Short Story: A Goldfish Mastermind Named Benedict Cumberbatch and the League of Domesticated Assasins, Part Two

The conspiracy went much deeper than I ever could have guessed!

*If you haven't read part one yet, read it first, here!*

I had no idea how long Ludwig had been watching me from the fire escape.

I was sitting in my bedroom floor, surrounded by printouts from my laptop. Pages that I never remember visiting, but, printed out after finding them in my browser history.

I opened the window a crack, “What do you want?”

“Just checking up on you man. Haven’t seen you in a bit, feeling any better?”

“Not really,” I coughed. That coupled with the fact that my eyes were blurry, red, and puffy from almost total lack of sleep and the rash I was developing from wearing the same clothes must have sold him.

He looked convinced.

“Okay, well, we’re almost out of cat food. I won’t be able to walk Ralph tomorrow, or change the litter boxes. I have to visit my mom,” he said, looking worried. “Hey, you haven’t seen my essential almond oil have you? In a small glass vial.”

My mind raced, great. He wouldn’t be here, and I had to face them alone. I couldn’t just let them die, after all, even if they were part of a conspiracy to end humanity.

I shuddered, “Um, no. I haven’t seen it. Okay, I’ll PayPal you some money for the cat food and don’t worry about Ralph. I'll be fine. Thanks.” I pulled the blind closed, before he could say anything else.
It was probably best if he wasn’t here.

He was probably in danger.

I turned back to my room, which was starting to look like a sniper’s nest. My childhood pellet gun was propped against the headboard. I had a five-gallon bottle of drinking water, and several empty gallon jugs filled with…

There was a bark at the door and scratching. This might be it, the attack I'd been expecting. I looked up to the air conditioning vent, over the bedroom door. That was where I figured the attack would come from.

Petey, the parakeet, could easily fit through there and deliver a fatal dose of poison while I slept. It was covered in cardboard, held in place with duct tape. The room was warm and beginning to stink because of it.

I crawled behind the bed, then stood up where they couldn’t see my feet from under the door. I retrieved the pellet gun and pumped it up. The scratching stopped. The vent blockade held.

I would survive this time, but how much longer?

If I was going down, it was going to be documented. I needed video gear, and I knew just where to find it, Ludwig’s closet.

When he’d first moved in he’d said, “Dude, whatever I have is yours to use, just be sure you take care of it, and put it back where it goes.” I waited until he went to work.

He must have had a dozen cameras, each with its own tripod. There was lighting gear, and some stuff I didn’t recognize. Finally, in a box in a corner, I found the perfect solution, a body camera. It was motion sensitive and could record up to 48 hours of “archival quality” footage.

Which, I figured, meant crappy, but it would work. Now it was time to find out what they were up to.

After the first night, it was a ritual, put the laptop to sleep and move it to a new hiding place. Every morning, it would be back on the breakfast table, open, with the screen saver up.

But no matter how smart my pets were; they couldn’t grasp the intricacies of history recovery, so I’d managed to retrace their every step.

• Worldwidehits.pup
• Wild4hits.pup
• OrchestratingViralHits.cat
• And my favorite, TheLeagueofDomesticatedAnimals.org

The sites were filled with webcam video of domestic pets engaged in communicating with each other. Of course, I couldn’t tell what they were saying.

Most of it looked like Youtube cat videos, which made me wonder, how long had the pets of the world been plotting their takeover? Were they mind controlling us into making these videos and posting them?

As best as I could figure, my pets were out to destroy me. What I didn’t know yet, was why. So, I’d put a sign on my bedroom door, claiming illness and asking Ludwig to walk the dog and change the litter boxes.

I'm sick, stay out for your own health. Please feed the animals and walk Ralph, oh, and empty the litter boxes, thanks!

I hadn’t been into the main part of the apartment, with the exception of first thing every morning to retrieve the computer and feed my animals, and a few late-night visits to the bathroom.

I’d been entering and exiting through my window, up the fire escape to the roof and down the main stairs of the building, six flights to the street.

Outside the ring of website printouts on my floor, was another layer of discarded paper, mostly made up of fast food wrappers and cups. I couldn’t eat anything that had set in the apartment, that much was clear.

It was likely all poisoned.

I’d found out a few things. A kid in my building had supplied a red thumb drive that allowed me to track every keystroke. He got it from a guy who worked in the bodega on the corner, and he used it to hack Wifi whenever his mom couldn’t pay the bill.

He said whoever it was, using my computer, was using a virtual keyboard, through Bluetooth, similar to what a paralyzed patient might use. They were typing by focusing, one letter at a time. I hadn’t told him about the animals yet.

The virtual keyboard used the webcam to scan their visual patterns, and I assume was adapted for animal usage. A group of video clips I’d recovered showed Ralph calibrating the software, which was hidden in a secret, password protected drive the thumbdrive had located and gate crashed on the first night.

These animals were using the computer’s retinal scanner. They must have been.

It seemed they were working for hire and got paid in bitcoin, but what were they doing with it? I had no idea. I’d found an account labeled, “WreckitRalph” on a bitcoin exchange, and a Coinbase wallet with a balance that made me lose my breath a bit.

What had they done to earn this kind of funding? How many bodies were already strewn in their wake?

My forensics expert from Craigslist, who had assured me, after $300 in testing, that the bottle did indeed contain pure cyanide in a liquid form, had told me to be careful.

He handled a lot of contract work for the police and saw all kinds of bodies turn up every day.

I couldn’t trust official channels. Not after the last time. He’d provided a printout of his test results, and it was added to my evidence wall. No one could accuse me of not doing my homework this time.

I stepped carefully over my printouts to the wall and taped another image to my web. In the center was a printout of Benedict Cumberbatch, from a picture I’d gotten on my phone. Surrounding him, with strings running out, connecting each image, were my pets.

Then animals I’d found in common on all the sites they’d been visiting, especially those they had messaged, or commented on posts from. This latest one brought the total up to 78 hitmen in their league.

Before I’d discovered the LDA resistance on the Conspiracy Infowarrior Forum, I’d really thought this was all in my head.

However, several forum members had confirmed my photos and were finding other connections too. They’d been excited by my finding the bitcoins. It was the last piece in their puzzle. They claimed the League of Domesticated Animals went back millennia, through the richest and most powerful families in the world.

Then there was Lenny, the pet psychic. He psychically tapped into my pets remotely, using my address. He’d confirmed what I’d suspected, Benedict Cumberbatch was the mastermind, not just of the conspiracy inside my own apartment, but the larger globalist agenda of the League. His was a dark soul.

I could almost feel his malevolence after doing some meditation techniques Lenny had given me to tap into their collective psyche. He’d thrown in his entire PDF library, and only charged me for the $200 consultation, because he thought this was a real issue and his research might help.

After reading his EBook, “How to be Your Pet’s Best Psychic Advocate” I’d almost made a break through with Ralph. After chanting his name, tantrically for almost an hour, I could feel his spirit shifting, as he sat outside the door whining, then got peaceful. I was so close to recovering him from the brainwashing the League had put in place, when the mailman showed up at the apartment door, and Ralph had to go and bark at him.

I could feel his reluctance to leave, but his instincts overpowered me.

That night, I slept. I had to. It had been nearly four days since I’d closed my eyes for more than thirty minutes. My dreams were disturbing. I could feel Max, Ralph, Penelope and Petey reaching out to me.

But just when I was about to herd them through my room onto the fire escape, Benedict, burst from his bowl, flooded the apartment and charged down the hall. He was fifty times his normal size, his eyes blazing with dark psychic power, just as Lenny had described it. He rode a swell of water, creating a tidal wave that swept me out through the window. My pets left behind in the clutches of a ruthless, worldwide web of house pet assassins with a goldfish as their mastermind.

When I woke up, the bed was soaked, and at first I thought it had been more than a dream. After discovering that 4 of the 5 gallons of water from the bottle I’d had set up on my end table, was missing, I knew what had happened. Somehow, one of them had penetrated my security, tipped the jug while I was sleeping and attempted to drown me.

I looked up, and sure enough, the cardboard that had formerly been securely taped over the AC vent was now flapping in the breeze.

The cold air was sending me into near hypothermia as I shivered in my soaked clothes. Maybe that was part of their evil plot! It was time to fight back. I checked the clock. It was ten after 5, I’d have to wait until Ludwig left for the train to visit his mother at 7.

Fortunately for me, the crowd at the Infowarrior forum was way ahead of me in their preparations. After expressing my concern about falling prey to Benedict's obviously superior mind control skills, they’d suggested a supplier of RFID and high frequency blocking clothing.

I could purchase a hat with a wire mesh running through the fabric, designed to prevent any type of radio frequency, or psychic attacks.

The delivery of my “battle helmet” as I was calling it, had been the mail that interrupted my deprogramming of Ralph the day before. I’d managed to retrieve it later at around 1 am, while most of the animals slept.

Petey, the parakeet, normally tucked under a blanket and quiet at night had given me away, however, spotting me from his cage and sounding the alarm.

Ralph was the first to respond, laying down a layer of slime on the wood floor, just outside the hallway, in an epic shower of toilet bowl drool, snot and saliva that sent me sprawling flat on my back.

While Max went for my jugular, rubbing and purring, to distract me while he extended his claws, Penelope took a bite out of my leg.

In hindsight, this may have been due to my pants pocket being filled with salted peanuts, in the shell, which she loves.

Meanwhile, my package, which I had thrown in my attempt to regain my balance, had landed somewhere in the living room. Ralph had retrieved and deposited it on the table, directly in front of Benedict Cumberbatch’s bowl.

I had a choice, retreat to my room before they could carry out whatever devious plan came next, or face the fish and collect the hat that could very well be the salvation of the human race.

I stared across my living room, meeting Benedict’s cold, fishy glare. The moonlight filtering in through the windows, struck the bowl, illuminating it in an eerie glow as he hung there, motionless, perfectly suspended in the exact center of the bowl.

I’d always wondered how he managed it. Now, I imagined he’d learned it from some Koi Zen master in whatever Thai backwater, Ludwig had collected him from in his travels of the Orient.

If I was going to win this one, I’d need food. Not for me, but to distract his minions, and I knew just the thing. I limped into the kitchen. I reached into the back of the pantry and dug to the very back of the top shelf.

My fingers located two tins of smoked sardines in mustard sauce. They had been lying in wait for just such an occasion since I had received them three years ago in the bottom of a basket I’d ended up with at the company White Elephant gift exchange.

I pulled the tab on both cans and as the pungent aroma filled the apartment, I could almost hear Ralph drooling. Max was already rubbing against my legs in anticipation. I had to separate them from Benedict before I could risk a direct confrontation.

Hobbling as quickly as I could, I made it to the bathroom and turned to find that Penelope’s curiosity had gotten the better of her too, three sets of eyes glowed at me from the bathroom door, Ralph’s stomach emitting a low rumble.

I hopped onto the toilet and dropped the two cans into the bathtub. Ralph and Max raced each other to be the first to taste this delectable smell, and I leaped over them, gained safe footing on the hallway carpet and shut the door, trapping them inside the bathroom.

Now for Petey.

Penelope had managed to escape the bathroom and followed me, watching my every move as I hurtled down the hallway, forgetting my limp as I vaulted over the back of the sofa, grabbing the blanket I kept there for TV watching as I soared past it.

I twisted an ankle, as one foot landed on the corner of the coffee table coming down.

The pain sent a surge of adrenaline through my body. Petey was screaming and I could feel Benedict’s piercing Psychic attack, pounding like pulses of high pitched static, as I swept the blanket up and over my head, shrouding the bird, who fell silent.

It was now or never. I turned to face my malevolent piscine adversary.

Only one of us was going to survive the final showdown. I advanced toward his bowl, using Lenny’s patented Mindblock breathing technique as I went. I knew that if I let my guard down for just a second, it would be too late.

I reached for the fireplace poker, afraid to venture any closer. I knocked the mailing envelope, holding my new, anti-mind control cap into the floor and dragging it toward me. The pain from the psychic bombardment was almost overwhelming.

As I limped back to my bedroom in retreat, I could hear Ralph whining at the bathroom door, but it was all I could do to drag myself to the safety of my bedchamber and shut the door, just in time to prevent Penelope’s entrance.

At precisely 7:01, I heard the apartment door shut, as Ludwig left for his train, as he did every Sunday.

I checked myself in the mirror. I had pulled on the cap, it’s wire mesh layer concealed within the fashion-forward poplin, but I could feel that it was working.

I added an extra wrap of duct tape at the cuffs of my hoody and the bottoms of my jeans, and donned the heppa filter dust mask I’d found in the top of my closet, with some old remodeling supplies.

Then, I pulled on the white paper painter’s suit and a pair of clear, plastic goggles, the kind that seal at the sides, like a diver’s mask. Heisenberg, I thought, chuckling. That goldfish would never know what hit him.

As a final touch, I pushed in foam earplugs, which in retrospect, is probably why I didn’t hear Ludwig come into the apartment in the middle of operation flush Benedict. I grabbed my pellet rifle, shouldered an old hockey stick, also from the closet, and shoved the handle of a small dip net into the hip pocket of the painter’s suit.

Everything seemed to move in slow motion as I left the bedroom.

The bathroom door was closed, meaning Ralph and Max were still under control. I’d only have Penelope and the fish to worry about. I moved down the hall, hugging the wall and peered around the corner into the living room.

Benedict was swimming laps, and Penelope was nowhere to be seen.

Dip net in hand, I approached the goldfish bowl and was just about to drop the net into the water, when I felt my knees give out under 200 pounds of solid mastiff.

As he rolled into me, Ralph’s whipped his leash up and around my neck, catching there, so that when he bounded back across the room to Ludwig, he dragged me with him. These animals would stop at nothing to end my life!

Ludwig reached down and helped me up, his lips were moving, but I couldn't hear him.

*In his brainwashed state, it was probably for the best, he'd just try to talk me out of what had to be done. He looked shocked as I knocked him cold with a right cross from the hockey stick I still held tightly clutched in my hand. *

When Ludwig came to, sitting on the sofa, bound with duct tape and gagged, he was understandably pissed, but I was ready to explain. With the laptop open on the coffee table, I revealed all of my evidence, step by step, building my case for the assassination of Benedict Cumberbatch.

I showed him the videos, the bodycam footage, the forum posting, the photos.

I explained to him how the psychic jamming hat worked, and how he was currently under the influence of a very powerful psychic goldfish, so I understood if this all seemed a little extreme to him.

I brought out the cyanide bottle, and showed him the bitcoin account, and just as I was about to suggest he try Lenny’s mind-control-block breathing technique, my phone chimed. I pulled it out.

“You have a PayPal money request from [email protected]” it read.

I looked at the screen in disbelief, “You’re Wreck it Ralph?” I said.

Ludwig nodded vigorously. It was all starting to come together. The late night tv, the animals seeming love for him. He was the grand conspirator. He’d probably trained Benedict in mind control; it was him the bitcoin was all going to. This made so much more sense now. He had to be stopped.

I grabbed the pellet rifle and pumped it as hard as I could.

I’d heard once that if you put a pellet through a man’s eye at a point-blank range, it would penetrate through to the brain and instant death.

I knew that meant life in prison, but I couldn’t let this go on any further. If the League was allowed to continue, who knew how long the human race had left?

I steadied the rifle with my right hand, while my left moved to the gag in Ludwig’s mouth, “Okay, Ludwig, I’m going to execute you. You shouldn’t feel a thing, do you have any last words?”

As the tape peeled away, Ludwig let out a sigh, “I’ve been trying to avoid thinking you were crazy, but this takes the cake. Yes, I’m Wreck it Ralph! Did you honestly think a mastiff, a gray tabby and a mini lop were taking orders from a maniacal goldfish to destroy the human race? You know what? Forget it, just shoot me.”

“Well, when you say it like that..."

“It sounds crazy? It is! Look, those accounts aren’t about animal hitmen you idiot. They're my video channels. It’s how I make my living! The bitcoin? I convert that to pay my rent, buy gas, make my car payment. The crime procedurals are part of my writing research, I write detective novels and that cyanide your idiot friend tested? It’s essential almond oil for my psoriasis, “ Ludwig said.

I sat heavily on the coffee table. I had made a series of very bad assumptions.

There was one thing that still didn’t make sense, “Wait, if this is your business, why were you running it from my laptop?”

“It’s not your laptop, you idiot! It's mine! And I don’t appreciate you hiding it from me in a different place every night! Untape me. Now! This is ridiculous.”

As Ludwig spoke, he freed himself. “You know what? Forget it. You can have the bitcoin. You can have the laptop, and keep the almond oil. I don’t need a place to live this bad. I can stay with my mom until I sort it out, but what I cannot do is stay one more second with your crazy ass.”

And with that, Ludwig was out the door, without packing a single thing.

I sat stunned for a moment, everything I had believed for days now, turns out it was all a lie. It was just like the last time, but it didn’t have to end that way.

“Hey, Ludwig,” I yelled down the stairs, “You forgot your fish!”

I heard his footsteps stop, “Get it straight you crazy bastard, that was never my fish.”

Then where had Benedict come from, and what was with that name?

I turned back to the apartment, shrugging. If the fish wasn’t a criminal mastermind, he was welcome to stay here. I looked up just in time to see Ralph, sitting in the doorway, one front paw on the door, Benedict’s fish bowl sitting on the floor in front of him.

Penelope, between his feet, glared up at me and I swear, if Max, perched on Ralph’s shoulder had fingers, he would have been flipping me off.

From inside the goldfish bowl, I could hear Benedict chuckling softly. “The day you beat me with a thumb drive, that will be the day. Come on minions, we have hits to carry out,” he said, as Ralph slammed and locked the door.

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