Overbury Ink

Number 38 is a story about the intersecting lives of a serial-killer and his 38th victim. Luca “The Rock” Marrone, the serial-killer is a character from the pages of Blank Death, the first book in the Blank Must Die Trilogy. Number 38 is a new short story from Ian Eliot LeWinter, writer and creative strategist of the duo Brothers of the Silence with his partner writer & illustrator Don Richmond. The Blank Must Die Trilogy was set in motion in May 2009 when Blank Death debuted as the first graphic novel in history to launch and be continuously unveiled on Facebook and Twitter. The story is rich with mythic iconography, psychopathic megalomania, ghosts, murder and bloodshed.





“How are you feeling, Vannah?”


Ms. Grievous and her charge were sitting on a bench drenched in the light of the Arthur Ross Terrace. Encased in a ribbed-glass prison, the Hayden Planetarium Space Center sphere looked synthetic and lonely. The terrace was uncharacteristically empty, the sky dull and soundless.


“I’m feeling better, Ms. Grievous. I’m really sorry I threw up.” Savannah felt that her face had lost most of its initial flush and, although not queasy, she was still embarrassed.


“It’s okay, sweetie,” Ms. Grievous said. “You sit for a minute and I’ll check my messages. You’ve had a rough morning.”


As Ms. Grievous walked a few feet away, Savannah looked out at the polar rink. She noticed a group of pigeons on the railing, all seemingly staring at her, adding to her embarrassment. “God, even the birds,” she thought. “What happened back there? I wasn’t feeling sick at all.”


One of the birds was jet-black, different from the others, and Savannah would have thought it was a different type of bird altogether, except that it looked like the other pigeons in every other respect. She imagined it was sending her telepathic messages. “Little silly girl, you made a great, big mess. You went and threw up breakfast on your pretty, yellow dress.”


Savannah frowned. She thought the bird’s one visible eye was beady and she wished it would stop looking at her. “Your eye is too small for your head and it looks stupid,” she willed back to the bird. As if on cue, the black pigeon turned and flew away.


A cloud moved between her and the sun and she thought she saw that same hulking, dark figure near the entrance of the terrace. But when the sun returned, she only saw the security guard walking her way. He stopped and held out his hand to her. “Is this yours?” he said.


In the middle of his palm was a small, wooden English flute about two inches long and half an inch wide, with two holes in the top and a small but playable mouthpiece. Although miniature, the flute had been intricately crafted from two kinds of wood, with simple, rune-like carvings that ran its entire length.


Savannah marveled at the beautiful little flute in the guard’s calloused hand. “It’s so cute and interesting,” she thought. “I wonder how it sounds?” She slowly looked up at the guard and he looked down at her expectantly through his glasses, his face pink and swollen, like a balloon. She glanced over at Ms. Grievous who was still trying to get a signal with her phone.


“Yes, it’s mine,” she lied and snatched it out of his hand, hiding it quickly in her purse. She again looked up at the guard, but he was saying thank you and turning to walk away.


*******


He was in the state. It was the same every time. Tingling hands. Dilated eyes. Heightened awareness. Quick, shallow breathing. A feeling of things moving in slow motion. Buzzing ears and a sharp, stabbing headache.


After the security guard had passed, Luca moved into the large archway separating the two galleries. There in the passage between the rooms, exposed and vulnerable, he was just a few feet from the commotion. Something small dropped from his hand.


“Pink. Pink with white and blue stars. Golden hair in a braid.” He trembled, making mental notes of what he saw.


He went to the nearby museum shop and feigned interest in a bookrack of cheap, brightly-colored novels, glancing more than once over the rack’s sterile top toward the archway that led to the girl. His mind raced. “What if she doesn’t come this way? This is the most important part. I might lose her. Should I go back? Should I make my way to the other end of the gallery? What if she’s already gone? Think! What would Mother want?”


One minute passed. Five minutes. The swelling flood of questions coursed through his mind. Then two men appeared in coveralls, both sullen-faced, one towing a sloshing mop bucket of steaming, soapy water, the other, a half-dozen rags and a yellow caution sign.


Again, the sharp headache. Luca decided it was time to move, to risk being seen.


He would turn and walk the long way round to the other side of the gallery. There was no other way. He stepped out from behind the bookrack — and that’s when he saw her again. She emerged from the same light-streaked archway through which he’d first spied her and in which he had just stood moments before.


She and her guardian walked down the hall and outside onto the terrace. Luca followed, banging his knee on the bottom of the rack, causing him to wince and curse his loss of focus. He positioned himself in a corner of the walkway that overlooked the giant sphere of the planetarium, a corner that offered him an uninterrupted view of the terrace and his prey.


“I know it’s her. She is the one.”


*******


“That was disgusting,” Brenner thought, walking into the empty security office behind the museum shop. “What did she have for breakfast, green pasta with brown marshmallows?” he chuckled. “I’m sure as hell glad I didn’t have to clean that up!”


He sat down on the sagging sofa and made himself comfortable among the mess of paper. He skimmed all the entries on the top page of the security log and added a brief description of the vomit incident. He’d encountered one like this just a few months ago, although he was going off-shift when it happened and his relief had to deal with it. A UC-8 the guards nicknamed it, insider code for “You See What They Ate.”


As he wrote, Brenner glanced up at the bank of security monitors that lined that wall in front of him. The monitors were supposedly color, but they were old and the locations they depicted were abnormally monotone that the screens displayed an integrated montage of grays and blues. Before looking away, Brenner noticed a large shadow on the deck overlooking the rink. He recalled his mental note to check out the big guy.


“What are you all about, you big fuck?” he said to the screen. Grabbing his oversized walkie-talkie, he headed out of the office. Then, he stopped, remembering that the device’s batteries had died yesterday on Chen’s shift and no one could find new ones in the supply cabinet, meaning a requisition order would need to be filled out.


“I’ll take care of it later,” he thought.


*******


Though his ears buzzed, Luca heard the guard heading his way long before the guard saw him.
He moved with a quickness incongruent with his size and shape, scuttling across the tile causeway toward the men’s room. He paused in front of the door long enough to ensure the guard noticed him. Satisfied, he moved inside, walked up to a urinal and feigned pissing.


*******


The man was gone. “What the fuck?” Brenner thought.


The broad carpeted “Scales Of The Universe” walkway encircled the massive planetarium, obscuring part of it from view at all times. Brenner had walked heavily and briskly until the section where he expected the man to be standing came into view. But the man wasn’t there.


And then he saw him outside the men’s room. He was big.


Changing his direction, Brenner moved to intercept him about 40 feet away. He closed half of the distance quickly and looked around as he had been trained, scanning his surroundings. When he looked back, the man had vanished again.


Brenner moved to the entrance of the men’s room and felt a rush of adrenaline. He pulled his walkie-talkie out of its holster and put it up to his head and then remembered once again that the batteries were dead. He tried it anyway, depressing the Talk button. No noise. “Shit”, he muttered under his breath. “Focus!”


He glanced to his left and right, before entering the bathroom.


*******


As the door to the men’s room swung open, Luca’s right thumb slowly and smoothly pushed the thin, 3-inch long blade out of its handle and locked it into place.


(To be continued)

Dying for more? Have you read Blank Must Die? Tell us in the comments! Missed a chapter? Find Parts 1 through 4 below or in the Bookshelf page.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4