The race was on. Detective Porter could feel the excitement running through his veins. He was flying through the streets of the city, chasing Mr. Nickel and trying to get to the bottom of what he knew about DeAndre’s murder.
“He has some explaining to do,” he said with a menacing look on his face.
Mr. Nickel was on a tear through the streets as he was whipping his vehicle through town. Detective Porter was hot on his trail as well as they whipped through traffic. He could not believe what he was seeing. The man that many loved and supported was a suspect in the murder of a local teen. He did not want to believe it, but when his car showed up and how Mr. Nickel was driving right now, something wasn’t adding up.
Detective Porter was sticking with him for a minute until Mr. Nickel decided to turn on the afterburners. While the light was getting ready to turn red, he floored it through the intersection. Porter wanted to give a chase, but at the risk of tipping himself off for tailing him, he did not run the light. From there, Mr. Nickel disappeared into the darkness of the city.
“We’ll meet again Cary. I don’t know what you’re hiding, but you cannot hide it forever.”
Inside Mr. Nickel’s car, there was dead silence. The way he positioned himself was different than usual. Mr. Nickel usually wasn’t a guy that sped through the streets of the city, but he was doing so tonight. He was usually not one to wear all black, but he was doing so tonight. And he was not the guy who would go out late nights like this, but he was doing so on this evening.
“Now to get to the hideout.”
The voice though, sounded different than Mr. Nickel. It was that same scraggly, deep voice from before and as Mr. Nickel drove, there was a scary smile on his face, as if he was thinking of something sinisterly fascinating he was about to do. As he continued driving, he seemed to not have a care in the world, weaving in and out of lanes in the early morning darkness. He would drive a little further until he arrived upon a body of water where there was a group of storage units. The odd-acting Mr. Nickel got out of the car and headed to his storage, which was number 234. As he unlocked the storage and rolled up the doors, the stench of death rolled out.
There had been a series of murders in the city over the past decade and some of them had been solved, but there were others that had yet to be solved along with missing people. The police had all but given up on the dead bodies because they could not find anyone to incriminate because of lack of evidence. They searched and searched for the missing people but came up with nothing at all. When Mr. Nickel opened up that storage, it seemed like all those murders and missing people would have been solved if only someone knew.
“Hello everyone. Did you all miss me?”
It was Mr. Nickel in the physical, but this was not him. This was an alternate version of him and as he entered the storage, there were legs, arms and heads from the many murders victims in the city. Along with the dismembered bodies, there were clothes in there from past murders. Some of the clothes were his, but there were others that seemed to belong to someone else.
“I guess I showed all of you who was in charge didn’t I? I cannot stand it when people don’t listen to me. I run this show. This is my city. I run this.”
The alternate version of Mr. Nickel seemed to be irritated with the faces that he saw.
“You didn’t listen to anyone. You didn’t follow the rules. You basically did whatever you wanted to. There are rules you had to abide by. Guess you both can abide by them now.”
Mr. Nickel laughed as he pulled out a backpack he left his home with that had a separate pair of clothes: some slacks, some underwear and a blue t-shirt. He quickly got dressed, closed the storage and went back to his home.
While Mr. Nickel was at the storage, Detective Porter went back to Mr. Nickel’s house to search for clues. He did not have a search warrant, but he knew this may be his perfect moment to look around the outside of the house and find some clues. Detective Porter searched around the house looking for clues. He did not see anything in the front of the house, as there was nothing there. As he undid the gate and made his way to the back of the house though, he heard music playing. He noticed there was a radio out back a long with a nice setup with a couple chairs. He also noticed what looked like a cup of tea and a knife. As he eased his way towards the knife, there was a turning of the door. Mr. Nickel had returned back home and Detective Porter had not heard him pull up.
Detective Porter scrambled off the porch to the side of the house, where he could see Mr. Nickel but still be hidden.
“Oh what a night!” said Mr. Nickel.
When Detective Porter heard that voice, he immediately looked around to see where it was coming from, as if he did not believe it was coming from Mr. Nickel, but when he focused again, it was coming from Mr. Nickel.
“Where did that voice come from?” Detective Porter wondered.
Detective Porter was stunned as he observed the different mannerisms and ways Mr. Nickel was carrying himself. He just sat there in stunned silence until Mr. Nickel went back in the house and turned off his lights.
Detective Porter went back to the porch, but the knife he was looking for had been swiped by Mr. Nickel and taken in the home. So Detective Porter creeped back to his car, making sure not to make any noises that could wake up Mr. Nickel. As he arrived to his car, he noticed what looked like a note in his windshield. Detective Porter grabbed it and got in his car.
As soon as he read it, he was perplexed and looked around in the darkness.
“Stay far away. Stay far, far away”
What had him a little shook wasn’t that he got the letter, it was the person who signed it.
“Who is Dirty Change?”
Detective Porter instantly floored it out of the area and went back home.
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