Chapter 2: Routine
When the news came out about the man in the woods, I had already made it the four-hour drive to my new home in the Hills. The news reported that an old woman who went out to feed the birds found him. The news described him as a new college student on the football team with a scholarship, Jeremy was a college student studying to become a veterinarian and had two dogs. Blah blah blah, dude seemed boring and that was the end of it. after a few months went by the incident turned to a cold case and the police went about doing their normal things and they stopped reporting on the man in the woods.
But it wasn't over for me, I dreamed about him for weeks, I wanted to kill and clean him again, I craved it so much that I was seeing his face in the people who walked by me on my campus, I envisioned them as him and I wanted to do it again. But I had moved away from the suburbs, now I was living in the Hills, the people here didn't give me the tingles he did. When I got here to the Hills my mom had come to help me move into the house I had bought a few weeks ago and hire people, after all I had started a café in the popular shopping district while I was in college for business, the house was not big, but it was so perfect I couldn't resist it. I borrowed money from my rich aunt and started a little café, I wanted to be a small business owner. I wasn't trying to be the next Starbucks or anything, just a cozy café in a tourist trap.
When I bought my house, I had already executed a few people and made a killing, yes pun intended, and I made a few friends in the shadows. None that knew I was a girl, but I had a secret contractor create me a beautiful playhouse under my wood cottage. The designer was anonymous and told me that I had to be gone for two weeks for them to put the basement in, so when I actually bought the house I had to wait two weeks before actually moving in. it was perfect since it was all anonymous, I had nothing in the new house that was just bought, and the contractor would never be seen.
My secret basement was soundproof and sterile there was a fourteen-foot-tall stainless-steel guillotine. Yes, like the medieval one, but of course upgraded for the modern day. Instead of a basket, the guillotine is directly in front of a large bath, so when the head goes popping off it lands in the tub. and then there are the beams I use to hang the person until all the blood drains from the body. After a few days of hanging the person is usually ready for the most important part of the job, dismemberment and grooming.
The secret basement was very well designed, and I couldn't even begin to understand how they created the perfect place for me. All I asked for was the soundproof and sterile place, but the contractor had actually brought in and placed the guillotine and tubs and everything there were even shelving units where I could store my cleaning supplies. I hung my axe on the wall as a memento of my first few kills.
Once I finally got settled into my new home, I had such a bad craving for another kill. It had been four months since I killed, I felt that familiar need deep in my gut. I went out to find a new prey, the next victim, my sick obsession. Men, women it didn't matter as long as I felt like they deserved to be mine, that's all that counted to me, I saw a female pushing drugs to kids and I just couldn't resist the temptation, she was my fourth victim. I found her out walking in a dark side street one night and I took the opportunity to take her home. I pulled out the chloroform and rag and pulled up to offer her a ride in the dark alley.
She thought that because I was a female I wasn't a threat, but she didn't realize she was in the car with a murderer. As she put her seatbelt on I reached over and pressed the rag against her face, she was out in a few seconds. I tied her up and placed her in the trunk before making my way back to my house in the hills. I parked in my garage and hauled the sleeping girl out of the trunk giving her another whiff of the potent cloth so she wouldn't wake up while I was strapping her to the bascule.
While she was laying on the bascule I was prepping for her execution. I plugged my phone into the surround sound system that the designer also built into my playroom, seriously they thought of everything. The phone started playing C-Mob over the speakers, "See I'd rather not, be out on the block, I'd rather find a legal way for me to make my guap, see I'm too damn old to be running from the cops, I'll hustle if I have to if I don't then imma stop." I sang along to the song.
It was funny that I was listening to a song about making a living the legal way when I was about to drop a giant blade through this chicks neck severing her spinal cord and wrenching her head from her shoulders, the irony was not lost on me. I couldn't help that I loved crazy rap music even as a little white girl, and underground rap had the best thumpers to get you in a happy mood. I was singing along when I heard a stifled scream come from the guillotine.
"Hello, you are Vanessa Rhodes, correct." I said pulling the bascule up so that the strapped woman was in a standing position and not laid face down on the chopping block. She started making a bunch of muffled noises her face turning red and tears falling from her eyes. She wasn't really sorry for what she did to those kids she was just terrified and who wouldn't be in this situation. I looked down at the papers in front of me and started reading her criminal history to her.
"You started down the wrong path at such a young age. I mean this record is impressive from car theft to armed robbery, prostitution and now you have added pushing drugs to minors on the streets. Because of you three kids in the district were rushed to the emergency room for overdose. They were only ten, twelve, and fourteen years old.
Her face was tear stained and I pulled my cute pink polaroid out and undid the gag in her mouth she started screaming at the top of her lungs, so I turned the music up and looked at her with a smile. Then I turned the music down and addressed her again. "You can scream all you want but first can I take your picture, smile like a good girl."
She looked at me purely horrified and I snapped her picture. When I was done I let go of the counterweight holding her in the up position and she slammed forward into the lunette. I pulled the release handle and the rocker arm engaged sending the blade flying down and severing the woman's head.
"I wonder if they know what has happened after their head becomes detached?" I asked myself. "Oh well, oh this is a pretty good picture, she was really scared. I am going to put this into my picture book." I said with a smile.
***
Over the next three years I had fallen into a new routine, every three months I felt the familiar need, of course, cleaning them up was my biggest ritual. I found that I enjoyed the dregs of society, they were low fruit hanging and I couldn't resist the lure of a bad dog needing to be disposed of. The news named me the executioner since the killing blow was always a clean slice from the back of the neck. I don't think the cops had figured out I had an actual guillotine. I had set up a dark web site that automatically ran names from the prison systems and jails in the area and the crimes of individuals.
Eventually people started posting jobs specific to the executioner, it was a strange system that had developed for me. There was a whole bunch of people begging to have someone killed and if the job sounded like a rabid dog I would take it. and I would get paid anonymously into a secret account. I had a whole network of bad people wanting worse people to die.
If I was interested in a job I would place a headsman marker next to the job on the cite, there were many other markers too. There was a green cat eye and a red sickle, there was even a shadow figure. For three months I would stalk the next victim, I would gather information on certain targets, I would learn everything about the target. Height, weight, usual schedules, families, anything I could get my hands on would go into my profile.
I didn't mind the nickname what bothered me was that every profiler in the country had categorized me as a man. It made me angry, but I also knew that it kept me safe since no one would be looking for a five foot ninety-eight-pound girl. no, I was scot free and that made me happy because it meant that I was able to continue living my life the way I wanted to. I always hunted during the week since the weekends were my down time, and the Hills was my home, I was smart enough not to hunt where I lived or worked so I took my business outside the Hills.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone