100 Ghost Stores Counting Down To Halloween 2025. #54. He.

 He was no better than the other killers, that is, if everyone knew he was a killer.

He was more sophisticated than the rest, more subtle if that's not an oxymoron, considering he's a killer. He wasn't out there to make a name for himself and gain millions of followers and devoted acolytes who swear their allegiance. His method of killing was akin to breathing. It was a natural state of being, like breathing or passing water and waste. Whoever they were, they were constantly on the news, and they were show-offs. Leaving their kills out in the open on the beach, in the park, or at the mall, of all places. They had no finesse, no polish, just sloppy and careless. 

5 pm on the nose. Time to clock out and head to the gym. The gym was a great way to get the blood flowing after sitting behind a desk for eight hours. Get to the gym, go to his locker, change out, walk to the mats, warm up, stretch out, and hit the treadmill. Get rid of the brain fog and go to work. If it wasn't the group of muscle heads doing dead lifts in the corner, screaming and shouting encouragement at each other, it was always the one guy from the group, doing dead lifts on his own, but at the same time, being an asshole to everyone around him. Looking at the asshole from across the floor, he realized he had to be quick before the rest of the asshole's friends showed up. 

"Oh what kine pants is that, Bebe?" The asshole called out to the sixteen-year-old girl doing squats nearby. "Das spanks, yeah? Eh, daddy spank you whenever you like!"

That was all the cue he needed. Calmly, he walked across the floor while the asshole deadlifted and screamed bloody murder each time he stood up from the squat. It grated everyone's nerves, but the asshole thought it was a way to show everyone he was seriously honing his craft. That was the asshole's last deadlift for that set. Now, he was switching off plates for lighter ones, so that he could do clean and jerks. 

"Ah, fuck it," the asshole said at the last second, deciding to leave the heavy plates on. Without a warm-up or stretch, the asshole went straight to it. He yanked the bar up to his chest, and as he stood to clean it over his head, the killer casually walked past the asshole from behind, and gave a quick knife-edge kick behind the knee of the asshole. The asshole's knee buckled, and he collapsed to the floor, with the fifty-pound plates crushing into the side of his skull. There was a popping sound, like the way one would pop bubble wrap, except in this case, it was louder and more gruesome. 

Mission accomplished because the asshole was such a loud asshole, no one was looking in his direction, but secretly wished he would shut the fuck up and die. Both of which he just did.

That was finesse, clean, right out in the open, but undetectable and right under everyone's noses. An hour later, with his workout complete, he was walking out to his car, prepared to go home. Something caught the corner of his eye. Not less than a foot away from his car was a robbery. Three young men were trying to pull a purse away from their victim, who would not surrender her purse, no matter how much she was punched and kicked. Feeling for the knife in his pocket, he walked briskly to the three men, when to his surprise, the three men and the victim turned on him. Stabbing, slicing, and cutting him again and again, even while chunks of his own flesh flew about here and there. When they were done, they let his form crumble to the pavement.

"You're making us look bad, you fucker!" One of the assailants said. "You couldn't stay in your fucking lane, could you? No, you had to show off how clean you can be so you can make the rest of us look bad!"

They left him there, where he died in a pool of his own blood. No one would notice until a few of the gym members were walking back to their cars. No one would know that he was one of the good ones, trying to keep it old school in a world where no one cared about tradition anymore. Their only concern was gaining likes, getting monetized, and being recognized, regardless of the context. There's an audience for everything, I suppose, even serial killers.