Sintrix
It was 2:35 AM when I got the call and rolled over crumpling the sheets to half-handed reach for the phone sitting on my nightstand and pick it up and "Hello yes yes alright where at? I'll be right down". It was another two minutes roughly before I was really awake, so 2:37 AM at this point. It was the usual call. A murder. I turned off the fan and flicked the light on and the room was bathed in yellow sickly light. It was another half hour or so before I was down there. It was in the city, like right smack dab in the middle, but since it was so early there wasn't any traffic and it was a weekend anyway.
After I got through all the checkpoints I got to the tape. I could see even from behind it that it was brutal. Getting closer confirmed it. The victim was a man in his mid to late 30s and they would tell me later that he was a journalist at a somewhat reputable newspaper and I would recognize his name because I had read some of his work before while sitting on the train or in a cab or in a bar just scrolling on my phone. Just fluff pieces mainly, though. He had been in his deskchair at the time of the killing typing something on his laptop when the door had been opened behind him. There was no sign of forced entry so we had been going off the initial assumptions that either he left his door unlocked or that the killer was someone he knew who had a key or got in somehow based off of that relationship. Either way it was clear that the fight started at the chair he was sitting in. The killer came up behind him and grappled him by the neck trying to squeeze the life out of him at first. There were marks on the floor from the chair scrapping the wood paneling that went back and forth back and forth back and forth until the chair fell over and everyone came down with it. From there they writhed around on the floor a bit like undulating worms and eventually the killer grabbed a pen from the desk and shoved it in the victim's left eye socked within a quarter inch of his brain. We knew it was from his desk because the pen was had the logo of the victim's newspaper on it. I think he would've been lucky if the killer pushed it the extra bit and ended him there but things rarely ever work out like that. From there the killer backed off a bit and got a boning knife from the kitchen while the victim tried to crawl away a few feet towards the front door but the killer came back and stabbed him three times in the back hitting his thoracic muscles on the left side and piercing into his lungs twice and scraping one of his vertebrae so that a few days later during the autopsy the coroner would find some white bone power that had sprinkled from the spine down into his chest cavity. The force of the blows from the knife had snapped the pen in his eye in half against the ground and blood and liquified brains started to come out of the opening of the pen like a water spout. The victim started coughing up blood and choking on it when the killer flipped him over and stabbed him in the neck six more times until there were just a bunch of disconnected fleshy tubes of twitching pink and red choke matter caked in warm blood that pooled up and around the victim, covering the floor of the desk area and staining the victim's face. Then he died, probably squealing and crying, and the killer dropped the knife on the way out of the front door and shut it behind him.
The neighbor had called the police because he heard the altercation but he didn't hear anyone say any words-- just screams and choking noises and slams on impact. He didn't see anyone either. Great way to start. We started by canvassing the area for more potential witnesses but no one had any extra information or had seen anyone. We pulled the security camera footage but the place wasn't covered very well and had lots of blind spots. Nevertheless, we still saw a suspicious man going down the staircase and out the front door turning right and headed south. He looked white, approximately six foot one hundred seventy pounds average in pretty much every way which didn't help at all. We canvassed the area right of the apartment building but it was mainly vacant and there were no witnesses to interview besides one security guard who didn't see anything and no cameras besides a traffic light about three blocks down which we decided not to pull because it likely would've been a waste of resources. Spent a little time interviewing the victim's family, friends, employer. They only had good things to say about him: no enemies, good guy, nice guy, loving guy, great guy, I can't believe it, who would've done this to him? Good question.
So the only thing we had to go off of was the crime scene now. What was the victim doing? What does the act itself signify? Why the victim?
At the time of the murder the victim had been typing something on his computer. I took at look at that. It was very strange. There were no windows open, nothing except for a word doc. It was titled SINTRIX. Reading more there were about two and half paragraphs of nonsense. Random words in a random order, like a word association game almost. At first I thought it had been edited in the struggle-- keyboard smash while trying to not get strangled to death-- but it wasn't random enough for that. It wasn't gibberish, more like schizophasia. All the words in the document were dictionary words that I had more or less heard before, nothing like random concatenated letters from a gyrating fearful hand. So my next thought was the document had been changed by the killer, maybe whatever the victim was typing was a possible motive. That didn't pan out either. Autosave shows when every change occurs and exactly how much and what specifically was added or deleted. It was all typed out over a period of about twenty minutes. Way too long of a window for the killer to be doing it. Besides, there were time codes too and they showed that the document was edited up to 1:46 AM which was two minutes before the first police call was made by the neighbor, and the killer was out the door by then. So the killer didn't edit the document, it was all the victim.
The act itself was extremely violent and signifying some level of hatred for the victim. You don't beat, strangle and stab someone ten times just to kill them. You do it because you want them to suffer and feel hopelessness before their eyes go blank. No signs of anything stolen, so it wasn't a robbery. But he had no enemies, according to everyone we interviewed.
So why him? It had been a few days since the murder now and I let myself back in to the crime scene. The place was dark even though it was midday. I looked around for anything we had missed but I didn't find anything except for the clock. There was a digital clock on the victim's nightstand in his bedroom. The same brand as mine. It was frozen at 1:46 AM which was when we tentatively placed the murder time at. I stood there staring at the green glowing numbers on the little digital clock for what felt like a few minutes trying to put it together but nothing was coming together.
That's when I heard something from the other room, some metal clang like someone dropped something. I jolted around and took a few quick paces out to the living room half expecting to see a uniformed cop but there was no one there. The hallway light through the open front door lit up the room and I remembered that I had closed the front door. I strided over to the entrance and looked down the hall and saw someone jogging away just as they turned a disappeared towards the staircase. I went after them full sprinting like a movie chase and turned and saw them just out of sight again. They seemed to match the vague description of the killer but I wasn't too sure. I pursued them down the hall and down the stairs at out the huge ornamental wooden doors to the building-- all while they stayed just out of reach. Something about the way they moved was odd. It was like they were gliding instead of running. But their legs were still moving in a way that was extremely intentional. Like they wanted me to notice that their legs were moving. Kicking like a child learning to swim but in slow motion and smooth.
When I got out the front door I saw them on the street turning a corner into an alley. As I got closer to the alley I started to realize how strange the whole situation was. They had maintained a distance of about six to eight feet in front of me this whole time without changing their pace, meanwhile I've alternated between sprinting and jogging. And even stranger, it's about 3 in the afternoon but I haven't been able to see them once. They look exactly like how the security camera footage looked. Dark and blurry. But this is right in front of me, so why can't I see them?
That's when I realized I had slowed down. I stopped sprinting but they were still the same distance from me. And they were still surrounded by the same amount of dark blur and distortion that looked almost navy less than black around them. Then I stopped completely. But they didn't stop. They stayed moving, throwing each leg back up into the air behind them and then back down and then the next leg alternating in the exact same motion for each leg in a perfect sequence. They were moving though, but they stayed the same distance away from me. How is that? I thought.
I looked around and realized I was still moving. My body wasn't running, I was completely still, but my surroundings were moving like a conveyer belt. I could hear the sound of my footsteps despite standing completely still. My line of sight was even bouncing too, like from each impact of a footfall on the ground. But I was motionless. It was exactly what I had been seeing a few moments ago while I was running, a perfect biomechanic motion but without the input. Just output. This isn't right. I started feeling sick and the noise of the city started getting more noticeable. Like shifting from mono to stereo. It was very slight but it was like standing next to electric machinery and I could feel the vibration from whatever was making the noise change starting to shake my body. It wasn't getting any louder but the sensation of the noise was increasing steadily. I looked forward and saw I was within about three feet of the right turn into the alley and the figure in front of me made the turn just as I glanced over. That isn't right either. Now the distance changed, he should've already made the turn. I need to get out of here.
It took every bit of energy I could summon but I used it all to turn around and fall to the ground breathless and start throwing up on the pavement. There was a chill going all throughout my body like ice in my veins like being stabbed with frozen needles. It took a moment to register it, but it was pain. It was sharp pain all throughout every square half centimeter of my body and like the inside of my dermis was perforated with sterile metal syringes that were shooting cold air inside of every pocket and pore so that I was covered with chill underneath my skin at every layer possible. It took several minutes for the feeling to subside as I lay screaming in agony on the side of curb. No one heard me. It was just me there.
When I could move I called for an ambulance and backup. While I was waiting on the curb I didn't move an inch and I looked around at every building in front of me and tried to ground myself back to reality by counting the bricks and noticing every distinguishing feature on the dilapidated buildings. When I finally felt like I could move I wiped my face and there were tears in my eyes that I didn't remember crying. They were cold.
I told the ambulance and the police everything but they didn't find anything wrong with me and they didn't find the figure either. The security tapes didn't show anything, they had all cut off when I entered the crime scene. The operating theory was the killer had some kind of way to tamper with the security cameras and so we looked into the landlord. He was cleared eventually and he suggested we look into the company that did security for his building. It was called Sintrix.
~
There was something that was always very appealing to me about being a detective. I grew up watching Law & Order and Forensic Files. Those things always had a certain appeal to me. I remember when I was young I would watch movies that had dead bodies in them. Monster movies, zombie movies, or police movies. I would see these bodies and I would pause the screen to look over them for details. I would write things down in a little notebook and make guesses about the body. Then I'd play the movie and see if I was right.
I usually was.
When I was about twelve years old I saw a dead body for the first time. It was an animal's, but it was the same as a person's to me. It was our neighbor's dog and when I scraped it's flattened roadkill corpse from the asphalt of our cul-de-sac and put it in a paper grocery store bag and walked over to our neighbor's house with my parents I told our neighbors that their dog had been hit by a car. I tried to look as sad as possible for them because that's what they did in the shows I watched when they told someone their daughter or sister or father or uncle or friend had died.
Our neighbor asked me if I had seen anything and I said I hadn't, but I could ask around for them. So I did and after a few days I came back with some information that a black SUV had ran over their dog because the kid down the street had seen it driving away quickly after a loud dog yelp and crunch.
They handled it from there but I was the one who found out who did it.
~
When we looked into Sintrix it couldn't have been cleaner. Mid-sized regional security company mainly doing work for commercial buildings. The cameras at the apartment building were on legacy technology and hadn't been switched over yet, so shortages happen sometimes according to the representative we spoke to. We asked to look into their employees who worked at the apartment building or would've had access to the apartment building's security system. They allowed us full access, but nothing ever came of it. Not even a single person out of the twenty-some people we thumbed through even raised an eyebrow. So that was a dead end for everyone.
I couldn't get that out of my head though. Sintrix. SINTRIX. It was what the victim had titled his document the night of the murder and coincidences aren't real. I spend the next few weeks reading through the half page document every day several times a day while the case slowly went cold.
--- SINTRIX ---
Near Two Dark Ma ge 7 World House In A to Build 09749
Guilt Fawn Justify Agony 2232 Reed R ead Abolish
Guilta a br eath Word 13333333 Insi
de
Holland Bremax Methlyene Form Of
Final Meet Meat 0000 6437
Gib On Reception
Two Bit cinema Supplement Sunshade
Candlewax spindle Catechol
46
Finish Uto Cyto
Seneca Appendix Safari
Farther Further Ich
Veg as Ch
rystal Sin ew Sin Yew
1/165000300. 0
Halcyo n Tide Tyne king
Plexer tooth 99 Shave
When these things are given to you, it’s like a godsend. Random pieces of evidence are often the key to breaking a case and require a lot of scrutiny, but something about this one specifically just made me leaf through it over and over and over and over again. There was an allure to it and everything around me would go blurry when I read it. I could feel there was more to it, there was something I was missing. Something just beyond what I was able to perceive with my own senses. Something elusive. Something further.
I took the document to at least three different analysts. Two were in the station, one was a university linguist, but all three gave me the same tired excuse for finding nothing particularly special or noteworthy. One said "It's no different from a random word generator, it just happens to be in a murder case." Yep, you cracked the code buddy.
It took about two months for the case to go completely cold. After it went into cold-case files, I got put on two others. One was a gangland drive-by shooting that never got solved either. The other was a dead wife. It looked like she shot herself but forensics found discrepancies with the wound. We sweated the husband and he confessed. That felt good at least.
All the while I was still reading the document every day. Every day every day still reading still reading. I would walk down the street to the corner store and see numbers. I'd think they seemed familiar but then I'd remember the document said 6437 and the street sign said 6430. Off by seven. It was getting harder and harder to concentrate on the job, so I took some time off and started hitting the bottle. I felt I deserved it.
One night I ended up by the Sintrix HQ. Same place we had gone into the consult them about the apartment footage and the same place we interviewed the twenty-some odd employees of interest at. There was a bar about a block down called Spencer's.
Inside the bar it was dim, with jerseys on the wall framed like pictures. Stickers along the wall and mostly small wooden tables with a few stools at the bar. Two TVs were in the place, one had a game on and the other was on a commercial break and no matter where you sat you'd be able to see at least one of them. There were string lights handing down from the ceiling in different colors that made the bar a dark purple and black with all the colors combined. There were about five other guys there including the bartender when I walked in and two of them turned to glance at me before looking back to whatever they were looking at before. It was quiet inside and no one was sitting at the bar, they were all at tables. So I did the same.
The bartender came over and asked what I wanted. He was younger than me, probably in his mid to late thirties with a full beard and a wearing a plain T-shirt. I told him which beer I wanted and he was gone. There were two groups of two at the tables and one lone guy sitting in the back. I was close to the entrance so I could see everyone, no one was behind me. Like a theater. The first group of two were two fat guys, both dressed in button ups and talking pretty loudly about work. The next group was two older guys both quiet and watching the game. The loner in the back was wearing a black sweatshirt and jeans. He was looking at me.
The bartender brought me my drink. I paid him and then I paid him for the next one in advance. I looked back over at the man in the back. He looked average in every way, but not ordinary. He's going to ask to sit with me I thought. The man stood up and approached my table slowly, like waltz. All the while I kept my eyes on him.
"May I sit here?" he asked.
"Sure" I replied.
He took the seat across from me. The stranger spoke slowly and deliberately, hanging on every word. He was pretty, as men go. His features were soft and his face was smooth. His hair was short and dark and his eyes were dark as well. If I had passed him in the street I wouldn't have noticed him, but something about staring at him made me see more to him the longer I stared. A cut here, a mark there, a bit of stubble that he missed shaving on the right side of his neck. I took it as the detective part of my brain acting up.
We just sat there, staring at each other for a time. Me looking over him studiously. And him smiling back at me warmly. Like a grandfather's smile. The more I looked, the more intrigued with this stranger I became. Then he spoke:
"I don't think I've seen you here before?"
"No. No I've never been before. I came in on a whim."
The stranger smiled and looked around the room, before turning his gaze back to me.
"And how do you like it?"
"It's-"
I stopped and started to sense there was more to his question that just small talk. He had come over to my table for a reason. And he was asking me these questions for a reason as well. But I didn't know what that reason was, only that I should respect it. I fidgeted a little in my seat, the hard wooden chair was uncomfortable and the back rest only came up to just below my shoulders. All the while he looked at me with warm eyes. Curious eyes. Something behind them. Like a wife's eyes.
"It's nice. It's how I'd imagine a dive bar would look." I chuckled a little.
The stranger nodded. "I'm glad you like it."
"What's your name?"
"John."
"Do you come here often?"
"Hm. Not really."
"So, John," I asked "why did you decide to come over here?"
John paused. He hadn't stopped grinning since he sat down. "Oh you seemed interesting. I wanted to ask you some questions. You are a cop, aren't you?"
For a moment I felt a lump in my throat, like being in trouble with your parents as a child. He must have sensed my discomfort because he glanced down below the table to my belt where I still had my badge on display.
"Oh, ha, yeah. I'm a detective with metro."
"Ah. That must be exciting."
"It can be. Sometimes." I downplayed it. Never good to tell people too much about it. Not like that, at least.
~
It was four beers into my conversation with my new friend John when we started to discuss the case that had been occupying my mind.
"It part of the reason I came into this bar tonight. Sintrix building is right across," I said "and I can't get it out of my mind. Feels like there's something I'm missing."
"I'm sure you will find it." John replied.
"Ha ha. Thanks. But I think the case is closed at this point. Barring any new developments."
"And what would a new development be?"
I took a sip of my beer. "Some new clue or break. Or even if the killer killed again. That's one!" I laughed.
"I see." John said. "And what, exactly, would you do with a new development, like one of those?"
I paused for a moment to think. Probably longer than a moment.
"I guess I'd use it to find the killer."
"And?"
""And catch the killer."" I half-shouted.
"But what then?"
He was starting to get on my nerves.
"Then the killer is in prison."
"But there will be more killers in the near future?"
"Yeah.. Well. I want to catch this one."
John's eyes narrowed on me and he chuckled. It was a laugh of knowing, like a father's laugh to a son when he asks him how the sky is blue. Without malice, without judgement. Like I had told a joke we were both in on.
"Wants are a strange thing. People think they want something but when they get it, the often find it lackluster. And more often than not, when people are denied what they want the most, they are more satisfied than if it was only given to them on a silver platter."
His eyes never left me. I started to feel uncomfortable and began to rub my forehead.
"I'm sorry if I am making you uncomfortable," observed John "I am only speaking honestly as I hope you are to me."
"No it's alright." Even though I still felt some discomfort as a whole, I wanted to keep talking. There was something about John that was alluring, like a good painting. "I just- I just don't think I'm used to conversations with strangers at the bar. Ha ha."
John didn't laugh. Instead he kept his eyes fixed on me as he thought for a moment before speaking.
"Do you often find yourself at a loss for words?" He asked.
"Yeah, sometimes."
"Why?"
"I guess I just don't really like talking to people all that much."
"Ah." John said. "I like it. Even if it is a bit wasteful."
"Wasteful?" I started feeling sick again.
"Yes. Space is a totality. Time is finite. Even for someone, or something, that could not perceive Time-- it would eventually End. That is a certainty. So every choice to fill every nanoinstant of Time is inherently of great consequence, and therefore potentially wasteful."
"That sounds right. We have to use the time we have to the fullest I guess."
"It is right." He said. It was matter-of-factly but not in a rude way. That was something I noticed about him. He didn't seem rude, he didn't speak as if he had nothing to learn-- yet he spoke plainly and without hesitation and completely unopen to suggestions or anything new. I, myself though, did hesitate. I didn't know what to say to that and I quickly forgot the topic as a whole. I had to ask him to remind me what we were talking about.
"We were talking about our conversation. And conversation as a whole. Are you drunk?" I would've thought, if anyone else asked, that it was meant to be insulting. Or a joke. But he asked in a curious way, like how a child asks a teacher what a star is.
"No. No, I'm not. At least I don't think so."
"You don't know?"
"Ha..." I thought for a second for what to say. For the right thing to say. "No I'm not. I'm just- uh- having trouble keeping up with the conversation I guess."
I noticed the bar was empty. I hadn't seen anyone leave. In fact I still heard them talking, faintly, but they were nowhere to be seen. "The other people here, they're gone." John's eyes gleamed and he titled his head. "They can be here, if you'd like."
"W-what were we talking about?"
"The people," John reminded me "here. At this bar."
"Oh. Right." They had gotten somewhat louder, and it was starting to annoy me. One of them had gotten up to order something at the bar and when he did the screech of his chair against the laminate floor hurt my ears like nails on a chalk board. I winced like a scared puppy. Like a pathetic beaten dog.
"That sound you just heard, the sound of the chair, was that painful to you?" John asked.
"Oh yeah. Did you think it was too?"
"No."