has the gun at his side. I take a deep breath. I just had a gun to my head. I look at my shaking hands which are still tied together and then at him. “You want me to write like this.”
He smiles, turns and walks to the bench. Putting his gun down he goes to place the final three gas cans around the barn.
“You don’t care if your story is told. That means you don’t care if anything really changes.”
With the last can in place, he looks at me and says, “My story doesn’t matter. It won’t change anything. What will change things is when enough people with money have their kids taken to change things.”
“You haven’t been targeting rich kids. You have taken kids from all over.”
“Keep doing your amateur profiling. Tell me why you think my targets have been completely random.”
“Because they’re easy.” Then it occurs to me. Now everyone knows him. If he takes rich kids, it won’t be covered up, it won’t be hidden. If he was a nobody it wouldn’t have the same impact.
Getting the blue book open and pencils out, I start writing. After a few minutes of notes about making an impact on the rich. I look up at him. He is now sitting on an old bucket looking at me. I ask, “Tell me about what caused you to do this.”
“No. You don’t need those details about me.”
“You want to stop abuse. People need to understand why that motivates you.”
He stands abruptly saying, “NO. You aren’t going to listen, just like the rest. Let’s make your story simple. If things don’t change, there will be more like me. I will leave a message for the kids to understand. You can tell the story of the next one like me.”
He walks to the barn door and looks out then returns and sits.
After a few minutes he says, “Two hours and thirty minutes. But I could decide to kill you early.”
I ask questions and wait. He responds quickly or sometimes I wait minutes before he responds. My silence I think encourages him to talk. I’m simply watching him and waiting.
“Where did you grow up?”
“In a basement.”
“Where?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“A basement and what, where did you go to high school?”
“They call it homeschooling.”
“How did you get so smart? I mean you are way smarter than someone in a basement and home-schooled. You said prison. Is that where you learned everything? Prison must have been hard.”
Jeff is looking at me with piercing eyes. “Prison was like a vacation for me. You think you have me figured out. You watch TV and think you are profiling me. You don’t know what you are doing.”
“No, I don’t. I want to hear you tell me. What happened to you to make you kill people?”
After a long wait, “A failure in the system. This could have been prevented if people listened.”
I am writing, and with that statement I pause and say, “Listened to what?”
“He stands up and turns toward the door saying, “Two hours.”
Returning from checking the door he sits down and asks, “What do you think will happen? Do you think I will become sympathetic toward you and not kill you? That means you’re eventually found and then you identify me. I’m not done.”
“Tell me what made you a serial killer.”
“I’m not a Zodiac, doing random shit. I’m sending a clear message.”
“What made you a focused killer?”
Every question has a long pause before he replies now. “They did. The lack of empathy. The lack of caring about people, about kids. I know what those words are, but I can’t feel them. I learned from them not to care.”
“But that isn’t everyone. I care.”
He laughs. “You’re talking like that to try and connect with me. To try and get away from me. Tell me the last time you stood up for someone else, not yourself. All the documentaries about problems in school have someone getting beaten up and no one stands up to support them. It happens in school all the time. When did you stand up for someone else?”
“I don’t understand. I don’t think I’ve been in that kind of situation. If I’ve never been in that situation, how could I stand up for them?”
Checking his watch he says with an angry voice, “One hour.”
“It sounds like you are mad at me. I don’t know what to say. If one of my friends was being threatened or abused, I would do something.”
He chuckles, “You are an idiot. Everyone says they will help their friends. What if it is a stranger. People like you never do. You only care about your little world.”
My eyes are unfocused as I’m thinking. I thought I was making progress. Now I’m making him angry. I need to find some bridge to him. “I’m sorry. I misunderstood. I just want to understand. I want to write down your story, to know where you’re from. People will need to understand how we got to this point.”
“Your brain is churning. Are all those Criminal Minds episodes not working for you? You have one hour.”
“Tell me what I should write as your story. In a typical story from a book, every lead in the story has an inciting incident. What is your inciting incident that will make you the hero.”
Smiling he says, “Different approach. This is better.”
“Good. Tell me your inciting incident.”
“It was when they lied to me. When I was told, I would never have to go back. Then they told me I had to go back. That I had no choice. That is when it changed.”
He stands, walks to the door, and checks. He then begins to pour the gas from each can around the area. On the posts and anything else flammable. That’s when I knew I was running out of time. All I could do was try to keep capturing his struggle.
He finishes all the cans but one. He walks over to the table grabs the knife and walks toward me. I say, “Wait. Wait. I need you to take this blue book and get it outside the fire area so someone will know.
He has a knife in his hand. I hold up the blue book in my tied hands. I look in his eyes and see that he won’t take it out. He will let it burn.
That’s when we hear the sound. He reacts quickly, putting out the one small LED light that has been providing illumination. Now we are in total darkness. My eyes are not adjusted so I can’t see. I don’t speak, simply listen, knowing that my brother is outside.
He says softly, “Don’t speak or yell. You will be dead before they can get inside.”
I hear him moving quietly to the big door to look out. I know what he is thinking, they can’t see him in the dark. He can check on what is happening, kill me, and escape through the side door. He doesn’t know my family hunts at night with night vision scopes. My family will be able to see him clearly.
Jeff has his gun. At this point, he needs some idea of how many are outside. I can shoot the girl and then get out the side door into the night.
I hear a bird whistle. It means nothing to Jeff, but it is my signal. I lay down next to the post in the dirt and wait. I need to be out of the way for any shooting.
As he approaches the door and hears the bird Jeff stops, listening. A bird will call and get a response or call again. He turns and takes the safety off the pistol, heading to the girl. There is a roar outside. He turns and the bullet hits him in his right chest.
Seconds later a cyber truck rams the barn doors bursting them open. A cyber truck makes almost no noise but is ready to move when needed.
My eyes are adjusting, and I can see the white of the painter’s jumpsuit when the bullet hits him. The bullet passes through him and hits the post above me. When the truck crashes through the door the lights turn on and it’s blinding. I can’t see. Then I can hear my father’s voice next to me.
“Sarah, are you okay?”
“Yes Dad, cut me loose.”
After being cut loose I stand and walk to Jeff. Andy, my brother has taken the pistol. Jeff looks at me when I walk up. He is dying and no one is going to give him first aid.
I look down at him and say, “You aren’t so smart. You don’t understand the community around here. We take care of each other. You especially don’t understand my family. We protect our own. Everyone, adults and especially kids. There is no need to change our system because we don’t tolerate shit like you.”
His eyes close and he stops breathing. Andy asks, “What was that about?”
He wanted to change the world by killing kids as they turn adults. The system that turns abused kids into abusive parents. Until the system changes around abusive parents you don’t break the cycle. That is all I know about him and why. I will make sure his story isn’t lost so people can learn from what he did.”
Dad asks, “What’s with the blue book?”
“I was making notes about his story. I told him people needed to know his story. It was a delay tactic. It’s done now. Let’s call the sheriff and the FBI.
Dad says, “NEVER, EVER, do something like that again.”
I look at him saying, “In our small town we spotted the piece of shit watching. Every cheerleader knew in minutes about some creepy guy watching kids. There are only two kids in town about to turn eighteen. It was Jimmy or me. All I had to do was make one phone call to Andy and get this set up. We could stop a damn serial killer. I didn’t hesitate. The sheriff would have to talk for hours, following procedure. I knew my family would be here for me.”
