City of Shadows Mux City of Shadows Mux

What Kind of Monster - Down in the Dark
We're gonna hunt him, and he's gonna die scared...
Players Colt, John	June 6, 2022 Colt and John go to explore an abandoned building that they suspect the homeless have taken up residence in, but find it strangely empty. After looking in the Hisil and seeing the scars on the building, they decide to explore, and find something terrible.
CONTENT WARNING: Involves an NPC victim of human trafficking and captivity. Involves depictions of imprisonment and the effects of abuse, including forced drug use and implications of assault. Be safe, please. Roseland is, for the most part, a quiet, residential neighborhood. But it's jutted up against by one of the poorest, most run down neighborhoods in Chicago -- West Pullman and Old Pullman, the wasteland left over from the railroad company town founded there once upon a nightmare ago. This means, of course, that on the fringes of the lovely neighborhood is a not-so-lovely area full of abandoned foundries, factories, and rusted out husks of buildings that once served the larger community that's long since disappeared. And it's one of these buildings that Colt finds himself standing out side of. Having texted a selfie to John, inviting the man to come explore the building with him, Colt leaning against a door that *conveniently* saw the padlock fall off, rust from the screws still falling down the door like blood. Today's shirt is a black tank top showing off his shoulders, with green letters that state "I keep forgetting about Dre." The jeans and shoes are largely the same, though he's added an across-the-chest backpack to the mix today. "So the whole Eminem thing is your fault?" That's John's greeting, as he exits an SUV that is perhaps a touch *too* conspicuous in this neighborhood. He wears a cheap dark green t-shirt with 'Albert Anderson Raby Community Center' silk-screened onto the front, and blue jeans that cost more than a box of those t-shirts. His shoes are practical, cross-trainers without much wear and tear. He shakes his head, grinning as he approaches, until he can reach out a hand to Colt. "So what's up with this place," he asks, brow furrowing slightly above a warm smile. "What caught your eye, here?" "Absolutely," Colt agrees, nodding his head at the accusation of the Eminem thing, returning the grin. Placing his hand on his chest, he offers, faux apologetically, "mea maxima culpa. But I made up for it," he adds. "I taught Christian Gray *all* that shit." Taking a few steps backwards, he leans over, catching the door with a toe and letting it sliiiiiide open. The inside is dark, naturally, as there are few windows that aren't boarded up, though a little bit of light shines through from the cracks. Even from here, the smells of general human habitation in less-than-pleasant conditions can be found. Urine and unwashed bodies and worse things, most of it old and fading. Not overpowering, but not exactly subtle. "It's dark," he answers. "And old. And people were there. Probably still are, though I doubt they're here right now." He points to the padlock. The lock is new, but the slab of metal was very much not. Something replaced easily enough, and probably offering only the appearance of security, as the building likely has multiple ways in. "And I figured that, maybe, you'd wanna go poke around with me." "You're fifty shades of hilarious," John says, shaking his head as he follows Colt toward the door. He closes his eyes briefly as the smell rushes out of the door and over him, and shakes his head. "You get me," he says, snorting a laugh. His voice is hushed, not from any sense of intimacy (this time), but so that it doesn't carry to anyone inside. "Exactly the sort of thing I'm interested in." The Rahu leans in behind Colt, peering into the darkness of the building's interior. "It's peak season for the unhoused in Chicago, and you know what that means for Roseland." Colt looks over at him, grinning. "Yeah, well," he whispers right back, their hearing good enough that they barely have to make a sound. "Never let it be said that I don't know how to show someone a good time," he laughs, leaning over to bump John's shoulder playfully with his. He lets the door close behind them, cutting off most of the sources of light and giving their eyes a chance to adjust to the dark. Taking a few tentative steps inside, opening himself up to the wolf's senses, even more is revealed. Spots of blood, here, there. Some splattered from fights. Some probably just the stains left over from needles, or cuts from the broken glass. There's a heavy smell of rust in the air, and the boards beneath their feet sag in a manner that some might find a little worrisome. Giving John a nod, he starts down the hallway, beckoning the man to follow. Apparently, it's time to see what they can see. John stops just inside for a moment, letting his senses adjust and then acclimate to the smells and sounds here. "Blood," he whispers, but not in alarm -- he, too, understands what it is. He pushes at the give in the floor with one foot until it creaks dangerously, then again, before following toward Colt, staying near the wall. "Wood floor," he muses, "There must be a basement, right?" He searches out the corners, the far walls, the doors, exploring the place in his mind also, as the pair make their way through. "Almost have to be," Colt answers. "This whole place used to be a giant-ass swamp. They drained it, but not before half the damn city sank." He looks over at John. "Pretty sure you're familiar with a lot of it. Your boy the creepy giant seems to run that show." Colt doesn't bother staying close to the wall. But then again, he barely makes a sound as he moves, and the few that he does make seem almost intentional in their precision. "Gotta have a way to get under the building and sometimes, literally, jack it up. Especially with brick." At the end of the hall, past side rooms full of old, dirty cloth, discarded hypodermics, food and alcohol containers, condoms, and everything else one might expect to be in such a place, are a set of double doors. John can already tell, though, that the area beyond is mostly open, empty, from the way that the sounds of the breeze move against the walls, giving the man a pretty clear idea of what lays beyond -- a large, open basement area, and a large, open area beyond the doors. Colt gives the door a try, but finding some resistance, he braces his shoulder against the door, preparing to give it a shove. "Careful," John warns softly, his senses suddenly on alert. Not 'stop' or 'wait', though. Just a word of warning before Colt pushes through. "It seems empty, but if it's not, this is a dangerous spot." He bounces twice on the balls of his feet, then steps up close behind Colt, hand on his shoulder. The Blood Talon is ready, as if the two were about to breach a hostile room. Colt pauses at the hand on his shoulder, looking back at John for a moment and offering the man an easy grin. "Where's the fun in 'careful'?" Still, he's an Irraka. They're the least likely to do something extremely reckless. Bracing himself, he bears down on the door, opening the rusted thing with a grinding groan. John's perceptions were, naturally, pretty close: the area inside is largely open space, maybe a newsroom or an office of some kind a century before, brick columns supporting a ceiling that's collapsed in almost half the places, letting in light from above and giving a view of the floors there. Here and there, ladders have been propped up to allow for faster access to the floors through the ceiling, this place having been used by someone for a very long time, despite how absurdly dangerous it is in its current form. Colt steps through, just taking it in. "Hoooooly shit," he whispers, eyes wide as he just takes in the sight. "This place is like a playground!" This time, it's his turn to bounce on the balls of his feet a bit, looking excited. "...or something," John adds, stepping in behind Colt. His eyes travel up and up, and as he steps in he turns a one-eighty, looking around at the space above them. "People have..." He glances aside to Colt, shaking his head at the state of it all, and then back up to where holes in the roof let in sunlight, "...really *settled* here, huh?" It doesn't sit well with him, for some reason. His lip curls, the bridge of his nose wrinkles, but that's all brief. By the time he reaches the base of one of the ladders, his expression is back to curious. He reaches out with one hand to test it, pulling it away from where it leans, pushing down on a rung, and shrugs. Colt catches some of that, the smile diminishing a bit. "Yeah," he agrees. "Yeah. They have." This time, it's his turn to move up behind John, reaching up to put a hand on the man's shoulder. "You know," he sighs. "There are worse options. At least it's out of the rain, and the wind." It's probably not the most reassuring thing, given that there are certainly *better* alternatives. The ladder is old, and wooden as well, not the newer aluminum ones. probably ones found in the building already, used for cleaning exterior windows or general maintenance. They feel sturdy enough for use, but certainly aren't the safest either. Everything on the ground floor is the dull grays and browns of things left too long in the dirt, gathering dust and mold until all semblance of color is washed out. Moss grows along the brick in places, giving hints of vibrant greens and dark blacks to the browns and grays. "Yeah, there are people living worse," John agrees, turning to nod at Colt, his hand still resting on one rung of the ladder. Almost reluctantly, he lets it fall away, then steps back to crane his neck, giving what he can see of the upper levels a more thorough inspection from the ground floor. That done, he wanders the length of the room, stooping to shift one bundle of ragged cloth with the toe of his shoe. "Seems empty right now, but..." He shakes his head slightly, "Is something telling you it isn't? I'm going to take a peek at the other side." He crouches, forearms resting on his kneees, and asks, "Keep an eye out?" Colt lets the hand fall away, giving John space to explore. The bundle of cloth that John turns over with his foot turns out to be an old baby doll, dressed in what was probably once frilly lace, but has been soiled by all manner of dirt and filth since then. The doll alone tells the story of what kind of desperation and suffering the people in this part of the city must feel in order to come here -- those that are too young to have a choice even worse than the adults. Colt gives a little nod, though. "People smells are too recent," he agrees, looking around. "You can still make out footprints in the dirt. This place isn't closed enough that those should still be here after more than a couple of days." They can both feel the breeze blowing through broken windows and the holes in the ceiling. "They haven't been gone long." When John asks him to keep a lookout, though, he looks at first like he's going to object. But then, begrudgingly, he gives a nod. "Be careful." John reaches out to place one hand against the wall, balancing himself as he crouches. He closes his eyes, take a deep breath, and when he opens them they're distant, as if staring off at nothing. He wears a frown of concentration as he sweeps his head from side to side, then rises. He turns slowly, reaching out with his free hand until it finds the same wall, then continues that slow spin until he has turned full around. Spirit senses show John a different world entirely. The building is still there, but the spirits are obvious. Spirits of pain like chunks of molten glass spiked with jagged needles like a demented porcupine, and spirits of deprivation like rail thin, sickly-looking men and women with sunken, impossibly elongated faces and empty, black eyes. Spirits of ecstasy make their sighing, shuddering gasps and moans, while spirits of desire -- watch Colt. Watch him a bit too carefully, following the werewolf and sweeping up all the little motes that he gives off. But there's something else, too. Something reflected in the spirit that isn't reflected in the physical. In the center of the room, a black, yawning pit, just radiating feelings of foreboding and fear. Spirits linger along the periphery, yellow eyes shinining in the dark as elongated fingers stretch spiderlike and wicked-looking out from the shadows. "This is..." John's attention goes inevitably toward that black chasm in the room's center, despite that there's much to see. The spirits that hover nearby, the way certain of them are drawn to Colt, but that sinister gulf can't help but dominate his attention. "I don't know what this is," he admits, watching the darkness as those spindly fingers seem to threaten to drag horrors from its depths. "This place is wrong." He shudders as his senses snap back to the mundane, and his eyes quickly find Colt. "There's something here. A..." He searches for the word, shaking his head. "Pit. Something. I don't know." Colt turns to look where the man is looking. On his side of the gauntlet, it looks like nothing more than a particularly rotted section of floor, the carpet eaten away in a large circle as water from the ceiling dripped down from above. "Well." Colt can't see what John is seeing, of course, and he doesn't have the gift of the Ithaeur to have his senses in both realms at once. "Pits go down. Right?" A look at John, then, and then back to the circle. "So. Let's go find out what *down* looks like." He moves along the wall, checking for doors or steps that lead down, given that the floor is, miraculously, mostly instact. Coming to one that looks like a likely candidate, he tries to open it, and the thing doesn't even so much as budge. It barely makes a sound against the bolts, and looks like newer metal. Recently replaced or refitted, maybe, from what John knows of the doors at the Center. It seems out of place. "Alright," Colt mutters. "This could be promising." "Down we go," John agrees, following along behind Colt. When they come to the newer door, he shakes his head, grimacing. "That's going to be tougher to get through." He casts a glance back at the moldy section of floor, thinking, and then back at the door. "Do we give it a try together? Or..." Another look over his shoulder, and he hesitates before he asks, "...find some way to get through that? I have a shovel in the back of the Land Rover; we could maybe pry up some of the floorboards." Colt takes a step away from the door, looking back at John. And then looking him up and down before looking at the door. "You don't look like you skip too many gym sessions," Colt muses, "but I think that even you and me together would have trouble getting through that door. You hit it hard enough and you're more likely to just knock out whatever kind of support structures it's attached to, and uh..." He looks around at the crumbling building. "I like you, but I'd rather not be buried with you. I usually save that kind of thing for third dates." He looks back at the flor, and then back at the door. "I don't like the idea of going through the floor, though," he admits. "Kind of the thing about a Pit. Down is the easy part. Back up can be kind of a bitch." "I don't even know if..." John clearly doesn't want to think about how long he could surived, trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building. He scrunches his face, shakes his head. "Figure out something better for a third date -- I'm getting that shovel." It takes a minute, but John does indeed return, shovel in hand. It has a short, collapsible metal handle, and a spade that is serrated on one side. Bought for spelunking, not gardening. He takes a moment readying it for use, unfolding the handle, screwing a metal collar into place, and places the tip between two of the floorboards. "Here goes," he says, looking up to Colt with a grin. He leans on the handle, and the grin spreads into a smile as the board starts to come up. That smile turns into shout, though, as the board behind it breaks under the weight of the lever, and then the several boards around it give way. "Fu---" John shouts, as he crashes through the floor and into the basement. Colt's eyes widen as John falls through the floor. The smaller wolf runs over, leaping up along one of the support columns and grabbing one of the support beams to avoid putting weight on the collapsing floor. "John?!" he calls, looking down into the hole. There's very little chance that the man is dead, so he doesn't sound *panicked*, but certainly doesn't sound very cool and collected, either. Spotting the other wolf, though, he lets out a breath, dropping down into the hole. His feet come down on either side of John, knees bending to absorb the shock of his weight in a way that makes the landing seem almost soft. "I dunno," he laughs, sinking down a bit so that he's straddling over the man, but putting no weight on him. "We haven't even made it to an actual date yet and you're already on your back. I think I'm doing ok." Standing up, he offers John a hand, then looks around at where they've found themselves -- and his eyes widen a bit. "Jesus fucking..." All along the hall, five along each wall, is a door. A cell door. And the smells of *human* are much stronger here. Death. Decay. Filth and fear and despair. It seems that John found the Pit. John hits hard, the impact stealing his breath from him, so when Colt lands he is just beginning to recover. Blood has drawn a sticky path through his blonde hair, but his eyes are only wild for a moment, and as he regains his breath the wheezing is mixed with laughter. "Yeah, you've got all the right moves," he manages after a second, reaching up to take hold of Colt's forearm to pull himself to his feet. That laughter dies as soon as he looks around, though, replaced quickly with a visceral anger. "That..." He starts toward the cell almost as soon as he's on his feet. "What in the *fuck* is that." His voice is still low, almost a growl. He stumbles once, staggering to his left, but his steps are more and more steady as he goes. Any trace of a smile disappears off of Colt's face. One by one, his eyes fall over those cell doors, eventually moving to the one that John is headed to. The one that smells most strongly of *people*. Colt looks in the others, one by one, giving a shake of his head. "Empty," he tells John, eventually coming up to the one that John stops in front of. It's solid, and steel, with a little viewport like one might find in old-school asylum housing, and looks just about as tough as the one John just tried to bypass with a shovel. Inside is something out of a horror movie. Two people are chained to a wall, sickly-looking and emaciated. There's a bead in the middle of the room, stained with -- everything imaginable. The cell reeks. A man and a woman, from the looks of them. The man -- well. It was a man once, and not too distantly, but now the man isn't breathing. The skin sags, and there are clear signs of scavenging on the corpse. The woman just atares off into the nothing, unaware of what's going on around her. She has a sickly-sweet smell to her, even present through the smells of filth and death -- the smell of heroin, the needles used for the process present on a little tray in the corner of the room, the better to keep her docile and calm. Colt steps up and looks in beside the door, eyes narrowing. "Christ." "How do we..." John steps back from the door, reaching up to press the heel of one hand into his eye, then shakes his head. "Ok." He turns his back briefly on this door as his eyes scan the room. "All empty?" It's rhetorical, and his tone makes that obvious. Colt already answered that. "Which door leads up?" He looks to the hole he fell through, and then back to the door between them and the woman. "She's chained. Maybe he leaves them unlocked." His voice is low again, pitched so that she can't hear them either. He reaches out to try the doorknob." The door doesn't move. But it only takes a moment to see why. The door locks from the outside, not with a key, but with a sliding mechanism that works similarly to a deadbolt. It takes a second of fiddling, but drawing the bolt up, over, and then back down until it *clicks* makes the door unlatch, and another second of observation will show that whatever spring mechanism is in place will cause it to relatch almost immediately upon closing the door. The smell is, of course, worse inside. Once the door is fully open, it hits them like a wave. The pair have been here for awhile now, just from a quick look around. Colt brings the back of his hand up over his face, asking, "The fuck do we do? Say 'hey, we broke into a dark creepy building because I wanted to impress a guy and accidentally stumbled on a fucking -- whatever this is." He glances around at the cell. "What *is* this? Sex trafficking? Some kind of drug cartel?" He mutters something not meant to be heard under his breath, but sounds frustrated. "I don't think it's either of those things," John says, eyes narrow as he looks at the woman. "Can we even... What do we *do* with her, if we take her out of here?" There was an 'if' in that sentence. "Do we... I mean, if we turn this over to the cops, what then? You're right -- why were we here?" The Rahu steps back to look out the door, and after a moment's examining it he goes to retrieve the shovel to prop the thing open. "If we knew the right doctor, could we rehab her at the center? Would she even survive that?" Colt kneels down, resting his forearms on his knees as he looks the woman over, and then over at the man. He shakes his head, slowly. "I dunno man. I've seen some shit, but I've never seen anything like this. She's got enough shit in her system to give *me* a pretty rough go of it, and I don't know if you come back from being that far gone even if you're healthy. She isn't healthy." A look over at the man. "And even if she could survive -- is she ever gonna *live* again? Would she want to?" Colt looks up at John, shrugging. "If you think it's worth a shot, we can. But it's a lot of explaining. And we don't *do* well in jail. I think your friend the hot prosecutor would have a thing or two to say. Otherwise..." Otherwise, it might be best to put her out of her misery. He looks to John, here. Wondering which path the man will take. John is angrier and angrier, the longer they're here. He paces as he watches Colt evaluate the woman's state, pausing occasionally to look out through the door. "No, I don't think..." His voice trails off, but he draws nearer, coming to stand with his hands on his hips, looking down on Colt and the oblivious victim. "I'll do it," he says, after a quick, fortifying breath. "And then we hunt whoever is doing this, right?" Colt gives a low, slow nod. He stands up, turning to look at John, trying to catch the man's eye. "You sure?" he asks. His fingers flex a bit, like he already feels the claws there. He doesn't question whether John is up to the task, or insult the man by asking if he's done it before. The question is simple, direct, and concerned. Not for the safety of the woman, but for the well-being of his friend. He steps past John, moving to put a steadying hand on the man's sholder. Maybe to try to calm the anger a bit. Or maybe just as a gesture of solidarity. But either way, it only lasts a moment, and then he's stepping out into the hall. "And then we hunt whoever's doing this," he agrees. "Right." "I'm sure," John says, meeting Colt's eyes. That anger has found its level, and simmers now, but it is intense. There are no words from inside the cell, just muffled grunts -- one from the woman, and a sudden one from John. A moment later, and he steps back into the central room, stooping to retrieve the shovel so the door can slam closed behind him. "Done," he says, once the sound spinning the shovel in his hand to lay it across his shoulder. "Now what? How in the hell do we get out of here?" He comes to stand in the spot where he fell, looking upward. Colt is quiet a second as John comes out. There's no judgment there, really. He would have done the same thing, and come to the same decision. But he still evaluates the other man for a moment, quietly, as if looking for some sign of a change. But it only lasts a moment. Pushing off the wall, he looks around at their surroundings, and then back up at the hole they fell through. "We can get back up," he tells John, "if one of us boosts the other up. Then the other guy just lays down on this stomach and offers an arm, I guess." He looks at John, considering his words a minute. "You want me to give you a boost?" he asks. "I've got you," John answers quietly, scuffing his foot in the spot where he fell. The shovel clangs, the noise of it too loud in this suddenly solemn space. He laces his fingers together, bending slightly at the knees to offer Colt a leg up. "Don't let me forget the shovel down here," he says as they prepare. "That's the last thing we need -- a conversation with Ethan's girlfriend about why they found this down here." Colt nods, waiting for John to get into position. Moving over, he puts a foot in John's hand, using his arms to pull himself smoothly up out of the hole. Turning around, he gets on his stomach, reaching a hand down. "Don't forget the shovel." Ok, so that soon after is *probably* sarcasm. There's only so long the Irraka can be serious around a horrific situation, after all. "'mon, man. I gotchu." He braces himself against the floor, ready to reach down with the other hand and provide a stabilizing force, if the other man needs it. "And I don't think Ethan's girlfriend is interested in any damn thing I have to say. Pretty sure he's got a thing for you golden-haired beauties, so if you don't wanna talk to her, I sure as fuck don't." "I don't want to talk to her about shovels," John retorts, grunting as he tosses his up and out, where it clatters and skids on the floor opposite Colt. "Ok, here goes." He steps back a few steps, runs those same steps forward, and jumps to catch Colt's hand, cycling his legs as he's pulled upward until he can help pull himself the rest of the way out of the hole. He crawls forward away from the yawning destruction that was the floor, rolls briefly onto his back, then sits up. "What in the fuck," he asks again, shaking his head. "What kind of monster..." Colt presses himself into a push-up position, then swings his legs between his arms, coming down into a seated posture in one smooth, fluid motion. He gives the shovel a glance, but John's question is a serious one, and deserves a serious answer. "The kind that likes to play with their kills," he tells John, looking around at the building. "I bet if you were to dig around under the floor, you'd find more. It smells like death down there. New death, old death, death-yet-coming." He folds his hands in front of him. "The one that thinks that he's smarter than everyone else. The one that likes to trick them into making a mistake, so that he can tell himself that it's their fault for being weak. That when he's fucking them, it's because he's naturally superior, and it's ok if they're crying because if they didn't want it, they wouldn't have let themselves get caught." Colt's tone goes a little quiet, there. Spoken a bit too much like a man that's had a bit too much time to think about what kind of monster. "Hey," John says, dipping his head forward, canting it to the side to meet Colt's eyes, "We're gonna get him. We're gonna hunt him, and we're gonna kill him." He puts one hand on the floor, then rolls toward that side to push himself up onto his feet. "We're gonna hunt him, and he's gonna die scared," The Rahu promises himself as much as Colt, taking a step forward to offer his hand. Colt turns, meeting John's gaze. "Yeah," he agrees. "We are. And he is." He takes John's hand, letting the bigger man pull Colt to his feet this time. He gives a little nod, and starts to move for the door, giving the place one last look around. As he moves toward the hallway, he looks up. On one of the walls, a crayon drawing of a family catches a ray of sunshine just right. It's the typical (terribly rendered) scene of a happy family, even in the crumbling down place. He nods up to John, pointing it out. "Not all bad, then." He stares at the picture a second longer, then heads out into the fresh air, leaving this place behind him with John close behind.