Undercover

• Harrison Kerr, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2020

It was late July and freezing. The moon was slowly creeping its way across the sky and dragging the stars along with it. Sergeant Gary Williams laid down staring up at the almost night sky. He was in a sleeping bag on the city streets. He was usually in his Police car cruising the streets with the heater up full in his car. God, he missed the heater, or maybe he just missed feeling his fingers he didn’t know. Gary was undercover on an assignment. The homeless population in the city was dwindling away. Most would consider that a good thing but not when murder was involved.
Over the last four months seventeen homeless people had been brutally murdered in their sleep. The Police were stumped they had no clue who was behind it. The top theory going around was a group of sadistic teenagers but that was just a theory. Gary had been sleeping on the streets for a week and a half and was getting sick of it but he knew he had to stick it out. After all that’s why he became a Police Officer. To help people, and if he couldn’t help homeless people, perhaps the most helpless of all he had failed his job.
Gary was usually clean shaven but he had grown a beard just for this occasion. It wasn’t very warm. Beneath the sleeping bag he wore a brown waterproof coat, lime green long sleeve t-shirt, jeans and a pair of steel capped boots. And about three pairs of socks. Next to his leg grasped firmly in his right hand was his service pistol the safety off and it was loaded. He shifted his position releasing the pistol and turning on his side bringing his body close to him, hugging his legs. He gazed out at the city. A thin layer of frost covered the road and alleys. Gary was in the rough part of town the part where doors were always locked and very little money was kept on your person.
Gary remembered a simpler time back when his dad was still alive. They lived in a little country town that had always been warm. One day Gary’s dad sat him on his lap and asked him “So champ what do you want to do when you get older?”
Without hesitation Gary replied “I want to help people!” with such excitement. He’d never seen such a big smile on his dad’s face. But that was a long time ago. Gary now desperately trying to get feeling in his fingers had a decision to make. He didn’t want to make it but he had too.
There was a good chance if he slept out here tonight, he would get hypothermia and die. But if he left more defenceless people would die. Gary made his decision he huddled up tighter. At the other end of the alley unseen to Gary a figure dressed all in black wielding a knife stepped towards him.