Axe Man, Part 2

Not only did he murder them using an ax, then chop them to pieces, scattering their body parts, he beat and raped them. And while the cops investigated Lulubelle’s disappearance as a possible victim to the man now dubbed, ‘The Axe Man,’ no evidence was ever found.

Slowly, Toby amassed more and more information. He used message boards, visited the dark-web, those hidden places few knew about, and searched open public records.

His work always turned up the same names, K.T. DeWitt, an employee of W.S. Hepperton Processed Meats Plant of Ames, Iowa. He was never really considered a suspect since his wife had made a couple of calls to family during the time he was working.

The other name that kept popping up on Toby’s radar was a guy named King. It appeared that he’d never been spoken too about her disappearance, not by the cops, not a single reporter, no one.

Eventually, all of Toby’s suspicions fell on King, first name Steve, Steven or Stephen. After a week, he’d become convinced that King was the murderer, the Axe Man, as he appeared connected to other strange activities through out the US, but mostly along the eastern sea-board.

To smoke this murderer out, Toby opened threads on ‘Chan 4′ and ‘Chan 9,’ of the dark-net. Within minutes he had a most singular answer: “This is a Stephen King short-story, dumb ass! S.K.”

Toby typed in the name ‘Stephen King,’ on Wikipedia: “Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, and fantasy novels.”

Toby reached over and turned the power to his computer off, utterly embarrassed, and mumbling, “Fucking Stephen King,” though he’d never heard of the author until that moment.  He switched off his desk lamp and pushed away from the black screen.

Within two years, Tobermory Blodgett would be studying to be his pipe-fitter father’s apprentice.