122

You set down your AK-47 on the side of the desk, take a seat, and look over the first stack of papers closest to you. As you turn to face the paperwork, the chair squeaks, startling you. Your head is still foggy from lack of sleep and anything to eat yet today, but you chuckle for being so jumpy.

A noise from the hallway causes you to look up. Floorboards groan. A light scratching noise resonates through the hall like the sound of an animal scurrying. A heavy odor flows through the air. Death. Something is coming.

As you stare at the hall through the doorway, a long, blurry shadow passes—a tall figure casting a wavy image across the floor.

A man steps into view, old and gray with thin strands of coarse white hair sticking out of his scalp. He stares further down the hall. A long white, linen robe hangs from his bony frame, a golden cross embroidered on the sleeve. His head bobbles back and forth with a red, square-shaped ridged hat adorning the top and a golden tassel hanging behind. His skin is prunish with long trenches of sagging skin and dark yellow lesions crusting out. Slender fingers hang like tree twigs waving in the wind. Air whistles from his throat in sickening streaks. Though he stands at the door unmoving, he makes no indication of noticing you. But you still hear the drawn-out scratching and shuffling noise from the hall now multiplied. Could there be more of them?