Chapter One: The Bankhead Boogeyman. Part One.
Mar 28, 2021 16:46:01 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Mar 28, 2021 16:46:01 GMT -5
“Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” – St. Francis of Assisi
Pulling the collar of her tapered black frock coat closed and her short black skirt down just a tad, her heels clicked and echoed across the cold concrete.
She shivered, even in ‘Hotlanta’ a chill was in the air, Spring was practically here. The ravages of winter would soon be behind them.
Thus was the cycle of life; bloom in Spring, grow in Summer, slow in Fall, die in Winter. Begin again. The lesson? Death is but a part of the cycle of life. Death comes before rebirth.
Looking around, she was absolutely freezing. She never thought she’d be here on a Friday night.
Her life had been cleanly cut into sections, before and after ‘he’ entered her life.
He watched her struggle through relationship after relationship, all the while challenging her to be the best version of herself, the version ‘he’ saw all those years ago in PWA. The version she had finally become before their relationship came crashing down around them.
This made six nights in a row and she was getting desperate, ‘they’ were getting impatient. Her skirt was shorter than usual, her makeup leaning just a tad on a trashy side. She couldn’t believe their instructions, “Look more vulnerable.”
This was the gamble she’d taken each night since returning to Atlanta. Each night, curfew in place or not, she walked the streets of Bankhead.
She wasn’t a prostitute, even if she was being used. At least there wasn’t anything sexual about her demeaning presently.
Dressed as though she were some drunk party girl stumbling her way home alone, she was being used as glorified bait and though ‘they’ constantly referred to her as an “asset”, she had the distinct feeling that assets were easily parted with when it came to this particular ‘organization’.
People swarmed the streets from time to time. Smaller, more contained riots seemed almost a normal occurrence these days. This was the real “new normal”.
Social and political unrest. Everyone was uneasy, yet no one dared to speak about it.
But tonight, as of yet, she’d seen nothing, not a shadow, a scurry of anything other than a rat, nothing. Why were ‘they’ so sure?
All she had was questions, precious few answers graced her ears these days. They kept her locked out from information and though her professional title these days read “production assistant”, years spent as a wrestling journalist left her needing answers.
That was how ‘they’ controlled people, keeping the answers just out of reach while the realization that ‘they’ are the only ones who could possibly gain their quandary settles in. Once that happened, they would see the kind of reach Justice truly had. It only took one demonstration to keep most of their “assets” loyal.
Her nightly walk was almost nearing its end, she turns on her heel to cut through an alley. The latest news reports had stated most of the attacks had taken place in alleys or narrow side streets. The police believed this was how their vigilante was getting around Bankhead unseen.
She was amazed by the sheer lunacy of it all. If ‘they’ were correct, she had almost married this man.
In normal times, there would be a task force dedicated to his capture, pleas to the public for information leading to an arrest, maybe even a reward. But these weren’t normal times; a global pandemic, racial tensions flaring, protests and riots claimed the streets, police trust was close to an all time low, political unrest, western parts of the country recovering from fire. And all of this laid at the feet of a new President.
It seemed, for now, local authorities were on their own.
Then, there was an unforeseen complication.
The Bankhead Boogeyman had become something of a folk hero.
The stories were starting to pile up. This man, appearing from the shadows, saving people from thugs and out of control rioters, then simply disappearing. It was torn straight from the pages of a comic book. And the people were eating it up.
Passing a drugstore window as she entered the alley, she chuckled, if they only knew.
Businesses and cars were starting to place a red ‘B’ decal in their windows, a sign of support for the increasingly brutal vigilante. There were the Braves, the Hawks, the Falcons and now the Bankhead Boogeyman. Atlanta certainly wasn’t as boring as Morgantown. She missed the days they spent in his home in West Virginia, simpler times. When they were in love.
Each time the Bankhead Boogeyman appeared, it was resulting in hospital stays for the would be attackers. Each time, the story was the same. He’d give them the chance to leave peacefully, when they didn’t accept that offer, he brutally and efficiently beat them into unconsciousness, carving their would-be crime into their foreheads before disappearing.
The people he saved were often left confused by the ferocity and brutality of it all. The ones that didn’t run away were left traumatized in their own way.
They all remembered one common thread, he laughed as he carved his message into each of them. Sometimes merely a chuckle, other times maniacal laughter worthy of an insane asylum, but he always laughed.
For these reasons, the praise wasn’t universal. Police were intensifying their investigation and more news outlets were picking up the story. Needless to say, their message was a different one.
He was dangerous, he was operating outside the law, but worse; he was making them look bad.
Their task was simple, in theory. bring him in, dead or alive. He was becoming a symbol, an increasingly dangerous symbol.
Pulling the collar of her tapered black frock coat closed and her short black skirt down just a tad, her heels clicked and echoed across the cold concrete.
She shivered, even in ‘Hotlanta’ a chill was in the air, Spring was practically here. The ravages of winter would soon be behind them.
Thus was the cycle of life; bloom in Spring, grow in Summer, slow in Fall, die in Winter. Begin again. The lesson? Death is but a part of the cycle of life. Death comes before rebirth.
Looking around, she was absolutely freezing. She never thought she’d be here on a Friday night.
Her life had been cleanly cut into sections, before and after ‘he’ entered her life.
He watched her struggle through relationship after relationship, all the while challenging her to be the best version of herself, the version ‘he’ saw all those years ago in PWA. The version she had finally become before their relationship came crashing down around them.
This made six nights in a row and she was getting desperate, ‘they’ were getting impatient. Her skirt was shorter than usual, her makeup leaning just a tad on a trashy side. She couldn’t believe their instructions, “Look more vulnerable.”
This was the gamble she’d taken each night since returning to Atlanta. Each night, curfew in place or not, she walked the streets of Bankhead.
She wasn’t a prostitute, even if she was being used. At least there wasn’t anything sexual about her demeaning presently.
Dressed as though she were some drunk party girl stumbling her way home alone, she was being used as glorified bait and though ‘they’ constantly referred to her as an “asset”, she had the distinct feeling that assets were easily parted with when it came to this particular ‘organization’.
People swarmed the streets from time to time. Smaller, more contained riots seemed almost a normal occurrence these days. This was the real “new normal”.
Social and political unrest. Everyone was uneasy, yet no one dared to speak about it.
But tonight, as of yet, she’d seen nothing, not a shadow, a scurry of anything other than a rat, nothing. Why were ‘they’ so sure?
All she had was questions, precious few answers graced her ears these days. They kept her locked out from information and though her professional title these days read “production assistant”, years spent as a wrestling journalist left her needing answers.
That was how ‘they’ controlled people, keeping the answers just out of reach while the realization that ‘they’ are the only ones who could possibly gain their quandary settles in. Once that happened, they would see the kind of reach Justice truly had. It only took one demonstration to keep most of their “assets” loyal.
Her nightly walk was almost nearing its end, she turns on her heel to cut through an alley. The latest news reports had stated most of the attacks had taken place in alleys or narrow side streets. The police believed this was how their vigilante was getting around Bankhead unseen.
She was amazed by the sheer lunacy of it all. If ‘they’ were correct, she had almost married this man.
In normal times, there would be a task force dedicated to his capture, pleas to the public for information leading to an arrest, maybe even a reward. But these weren’t normal times; a global pandemic, racial tensions flaring, protests and riots claimed the streets, police trust was close to an all time low, political unrest, western parts of the country recovering from fire. And all of this laid at the feet of a new President.
It seemed, for now, local authorities were on their own.
Then, there was an unforeseen complication.
The Bankhead Boogeyman had become something of a folk hero.
The stories were starting to pile up. This man, appearing from the shadows, saving people from thugs and out of control rioters, then simply disappearing. It was torn straight from the pages of a comic book. And the people were eating it up.
Passing a drugstore window as she entered the alley, she chuckled, if they only knew.
Businesses and cars were starting to place a red ‘B’ decal in their windows, a sign of support for the increasingly brutal vigilante. There were the Braves, the Hawks, the Falcons and now the Bankhead Boogeyman. Atlanta certainly wasn’t as boring as Morgantown. She missed the days they spent in his home in West Virginia, simpler times. When they were in love.
Each time the Bankhead Boogeyman appeared, it was resulting in hospital stays for the would be attackers. Each time, the story was the same. He’d give them the chance to leave peacefully, when they didn’t accept that offer, he brutally and efficiently beat them into unconsciousness, carving their would-be crime into their foreheads before disappearing.
The people he saved were often left confused by the ferocity and brutality of it all. The ones that didn’t run away were left traumatized in their own way.
They all remembered one common thread, he laughed as he carved his message into each of them. Sometimes merely a chuckle, other times maniacal laughter worthy of an insane asylum, but he always laughed.
For these reasons, the praise wasn’t universal. Police were intensifying their investigation and more news outlets were picking up the story. Needless to say, their message was a different one.
He was dangerous, he was operating outside the law, but worse; he was making them look bad.
Their task was simple, in theory. bring him in, dead or alive. He was becoming a symbol, an increasingly dangerous symbol.