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Crime Mystery Suspense

There I stood, in a whale of a coat, trying to stay warm in this wintry weather. In front of me laid a lifeless corpse that lit up by the moon’s dazzling rays. As I starred at the most horrific scene that I had come across, I knew that whoever butchered this innocent soul was truly a merciless human being. In an instant, I switched on my phone and pursued to dial animal control. As I put my phone against my ear, I felt a buzz pounding away against my head. To my relief, it stopped.

There was an automated message that said, “Hello. This is your regional animal control service. Unfortunately we are not able to answer your call at this moment. Please leave a voicemail, Thank you and have a great day.”

My last attempt was to call my nephew, who works part time at the animal control.

After I dialed his number, I heard, “Hi, this is Henry Jones. As soon as I heard his voice, I thought in relief, thank god he answered. Then the message continued saying , “I am not able to answer your call, but if you leave me a message, I will call you back.”

“What, him too?” I said out loud. It wasn’t a holiday and it couldn’t be that they’re closed. In fact, the animal control operates 24/7. My only conclusion was that they were too busy and didn’t have enough help to take care of customers like me. I haven’t seen my nephew for a while, so I thought it would be nice to go where he works, and catch up on the little things. I could also discuss with him, the phone messages situation. I hopped in my car and sped past the peaceful evergreens that mounted side by side with a roar of total silence.

It took me about an hour when I arrived. I lunged myself out of my car and strutted up to the door, snow crunching at my feet. Then I opened the door. The room was spacious and all the lights were on. I made my way to the reception desk and to my surprise, nobody was there. I rang the bell multiple times, but nobody came. In a burst of curiosity, I peeked over the desk and that’s when I truly witnessed something despicable.

I saw a human corpse, stripped from her facial expressions and drenched in a blood bath. That’s when I flicked out my phone from my pocket, almost dropping it across the room. At a speed of lightning, I contacted the authorities.

“911, what’s your emergency? ”said the operator.

“I found a dead body!” I replied, still frightened, and masking my face from taking another glance at the sea of blood.

“Ok sir, is there only one body? Can you verify?” The operator said in all seriousness.

“Umm, I don’t know. Should I check?” I replied, knowing that I need to chin-up and pull myself together.

“Yes sir.” “ Please do that and tell me where you are located,” the operator asked with a tone of urgency.

“Lexington Street by Highway 89”, I replied as I made my way through the vestibule that seemed to magnify the other the other side of the building. Nothing looked out of the ordinary, other than the deceased gal behind the desk and the flickering lights that brings to mind the overshadowing evil that took rest inside of these four walls. I hovered down the hall and came to a stop. In front of me was a door. On the edge of hesitation, I took a deep breath and advanced into the room.

I was not, at all, ready for this. I averted my eyes, trying to camouflage myself from the setting, but it was no good. I laid my eyes on which was a manslaughter of innocent and marvelous people. There were 8 to 12 bodies covered head to toe with vital fluids. In the mix of bodies, I found Henry, my nephew. My legs all of a sudden gave out. At a snail pace, I made my way over to where he was laying. Throwing my arms around his carcass and mourning uncontrollably, I then heard a faint whisper.

“Back door”, “Back door”, Henry so faintly whispered.

“Back door?” I questioned as I looked up. I saw the back door cracked open, as it was letting the icy wind leak into the room. I jolted out the door expecting to find the death reaper waiting for my appearance in the hazy snowfall that poured from the clouds. Instead, I had seen a murky image running into the woods, leaving behind tracks that were swiftly disappearing from the snow flurry. I fell into a vortex of sorrow. I was then pulled out by two men, who showed their badges, and handcuffed me.

The man who was arrested and telling his story was Paul Jones.

At the police station Detective Weston Lowell asked a blonde woman, as she was observing the interrogation through the TV screen, the name of the suspect.

The blonde lady said, “ Paul Jones”. Then with an exaggerated sass, she said, “ May I ask who you are”? I answered, “ I am Detective Weston Lowell. I will be taking over this case,” “ Please show me to the interrogation room,” as he displayed his badge.

“Umm, sure, right this way sir.” She replied with a stumped expression on her face. “Here we are, please knock before you enter,” she said. She then walked away.

“Will do” I said and gave the door three soft thumps. I opened the door and had seen two police officers sitting down facing Paul Jones, who has been handcuffed to the table. The two men turned to face me and gave me a disgusted face.

“Who are you?” One of the officers said in complete annoyance.

I gave them the whole routine. After the two had left, I walked over to the camera, shut it off, and sat down to converse with Paul Jones.

Detective Lowell, was familiar with Paul Jones’ story. As he continued to talk to Paul Jones, Detective Lowell said, “So that’s your story huh? You couldn’t get hold of anyone when you found that dead animal on the side of the road. Then, since you couldn’t get ahold of anyone you drove to the building and that’s when you found the woman laying dead. Did I get that right?” I said, trying to snag some kind of confession out of him.

“Yes, that’s for sure what happened” Paul said, looking at me with innocent eyes.

“And the emergency call, that was you?” I asked, with an eyebrow up.

“Yes sir, that was me” He responded promptly.

“O.K, excuse me, I’ll be back.” I said , marching out the room and jogging to the parking lot. My next move was to head down to the crime scene and take a look at the security footage. Immediately upon my arrival, I looked high and low. When I found that pint sized camera. I followed its snake, figured wire, down to the main control. I inspected every bit of that tape. During that time I noticed something rather peculiar. In the dead of night, I saw a man who was disguised remarkably well. He didn’t pull up in a car like Paul Jones did a few minutes afterward. Instead, he seemed to have come out of thin air. I didn’t see him exit. In Paul’s story, he claimed to have seen a dark figure run off into the woods. Regardless, it is safe to say that Paul is not the culprit. With this break in the case, I am truly one step closer in unearthing the beast of this unsuspected murder.

December 17, 2020 20:55

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10 comments

Wow Julian! This is a pretty impressive first story! One of the best ones I've ever read for this prompt! You did such a great job! Happy (early) Holidays!!❤️🎄⛄❄️

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Julian Castro
00:07 Dec 22, 2020

Thank you 🙃 Happy holidays!!

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No problem! Also, thanks! :)

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15:37 Jan 09, 2021

That was a really great story!! I couldn't stop reading it! Great job!

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Hema Saju
07:51 Dec 23, 2020

felt as though the dark figure cud be somewhere around the corner!! Good job Julian.

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Vicky S
02:10 Dec 22, 2020

I enjoyed your descriptions, really set the scene

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Julian Castro
02:32 Dec 22, 2020

Thanksss

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Nainika Gupta
01:02 Dec 22, 2020

This was such a unique story!! Well done, especially for a first submission :)

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Julian Castro
01:37 Dec 22, 2020

Thank you so much :)

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Nainika Gupta
15:02 Dec 22, 2020

of course!!

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