It had all gone quiet on the Western Front. He wasn’t surprised; he didn’t have much faith in the police these days.
The Victorian police had an excuse: they were living and working in a time in which recent advances in forensic science and criminal profiling hadn’t been made. They had that against them. The police of today didn’t have that excuse. They had all the tools at their disposal, all the evidence and clues they needed and they still weren’t capable.
He wasn’t upset. He was quite pleased, actually. He’d predicted this might be the case. As a citizen, of course, he was dismayed, but that didn’t matter too much. He wouldn’t be a citizen for long.
He’d read all of the newspapers that day as a matter of course, like he did every day. He’d browsed through all of the major online news sources, too. Things had gone quiet. It was a sad situation when even a modern day version of the most famous and ruthless serial killer of all time was loose on the streets and it was still being knocked off the front pages by the latest celebrity relationship break-ups and shock-horror news stories about immigration.
He had very little faith in anyone or anything these days. That had all gone long ago. When everyone else had finished caring about the important stuff, he’d decided to join them.
He wasn’t panicked or anxious, but his sense of awareness had been heightened dramatically. He was now acutely aware of the passing of time. He knew exactly what time of day it was at any given moment, and he certainly knew what the date was.
He was counting down.