B&D Ch. 1

''FOR MR. FREDERICK KRUGER. CONFIDENTIAL. ONLY TO BE OPENED BY THE RECIPIENT''

Fred murmured his name under his breath. His name was roughly stenciled with red, shiny paint on the matte black box about the size of a shoebox. There was a strange symbol—a scythe in a hair-thin circle outline, specifically—etched on the top box, and it didn't ring any bell in him. What made matters worse was he didn't ever expect to receive such suspicious package, and he didn't know who brought it to his house's front door. He was reluctant to even pick it up from the floor—no one in this godforsaken world knew what was inside this lost box—fearing for his and his family's safety.

''But there's only one thing to know,'' he thought, ''if this is ever a bomb, I don't need it to blast my front porch to a million pieces.''

Trying to keep his fear controlled, he kneeled down to the wooden floor. He wanted to stop himself, but his hands slowly made its way to the box, as if it was controlled by an other being his naked and blurry eyes couldn't see. As his palms felt the box's slickly smooth texture, a trickle of sweat flowed down his cheeks, then to his chin; the temperature was cold and cozy—a perfect temperature to chill down to his bed and sleep—but the place seemed to grow hotter and hotter every second. Panic nearly bogged his mind, but he forced himself to manage it.

Nearly freaking out, he slowly lifted the box up, only to be surprised by its abnormally light weight. It seemed like someone sent him an empty box... was it? But it somehow brought relief to him; at least he knew it didn't contain a time bomb ticking down to oblivion or something equally terrifying. He now ''did'' want to know the thing inside... quite desperately. ''It may take some guts,'' he thought as he lifted up the lid.

Fear faded to relief when his fears were disproven: it was ''not'' a bomb, which he initially expected. It was an oblong-like object with a cone-like shape at the center wrapped in white cloth—''now what is this?'' he asked himself. Curiosity lingered somewhere in his mind, and it was making him think he must uncover whatever it was. ''It couldn't be a bomb,'' he whispered to himself, realizing he was being too paranoid and scared all the time. Why did he act so freaked out if it was just a box with a mysterious object inside? He, nearly against his will, decided to unravel the thing.

He picked it up,  laid the black box down at the nearby table, and pulled the piece of cloth down. What greeted his eyes was a strange mask—the mask didn't have any noticeable, if not prominent,  details: it was only painted with glossy black paint—except for some black, non-shiny stains he couldn't identify what—and it didn't show much any other features other than a nose with an open hole under for breathing and two parallel holes at the upper middle portion, obviously for seeing. He scanned every inch of it, and after several seconds of inspecting, he found the tiny—almost microscopic, and it wasn't any exaggeration—scythe symbol, the one he found on the box, etched on the backside of the forehead of the mask. He also found Roman numerals alongside the symbol—the first number started with ''I'' and counted up to ''XII''. ''One to twelve... what does this mean?'' he asked himself, feeling his initial fear resurfacing again. The number twelve seemed newly carved, while the others seemed to be older; it somehow sent chills down to his spine...

Now, he had no idea what to do. The mysterious mask radiated a dark and eerie aura; the more he held it on his hands, the faster fear flowed in his veins. This thing obviously had a horrible history, and he didn't want to learn about it, thinking it might drive him up the wall if he ever knew. The stains... the stains were something...

For a moment, he felt like a crumbling Praxiteles statue—his arms felt numb, his legs felt rubber, his head ached faintly, and his heart beat rapidly, as if it wanted to rip his chest open. He was frozen still. Things weren't going fine, until he saw the lights on the upper floor light up. He unfroze and turned around as quickly as possible as his wife, Cynthia, descended down the stairs, keeping the mask out of her view by tucking it behind his pants. She—as she had always been—looked gorgeous and beautiful and breathtaking, especially when she wore her knee-length nightdress. But even without vanity, he could see she was curious about what was happening. The worry on her eyes was evident.

"''Amant'', where have you been?" she asked, staring intently at his blinking eyes; he was sweating profusely, as if he had been stuffed in a scorching brazen bull, "I thought you were gone."

"I'm sorry ''amant''," he replied back, trying not to stutter—he hoped he didn't notice something... "I just heard something here, and just I checked it out. It's just a stray cat. Nothing else. Let's go upstairs and sleep. There's—" he stopped short, thinking of words that might not raise suspicion, "—nothing to worry about."

"Are you sure?" his ''amant'' asked.

"Yes, I'm quite sure," he assured as he wiped his sweat with his bare and hairy hands, "it's getting hot in here. Climb up and I'll follow in a few minutes; I just need to make sure things are in their proper places." Then he nodded vigorously. His ''amant'' went to the stairs and climbed it up, her left hand gripping the metal rail. He sighed in relief as he heard the bedroom door close with a loud ''click''. At least she didn't notice something strange was happening; the thought of her finding about it rattled him to the bones.

Making sure she wasn't peeking at the edge of the wall, she looked around—thankfully, he found no other manic eyes other than his... in the mirror nearby. As he gazed at his own reflecion, he realized he looked so ugly and haggard when awoken godawfully early in the morning. ''I don't want to see myself like this anymore,'' he thought, pulling out the mask from his pants.

The mask grew more uncomfortable as he and his wife talked, but now his ''amant'' was gone and now waiting for him... Clutching the mask on his hand, he picked up the black box, put the mask inside it, and sealed it tight with the lead. Hiding it wasn't a difficult task—he had every place to hide his things. His hands wrapped around the box, he headed for the kitchen. There was a disguised vault only he knew was even there; not his wife, not his children. ''Thank god you left that day; without that, I couldn't have been able to make this,'' he said quietly, setting the box at the counter. He headed for the refrigerator beside him, and started pushing it aside with his shoulder.

It took him a lot of energy, but at least he made it without making any disturbing noises that might attract the attention of his ''amant''. Breathing hard, he reached for the wall behind, and started patting the wall. There were thin and straight trim on the wall, forming a rectangular shape, nearly hidden since it blended with the white paint. He almost had forgotten where it was, but when he found the depression the size of the thumb, he almost shouted in happiness. He held a finger to the depression, and pulled the panel up.

A vault-like compartment opened behind the blind door, and surprisingly, it seemed large enough for the box. There were other things hidden in there—his personal money worthing a hundred dollars, two bottles of wine, and some empty packets of cocaine he had used before until he went to a rehabilitation center somewhere in Carolina to piece his shattered life back together. He wasn't sure what to do with the wine, whether he would throw it away or drink it in disgust. ''I don't like the taste of bad wine, so I'll guess I'll need to dispose of these,'' he said as he grasped for the wine bottles with his both hands, and threw it at the nearby trash can. Then the money came to his mind... without any second thought, he grabbed it all and shoved it to his pockets. ''It's free enough,'' he thought.

He picked up the box, and lifted the lid one last time; he needed one last look. Technically, it wasn't the last day, but he felt he desperately needed a single glance. He frowned, then shut the box close. ''I'll take a look on you if I buy myself some time alone,'' the thought came to his mind before he put the box inside the compartment and slid the panel close. Whatever it was, he should know where it came from, and from whom. He considered the idea, but he doubted it would ever fruit to something.

Walking at the other side of the refrigerator, he snapped the bones of his fingers, and clasped his hands at the side of the refrigerator—his shoulder hurt like hell after he pushed the refrigerator with it, he knew his hands were the best choice left. He easily did it at first, but he decided to stop for a moment when the fridge almost toppled down. Few seconds later, he managed to put the fridge back to its place.

His ''amant'' called his name, and he jolted up the stairs, thinking about what he had done to the fridge—''it was kind of ironic,'' he thought as he opened the bedroom door, and found his ''amant'' lying on the bed, adjusting her dress.

''Let's sleep, ''amant''." she urged as she covered herself with the blanket, "it's till one AM in the morning."

With that, he climbed up to the bed, and lied comfortably. He wasn't able to take the mask out of his mind, but he only needed to do one thing... slowly, he stretched his arm, and wrapped it around his ''amant'''s waist.

— * —

Rover Johnson walked as fast as possible on the dangerous and silent streets of Heartcrest, his hands in his jacket's pockets. The temperature felt too low for him—his whole body seemed to grow numb. He, in fact, didn't like walking on the streets alone in the night, knowing there were some thieves and pickpocketers hanging around, waiting for their unknowing prey to come to their territories. But some taxi drivers were simply too cold-hearted to him, colder than the pavement he was walking on.

''I should have reported that taxi before,'' he thought, his eyes watching the old shaggy man with a haywire beard and torn clothes lie asleep on the sidewalks, ''I should be at home right now.''

When he found the poor old man, he suddenly felt sympathy to him. He felt grateful he wasn't going to be like that when he grows old... thanks to his loving wife and children. As he neared the man, he grabbed his wallet—quite too light—from pants' back pocket and pulled out ten bucks. Without making any noise, he kneeled in front of the man, and stuffed the ten bucks to his hand. If he meet this old man again, he felt he should do something to end his suffering—not to kill him, of course, but something else.

He stood up and continued walking. He had never felt this good helping helpless and powerless people. If he could give them a new life, he would, ''if''. But that seemed to be in his dreams only. He was just an average working man who had a family to feed and care for. Perhaps the best thing he could do for them was provide them money—he didn't have much of that, but still... After a few steps, he turned left and kept on walking past stinking garbage, the disgusting and overpowering stench rushing in to his nostrils. Suddenly, he felt he wanted to vomit his soul out.

Far ahead, a pair of lights glowed, and then he heard an engine revving. The headlights slowly drove to his direction, as if it wanted to torment him and scare the living hell out of him. Avoiding to be seen, he ducked behind a trash can—he had to cover his nose to prevent himself from dirtying himself and everything around him. He didn't know what was that, but he felt the dark aura it radiated, like it had a one-hundred shades dark history. In addition, he had heard of news reports of kidnappings around the city, and those who were kidnapped were never found again ''or'' never found alive—all those crimes were associated to this so-called "Black Van Phenomenon". It was just a strange occurrence: a black van comes into a dark and uncrowded spot and kidnaps people. So far, no one had managed to catch that mysterious van—only pictures exist. This could be that van...

The van roved past through him; thankfully, they didn't see him. This was the chance. He reached for the phone in his pocket, only to find out it was low battery. ''Damn! Why now?'' he cursed his phone for being useless at times of emergency. He almost forgot he drained its battery playing CSR while waiting for a damn taxi. Suddenly, he regretted playing the game. Knowing the phone had no more purpose, he slid it back to his pocket. The car turned right. He heaved a heavy sigh. He turned around and strafed his way to the edge of the wall.

His eyes peeking at the edge, he watched as the black van drove a few meters, until it stopped in front of the old man. Two muscular man wearing strange featureless masks, black shirts, and black pants emerged from the sliding door, and headed for the old man—they had forty-fives hanging in their belts. ''No... not the old man,'' he thought, wanting to save the old man, but he knew it was already too late. One of the men started kicking the old man—the old man groaned in pain. As soon as he woke up, the men grabbed him in his wrists, and pulled him up standing. The old man looked badly scared... he was too weak to at least scream for help, yet he couldn't do anything about him but watch him being kidnapped by two murderous people.

One of the man noticed the ten bucks tucked in his hands—he grasped the ten bucks and shoved it into his pocket. ''I can't take this anymore,'' he murmured, trying to stop his tears from falling down to the asphalt. They threw the car in the van, and they followed inside.

The last things he heard before walking away were tires screeching loudly and an engine roaring wildly. He watched as those bright taillights fade to darkness.