Heroes

By Michel Wolf Ilett

"This is Jane Litmore from QFN News with an exclusive interview. The St. Louis Slaughter, why did it happen? What kind of a man could do such a thing? We're here with Mathew Ellis, convicted of thirty-four counts of murder and twenty-six counts of assault with a deadly weapon in the St. Louis Slaughter six months ago. We'll answer these questions and more as we return with 'Confessions of a Dead Man'."

"…And stop," said Brad, the cameraman.

"Was that good?" asked Jane.

"That was perfect baby, as usual." Brad was as flattering as ever. He plans on riding the coat tales of Jane's career. He isn't a bad cameraman, but sometimes he gets on Jane's nerves.

Jane looks across the table at the convicted killer in shackles. He is average of height, below average build, attractive but not good looking with a goatee. His gray eyes show no emotion at all, yet somehow they pierce into Jane's soul. Mathew sits there with an unnerving calm. He doesn't seem to care that he is on death row. Jane shivers.

"Okay let's get this damn interview over with so I can get out of here!"

"Are you afraid of me Janey? You should be," said Mathew.

"No I am not afraid of you, I just don't like you, you SOB! And don't call me Janey. It's Ms. Fucking Litmore to you." Jane cannot believe that she is letting Mathew get to her. She usually is a calm and collected person.

"Ouch…Do you bite Janey?" Mathew smiles sardonically.

"Why am I doing this Brad?"

"Because it's good for our careers Jane baby." Brad said, pretending to care about her career as well as his own.

"Let's get on with it then." Jane said. She just wanted to go home and relax, but Brad was right, this would make her career, and his too.

"…Rolling."

"Mathew Ellis, can you tell us in your own words what happened on the night of March 17, 2000?" Jane said.

"Well Janey, it was a Friday and I felt like a Big Mac, so I climbed in my truck and took a ride down to Mickey D's. It was about 5:00. Suppertime. I got there and the dinner crowd was already there. I cannot stand line-ups, especially when it is juvenile delinquents in front of me. Each register had four or five people waiting to order. I did not want to wait, so I went back out to my truck, got my gun, and shot a few people." He said it casually, as if it was the logical thing to do.

"Your gun was an Uzi and you shot fifty-eight people!" Jane could not stop herself from blurting out. Mathew really knew how to push her buttons.

"Do you want to let me tell the story Janey? I came back into the McDonald's with my Uzi in my hand and nobody even glanced twice at me. I am walking around with an automatic weapon and nobody even notices it. Well, that just made me angry, so I opened fire. I sprayed the order lines and the employees, and then turned toward those people eating in the restaurant. People are stupid. They hear a gun firing and what do they do, they stand up to see what is happening. It was priceless I just mowed them down. Of course it did not take long for me to run out of bullets (I should have brought more clips), so that is when I pulled out my hunting knife. People were getting away. I had to stop them. I grabbed a hold of this man who was trying to drag himself out with a bullet in his leg. This little child started begging me to let his father go, so I did: I slit his throat. The kid started screaming, so in order to shut him up I plunged my dagger into his chest four or eighteen times. I killed as many others as I could before the police arrived. I also stopped to go behind the counter and get my Big Mac-"

"You heartless bastard, you enjoyed it didn't you? How could you kill that many people and not feel a goddamn thing? Why?" Jane was almost bursting with anger. She hated Mathew with all of her heart. He deserved to die.

"Tsk, tsk, Janey. Watch your language this is prime-time." Mathew smiled again and it infuriated Jane even more. "You see Janey, I will let you in on a little secret. I did not even care about the Big Mac. The real reason I killed them was because I wanted to become famous. I hate my life. My girlfriend left me, etc, etc, the usual melodramatic story. I have nothing left to live for, but I decided why kill myself when I can get the government to do it for me while making a name for myself. Society turns us killers into celebrities. Where are your Shakespeares now? It is the Jeffrey Daumers, Ted Bundys and Charles Mansons that will be remembered. I wanted to put my name beside theirs, a little bit of immortality on the way out. You do understand do you not Janey?"

Jane couldn't take it anymore. "Brad? Stop taping."

"Tape stopped," said Brad.

"But Janey, we still have ten minutes left, and I was not finished," said Mathew in his unfeeling tone.

"Let me see the tape Brad." Jane said.

"Here." Brad handed Jane the tape. Jane looked Mathew in the eyes.

"Here's your immortality you sick son of a bitch!" Jane broke the tape in half and threw it onto the table. She wanted to throw it in his face.

"Janey, you should not get so upset, it is unbecoming," Mathew said casually.

Jane reached the breaking point. "I said don't fucking call me that!" Jane slapped Mathew across the face splitting his lip. Mathew only smiled at her. Jane stalked over to the cell door and asked to be let out. How could she have let him push her buttons that way? She was shaking she was so mad.

Mathew yelled to her as she left the cell, "You know somebody else will do the story Janey. I will still get my name up in lights. You are not solving anything." Mathew was laughing to himself as Jane walked away. Brad followed.

That night at 6:00 pm when Jane turned on her television, she saw Tamara Check in a cell with the words 'exclusive live interview' on the bottom of the screen. "Daumer, Bundy, Manson, and now Ellis-" Jane turned off the television, went up to her room, laid down on her bed and picked up the book she was reading, the Complete Works of Shakespeare.