The Forum by Marie Reyes (short books for teens .txt) 📕

Quicky_Mart: The website it was posted to could find the IP address. Pickletubs118 messaged them, I think. They could give that to the police.

Pipes1983: Which police? We don't even know where this person is.

Quicky_Mart: Cyber police. Is that a thing?

Pipes1983: I can't believe there is no mention of it anywhere. What if it is fake? What if we're just wasting our time?

Quicky_Mart: Maybe. Maybe not. The way I see it, we could help, and it could just be nothing, in which case, we just look a bit stupid. Or we do nothing, and they get away with it. I know it's a long shot, but I have nothing else going on in my life. I want to do something.

Pipes1983: Agreed.

This stranger just read her mind. There was someone else out there as lame as her. She wondered if his username was some sort of innuendo. Did he like quickies? If she asked him that, the conversation would likely devolve. No matter what you were talking about online, it would always end up in smut.

Quicky_Mart: I think our best bet is locating the victim, not the killer. We know the victim was North American.

Pipes1983: How do you know that?

Quicky_Mart: I played the video at full volume through some awesome speakers. The accent is North American, well, I'm almost certain it is.

Pipes1983: Wow. What else did you hear?

Quicky_Mart: The killer kept asking the guy to apologize. They never revealed what for though.

Pipes1983: So, they must know each other. The victim must have done something to piss this guy off.

Quicky_Mart: I'll see if I can post an enhanced sound recording on here. Get your input.

Pipes1983: That would be great. Thanks.

Quicky_Mart: So, I can't find reports of any similar murders, but I'm scrolling through missing people. What do you make of this? Could be him, right? www.wewillfindthem.com/DeanForester

Pipes1983: No way. He looks completely different. Look at the chin and the eyes. Not the same person. I might call it a day. Before I go... what's with the username?

Quicky_Mart: I started using this username when I was doing marathons. Haven't done one for ages though, but it stuck.

Pipes1983: I was going to do the Seattle Marathon once upon a time, but then I remembered, I hate running.

Quicky_Mart: Seattle? You from there?

Pipes1983: I am.

Quicky_Mart: I live near Vancouver. We're practically neighbors.

Pipes1983: That's cool.

K-meister: Hello? Please take this forum down. It's disrespectful. People sharing this video should be arrested. It's not right.

Pickletubs118: I'm sorry, but I disagree. We're just trying to help.

K-meister: It's not your job to help. That's up to the police. You should stop spreading this around. I'm going to get this site, and all sites with the video shut down.

Pickletubs118: Who are you to censor us? We're just trying to help.

K-meister: That man in the video, that's my father.

Chapter Six

LONDON

Aadesh scrolled through memes looking for inspiration, anything. He hadn't come up with any new comedy material for ages, and the thought of going back to his barista job wasn't helping. The more he wanted something, the more fleeting it would become, hovering just out of reach. He wanted to make people laugh, to be able to work a room and invoke a reaction in them. If only he could string together the right words, in the right order.

He imagined himself stood in front of a real crowd, not the small venues he was used to. Despite being deeply uncomfortable in most social situations, a crowd didn't scare him. On stage, he was invincible, and larger than life. He didn't even have the forum as an excuse to procrastinate anymore. After the daughter of the first victim ranted at them, no one had been on it for days. His latest obsession was over before it began.

The urge to check the site every five minutes still tugged at his psyche. Impulse control was not one of his stronger qualities. One more time; he would check one more time. Aadesh was rewarded with an update waiting for him.

A new video. He couldn't click on it right away. Some things required a buildup, and this was one of them. It was posted by the same user that uploaded the last one. It could just be someone with too much time on their hands, collecting sick, morbid videos from the internet. Aadesh liked to think he was one step up from that.

After a deep breath, he pressed the play button. It was dark again, like the first video. The victim, however, was slim and female. Like the last one, she was duct taped to a chair and unconscious. Seeing a woman instead, helpless, invoked a reaction in him. Less curiosity like the last video, and more of a sad concern. It gripped at his heart and he felt an impossible urge to jump through the screen and help her, but he knew, if this was a video by the same person, it was probably already too late.

There he was, the same person, well he assumed from the black attire.

The figure in black turned to face the camera, and all that stood out was the whites of their eyes where the light bounced off them. When they got even closer, Aadesh could swear they were looking right through the screen at him, like they knew he was watching somehow. Those eyes. Light, bright, and blue. Too blue. Those eyes crossed over the line of baby blue into just plain creepy and he looked away.

Eye contact made Aadesh deeply uncomfortable at the best of times, and this was no exception. He did what he did when someone looked at him in person, concentrating on the space in between the eyes, which in this case, was the black fabric of the balaclava.