Monarch (The Monarch Series Book 1)

by Erik Fox

“So, this killer targets other killers or people responsible for them,” Harken says. “We’ve got a regular Dexter on our hands.”

A murder doesn’t end after it’s committed, and the ripple effects can be felt for years by the people closest to them. The majority of the pain isn’t given to the victims but to the family and friends who have to live with the fact that it happened, and they have no control.

“Oh, come on, Connor! I know you. I am you! Fuck man! I’m not real! I never have been. I am a part of you!” What the fuck are you talking about? I yell back. You’ve been my partner for twenty years, and you’re saying you’re not even real? You’re fucking crazy. “No, you’re fucking crazy,” he says and pushes a finger towards my nose. “You made me up twenty years ago to deal with the stress of killing that guy - the hair collector. You felt so torn between being right and wrong for what you did that you created me. Someone who is the exact opposite of you and has an ethical code of killing people who actually deserve to be killed. I’m the Monarch. Shit man! We’re the Monarch!”

I know what it is. I tell him to shut up. I need a minute to think. Collect my bearings. What about his wife and Tommy? What about his cubicle at work? The pictures. “None of that shit is real! Tommy was never Jack in that play. Tommy doesn’t fucking exist. Neither does my wife! You talked to no one on that phone. I made all those voices and backstories up. You created those pictures with your mind, boss! That cubicle next to you has been empty because you always stick notes to its walls, and the whole precinct knows that you have two cubicles for your work. Not one. You are in so deep that you made me and my life real.” I think hard about what he’s saying. If Harken is me, why can’t I remember doing any of the Monarch murders? “You can’t remember because you’re asleep when I do them. And while you, the main personality, are in this body asleep, I come out. Why do you think you’re always sore? Why you’re always tired? It’s because even though you’re not in control of your body, I am. Do you know how much work it takes to cut a body into thirty pieces?”

The person behind the voice is different from the me I know. It’s brutal and unforgiving. It’s death incarnate. Like all the horrible murders I investigated over the years, piled into some psycho. The blade is my tool. This body is my vessel to heal this world and rid it of evil people like Jeff and Francis. Harken and I. The caterpillar and butterfly. I’m emerging from the cocoon of pent-up rage and disgust.