Killer Genius 2: Attack of the Gym Rats

“You mean to sit there and tell us that you listened to two people being killed and your first thought was only to quit your job?”

Uniformed officers John Smush and Clay Pak were the first to interview Janice and the other witnesses at Beastmode. They took copious notes and put the manhunt for Jon and Clarissa Ratkevich in motion. Meanwhile, the NYFD would report over the radio that they’d found a burned husk of an SUV smoldering under a nearby Brooklyn Queens Expressway onramp.

Aside from leaving a lone detective with Mike and Pamela to collect any available information they had on the two presumably psychotic personal trainers, the only things left to do were to turn Beastmode’s Fort Greene location over to a forensics team led by one Pedro Salazar and figure out what to do with Janice. They waited until she went to the ladies’ room before discussing it and coming up with a solution.

“Hey, what about those two major case detectives that handled the Good Grades Killer case? They must know something about serial killers and unlike our guys over at the 167^th, they’ll probably want this pigfuck of a case.” Pak suggested. Smush only shrugged, not feeling very strongly one way or another, but agreeing that there was no way anyone at the 167^th would be willing to put in the work this case seemed to warrant.

Janice was so exhausted that she’d fallen asleep in the back of the squad car by the time Pak and Smush pulled up to the 88^th precinct’s new multilevel complex on the corner of Empire Boulevard and Brooklyn Avenue just a few blocks away from Medgar Evers College.

Pak and Smush escorted Janice inside, alerted the desk sergeant as to who Janice was and who she should be seen by, wished her luck and exited. Despite the bustling and noise in the waiting area, Janice fell asleep again. Finally, she was gently awakened by a hand on her shoulder.

“Are you Janice Thursby?” The plump, kind-faced white lady standing in front of her removed her hand once Janice had opened her eyes. She wore a pantsuit that might have been a size too big.

“Yes.” Janice felt disoriented and mildly concerned that her breath may not have been at its best.

“I’m Detective Brenda Smith. Friends call me ‘Smitty’.”

“That’s a cool nickname, I guess,” Janice responded.

“I’ve been called worse, that’s for sure. Anyway, heard you had a problem with some coworkers this morning. Why don’t we get you a cup of really bad police station coffee and talk about it?”

“That’s cool,” Janice immediately felt at ease with Smitty. “Do you have any gum by chance?”

“I don’t, but we can get you some, I’m sure.”

With a swipe of Smitty’s magnetic card, Janice found herself wandering through a place she’d only seen on television. A world inhabited by middle-aged men with guns strapped to their torsos. Many of the men were dressed in suits, yet still managing to look disheveled, as if their wives had forced them all to go to an impromptu church function. The few women she saw were also dressed in pantsuits, but managed to look less frumpy and much sterner than Smitty could probably ever be.

After a few twists and turns past conversing detectives and handcuffed people being moved back and forth, the two women found an interrogation room and sat down. After a short absence, Smitty produced the awful coffee she promised and they began to talk.

Janice figured she would leave out the details regarding Tony being his boss’ personal man-whore, and simply told Smitty that she’d been screwed by the New York City subway, which is why she’d opted to spend the night in the gym. Before she got too much further in the story, Smitty held up a hand.

“Janice, I’m sorry, but I have to go get my partner. He will definitely want to hear this.”

Smitty was gone for a few minutes, which was all Janice needed to fall asleep yet again. When she woke again, Smitty had returned, with a handsome black man who couldn’t have been a day over thirty-seven, despite the dark cloud he seemed to bring in the room when he entered.

“Janice Thursby, meet Max Baxter.”

“Hi there.” Max shook her hand firmly and they all sat down.

Janice recapped the beginning of her story for Max’s benefit, then detailed the murders as she’d overheard them. The more Janice spoke, the more sympathetic Smitty looked and the more agitated Max Baxter became.

Max interrupted Janice once she’d gotten to the part where she didn’t call the police.

“I realize that I should have called the police when it happened…”

“You are damn right, you should have! We wouldn’t be sitting here, wasting time now! And you’re supposed to be a scholarship student?”

“I was going to say, I should have called the police, but I was scared.”

“More scared than you’d be of, let’s say, letting two serial killers stay on the streets?”

“Scared I wouldn’t be believed. I’m sorry! I know I fucked up!”

Smitty had finally seen enough. “Can I talk to you for a second? Outside?”

Smitty slips Janice a tissue and the two detectives exit to the hallway. Once the interrogation room door was closed, Smitty punched Max in the arm.

“Hey! What the fuck?” Max grabbed his arm, more surprised than physically hurt.

“Are you serious in there, right now? That girl is a victim. Since when do you not know the difference between a victim and a suspect?”

“Probably when I’m confronted by a victim so dumb that I start to feel like I’m developing a brain aneurism by listening to them.”

“She was scared out of her mind. People do questionable things when they’re scared.”

“That child still deserves to be yelled at,” Max snapped. “Fucking dumb ass kids.”

“By that remark, are you expressing a general annoyance with millenials, or are you just feeling extra rancorous about this because she looks a little like Shelia?’

Max’s eyes narrowed at the mention of his ex-wife’s name. “She does not look like Shelia and you’ve got a lot of nerve.”

“Yes, she does. And even if she didn’t look a little like Shelia you would probably project some residual feelings onto her.”

“Easy!” Max held up a hand as if to signal he’d heard enough. “I’m so over Shelia. Bridgette and I are doing great.”

“But not calling the police is something Shelia might have done. Probably for the sake of some stupid show she was working on, all to score an exclusive with the killers. Come to think of it, Bridgette might have done that too.”

Max palmed his forehead. “Bridgette wouldn’t have done that. She’s got integrity and common sense. If this was Bridgette, we would be eating dinner right now, because she would have called it in and the suspects would be in custody.”

“Yeah. You know what? I take that back. Bridgette is a good egg, despite being in television and married to your grumpy ass.” Smitty gave Max a wry smile.

“I am not grumpy!”

Smitty pretended not to hear him. “But Shelia hurt you, and I think you subconsciously revisit that hurt at times. And this is one of those times.”

“Okay, I won’t say another word.”

“That would be useless. I didn’t call you in there for you to not participate. Just be a little nicer to the kid, is all I’m asking.”

“You know what, I have a better idea!” Max raised a finger by his head. “I’m going to let you finish getting the story, while I get on the horn with Pedro and see what he’s dug up.”

“Max!” she tried to protest, but he was already walking away.

With a sigh, Smitty walked back into the interrogation room, only to find that Janice had fallen asleep once again.

Janice’s eyes sprung open, “I’m sorry. I was up all night scared, that’s why I keep falling asleep. Didn’t think I’d ever be in the position where I’d only feel safe in a police station.”

“Me either,” Smitty sat back down. “You want to just go back to sleep for a little bit? We can pick up the story in a few.”

“I’d rather get it over with if that means I can get done before your friend comes back in here yelling at me some more.”

“Just between you and me, my partner is going through a little something so he’s a little on edge. Please excuse him.”

Janice took a deep breath. “Whatever. But let’s do it now.”

“Okay. I’m listening.”

Max was on his way to his new cubicle so he could talk to Pedro on his desk phone, but the quirky forensics team leader called him on his cellphone while he was still in the hallway.

“Pedro! You got something? What’s all that noise?”

“I’ve got some guys behind me trying to figure out what these two Russians did to disable the gym’s security system. So far, it’s like they never even had to touch the thing to get it to shut down whenever they wanted it to.”

“So, they’re Russian hackers? Is that officially a stereotype?”

“You would think. Look, I managed to dig up a lot of stuff once I got the info on who sponsored their original immigration paperwork, but I need to keep my hands free to show you.”

“You want me to call you back?”

“No! I want you to go to my lab and get on my computer. We need to video conference. There’s a lot of shit I need to show you.”

“Dude, I don’t know your password.”

“I’ll text it to you. Just go.”

While Max made his way to the elevator bank the text came through:

EyeamLatinoBatman65965868007

“I should have guessed,” Max said with a chuckle as he got in the elevator.

Though he loved Pedro like a brother, Max had not made it to the new lab since the members of the 88^th had been relocated. Once off the elevator, he wandered until he found a workstation surrounded by Marvel and DC action figures, complete with framed comic books mounted on an adjacent wall.

Jesus Christ, he’s got a Werewolf By Night #32 on the wall. That’s rare as fuck and super valuable. I saw someone buy that on Comic Book Men years ago.

About thirty seconds after Max sat down in front of Pedro’s computer and punched in the password, a window with Pedro seated in front of his laptop, popped up on the screen. “Primo! This is some fucked up shit, right here!”

Max quickly spotted the microphone stand in front of the computer and leaned into it. “Did you find evidence of the murders?”

“So far, nothing. As you can imagine, these locker rooms are a DNA Greek salad. Of course, going by the young lady’s story, there’s a slim chance there’s blood in the pipes. The problem with that is we would have to break through the walls to get to said pipes. The manager isn’t letting us do that without a warrant. He’s afraid of getting in trouble with the owner, blah, blah, blah… But he gave us all the personal information on the Russians that he could. And we were able to lift fingerprints and hair fibers from their lockers.”

“That’s it?” I know you didn’t have me come up here just to see these damn action figures.

“There’s more. Uniforms confirmed that the address Beastmode Fitness had on file was a fake. The building exists, but not the apartment. In any event, they were living somewhere in Downtown Brooklyn and if they torched their car, they may still be close.” As Pedro spoke, two more windows opened on the screen next to the one Pedro was in. Max could see the video feed from two officers standing in front of the Ratkevich address listed in the second window. Only the address in the window listed the apartment as ‘7N’ and the building the officers were in front of stood at only three stories.

“Or they made it to the subway and they’re miles away by now. In any event, if the airports have been alerted, we still have a shot.”

“Especially, if they try to go back to Mother Russia! But here’s where it gets interesting.”

The fake address and the police officers’ video windows disappeared to be replaced by another window that showed several pages of work visa paperwork.

Working his keyboard, Pedro could highlight and magnify things as he called Max’s attention to them. “First thing I want you to notice is that these two changed their first names. Jon and Clarissa were Osip and Nika before they came to America. Not sure why they felt it necessary to change their first names but not last, or how they managed to get Jon and Clarissa IDs down the road.”

“They had help. They ‘white-peopled’ that shit.” Max was only being dismissive and sarcastic because of his mood. He knew the name change issue was important. “Nice work, Pedro.”

Pedro was reminded why he liked Max. “You got it, my brother! Now, check out the sponsor’s name…”

Pedro turned the document in the window to a different page and zeroed in on a signature.

“I looked up the doctor that you see mentioned as their sponsor, a Dr. Julian Orlov. Turns out he was a big deal clinical psychologist back during the KGB days. Worked on gay conversion therapy, studied the effects of masochism on the elderly and a bunch of other kinky sex worker shit.”

“And here we have a Russian brother and sister who for some reason like to bone each other and kill people.” Max smiled slightly.

“I’ll keep digging, but I’d say it’s a good bet that this Orlov dude fucked these Ratkevich kids all the way up.” The visa windows closed.

“Keep on it. I’ll start digging on my end.”

“You got it, Primo! Hey before you go, there’s something else I’ve got to tell you. Are you alone? Is Smitty there?”

“I’m alone. Smitty is interviewing our dumbass witness. What’s up?”

Pedro grimaced and bit his bottom lip. “Um… oh boy…”

“I think the new lieutenant found out about you and the Good Grades Killer.”

“Found out what?” As if Max wasn’t already in a shitty mood. “Everyone knows I was kidnapped.”

“I think she knows everything else, dude,” Pedro said while shaking his head. “That Good Grades basically raped you. Harvested your sperm. That your new baby’s mother is Good Grades and not Bridgette.”

“Fuck!” Max wanted to throw something but wouldn’t dare damage any part of Pedro’s superhero shrine. “The Feds said they were going to keep that suppressed, if only because they didn’t want people knowing Good Grades was a super intelligent black woman. How did this happen?”

“The only thing I can think of is Hopper must have had something about it in his files or personal notes.” Even in the computer screen windows, they could both see that neither of them had fully recovered from the recent death of their friend and mentor, Lieutenant Harry Hopper.

Max couldn’t bring himself to be mad at Hopper. “Can’t blame a dead guy for being careless, I suppose.”

“Remember what he said when you both came back to work? ‘Of course, she raped you. That’s what you get for being such a pretty, black motherfucker!’”

“Yeah, he was a crass, Irish bastard when he wanted to be.” Max suddenly, involuntarily sobbed.

“Shit! I’m sorry, Max! I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s cool, dude. Get back to me when you have something on the weird ass doctor.”

Pedro tried to say something else, but Max closed the window. Afterwards, he took a moment to sit at Pedro’s desk to compose himself. Two tears fell in front of the action figures; one tear for his fallen friend and another for this latest blow to his dignity.