Hunted by the Moon

The Vanishing

✰Caitlin✰

As always, the precinct conference room was a mess with papers, case files, coffee cups, and a whiteboard filled with the names of nineteen missing people, nine of them confirmed dead. The rest? Still gone. No leads. No suspects. No pattern. And it was driving me insane. Stanley sat next to me, as he flipped through a file, while Kathy and Jack leaned against the table. They looked just as frustrated as I felt. We had spent hours trying to connect the dots, but every missing person – every victim – seemed completely random. No shared history, no common classes, no specific physical traits. Just young adults, most of them college students or recent graduates, plucked off the streets like they were nothing.

"It doesn’t make sense," Kathy muttered as she rubbed her temples. "Serial killers usually have a type. Even the ones who claim they don’t do. These guys? They don’t discriminate,"

"Because it’s not about preference," I said, as I flipped through my own notes. “This isn’t personal. It’s systematic," Stanley let out a breath.

"A total of nineteen people taken…nine of them are already dead and we still have ten missing…what the hell do they want with them?" Stanely questioned, but before I could answer, the door suddenly swung open, and Officer Owen stepped in. He held up a small memory stick.

"This just came in from the college. Security footage from the night Jonathan, Brian, and Joel disappeared. The head of security hand-delivered it himself," Owen explained, and I sat up straight.

"Finally. Let’s see what we’ve got,” I said as Stanley grabbed the memory stick and plugged it into the laptop connected to the wall monitor. The grainy black-and-white footage flickered to life and showed the front entrance of the female dormitory at Bedford College. We all leaned in. Judith Tucker stumbled into view first, swaying slightly on her feet. Her posture screamed intoxicated, but she wasn’t falling over. She stopped near the entrance, turning back toward the camera. Moments later, Joel and Jonathan appeared on either side of Brian Peters, who looked like he could barely stand.

"Brian’s completely out of it," Jack noted. "Jonathan and Joel are keeping him upright," we watched as Judith and Joel shared a quick kiss before she disappeared into the dorm. Brian bent over, retching onto the pavement while Jonathan and Joel grimaced but held onto him.

"Wait," Kathy said sharply. "There," the van. It had been sitting just outside of the frame, but as soon as Judith was gone, the side door slid open. Four men in masks jumped out. Everything happened fast. The men were quick and precise. One grabbed Brian, who barely put up a fight in his drunken state. Another took Jonathan, covering his mouth before he could react. Joel fought back – he struggled, tried to throw a punch – but they overpowered him with sheer numbers. Within seconds, all three were forced into the van, the door slammed shut, and the vehicle sped away. Silence filled the room. I swallowed hard, and my fingers curled into fists.

"They were waiting," I stated.

"They knew exactly what they were doing," Stanley added grimly. "Planned. Executed. Not a single hesitation," Kathy rewound the footage, and we all watched it again.

"No plates on the van. The masks hide any defining features. And with the footage in black and white, we don’t even know what colour the damn van is," she muttered.

"Can you zoom in?" I asked, even though I already knew the answer. Still, I was desperate for something. Anything. Stanley tried, but the closer we got, the grainier the image became.

"Nothing useful. The masks are standard ski masks, and the van…well, it could be any make or model," he said, and I ground my teeth together.

"They knew about the cameras. They parked just out of range at first. Only moved when they were ready," I pointed out, and Jack nodded.

"These guys are organized," Jack said. "This isn’t some random psycho working alone. This is a group. A coordinated effort," I turned back to the board, and I stared at the names of all the victims.

“Nineteen victims. Four men in masks. That means at least four people are behind this,"

"If not, more…especially since that is what we just saw,” Stanley pointed out. "There could be more," Kathy went back to her notes.

"If they are this careful, this methodical, that means they have done this before," she said, but I wasn’t quite sure I believed that. This was something new. Something well planned.

"We need to check security footage from the other disappearances," I said, as I headed to the evidence table. “I think it is safe to say that this whole setup has been planned…but that doesn’t mean they haven’t left any traces. We just have to find them,” Jack nodded in agreement.

"I’ll start pulling footage from other locations. If that van has been spotted anywhere near our other missing victims, we will find it."

"We need more than just footage," Stanley muttered. "We need a f*****g break," I knew he was right, but I couldn’t let the frustration get the better of me.

"One step at a time. If the van shows up in other cases, it means this group has been operating longer than we thought. And if they have done it this many times without slipping up, they are either damn lucky or damn good," I said.

"Or both," Kathy said darkly and I sighed.

"We need to identify them before they take another victim," I remarked, and Stanley tapped his pen against the table.

"And before we find body number ten," he unnecessarily reminded us. The room went silent again. That was the real problem. The ten missing. We had no way of knowing if they were still alive. The longer we took to crack this case, the more likely it was that we would be adding another name to the morgue. The weight of it settled over me, cold and suffocating. I wasn’t afraid of killers – I had faced my share of monsters – but this wasn’t just a murder case. This was something bigger. Something we didn’t understand yet. But I would. I had to. Because if we didn’t stop this group soon, more would disappear. And next time, we might not get lucky enough to find a body. Next time, they might vanish completely.