The Crimson Room

“Police! Open up!”

The barrage of slams on the heavy wooden door let out a loud bang that resonated through the neighborhood. A multitude of officers stood waiting outside a large California house.

Complete silence had enveloped the area. Perhaps it was the tension in the air, deafening all other noises. Or maybe it was a terrified silence, the fear that someone may have died in this house right in front of them. This was the thought that Detective Matthews kept in his mind during all this time. Death. The thing he hates the most. The idea that someone could die in front of him terrified him, yet angered him. Nonetheless, he waited in his vehicle for his time to come. That was his job, after all. After the officers swept the house, he would go in and analyze every hair found, every spatter of blood, even tiny skin particles left on the floor. The lead officer put his hand up, signaling for the wall between life and death to be broken down. The biggest man on the team, Officer Jakes, lugged the big metal battering ram up the porch, and with a huge windup, slammed it hard into the door handle. It crashed open with no resistance and the officers funneled in, keeping formation. Maybe it was three minutes that passed, or maybe it had been an hour. It didn’t matter, though, because neither felt short in this line of occupation. Matthews waited in silent anticipation, tapping his feet against the black rubber carpets on the floor of his police car. He probably could have stayed like that for an eternity and not even realize the time passing, if the lieutenant officer, Officer Morgan, didn’t knock on his window.

Getting out of the car, Matthews asked, “How is it?”

Morgan simply shook his head and looked away.

Good lord, Matthews thought, and then gulped hard.

It was worse than he could have imagined. Blood covered the floor and wall, and only the ceiling was out of reach of the crimson red mess.

“Well, what do you think?” asked Reyes, a fellow detective

“...”

It was grisly, for sure. The sheer volume of blood that covered the floor made it extremely difficult to differentiate tell-tale signs that showed a cause of death. There was no visible spatter or misting, or any footsteps or fingerprints. From what he saw in front of him, it was a perfect crime. Cover everything in blood, and nothing will be left behind. How convoluted, he thought.

“O-Okay,” Reyes stuttered, having been completely ignored. “Take a look at this, though.”

Reyes walked Matthews around the room with no specific destination.

Matthews held a confused expression on his face, appearing to be deep in thought.

Suddenly, his eyes widened a bit.

“No bodies…”

“Took you long enough. You okay today?” Reyes asked.

“Yeah, just a bit tired, I guess.”

“This isn’t all, too,” Reyes said, smirking as he led Matthews into the bathroom.

To Matthews’s surprise, it was pretty clean. There was noticeably less blood, except in one spot. The mirror.

There was a message scrawled in blood.

Who are you looking for?

This was a common tactic of killers, to leave a sort of signature. It was nothing new to Matthews, as he had seen many things like this before.

And yet, he couldn’t focus. All he could see was the reflection of himself behind the bloody message.

“Creepy, right?”

“Yeah…”

Later on in the day, the police station was busy with the search for new information on this case. It appeared that the time that the crime was committed was just a mere 45 minutes before the police had arrived; however, they couldn’t decipher a time of death. That was the strange part as there was no body found on site of the crime.

This left them with nothing to go on besides a room full of blood.

Detective Matthews sat at his desk, perplexed. Waiting for a sample of DNA or fingerprints, he was left with nothing to do but just think.

Thinking was his worst enemy. One thought leads to the next, which leads to more thoughts, and soon, you find yourself swimming in an ocean of confusion, brought on by your own mind.

Matthews had always found that unsuccessful investigations usually are caused by an overfixation on the tiny details.

This isn’t inherently bad, as most killers are careful, but how can you expect to figure out an entire case when you’re focusing on one small thing?

It would be like focusing on one tree inside an entire forest. You’ll miss the big picture.

Knocking away his thoughts, a cop who Detective Matthews didn’t know, brought him a tiny evidence bag.

“Thanks…”

In this bag, was a tiny hair.

Yes! He thought.

This could identify a victim, or even better, a suspect.

Looking back on this, how naive Matthews was.

He was on a case when he got the call.

That same case that was named “The Crimson Room Murders.”

It consumed his life. He had become obsessed.

That, unbeknownst to Matthews, would become his greatest regret.

Matthews listened to the voice coming through the phone, which was pressed against his ear.

Although he heard the voice, he didn’t understand it.

No, he understood it; it just didn’t register as reality.

“Your wife and child are gone.”

Gone where? he thought.

“So? Can’t you find them?” he said, confused.

The voice over the phone stuttered a bit.

“T-That’s not what I mean, sir…there was a house fire. They passed away.”

“...”

Matthews was silent.

He wasn’t there.

He wasn’t at that house, where he should have been.

There was nothing to go home to.

He would never feel their warmth again.

Detective Matthews stood there, his brain moving at a million miles per hour.

It’s my fault, I guess…no, there’s no way they’re gone…what do I do now…

However, there was one thought, one image that stuck in his mind, even through the sea of confusion he was drowning in.

The Crimson Room.

That room in which he had become obsessed.

No, it’s not my fault.

It was whoever this killer was.

It was their fault.

He wasn’t there for his family because of this killer.

It must be solved.

He would find him. He would find this murderer.

And until then, he would not rest.

A lone man walked down an empty street, late at night.

Long hair blowing in the wind, it was obvious this man hadn’t taken care of himself in a very long time.

Ask anyone who used to know him, his old self, and they’d say that there was no possible way that this was him.

In the time that had passed, Detective Matthews had lost his job.

Doing nothing besides working a single case, the department eventually lost their need for him.

He had become a one-track record, doing nothing but repeating the same song over and over again.

All because of the Crimson Room Murders. Even after 4 whole years, he never stopped searching, even through the death of his family. It was all he had left, and he couldn’t bear to let everything he had worked for go to naught.

In the corner of his eye, Matthews saw a red glint. There was a strange red light glaring out of an alley, begging him to investigate further.

No more than a slave to his own desire, Matthews had no choice but to go down that dark alley, bathed in red.

Make no mistake, though, this was merely a red light, no blood to be found.

At the end of this alley was a door, a plain white door. There’s no way I’m actually going to enter it, he thought, knowing well that he had no more control over his own body.

Entering the room, it was empty. Just a plain old room, except for a single mirror in the center.

“You’ve followed me all this way, Detective Matthews,” said a calm voice, coming from beside him.

Taken off guard, Matthews jumps backwards, drawing the concealed firearm on his belt.

“Who are you?!” Matthews demanded.

Getting a closer look at him, he was tall, with blonde hair and blue eyes.

To Matthews’s inquisition, he simply smiled.

“Who else would prepare such a room for you, besides the one who you’ve been searching for these long 4 years?”

Matthews’s blood boiled with anger, and was prepared to shoot on site. However, something seemed to be stopping him.

Turning towards the center of the room, the man said, “Why don’t you take a look in the mirror? You’d probably find yourself enlightened if you did.”

But Matthews couldn’t look away, not while knowing who was in front of him.

The man seemed to expect this, though.

“You need some convincing, I guess. Let’s start then,” He said, with an almost childlike smile. “You consider yourself a good man of justice, and me a man of evil and murder, I presume? Why don’t we take a kill tally then? In the past 4 years, I have killed 4 people in cold blood. You would be right that I am a murderer, there is no denying that. However, before judging, how about we take a look at yourself?”

Matthews couldn’t speak. As the man talked on and on, he found himself slipping out of reality and into whatever world this man in front of him lived in.

“In the past four years, you have wasted your time baselessly chasing after my shadow. During this time, you rejected 17 different cases that led to some sort of societal harm, nine of those cases included the death of an innocent. Not to mention, you were even chasing after me while your family burnt to death in a fire. So I ask you, who is responsible? While those criminals killed on their own, it was your obsession that stopped you from preventing them from murdering. Nine people dead, their blood on the hands of an obsessed cop, chasing after the image of the past. I ask you again, who is a murderer?”

“I-I DIDN’T KILL ANYONE!”

Eyes widened, Matthews couldn’t bear it any longer. He prepared to shoot.

The man began to take steps closer.

“Of course, not with your own hands, but actions have consequences. It’s kind of ironic, as you should know that best. How hypocritical, the self righteous cop with the blood of 9 innocents on his hands. That’s more than me, you know. We’re both murders. Accept that.”

The man was inches away from Matthews’s face.

“Why don’t you take a look at that mirror, now?”

Gulping heavily, Matthews began to turn.

Don’t do it, Matthews’s brain told him, but he no longer had control.

The silvery glass was now in the corner of his eyes.

“Look,” the man said.

Matthews's heart stopped.

In the mirror, stood the figure of a man pointing a gun at his doppleganger.

Every strand of hair, every minuscule wrinkle, every single vein, was exactly identical to the one he named a murderer.

“It’s no surprise, really. We’re both killers, after all.”