X-MAN SCREENPLAY by BRIAN R. LUNDIN (ereader for comics txt) 📕

the maintenance man went to investigate foul odors coming from the apartment, saw her door opened and went in to investigate, he found her in the bathtub at her second floor apartment, where she lived alone, at 4555 South King Drive estimated time of death between 2-3 am. Vic was a member of Melony Fitness Center in Dolton, Illinois.

RINGO

Let’s go to the scene, ok?

EVETTA
On the way.

The black unmarked Ford sped down the slick expressway, the wipers going full blast fighting the backwash from the semis and the rain. The heavy rain had replaced the snow and was punctuated by flashes of thunder and lightning adding to the traffic congestion, even at this time of the day.

RINGO
What’s the lieu saying?

EVETTA
(smiling)
The little general is in his usual tissy, with his no-nothing ass, getting in the way, fucking things up. He’s got the best detectives in the department and he won’t leave them alone, and giving the standard line of bullshit to the media and waiting for you to hurry back.

RINGO
You know all of the murders seem to be random and senseless, Wake me when we get there.

EXT: 4555 SOUTH KING DRIVE-LATE MORNING

Evetta nudged Ringo as she parked the car next to a three flat depressing looking building two doors down from 4555 South King Drive

EVETTA.
Here, I thought you might need this.

Handing Ringo a white Styrofoam cup of coffee.

RINGO
If you weren’t married to my best friend and I wasn’t the godfather to your three boys, I would hit on you.

Ringo removed the cap from the steaming coffee cup and threw it out the window.


EVETTTA
(smiling)
And I wasn’t damn near old enough to be your mama. Lieutenant O'Shea assigned Marcus Burke as the lead detective until you came back and Charley Turner, lead I.D. Tech. Turner was as grouchy as ever, but as usual very careful. He shot color and black and white photos and videotapes of the Vic and the apartment, sketched a floor plan that showed all angles of the apartment and the bathroom and filled out a VICAP report and a death scene checklist. The Medical Examiner Office sent Doc Dixon, their chief pathologist and he examined the body and listed the cause of death was strangulations but lacerations was found on her scalp, results of a blow with a blunt instrument and numerous stabs wounds and she was raped before and after death.

RINGO
Go on.

EVETTA
Everything else in the apartment was in order but like the others, all of her underwear was missing.

RINGO
Most rapists’ leaves something behind, saliva, semen or sperm but this guy is very careful he leaves nothing and he is getting quite a collection of women panties and underwear, maybe he planning on opening up a ladies underwear boutique.

EVETTA
Charley found some open and unopened mail in her bedroom and a three day old Sun-Time Newspaper, O'Shea ordered everyone not to touch anything we didn’t have to and you can go from there.

RINGO
Fibers, hair any kind of trace evidence?

EVETTA
Charley vacuumed the entire apartment, we’ve got six bags, and it’s at the crime lab.

RINGO
Ok, let’s do a walk-around before we go in.

EXT.45TH SOUTH VINCENNES AVENUE -AFTERNOON

Evetta gathered up the folder and the clipboard. The snow and rain had stopped and they walked west on 45th Street and turned into the alley.

EXT.4555 SOUTH KING DRIVE ALLEY-AFTERNOON

The smell of rotten garbage, dog shit and decaying rodents were accentuated by the cold wind. A Chicago Transit Authority elevated train came to labored and noisy stop at the 47th Street. The walk around consumed about ten minutes. As we walked through the dirty and smelly alley hostile eyes followed us.

EXT. ARIEL SHOT: VIEW OF DOWNTOWN CHICAGO

STRAIGHT DOWN from above. This area of the city three miles from downtown and two miles from the expensive high-rise apartment buildings overlooking Lake Michigan consisted of ancient derelict tenement buildings, boarded up businesses, Arab liquor stores and storefront churches. Stray alley cats could be heard scrambling towards the overflowing garbage cans as the rats some as large as cats, hurried away. The alley creatures ran towards building openings and the cats hissed as they took flight after their prey.

EVETTA
I don’t think they like cops in this neighborhood.
They passed a fenced- in yard and a large pit-bull secured to a heavy chain came from somewhere growled and attacked the fence with a fury. An old woman with different colored rollers in her thin gray hair and wearing an oversized pink and yellow house dress with a pair of mismatched house slippers that covered her ashy bare feet and carrying a garbage bag, smacked the large beast with the back of her hand. The animal whimpered and lay on the ground. The woman eyed Ringo and Evetta suspiciously and removed the lid on the garbage can. Large black flies flew out the can and she casually waived them away. Evetta nodded and smiled at the woman but she watched them.

RINGO
Remind me to have someone interview her, people think that serial killers jump out the bushes and grab their victims, but most of the times it is someone they know; a co-worker, the mailman and an old lady like that that have nothing else to do but look out their windows might have seen something.

EVETTA
Evetta made a note of the address.

I read that the Summerdale Sandal that happened nearly fifty years ago was the result of an old lady going to the bathroom to pee, around three in the morning, looked out her window and saw the police officers placing stolen goods into their squad car.


EXT.4555 SOUTH KING DRIVE ALLEY-AFTERNOON
They continued walking and stopped at a battered sign on a post that read, 4555 and entered the back yard. Ringo searched the entire area, looking downward. The rain and snow had eliminated any footprints and the back yard was littered with foul smelling, rotting garbage and discarded furniture. It began to snow again and the sky became an overcast gray. Ringo searched the perimeter of the small yard first, walking beside a worn wooded fence eyes trained downward and found nothing. They walked up the stairs to the rear wooden porch that had gaping holes in the floor and Ringo shook the door that showed signs of being jimmied but was unlocked, when he gently pushed the door open the rusty hinges protested.

INT. 4555 SOUTH KING DRIVE SECOND FLOOR APARTMENT-AFTERNOON

It was a plain, stark apartment, smelling of disinfectant and death. Shadows deepen in corners as they entered the small, clean and tidy kitchen. There were a few pieces of unwashed silverware in the sink, a wood table surrounded by four chairs that held a bowl of artificial fruit and a grocery store receipt. Shaded masks of black fingerprinting powder covered most of the items in the room. Evetta took the floor plan out the folder and I made a note of the noisy hinges. Something wasn’t right; inside the apartment was an unnatural quietness, someone was in the apartment. Ringo pulled out his .44 Magnum and put a finger to his mouth as Evetta pulled out her weapon.

MALE VOICE
(yelling)
Hello? Is someone there?

EVETTA
Police!

A second later an elderly man wearing overalls came into view.

RINGO
Who are you?

MAN
I’m the building maintenance man, the police told me I could come and clean the apartment.

RINGO
(holstering his weapon)

We’re conducting an investigation, give my partner your name and address and we’ll notify you when you can come back.

After giving the information to Evetta the maintenance man hurried out the apartment. Ringo removed two pair of disposable surgical gloves and gave one to Evetta. Putting on latex gloves, Evetta carefully opened the refrigerator and made a note of its contents; orange juice, butter, mustard and mayonnaise, a six-pack of Miller’s Lite beer and a half filled bottle of white wine. The refrigerator freezer contained a bag of spoiled neck bones, ham hocks and salt pork; she wrote down the expiration date of the items and closed the door.

In the cabinet over the sink was a two-pound bag of pinto beans, two cans of mild chili beans, box of cornflakes and nothing else. On a counter was a coffee maker a two-slice toaster and a small microwave oven. Evetta noticed that there were no curtains on the kitchen window; I peered out the window on the south wall at another drab looking apartment building.

RINGO
She must eat out a lot.

EVETTA
Or can’t cook!

They walked through a small hallway and into a small living room that contained a brown cloth couch, two brown chairs and a 24-inch plasma wall television. Black dusting powder littered the curtain-less window frame and landing. The floor plan revealed that the window faced a narrow gangway between the buildings and was five feet from the ground. Looking out I wondered if the killer had stood on a box and pulled himself up.

EVETTA
She must have been very private person, no photographs, and no personal items at all.

RINGO
Where is the bathroom?
Evetta looked at the floor plan and pointed

EVETTA
Down the hall on the other side of the apartment, if our Vic was taking a shower or in the bathtub, she might not have heard anything.

RINGO
Was the window broken?

EVETTA
Nope

RINGO.
The report states that the both doors were unlocked?

EVETTA
Yes sir, I lifted the window and it went up about a foot, this is a pretty small opening for a man to crawl through.

They entered the victim’s equally bare bedroom that contained a queen size bed, a walk-in closet, a three drawer chest-a-draw, a nightstand and a small color television. There were no curtains on the windows that faced the gangway. Evetta carefully open the doors to the nightstand and found feminine napkins, cheap perfume, a half-filled cellophane bag of suspected marijuana and a dildo.

RINGO
The worst part of this job is the uncovering of people’s private lives. Murder has a way of bearing for the world to see and expose all of those private things we spend a lifetime trying to hide. The murder victim does not have time to bury or hide their little secrets; the victim is left unmasked and totally vulnerable.

EVATTA
This reminds me of some cheap transit hotel room.

RINGO
What do you know about cheap hotel rooms?

Evetta smiled and winked.

I wonder if she ever though someone would find her sex toy?

Ringo opened the fingerprint-dusted drawers; the top drawer was empty and noticed a smug on the top that had been dusted. The second drawer contained socks, neatly folded blouses, rent receipts and other papers. An empty trash basket sat beside the bed and I opened the third drawer and removed a dusted ledger. The ledger contained three columns of checks, checking account deposits and withdrawals another line contained credit cards payments and amount due Evetta opened the ledger.

EVETTA
She kept good books, and her last deposit of five hundred dollars was three days before she was killed, she had a balance of two thousand.

RINGO
Shit that’s more than I got. No underwear, no panties or bras.

Ringo closed the drawers.

RINGO
Well, let’s wrap this up.