Wraith felt the bite of the cold wind against his cheek. It was the first weekend in October, and autumn was making itself known. He checked his watch and surveyed his surroundings from the bench he sat on in Lincoln Park. It was two thirty in the afternoon, but few people were out and about in the park due to the cold. To his right, a couple of die hard golfers were getting their clubs out of the back of an old Jeep Cherokee. From the squared body, Wraith guessed it was probably from the late eighties, early nineties. The men were not wearing the typical outfits that Wraith associated with golf. There was not a speck of plaid on either man. Instead, they were dressed in hooded sweatshirts and jeans. 'What is the world coming to?' he wondered to himself. If you couldn't stereotype golfers, who could you stereotype?
This made him smile inwardly. Chaos. Change. These were things that many feared, but not Wraith. He was an agent of chaos. Anything that pulled away from the status quo was just fine with him. On a regular basis, Wraith himself was the instrument of such things, but every now and then they happened without his assistance. This was a fine example. These two men had chosen to wear what was practical rather than expected. It was almost enough to save their lives. Almost, but not quite.
While allowing the men to carry on in their recreational pursuits would allow them to display a small measure of rebellion due to their aversion to the norm, it did not create the sort of chaos that Wraith preferred. Subtleties can only be enjoyed by those that are looking for them after all. Wraith was more interested in the kind of chaos that shocked those who were mostly oblivious to subtle changes in the environment. That kind of chaos could only be achieved through the work of an expert such as himself.
He watched as the two went into the clubhouse in order to claim their tee time. Checking his watch again for no particular reason, Wraith lifted himself off of the bench. He was not really concerned about the time; he just liked to be aware of it. It never sat well with him if any of his contributions to chaos took place at a regular interval in time. Increments of five, ten, or fifteen minutes simply would not due. Truly heinous acts were better suited to be done at random times, like four thirty three, or seven nineteen. Since the times of his actions were important, Wraith checked his watch quite often.
Other than that, he had no reason at all to be concerned. It was Sunday, after all. He was not on any schedule, save his own. He did not have any assignments pending. He was simply out for his own enjoyment as a fan of chaos. That meant that it was quite necessary for him to wreak havoc in some sort of fashion. Sure that was what he did for a living, but it was also great entertainment for him on a personal level. Even if he was not getting paid for it, the only way he could truly enjoy himself was to pursue his one and only interest.
He casually walked across the grass to where the practice greens were situated. From here, he circled around the clubhouse and walked out onto the course. Nobody was currently near the first fairway, so he stepped out on to it and walked in the direction of the restroom building that he saw out in the middle of the course. He walked briskly so as to imitate somebody trying to limit the amount of time they were exposed to the wind. When he was almost up to the small brick structure, a cart pulled up next to him with a portly man sitting in the driver's seat. From his shirt, it was obvious that he worked for the gold course.
"Can I help you sir?" The man asked, arching an eyebrow.
"Oh, no, I am just looking for my cell phone." Wraith said. "I was out here yesterday, when the weather was nicer, and I think that it must have fallen out of my pocket while I was using the restroom. I am just going to duck inside and see if it is there."
"Sure, no problem." The fat man said. "I just wondered what you were doing out here without any clubs."
"Now those I managed to keep track of." Wraith said smiling.
"Yeah." The man laughed. "It is all about priorities. Well, I hope you find it in there. If not, you might have better luck in the lost and found box in the clubhouse."
"Thanks." Wraith said. "I will look in there if I don't find it out here."
"Good luck. I am getting out of the wind. Have a nice day."
"You too." Wraith said, smiling congenially as he watched the fat man drive off on his golf cart. It had briefly crossed his mind that he could dispatch this man as well as his intended targets, but then he liked the idea of leaving a witness to provide his description to the police. It was a game that he played. He changed his look on a regular basis and dared the authorities to track him down.
He stepped into the bathroom and looked at his reflection. Devilish blue eyes stared back at him, so bright that they nearly mesmerized even him. They were contacts, of course. His real eyes were blue as well, but paler. So pale, in fact, that in certain light, they almost seemed colorless. A light blond wig sat on top of his smoothly shaven head. It was such a good fit that few would have been able to tell that it was not really his hair. He had unremarkable features that made it easy for him to blend in with any crowd, but he was able to use his contacts, wigs, and other accessories to make himself as attractive or ugly as he needed.
He smiled and winked at his reflection. He loved being an anarchist, and he loved himself. He loved only himself. He was not a social creature by any stretch of the imagination. In fact the truth was that he was not only anti social, he was shy to a debilitating degree. That was how he had learned to disguise himself. He had never known how to talk to others, until he had learned to act. Acting had opened a whole new world to him. He could be anybody he wanted to be. It did not matter how afraid he was of everybody around him. As long as he acted like he was bold, then he was bold. He could fake it with the best of them.
He waited inside the building for slightly more than half an hour before he heard the sounds of voices approaching. It sounded as if both men were in jovial moods despite the weather. They were laughing quite loud over some comment one of them had made. Wraith smiled the smile of a shark about to feed on unsuspecting prey. They might have been in a good mood for now, but he was ready to change that for them. One more glance at his watch told him that he was good to go as soon as they drew near. It was two forty one.
"Hey, I need to take a piss really quick." One of the men said from outside the bathroom.
"Me too." This was perfect. Wraith had thought that he would need to approach them, but here they were offering themselves up to him for the slaughter. While he had never tried to rely on such luck, these sorts of things tended to happen on a regular basis. He had always taken it as a sign of divine approval. Clearly God wanted him to continue in his quest to both thin out the herd and move society away from conformity. Wraith welcomed his divine assignment and stepped away from the door.
The first man who entered did not even register recognition of Wraith's presence before he was pulled inward and had a knife thrust between his ribs. Wraith expertly found the man's heart and he was dead before he even hit the floor. There was barely any blood on Wraith's knife due to his quick efficiency. He had already withdrawn the knife and focused on the second man before the first had finished dying.
"What the hell, man?" The second man laughed, not realizing what had just happened. Wraith had made a good living off of the element of surprises just like this one. "Did you forget how to walk or something?"
"I think he bumped into me." Wraith said with the knife held behind his right leg as he knelt down next to the dead man. He was lying on his face, so the wound was not visible. "I think he is hurt."
At this, the second man stepped in and knelt next to his friend. As the door closed behind the golfer, Wraith rolled his first victim over for the man to see. A small pool of blood was on the floor underneath the body. The man's eyes were open wide in a look of surprise and his pants were wet with the urine he had intended to expel in peace.
"Oh, my god, what happened?" The man stammered in total shock.
"This happened." Wraith said whipping the hidden knife out and slashing his throat. He always kept his knives well sharpened, and the blade sliced through without the slightest hesitancy. Blood sprayed from the wound, but Wraith had anticipated the path it would take and had managed to avoid getting any of it on him. It was not that he was afraid of blood. He had actually bathed in it from time to time. His current aversion was only to prevent being spotted walking through the park splattered with somebody else's blood. It might raise an eyebrow or two.
Once the majority of the blood that was going to flow out of both of them and poured itself out on the bathroom floor, Wraith began to strip their clothes off of them. This was not too difficult. Wraith was fairly strong, but often dead bodies were still hard for him to move around. These two men, however, were both small in stature, so it was with relative ease that he stripped them. When they were both naked, he reached for the knife once more. Humming slightly to himself as he worked, he severed their sexual organs. He shoved the first man's penis into his friend's mouth and repeated the step with the opposing man's organ as well.
It was not that Wraith had any sexual perversion in this regard. He was not gay. He enjoyed sex with women. He was also not into necrophilia, but this particular display was necessary in order to properly shock the individuals that would come across his work. It would also throw police off his trail. They would think that this had been done either by a homophobic person that thought these men were gay, or by a spited lover of one or both of the victims. In any case, an anarchist would probably not be on their radar. At least, not immediately.
He then took the first man's clothes and stuffed them into the only sit down toilet in the bathroom. He took the next man's clothes and used them to clog the drain in the urinal, as well as the sink. There was also a drain in the floor, which he used the man's socks to block. Once every known drain was plugged, he flushed the toilet and the urinal and turned the sink faucet on. Stepping out of the bathroom, he looked around quickly and saw that he was still alone on the course. He pulled out a roll of duct tape from his jacket pocket and taped off the edges of the bathroom door. This would allow the water to rise up suitably.
Satisfied with his work, he walked back in the direction of the clubhouse, whistling softly to himself as he went. This had been a very good day. With luck, he would be long gone from the park before the two men were discovered. Once they were, the place would be thrown into turmoil. Chaos would reign over the park for a while. Blessed, chaos.
Sure, eventually everything would go back to normal, but it would take quite a long time for those who knew about the incident to forget the horrible crime that had been committed on this cold autumn afternoon. Wraith smiled happily as exited the golf course and walked across the street. This had been a very good day indeed.