Chapter Three
Meanwhile in Detroit, another band of Richard’s friends were busy clearing out a path to escape from zombies which were attacking them at Michigan State University. One of them grabbed a shovel from a now dead landscaper and lobbed off the heads of 2 of the zombies who had broken through their line of defense.
“Dammit EvenButt! If you aren’t going to help fight, than do me a favor and don’t get in my way, Creeper!” Karma was at this point trying to remain semi-calm given the sheer horde of zombies which had been multiplying each time one went down. For it seemed like for each zombie they took out, 20 new ones showed up.
“I am NOT a creeper!” Evenkurugan replied. He took out his Playmate Sasha, a state-of-the-art Gatling gun*, and donned a pair of shades. “
I am so cool” he muttered before pulling Sasha’s trigger. As a spray of bullets rained out on the zombies, Sage and eture rushed up behind him and bopped Even on the head.
“
QUIET! They react to sounds!” Sage hissed at Even through clenched teeth.
All seemed quiet for now. The zombies they had been dealing with; were now simply a gooey mess on the ground, with thankfully no sign yet of additional zombies.
“It looks like the coast is clear” Cherub mentioned after looking around the corner.
“So what do we do now?” eture was unsure of what they should do at this point, as was everyone else.
“What about seeing Capt Richard? I’m sure he’ll be able to sort this out.” TAY3LOR threw the suggestion out since she had no other ideas. “He seems to know about zombies and such from all his books. Besides, it’s only about an hour’s drive to him from here.”
With no other ideas coming forward, everyone agreed that it would probably be for the best, although they might want to make sure he’s alright first. Even grabbed his cell and sent Capt Richard a text. “Well, at least texts can still be sent for the time being at least. Let’s hope he receives it and can reply.”
*****
As the team slowly made their way into the old mill, it felt like they weren’t alone. It was dark and dust covered everything, and the mill gave the appearance of being haunted, not just shut down and abandoned.
“Anyone know an interior decorator that would be interested in remodeling this place?” Stein asked jokingly, trying to lighten the mood a little.
“This place is
creepy” Horn commented, unsure of where to step for fear of stepping on a rotten floorboard and thus falling to his potential death below.
Capt Richard and Stein however hit the jackpot for creepiness. Their flashlights had come across the skull of a bull which was dangling on a rope above what looked like strips of shiny business cards. “What the hell?” Stein asked as Richard knelt to take a closer look.
He reached out to touch the material and found it had a leathery feel to it, smooth yet somewhat coarse in texture. And then he figured out what it was. “
HOLY s**t!” He stumbled backwards as adrenaline rushed through his body.
“What is it?” Panda asked as she headed over with Tamako and Djinii.
As they caught sight of the pile, Capt Richard cleared his throat. “It’s strips of human skin and flesh. Like someone shaved it off with a wood plane.”
Richard was interrupted however as he tried to regain some composure by his phone buzzing on vibrate. “That’s odd.” Taking out the phone, he noticed a text message from Evenkurugan asking if he was alright and that they were heading his way.
“What is it?” Tamako asked.
“It’s from my old Gaia friend Evenkurugan. He wants to know if he and the Detroit gang can head up here to help out.”
“The more help we can get, the better I think” Tamako replied.
Typing back his reply of being alright and to try and “borrow” a boat for the group to escape on if need be, he told Even to meet up with him at the old mill. “Hopefully they can find a boat to use.” Capt Richard muttered.
*****
As eture drove the team out towards Capt Richard at nearly twice the posted speed limit, Even got the text back from Capt Richard. After reading it, he scratched his head. “Why does he want us to borrow a boat? And where are we going to even
find one?!”
Karma glared at Even. “You’re so silly Even. We go to the boat show in the neighboring town to where Capt Richard is and get it from there. That’s so obvious!”
“Oh yeah?!” Even was getting annoyed with Karma at this point. “And just how do you propose we get to it without attracting attention?”
“We use Sasha” Karma replied with an evil smirk on her face.
“I’m not using my girlfriend for that!” Even took Sasha and nuzzled his cheek against the gun’s multiple barrels.
“Even, do we need to get you a psychiatric exam for having an erotic relationship with an inanimate object?” Sage looked back at Karma and Even as Karma asked that question.
“Even, I want you to be happy.” Sage said, gaining a dejected look of shock and dismay from Evenkurugan as his head dropped in shame. Karma burst out laughing before looking towards eture who had continued to drive throughout this debate.
“Hey! eture! A slight change of plans! Take us over to Highpoint and the Expo Center there. We’re going to take their finest boat from the boat show and use it to help Richard and his other friends out.”
Eture nodded in understanding. “A driver’s job description is driving. Leave it to me!” She took the exit for Highpoint and made her way through the empty streets towards their destination, all the while towing an unknown stowaway on the rear bumper of the van.
*****
Back inside the mill, Mocha kitty had gone off alone and was sitting in the Manager’s office when she thought she heard a soft tinkering noise from by the vicinity of the door. Shining her flashlight in the general direction, she didn’t see anything, and so she sat back down in the musty chair and looked through some of the papers on the desk. It seemed the mill had a darker history during its tenure in the community. For included in the pile were reports of workers who had suddenly disappeared from their stations and of strange sounds which bellowed from beneath the basement. It seemed workers had even at one time staged a protest to working in the basement because of the noises they would hear rising from the concrete floor, as if the building went even deeper than just the basement the workers and managers knew of.
Mocha kitty at this point was so engrossed in what she was dong, that she didn’t notice the door slowly closing ever so quietly. She wondered if some secrets could be found under the floor in the basement to help solve the mystery of at least what had happened with the workers and those apparent eerie sounds which had been heard so long ago during the mill’s operational years.
“
What happened back then?” she wondered.
Continuing to be lost in thought, a shadow appeared to crest the moonlight which shone through the office window, though no physical object could be visibly seen to be making it.
“
Mocha kitty…” A soft whisper echoed throughout the room, seemingly coming from everywhere, and nowhere at the same time. It had no defining characteristics of being male or female.
Mocha kitty shot her head up from the desk and looked around, shining her flashlight as she did so. “Who’s there?” she asked sternly. There was no response. Shrugging it off as her imagination, she resumed looking at the documents on the desk.
The shadow which was seen in the soft moonlight but wasn’t visible under the light from her flashlight, soon took a towering form over her as it bent over, It appeared the head of this shadow was now by the side of her face as once again, it called out.
“
Mocha kitty…”
Mocha kitty looked up once more as the door opened, and there was Djinni. Mocha kitty looked somewhat shocked as Djinni walked in. “Oh! It’s you. I thought for a moment my mind was playing tricks on me.” Mocha kitty caught her breath. The shadow figure had vanished as soon as Djinni opened the office door.
“Are you alright?” Djinni was confused as to what Mocha kitty meant by that, since she’d only just arrived.
“Fine! Anyway, you need to take a look at all this!” She pointed at the pile of papers and smiled. “It seems there’s more to this mill than meets the eye.”
“What is it?” Djinni walked over and glanced at a couple of the reports.
“Well, for starters, they seemed to have had problems with missing workers and strange noises in the basement throughout the life of the mill.”
Djinni rolled her eyes. “Oh
great! So we go from zombies out there to ghosts in here! That’s just perfect! My life is
now complete! I can die by zombies wanting to eat my brains, or be frightened to death by the supernatural! What a great selection of choices on how I want to die! It’s perfect, don’t you think?” Her tone of sarcasm was rather obvious.
“Ha, ha. Very funny Djinni.” Mocha kitty waved her hands and gave a “Whooo” before turning her attention back to the documents before them. “It may not be ghosts though. There might be something else such as zombies trapped beneath here.”
Djinni’s face went pale. “You know something Mocha kitty. Sometimes you can say things which freak me out.”
Mocha kitty smiled. “Thanks Djinni. I’m glad I can help. But in all seriousness, let’s get the others in here to take a look at this.” She then headed out of the office and called out to everyone to come over to the office on the upper level, as she had something to show them. As she called out, the shadow appeared once again on the wall behind her, seemingly reaching a pair of arms out towards her neck, but vanished as she turned around.
*Gattling gun:
