Coffee and Serial

Warning: Strong Language, Mature Themes, Graphic Violence

A WHISP story. If you like it, please check out Whispers of a Killer (WHISPs Book 1)


The scene smells more like a slaughterhouse than a coffee shop, but I force myself not to cringe or wrinkle my nose. I’m the senior detective here and I need to act like it.

“I’m Detective Harbinger. What do we have?”

The first responder beat cop is wide-eyed and green around the gills. He swallows hard. “Single victim. Male. Jacob Beene. Um, found by the owner around seven a.m. when,” he takes a deep breath through his mouth, “a customer called to complain that the shop wasn’t open. Owner called 911. No one else but paramedics, owner, and I have been in there.”

“Paramedics?”

He nods.

Considering the smell, they were optimistic. I point to bloody boot prints leading out the front door. “These from them?”

He nods again and sways slightly.

I glance down at his badge, Officer Trout, and stifle an inappropriate chuckle. “Officer,” I can’t bring myself to say his name, “why don’t you go outside and make sure forensics gets shoe impressions of all the paramedics?” And get some fresh air before you pass out.

He nods and bolts like a frightened colt.

I have more questions, like what time the coffee shop normally closes, what time it normally opens, if the victim was in a relationship and, if he was, if it was a stable one, but those can wait. Pulling booties and gloves from my pockets, I put them on before advancing to the store room. The tables in the customer area are all clean with the chairs stacked neatly on the tables, the counter is wiped down, and the cash register is closed. Doesn’t strike me as a robbery gone bad, but I reserve my judgement. Way too early to start a theory.

The hallway is likewise free of debris and blood other than the occasional smear from the paramedics’ shoes…but the smell is worse here. I begin breathing through my mouth. The heavy air presses in on me as I approach the wide open storeroom door. I’ll have to ask if it was open or closed when the owner arrived; if the obnoxiously flickering fluorescent bulb was on or off. Pressing my eyes closed, I stop and count backwards from three. At zero, I turn and gaze into the room from the doorway.

The scene is worse than I was imagining. It usually is. Not exactly shocking—after thirty years as a police officer, almost nothing is—but my breath catches. Blood is everywhere but in the body of the man on the floor. Large, jagged, gaping holes in the victim’s chest and abdomen expose the shiny organs beneath, which explains the crimson painted walls and bags of coffee, but I have no explanation for the angular bulge in his throat. There’ll be no getting up close to this body to search for subtle clues. The paramedics have already made Forensics’ job that much harder and I won’t add to the mess. Pulling back into the hallway, I carefully follow it to the emergency exit in the back. No alarm. I make a mental note of that, and of the rock undoubtedly used to prop it open. Nothing else to see here, I return to the front of the shop, avoiding looking into the store room. I’ll see plenty of photos later.

#

I leave Forensics to their work at the scene. Hours later, I haven’t left the precinct. After interviews with the wife, just back from a business trip, poor thing, and the owner of the coffee shop, most of my questions are answered; still, I’m no closer to a motive or suspect. The coroner’s full report is about a day out, but one question was answered by the preliminary report: a cell phone. That’s what was lodged in the victim’s throat. I’m sitting at my desk trying to wrap my brain around the physics involved when someone clears his throat. My heart hiccups. It’s Chief Lowman.

He gives me a grim smile. “Deep in thought, Detective?”

“Was just checking the preliminary coroner’s report. Why?”

Something over my shoulder catches his eye and he waves a hand. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

I turn to find a mid-height, muscular woman with close-cropped black hair, tan skin, and green eyes.
She holds out a hand. “I’m Detective Pereyra.” There’s a trace of tall mountains topped with llamas in her accent.

“Detective Harbinger.” After standing and shaking her proffered hand, I turn back to the chief. “What’s this all about?”

The chief nods to Pereyra and she takes over.

“Sorry to intrude on your case, but we asked the coroner to flag any cases with a specific MO, and yours has it.”

I don’t really have to ask. “A cell phone crammed down the victim’s throat?”

She nods.

“A serial?”

She nods.

“How many?”

Pereyra shrugs slightly. “Three, so far, we think. In NYPD jurisdiction, anyway.”

“Any other commonalities in the victims that we know of?”

“All the victims had WHISPs.”

Keeping my face neutral, a knot forms in my stomach. WHISPs. It had to be WHISPs. “I see.” I clear my throat. “Anything else?”

She shakes her head. “Not that we know of.”

“So, hate crimes maybe?”

“Maybe,” she agrees, “but if that were the case, you’d think they’d have left a message. You know, like ‘For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against dark spirits of evil.’”

I nod slowly. She’s not wrong. There’s been a lot of talk about WHISPs being demons or a person’s guilty conscience manifesting in a creepy, grey shadow instead of being clouds of electromagnetic particles pushed out by cell phones, high-tension power lines, and god-only-knows what else. “So, you’ll be taking lead on the investigation?” Normally I’d be pissed about someone sniping one of my homicides, but in this case…

Her gaze stiffens and finds the chief.

He straightens and turns to me. “Harbinger, the commissioner wants you to head the investigation.”

Oh crap. “Me, Sir?”

“You have seniority here and he wants our best heading up this case. Wants it wrapped up quick and quiet before the press sinks its teeth in.”

No pressure. “But, Chief…” He must know. Everybody in the precinct knows about my shadow phobia after my blowout with Waller at the WHISP sensitivity training seminar last year.

“Is there a problem, Detective Harbinger?”

“No, Sir.” No problem. Shit.

Fowl/Foul Peace/Piece: (3 min)

Theme for this session's prompts was horrid homonyms.
A foul moon hung in a sky of bloody clouds. Out of the night a single white goose flew and landed upon the countess’s windowsill. It was Roving, the white fowl of the east, and often it was the herald of peace, but not tonight. This night when the countess retrieved the bird it was sickly and thin. Feathers dropped from its wings like pieces of fine silk and fell to the floor as she placed it in a basket. She had to summon her marshal from the green lands. The peace was broken, war had come.

Yesterday My Forehead Had the Number Nine on It, Today it is Eight

Timed writing prompt.

I am not crazy. I am not crazy. I am not crazy!

My eyes are closed and I’m doing deep breathing exercises and trying to calm my mind. This is not happening. Breathe in. Yesterday was just a bad dream. Breathe out. I open my eyes. The number eight is still drawn on my forehead as if in ash. Yesterday the number was nine. No it wasn’t. I turn on the tap and fill my hands with water and splash it on my face over and over. First it’s cold, but soon it is hotter than I can stand and I have to stop and turn it colder.

I take the nubbin of soap and work up a thick, white lather in my hands then press them to my dripping forehead and scrub and scrub and scrub. Minutes, pass. My face feels raw. I stop and rinse my face again and again and again. Finally, I turn the water off and glance up at the glass. My face stares back at me, the smeary grey number unchanged. I press my palms against my eyes until I see flashes of light in the darkness. When I take my hands away and blink until the afterimages fade, the eight is still there.

Only it’s not. Of course it’s not. It wouldn’t make any sense if it was. It didn’t make sense yesterday and it doesn’t make sense today.

“I am not crazy!” I scream at the mirror.

“I am not crazy!” the mirror screams back.

Design Your Very Own Superhero

Writing prompt (4 minutes).

I am Whisper. I am the shadow in the corner of your eye. I am the flickering of candlelight and the soft tickle of wind in your ear. My voice is breathe carried to the far corners of the earth. I could be struck down by a child, crushed beneath a mound of feathers, yet I am powerful. I am the words in your head. I am the angel on the shoulders of demons. I am the conscience of the night. With small sounds I hold the darkness at bay and tip the souls of humanity towards the light. I am an echo of goodness. I am Whisper..

Chairs and Pears, Pairs of Gears, People Upstairs

One of our weekly writing prompts.

Granny’s house is a strange place. The main floor seems normal. There’s a rocking chair in the living room with an orange and gold afghan draped over the back and a sofa that has ugly flowered upholstery. The kitchen is tiny and there is always a bowl of yellow pears in the middle of the miniature table. Her bedroom is also on the main floor and not too interesting except for the cuckoo clock on the wall that ticks and grinds and makes all sorts of noises, and then on the hour, the little wooden cuckoo explodes through the painted doors and screeches its mechanical coo.

But these are the normal things. It’s the people who live upstairs who are strange. The first thing that’s strange about them is that Granny tells me they aren’t there even though she has pictures of them in frames on the mantel. The second thing that’s strange about them is that they never seem to sleep. When I visit Granny I sleep in a bed upstairs, but even when I wake up in the middle of the night the people are awake and staring. They don’t talk much, the people upstairs. That is the third strange thing about them. When they do speak their lips don’t move. I think that is also strange.

There’s also a cuckoo clock upstairs, but there are two cuckoos in it, one is white and one is black. The white one cuckoos on the hour, but the other only cuckoos when someone dies, like when cousin Emma was sleep walking and fell down the stairs. I only heard it cuckoo then.

The Little Mermaid Where the Mermaids are Feral and Eat Humans (4 min):

 Fun and Frisky Recent Writing Prompt.

The little mermaid sat on the sand and tears streaked down her face. She thought that it would be so much easier to catch men and eat them on land, but without her voice and her siren song, it was proving difficult to lure lone men to their deaths. She had never really cried before or felt the salty sting of the tears on her face for the ocean’s waters had always washed them away as soon as the tears left her eyes. She was marveling at the sensation when she heard a horrific noise akin to a giant squid being macerated in the jaws of an orca. She turned and saw a man stumbling down the beach towards her. After a few moments she realized that he was trying to sing. The sound hurt her ears. He got closer and then peered down at her with blurry eyes. “Well now Love, what are crying about?” A smile curled the corners of the little mermaid’s mouth. So tears will also attract men, she thought, and lunged.

The Consequences of that Demonstration for Good or Ill

Part 3 of 3 of a multipart prompt.

The smart thing to do would’ve been to laugh and give a wink towards the man who had been heckling Katrina earlier, fling the hand backstage, and then immediately pull something else out of the hat to distract the audience. That would’ve been the smart thing. What Katrina actually did was drop the hat and chuck the hand away from her as fast and as hard as she could, right into the audience. The chaos was rapid and complete. The audience was no longer an audience, it was a hysterical mob. Katrina watched in horror as grown men trampled little old ladies in their haste to get just a little bit further from the severed hand. Women screamed, some fainted, their children getting swept away in the tide of patrons trying to exit the theater. Katrina backed up slowly and slipped behind the curtain.

A Demonstration of Good Faith

Warning: Some gore.

Part 2 of a 3 part prompt.

“It’s fine, it’s fine, we just need a few more minutes.” Simon appeared way to calm for the situation.

“What am I supposed to do for a few more minutes?” Katrina threw her arms wide for emphasis.

Simon glanced around and then plucked up the blood spattered top hot. Wiping it off with the cast-offs from the “never-ending handkerchief”, he handed it to Katrina. “Magic.”

Reluctantly, she took the black hat. It was heavy, like it was filled with lead, and immediately she had to put a hand under it to keep the brim from slipping out of her grasp. “What the hell do you mean magic? I’m a stage hand, not a magician!”

A Difficult Explanation to a Suspicious Audience

Warning: Strong Language.

Part 1 of a 3 part prompt.

Simon shoved Katrina out in front of the curtain. The audience murmured in alarm under the house lights. Only a few patrons had noticed her. Fighting the urge to flee, she swallowed hard and made ready her performance voice.

“Ladies and gentlemen! Let me assure you that it is but a minor technical difficulty that is holding up our performance for you tonight, and that we are doing everything that we can to remedy the issue and continue the performance.”

The crowd quieted some, but not everyone was satisfied.

“That guy lost a hand! I saw it! How’s he going to do the rest of the magic show with one hand!?”

Katrina stiffened, but kept the placating smile on her face. “Sir, please. A minor technical difficulty is what we are dealing with.”

“Minor amputation is more like it!”

“Please, sirs, ladies, take you seats. I assure you that the performance will be continuing in just a few moments. Thank you for your patience.” Katrina ducked back behind the curtain. “Dammit Simon! They’re not buying it.”

The Sensation on My Skin was Unbelievable

Part 4 of 4 of a multipart prompt dealing with the senses.

It wasn’t as if I didn’t know that Yellowstone was dangerous. Hell, just a few weeks ago some guy got eaten by a bear. But what doesn’t make the headlines like the bear attacks are all the people who are horribly burned each year by the thermal features. Even with warning signs, imbeciles still step across barriers and jump over railings and scald their fingers sticking them into boiling pools. I heeded all of the warning signs. There weren’t even supposed to be any thermal features where I was hiking, but I guess I found a new one. Hiking off trail isn’t forbidden in the park, but they do assume that any idiot who does it at least half-way knows what they’re doing, and I did. Bear spray, rig to hang my food, spade to bury my…well you get the picture. Doesn’t matter. If the park has it in for you, you’re going to die. That’s what they tell you anyway, in the park orientation. Everyone scoffs, but it’s true.

I’m walking along, shouting “bear, bear, bear” and then I’m burning, the sensation on my skin was unbelievable, incredible heat, like embracing the sun, and the pain, oh God. It was only later they told me I’d stepped into a thermal pool. Guess the park had it in for me.
.

I Had Their Scent, It was Hard to Describe

Warning: Mild grotesque horror

Part 3 of 4 of a multi part prompt dealing with the senses.

I’m not some two bit tracker. I don’t put an ear to the ground and tell you that someone passed this way ‘not but an hour ago’. I’ve been blessed…or cursed. Depends on how you look at it, though today there was only one way to look at it. The creatures we were trailing were about as foul a thing as I had yet encountered. I had their scent to be sure, but it was hard to describe: rotten blood sausage, three day old standing sewage from a dysentery camp, a microwaved Chihuahua? Never before had my sensitive nose had to withstand such ongoing offenses.

“Yeah, they came this way.”

The hunter grunted. “Didn’t really need you to tell me that.”

We were standing over remains, though of what unfortunate animal, there wasn’t enough left intact to say.
“Sure, but I can also say that they stopped here about an hour ago and are heading southeast at approximately 12 miles an hour.”

“How in the crap do you know any of that?”

“Do you really want me to explain it to you or do you want to go kill these things?”

Sounds Became Intense, I Heard Everything

Part 2 of 4 of a multi-part writing prompt dealing with the senses.

Standing in line, waiting to board that infamous ride, all the sounds of the amusement park suddenly sprouted around with a blossoming intensity. I heard everything. I heard a barker at Prize Alley trying to get a young couple to play that game with the squirt guns. I heard the individual scream of a blond on the Gemini as the trains raced over a hill. I heard a child crying for more ice cream at one of the concession stands. But more important, I heard the ride. I heard the creaking of the metal support beams and the chunk of the over-greased gears. I heard a soft whine in the cable that pulled the car up to the top of the tower and the groan of the tower itself as it swayed in the wind. Finally, unmistakably, I heard the bolt shear and go pinging off into the ether as the car plummeted down with no stopping mechanism..

The Person Finally Arrives at Their Destination but is Disappointed or Surprised by What They Find There

Part 3 of 3 of a multi-part prompt in which the heroine attempts to find her own adventure.

I sprinted away from the grinning, stripy, half-cat through the trees, wincing as the pain in my ankle increased exponentially. Finally, unable to run any longer, I stumbled to a stop in a clearing and sat on a felled tree. Elevating my ankle onto the tree, I decided here would be an okay place to rest until I found my adventure. Maybe, my ankle would be better in the morning. A man hiked out of the woods across the clearing from me. He was tall, dark, and handsome. Now this would be okay, I could do with a little prince charming, I thought. He saw me and stopped.

“Oh no, you must get away from here, run!”

“What?”

He doubled over in pain and then fell to the ground. I tiptoed over to him, and heard a growl. It was then that I noticed the large, white full-moon above the trees. And then I noticed sharp teeth.

Nature Abhors a Vacuum: A Murder Mystery (part 35)

A serialized science-fiction mystery created exclusively for this blog! When last we left our heroine, Pip, along with the rest of the captives, had been tossed through the Confluence by the surprisingly helpful Nib. Now, she returns to the world she knows--or at least, some version thereof. This is the last installment. Thanks for reading, everyone!

Marjorie Loft just wanted a quiet evening at home. She'd unplugged the TV, taken the phone off the hook, and locked the dog in the bathroom. She'd finished her daily housekeeping in record time--dishes, laundry, toilet. Her arthritic hands still ached from the effort.

It would be worth the pain, she'd thought at the time, to have an hour or two of sedate nothingness at the end of it all. She wouldn't meditate. She wouldn't unwind with a novel. She would simply sit and stare at the wall. It was an activity Marjorie often indulged in, the appeal of which spoke volumes for her deprived childhood. She was looking forward to indulging in it again.

Then she remembered: next week was her nephew's birthday. With a sigh, she fetched her knitting needles.

She didn't know why she bothered making presents for him. It wasn't as if they got along. He was, quite simply, a dreadful child. He punched cats, threw rocks at cars, and called his parents the N-word. Once he'd gotten Marjorie arrested at the mall.

"Help!" he'd squealed, while Marjorie held fast to his wrist and tried desperately to shush him. "I don't know this person! This person is not my mother! Somebody call the police!"

Nature Abhors a Vacuum: A Murder Mystery (part 34)

Warning: Strong Language, Mature Themes, Graphic Violence

A serialized science-fiction mystery created exclusively for this blog! When last we left our heroine, Pip and company had fought their way to the Confluence with the aid of a severed tentacle. Now, they face a final stand-off against George Lugner and his detachment of pistol-wielding aliens. Not everyone will come out alive...

"Well, George," said Eddie. "It looks like you've got yourself an army."

There was mockery in his voice, but it sounded forced. Standing at the business end of more than a dozen pistols was unnerving. The only encouraging factor was the Nib, who looked equally unnerved. One of them was even sniffling as his body went ashy gray. He had the gun cupped in his tentacle like an apple--a rotten one he was desperate to dispose of.

George Lugner must have seen the bemused look on Pip's face, because he hastened to reassure her: "They can use them. Their ancestors conquered all of Sagittarius with weapons like these." He gave the gray Nib a look that was at once solicitous and threatening. "Didn't they, Kirar'nib?"

"Mm-hmm," said Kirar'nib miserably.

"Nine hundred yearz ago," murmured the green Nib standing beside him. Realizing Lugner had overheard her, she stiffened and immediately backtracked. "Piztolz have been refurbished, zir! Good working order, juzt like you azk."

Nature Abhors a Vacuum: A Murder Mystery (part 33)

Warning: Graphic Violence

A serialized science-fiction mystery created exclusively for this blog! When last we left our heroine, Pip--along with Charles, Masha, and Duncan--had survived the sadistic experiment that claimed her ex-boyfriend's life. Now, having run into Eddie and the rest of her fellow captives, she fights her way to the Confluence.

"Eddie!" said Pip.

"Pip!" said Eddie.

"Eddie!" said Masha.

"Masha!" said Eddie.

"Eddie?" said Charles.

"Who the hell are you?" said Eddie.

"Stop zere!" shouted Lirma'nib, flailing her appendages at Eddie and the Dredmillon's entire human population, which stood huddled behind him. With an instinctive alacrity that would have put a juggler to shame, she snatched at all escapees within her grasp. Eddie leapt aside and the tip of a tentacle brushed his face, leaving a viscous streak across the bridge of her nose. Pip was seized by the neck, Duncan by the waist, Masha by the shoulder. Charles dove at Lirma'nib as if to tackle her and was immediately engulfed by her gelatinous trunk. The Nib wrapped an appendage around each of his legs and pressed him further inward, smothering him against her body.

Nature Abhors a Vacuum: A Murder Mystery (part 32)

Warning: Strong Language, Mature Themes, Graphic Violence

A serialized science-fiction mystery created exclusively for this blog! When last we left our heroine, Pip had found her brother aboard the Dredmillon. Now, Lirma'nib offers to set Duncan free--but only if Pip participates in a sadistic "experiment." Note: I included the "Mature Themes" and "Graphic Violence" warnings to be safe. I don't think anything in here is too terribly explicit. It might, however, be a little disturbing.

"You know zizz perzon, yez?" Lirma'nib openly drank in Pip's astonishment: the widening of her eyes, the clenching of her fists, the soft "oh" that gusted from her gaping mouth. The alien was studying her reaction with as much care as a scientist bent over a Petri dish. Part of Pip rebelled against the scrutiny, but that part was so quiet as to be almost sub-vocal. Her mind was occupied with other things.

Like the man in front of her, whom she did in fact know. Very well. In the Biblical sense, even. He shuffled across the floor like a zombie in a white shift until he reached Duncan's chair. There he stopped, turned, and raised his head to look at Pip.

Pip gasped again. He did not look well.

"Ron," she said. "What are you doing here?"

Nature Abhors a Vacuum: A Murder Mystery (part 31)

A serialized science-fiction mystery created exclusively for this blog! When last we left our heroine, Pip had confronted a vengeful George Lugner and been reunited with Charles. Now, Charles takes her and Masha to the place where Duncan is being held. What they find when they arrive is not what they expected.

"You have a lot of explaining to do," Pip said as she balanced precariously on the back of a bicycle seat. Charles was standing to give her more room and to apply more force to the pedals, which were difficult to turn beneath the weight of three people. Masha sat on the handlebars, one leg propped on either side of the clip-on flashlight that was their only source of illumination in the darkened corridors of the Dredmillon.

The arrangement was every bit as preposterous as it looked and only marginally faster than walking. Pip had advised Charles to ditch the bike, but he had refused. He'd been glued to it ever since he's found it in the debris catch. It seemed to serve as a security blanket, a token of familiarity amid the absolute weirdness of their surroundings.

Charles nodded. "I know," he panted. "The only question is where to begi-"

THWACK. The bicycle careened into a wall, sending its occupants sprawling.

A Group of Friends (3 min):

Writing prompt part 4 of 4.
Hera stood guard while the others:  Jeth, Miso, and Skutcha played behind her. She wanted so much to run and spin like they did, but it was her night to watch, so watch she did. She would protect her friends from the Unseelies, here in this place where the veil was thin. Laughing broke out behind her and she stole a glance back to see Miso had toppled over into a BarraBush and now all that could be seen of him were his legs. Smiling, she turned back to face the dark wall just in time to see a blur disappear behind the gnarled stump.

“Skutcha! Skutcha I see Unsee!”

She was afraid to take her eyes off the darkness, but Skutcha didn’t hear her over the laughing.

“Unsee, unsee!” Hera shrieked again as another blur peeled from the darkness and rose into the air.

Finally the laughter behind her faded and she heard Jeth’s voice.

“Hera you squeak? You squeakie?”

Nature Abhors a Vacuum: A Murder Mystery (part 30)

A serialized science-fiction mystery created exclusively for this blog! When last we left our heroine, Pip had searched high and low for her brother with little success, hindered by her lack of tentacles and the overly-curious Nib. Now, with the ship on lockdown and Charles on the loose, she confronts a vengeful George Lugner.

"Charlie," Pip said, a half-second before the Nib burst into a frenzy of hushed buzzing. They'd forgotten all about Pip and Masha. Likewise, Pip had forgotten all about them.

"Charlie!" she shouted. "Charlie, we're here!"

She groped in the dark for Masha's hand, catching several tentacles before she finally found it. Then, with a tug that caused Masha to cry out, Pip began dragging her through the crowd. They shoved and jostled amid the sea of viscous bodies. The Nib didn't seem to notice. Perhaps, in light of more interesting developments, they simply didn't care.

Pip broke free of the crowd and started running.