Monday, August 11th -- Later that day...
(Check out: http://ctaretz.xanga.com/755787380/murders-close-to-home----part-1/, http://ctaretz.xanga.com/755861297/murder-close-to-home----part-2/, http://ctaretz.xanga.com/756199130/murder-close-to-home----part-3/, http://ctaretz.xanga.com/756666341/murder-close-to-home----part-4/, http://ctaretz.xanga.com/757336374/murder-close-to-home----part-5/, http://ctaretz.xanga.com/757860842/murder-close-to-home----part-6/, http://www.ctaretz.com/758344236/murder-close-to-home----part-7/, http://ctaretz.xanga.com/761088449/murder-close-to-home----part-8/, Murder Close To Home -- Part 9 first if you haven't yet)
Two hours after I flipped over my desk, scaring the hell out my new partner, detective Lopez, and tackled by half of the homicide department so I didn't, not only break up the place, but, hurt myself, I found myself sitting in the captains office one more time. I showed him the pic on my cell and he stared at it, speechless, just sitting there and staring at it. Did he see something? What the hell was he doing?
"Joe, I don't really know what to say, this picture is very disturbing, I can't say that I wouldn't have reacted any different (sighs). Here (he hands me back my phone), all I can suggest for you to do is look at the picture and see what you can find for clues. He's smart, he sent this message privately. There's no way to crack a private number easily, if at all."
I didn't say anything, I just walked out of the office and went back to my disorganized desk. Cynthia, my partner, sat at her desk and stared at my forehead while I was looking at this pic of Peter -- bloody and broken. But then I started to look around the picture of Pete, I started to see rusted out pipes, a bunch of pipes together, on top of each other, like, a, like, A BOILER ROOM. But, a boiler room where? And a boiler room that is in as bad a shape as this. I could be wrong though, SHIT! FUCK! It could be anything, anywhere. It's time to talk to my partner, it's time to clue her in on my thoughts, this is why I wanted a partner, this is why she's here.
"Cynthia (I looked up and was startled when I saw she was still staring at me), wow. You're staring at me."
"I know Joe, I feel really bad, I can't even express the hurt I feel for you."
"I understand, my boys aren't dead yet, if they were, I don't believe that the perp would have sent me a pic of Peter. He wants me to know they're alive but, he's not afraid of hurting them. Anyway, I am looking at this picture and I see that there are a bunch of busted up and rusted pipes on top of each other, I'm thinking that the only places these type of pipes would be necessary would be in a boiler room. Take a look."
Cynthia takes my phone and looks at the picture.
"Yeah, it does look that way Joe, and you're right there's no way that those pipes are of any use, being rusted out like that."
"Cynthia, isn't there an old energy plant on the border of Lyons and the town of Bobbins? You know, the one that went bankrupt about eight years ago?"
"Yes there is, oh, I remember that too, that plant had so many problems with outages and leaky pipes that they had to go Chapter 11. It was either that, or they would have been shut down indefinitely."
"Right, but, before we take a ride over there to take a look, are there any other places that shutdown, that would have a big boiler room with pipes as big as these?"
"Hmmm, I don't, wait, no, the ones that I've heard of have been bought and restored/rehabbed -- they are fully operational.
"come on (I reached for my phone), lets go talk to the captain."
Cynthia and me got up and walked over to the captain's office, it wasn't a sure thing but, I started to feel a wave of hope fill my body, it was a cool feeling, a feeling one would get drinking down a tall glass of water after sweating in the hot sun for hours. I knocked on the door:
Captain: "Enter."
"Captain, I think we have something (Cynthia looked at me, could she be surprised that I said "we"?), we looked at this picture in my cell and realized there were a lot of old, rusted out pipes on the walls above and next to my boy, we believe they look like pipes that would belong to a boiler, a big boiler, and the only thing that we could think of as a possibility, is that my boys are being held hostage at the old energy plant, on the border of Lyons and the town of bobbins."
"Really? Let me see the pic again."
The captain observed the pic a good while, squinting, hmmm'ing, rubbing his chin, and then he started to nod.
"Okay, let's not spare any more time and get over there, I'll call the Bobbins police department and let them know that two of my best detectives are going over there to investigate a case. I'll ask them to stay out of the way. The police in the town of Bobbins and the city of Lyons are allies, no rivalry between us, this should be an easy task. Besides, that energy plant is a part of our territory too."
We thanked the captain and made our way to the car. Now I'm not only hopeful, I'm excited, shit, I'm getting my hopes up too high, I need to settle, I need to get realistic.
My cell phone rang, I was reluctant to answer it, I've been bombarded with all these fucked up calls from the murderer, kidnapper, sex offender. Holy Shit, what a disgusting beast! "Murderer, kidnapper, sex offender", I'm gonna get this shithead! I look down at the caller I.D., oh, it's the captain.
"Hello?"
"Joe, we've got clearance to check out the whole factory but, both the captain at bobbins and myself are going to insist on some back up. Don't worry, we will keep the back up out of sight, a ways away from the plant, but, you need to have this back up Joe, so get a walkie talkie and set it to frequency two. You and Cynthia."
"Okay, will do captain."
I told Cynthia what the captain said and we both went to dispatch, signed out a couple of their spare radios, turned them on, and switched them to frequency two, like the captain asked.
On the way to the plant, the car was silent, I drove fast and furiously, and beeped and weaved around traffic. It was 3:00 and the first wave of heavy traffic between Lyons and any surrounding town would start as early as 3:30. This is when all the morning workers at the businesses and factories in the industrial parks got out of work. We got to the factory in record time, not because of safe driving, but, we got there fast. I was ready to patrol this factory for my kids. I was ready to put bullets in this motherfuckers chest and head. I stopped a little before the factory and we got out, closed the doors to the vehicle quietly -- you never know, this psycho could be outside getting some fresh air, taking a stroll, a smoke break, whatever.
We went around to the back of the car where there were two sawed off shotguns and flashlights (we signed them out at the station before we left), we grabbed the shotguns and flashlights. I closed the trunks door quietly and we were off. We walked to the end of a row of trees to a cracked cement driveway guarded by a fence. The fence wasn't guarding the property very well though, there was a hole in it, a hole big enough to walk through. I observed the links on the fence as I walked through this hole and looked at my partner.
"Cut (I pointed at the fence)."
Cynthia nodded. When we got through the fence we ran quickly across the driveway, behind a building, past the quad, and to the front of the building. Wow, this place has a quad. Shit, he could be looking at us through any one of those broken windows if the front door, front door? Shit, I don't even know if this was the front door anymore, there wasn't a sign saying front door, there wasn't a sign at all. A section of the southern part of the plant across the quad was exposed after we past the rear of the North building, on the way to the west building, this means we were also exposed at the Northwest side of the quad and building, and even though it was about a hundred yards away, I'm sure that if someone was looking out the right window at the right time, our cover would be blown.
We tried the first door to the factory, this door was at the west side of the quad and facing east, at least from where we were standing. again, we were at the Northwest corner of this big garbage dump of a building. I pulled the knob and found myself catching the door from crashing to the ground. The hinges were taken off. I laid the door down on the ground and pointed at the hinges, Cynthia nodded and whispered;
"The evidence that someone has been here is starting to add up, now the question is who?"
I didn't say anything and led the way. We both took a wall on both sides of the corridor. Shot guns pointed straight ahead, It was dark in the hall but the doorway provided a bit of light, now that its down a door. We took out our flashlights just the same, When we got to the end of the corridor we saw an open door, we looked in and out of it real quick to make sure no one was lurking around in there, and then we walked in. We shone our flashlights all around the room and as we did I noticed a diagram.
"Cynthia, flash your light over here, straight ahead. Look, it's a map of the buildings, this must be the main office, come on let's go take a look."
We both walked over to the map and saw that it was a blueprint-type map of where everything was located in the facility.
"Joe, I found the boiler, it's in building 'C'."
I looked to see where building 'C' was.
"Shit, it's directly across from us, damn, okay, we will back track, we'll run behind the north building again, or building 'B' and fast trot to the closest door. Where in 'C' is it?"
Cynthia points;
"Right here in the middle of the building, and it takes up the hole south side of 'C'."
"Okay, I'm gonna call it in to our back up so they know where we're going to be, and tell them to stand by (Cynthia nodded)."
I called it in with the proper coordinance and told them to wait it out until we needed them. Our back up complied and we were on our way to building 'C'.
Cynthia and I backtracked as planned and when we got to the first door we tried it, and the same fuckin' thing happened, the door fell and we found ourselves playing catch one more time. We walked in and this time we walked even slower than before. I shone my flashlight to the ground and saw that there were large footprints in the dirty, dusty floor, but, the front of the shoe prints were wider than the ones I saw at the last crime scene. Shit, is there more than one? Damn it, I can't think about that right now. Cynthia and I kept walking and as we got further we heard the opening of a door, Cynthia and I both crouched down and aimed our guns towards the sound, we saw a big figure walk into the hall, and shone our flashlights at him as we aimed our shotguns. He faced us, he wore a potato sack over his head and instantly I knew what that meant -- I yelled;
"Freeze!"
He, within an instant, grabbed for something and I fired, Cynthia fired right after me and this big man fell to the floor and we heard a clankedyclank as whatever he grabbed for flew out of his hand and bounced behind him.
I ran over to him and saw that he was shot in the stomach and the shoulder, his innards were hanging out of his stomach and his shoulder was bloody, dislocated and mangled.
"What flew out of his hands Cynthia? Cynthia shone her flashlight around and spotted something shining next to the wall, she walked over there and saw what it was;
"It's a 'Glock' nine millimeter."
I looked back down at the perp and took the potato sack of his head, he was coughing out blood and struggling to breathe, I looked at him and asked where my sons were. He pointed at the doorway he exited from, I looked and heard him gargling out a painful sound of laughter. I asked him what he was laughing at;
Perp: "I'm not the main guy, I only did this for the money (said while gurgling, coughing, and spitting out blood)."
He started to laugh again, so I took my Colt out and put one his forehead. I looked at Cynthia. Cynthia put her hands up and said;
"I didn't see anything, all in the line of duty, man, all in the line of duty."
Cynthia and I both walked through the doorway, walked down some stairs and opened a metal door. We walked into a rusted out boiler room with a line of trouble lights leading to another room, we walked to this room, I was nervous to what horrors I might see, I was scared that my boys might be dead. When I walked through the doorway, I walked past some pipes and there they were.
"Mikey! Pete!"
Mike woke up right away, Pete didn't wake up until after I untied both of them and grabbed Pete's hands and started rubbing them in mine, I said his name repeatedly. Pete was weak and I had to get him to a hospital right away. Mike's arms were already wrapped around my neck. They were both dirty and smelled like piss but, it was the best day of my life. Cynthia called for backup and medical assistance and met them upstairs, when backup reached me I was lying down with peter, and mike was on my back with his arms still around my neck.
Pete went straight to the hospital...
Monday, August 18th -- It's Not Over
To be continued...
