Part I - Chapter 9: A PRIVATE CONVERSATION

Chapter 9

A Private Conversation

(Ó 2007)

 

Early the next morning, David Todd and Noel Jaworski were busy setting up all the video equipment needed for what would turn out to be three days of recording, and listening to, the detailed confessions of both Raul Ortega and William Freeman. However, at that same moment miles away in a diner on Ohio Street in downtown Chicago, two women were having what they at the time believed was a private conversation.

They sat across from one another in a booth, next to the window that looked out onto the street.

Romana Alexiev and Ellyian Krupskya, two women who had emigrated from the former Soviet Union. Both women had come to the United States some three years before seeking a better life after the fall of communism in their former homeland.
 

Both women worked at the same five star hotel located on Michigan Avenue. Ellyian, being from Moscow, adjusted better to the city life of Chicago. She was a beautiful woman, and being that she was fluent in the English language, she worked her way to a position at the reception desk quickly. She was also in line to be a concierge.
 

Romana was from a smaller town known as Grodno, which was near the border of Russia and Poland. She herself was an attractive woman; however, she still lacked the skills of the English language that her friend had mastered. Therefore, for the moment, she worked in the housekeeping department of the hotel.

Romana had a husband, but he was a dissident toward the communist regime and became a victim of the Soviet prison system. After the fall of communism, she tried frantically to locate him but to no avail. He was missing and presumed dead. She now had to face life alone and raise her young son by her presumed deceased husband alone. With that, she immigrated to the United States, with the determination to make a better life for her son, with the faith that if her husband by chance were still alive, he would find them both.

It was Romana’s now ten-year-old son, Nicholas, her only child, which was the topic of their discussion. Romana was very distraught, worried over the welfare and well-being of her son.3
 

The diner was very busy with the morning breakfast crowd. The air was filled with the mumbled sound of hundreds of different conversations from the patrons. However, to insure their privacy, Romana and Ellyian conversed in their native Russian tongue.
 

Tears began to well in Romana’s eyes as she said to her friend, “I do not know what to do, and I get more suspicious every moment. A mother feels these things when her child is being hurt. I am so frightened Ellyian, I am so scared for Nicholas.”
 

“How do you think he is hurting Nicholas?” Ellyian asked.
 

Romana looked to her friend with a frightened expression, her lips quivering, “I think that he is hurting him in the worst way a man can hurt a little boy.” She then looked down to her hands and they were shaking.
 

Ellyian quietly gasped, “Romana! Are you saying that, - - - you think he - - - is?”

“Forcing my son to perform sex with him, yes.”

“Romana that is a very serious accusation. His father owns MB Media, and he is in line to take it over.” 

“That is what makes this so difficult. He is a powerful man, and his father is even more powerful. Me? I am just a maid in a hotel. If I say anything, then the next thing I know, Nicolas and I will be back in Grodno within hours of my speaking out.”

“Do you have any proof Romana?” Ellyian asked, taking her friends hands in hers.

“Nicholas is the only proof I can get. But he doesn’t say anything.” She answered. “Like I told you, a mother, she knows when her child is being hurt. I know he was a happy, beautiful boy before he became involved with that man’s foundation. He now sits in his room, he does not want to go anywhere or play with his friends. He avoids talking to me. And, I know of these things from back in Russia, when the communists were in power, they believed they could get away with anything. And many of them did, the ones who are like this man, who crave little children. They got away with it there. I have seen it.”

Ellyian looked at the heartbreak on the face of her good friend, “What are you going to do Romana? What are you going to do?”

“I do not know. Right now the only thing I can do is to keep him away from that man, that monster.” Romana then began to weep, “You have seen my Nicholas. Ellyian, he is a beautiful boy. That is what everybody says to me when they first see him. They do not say he is handsome, they say he is beautiful. They say I should have photographs of him taken to show to the modeling agencies. I brought him here to have a good life. I did not bring him here to be used for the pleasure of some perverted animal.”

Ellyian stood up from her side of the booth to sit with her friend on the other. She put her arm around her and let her cry on to her shoulder, “It will be alright Romana. I do not know how, but something will come of this, I do not know what. But somehow, it will turn out alright.” She grabbed some of the paper napkins so that she could wipe her tears and clear her nose, “Here, put yourself together, it will turn out right somehow.” - - -

- - - He sat finishing his coffee with his copy of the morning Chicago Sun-Times. He was reading the main story with the headline, “SUSPECTS IN SERIAL RAPES TO CONFESS”. The small sub-heading followed, “Both suspects admit to rape spree, will stay hospitalized for ‘indefinite period’”. In the center of the page was a large photograph of detectives David Todd and Noel Jaworski. He studied the faces of both men for quite a while, and read the reports in the papers a few times.

There was another smaller story that also had his attention, “‘Dark Man’ Who Hospitalized Rape Suspects Still at Large”. There was a sub-heading that read, “Urged to turn self in”.

He was engrossed in the newspaper reports since he woke that morning, with that being the main story on the morning news on both his television and radio. He studied and listened to every word, noting that the only mention of him was of him being referred to as the “Dark Man” and the plea by the authorities to turn himself in that he had nothing to fear from them.

To him that meant that they had no idea who to look for, or any idea or clue to who the person was that had brought to a stop the terrorization of the two rapists.

However, something now distracted him from his newspaper. It was the conversation of the two women in the booth directly behind him. They were speaking in Russian. One woman, her tone worried and frightened, the other woman, trying to comfort and consol her. 

His briefcase was on the seat next to him. He picked it up, placed it in front of him and opened it. He closed his newspaper and placed it neatly inside the case. He then took from it a small pad of notepaper and removed the top sheet, and replaced it back in its proper place. He then closed and locked his briefcase and set in back down on the seat next to him.

His suit jacket was also neatly set on the seat next to the briefcase. He picked it up to retrieve his pen from the inside breast pocket. He then wrote on the piece of note pad paper:

 

 

Father -

MB MEDIA

Son- next in line

Foundation?

　

He folded the piece of paper twice and inserted it into the breast pocket of his shirt. He then reached over to get the check for his breakfast that his waitress had set there a few moments before. He stood, picked up his suit jacket and put it on. He then picked up his briefcase, left a five-dollar bill on the table for the waitress, then stepped over to the cashier to pay his bill.

He never looked over to the two women who sat behind him. He paid his bill then went to the entrance of the diner. Once outside he reached into the other breast pocket of his suit jacket to retrieve his sunglasses. He placed them on; the dark lenses concealed his eyes. He turned to the left and began to walk slowly up the street. He looked through the window of the diner as he passed by and looked briefly at the two women, one still consoling the other.

He walked up to the corner, which was La Salle Street. He stopped to turn right, but he couldn’t cross because of the red light. As he waited, the crowd of pedestrians around him began to grow. In a minute, the light turned green and all began to walk. He disappeared into the morning flow of all the other people on their way to their various jobs.

Part I-Chapter 5: THE SHAMROCK

 

Chapter 5

The Shamrock
(Ó 2007)

The Shamrock was just one of the many local bar and grills that both David and Noel would use as a meeting point. Every one was small, inconspicuous, but most important of all to both of them, had to have great cheeseburgers and cold draft beer. Both of which now had just been placed before them.
 

The Shamrock was just a little Irish Pub, with the bar itself on your right as you entered, a few standing tables by the front window, and the booths to the left. It was somewhat darkened, and you could see the small kitchen grille at the far end of the bar.
 

“It all feels kind of anti-climatic to me,” David said while putting ketchup on his French fries, “Don’t you somehow feel cheated at something?”

“Yeah, yeah I do,” Noel answered him, “but we still don’t know if it’s them.’
 

“Oh, it’s them alright, I can feel it. I KNOW it. Same M.O., they fit the descriptions and everything, I’ll bet a years pay that when all the body evidence is compared to them, there will be matches all the way round.”

Noel was adding extra salt to his fries and saw David’s disapproving look that he always ignored, “I had thoughts always that it would be different,” he said, “that we would catch them in the act, or find who they are and bust the door down and drag ‘em both in, right now, the whole thing feels sort of, well, incomplete.”

“And whoever this guy is that walked in on ‘em,” Noel said taking a sip of his beer, “well, he fucked these two up, I mean but good and permanent. I saw the X-Rays, both their spinal cords snapped, and from what the docs say, well, they say that they’re lucky to be alive. Yeah, . . .right!”

“Paralysis?” Noel asked.

“Both, from the neck down,” David answered, “the doctors won’t say for sure yet, but you don’t have to be one to know, not after what I saw. Plus, they’re both minus some teeth, the white one has a concussion, and the Hispanic one has a broken jaw.”

Just then, Noel pointed to the television over the bar, “Oh shit,” he said pointing to it. Noel looked behind himself over his shoulder to see what he was referring too. There on the television, was Sherry Thornton, of the CHICAGO EYEWITNESS news. She was a beautiful black woman and she was standing outside Cook County Hospital and speaking into a microphone with the channel seven logo. The word “LIVE” was in the upper right hand corner, and on the bottom of the screen, the graphics read: SERIAL RAPISTS SUSPECTS MAY BE IN CUSTODY.

Noel yelled to the woman behind the bar, “Hey Bonnie, turn that up will ya?” Bonnie and older heavyset woman with red dyed hair picked up the remote and turned up the volume. Sherry Thornton’s voice then began to fade in.

“ - - -Repeating Joseph and Lynn, two men who were brought into the emergency room here at Cook County are right now in surgery, both are in extremely critical condition, and sources tell me that both men may be the serial rapists that have been terrorizing the entire Chicagoland area for over the past three years. One of the detectives who is in charge of the case was seen here earlier. He did escort them both in the ambulances and has since left the hospital. We do have reporters at Chicago Police Headquarters trying to confirm this report - - -”

Bonnie and a couple of the other patrons sitting at the bar, all who knew both Noel and David turned on their barstools and looked at the both of them as if waiting for them to confirm what they all had just heard. “Looks like it’s them,” David said to all of them.

“What are they in surgery for?” Bonnie asked David.

“Sorry dear, but I can’t go into any of the details now,” he said to her.

“Well, do you think that while they’re at it, they could cut both their pricks off while they got ‘em on the table?” Bonnie asked and they other patrons began to laugh and applaud.

When the cheering died down David said solemnly, “Well, like I said, I can’t go into any details, but I can guarantee you, they won’t have any use for them anymore.”

A look of approval came on all the faces of the bar patrons. While they all continued to watch the news coverage David looked at Sherry Thornton on the screen and told Noel, “Well, it’s a good thing I left when I saw them coming.”

“What do ya mean?”

David then turned his look to Noel, “I mean Sherry there would have caught up to me and may be interviewing me now. Regina would get pissed.”

“Huh?”

“I made the mistake of telling Regina that I thought Sherry Thornton was good looking.”

“Whoa!” Noel said and a big smile came to his face, “big mistake.”

“Man, those African girls,” David said shaking his head back and forth, “they got tempers.”

Noel took another big bite of his burger, chewed it a few times and then washed it down with some of his beer. “Well, we better finish this off, if the news is down at the station they probably got the Boss surrounded, and he’s gonna want us there.”

David watching his partners rather primitive eating habits lifted his beer glass to his lips and said, “Oh no, take your time, let the food get into your stomach at least.”

“Alright, alright, smart ass.” Noel said as we wiped his lips with a paper napkin. “Let’s get going.”

Both men then got up from their table and David looked at the bill. It was for $14.50, so he left a twenty dollar bill on the table, turned and waved to everyone at the bar, “Night all, night Bonnie.”

 “Night guys and thanks, I hope you got those two bastards.” Bonnie said as they went through the door.

 

The night air quickly hit them as they came onto the sidewalk, “Where’s the car?” David asked.

“It’s over on the next block,” Noel answered, pointing just up the street. Both men walked together side by side without saying a word. In no time, they were at the corner that Noel pointed to and made a quick left where their unmarked blue Ford Taurus was parked. Noel took the drivers side as David opened the passenger side door and slipped into his seat. Noel then got in himself, reached into his coat pocket for the keys, put them in the ignition, and started up the car.

David then turned to his partner, now feeling the privacy they had in the car, “We didn’t you know.”

“We didn’t what?”

“Get them,” he said solemnly, “we didn’t get them. Somebody else did.”

 

“I know what you mean,” Noel said as he pulled away from the curb, “I feel both cheated and like a cheater.”

  

“It’s almost like having somebody take your final exams for you,” David said, “only to find out they did it without you knowing.”

“I have to admit it though, I’m kind of glad they got what they got though,” Noel said as he guided the car through the evening traffic, “being in that room, with the girl, and her mom and dad . . . I mean it was different. When we all knew, at the same time that these dirt bags are all fucked up? Well, we were all calm about everything, almost. There was satisfaction in the air, you know?”

“Whoever it is that did it, I wanna thank him, and punch him out at the same time,” David said, now a little more adamant, “it was supposed to be us that caught them, put ’em in jail, then go down to Joliet to watch ’em take it up the ass. But instead, . . . it just ends. Like, like somebody just got tired of this bullshit story over and over again, and just, well, switched it off.”

A silence came over them for a few minutes; they watched the sights and listened to the sounds of the evening city life as they came nearer to the police station.

Noel then broke the silence, “Do you know what the girl told me?”

 “No, what?”

“That the guy who fucked them up? He did all of that in around a half a minute.”

“You’re fucking kidding me.”

“Nope, that’s what she told me, she said the one thing she remembers the most was how fast he moved, and the way his voice sounds.”

“He talked to her?”

“No, . . . them. He talked to them. She couldn’t hear what he said, but he did say something to them. She also told me his voice was soft, deep, and eerie.”

David looked at his partner with a little astonishment. Then Noel added, “And I mean he fucked them up, talked to them, and left, . . . all in around a half a minute, according to the girl.”

They were now coming up to the police station and they saw all the trucks from the local news stations were parked out front. Noel then said, “Better take the back entrance.” Then he turned right to go into the alley where they both could enter the station and not be seen by the press.

David then said, “Well, I gotta hand it to this guy.”

“What do ya mean?” Noel asked.

“He may have cheated us out of our glory, but at least he’s kept it all interesting. What time do you got?”

Noel looked at his watch, “It’s about 10:25 in the evening.”

 David looked at his watch also to double check, “Good, it’s well past anytime that they can broadcast, and I know anyone of those sports reporters are not going to let their time get interrupted by anything. By the time we get in there, the broadcasts will be over.”

“We really don’t have anything to give them anyway.” Noel added.

“Even better,” David said as the car came to a stop, Noel then shut the engine off and the quiet blanketed them, “now kids . . . shall we go to the circus?”
 

* * *

He stood to turn off the television set, and the quiet filled the room in which now the only light present was that of the single candle. He then walked to his small kitchen, still in the dark and opened the broom closet. There, on the top shelf was a box of black plastic garbage bags. He took one from the box and then whipped it around to let it open by forcing the air into it. He took off his black hooded sweatshirt and placed it in the garbage bag. He then unlaced his black working boots, and then too placed them in the plastic garbage bag. This was all quickly followed by everything else he was wearing.
 

He then walked naked down the dark hallway to his bathroom where he turned on the water to the shower, choosing to remain in the dark. When the water reached the temperature he preferred he stepped in and let the hot water flow over him.

He remembered what the woman reporter said on the news, that both men are still alive, but in very critical condition. He had satisfaction in knowing that they were not dead.

It was all by chance, . . . it was all fate. He had no idea that those men were who they were. He had knowledge of them before, from the papers and in the news, but he had no idea at the time who they were, he just now heard who they might be from the woman on the news broadcast. He quickly washed and rinsed himself off. Then he stepped out of the shower and stood in the dark bathroom, he reached for the towel that hung on the wall and began to dry himself. Never once turning on any of the lights.
 

  After it all happened, it took him about two hours to get home, after he figured out where he was anyway. He made sure he stayed in the back alleys and side streets, so that no one would ever see him, and that he succeeded in. What amazed him was that he was not frightened at all, and right now, he wasn’t nervous, he was very calm, perhaps it was because he had done everything like he had before. 


Plus, he knew, he was being watched over and protected. 

What he tried to suppress in himself was how it felt good again. How good it felt to strike the enemy swiftly, then leave nothing of yourself behind you. He thought of the look on the girls face right before he left her there, the shock, the fright, and then if you looked deeper, . . . the gratitude.
 

He then went into his bedroom, still remaining in the dark and dressed himself in clean underwear, pajama bottoms and an undershirt. He found his rubber sandals and put them on, and then went into the kitchen once again to retrieve the garbage bag contain the clothing that he had just placed in it.
 

Fate he thought, the whole thing was just a strange act of fate, and he came across those men and the girl just by chance. He reached down to pick up the garbage bag when he stopped and froze for one second.
 

He wondered, “was it fate?” Something had made him stop, something he felt guided him.
 

He picked up the garbage bag, tied it securely and quietly walked over to his doorway. He peered through the eyepiece on the door and checked down both sides of the hallway, there was no one around. He opened the door and peered around both side of the hallway, all clear. He took the garbage bag and turned to his left. He had to go to the end of the hallway to the room that housed the garbage chute. As he walked down the hallway, he once again went into his battle mode, walking stealthily, not making a sound, even with the garbage bag. He heard the sounds of televisions, radios, and the inhabitants in the other apartments of the hallway having either conversations or arguments.
 

Once in the room, he dropped the garbage bag down the chute, listened to it as it traveled down the three floors, and heard the thud as it hit the large trash compactor in the basement. He then heard the whirring sound as the machine turned on to compress the garbage in with the rest that was already there. As luck would have it, the garbage was to be picked up by city sanitation in the morning.
 

He then went back to the doorway and looked down the hall, still all clear. He quickly and again stealthily returned to his apartment. At the doorway, he again looked both ways, and silently entered his home. He noiselessly locked the door behind him.
 

Now, for the first time since his return home, he felt exhausted. He slowly walked into his living room, which was still dark, except for the light of the one candle. He went into his bedroom and sat on the edge of his bed, the comfort of the mattress and his room were comforting to him. He looked out his bedroom door and saw the dim flickering light of the candle as it burned. He then bowed his head, and again, as always, he began to cry.
 

He sat and cried for a few minutes, then he reached over to the box of tissues that was always next to the clock radio. He wiped his eyes dry, and cleared his nose. He then took a couple of deep breaths, then slowly backed his body onto the mattress to lie down.
 

He looked up to his ceiling, and his thoughts returned to the moment when he stopped in the alley, convinced that there was “something” that made him stop, to do what it was that he did.
 

As he tried to bring his mind to figure out what the 'something’ was, . . . he drifted off to sleep.

 

 

Part I - Chapter 1: "SOMETHING"

Chapter 1

“Something”

Spring 1995 - Chicago, Illinois
(Ó 2007)

 

“What?” He asked himself in a indistinct whisper, coming out of his trance. He stopped dead in his tracks, he heard “something.” Was it the drums? Was it the wind chimes? Was it both? Or … was there “something” else? But “something” is making him stop, to stop and sense everything around him. He stood there, frozen from all his movements.

“Something.” “Something” is wrong, he can feel it. “Something” has made him stop walking, “something” that is recognizable, “something” he has experienced before. “Something” from his past, a déjà vu. He raises his right hand to his ear, with the index and middle finger together, the ring and small finger together and his ear between the middle of the “V” shape, rubbing the back of it. Whatever “it” is, “it” has made him stop as he was walking through the back alleyways, a walk he had to do so that he could be alone, and to not be seen. 

It was early evening, and he was behind some of the apartment and condominium buildings of downtown Chicago, exactly where, he doesn’t really know. Whatever is wrong, the “something” has brought him out of the daze he’s been in for the past few hours. He often went on these “stealth marches” when his emotions would mix, and turn into the rage. He would sometimes walk for miles, and often not know where he would end up. It started again tonight in his apartment. It would always begin when the sadness would come, next by the depression, followed by the loneliness, the longing for, and then by the blame. The memories would flood his mind, and he would feel the rage building inside himself. He knew then that he had to go and walk, and run, to stop the anger.

Now, the “something” had come back, the “something“, which now had made come to a complete halt. He was now stationary, tuning in to his senses. Then, his warrior instincts took him over. “Something” was wrong and he now fully aware of it. He closed his eyes to listen, to separate all noises and put them in their place. The distant traffic, the slight breeze coming from the lake, the sound of the “L” trains, and that hum in the background that always seems to be there in Chicago.

He tuned into his sense of smell and touch, keeping all the usual things in their own separate area, scanning all around him for whatever was out of place.
 

There! Just up ahead, coming from another alleyway, a slight noise that didn’t belong, a noise different from all the rest. He then moved swiftly and quietly to the entrance, standing on the side, and slowly peered around to look, and keep himself from being detected.

His eyes darted quickly in all directions, up, down, and side to side of the alley when … there! About thirty feet forward and to the right, on his side of a large garbage dumpster against the brick of the building. Two men, who were facing one another. The man whose face he could see was on his hands and knees, the other was lying in a prone position. The one lying down had his pants down around to his knees, and on either side of his hips were the legs of a girl. He looked to the man on his hands and knees and saw that he was looking downward. He followed his stare to see that he was helping the other to hold her down. He saw her face for an instant, blood coming from her nose and mouth. 
 

“She’s just a child”, he said to himself in his mind.

Now, other people would have either shown their apathy and walked away, or run up immediately screaming at the two assailants while screaming for help. Not him though, his instincts and his experience instantly took over his entire being. In his mind, he knew the real damage has been already done, and you cannot change that … but you can stop them.
 

The numerous times that he has had to do this before, to let two or three more die, in order to save the other twenty or more. His knowledge of these situations came flooding back him and all that he had been taught began to flow through his mind. To put together a plan of attack.
 

First, look over your terrain; find the best attack route, and your escape route. Second, plan to use the weapons at your immediate disposal, if no weapons are available, find what to use that is around you. If there is nothing around you, then YOU ARE the weapon.
 

Third, focus in on your target and your enemy and plan how to neutralize them. Lastly, check the whereabouts and direction of your escape route, so that when the all has been neutralized and the mission has been accomplished, you immediately take it.
 

Check for all you advantages, and then look at your disadvantages. Plan on the course of action for any disadvantage, or counterattack that may occur.. Plan, make your strategy, double check, and check again.
 

Now, with all your plans in place, get yourself at the ready, focus in on your target, now, . . .initiate, . . . engage . . . and … STRIKE!

* * *

Billy Freeman and Raul Ortega, both twenty-six years of age, were partners in the illegal narcotics trade. Both of them had been so together since high school, but they never could get above what everyone would refer to as “low-level drug dealers”.
 

Both of them now lying face down at the end of a dark alleyway with agonizing pain firing through their heads. Both of them laboring to keep breathing, incapable of moving, both of their bodies now dead from the shoulders down. Raul lying there with his trousers and underwear still down around his ankles. But both of them now in a state of fright, believing that they were dying right there on the blacktop.
 

Meanwhile, the blonde teenage girl whom they both had just raped minutes ago, was still cowering behind the dumpster and against the wall. She was shivering not from what just what happened to her, but to what she had just witnessed.
 

Billy was the taller of the two, around five foot ten, with a slim build. Tonight he was wearing his dirty blond hair long, and had not shaved in about two weeks. After tonight, he thought he would be changing the way he looks, as he would always do, after “hunting”.
 

Raul was slightly shorter, a Hispanic with a light brown complexion. He too was wearing his hair dark brown hair long with a goatee beard and sideburns. He also thought that he was going to change his appearance after tonight.
 

They had made good money, if you could refer to it as “good” money, but it never was anything so that they could live above what they believed to be extravagant. However, they had big plans to do so one day, but those plans had now ended a few minutes ago. They were working on establishing themselves, and making all the good connections. Over the years, they had developed narcissism about themselves; they believed that they could do just about anything, and that they were invulnerable. Because when the times did come when they had their run ins with law enforcement, they seemed always to beat the system. 
 

Because of this belief of being untouchable, which had now been proven to be a false belief, one of the personal trends that they both together had started, when they felt like having a “good time”, was that they would go out to do what they both termed as “going hunting”. 

Tonight, after making a great deal earlier in the afternoon on four bricks of cocaine and two kilos of Jamaican marijuana, Raul decided to celebrate by getting what he had referred to as “their special treat”. After their special treat their plan was to come back to Billy’s apartment and shave their beards, and cut their hair to a buzz cut. They always had changed their appearance after their “hunting trips.”
“So, bro, let’s go hunting”. He had said to Billy earlier in the evening. 

Over the years, the “hunting” they referred to was to journey around the streets of Chicago to look for any particular woman. She had to be alone, and if opportunity presented itself to be just right, they would begin to follow her, to see where she was going to. They would look for situations like going to the corner grocery, or to a neighbors, or any other place close by where she would have to travel by foot. Tonight they started to follow Stephanie Morris, age fifteen, from her home. They knew that this situation was just right for them when they heard an older woman say to Stephanie, “Not to late now Stepphy,” as they sat in their car parked in the opposite direction from where she was walking.
 

“OK Mom!,” she answered as she left her home. She was petite, pretty, blond-haired, blue-eyed, and with a perfect milky complexion. She was wearing a white blouse, with a blue skirt, and green Notre Dame zip front parka. She was carrying a large roll of art construction paper and was going to her girlfriends home about five blocks away to work on an art project for school. She was just a sophomore.

Stephanie had been taught by her parents to always be aware of her surroundings. Tonight she saw a man begin to follow her about a block from her girlfriends’ home right as she left a couple hours later, so she began to walk faster. She thought she was doing the right thing, but what she didn’t know was that this was all planned. She was being watched when she walked to her girlfriends. Billy and Raul watched her as she went into her girlfriends home and began to make their plan. They now knew the route that Stephanie would take when she would go back home. So they drove down the street that she just finished walking, and found the long, dark alley that would be perfect for them. It was almost halfway from her home.
 

The man behind her, saw her as she left from her home some blocks away, and waited for her to leave. He was purposely making her walk faster in the direction she was going, while her attention was on the him while behind her, the other man, his partner was hiding in the alley just up ahead on her side of the street, and was waiting to intercept her.
 

When she just started to pass the alley entrance, Billy Freeman grabbed her, one arm around her waist; the other hand covered her mouth. He carried her down the length of the long, dark alleyway and pulled her behind a large garbage dumpster next to a brick brownstone building and held her down. A moment later, from the other end of the alley Raul appeared, and walked up to where Billy was holding Stephanie.
 

Raul looked down at the young girl. He saw the terror in her eyes, but that only made him more aroused, it was part of the pleasure that he enjoyed the most.

“Nice,” he said, “real nice”.
 

Then they both began tearing off her clothing, pawing at her body as they did so.
 

“You won they coin flip bro, you get to go first,” Raul had said to Billy, “I believe that this is untouched merchandise you lucky shit.”
 

Raul took over for Billy, and when his hand came off her mouth, Stephanie had inhaled to get ready to scream. Before she could, Billy’s fist came crashing into her face.
 

“Shut-up bitch,” Billy had whispered to her through his clenched teeth, “don’t you fuckin dare make a sound.”
 

Billy stood up and began to unbuckle his belt, undid the button and unzipped his fly, and let his pants drop to his knees. He dropped down and forced Stephanie’s legs apart. He then mounted and raped her.
 

Stephanie being a virgin had tried to scream from the pain but was met with Raul’s fist this time. Blood started to stream out of her nose.
 

Billy climaxed after a couple minutes, then began to change places with Raul. Stephanie started to cry and Billy once again had struck her in the face with his fist. Blood was now coming from her mouth. Raul now stood and unbuckled his pants, unzipped them and let them fall to his knees, he mounted Stephanie and he too began to rape her.

The last thing Billy remembered was Raul on top of Stephanie asking him, “You wanna go again bro?”

They never heard or saw him coming when he swiftly bore down on them.
 

It all had come about so rapidly. Billy was looking down at Stephanie as he pinned her arms when he was kicked dead center to his face; the force knocked his head backwards into the metal dumpster. One quarter of a second afterward Raul was kicked to the side of his face, directly to his jawbone, driving his head into the brick wall beside him.

Billy tried to get up, but the intense pain had shot through his skull, and it was unbearable. He tried to yell, but he felt his pain increase greatly when he tried to do so, and he forced himself to stop. There was a thud to both of his shoulders coming from behind him, he fell to his knees and on to his chest while holding onto his face. He then felt a tremendous strike to the middle of his back, right between his shoulder blades, directly on his spine, and he then heard the crunching sound. He felt the pain in his back for just a second, then it vanished, and he couldn’t move.
 

He then heard the footsteps leave him and go to Raul’s direction, and then passed out.

Stephanie watched with her head swimming as a large dark shape of a man grabbed Raul by his hair, twisting his head around violently, and wrenched him off of her. She saw as the dark shape throw Raul to the ground and onto his stomach. Raul was only half-conscious, as he lay there flat on his chest. Then she witnessed as the dark man, who was wearing a black hooded sweatshirt, raise his right foot high enough so that his knee was almost parallel with his chest, and intentionally drove the sharp end of the heel of his boot directly between Raul’s shoulder blades. The large dark man used all his strength when doing so that Raul’s arms and legs made a vicious jerk backwards, and she heard a loud crack, and Raul then lay there motionless.
 

The dark man then knelt next to Raul, grabbed him by the hair to pull his head back, and Stephanie heard the ever so soft, deep sound of the dark mans voice as he whispered into Raul’s ear, and then pushed Raul‘s face hard into the pavement. She couldn’t comprehend what it was he was saying, but it wasn’t much. Then the dark man walked over to Billy, shook his head as to wake him, and seemed to repeat to him the same thing.
 

Then the dark man walked back to the end of the alley from which he first came, the same place Raul came from when Billy had grabbed her, and dragged her back there. The dark man stopped quickly, turned to his right, and turned his head to look at her from his right shoulder; she couldn’t see his face because the hood from the black sweatshirt was covering his head. All that there was to see was a black void inside the hood. He froze, stood looking directly at her for only two seconds, then calmly walked forward and disappeared as fast as he had come.
 

She stayed there not moving for a few minutes shivering, the only sound that she could now here was the labored breathing of her two rapists. She began to pull her torn clothing around her and she now started to cry. 
 

“D-d-daa-dy,” she began to whimper quietly, “dad-d-dy.”
 

She slowly stood up to walk to the other end of the alley. She looked down as she passed Billy who lay there still immobile, and trying his best to breath. The she continued to limp her way toward the entrance of the alley, and her crying grew louder. The closer she to the entryway, the louder she became.

 

 

When she finally made it to the sidewalk, she dropped to her knees and began to scream as loud as she could. Her crying was now loud wailing. People came to there windows to see the beaten and bloodied little girl collapsed in the street. Many people would later say that they would never forget the sight of the little girl and her heartbreaking cry.

“DADDYYYYYYYYY!!! PLEEEEEAASEEEE!!!! I WANT MY DADDYYYYYYYY!!!”

THE MAN WITH THREE NAMES - PART I - OUT OF THIN AIR

THE MAN WITH THREE NAMES

BY: SCOTT T. SCHLIEF

(Copyright 2007)

PART 1

OUT OF THIN AIR