In a silent night, where all have slept. A hole opens, like a gash across reality. The once silent night burns as the screams of the damned echoes before spitting out Felix and Val.
"You know, I'm starting to wonder whose spirits are those." Felix dust off… spirit dust?
Val shrugs, "I don't think either of us would want to know."
Felix shrugs, "So… is this the house?"
"It seems so."
"But it looks… normal?"
"It has eaten about a hundred souls. Felix."
"So, pretty typical for a house?"
"I don't know what house you live in."
"It's-!"
"I said I didn't want to know." Val starts walking towards the house.
Felix runs after her, as he studies its features.
It was a run down house, a mouth seemingly gaping open in horror.
The trees were dead, the birds hid and it seemingly sucked all the light around it.
It was a terrifying house and Felix ran inside it. "It's safe!"
Val palms her face, "Good lord."
"So, what are we trying to find?" He asks as he stands looking around the house.
"Any clues, anything relating to the lost souls." Val pushes through the door.
"Affirmative!" He runs into the living room, feeling the stench of decayed wood as he walks on uneven floors.
Felix looks under a pillow. "If there's no retirement, do we have vacation days?"
Val flicks her eyes as she analyzes the scene, "You get one month every year."
"Holy shit, that's a lot." He mutters as he looks under the sofa. "Wait, how much are we getting paid again?"
She scans the house in its entirety, "About one million credits, more or less."
"Nice." He pumps his fist as he mutters, "I knew those internships would be good."
"I refuse to comment on that." Then her eyes went static, "Yup, just as I thought."
"Huh." Felix caresses its walls and it shudders. "The house is the monster?"
"Yep."
"But we're inside the house?"
"Yep."
"Huh." He scratches his chin. "Should we run?"
"Hmm…" Val lifted a finger. The ceiling split open, ready to devour them. "Yes."
Felix scooped Val up. A second later, he was sprinting for the window.. "You know, I feel like we should've seen this coming."
Val's arm unfolds into a cannon as she aims it to the wall. "You don't say."
A powerful blast rips through the walls as Felix jumps through. "What's the plan?"
Val's eyes turn red as an alarm rings from her head, "Don't have one."
"There's definitely a lot of trapped energy in that house." Felix's eyes narrow.
"Evidently, the question is how they all got there."
"Can't we just break the house?" He asks.
She looks at him like he's stupid and he might be. For a long moment, she just stares. "I'm not gonna respond to that. You know what you said."
"Yeah, I kinda felt it was stupid when it was leaving my mouth."
He stares as the destroyed wall stitches it back together. "So? What's next?"
"We have to investigate the reason for its existence."
Felix looks around, as police surround them. "That's gonna be a problem."
Val takes something out of her bag, small, cylindrical and made of polished silver and chrome metal.
Felix stares at it, "Is that what I think it is?"
Val nods as powerful light shutters as she says, "All of you went into the scene without finding anything. You will return back to where you were before this and report no anomalies unless asked." They go back into their cars as they drive back.
"Oh so that's what it was." Felix mutters.
"What did you think it was?"
"Well, you know, small? Cylindrical? Inside your purse?" He grins.
She inhales deeply as she walks away, "Don't engage with the stupid. We don't engage with the stupid."
"So is that a no?"
"Not talking to you!" Val responds as the sun rises over the horizon. The suburban wakes up with it.
Felix gorges himself with eggs and bacon, "This is paid, right?"
"Yes, eat as much as you want." She sips her coffee.
"So, you still have no idea where to start?"
"I've already connected to this world's internet. Not much info."
"Have you tried hacking into the government database?"
"Highly illegal."
He stares at her, "Really?"
She stares at him. Sips at her coffee, stares some more and exhales. "Good point."
Felix nods, as he looks around the diner they found themselves in.
It was the nearest one they could have gotten to. And since the sun just rose over the horizon it wasn't bustling, yet. He takes another bite of his meal as he mulls in thoughts. Before he stands up.
Val asks, "What are you doing?"
Felix wipes his mouth and stretches. "I'm going to interrogate some innocent bystanders. Can't have my seniors do all the heavy lifting on my first day."
Val shrugs, "Don't die."
He chirps, "No promises."
Now, where would be a good place to start?
Waitresses? Too easy. Neighbors? Too typical.
Raving lunatics on the street. Now, that's thinking outside the box.
He leaves the diner and looks for anyone matching such description.
A man shouting, the end is near? Jackpot.
"The shadow government is behind everything!" The man shouts.
"Which shadow government? The lizard one? Illuminati? Or the weirdly chrome one?"
"The shadow government that controls the government!"
"Yes, but like what type?"
"They talk to the moon!"
"But the moon can just control people."
"The moon can what!?"
"Oh yeah full override, or influence your thoughts depending on your protection."
"Yes! The tinfoil hat." The man points to his hat.
"That isn't gonna be enough." Felix shakes his head, "You probably would need…" He stops and whispers, "Take a pen and paper. I'll tell you how."
The man pats his pockets, "Yes! I knew this day would come."
"Ok, listen to me closely." He raises five fingers, "You need five things, an entire foil of aluminum, lemon juice, a teddy bear, dirty socks and lipstick."
Felix spins the lipstick around the tinfoil as he squeezes lemon into it.
"So you have to slap your face with this every morning. Then hit your dick three times to waive off all the control over your emotions. And if that doesn't work, it means you have to put your dirty sock on your head as you hug your teddy bear jumping on one foot. Did you get all of that?"
The man stares, wide eyed. "No way."
Felix nods, "You have to do this every day to waive of their influence. If I were you'd immediately go for the dirty sock."
"Thank you master!" The man bows.
Felix stroke his nonexistent beard, "Then do not forget my teachings my student." He stops, "Wait, I got sidetracked."
"Master?"
"Do you know anything about a house? The one on Peach street? The creepy haunted one." He whispers to his ear, "I have this top secret, classified mission and I'm trying to find clues."
The man's eyes lights up, "Yes, I know something about that, anything you need to know master!"
"Yup! So, do you know the history about that?"
The man scratches his head, "Last I heard master was that the family that lived there had their little girl disappear then after that the haunting started. We don't know why but some rumors said it was her parents that had her killed."
"Do you know where they are?"
"They left after the rumors started."
"Okay," He pats the man on the shoulder, "Thanks! Make sure to win the war against the moon!"
"I will never forget this favor."
"Don't mention it."
Val stares as Felix sat back in their booth.
"What did you do?"
"I got us some info, that's what I did."
"No, that! You guys were jumping everywhere, what was that!"
"Oh nothing much, I just gave him a proper way to shield himself against the moon."
"The moon?"
"The moon, yes. The race of entities on the moon controlling the mind of people. I just taught him how to protect himself."
Val stares at him then back to her coffee and just asks, "Did you tell them about the lemon juice and lipstick?"
"Yup! I think he's gonna do good."
Val nods, chewing her food, swallowing. "That's good, we lost a city in the war with ours."
"Right!? Those guys are a pain in the ass. Especially with those gross brain juices. You step on one and suddenly you'll smell like psychic mucus for weeks!"
"Eating," She scolded as she bit into her meal, "Nevermind that, what did you learn about our mission?"
"Oh yeah about that apparently. Something about little girl disappearing and the suspects being her parents oh and the haunting started after her disappearance." Felix nods to himself, "Classic demon shit."
"You think so? It feels more like a poltergeist."
"Poltergeist? Maybe it got ambitious! I don't want to just be a wandering spirit seeing teenagers jorking it. Maybe I want something more with my undead life, let's suck some souls!"
Vale glares.
"Ok, but you know how ridiculous that sounds, right?"
"You're not wrong."
"I'm feeling a "but" here."
"But demons don't invest souls into real estate—Not like this."
Felix taps his chin, "Ohhh, Unless… it isn't just a normal soul."
Val stands, "Let's talk to the parent, see what they know."
"Aye, commander!"
Val stares at him and walks away.
Felix fixes his tie and hair, looking into the mirror again as they stand in front of a house.
He turns to Val."Ok! Before I do this, what's your name again?"
"Valentine Mendez."
"Valentine?"
"What?"
"Well, you don't really feel… Valentine. More of a Valerie or Valkyrie."
"Just open the door, Felix."
"Knock, knock." Felix knocks on the door.
"What!?" A woman opens the door, eyebags on her eyes, tears on her face.
"Good morning, ma'am. My name is Felix Calloway, my friend here is Val Mendez and we're here to—" He turns to her, "I can't think of a lie."
Val raises her hand with her neuralyzer, "I thought so."
A flash of light occurs as he continues, "You forget the last minute, we're… what's the FBI for this?"
She shakes her head and speaks up, "Answer all my questions and cooperate."
The woman's eyes glaze over. "Yes."
Felix struts in, immediately inspecting the place as Val asks, "So, is there anything that happened leading up to your daughter's disappearance?"
She blinks, "I don't know, she just left."
Felix wandered past the picture frames, running a finger over the glass, seeing the pictures of their smiles.
They looked like a normal family, but the recent disappearance of their daughter seems to have taken its toll. It was unfortunate… it always was. Then his eyes snapped to the picture, a box that hid inside the girl's pocket. He felt something unexplainable.
Then a glint of recognition, he took the picture and rushed to the mother's side.
"Where is this? The box, the one on her hand?"
The woman blinks, "We left it, I don't remember seeing it again."
He stared at it, "When did she get this?"
"She bought it from a garage sale."
"Val!" Felix shouts, "We're leaving."
"What happened?" She runs to him.
"I know what happened. We were both wrong."
"Then what is it?"
"It's a vessel box, someone is using that girl's body to stay here."
"That means…"
"Whoever's in there is the one gathering souls."
"We should go." He grabs her by the waist as he runs before jumping as a cloud beneath him forms, zooming past the street headed back to the haunted house.