WnW 1.6 Say Nothing

My bag rattled with items as I sifted through everything I had brought. Sitting on the steps of a church, holding my flashlight in my mouth, I took stock of what I had. Rope, duct tape, first aid kit, pepper spray… My fingers brushed the sheath of the hunting knife I borrowed from my mother and I shivered. I didn’t know if I had it in me to actually kill something. I was hoping Chase would take care of it.

Some branches rustled and I jerked my head up to stare at the hedgerow lining the church property. The beam of my flashlight briefly illuminated the blur of some small rodent or squirrel as it disappeared into the leaves. The spotlight moved to rest on the barrier that signaled the beginning of Old Town. At one point the boundaries of the city district were probably somewhere else, but as barricades began to be placed down, around ten years ago, the boundaries began to be defined by where you couldn’t drive and where bright yellow signs warned of falling rocks.

People were suspicious of course. The enclosed area seemed to stretch further than where rocks falling from the unstable Sill could really be considered an issue. Businesses had already been moving out of the area, and some wondered if it wasn’t because the city had asked them to, but instead because of the violent gang wars that had occurred around that time frame, back when I was a kid.

There was the haggard sound of someone yelling, off in the distance. Sirens wailed at irregular intervals. I curled up, wrapping my arms around my legs and resting my chin on my knees. It was scary being this deep into the city at night. It felt like a different world, where each noise felt isolated, like they came from different islands in a vast, dark ocean.

I checked the time. Chase was late. There was something about the guy, strange as he was, that made my fears go away. Maybe it was his unflappable confidence. There was no way I could have done this alone, but with Chase it felt like there was nothing that could go wrong that he couldn’t handle with a smile.

I heard someone whistling, getting closer, and fixed my flashlight on the entrance to the church lot. After a moment of deliberation, I turned off my light.

A shadow of a person stopped in front of the church lot entrance. They pivoted on a heel to face me and the whistling stopped.

“All ready to go, my fellow hunter?” Chase’s voice called out.

I breathed out and hoisted my bag onto my back. “Yeah. Ready.”

His features became more clear as I approached him. He eyed the backpack. “Looks heavy. What ‘cha got in there?”

I shrugged. “You’re not bringing anything?”

A switchblade flashed between his fingers for a second, making me jump, before he showed his empty palms, wiggling his fingers like a magic trick.

I sighed. “I feel like a gun would make this easier.”

Chase ignored me and started walking towards the barricade. “Let’s get a move on. We’re wasting the night.”

I hurried after him. “Have you ever been to the Old Town?” I asked.

“Nope”

I stepped in front of Chase and jumped up onto the base of the concrete blockade. “Then let me lead so we don’t get lost,” I said as I squeezed through a gap. “The streetlights aren’t working, so it’ll be dark.”

I started down the street, watching the stores to our right. The windows had been smashed and graffiti tags crowded the walls, giving them texture. My shoes crunched on broken glass as I looked at messages left by spray cans and stencils.

We came to an intersection and I had to stand directly next to the street sign to read it.

“How come you aren’t using that flashlight?” Chase asked in a relaxed voice. “Scared of something?”

“Damn right I am,” I whispered back. “The Rings run these streets.”

“Rings?” Chase asked, pointing to some messy art of a chain of interlocking rings, made with black paint. 

“Gangs. I grew up hearing about turf wars on the news. I don’t want to run into any of them.” We walked past an apartment building with some actually good graffiti art. It depicted a young indigenous teen holding a missile with his bare hand, the rocket’s fiery trail spelling out Sticks and Stones.

The next street was the one we wanted. That nostalgic, sick feeling started to stir inside me again, so I asked a question to distract myself, “Did anyone else get away?”

“Hm?”

“At the asylum. People who didn’t turn into monsters.”

Chase was quiet for a bit, then he responded, “Just me, I’m afraid.”

I ignored the art of the man with a street sign for a head, even though my awareness of it still made me feel like heat was emanating off of it.

We stopped in front of the parkade. Dark and silent. It was at least six stories, with a bridge connecting it to the mall next to it. There was a banner advertising glasses on the side of the mall, “See What You’re Missing!” The man was smiling but the banner was ripped halfway down, making his hand that was holding the glasses look like it was hanging on by a thread, dangling in the breeze.

I sucked in a deep breath and faced the parkade again. “People could get hurt by it,” I said. “That’s why we have to do this.”

Chase patted my shoulder. “A noble cause, milord. Your friends will laud you as a hero.”

I shook my head and turned on the flashlight. The beam cut through the shadows, revealing parking lines and concrete beams. “I don’t really have many friends. Just one, but he’s always busy.”

I heard the flick of Chase’s knife snapping open. “Your parents, then?”

I squeezed the flashlight tighter. “No way I’m telling either of them. Mom would die of shock. Dad…” I’m scared he would encourage it. “Nevermind. They’re separated anyway, so I don’t talk to him much. I guess I’m doing this because it feels more worthwhile than what I was doing before. Just going through the motions. Like my body isn’t even my own.”

“Hmm.”

I turned to Chase. He had found the stairs and was examining the sign next to them. 

“Looks like there’s a few underground floors. We should split up.”

“Fuck that!” I hissed, looking nervously behind us. “Strength in numbers. What if one of us gets got?”

“Nick,” Chase cajoled, “we need to flush this thing out. If we drive it up, it could escape into the mall. I’ll start at the top, you start at the bottom. We’ll meet in the middle.”

“Why do I have to start at the bottom?”

Chase patted his ribs. “It’s going to be slow going for me, with this injury. If you ‘get got’ probably better for me to be going down stairs instead of up, no?”

The fear crept along my body like cold water. I shuffled anxiously. “Splitting up is such a bad idea.”

“Nick.” Chase’s face was serious. “You wanted in. This is what you signed up for. I’ve been doing this for a while solo. I need to know that I can trust you to handle yourself. The last thing I need is for some wailing kid to be clutching at my leg, weighing me down as I hunt.”

I shut my eyes and breathed in, shoving the emotions down. 

“You gonna man up?”

“Yeah,” I breathed.

Chase’s grin returned. “Then I’ll see you in the middle. Just yell if you find it, it’s quiet enough, I’ll hear you for sure.”

I followed him into the stairwell. “Hold on,” I said, fishing around in my back pocket. Chase waited, foot already on the first step upwards. I handed him a penlight. He raised an eyebrow at me.

“Better than nothing. Don’t try to fight it alone,” I told him.

“Awww. Are you worried about me?” Chase asked.

“I’ll be there to help,” I said seriously. “You can trust me.”

He pocketed the penlight and started to climb. I stared at the steps going down. The flashlight made the handrail’s shadow quiver.

I descended, feeling like my footsteps could be heard five blocks away. There was trash strewn about the stairwell but most of it was so trodden down and decayed that it had nearly turned to dust. Soon there were no more stairs and I was standing in front of a door, B2 painted on the wall beside it.

I pushed down the bar to open it and the door scraped open with some resistance. I cringed at the noise it made. The door didn’t quite fit the frame, bending slightly inwards and it stayed ajar after I let it go.

My flashlight beam swung from left to right. The dust particles hung in the air like they were caught in stasis. Pipes stretched across the ceiling, painted yellow and red. The light settled on a car that was shrouded in a brown cover. Someone had left it here.

Quiet as possible, I walked forward, paying close attention to each concrete pillar, where anything could be hiding. I could still hear Chase walking up the steps. Reaching the first pillar, I peered around it. I wrinkled my nose. There was a rusty brown splotch that covered most of the wall. A leaky pipe? I shone the light upwards, but no pipes were close enough to the pillar for that explanation to make sense. 

I froze. Was it just my imagination, or were Chase’s steps getting louder?

I waited and listened. The scrape of shoes on concrete was getting more pronounced. Why would Chase be coming already? My thoughts fixated on one possibility. They used to be human. It could still be wearing shoes. Heart beating quickly, I kept still.

The footsteps stopped at the bottom of the stairs. Then a faint light played across the floor. I sighed in relief. The penlight. 

I stepped out of hiding. “Chase, what are you doing?” I raised my hand to shield my eyes as the light aimed at me. I squinted at the person holding the light.

The figure started running towards me.

“Chase?” I asked again, alarmed. I took a step back.

An unfamiliar voice rang out, “Found you, bitch!”

I scrambled, turning to run, instincts screaming at me for being so foolish. A heavy weight hit me from behind and I fell, scraping my cheek against the concrete.

“Haha! Caught me an urban explorer!” The voice crowed. I felt something hard press against the back of my head. “Got anything good in here?” He tugged at my backpack. 

“N-no,” I stammered.

“Shut up and give it,” he ordered. The object left my head. I let him pull the backpack off of me and heard him unzip it. “Fuck… nothing?” he muttered.

I rolled over slowly. It was a middle-aged man. I couldn’t see his face in the dark, but the light from his phone let me see his arm as it rummaged through my backpack. It was covered in tattoos and as he pulled his hand back out, I saw that he had black bands around his fingers. A Rings member. His gun glinted from where he had tucked it into his waistband. A pistol or a small SMG.

“Please, I don’t have anything-”

“Shaddap!” He shouted loudly, putting the bag on his back and pulling out his gun again. He gestured it at me, wiggling the barrel. “Wallet and phone. Gimme them shoes too. Fuckin’ kids running around our turf and they think we ain’t gonna run those pockets.”

A chill ran down my spine. Something moved in the dark behind him, at the edge of the shadow made by my flashlight. A pale figure.

“Stop playing,” the man said, gesturing urgently. He wasn’t staying still for a moment. “Take those shoes off!”

I pointed. “There’s someone-”

The man came close, shoving the barrel under my chin. I closed my eyes and a small whimper left my mouth. I felt the man’s hot breath. “I swear to God no one will find you down here. Shoes.”

I had no bravery left. I obeyed, taking off my shoes, feeling the grit of the parkade through my socks. The shoes were snatched from my hands. I handed him my flashlight too, but he smacked it out of my hands.

“Why the fuck would I want that?”

Opening my eyes again, the pale shadow had gotten closer. It was another person. Naked and covered in what looked like brown rust, they slowly walked towards us. A homeless person?

The man saw my expression and finally looked over his shoulder. “Ay man,” he called out, gesturing threateningly. “You his friend? Back off or you’re gonna get filled with holes.”

The person didn’t respond. The man wasn’t holding his light steady, but the glimpses of the naked person’s face showed skin that sagged heavily around their facial features, with sunken eyes and lower gums that were fully exposed with how much their lips hung down. Completely hairless. They didn’t blink.

I started to back away.

“Ay!” The mugger shouted. “Stay where you are!” He pivoted, walking up to the person-thing with a confident swagger. “You want some too? I swear I will-” his confident words trailed off. 

The thing lunged at him and he scrambled to one side. 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” He backed up a few paces as the thing turned towards him. He kept backing up, until his back bumped into the old abandoned car. He dropped his phone, the light pointlessly shining at the ceiling.

“Shit, shit!” The man said, panicking.

I heard the thing take one more step and then the sound of gunshots ripped through the underground. Lights flashed, catching the thing in frames of stop-motion as it expanded. Ballooning outwards, skin stretching, bulging, and cracking. There was a sickening crunch, and the man went quiet.

The car alarm didn’t sound, even though the chassis was bent and broken. The flesh withdrew, strings of blood caught in the light for a moment. A smear of red across the brown car cover was all that was left.

I stared, petrified, at the spot where I knew the monster stood, shrouded in darkness, the old dried blood covered in a fresh coating.