The Zodiac Killer scares me because he never let the story end.
He didn’t just kill people; he haunted the space after the killings, where answers are supposed to live. Most monsters want control over bodies. Zodiac wanted control over attention, over fear, over the narrative itself. He turned murder into correspondence and made the whole world his unwilling pen pal.
He came out of nowhere in the late 1960s, attacking young couples parked in cars like intimacy itself was the crime. He shot them. Stabbed them. Walked away calmly. No frenzy. No panic. Just deliberate violence and a man who knew exactly when to leave the scene. Then he wrote about it. Casually. Cheerfully. Like he was reviewing his own performance.
That’s the part that makes my skin crawl, the letters.
The tone.
The confidence.
Zodiac didn’t sound angry. He sounded pleased. He mailed newspapers coded messages, symbols, taunts, threats, and body counts like he was keeping score in a game only he understood. He demanded attention and punished people when he felt ignored. He wanted his murders printed. Wanted credit. Wanted fear delivered straight to breakfast tables.
And the ciphers, Jesus Christ.
Not clues meant to help. Not puzzles meant to be solved out of goodwill. They were power plays. Look how smart I am. Look how long I can make you stare at this. Look how much space I can take up in your head. Some were cracked. Some still aren’t. And that uncertainty is the knife he never stopped twisting.
He claimed more victims than anyone could ever confirm. Some of it was probably bullshit. Some of it might not have been. And that ambiguity? That’s the real weapon. Zodiac understood that mystery lasts longer than blood. He understood that not knowing is worse than knowing. Closure is mercy. He didn’t believe in mercy.
What makes it worse is how close he kept getting to the truth without ever crossing into it. Eyewitnesses saw him. Police talked to him. A surviving victim described him. Sketches circulated. Suspects piled up. And still, nothing. He slipped through decades of investigations like smoke, leaving behind theories, documentaries, forums, and people who will die never knowing who he really was.
And I hate how intentional that feels.
Zodiac didn’t need to keep killing to stay alive. He just needed to keep writing. Keep reminding everyone he existed. Keep proving that fear doesn’t need a face to work. The idea of him became bigger than the man ever could have been, and maybe that was the whole point. Maybe he wanted to disappear into the legend so no one could ever touch him.
There’s something uniquely cruel about a killer who denies you an ending. No arrest. No confession. No grave with a name on it. Just letters, symbols, and a question mark where a person should be. Zodiac didn’t just take lives; he stole certainty. He made terror immortal by refusing to be known.
And that’s why he still works on people. Why does he still get under the skin? Because deep down, we’re wired to believe every story has a solution. Zodiac looked straight at that instinct and said, fuck you.
Maybe he’s dead.
Maybe he lived a normal life.
Maybe he laughed watching people try to solve him.
What scares me isn’t who Zodiac was.
It’s that he proved you don’t have to be caught to win, you just have to leave enough unanswered questions behind to rot forever.