Chapter 6: Into the Abyss
The staircase seemed to stretch forever, each step taken in silence, the only sound the muted echo of their boots on the creaking wood. As Elias descended further into the mill’s bowels, the air grew thicker, colder, as if the very building itself were holding its breath, waiting for something. The walls seemed to close in around him, the dim glow of Carter’s flashlight flickering like a dying star in the oppressive darkness.
They reached the bottom, and Elias couldn’t shake the feeling that they were entering a world separate from the one above. The ground was slick with dampness, the air filled with the faintest scent of decay—mildew, something rotting in the dark. Carter’s light swept across the room, illuminating rusted machinery, broken pipes, and piles of abandoned debris, all standing like silent sentinels in the gloom.
It wasn’t the physical surroundings that made Elias uneasy. No, it was something far more primal. The feeling that they weren’t alone. That they hadn’t just stumbled upon a hidden layer of the mill, but had entered a place where the rules of reality no longer applied. The shadows here were thicker, more alive, as if they clung to the walls with a malevolent purpose.
“You sure this is it?” Elias asked, his voice breaking the silence, a touch of uncertainty creeping in.
Carter didn’t respond immediately. Instead, he gestured with the flashlight, pointing it towards a far corner of the room. Elias followed his gaze, his heart pounding in his chest when he saw what Carter had uncovered.
At first, Elias thought it was a trick of the light—a heap of scrap metal, perhaps, or a discarded pile of old tools. But as his eyes adjusted, he realized with sickening clarity that it wasn’t just debris. It was a body.
A man’s body.
He was slumped against a pillar, his limbs twisted at unnatural angles, his face frozen in a grimace of pain. Elias swallowed hard, his throat tightening as he stepped closer. The man was familiar—Mark Wheeler, the bartender from the missing persons list. But something was wrong, something Elias couldn’t put his finger on.
He crouched down, examining the body closely. There was no sign of a struggle, no visible wounds, nothing to explain the horror of his twisted posture. But then Elias saw it. The eyes—wide open, staring, unblinking, as if the man had died in terror, unable to look away from something that had terrified him beyond reason.
“Christ,” Carter muttered under his breath, his voice strained. “This isn’t how he disappeared. The others… they were gone without a trace.”
Elias reached out, his fingers brushing the cold skin of Mark Wheeler’s wrist. No pulse. The body was still warm, but only just—no more than a few hours since death had claimed him.
“We need to get out of here,” Carter said, his voice sharp, snapping Elias back to the present. “This place—this whole thing—it’s getting worse. We need backup.”
But Elias didn’t move. His eyes were fixed on the body, on the lifeless form of Mark Wheeler. Something wasn’t right. The body wasn’t just a victim—it was a message. Whoever had left it here wanted them to see it. They wanted Elias to understand something.
His gaze drifted to the shadows around them, and for a moment, just a fleeting moment, he thought he saw something move. A figure, just beyond the reach of Carter’s flashlight. But when he blinked, it was gone.
“Elias?” Carter’s voice snapped him out of his reverie.
“I saw something,” Elias muttered, his voice barely a whisper. He didn’t look at Carter, his eyes still searching the darkness. “Someone’s here.”
Carter raised an eyebrow, his flashlight scanning the room more frantically now. “Where? I don’t see anything.”
Elias shook his head. “It’s gone now. But I’m telling you, there’s something in the shadows.”
They stood in tense silence for a moment, the only sound the faint hum of the building settling around them. Then, the unmistakable crunch of footsteps on gravel echoed from above, followed by a loud, hollow thud.
A cold chill raced up Elias’s spine. Someone else was in the mill.
“Who’s up there?” Elias shouted, his voice cutting through the stillness.
No answer. Just the sound of footsteps, deliberate and slow, moving closer. Elias reached for his gun, his hand trembling slightly, though his grip remained firm. He nodded to Carter, motioning for him to follow. They moved quickly, back towards the staircase, but just as Elias reached the bottom step, the room around them seemed to shift.
The walls seemed to close in, the shadows growing longer and darker, swallowing up the feeble light from Carter’s flashlight. The air grew heavy, suffocating, and Elias felt the oppressive weight of something watching him, something that had been there all along.
“Stay close,” Carter hissed, but Elias barely heard him over the thundering of his own pulse in his ears.
They reached the stairs, but just as Elias stepped onto the first step, the lights flickered, plunging them into darkness. The air turned cold—unnaturally cold—as if something had sucked the warmth from the room, leaving them standing in the dead silence of the mill.
A voice—low, guttural, almost a growl—whispered from the darkness, sending a jolt of terror through Elias’s body.
“It’s too late for you, Detective.”
Elias spun, his heart racing, but he saw nothing in the pitch-black gloom. Just shadows, twisted and crawling along the edges of the room.
“Who’s there?” Elias demanded, his voice strained, trembling.
No answer. Just that voice—closer now. So close it felt like it was in his ear.
“You’ve come too far. You’ve seen too much. There’s no going back.”
Elias’s breath hitched, and he felt Carter’s hand on his shoulder, pulling him back. “We need to get out of here,” Carter muttered, fear in his voice now. “This place… it’s not right.”
But it wasn’t just the mill that felt wrong. It was everything—Alder Creek, the disappearances, the bodies that were showing up. It was all connected, and Elias knew it. And as he stared into the pitch-black dark, he understood something he hadn’t wanted to admit: The danger wasn’t just to the people of Alder Creek anymore.
It was personal. It was coming for his family.
“We’re not alone,” Elias said, his voice low, a tightness in his throat.
“No, we’re not,” Carter replied, his voice filled with grim understanding.
And as they hurried back up the stairs, the whispering voice followed them, trailing behind like a dark cloud that refused to let them go.
“It’s too late for you, Detective. Too late for all of you.”
Elias’s heart slammed in his chest as he turned, his pulse hammering in his ears. The shadows were closing in, and the truth was beginning to slip away from him, like sand through his fingers.
One thing was certain—the past was never truly gone. And in Alder Creek, the light had already begun to fade.
