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Home > Fan Fiction > General > Covenant II Monsters
Covenant II Monsters
Covenant: Monsters
by Rhondda Lake
(part 1/8)
Hush now don't you cry
Wipe away the teardrop from your eye
You're lying safe in bed
It was all a bad dream
Spinning in your head
-------------------------------
102 VALENTINE ST
HADLEY, PA
OCTOBER 20
8:30 P.M.
Eight-year-old Kally Carlson curled herself into a tight ball in the middle
of her bed. She didn't know which she feared more, the soft scratching
coming from her closet or the sound of her father's footfalls on the stairs.
::Scritch, Scritch::
Her eyes darted to the closed closet door. In the darkness of her room the
shadows seemed to move. And they seemed to converge and pool before her
closet. The soft scraping sound wasn't quite as soft any more. Too loud for
mice or rats.
::Thump, Thump::
No, not Daddy. If she closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep he'd only
hurt her more for not waiting up for him. She wanted to run away. She wanted
to hide in the bramble. But she couldn't. Daddy stood between her and that
escape. She couldn't even hide in her closet.
::Scritch, Scritch, SKreeeeeeek::
Kally began to shake. Her silent tears were absorbed by her pillow. Ever
since Mommy died there had been no hope. No light. No release.
::Thump, Thump::
The door handle turned and Kally sat upright in bed, clutching her sheets to
her chest with knuckles gone white.
Daddy was here.
Suddenly the closet seemed a safe place.
"You ready for me, bitch? Just like your whore momma, ain't ya?" He reached
for the buckle of his belt and Kally swallowed around the lump in her
throat, closing her eyes.
She was going away again. Into that beautiful place where the unicorns
played by the stream. The sun always shone brightly in that place. There was
no fear. No pain. Just her and the unicorns and the gentle water.
The last thing she felt before jumping onto the unicorn's back for a ride
was the heavy weight that settled onto the side of the bed.
The last thing she heard was the closet doors splinter open and then the
screaming started.
X
J. EDGAR HOOVER BUILDING
WASHINGTON, D.C.
OCTOBER 21
8:10 A.M.
Dana Scully was worried. She was afraid she was going insane. If she was,
how would she know? The nature of her doubts was such that talking to anyone
about them would only serve to make the listener certain she was insane.
Trying to prove one's sanity to oneself was NOT an easy proposition.
She couldn't even tell Mulder about her doubts. Mainly because he was the
cause of them, and if she were not insane, he didn't need any more guilt on
his plate. The guilt of making her doubt her own mind.
The cause of her self doubt, her perceived possible insanity was currently
sitting on the corner of his desk, reading through an X-File. He appeared to
be unaware of the havoc he was wrecking on her mental well being.
Why would her own partner, best friend, and - for the past month - lover
make her doubt her sanity? It was very simple.
He insisted on coming in to work every day like a good little FBI agent. He
insisted on talking to her, on running surveillance on their enemies, and on
spending four nights out of seven making her scream. Not with fear or anger,
although sometimes with frustration, but with pleasure such as she'd never
known.
Which would be all very well and good if Fox William Mulder hadn't died in a
car crash four months ago.
Dana Scully was not only seeing a ghost on a regular basis, she was working
with one, talking to one, and making love to one. And she was the only one
who could see him. He claimed someone else once had, but that tenuous proof
of her mental health was snatched away the very morning after she first saw
him. Her eighty-three year old neighbor had died of a heart attack, and was
unable to confirm or deny that Fox Mulder had ever talked to her from beyond
the grave.
All in all it was very disconcerting and enough to make her doubt her
perceptions and mental health.
And self doubt was not something Dana Scully was familiar with. She'd always
been very strong in her convictions. Her view was that everything could be
explained by science if one tried hard enough. She's once said that nothing
existed outside of nature, only outside of what we know of it.
Having a ghost for a partner was really pushing the envelope. She needed her
scientific proof. Because without it she was left adrift with only her faith
to hold her. And that was tenuous at best at the moment.
Which is why they ran the tests.
She might not be able to talk to Mulder about her personal fears, but he
seemed to perceive them anyway. He kept assuring her that he was as
telepathic as her coffee table, and so couldn't read minds -- hers or anyone
else's. His perceptions were simply based on how well he knew her.
Scully looked down at the list of physical proof: solid empirical evidence
that she was indeed of sound mind.
They'd used equipment both ordinary and strange, Mulder telling her how to
obtain some of the more unusual items.
The first proof was that a barometer registered a one to two point increase
in pressure whenever Mulder was in a room, or within a fifty foot radius
outdoors. The second was that infrared scanning picked him up. Sort of. Just
barely. His presence was a cool spot, about five degrees cooler than
whatever he was around. The image was faint, but there. And that fact she
found odd as he felt warm to her touch.
On this point she wanted outside assurance that her mind wasn't tricking
her, so they shot a few infrared pictures. She presented the photos to the
Gunmen telling them they were for a case she was working on.
The three men had been wonderful in the past four months. They accepted her
as Mulder's heir, and had tried to offer what comfort they could. So far the
best comfort they had offered was noticing the cooler image in a roughly
human form right away. They saw it. Thus, in a way, they saw Mulder. It was
the best proof she had as of yet.
Other tests produced varying results. Mulder found electromagnetic emissions
ticklish. But for her he'd stood in the way of various people and allowed
them to pass right through him. She'd noticed that many of them shivered as
they passed some even stopping and taking a look back. She'd stopped those
tests though, since they created some side effects Mulder could only
describe as nausea. But all over.
They'd also learned the hard way that if he passed any part of himself
through electronic equipment it went haywire. Her VCR threw sparks and had
to be replaced, while her TV only became snowy and flickered. The office
computer sparked and sizzled and had to be replaced because its memory was
erased. He had similar erasing effects on audio and video tapes as well as
computer disks. They were fine if she was around and he only touched the
outside to manipulate them, but if he concentrated and passed THROUGH them,
poof. Major damage.
And he could manipulate physical objects, but only when she was around.
Mulder's theories were either that he was somehow tapping into a latent
telekinetic ability within her, or her ability to see him made some sort of
bridge between the physical world and the non physical. She, frankly, didn't
believe she had any telekinetic abilities so if she had to choose she'd go
with the second theory. As yet unproven.
She had a bunch of pictures of him moving physical objects. But she couldn't
show them to anyone. Partly because she didn't want to draw too much
attention to Mulder, if he was real. He wasn't a performing monkey, knocking
on walls to impress the easily impressible. And partly because she didn't
want to damage her own credibility.
So far she had been able to act somewhat normal when around others. She
didn't tune Mulder out, but she'd managed to not look at him, to focus on
the real world where people didn't glow with a faint blue light or walk
through walls. She had so far managed to ask him questions veiled in
conversation with other, living, people. The only thing she hadn't been able
to disguise was her inability to sustain her grief. Her mother was worried,
and Skinner seemed to watch her closely. Maybe they were afraid she was
locking it in and letting it fester. She could hardly explain why she didn't
grieve anymore, why she was able to put Mulder's death behind her. That it
was almost like nothing had happened. He was still there.
She hoped he was still there.
She glanced down at her list. Actual proof. Solid, empirical evidence. She
was NOT insane.
The phone ringing startled her and she jumped a bit.
"Want me to get that?" Mulder grinned at her from his perch on the desk.
She just glared as she snatched the receiver up. "Scully."
She nodded. "Yes, sir. Right away."
Hanging up she turned to her late partner. "Skinner. I...we...have an
assignment."
102 VALENTINE ST
HADLEY, PA
OCTOBER 21
5:00 P.M.
An officer was waiting for her outside of the house. If he hadn't been
there, she still would have known it to be the right place. The yellow
police tape decorated it in bright ribbons. All done up for a party. Or the
dance macabre.
"Be good," were the last words she spoke directly to Mulder before getting
out of the car. She had received no pictures of the crime scene, only a very
strange report. The body had not yet been removed from the house for one
simple reason, they had spent most of the day trying to find a contractor to
do it.
"Dana Scully. I'm with the Bureau." She held up her badge.
"Donald Flowers. I'm from the State Police. They aren't equipped to handle
homicide out here." He led her up the porch stairs and through the front
door, which opened into a neatly ordered kitchen. "And while I worked three
homicides in the city there is no way I can handle this. I called a friend
who called some friends. Eventually I heard about you and the cases you
handle. Watch it." He pointed to a puddle of dried blood under the doorway
to the stairs. She could see the small, dark stained footprints of a child
across the rug. She stepped over the puddle and followed the cop up the stairs.
There were sounds of a buzz saw coming from one of the bedrooms.
"Something doesn't feel right here, Scully." She cast a very quick glance at
Mulder in the guise of surveying the hallway. He stood next to her, frowning
at the room the noise was coming from. "It's...cold. Weird. Like I just
stepped out of the sewer after that flukeman thing only worse. Something
happened here. Something so terrible it leaves an impression I can pick up."
She raised an eyebrow in his direction. It was both questioning and mocking.
She followed the cop into a bedroom. Stuffed animals were piled in one
corner. Clothing and hangers were scattered about. Her immediate reaction
was to marvel at the lack of blood. If this was where the murder had taken
place, then why was the blood pooled downstairs, albeit directly under this
room?
There were two men working in the closet, where the smell of blood and
sawdust was strong. One of the men in the closet jumped back and moved
quickly away, pushing past her to get to the bathroom across the hall. He
was immediately noisily sick into the toilet.
"Mike, move outta the way, let the lady see." Don Flowers gestured the other
man back.
"Are you sure man? I mean this isn't something a lady SHOULD see." The man
Flowers had called Mike set down his buzz saw and blocked the view.
"I'm with the FBI and a trained pathologist. Why hasn't the body been moved
already?"
Mike moved out of the way and a startled gasp came involuntarily from
Scully's lips. She'd seen death in many forms. Plenty of them violent and
gruesome. Nothing she'd seen before could prepare her for this.
The body was half submerged in the back wall of the closet. Mike and his
companion had been attempting to cut out the wall surrounding it. The
corpse's face was contorted into a silent scream up to the point where it
merged with the cheap wood panel. Half an arm emerged from the wood
paneling, reaching for help. A knee poked out below it. It looked as if the
man were caught trying to escape the wall itself. Everywhere the body merged
with the wall, there was dried blood.
The closet was directly over the pooled blood downstairs.
"Looks like a bad Han Solo imitation." Mulder moved past her to peer at the
body.
She fought down the urge to jump when Mulder stuck his whole head through
the back wall. Damn. She wished he wouldn't do that. It was...spooky.
He pulled his head back and looked at her. She moved next to him and made a
show of examining the corpse.
"Um... Scully, he's all in there. You should have them check the back of the
house, his foot is sticking out in the back. But he wasn't shoved into the
wall. He's become part of it. As far as I can see the beams pass through
him, so does the insulation and the siding in the back."
"Has anyone checked the back of the house. The walls aren't that thick."
Scully looked at Flowers and he shook his head.
"Hey Mike, go take a look. If there's anything there, give me a holler and
I'll have a team come back and give it the treatment."
Mike nodded and seemed happy to leave the room.
"You ever see anything like this before, Agent Scully?" Flowers looked over
her shoulder.
"No. Never. I'd like to do the autopsy though."
"Fine by me." Flowers shrugged and dug out a cigarette. "Hope you don't mind
if I skip it. This is gonna give me enough nightmares."
"I think we can agree whatever did this was NOT human." Mulder moved away to
survey the room. "It might be what's giving me the willies about this room,
but it feels, I dunno, older than the body. Something really bad's happened
here, and it wasn't this guy getting eaten by the house."
"You said there was a witness?" Scully looked only at Flowers.
"Yeah. A little girl. She wandered out of the house around ten last night
and walked barefoot down the street in her nightgown. Neighbors saw her and
one lady followed her. Found her curled up in a large bramble of lilac
bushes 'bout a block away. She was white as a sheet and shocky. She had
blood on the shoulder of her nightgown and blood on her feet. They have her
at the Community Medical Center. She is mostly unresponsive. What she does
respond to is men. She shrinks away from them. They have all female docs and
nurses on her." He shook his head. "I'll give you the report on her
physical, but I hope you gotta strong stomach. If that bastard weren't
dead...I'd most likely shoot him myself."
Scully looked back at the imbedded corpse.
"I knew it felt older. Repetitive abuse took place in this room. Over a long
period of time." Mulder muttered. "Shit." He didn't bother to use the door.
He just walked through the side wall, leaving Scully alone with the cop and
a hundred questions of her own.
end part 1....
Covenant II: Monsters
by Rhondda Lake
(part 2/8)
Your mind tricked you to feel the pain
Of someone close to you leaving the game of life
So here it is, another chance
Wide awake you face the day
Your dream is over...or has it just begun?
--------------------------------------------------------
Scully found Mulder on the front porch, waiting. He'd been good to his
promise. He didn't ditch her anymore. He hadn't let death separate them, and
he wouldn't let being upset push him into breaking his vow, either.
"So what now?" Flowers tossed away his cigarette and stood with his hands on
his hips.
Scully handed him her card. "You call me as soon as the body is cut free and
brought to the morgue. I want to do the autopsy as soon as possible. Now,
I'm going to go talk to the witness. I have a feeling I'd better do that
alone." She inclined her head to Flowers. "You said men make her nervous."
She ignored Mulder until they were away from the house and on the road to
the hospital.
"So now you're telling me you can feel things, that you're psychic. You told
me you couldn't read minds." Her hands tightened on the wheel. She was
having a hard enough time dealing with a ghost only she could see, a psychic
ghost was just too much.
"No. I still can't read minds. I couldn't tell what had happened in that
room. Only that it was bad. Sick. Vile. No visual images, no insight other
than a filthy feeling. A build up of some sort. Maybe places where evil
happens can hold some sort of residual memory. A lasting stain or
something." Mulder pinched his bottom lip between his thumb and forefinger,
tugging at it as he thought.
"I don't know how else to describe it, Scully. Maybe I am more sensitive to
things than I was when I was...I mean I'm no longer strictly in the physical
world. Even you have to admit that. I mean, face it, Scully...I AM a
paranormal experience right now. If a person can defy death, just refuse to
move on, isn't it possible strong emotions can do the same? Leave their mark."
Scully licked her lips. "Love never dies."
"Poetic, Scully, but true." He smiled at her.
"Not poetic. It was the catch phrase for the movie Bram Stoker's Dracula."
She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. "So, following your theory
the emotions involved in this abuse scenario were trapped in that room. And
you could feel that?"
"Love isn't the only thing that never dies. Anger, hate, fear, all are
strong motivators. And since I'm at least partially in that...plane of
existence... sharing paranormal space with such a strong impression, it
isn't unreasonable that I would be able to perceive it."
"Ok, great swami, why did our witness leave the house and walk to a lilac
bramble?" Scully turned off the highway when she saw the signs for the hospital.
"Maybe it's where she escaped. Her father abused her, so she needed a
sanctuary. Maybe she hid there. She was in shock, so she headed for her safe
place." Mulder looked out the window, lost in his own contemplations.
That he had felt anything was unsettling. But what he felt...made him sick.
The very familiarity of it. The way it pulled it him and forced him to
remember a long ago time. He knew a variation of that feeling. He didn't
ever want to feel it again. The helplessness. The fear. The pain.
Part of him already strongly sympathized with the little girl involved here.
He felt absolutely no sympathy for the murder victim. Which, from a
profiling viewpoint, was very bad indeed.
If he couldn't regain his perspective he might be useless here.
XXX
COMMUNITY MEDICAL CENTER
SCRANTON, PA
6:38 P.M.
Kally had her arms wrapped around her legs and her head resting on her
knees. Her eyes were riveted on the little boy in the crib at the far end of
the pediatrics ward.
He was three or so, and slept fitfully. When awake his eyes were dull. There
was a bruise on his cheek and a matched pair on his arms. His mommy had
gotten fed up when he wouldn't stop crying. She had hit him. Kally sighed.
Even she knew hitting a baby wasn't going to make them STOP crying.
Kally was bright. She could read beyond her own third grade level. She'd
snuck out of bed and looked at the little boy's chart. Most of it was
confusing. Big words of big people.
She did understand brain damage. She understood the words scrawled followed
by a question mark. Shaken Baby Syndrome. His mommy had shaken him so hard
his brain got bruised.
She didn't know how she knew that. She just did.
She looked around. She shared this room with six others, including the
little boy. Mostly because the hospital people didn't know who was going to
pay for her staying there. Right now the other five kids were with their
families in visiting rooms or having tests done.
She unfolded herself and walked silently to the crib. She had to climb up,
balancing herself on the base of the rails, in order to reach over and
stroke the little boy's bruised cheek. His hair was fluffy white and full of
big curls. She smiled.
"If your mommy doesn't love you, I will. My mommy would have loved you." She
whispered, so as not to alert the nurse with the pills. "When the grown ups
hurt us, sometimes all we have is each other."
Kally heard the nurse coming, talking with someone. She jumped down from the
crib and ran to her funny bed. The one with sides on it like the baby's crib.
The nurse came to the door followed by a pretty lady and... someone else.
Kally's eyes got wide as she looked. It was a man. But he was glowing. Like
an angel.
*
Scully's heart went out to the little girl sitting on her hospital bed. She
was thin, and had dark circles under her large, blue eyes. Her dark hair was
pulled back in a thick braid. She looked terrified. Dana felt her gut clench
in anger as she recalled what she'd seen on this child's medical files. The
worst of it wasn't the right arm that had been broken three times in as many
years, or the signs of mended ribs. Where HAD the doctors been when she was
brought in for those, anyway? Asleep? The symptoms of abuse were easy enough
to see.
No, the worst of it was from an exam prompted by the child's fear of men,
and evidence of spotting on her panties.
This little girl, this tiny human being so dependent on the world of adults,
might never have children of her own.
Scully hoped and prayed that Barry Carlson was just starting his eternity in
Hell for what he had done. To his own child.
Just reading that chart had shaken Scully to the core. If Mulder hadn't been
there, putting a supporting hand on her shoulder, she might have run off
somewhere to cry in privacy. As it was that would come later. She might be
strong and professional, but she was only human, for Christ's sakes. And
what she had read made her sick. Made her want to hug this child so tightly
she'd never let go. Wanted to protect her from a past that was immutable.
"Can I talk to her alone?" Scully asked the nurse beside her.
"Kally, honey, this is Special Agent Dana Scully. She's with the FBI. She's
like the nice police ladies you talked to. Would you mind talking to her?"
Kally shrugged but remained silent.
"Just call me if you need me, or ring the buzzer, okay?" The nurse stepped
forward to place the oblong button unit in the child's hand.
As the nurse left, Scully crossed the room slowly and sat on the end of
Kally's bed. Giving her distance, yet close enough for confiding.
"Kally, do you know why you're in the hospital?" Scully started out slowly.
If the child couldn't recall then the questions ended here. She wasn't going
to push. The poor thing didn't need any more trauma in her life.
Kally nodded. "Because the monster ate my daddy." Her voice was small,
barely a whisper.
"The monster?" Scully cocked her head to one side, trying to understand.
"Are you an Angel?" The child looked right past Scully.
Dana turned to see an empty room...and Mulder. He was frowning and had that
little line between his brows.
"Can you see me?" he asked. Scully knew he wasn't talking to her.
"Uh-huh. Are you? An Angel?" Kally didn't seem to be afraid.
Scully was lost. Oh Lord. Son of a bitch. Christ. Her sanity had just been
confirmed by an eight year old. She could see Mulder. Somehow, someway, she
could see Mulder.
Then the absurdity of the child's question hit her, mixed with the stunned,
hit-in-the-back-of-the-head-with-a-brick expression on Mulder's face, she
felt the laugh bubble up before she could catch it. Too many emotions. She'd
run the gauntlet of them today. The relief and joy raced through her.
A small laugh escaped her and Mulder and Kally both looked at her like she
had just eaten a cricket.
"Kally, I seriously doubt he's anything as divine as an Angel," Scully
explained with a grin.
"Go ahead, boost my ego, Scully." Mulder muttered.
"You really can see him?" Scully asked, trying to...no, NEEDING to confirm it.
"Yes. He's right behind you." Kally frowned, not understanding the reason
for the question.
"Can you describe him?" Scully pressed. This, at least, was safe ground. The
harder questions needed to be asked yet. But for now this might draw Kally
out as well as take a four-month-long burden off Scully's mind.
"He's tall, dark hair, kinda big nose, square face and he has a dot on his
cheek. He's wearing blue jeans and a black V-necked sweater over a white
T-shirt."
Scully really wanted to hug this remarkable child. That was exactly what
Mulder looked like right now.
"Kally, it may not be a good idea for you to tell people you can see me.
It's your choice. I know you've kept too many secrets. Ones that shouldn't
have been kept. So it's your call." Mulder stepped a little closer to the
bed and the girl did not back away.
She nodded. "Because you glow. Other people don't see you, right? Nurse
Majors didn't talk to you or look at you."
Mulder smiled encouragingly. "That's right. Now...you said a monster ate
your father? Did you see it?"
"No." Her voice became small again. "I had my eyes closed. I was...There
were noises from the closet. Scratches. It scared me. Daddy came to my room
to...say goodnight. I had my eyes closed, but I heard the door's smash open
and Daddy screaming. Then...I don't remember until Mrs. Chisdok woke me up."
Mulder felt what passed for his body clench up. Say goodnight my ass.
Scully looked quickly at Mulder and met his eyes. Silently they agreed a lot
was going unsaid here. Mulder turned his attention back to Kally. He seemed
pleased that she not only saw him, but had no fear of him.
"You had your eyes closed, but you weren't asleep. Were you pretending to be
asleep? Playing a joke, maybe?" Mulder knelt by the side of the bed, so
Kally became the taller one. Giving her the height advantage could help her
feel more secure.
She shook her head quickly. "No, no. I wouldn't pretend to be asleep." Her
eyes were big again.
Scully felt a knot tighten in her stomach. Were any of those broken arms
from pretending to be asleep?
"Then why were your eyes closed? Was it because you were afraid of the thing
making the noises in the closet? Or something else? It's okay, Kally...I can
keep your secrets, just like you can keep mine." Mulder smiled softly but
made no move to touch the child.
Kally looked quickly at Scully.
"Agent Scully can keep secrets too. She's kept mine for a long time. She's a
very nice lady." Mulder assured the young girl.
Kally looked down at her hands. Hand that were twisting the bed sheet. "I
was going away." Her voice was just audible. Barely.
"Going away? To a safe place. To someplace where nothing could hurt you,
right? Somewhere sunny and bright." Mulder cocked his head to the side.
"Have you been there?" Kally's head snapped up and she looked at him with shock.
Now it was Mulder's turn to look down. He inhaled deeply and gripped the
side bars tighter. Scully felt her breath catch. Oh dear Lord.... There was
a whole huge chunk of his childhood they'd never talked about. She knew him
better than anyone, yet she realized, she barely knew his past at all.
He looked back up. "I know ABOUT the safe place. It's beautiful. Did you go
there a lot?"
Kally bit her lip and she didn't meet either agent's eyes. "I don't wanna
talk any more. I'm tired."
Any protest was cut off by Scully's cell phone. She extracted it from her
jacket and answered it.
"Scully." She looked at Mulder and nodded. "Good. I'll be right down and
waiting for it."
She tucked the cell phone away and smiled at Kally. "I have to go now. Would
it be okay if we came back to talk to you some other time? We can talk about
whatever you want."
Kally continued to chew her lip but nodded.
Mulder followed Scully into the hall. "I'm assuming that was Flowers on the
phone."
Scully didn't say anything until they were alone in the elevator. "They got
Barry Carlson cut loose and are bringing him to the morgue in this hospital."
"I just hope they got ALL of him. That house is gonna be drafty for a
while." Mulder leaned against the elevator's rail.
"Something tells me it needed airing out anyway." Scully didn't look at him.
XXX
1112 SPRING STREET
SCRANTON, PA
11:32 P.M.
Michael Dodson removed his headphones and kicked off his sneakers before
laying back on his bed. To his left, beyond the thin chipboard walls, the
furnace clicked on.
Michael hated living in the cellar. But since momma had Chucky and Billy,
he'd been kicked out to stay down here. He hated his brothers, almost as
much as he hated his momma and old man.
They were most likely upstairs griping that child welfare services didn't
haul him away like they had taken Chucky after Billy got admitted to the
hospital.
But he'd said he wanted to stay. He was sixteen, and the case worker decided
he was old enough to make up his own mind.
Bet that fucked up his 'rent's plans. It was their own damn fault they got
caught. Billy would most likely be shit stupid for the rest of his life
because of momma. With any luck they'd haul him into an institution and keep
Chucky in foster care and Michael could get his old room back.
He turned off the light and closed his eyes.
::Scritch, Scritch::
There was a rolling sound.
Michael switched the light back on and looked around his room. All he needed
was goddamn rats.
His baseball finished rolling across the floor to rock gently against the
wall for a second. His baseball had been shoved under his bed.
::Scritch, Scritch::
The sound was coming from under his bed. A rat. Big sucker, most likely. It
must have bumped the ball as it scurried around. Shit. He wasn't gonna sleep
in a room with no fucking rats.
He jumped out of bed and took one step toward the door when something
grabbed his ankle and gave a hard pull.
The floor rushed up to meet him.
Michael looked back. Whatever had his leg was under the bed. In the dark. It
started to pull him. He kicked at it. Whatever it was it was no fucking rat.
It was STRONG.
"Oh God! HELP!" He clawed at the concrete floor, trying to find purchase and
only finding a magazine and a sneaker.
"HELP!"
He thought he heard footsteps descending the cellar stairs. He wasn't sure
though. He was too busy screaming.
end part 2...