Inside the 1976 Windsor Case

Unanswered

"Unanswered"

In a small back-country town in Tennessee

September 21st, 2011

The Sheriff’s Office

“So,” the sheriff began as he locked his green gaze with young man, who promptly lifted his head as a sign he had heard the sheriff and was listening. “What do you know of the case?” he asked and a look of amusement flashed in those cold blue eyes.  The young man’s mouth twitched, almost favoring a smirk, but it fell back into a flat line at the last second.

The sheriff wanted to glare at him, but he knew that wouldn’t be acceptable in his profession. He didn’t matter that the brutally murdered wife, Sarah Windsor, had been his baby sister. It didn’t matter that her husband, Arthur Windsor, had been his best friend and a well beloved doctor and trusted by the whole town.

It didn’t matter that his niece, little Eve Windsor, barely even three years old at the time, had never gotten a chance to continue her life. It didn’t matter that they never found her twin brother, Ava Windsor, or his body. It didn’t matter that it had pained him greatly that he had to list the poor boy as missing and lose hope every day that the poor boy was even alive.

It didn’t matter that his stranger was probably laughing at his sister’s family’s total demise.  That the stranger was laughing at his failed attempts to bring her murderer to justice.  That the stranger was mocking his defeat and pouring acid over wounds that never got a chance to fully heal.

They didn’t matter, all that mattered was that the young man in front of him had information, what mattered was that the young man a possible lead and the possible key to solving the long-closed murder.

The young man gazed for a long minute at the sheriff, taking in his blocky frame, his stern green eyes and the way his bronze was just starting to hint at turning grey at the roots of his exposed bangs that were not hidden under his wide-brim hat.  The he said, “I know of all that happened.”

The intern blinked, her nimble fingers typing furiously. She stared at her monitor, confused, and looked forgetting all fear of him to stare at the young man. How could he know anything, she thought, he couldn’t have been born yet!

The fact that the young man looked young blew off any hopes the sheriff had that he knew anything. He began to assume he was just some teen trying to gain credit and fame by giving false information that would lead hopefully to wild goose chase once again putting them back where the town had been over thirty years ago.

Nowhere, that is where this young man seemed to be leading them. These were the intern’s thoughts exactly.

The sheriff was skeptical of the young man as well, somehow having heard the intern’s unspoken thoughts and agreeing with them, “And would that be? You don’t look old enough to have even been born when it happened…” 

The young man didn’t even blink at the insult. He just crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes. He crossed his legs, placing a long leg over its partner.  He was bidding his time as he nodded his head to some unheard tune. The intern thought she saw his lips move in the slightest way of murmuring words but she heard nothing and dismissed the thought.

That is, until she heard the words ring loud and clear in her mind. Do not listen to his words, run! I beg of you, leave this place, run as fast as you can, get away! Do not let him finish, get away. Don’t let him get you, he will—

The words ended sharply in her mind after an ear-splitting shriek that made her want to cover her ears.

“So it would seem,” was all the young man began in response before he opened his eyes, a very eerie feeling of dread beginning in the intern’s gut when she looked up and as he said, very calmly, “However, looks can be deceiving.”

He looked beyond the sheriff, over his broad shoulders, and met the intern’s apprehensive gaze with a very level one that all but commanded for her to beg for mercy no her hands and knees. The intern felt her lip tremble with her legs in fear. She had already ended typing and could no longer use that excuse to escape his fixed stare. She was trapped and both of them knew it.

The voice from earlier came back. Look away! Look at the window, an officer is gesturing for your attention! He needs you to unlock the door, he has a phone, hurry before he begins--

Once again, the shriek came and this time the intern heard the voice that gave her a warning whimper as if in pain. She heard another voice, but this voice made her nearly bolt for the door and run screaming her lungs out for the hills. All in due time, my dear, it said so wetly its voice seemed rotten. You shall hear all and become mine.

The intern licked her lips again, unconsciously, as she looked up and she immediately paled when she saw the young man was still staring at her. But this time she saw the red streak again in the depths of his pupils. It was there, just staring her in the face, and yet despite how much she wanted nothing more than to stand and run out of the room, she felt like there heavy lead in her soles, making her efforts to move all in vain.

She was trapped.

And with it was a look of madness and pure maliciousness. Whatever dark thing was there, it thrived off pain, and from what the warning she had been given prior, whatever was there was going to use the young man’s body to commit a murder.

Or possibly, she thought with a sinking feeling in her stomach, murders.

All heads turned as a rapping sounded at the safety glass window. The voice had been right, a brunet officer had been trying to get her attention and was currently holding a cordless phone, mouthing that it was for her. She tried to excuse herself and though the sheriff nodded, the young man’s eyes narrowed in a visual threat. His voice giving the suggestion he was edging on boredom the young man said, “I wouldn’t if I were you…” The mad red streak in his eyes as he looked askance at her dared her to grab the knob. Feeling bold, the intern did just that—

--As the voice, the one that gave her the warning, screamed, Don’t!

The intern only had time to scream in horror when a long black shadow severed the officer’s head from his shoulders none too painlessly or too swiftly. The officer was still alive even as his head was being repeatedly hacked at like a piece of timber fit for chopping.

The brunet’s mouth just flooded blood, continuous rivulets that poured down the safety glass. The shadow hit the officer’s head hard and finally severed his head completely and his decapitated body thumped against the glass once, a physical vocalization from the voice that gave the warning to the intern translating as, “You should have stayed put...”

But before the body fell to the ground completely with a silent but sure soggy thud, the tip of the shadow broke through the bullet-proof window. Leaving behind it was a long jagged crack with many other tiny cracks branching off of it.

Before the shadow peeled away, it fancied a small caress of the intern’s chin, before stealthily delivering a painless slash. A small slash, nothing more, that all but screamed in her mind, “You should have took the day off, and now you’re screwed.”