Number: 41 Title: Save the Children Type: Original fiction ---------- Creepy Quotes: ---------- "You'll get rid of all the monsters, won't you? You'll get them and you'll save all of the children." - a ghost "I do believe in evil." - Gart Errant "Just a monster. I don't think we'll be having bad dreams about him for a long time." - Geriann Tal "I can't escape the fact that there's something just horribly wrong with this." - Vance Denhart ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------- Characters: ---------- Gart Errant: Black hair, brown eyes. Quick and intelligent, Gart can be the voice of reason very often. He has a phobia oabout dead people, which he keeps well hidden--he keeps himself tightly under control. He is good friends with Vance, whom he has known since kindergarden. To this day, Vance still makes unconscious corrections to Gart's speech. Gart is not usually the brains of the operation, but is most often the heart. He is the type of person who has to have a crusade to live for, or he feels his life is wasted. Vance Denhart: Vance is tall and rail thin. Despite the freckles which seem to have plagued him since junior high, he doesn't have a boyish face. Vance is a simple but driven man; set him at a task and he WILL accomplish it. Throughout his years being good buds with Gart, he's found himself the excitable one to be reeled in by his friend's level- headed attitude. Due to recent events, however, his determination and focus have left him the one with the most working grey matter to spare. Geriann Tal: Geri is a mildly tomboyish girl with shoulder-length black hair and a "wishful" smile. People have been calling her smile "wishful" for years, but no one has yet been able to tell her why that particular word jumps to mind when she shows her whites. She's endlessly supportive and a very honest person, two traits that can sometimes be at odds with one another. Being close friends with both Vance and Gart for years has led to a kind of bonding among the group; they're as close as family in many ways. Geri is occasionally the brains of the operation, always looking for a new way to out-smart her comrades. It's a really interesting game for her, and she doesn't put her friends down with it, like so many other women do. Hey, she'd be bored otherwise. Percevial Vane: A name made up by the killer the good guys hunt down over the course of the story, Vane is an enigma. Who is he? What drives him to commit these crimes? Where did he get that cool tattoo work? Vane takes pride in being dangerous and enjoys his hobby of cutting up young children. Not one for sexual abuse of anybody, he's as dangerous to 30-year-old convicted rapists as he is to the victims. Vane's normal life is meticulously mundane, and in total, he's of only average intelligence. ---------- Outline: ---------- The author makes no claims to the amount of undisturbed sleep you will be getting after reading this story. Act 1: Mystery Scene 1: Car, front of house, car, movie theater Drive to Geriann's house. Pick up Geri. Drive to mall. Argue in front of movie theater. Scene 2: Street market. Argue over stupid movies. Vance walks through street intersection. Argue over seeing girl. Scene 3: Mall In mall food court, arguing over seeing the girl. A young girl tugs on Gart's arm. Gart asks her what she wants. As the girl turns away, Gart sees the axe sticking out of her back. Gart freaks out. Scene 4: Gart's house, porch The guys have a beer. Gart and Vance agree the day pretty much sucked. Scene 5: Vance's house, kitchen Gart and Vance talking about the strange dreams. They wonder if Geri has the same dreams. Geri calls and tells them to check the newspaper. Act 2: Pain Scene 6: Random house; crime scene Police talking in the foreground for a long time. One of the officers asks the trio why they are here. Geri identifies them as reporters. Scene 7: Street before newspaper, newspaper Geriann explains that they need a cover for this. Figure watches them from across the street. Geri works her way through the building. She convinces the head honcho that they are officially reporters now. She gives him all the information (minus dreams). Scene 8: House, porch The trio is back on Vance's porch, discussing the new project. They confess that maybe there's something bad a work here. INTERMISSION--The nightmare Scene 9: Two days later... Vance has employed his neighbor's police-band scanner in the project. A call at seven a.m. (they got up early because of the bad dreams) sends them off. Scene 10: Crime scene 2, the basement The trio does a drive-by that morning. They question a few officers, the police very tense and upset. Nightfall, the trio breaks in. In the basement, the seem to have a psychic connection; the killer is hiding in the shadows, watching this. Act 3: Certainty Scene 11: Vance's place, kitchen A long conversation takes place. The newspaper guy calls for details--he gets some of them. The aunt of the latest victim calls. The three decide that there's only one thing to do. Scene 12: Library Reseach done on child murders and serial killers. Discussion to match profile to other cases. Resort to phone to talk to an expert. {something else went here.} ---------- Scenes: ---------- A blue Jaguar cut into the lane of a gray Honda, the smaller, visibly cheaper car stopping suddenly. "GOD DAMN THAT PIG-FUCKING MOTHER OF A WHORE!!!" The driver cut loose, hitting the windshield with a fine spray of spittle. The man in the Jag gave a jocular wave. Vance, the driver of the Honda, hissed in anger at the sudden movment, which had nearly torn a good piece of his car off. Not that wholesale destruction of his automobile could make it look worse, but it was the principle of the thing. From the passenger seat, a young man looked calmly at the driver, as if this kind of thing happened all the time. "I actually think he might have heard you, Vance." The passenger was on the short side and sported a very short haircut. His face was clean shaven and twisted in an almost constant grin. He had steel blue eyes and dark brown hair. "Shut up, Gart." The driver retorted, gripping the steering wheel as if he intended to sculpt the plastic like an artist working clay. Vance was taller than his friend and wore a pair of Rayban sunglasses. His long brown hair hung over the frames and made him look like a man that had elected to go through life half-blind. "Jeeze, man, calm down." Gart said. "Could you believe that guy?" Vance said, suddenly turning to his friend. Gart put his hands up in a defensive gesture as he answered. "Frankly, yes. The way I see it, sometimes the world bows down to you, and sometimes you bow down to the world. Try not to be too angry while _I'm_ in the car, please." Vance shook his head and returned his concentration to the traffic light before them, which was had turned red. The Jag, after blasting past them, had turned right. Vance briefly thanked the gods he was heading in a different direction than that... that... guy. "Sorry, that guy just..." The light turned green and the pair went on their way. Traffic was light, due mostly to the fact that half of the city was probably sleeping in, but Vance drove defensively, as if in the middle of rush hour. From the passenger seat, Gart picked up the conversation. "Astounded you with his complete lack of intelligence. I know. I'd feel the same way if you were I." "I were you." Vance corrected automatically, shifting gears. "I were you." Gart repeated, counting the streets. "We there yet?" Vance asked. "Three blocks; it's on your right." Vance nodded, mostly to himself. At the third block, Gart raised his arm and pointed. The Honda followed his directions, pulling to a stop at the end of the block. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- FROM WORK: It starts with Vance, Joe, Kara, and a house that burnt to the ground a year ago. Vance is a working man--a young machinist with a promising future in high-end component fabrication. Single and living alone, he recently bought a small house in a Portland suburb. Curiously, his best friend Joe used to live in the same neighborhood, but left under mysterious circumstances. The only Vance can really say is wrong with his new home is the way the nearest empty lot is treated. Across the alleyway behind his house is an empty lot. The remains of a burnt-down house used to reside there. Joe suspected foul play, but the "authorities" ruthlessly pushed aside his attempts to file an injunction and cleaned up the mess. However, no one has opted to do anything with the land, so there it sits, scortched and barren. The scortched earth, get it? Vance likes the neighborhood at first, but he hears a lot of ghost stories (like all of Portland), but they all fit together perfectly (unlike the rest of Portland). His attempts to find out why Joe thought there was something important in that pile of ashes are met with stern resistance from the community. "Then tell me why everyone on my street--hell, everyone on my _block_--has nightmares almost every night. Tell me why I'm the only one who doesn't. Don't let your emotional mind entirely guide you, sir, let your logical mind do some of the thinking too." Pieces start falling into place, and Vance figures that either A) nothing happened, or B) a serial killer lived in the house and whatever that person did was so horrible, no one wants to even look at the evidence, let alone hunt this psycho down. Of course, Vance, Joe, and Kara are immediately forced to when they start having hallucinations--visions, if you will--of the children this killer has gone after. Battling skeptical and unreasonable law enforcement, cogey (sp, use?) news reporters, cars that break down constantly, and dead kids who have to communicate without words ("I don't hear voices in my head, so they can't talk to me. Besides, dead men tell no tales and all that."), the trio has to solve Portland's most vicious crimes to ease the suffering of its victims. Not entirely your standard Stephen King scare story.... ------- "... yeah. I just passed the bar exam." "Or as we call it here, an invitation to Hell." --- "Now that my honor is mortally wounded, could you please let it die in peace?"