The Stalking Lion Does Not Roar

Chapter 1

The bulls pressed on wearily inspecting the railroad tracks, ties and rusted boxcars languishing on the siding. The two railroad cops had been at it since noon. The temperature registered a sweltering 97 degrees when their shift began at noon. Only an hour remained in the 12-hour workday yet the temperature had dropped barely five degrees. Suffocating heat waves were unusual in this part of the country but this went on, unrelenting, for a week, no relief foreseen in the near future.

The cops’ shirts clung like fresh paint to their chests. Salt-laden perspiration streamed in torrents down their faces, into their eyes, briefly blinding them throughout both day and night. 

The lead bull struggled to slide the huge metal door of the boxcar, satisfied no freighthoppers or homeless trespassers had taken up residence in there since yesterday’s inspection. He’d worked too many years for the railroad and they had taken a severe toll on his body. Once lean and fit, he had developed diabetes in the years-long process of becoming well overweight. His reflexes had dulled. Nowadays, when the pair were confronted by a situation requiring strength or stamina, his youthful sidekick was forced to handle the tasks alone. Along with his faltering memory, he was more a burden than a help. 

The senior cop secured the freight car door’s “slam latch,” just before he chanced to see his partner suddenly sprint off in the trackbed ahead. Surprised by the unexpected break from their nightly routine, his flashlight now turned toward the silhouette running ahead of him, easily outdistancing him. 

Gasping, standing alongside the rookie, he saw what had triggered his excited response — a woman lying face-up in the trackbed between the rails. Aided by a streetlight from the nearby railroad crossing shining obliquely onto the scene, they stepped nearer the lifeless body. Horror replaced shock.

Her thin summer dress had been slit from neckline to hemline, revealing a neat incision running from her throat to the top of her pubic bone. The flesh had been neatly peeled back on each side of the laceration. Most of the internal organs had been removed from her body. She had been eviscerated.

Inside the gaping void where the woman's abdomen had been, her stomach, small and large bowels, liver, gallbladder, and pancreas were packed into a blue plastic pail.

Chapter 2 – Coming November 2, 2026