“Where are you?” A female whisper came in the dark, weeping, croaking and breaking her voice.

  “What the fuck?” The leader of the pursuers took out his fshlight and tried to light up the area around him. But the same fshlight that could usually reach five or six es away could now only light up a few steps’ distan a narrow line, outside of this very immediate range everything was still dark.

  “Boss - I think we o go. ” One of the pursuers said with a trembling voice: “Somethings nht here.”

  “It’s pletely dark out there! It’s pletely dark out there!” Another pursuer freaked and tried to run downstairs: “Oh my god! This is happening! This is happening!”

  “Shut up! Don’t panic, you fug moron!” The leader tried to call this pursuer, but this hen of his already made it out of the staircase, and gone were his cries for help and his terrified whining.

  “Boss?” The only other pursuer remaining by the leader’s side asked, his voice was shaking beyond his trol, he had more words but they were stu his throat. He had to swallow a few times before he could finally get a half plete sente: “What - what should we - ”

  “Calm down! ” The leader raised his voice: “It’s just the lights. Let’s get outta here.”

  “Where - where is he?” The same female voice crept in again, this time seeming from different ers around them.

  “Help me! Help me!” Just this moment, the voice of the pursuer who ran away earlier came back - it was from behind the leader and the other man. “Where the fuck am I !? Oh god! Where the fuck am I!?”

  Aside from the leader, the other two pursuers screamed and bumped into the walls behind them. And within a mere moment, both of them had their guns poi each other. The man who ran away had the shotgun, while the man who stayed by the leader’s side had the pistol.

  “Wait! WAIT A FUG MIhe leader tried to calm the two men down.

  But he was too te. For in a moment of panic, both of them squeezed their triggers. The man who held a shotgun bsted his shot. The pellets covered a dangerously wide ar this narrow staircase. The man with a pistol instantly lost most of his left chest from the majority of the pellets. The leader’s right arm was grazed and he fell to the side. And the man wielding a pistol fired two shots before his gun jammed. The man with a shotgun was thus struck, in the right chest and in the abdomen.

  “God dammit! God dammit!” The leader cursed and cried out, trying to hold his right arm and stop the bleeding. But that was until he saw the face of a pale woman, with bloodshot eyes, no nose and a mouthful of bloody teeth.

  Pain radiated from his chest and his abdomen. He looked down and touched where he hurt. Blood was left on the finger. Yet, the other hen of his was already dead, killed by the police captain, he should have had only one man by his side just now.

  The darkness faded. Two more bodies were left iaircase.

  The pale face of the woman remained. A long wound sshed across her face. This was no mere flesh wound. It cut through her entire head, separating the top part of her head from the lower half, across her nose. With any swift movement, her upper head would drift, only corrected by dark smoke pulling the halves together.

  “Please - please.” A few breaths remained in Captain Ko. His Qi halted his profuse bleeding, only for a moment and for his wife to ma: “Don’t - don’t fall further. There’s - there’s no more hope for me. There just might be - for - you.” His eyes dimmed. His Qi stopped cirg, and his bleeding finally took the toll on him.

  A deafening scream exploded from the house. The men outside guarding the entrances were instantly paralyzed. It was not just the surprise factor, it was not just fear. It was a bone-chilling hold on their entire bodies. They wao move, they wao speak with each other. But they could not even lift a finger or utter a sound. All they could do was shallow breathing and moving their eyes.

  “Where are you?” “Where are you?” “Where are you?” tless voices came p out of the house, along with waves and waves of dark smoke, inside of which tless hands with red fingernails could be seen.

  The men screamed on the inside. Panid horror shook their bodies. But in a short moment’s time, they were swallowed by the smoke, and pulled into invisible pockets and holes where they would not be seen ever again.

  A painful cry shocked the entire neighborhood. Electric sparks shot out of the light posts, the wires and the electric substation. A blood rainboeared high up in the sky. Many unsightly, creepy shadows maed in different ers of the unity. But before they could do anything, streams of dark smoke shot at them and devoured them. After a brief moment, eveire blood rainbow was swallowed whole.

  The blood rainbow dissipated after a few short moments, and the dark smoke rose up into the sky, taking the shape of a cloud, and began floating north - the dire where the energy aura suppressing the cloud's power was ing from.

  Shout outs to my patrons:

  mant06

  Jonathan

  Thank you very much for your support!