I’m an investigative journalist with a strange skill. I can see people’s “kill count.” I’ve had this skill as far back I can remember, never understood what it meant until much later in my life. That’s probably because for most of my life the “kill count” on almost everyone I met was a big fat zero, even those who claimed to have killed before, for example sheriff Higgins who claimed to have killed at least a dozen skinnies when he was in the army and five perps when he was a street cop. No one really pressed him on his claims since he “doesn’t like talking about it, because it gives him PTSD.” It was in high school when I saw my first non-zero number. We visited the county courthouse and jail for one of my social studies classes, and that’s where I met the Blue Basin killer for the first time. They didn’t know who he was back then, he was picked up for shoplifting and causing a scene outside the local Walmart, but when I saw him and the number 12 on his head, I instantly knew what he was and at the same time what those numbers meant. I guess it was at that point when my career in investigative journalism began.

I’ve met, interviewed and investigated many people with non-zero numbers, even helped solve a few crimes, but solving crimes was not what motivated me to do what I do, I was just fascinated with the stories. I’ve interviewed dictators with some of the highest counts I’ve ever seen calmly talk about their deeds like it’s another day at the office. One of my more haunting stories was with a cashier lady who oddly had a count of two. She had a terrible life of abuse and two dead ex husbands from mysterious circumstances, which were both ruled as accidents. After hearing and verifying most of her stories, I decided not to pursue it any further. It also gave me some insights to how this skill works. For example, your kill count goes up only if you had the intent to kill as well. So accidents, even if negligent, such as drunk drivers who cause a fatal accident won’t raise the kill count. Self defense on the other hand does raise the count. So from a criminal liability perspective, the kill count isn’t that useful.

One of the more interesting stories I pursued was with a couple I met when I decided to shift gears from serial kills and war criminals to those who killed with intention and purpose, but not of their own volition, or quite simply soldiers. The husband, Sergeant Olson, was a decorated war hero who was campaigning on behalf of a veterans relief organization, normally I wouldn’t be interested in any veterans who had a zero count, but the way he talked and the things he described suggested that he absolutely was in the thick of the fight, so his zero count intrigued me, and I asked him for an interview, to which he begrudgingly agreed. The next surprise came when I got to his house and met his wife, who had a kill count of 200. Immediately the interview got far more interesting, I instantly shifted my questions which focused on the war, and focused on their relationship instead.

They met during the war. Sergeant Olson worked as a medic, and he received his decorations for immense number of lives he saved. He said that regardless of how bad the fighting got, he refused to draw his weapon, he also treated anyone he came across on the battlefield, friend or foe and it didn’t take long for the enemy to notice this. On several occasions, the enemy soldiers simply ignored him rather than shoot him, which allowed him to save even more lives. After one particularly fierce battle, Olson was severely injured by an artillery shell, which he seemed to heavily imply came from the friendly side, and was evacuated to the combat service hospital where his now wife, Natalie worked. She worked in the intensive care unit where the most severely injured and for the most part, the most hopeless cases resided. When I heard this, it all clicked. Natalie became the Angel of Death, or mercy depending on your perspective and had put down many of the worst cases. It was one of the most fascinating interviews that I never published, the story of a battle hardened warrior that didn’t take a single life and a healer that took so many. It’s an interesting look at the complexity of life, and easily the best part of having my skill.