Chapter Text
Truth be told, Vincent Whittman had lost track of his kill count. There was a time, not too long ago now, that he’d carefully counted each and every producer, talk show host, or random witness, marking their deaths with a smug grin and a glass of expensive rye whiskey. Now, as he drove home from a particularly long and difficult day with a body wrapped like a macabre gift on the backseat, it occurred to him that he didn’t even know this guy’s surname. He wasn’t a person, and now wasn’t even a number, because Vincent had killed too many to remember. There was something melancholic about it. Something special.
He took the back route home, hoping he could stop by on the way and dump the body somewhere. Vincent wasn’t exactly careful with his kills, and didn’t much care for proper disposals or burials (they were quite frankly a massive waste of his precious time). Why should he be? He was well-liked, popular, charismatic, and most importantly of all, powerful. Even if anyone looked at him, he would easily dissuade them and continue to climb the coveted staircase to stardom, knowing against all else that he’d fought hard enough to be worthy.
Holding his cigarette between his teeth, he turned up the volume on the radio. It was late, but that didn’t matter. Every journalist, every reporter, every radio host were all discussing the media murders seemingly at all hours of the day, searching desperately for the coveted murderer. It was tempting, so tempting, to come forward and take the credit himself. Show the people how hard he’d worked for where he was today. Show just how serious he was about the entertainment business, show the world that he was not to be fucked with. He wanted desperately to outwardly gloat about it, and it took great self-restraint to keep his secret to himself.
As he listened, the radio host pondered, as they often did, the identity of the strange media murderer. Some of the guesses were normal. A television producer here, an actor there. Some of them were more outlandish. A demon. A retired jazz singer from the South. Vengeful spirits hungry for blood. It would make a good story, he thought. The so-called media murderer, a crazed creature from the beyond, crawling out of its grave to target the weatherman and all his superiors. They should write crime books about it, Vincent thought. He’d read them.
The dark seemed to close in around the car, dragging its fingertips across his windshield. It was a clear night, the milk of the moon casting him in a spotlight as he drove along the familiar path home. The roads around this route were pretty precarious at the best of times, but this winter was particularly cruel, and he had to drive carefully. He’d rather live in the hustle and bustle of the centre of the city, but it would probably make his recreational activities a little harder, and in reality, it wasn’t so bad. He had more space here, and the commute wasn’t so bad. He liked the rare solitude, relied on it to muse and scheme without the pressure of turning on the charm and hiding behind his mask.
The car passed under a streetlight, the orange light cutting through the darkness. It reminded him of the incompetent stagehand who now lay on his backseat. The idiot had lit him so poorly he’d looked twenty years older, and the ratings, which had been skyrocketing for weeks, took a dip from which he was still recovering now. The only people who seemed to work with him behaved like cockroaches in need of squashing. Just a month ago, he’d had to kill an operator who had sloppily dropped the mic into frame live on camera. Seriously, Vincent wished he could have killed that one twice. No accounting for talent these days, he supposed. Half of the fight for success was finding the right people to cut off – not, of course, that it wasn’t fun to slice into them like butter.
As he took one final drag of his cigarette and carelessly discarded it, the radio crackled. He frowned. The car was pretty new, and the radio was supposed to be state-of-the-art. Irritated, he slapped it with the back of his hand, and it came flickering back to life.
“Police have reason to believe the murders are linked,” the radio continued, “due to their similar nature.” It trailed off again, flickering in and out of signal. “… found in a dumpster several weeks ago has been identified as …”
He sat back in his seat, smiling. One less to worry about. Slowly, person by person, slit throat by slit throat, he was thinning the herd, and soon there would be no competition to take out. It was satisfying. It was what he deserved.
Of course, there were other people to now consider. The network had recently decided that what he really needed was a co-host – the absolute fucking nerve of them – and worse, they hadn’t even divulged this co-host’s identity. One of these days, he would commute to work only to find some arrogant square who really thought they could compare to the likes of him. Well, it’d just be another person to dispose of. He’d bide his time. Wait it out until the media frenzy around the last killing calmed down. Then he’d strike.
The radio host was now interviewing an ex-cop to discuss the identity of the so-called media maniac.
“From what we know,” he was saying, “and assuming the accuracy of the police’s theory that the murders are connected, I think it’s fairly understandable that the public would want to guess at the killer’s identity.”
“And if you could identify him, what kind of maniac would you say he is?” the host asked.
“This is pure speculation, of course,” the cop said, “but I’d say, given the frequency of the killings, as well as how close they are in terms of vicinity, that the killer is experiencing some serious hubris.”
Vincent scoffed. Just because the police weren’t smart enough to catch up to him didn’t make him hubristic. It said more about them, surely?
“Whatever his motive, this man is clearly violent, depraved, and potentially most importantly of all, angry,” the radio continued. “To kill so viciously requires a certain relationship to the victim, after all. Arrogant and angry, and someone close by. If I were working on the case – and again, this is purely speculative – I would be looking at any arrogant up-and-coming stars in the industry.”
“Someone young, then?” the host asked.
“Not necessarily. With this amount of bitterness, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the killer is older, actually, and feels he’s entitled to a piece of the pie.”
Vincent laughed aloud at that. They always thought they were so clever, these ants crawling into the wrong industries, the wrong theories, naming their killers instead of actually finding them. He wasn’t without heat, of course. There were murmurs and whispers here and there, connections between the mysterious deaths and the one person they all had in common. There was nothing of substance. Vincent Whittman was a smart man, no matter how arrogant these idiots seemed to believe him to be, and he knew exactly what to say to slither out of trouble. If he had to do it fifty times over, well then, so be it. He was too close to his goal to give in now.
They were just discussing why the police weren’t releasing a suspect list when the radio crackled again, this time a constant static that covered up every word. Vincent grunted in frustration, hitting it again, but to no avail.
His eyes only flickered down for a second, but the next time he looked at the road, it was to see a strange and sad sight indeed.
A deer stood in the middle of the road, still as a statue, watching dolefully as Vincent’s car rapidly approached.
There was no time to swerve, though he tried. The car slammed right into the deer, so hard that he felt the entire car rattle, every bone in his body screeching – or maybe that was the tyres? Vincent cried out in shock as the car swerved. Knuckles tight as a vice on the wheel, he tried desperately to regain control, to no avail. It was as if the wheel had a life of its own, turning rapidly, and then all Vincent saw was flashes. The road ahead of him. The deer. The moon hanging low, watching impassively. Trees.
When the car slammed into one of these trees, Vincent was thrown forwards, his head slamming hard against the wheel. All the air went out of his body. Pain, sudden and insistent, dug its merciless fingers into his skull. He had to fight to remember how to breathe, mouthing at the air like a shark on land, desperate for the safety of the sea.
He just sat there, so still he could be dead – and perhaps he was. Sluggish and slow, he tried to process a new instinct that roared in his ears, overwhelming the pain and fear. Get out of the car.
He opened the door and slipped out, falling hard onto the ground. Frost-hardened mud and grass hit his cheek, and he felt the shivering cold of winter splay across his bare skin. For a moment, Vincent just lay there, dazed and wincing in pain. Then came the voice at the back of his head. Get up.
He pulled himself up slowly, and it took more effort than he’d have liked. He used a tree for leverage, the leathery bark hard and coarse beneath his hand, and straightened to survey the scene. The car had been thrown off road and had barrelled right into the very tree he was leaning on. The hood was surprisingly intact, but from the sight of the smoke coming out from underneath it, Vincent could gather he wouldn’t be driving it any time soon. The static white noise coming from the radio was distracting, worming its way into his head.
Vincent shook himself, trying to focus. He adjusted his glasses, which had miraculously survived the crash mostly unscathed save a few scratches and cracks, and stumbled away from the car in search of the deer he’d hit. He could hear sickening sounds coming from further in the woods, animalistic groaning that made his heart twist with something he very rarely felt: guilt.
He saw something move from the corner of his eye, and turned, blinking as his brain struggled to keep up with his body. There was nothing there but trees and darkness, the light of the moon the only thing keeping him balanced. He swallowed, trying to find courage within himself and coming up with very little.
“Hello?” he managed to get out.
Nothing at all, besides the distant static of the radio.
He turned back in the direction of the deer, rubbing a little uselessly at his head. He felt completely dazed, and so out of it he wondered if he was dreaming, but some bizarre instinct forced him to keep stumbling forwards. He tried to use the trees for leverage, balancing himself as he struggled deeper into the woods, leaving his car further and further behind.
A twig snapped.
He turned again, his blood so cold in his body, it felt like winter had made a vessel of him.
“Is someone there?” he asked.
Again, nothing. The radio continued to buzz. Oddly, though he was getting further and further away from it, it sounded louder now, as if it was following him.
Foreboding dripped down his spine, sweat beading at his brow, but he forced himself to continue. He was Vincent fucking Whittman. He wasn’t afraid of twigs snapping in the woods. He wanted to find the deer, and he would find it.
The sickening sounds were growing louder and louder as he continued to approach. The soft bleating of the animal had become a horrible gurgling sound as if it was choking on its own blood, and Vincent could hear a consistent splintering noise that sounded suspiciously like bones breaking. There was something else, too. The sound of something heavy being dragged away across leaves and mud. Logically, he understood that most of these noises could not be attributed by wounds sustained from a car crash. He was hearing something else, if he was really hearing anything at all. In all likelihood, his long work day, alongside the stress of killing again and the concussion from the crash, was all getting to his very pained head. Still, he couldn’t shake the horrible feeling that he was being watched.
A few more steps, but he still didn’t see the deer. He saw something else instead.
A great, hulking creature crept between the trees, slowly dragging a hunk of unidentifiable meat across the forest floor. Its winding, spider-like appendages betrayed an evident monstrous strength as it carried the carcass with ease. Vincent couldn’t comprehend what he was looking at. One second, there was nothing there at all. The next, a long-limbed, antlered creature was there, making a horrific sound he could only describe as hissing, but not like any ordinary animal. In fact, it didn’t look like an animal at all. It was a creature through and through, wicked and frightening, the type of being that made every instinct in Vincent’s body roar at him to run. It had stopped and seemed to sit with an impossible stillness, and in the shadows it could have easily been mistaken as a few fallen trees if not for the noise. It grew and waned. He was drawn to it, that ragged air escaping between clenched teeth. It brought out a curious new emotion, one he hadn’t experienced in so long he’d forgotten. Fear. It excited him to know that there was still something other than failure to be afraid of in this world. He had to know its face.
The creature lifted its large, deer-like head and fixed him with a sinister grin.
Vincent froze. He was transfixed. He stared at the creature, and it stared back at him. His eyes adjusted slowly, and as they did, he noticed a faint red glow across the thing’s face. And its eyes. Oh, its eyes. Every face he saw, the lives he’d taken, they all carried the same glimmer of light in them. Some reflection of the person inside, something small, something meaningless, that he needed to see leave them, that he and he alone had to take. He always loved it when they turned to face him with that stupid look of fear and confusion on their faces, and if he could get just close enough, in the emptiness of their eyes he could see himself. But these eyes. In them, he saw nothing and everything. They contained a light within them, but not a reflection, something deeper, an anger, a shadow, ready to crash forth into this world. In these eyes, he saw a world that existed without him, and that sent a shiver down his spine that he could not ignore. He saw the blood and gore dripping down the creature’s chin, its ominous red eyes paralysing. Its teeth, long and large, were so sharp they were like daggers, and they were currently gnawing into the meat.
It was like something straight out of hell. As Vincent stared at it in shock, it watched back the way a predator eyes its next meal. It could easily grab him. Easily kill him. And yet, Vincent still just stood there, and what he felt wasn’t as simple as fear.
There were shadows everywhere, creeping into his vision, sliding around trees like they had minds of their own. Vincent barely noticed. His eyes were fixed on the creature, tall and spindly and by all rights, terrifying.
And then, finally, like a dam breaking, he felt the fear – primal and human – come crashing around him. Before he really knew what he was doing, he was running. He leapt over outstretching branches, dodged looming shadows, and darted desperately around the trees, suddenly all too aware that by taking the long route home, he’d driven into the middle of nowhere with no payphones to be found. No one knew he was here. No one except the creature.
As he ran, he glanced over his shoulder obsessively, waiting for the creature to start chasing him through the woods. He didn’t see it. Didn’t hear it. All he heard was the static of the radio, which was getting so steadily loud that it was becoming deafening. He threw his hands over his ears, but the sound seemed to crawl right into his brain, worming its way in. It was probably the concussion. Probably the stress. Probably karma.
By the time he made it back to the car, he was panting and sweating. His heart beat so hard in his chest it was like a caged animal throwing itself at his ribcage. He doubled over, slapping his hands onto his thighs, gasping for breath that wouldn’t come. The ice in the air seemed to crawl down his throat, and when he swallowed it was like swallowing sharp icicles. He had never run so fast, and with such certainty that he would die if he stopped, in his life. It was frightening. It was shocking. It was exhilarating.
He leaned heavily on the car as he caught his breath. The creature didn’t reappear; it must have stayed back, perhaps too focused on its grotesque feast to pay him much mind. It was just him, the cold night, and the broken down car that he wouldn’t be able to drive home. Before the creature could change his mind, Vincent opened the car door and practically crawled into the passenger seat, locking the car door behind him and shivering as he waited for the relative warmth of the car to catch up to him.
The radio was still on somehow, though now it wasn’t just static noise. It was flickering erratically through channels, pulling random words and phrases through, and as he sat there trying to think of solutions, he found his attention was called to it.
“And now – this just in!” it bleated, scattered and crackling. “– people are raving – listen up! – radio – speaking to – video –”
It was complete nonsense.
He tried to zone it out. If he could reach a phone booth, he could call his producer and get home. There was no one else he could really call. Vincent was a solitary man behind the camera, and he sorely regretted it now. He supposed it was rather besides the point; even if he did have a choice of people to call, how far away was he from a phone booth? He’d catch his death wandering the dark, rural streets in search of something that may not even exist.
He could try and get the car working again, but he’d never been much of a mechanic, and he probably didn’t even have the right tools to get it started again. The battery wasn’t dead, he supposed, if the radio was still going, but that wasn’t a hugely helpful observation.
Well then, he could camp here overnight and hope that someone drove by in the morning. It was potentially foolish, but he had blankets in the trunk in case he needed to wrap up a body, and he supposed they would serve in the meantime. There was a flashlight back there. There was probably something to eat, though he didn’t remember seeing anything that morning.
“You – listen up!” the radio buzzed.
Vincent stared at it in astonishment. It was a coincidence, of course, but it really sounded like it was shouting at him specifically. The words lined up a bit too well.
He tried to shake it off, but the radio continued demanding his attention.
“Television interference, TVI – transmission begins – tonight we’re serving a special dish – hunting season! – predator hunting its prey –”
Vincent turned the volume down, trying to focus. He needed to get away from here before that creature – whatever it was – changed its mind and decided to come for him. He’d worked too hard to become a meal for some animalistic demon in the woods. He had too much left to do.
It probably wasn’t real. It was the stress and the shock and the adrenaline all working against him. He’d not been sleeping very well, and he’d done a few lines earlier just before he’d gone live. The thing in the woods wasn’t real, and if it was, it was probably just a trick of the light. The deer in the road – had it been a stag or a doe? He couldn’t remember. If it had been a stag, maybe that was what he’d seen in the woods. Shadows played tricks, especially at night after a traumatic event.
“Turn up the radio!” the radio said, just as loud as it had been before he’d turned it down.
Vincent stared at it again, this time fully focusing in on it. This didn’t feel right.
For a second, just a second, the static grew louder than the switching channels.
“Je viens pour toi,” it said. This time Vincent flinched, really flinched. That was a voice. A real voice, tinny and unfamiliar, but a voice all the same.
Before he could really stop himself, Vincent whispered, “What?”
As if a damn radio was going to answer him.
“Idiot,” he muttered to himself, rubbing again at his head.
“Tonight – buy one get one free!” the radio said, back to its odd crackling. “You – are – welcome – Vin – cent!”
Vincent’s jaw dropped. Unbidden, and without really understanding why, his eyes flickered to the rear-view mirror. The body in the back was gone.
He was moving before he knew what he was doing. He opened the car door again, slid out, and darted out of the woods and into the road. It was that fear again, so alien that it delighted him, and yet it was instinct and instinct alone that moved him now. His shoes slapped hard against the ground as he ran away from his car, away from the woods, away from the creature that stirred such oddness within him, and finally made it to the road.
Perhaps it was luck. Perhaps it was fate. Perhaps he’d been here longer than he thought. Whatever the reason, luck was a lady tonight, and a car stopped short of hitting him.
It came to a screeching halt, the door opening milliseconds later. A man stepped out, completely unfamiliar, and stared at Vincent in shock.
“What the fuck are you doing?” the man yelled at him.
Vincent twitched. He hadn’t been spoken to like that for a good while. He’d killed people for less.
“Why are you out here in the middle of the fucking road?” the man continued. “I almost hit you!”
When Vincent said nothing, the man peered at him, frowning.
“You look like hell,” the man said.
Vincent narrowed his eyes. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
The man held up his hands as if in surrender. “I’m just calling it how I see it, man. Hey, don’t I know you?”
Vincent said nothing. He just stood there, waiting for the penny to drop.
It did. “You’re that guy! The, um, what’s he called, the weather guy!”
He would be an easy kill, Vincent thought. Quick. Clean. This stranger probably had an assortment of things he could use as makeshift weapons. The car door. The steering wheel.
No. He needed to get to safety somehow, didn’t he? This wasn’t the time. The red-eyed creature was still out there, and for all Vincent knew, he could have a target on his back.
“Vincent Whittman,” Vincent said through gritted teeth. “I’m a talk show host.”
“Yeah, I thought your face was familiar,” the guy said. “Doesn’t really explain what you’re doing out here, though.”
From the corner of his eye, Vincent sensed rather than saw a shadow creeping towards him. The primal fear was still fresh in his mind and chest, but he wondered very briefly whether he could somehow convince this man to walk right into the monster’s den. He could feed the creature, save himself, and steal the car too.
He eyed the car a little wistfully. It was nice. Not as nice as his, of course, but nice enough that he would consider killing for it.
There was no time for that, he reasoned. The creature could already be making its way here, creeping among the trees.
“I crashed my car,” Vincent admitted, making a conscious effort to contain his rage. “I need a ride to a phone booth. You mind?”
The man eyed him for a moment, perhaps deciding whether or not he was trustworthy. Funny, really. Everyone around here was too trusting.
“You live nearby?” the man asked.
“Sure,” Vincent said. “About ten minutes out.”
The stranger shrugged, getting back into his car, and gestured to the passenger seat through the window. “Come on in. I’ll give you a ride.”
The goodness of strangers, Vincent thought. Before he could change his mind, he forced himself to walk up to the passenger door, open it up, and climb into the stranger’s car.
As the man began to start the car, the radio jittered to life. It didn’t ‘talk’ again, but Vincent couldn’t help but eye it cautiously.
As they drove away, he glanced at the mirror. A shadowy figure watched him retreat.
Vincent did not look away.