CHAPTER 012: Scary movie night, pt. 2
INT. SKY BREAKER TOWER, 23rd FLOOR. NIGHT
A woman dressed in a 1980's pants suit sneaked through cubicles. She then darted into one of them and fished through its drawers, retrieving a stapler.
Undoing her pony tail to use the scrunchies for a bit, she stapled an open stab wound on her leg shut. She wants to scream so bad, nearly biting the scrunchie in half, but she dare not; people are looking for her.
They wear finely tailored business suits, shined shoes, and balaclavas with a symbol of the moon expertly stitched in gold thread to the forehead.
"Where are you, miss secretary? Upstairs wants to discuss your future prospects at this company; we musn't keep them waiting now...."
She recognized the voice, and silently cursed its owner.
"Even Teddy at HR was in on it, damn it!"
She checked her cleavage to make sure the floppy disk was still there.
"With this, I can take them down!"
Suddenly, a man with a sledge hammer appeared from within the crowd. He shouted,
"Come out, come out wherever you are," before smashing every cubicle in sight.
"Thanks, whoever that idiot is. I can escape much easier now," she mused, moving at a crouched sprint under the cacophony of sound generated by the brute behind her.
She snuck into corridor hall, and approached the elevators at its terminus.
"Off... Out of order... Off... they're all off again. Wait, why isn't this one?"
This elevator was separate from the others. Its doors were wider, its movement was quieter, and it gave no indication of current floor from the outside. Indeed, the call button was a single gold button, with no up or down indicator carved upon it.
"This has to be a trap, right?"
"Hey guys, I found a shoe!"
"What are you waiting for, then? Whoever catches her gets a department wide bonus!"
She pushed the button, betting on the unknown. The elevator's interior was exquisite, and no movement could be felt while standing in it.
When it opened, she found herself on the roof. Only a small portion of it in the form of a path could be seen, however; the rest of the floor space was dominated by strange plants the secretary had never seen before.
Further down this path, the sound of chanting drifted over. It had a musical quality, feeding the very curiosity which set her down this path of no return to begin with.
She reached the source of the chanting, shocked by what she saw. 31 wizened old men in robes floated in a circular formation. They wore no masks, allowing their identities to be instantly affirmed.
"The board of directors?"
One of the old men floated toward the center of this mid-air circle. It was the CEO, and he was pointing right at her.
"The sacrifice has arrived! Let the ritual of increased quarterly performance commence!"
They swarmed her like hungry jackals, her screams not stopping until halfway through the credits.
"Wow, I gotta say; the original 'Satan inc' really holds up," Rock praised in between bites of liver and onion.
"You must be mad, the remake is clearly superior. The CEO was a fossil here! At least the remake had the good sense to cast Ryan Gooseling," Paper countered.
"I don't know, this one feels both more realistic and more exploitative at the same time... What do you think, Antonio?"
They all turned towards the hot mess at the end of the couch.
"Can we go to bed now?"
His smile remained, but it had seen better days. His eyes shuddered occasionally, and he rocked back and forth without realizing it.
"No way," Scissors protested. "We still haven't watched 'my drowned boyfriend' yet!"
He gave up arguing, and directly fled the encounter. The three heroes collectively broke into a fit of laughter, one which lasted until their sides hurt.
"Hey, where's Baba," Paper asked.
"It's late, she probably went to bed," Rock guessed.
Meanwhile, on the third floor, Logan was having a heated conversation with his grand master.
"I need you to tell me what that old woman is," he requested while cracking his knuckles.
The grand master, however, was lost in his own thoughts.
"Is this that spiritual qi the locals always seem to favor?"
"Hey, nose hair!"
"Ah! What? Let me deal with the ghost, you focus on absorbing that star crystal before that test tomorrow."
"So helpful! Who are you, and what have you done with my master?"
His audible sigh of relief somewhat undercut the quip.
"What'll I ever do with this disciple," the ghostly grand master complained while sinking through the floor. However, he was stopped by a wall of energy when he tried to sink into the basement.
"This really is spiritual qi! But where is she getting all this energy to power such complex formations?"
He took another minute or two to study the wall blocking his path. With many questions, he circled around the living room and floated down the stairs leading to the basement.
While the parts visible from upstairs looked normal, past that was like stepping into a time machine. Hallways spread out in every direction, resembling a spider's web from above. And, in each of these hallways, a different time period was reflected. One looked to be a Viking dining hall, another was decorated like a mid-evil castle throne room, and a third looked exactly like the inside of a hippie bus.
Unfortunately, as both an alien and someone who could see the flow of energy, this maze's delights and tricks proved no distraction. Zooming through several different chambers, he finally reached his destination: a hall constructed to look exactly like a speakeasy.
On the stage at the other end of the hall stood old lady Baba. She had ditched her usual practical attire in favor of a strapless red dress with a slit on one sit running all the way up to the mid thigh. The noisy clogs she wore when doing chores were now a stunning set of stiletto heels. Even her countenance seemed different, displaying a much more seductive and dangerous side of herself.
"I take it you weren't pleased with move night? It must have given your boy quite a fright," she sang into the microphone in front of her.
The grand master gulped, his only memory of a more stressful encounter being the time he fought that planet sized monster.
"Where did you learn these techniques? How are you making such massive stores of a depleted energy like spiritual qi? Why are you using a house as a conduit?"
"Ooh, I like a man with brains," she said while leaning forward to show off her cleavage. The old ghost appeared younger, now looking not a day over 65.
"Enough! You have offended me once by targeting my precious disciple; teach me some skills and I might just forgive you."
"I don't know... Sometimes a good battle can teach you more than ten thousand pieces of prose. Let's change to a more appropriate venue."
The scenery around them turned blue, before changing entirely. It now resembled a Japanese love hotel, complete with heart shaped bed and everything.
"Come, show me what a ghost from beyond the stars can do!"