Jumping to Conclusions

Complete until further notice; I may decide to come back to this later without the 1,500 word limitation.

There was a pounding that caused pain.  Hammering a deep path through everything it touched.  A young girl was causing the pounding, but she did not mean to cause the pain in herself or any passerby.  She had collapsed in a worn out shack, so disheveled that she would have appeared bestial.  Her clothes were in shreds and were sliding their way down her skin as her body convulsed with tears.  Her screams - inching between her sobs - were enough to keep everyone outside staying either miles away or attempting to flee from the screech.

There was a creak behind her that caused her vibrant, blood-shot, green eyes to whip around for the culprit.  How dare someone bother to come in here!  Her teeth jarred letting out a threatening growl.  She was not human at this point; she acted as her appearance proved, too distraught to be civilized.

The sound appeared closer and she quickly jumped in a 180° turn on to her hind legs with her yellowed ‘claws’ at the ready.  Her head jerked up and her eyes looked as if they could send icy beams through a person’s soul.  Her long brown hair was coated with grease and mud from what looked like months, or years, of not being taken care of.  It fell around her face in unkempt strands that helped her eyes and teeth gleam brighter by contrast.

A dark figure appeared out of the corner of her eye and she leaped at it ready to tear apart its flesh.  No one is allowed to be near me!  I cannot have people within my reach; what makes this person believe they can approach someone who obviously needs to be left alone!

Anyone who may have been walking outside would have heard a shrill outcry that would have made them wish they had never been born, followed by a loud crack.  The wind howled, but the eerie silence after so much turmoil did not settle anyone’s stomach or heart about their future if they stayed remotely close to that shack.

***

The smack of the morning newspaper caused one irritable man to drone toward his front door to retrieve it.  He tied his robe and grumbled incoherent words to the paper boy, “Ah… grumblerfingle!”

He slowly grabbed his paper and carried it to the kitchen to read with his coffee.  He lived in a quiet, suburban town where he got his excitement only from his job as a detective for the strangest cases.  Today would be the start of another case after he saw today’s headline:  MYSTERIOUS MURDER BAFFLES AUTHORITIES.

He shot out of his seat and ran out the door; looking a sight with his coat half on, his breakfast clutched in his teeth, briefcase and keys in his hand, and a hat tilted on his head.  Today suddenly looks more thrilling.

***

            He barged in, still not much better than when he left his house, but no one questioned him because of how frequently it happened; in fact, most people could even predict how his first conversation of the day would go.  Whomever he picked would normally just go along with what he said so he could get it out of his system.

The first one he ran into happened to be one of his closest friends, “Have you seen this?”

            “Who hasn’t?  It’s all over the news.  It wasn’t far from here, but the body is too mangled at this point to tell anything about who they were.  Let me guess "”

            “I want this case!”

            “Yep, knew that was coming.”

            “Sandy, you know this just screams me!  This could be "”

            “The mystery of a lifetime.”  They said concurrently.

            He glared at her; she always took away his excitement, but she was always good for making sure he kept his head on straight as well.

            “So, what are you going to do first…?”

***

            He arrived at the crime scene to look over the body for himself.  He never trusted anyone else’s judgment on what was useful, and besides whatever did not seem important now always had the possibility of being necessary information later.

            “Hey Jim, are you on this case now?  It looks right up your alley.”

            As the two men were talking they walked further into the shack until both were hovering over the scene.  “Yeah, just saw it in the paper this morning.  Where’s the body " HELLO!?”

            “Quite the job ain’t it?”

            All he could do was nod for awhile until he was left alone with the mess of shattered bones, diced organs, torn flesh, blood in an immeasurable amount, and other as of yet indescribable things.  At first glance, it looked like someone had been put in a paper shredder and dumped on the already dank floor to rot.  This was the worst murder he had ever seen, and coincidentally probably meant it would be the biggest challenge.

            “Ok, um… person.  What can you tell me about you, starting with how you ended up like this?”

            Suddenly, he was interrupted from his thoughts by the same cop he talked to earlier, “Jim!  There are two witnesses out here who you might want to hear!”

***

            “It was so awful; that poor girl!”

            “I’m sorry, what girl?”

            “Oh, I don’t know.  I saw her run in there crying; at least it sounded like a girl, she was hard to see from my house.  When I heard her screams, I wanted to go help, but…”

            “But…?” he coaxed.  It seemed harder than normal to get this woman to talk.  She was young and slender, a classic housewife with a tender heart, but she appeared to live more on her own.   Her manor though seemed to be concealing something important.

            “Her screams… itscaredme.”  She looked away, shameful to say anymore.

            “Fine, you can go.  Thank you; we will call if we have any more questions.”

            The woman left and in walked a tall, confident man with sophisticated airs.  “Good morning sir.  Are you ready to begin heeding my statement?”

            “Uh, yes, tell me what you remember from last night?”

            “Well, you see sir, I was sauntering by when I heard ghastly screams coming from the nearby shack �"”

            “Wait a minute… what were you doing in this neighborhood in the first place?  You do not seem like the type to wander around here.”

            The witness just smiled saying, “Why thank you; I come around here once a month to assist someone who I feel begs the most civility.”

***

            “I just don’t get it Sandy!  It has been three weeks, THREE WEEKS, and I still do not know who this person was, how they died, or even why!”

            “Well, Jim I’m sure once you figure out one of those questions you will know everything in no time; after all you won’t stop until you have all the answers!”

            “Why do I feel like you’re making fun of me?” he pouted.  Sandy only smiled saying that it was because that is exactly what she is doing.

***

Later that day, Jim went to the morgue to find clues.  They had arranged the carcass in what seemed to be a human formation to no avail.  You have to be someone!  He started to read the reports; he normally did not like to ‘downgrade’ himself in that way, figuring he could discover everything on his own.  This case was different �" that was obvious �" and this time he needed all the help he could get; everyone else had given up.  All of a sudden something caught his eyes.  He blinked in shock, “Why did no one tell me sooner!”  He pulled out his phone and when Sandy answered he practically screamed, “I know all the answers!”

***

At the press conference announcing his find that afternoon, “I really had a hard time believing it too; I thought I had all the answers, but when I checked them out it was not what I was expecting.  Here is what really happened that night from what I can gather…

            A young girl who had been thought dead for the last five years tore her way through the worst part of the city and into a shack that was set to be demolished in the morning because of its current state.  It is unclear where the girl had been or why she was so distraught in the first place, but her appearance and screams scared everyone off.

            Later that night a normal-seeming man crossed her and instead of laying dead like he should have, he was able to first snap her back in half and then tear her to shreds without a mere scratch on his skin.”

            “And is this man in custody, Detective?”

            “Well you see that’s the bizarre part; the man responsible turned himself in as a witness, but as far as I can tell he never existed.”

“What do you mean ‘never existed’?”

“There is no one matching that name, social security number, or fingerprint on Earth.”

Author's Note

Please let me know what you think. I would like to know your thoughts while you were reading it too, so I can see what else I need to do.