View from the North 40: Supervillain, or just a serial killer?

The bodies are piling up and the continual scenes of carnage are starting to eat away at my soul, causing me to ponder the deeper implications of the bloody actions of my quarter-feral, yellow-tabby cat.

Frankly, I had been thinking for a while now that I might be harboring a serial killer, but then earlier this week, in the faint pre-dawn light of morning, I saw him snag a bat out of the air mid-flight and it occurred to me that I may be operating a secret base for a supervillain.

I had even done some research on traits of serial killers, and he kind of matched the profile. Real Crime magazine reported that the top five traits of serial killers are:

1. Mad about power, controlling those around them. Cat wakes us at his beck and call each morning with obnoxious, grating meow, steals dog’s bed. Check.

2. Keen manipulators, pushing the buttons of both victims and others. Cat teases victims, harasses dog, lures curious horse into touching the electric fence. Check.

3. Egotistical braggarts, compelled by their own nature to brag about the atrocities that have committed. Cat brings most kills to house/yard area whether to eat himself or leave for us to find. Check.

4. Superficial charmers, with good understanding of how to play people’s emotions. Cat purrs loudly, then rubs on humans’ legs until he trips them and meows pitiably until I get up in the middle of the night to check on him, then spends remainder of night meowing in house and trampling me as I try to sleep. Check.

5. Average Joe-types, they blend into neighborhoods, work and relationships. Cat is just a plain, yellow tabby with narrow hips and a slightly funky stride that doesn’t seem athletic, helps with chores and is afraid of strangers, but kills everything. Check.

The thing is, though, he has no method of operation. I watch crime shows. All serial killers have a calling card method. No crime scene traits tie all his victims together except death by cat.

His victims include grasshoppers, spiders, mice, voles, birds of all kinds, including the elusive brown thrasher, gopher, snakes and now bats.

He will hunt using a variety of techniques: wait all afternoon for a bird to come close enough to kill then, while walking down the driveway, randomly decide to snag a bat that was flittering around doing the good deed of killing mosquitoes.

And he has no victim disposal method. Sometimes they’re a snack; sometimes they’re left abandoned around the yard or the barn or the shop or the road, never in the same place.

He is lacking in the neurotic, obsessive compulsive tendencies normally attributed to the common serial killer.

His actions, in fact, seem more supervillain-ish — kind of erratic, got-my-powers-from-falling-in-a-vat-of-acid, morally-whacked supervillain-ish — with, maybe a dash of evil superpowers, since he’s made some pretty spectacular kills. Caught a bat out of the air? That’s no amateur’s feat. He’s also been spotted with rabbit carcasses he own size. And, really, it would take a supervillain to stomach catching and killing a snake.

I gave him a supervillain name, just in case he needed it to make crime, cause mayhem: Yellow Menace.

It has a ring to it

All things considered — the dead brown thrasher, the dead bats, the dead voles, all outside, and the live mice he doesn’t go after in the house — if I had to choose between living with a serial killer or a supervillain, I would go the alternate route and choose an assassin.

Who wouldn’t want a pet assassin?

Assassin means I’d have at my disposal a targeted weapon to direct at my enemies, and be able to spare my allies. Serial killer or supervillain, he has his own agenda that doesn’t always mesh with my ideals. Is it too much to ask to have those mice eradicated from my home?

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Headquarters, we have a Code 187MDK MurderDeathKill in Bravo Sector at [email protected].