Body Count,
by Master Elf of The Shady Crew

It was dark and stormy outside when Jeice Burton woke up. He climbed out of his bed and looked out the window. What he saw shocked him -- there was a man dressed all in white opening the front door of his house! He then watched as the mysterious man walked in the door and closed it behind him.

"What the heck?" he murmured aloud. "Who's in my house?" Just then, he heard a whistle and then a scream coming from his sister's bedroom.

"Erika!" he shouted. "I'm coming, don't worry!" But when he stepped into his sister's room, he saw Erika lying on her bed, covered in the blood that was seeping from the numerous holes in her body.

"No! Erika!" he yelled as he lunged himself at the man in white. "Why'd you kill her?" he asked as he grabbed the man's knife.

"Don't do it, kid," the man warned. But it didn't work, because Jeice rapidly stuck the knife into several places on the man's torso.

"Good thing mom and dad aren't home," Jeice muffled out between sobs. Then, an idea popped into his head. He put his hand in the man's pants pocket and pulled out his wallet. He looked at the man's ID card and stripped him of his clothes.

He grabbed some old towels from the hallway closet and covered the man in them. "It's still gross even if he's wearing underwear," he blurted out to the otherwise silent room. He then picked up the body, carried it out into his backyard, dug a hole, and buried the man in it.

"Your whole family's going to pay, man," Jeice thought as he went back into his house.

--**--**--**--

Weeks went by before Jeice decided to start his revenge. After all, he was still very depressed about his sister's death; he had decided to wait until after the funeral.

But now, as he walked down the dark street, wearing white clothes with a knife hidden in the jacket he wore, he couldn't help but think about all of the innocent people he was about to kill in the next few weeks. "No, don't think that way," he silently encouraged himself. "It's Skyler McNab's parents who are responsible for Erika's death. If they had've raised Skyler better, he might not have been a murderer."

"234 Junction Ave. is where Skyler's parents live," Jeice told his best friend, Eric, who had also been Erika's boyfriend before her tragic end.

"That's only about three minutes away from here," Eric informed his friend.

"We could go there, or we could go to his sister Marron's house," Jeice said, while caressing the black and gray turtle necklace his sister had given him for his last birthday.

"Where does she live?"

"97 Junction Ave.," Jeice said while fingering through the address book he had found while exploring Skyler's house. He had also found a book of photographs, which contained pictures of people who Jeice thought were people Skyler previously killed. He thought this because past the page with picture of Erika were all blank. All blank except for the back of the book, which contained pictures of Skyler's family.

"Marron only lives around that corner," Eric replied.

"Then we strike there first," Jeice said, with obvious signs of hate in his tone of voice. "We're going to kill the sister of Skyler McNab, the man who killed my sister."

"And my girlfriend," Eric added. Jeice looked into his friend's eyes and realized that Eric wouldn't get over Erika's death anytime soon, nor would he himself.

"Don't worry, Eric. Who's going to find out that we're the 'killer'? The police think that Skyler escaped through Erika's window. They'll probably think that he killed his family for some reason."

"I guess you're right," Eric said as they approached Marron's house.

"You go in the back door, while I go in the front," Jeice instructed.

"Okay," Eric agreed as he took off towards the back of the house.

"This is going to be tricky," Jeice told himself as he pulled a picklock from his pants pocket. "I wonder how Skyler did it. Never mind," he said as the door silently opened. He looked around and saw that Eric was waiting for him at the bottom of a staircase. "Let's just hope she's asleep," he whispered.

"Yeah," Eric agreed, as they started up the stairs. When they reached the second floor, they laid down and started to crawl towards the end of the corridor. "Where's her room?" he asked, almost silently.

"Skyler's blueprints say that it's the third door on the left," Jeice replied. So they crawled towards the third door on the left and peeked in through the keyhole.

"Looks like she's asleep," Eric observed. "Let's do this and get out."

"Whatever you say," Jeice replied, not caring that his friends was bossing him around.

Eric opened the door and Jeice walked through. He then walked over to the bed where Marron was laying and pulled the covers off, revealing her naked body. He pulled out the knife from his jacket.

"Time to die," Eric taunted from the doorway. But just as Jeice hoisted the knife into the air, Marron rolled off her bed and kicked him in the groin.

"Get away from me!" she shouted at Jeice, who was moaning in pain. "You're my brother! Why do you want to kill me?"

At that moment Eric realized she hadn't yet noticed him, so he pulled out his knife and started to cautiously advance on Marron.

"There's two of you!" Marron shouted in surprise.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Jeice asked as he walked back towards his friend.

"That means you're not my brother," she explained. "You see, Skyler and my parents were planning to kill me."

"Why would they want to kill you?" Eric questioned her.

"When we were younger, I nearly drowned my brother while we were swimming in our friend's pool. Now that we've both moved out, Skyler and my parents have been trying to kill me. I suspected that so I've been alert ever since I heard about all of those teenagers that were killed."

"So, what do we do?" Eric asked, turning so he faced Jeice.

"I say the three of us kill Marron's parents. How about it?"

"When do we do it?" she asked.

"Tonight," Jeice suggested. "They'll probably be suspicious when they realize Skyler's missing."

"Good point," Marron stated, as she grabbed some dark clothes from her closet and put them on. "Oh, and I need a weapon. Do either of you have an extra knife?"

"No, we only brought one each -- that way there's less chance of police finding out we're the killers."

She nodded. "I have some knives downstairs in the kitchen anyway. Then we go for the kill."

--**--**--**--

A couple of minutes later, the three soon-to-be killers were on the street, heading towards Marron's parents' house.

When they were standing outside the McNab household, Jeice suggested that he and Eric take the back door, while Marron went in the front door.

"See you guys in there," Marron whispered as the two friends walked to the back of the house. "And good luck," she added, even though she knew they couldn't hear her.

As Jeice and Eric reached the back of the door, they heard a strange whistle, one that was all too familiar to Jeice.

"What the --" Jeice screamed as he saw the blade of a knife erupt through the front of his chest. He spun his head and saw Eric with a wicked grin on his face, and standing beside him were Marron and what appeared to be her parents, who were now all laughing hysterically. "But, you're my best friend," Jeice spat out with his last gasp of breath. His body then fell heavily onto the cold, grassy ground.

--**--**--**--

At nine o'clock in the morning, there was a huge commotion at the side of the McNab household. They were all standing in a huge circle around a mangled body, in which no one could identify. A car pulled up and a man and his wife walked out. They walked towards the crowd and people parted so they could walk through and get a closer look at the body. The only thing that wasn't destroyed was a black and gray turtle necklace around the body's neck that everyone could clearly see from all directions.

"I can't identify the body," Mrs. Burton stated.

"Neither can I," her husband added. He took his wife's hand and they turned, Mr. Burton winking at Mr. McNab. Eric watched this and nodded knowingly.

"Do you want a ride home, Eric?" Mrs. Burton asked politely.

"No thanks, Mrs. Burton. It's just too bad Skyler wasn't here to see this," he stated. "I think he would've enjoyed killing Jeice."

"Don't worry, Eric -- you'll be seeing Skyler, and Jeice, soon enough," Mrs. Burton said.

"Huh? What do you mean by that?"

Then he saw the knife.

---------------------

A/N: This is a short story I wrote in Grade 9 based on a picture that our English teacher showed us, which ended up being from the short story "The Lottery". Anyway, we had to write a short story to explain the picture, and "Body Count" is what I thought of, so I hope everyone enjoyed it, despite the many obvious plotholes that may or may not be filled in, in the future (re: a possible prequel, rehash, or sequel could very soon be in the works). Anyway, thanks for reading it!