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“What?” I glance up toward the scene guard. She’s some poor soul holding a handkerchief to her nose and mouth and refusing to leave the unfortunate corpse to his own devices. These little acts of bravery and quiet displays of strength from beat cops always get me. She could be like her partner, off vomiting in a trash can, but she’s made of sterner stuff. She’ll go far.
The officer gestures toward my head. Oh. Right. The pink party hat. I pluck it off my head and stuff it into my pocket. I already have a reputation for being a weird, heartless bitch, I don’t need to add to that with inappropriate headgear.
There’s a good reason for me being pulled away from my small office birthday party. A man has been torn nearly in two.
He is spilling out all over himself, a mess of human. The sheet they tried to cover him with is soaked with the contents of his guts. The smell is horrendous. The sight is worse. But the smell is also… no. The sight. The sight is definitely… hmmm, but then the smell sort of clings to you when you try to walk away, whereas the sight will only play in my trauma nightmares. Still, six of one, half a dozen of the other.
Forensics is going to do their job, take pictures, get amongst the goo. That’s not my job. I get to glance at the nightmares, then treat them like a jigsaw puzzle. I wish I could say I’ve never seen anything like this before, but that wouldn’t be true. I’ve seen this before too many times and all too frequently of late. There is a murderer stalking the city. A killer with a chaotic and disturbing signature.
“Any witnesses? Who found the body?”
“I believe you’ve got a witness in custody, detective,” the officer says. “But I don’t think you’re going to like what he says.”
“What does he say?”
I don’t know why I’m asking. I already know the answer. I’m just hoping she doesn’t say it.
“He says a moth did it, ma’am.”
Fuck.
* * *
Ileave the scene examination to forensics and return to the 89th precinct. The witness has been installed in an interview room that is doing absolutely nothing for his peace of mind.
He’s sitting in the steel chair shaking involuntarily. Some of that might be out of shock and disgust at what he’s just seen, but it’s also typical behavior for someone undergoing withdrawals. I’m going to bet he was as high as a kite when he saw the moth, just like everybody else who has allegedly seen this monster.
He’s about thirty, and is wearing an oversized band t-shirt, tight jeans, and leather boots. He’s skinny, and his hair is brown with that stringy quality you get when you decide washing your hair is a capitalist conspiracy. He has the vibe of a young Shaggy who just saw a ghost for sure.
“Chet Smithers?” I check my clipboard as I walk into the room. His basic details have been taken already, as well as a statement that makes absolutely no fucking sense. “I’m Detective Holmes.”
“Hey,” he says. He has a Californian accent, a chill drawl that persists even though he’s terrified. “Dude. That was fuckedup.”
“Yes,” I agree. “I’m sorry you had to see that. It was a very disturbing scene.”
“It was eating him, man.” As he starts to tell me his story, his tremors increase until he is shaking from head to toe. His eyes are rimmed with red, his skin is yellowed and sallow. Fear and a comedown make him look a lot like a zombie, but I’m not going to report an undead creature in interview room two. Because zombies aren’t real, and neither are moths who eat people.
“Speaking of eating. What do you want to eat? You look hungry.”
He looks sick to his stomach, but he also looks like he needs food.
“Uhhh…”
I go to the vending machines and get the guy a hot chocolate and a protein snack bar. He needs something in him if I’m going to get something like sense out of him.
When I get back and give him the stuff, he looks at it like he doesn’t know what it is for a moment or two, then sets about demolishing it. As he does, he tells me a story.
“It was a man. But not like a man, man. He was weird. He was like, twenty feet tall, with red eyes and wings. And his teeth were sharp, and his hands were clawed, and he was just ripping into that poor guy, shaking him, like the way antelopes shake on those nature shows when a pride of lions is eating their insides. You know, the guy was gone, but still moving and…”
This is the sort of eyewitness testimony I am supposed to conduct investigations with. If any of my witnesses were sober, I might get somewhere. But you don’t get sober witnesses in Brooklyn after three in the morning. You get the sort of people who see monsters everywhere. They should be looking in the mirror.
“Alright. Do I have all your contact details? You got a cell phone? Twitter account?”
“Uhhh… “
“Write them down,” I say, sliding paper over to him with a pencil. I might get some sense out of him tomorrow. I’m not keeping him overnight, and I’m not going to hammer him with questions while he’s addled on whatever he’s on.
It’s time to turn my attention to the victim, identify him, inform next of kin, ask them if there was anybody who wanted to gut him like a fish.
