UAKM4

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UAKM4
Chapter of Under A Killing Moon
Chapter 4 of Under A Killing Moon
Chronology
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Waking Dreams -

TO BE NAMED

What Happened

Discovery

The silence of the basement beneath the Goodwill has been broken by Ethan's cry of shock and pain. As he, Michael and Atlas were trying to comprehend what happened and what to do next, a voice called down from the store above. Officer Baker calling down to Dr Clarke with sharp urgency. Michael and Atlas decided not being there would be wise and hid amidst the sacks and shadows out of sight, just in time before Baker came down the stairs. He didn't even stop to look around, barely noticed Ethan's injured hand, just headed straight for the doctor and shepherded him upstairs while telling him what to say if anyone asked. Getting the story straight. He had been with him the entire time, they had just gone in for the torch, hadn't touched anything.

A boxy van with BCPD markings pulled up across the mouth of the alley just as Baker and Ethan got out of the building. Two guys who looked more suited to an office got out wearing CSI vests and carrying heavy equipment, exchanged a few words with Baker and headed down into the basement, their torches cutting bars of painful brilliance into the gloom. One of them cursed under his breath when the torchlight settled on damaged wall; someone had interfered with their crime scene. He pulled out a phone and headed for the stairs to get signal when a sudden noise came from a corner of the room.

Michael had been doing his very best to stay quiet. It was something he was well practiced in, but something was bothering him. Why did the CSI guys need torches when there was plenty of light coming down from the shop's skylight? The scuffed and filthy skylight that wasn't even in direct line of sight with the basement stairs was letting in enough weak winter daylight to see one floor down? Wait. The eyes... Michael couldn't stop himself from muttering a curse at the realisation. One of the torches panned over him, dazzlingly bright in the dark corner he was hiding in. Instinct kicked in. Unable to hide, he ran, shoving past the CSI investigator on the stairs, through the shop and out into the alleyway at full sprint away from everything.

Consequence

Michael's headlong sprint crossed paths with Jerome. They recognised each other after a brief chase and head back toward the Goodwill on Jerome's suggestion that they maybe could do something to help Atlas still inside. By the time got back there, circling around to approach from a different angle and giving Michael time to make himself less recognisable there was no chance to get in unnoticed. More CSI suits and BCPD officers were on the scene, and the two were waved off before they could get close. They noticed Ethan just outside the cordon, looking lost and forgotten in the chaos, and worked their way around to him. Ethan was incredulous about their plans and, when it became obvious that Baker was not coming back to help him, called a taxi to Felicity Memorial.

At Felicity Memorial's Emergency Room, Ethan had the joy of recieving the care of Dr Arcand, who was stuck working ER due to shortages and having pissed off someone higher up. He enjoyed the opportunity for some schadenfreude before seen off by Dr Monroe. She stitched up Ethan before sending him home for a few days, he was no use to her with one hand. On his way out, Ethan headed up to the labs to beg a favour. He sold the lab tech a story about being concerned about the guy who bit him and convinced them to run some tests on the blood sample he had scraped from the wall.

Back in the Goodwill, Atlas remained hidden in the shadows, unseen and unnoticed as the CSI techs worked their way around the scene inch by inch. They photographed and noted and annotated each mark and footstep and piece of debris, studiously avoiding the verminous depths of the room far from the scene itself, and chatting as they worked. In between discussions of relationships and childrens' little league games, there were snippets of gossip about the case and Atlas listened hungrily and hoped she would remember them all. There was no sign the body had been contorted post-mortem but also no bruises consistent with the amount of force needed to cause ... that... Maybe the tox results would tell them something...

Night Fall

A couple of blocks away from the Goodwill, at a diner whose sign read "Jake's Griddle" when all the neon was working, Michael and Jerome sat with over waffles and a lot of coffee, watching and waiting for the last of the BCPD vehicles to leave the scene. They talked to fill the time, sharing the strange things that they had experienced in the past few days. Michael told Jerome what he had seen in the others' eyes, the way their eyes had caught the light, and his realisation that they had been seeing in the dark of the basement. Jerome shared the experience with the strange man in grey at the gym and the instinctive surge of violence against Chet, a feeling that Michael had also felt when he had driven the broken bottle deep into Jacob's side.

Time passed, grey twilight descending into night, and still a patrol car lingered by the Goodwill. The crowd in the diner thinned out to only a half-dozen lonely souls lingering in the warmth rather than face the cold January night. Someone came in, a rail-thin man in long coat and shades, the sounds of night birds seeping in with him through the open door. He headed straight for Michael and Jerome's table and settled into an empty chair with a wide smile, reached across the table with a cursory greeting and picked up the salt shaker. With a brittle crunch he bit into the shaker, blood and glass shining between his teeth as he savoured the meal. He thanked Michael for introducing him to the new taste and felt he should share it. A cold and hollow need spread across the diner, enveloping everyone within. A yawning pit of bone-deep hunger opened up and the glass looked delectable... Michael and Jerome resisted the awful urge and watched in horror as people around them began to give in to monstrous hunger. Amidst the cacophony of splintering, crunching, wet tearing sounds and whimpered cried of pain and appreciation, the man flashed a predatory smile, tipped his glasses to Michael to show pinprick pupils, and took his leave.

Michael and Jerome fled, covering a block before getting enough wits about them to stop. They lingered, unsure and afraid, until Atlas found them, having slipped out of the Goodwill once the CSI had left. The three traded stories, Michael and Jerome looking haunted by the sight of the diner, and insistent they get moving before someone notices them. Atlas shared Ethan's number and Jerome called him, arranging for them all to meet in Memorial Park - not the safest place but open at night - and trade tales. No-one knows what us going on and while Ethan tries to keep a sense of rationality and normality, it is wearing thin. Ideas like mass psychosis are all that he can call on but even that is wearing thin. Michael seized on the idea of hunger - hunger of flesh that consumed Jacob, hunger for the glass. They decide to meet the next day and visit the weird shop in Fallon Heights. Maybe it just does patchoulli and crystals, but it could be something? Along the way, odd dreams are mentioned and and the realisation hits that they are sharing the same dream... something is very wrong with the world...

People Appearing (in order of appearance)

Locations

Notes

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