How I Went Missing For A Week And No One Noticed: Part I

by Jim Kopetz

The last thing I remember was the slight sting of a syringe plunged into my neck and a bitter, salty taste on my tongue. Then it went black.

I woke up in some seedy motel room. My head felt like it had been put in a vice soaked with liquor. It took me some time to regain my natural abilities and soon found out I was on an official assignment. There was a letter on the bedside table with some official seal on it. "Holy shit," I remember shrieking, "I'm in Columbia!" How the fuck did I end up here. I looked at the date on the daily calender and realized I'd been out of it for at least 48 hours, maybe more. It was at this point strange visions began coming back to me.

There was a man. I was tied to a chair. I looked at my wrists and gently rubbed the raw skin. He thought I had some sort of intelligence and kept referring to me as expendable scum. Then I'm on the ground, bloody and weak. There were others. A light dangled from the ceiling, swaying back and forth showing half-faces and shadowed eyes. They had me sign something, but I could barely see the page so they did it for me. And then I woke up. In Columbia. With a sealed letter from the official government.

"The Monster of the Andes" was the subject. My heart sunk. I had read of the man before, I believe in Manhunt by Colin Wilson. His real name was Pedro Alonso Lopez and he was/is a monster. A murdering rapist with a thirst for young girls, he's believed to have killed over 300 people. That would put him in the top 3 most prolific serial killers of all time. The one thing that distinguished him from them is his whereabouts were at the time, unknown. It was my job to find him.

Why me you ask? Hell, I asked it? And I can't really answer that. Maybe Prelude had put me on the grid and the CIA needed a patsy. Maybe I was bait. Could have been the DEA bartering some deal for pure Colombian cocaine. To this day I don't truly know what happened for those 48 hours, but I was in Columbia, I was on an assignment, and if I did not give it a solid effort I knew I would be killed. 

The last thing the letter mentioned was that anything I might need for completion could be found in the suitcase under the bed. I got on my knees and felt for the handle, dragging the leaden bastard out from its hiding place. I punched the locks and popped it open. What was inside might as well have been glowing, and I knew I had what I needed.

To be continued...