The warehouse just appeared one day. Tucked away in a corner of a relatively quiet part of the city. One Thursday morning, it just popped up. Close to a large residential area, and an office building. A clearly aged, but still sturdy looking building. 3 stories high, windows placed all along the sides. A wide garage door on the left side, and a regular door on the front. Chain link fence all around it, except for a short stretch just to the front of it. Not particularly intimidating looking. Just seemed like a standard warehouse that had been abandoned for a few years.
When it first appeared, people talked about it, obviously. They made posts on social media, which you can’t find anymore, made a bunch of calls, which you can’t find the logs to, to police, media, city council, and whoever else they could freak out to. All swearing up and down that the building had never existed prior to that day. Their claims were backed up by city records. The building had seemingly just appeared out of thin air. Cameras watching the area at the time were checked to try and shed some light on the situation. All the cameras showed the exact same thing. At 0632 hours, the warehouse simply materialised. One frame it wasn’t there, the next second it was. No explanation provided.
Within hours of its appearance, police were sent over. But before they could even get close, 2 guys entered before them. Fallon Fisher and Ryder Fisher, no relation. A couple of friends who lived in an apartment complex not 3 minutes from the warehouse. They got curious and invited themselves into the building. They entered at 0823 hours. What exactly happened to them, we’ll never know. But we do know that they were still screaming when the police showed up an hour later.The police rushed in, and whatever happened to those 2, happened to them as well.
The warehouse itself wasn’t what killed those guys. It’s what’s living inside the warehouse. 5… things. Officially designated Anomalies 1 to 5. The general public has different names for them, however. These Anomalies, most of the time they can be seen in the warehouse, through the windows. Other times, they can be seen just outside, staying within the perimeter of the fence.
They’re not confined to the place, not by any means. Sometimes they leave, go to other parts of the city, and they wreak absolute havoc when they do.
Anomaly 1, Creep. A hairless, frail looking man, crawling around on all fours. Its knees bend the wrong way, and its teeth are like sewing pins. Only targets people alone in their house. Survivors all have similar stories. They’ll be sitting on their beds, on their phones, scrolling through social media, and hear a noise, or see something out of the corner of their eye. They’ll look towards it and see it, sitting there looking at them. Always trying to hide. In the darkest corner of the room, in the closet, behind a drawer. When you see it, one of 2 things will happen. It’ll scuttle off, or attack, biting into you with those pin-like teeth. 87 killed, 20 injured.
Anomaly 2, Devourer. The opposite of Creep. A huge and heavy creature, barreling its way through everything and everyone. Built like a rhinoceros, but with human appendages, and a human head. Strong enough to flip cars and tough enough to shrug off heavy fire. Opens its face up and swallows people whole. It’s going to be a challenge. 125 killed, 237 injured.
Anomaly 3, Watcher . This one we don’t know much about. It never leaves the warehouse. All we know is that it’s an unnaturally thin woman, skin as black as charcoal, long hair reaching down to its knees, and likes to stand at the warehouse windows and stare at the people outside. Scares them to death. The popular theory is that it’s the ‘guardian’ of the place. Watching over it while the others leave to do their business. 0 killed, 0 injured. Presumably.
Anomaly 4, Skinner. You can figure out what this one does. The scariest part about it is, it looks like a regular guy. From a distance anyway. Get close, and you’ll notice some odd things about it. The skin is tight in some places, baggy in the others. It can be a little rotten, and smell awful, or look brand new. It wears a new skin every time, so it can be hard to spot. 92 killed, 0 survivors. A 100% fatality rate. The only Anomaly to have one.
And now we come to Anomaly 5. He’s something special. Something else entirely.
Man On Fire.
He’s not like the rest. He shows up wherever he wants, whenever he wants. You’ll be out shopping on a crowded street with your friends, in your backyard celebrating your birthday with your family, anywhere. He’ll just appear. The smell of smoke and burning flesh will fill the air. And that’s that. It’s over for you. Your charred remains, or just ashes, will be found later.
For some reason, I’m obsessed with him. I can’t stop thinking about him. When I’m asleep I dream of him. When I’m awake I do research about him, watching recordings, witness reports, news articles. There’s an aura to him that captivates me. I can’t explain it. I made him my sole focus, ever since they all first appeared 2 months ago.
The first time he appeared was in a mall. There were several recordings of it, as well as a decent amount of survivor recounts. The first video I saw of the incident was a recording from one of the mall security cameras. I can remember it perfectly.
A huge crowd runs past the camera, screaming. Fear carved into their faces. People in wheelchairs were spinning their wheels faster than helicopter blades, some senior citizens doing their best to hobble away. Some good samaritans are trying to help others. A guy hoists an 80 year old woman up in a fireman’s carry and sprints off. They were on the news after a while. Didn’t know each other at all. Nice to see some people still care about others. But most are just pushing each other out of the way.
And then he appears. Slowly walking, like he has all the time in the world. A man engulfed in flames, just strolling by. You can’t make out any facial features, or any features at all really. He walks by the camera, and turns his head towards it, slowly. Everything he does is slow. There’s never a sense of urgency with this guy. He faces the camera for a few seconds. The recording ends. According to reports from police, the camera melted.
Over 200 deaths. Only 30 bodies recovered. Everything else was reduced to ash. From just one appearance, he got more fatalities than any other Anomaly did in 2 months.
Nobody has been able to stop these things before. Anyone who goes into the warehouse never comes out, and the warehouse itself can’t be damaged by anything. Any damage done to the Anomalies is miraculously undone the next time they appear. One time Devourer stepped on a landmine and blew off its back half. Managed to crawl back into the warehouse. Military surrounded the place and got ready to take it when it emerged. It came out 5 minutes later, perfectly fine, and massacred them.
Any information about these things is being suppressed. Beyond the military, no one outside this city knows about these things. Which in this day and age, is absolutely miraculous to pull off.
Of course, my organisation knows about them too. We specialise in dealing in things like this. Monsters, unexplainable events. Happens more often than you think. The world is a scary place. But I have to say, I find these 5 are particularly interesting. And I’ve been doing this for quite a while.
My team was sent to take them out. 5 of us total. Small, but efficient. They all wanted to rush in ASAP, but I made us wait it out. I was waiting. For him.
I leaned against the armoured vehicle we drove to the place in, cradling my shotgun. My teammates were all pacing back and forth. All on edge, ready to go. They didn’t understand why I wanted to wait. I didn’t either, really. I just had to know. I had to know he was in there for sure. I didn’t care about the other 4 Anomalies, only him. If I went in there, got the other 4, and he was missing, I would feel… I can’t describe it. It was as if he was my nemesis, but I’ve never interacted with him. I just, had to get him. And it had to be me. I had to pull the trigger on him.
It’s funny, looking back. There was no guarantee to even kill him, or any of them really. If they could recover from major injuries, maybe death wouldn’t have even affected them. But if you never try, you never know.
We stood outside the warehouse for hours. Watcher was glaring at me through a window on the second floor. Creep was peering out at me through a crack in the door. Its name was well deserved. I had a bit of a staring contest with it. Lost, unfortunately. I don’t think it had eyelids, so I’m not too broken up about it. I turned back to Watcher.
And there he was. Right behind Watcher. In all his burning glory.
Man On Fire.
His head angled directly at me.
Watcher retreated slightly, still in view. But for just a few seconds, he was all I saw. My friends, Watcher, everything, faded away. It was just the two of us. Me and him. Him and I.
Man On Fire.
I sprinted for the warehouse. My teammates followed closely. I could practically hear them foaming at the mouth. After so long, they were ready to kill something, or get killed by something. Animals. I love them all.
I kicked the front door down and barged in. The door opened into a small room filled with crates and shelves, and 4 corridors leading away. My team ran in right behind me, guns up, safeties off. We looked around. Our adrenaline was pumping so hard, we could practically hear it, but we calmed ourselves down. It’s your head that’ll get you through rough places.
We picked a corridor and started heading down it.
We walked for hours, which should have been impossible. None of us so much as batted an eye. We were used to the impossible.
Eventually, we came to some stairs. Leading down. They always lead down, don’t they? Why can’t they go up for a change?
We made our way down the stairs. The place is pitch black, and I can’t see anything besides the stairs.
After 10 minutes of heading downstairs, we heard a noise behind us and turned to look. It was Creep. Crawling down the stairs, not half a metre away from the last teammate in the file. God knows how long it’d been following us.
It leapt at the teammate closest to it. The place lit up with gunfire. I don’t know who we hit more, our friend or Creep. It’s fine. He knew the risks of the job, and he would have done the same. I know he would have.
The two fall in a messy heap onto the stairs, and tumble off to the side. And they just… fall. Into the darkness.
After a moment of silence, I reach out into the darkness. There’s nothing there. No wall. We’re on a staircase floating in the abyss.
We hurry after that. No ceremony for our fallen comrade. No time.
Eventually the stairs lead us into a room. This one’s lit up. Another corridor. Something’s coming, and it’s coming fast. I can tell by the sound it’s something big. Devourer.
It bursts into the room, and runs straight for us. I dive out of the way, but my teammate isn’t so lucky. Devourer opens up its face, and she’s gone. Swallowed.
I aim my under barrel grenade launcher at it, and boom. It’s right side, gone. Blood splashes on everyone and everything. But it’s not over.
Devourer moans and rushes back up the corridor, I pursue, shooting at its rear end. Every hit, it lets out an all too human scream.
We reach the end of the corridor, and there’s the Watcher. Devourer crawls over to it, and it places a withered hand onto it. Devourer starts to regenerate. And I understand why, Watcher never leaves the warehouse. She keeps the Anomalies alive. They can survive massive injuries, but without her, they can’t recover. Without her, they’re all screwed.
Which makes her the most important target now.
My other 2 teammates ran into the room. We all open fire with everything we have. We turn Watcher and Devourer into paste. But we kept shooting. We had to make sure they were dead.
The smoke clears, and we look at what’s left. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Shotguns, man. They work.
We walk forwards, passing through a rusty metal door, into yet another room. This one’s tiny, barely 20 steps across. There’s someone crouching in the corner. We all aim our guns at him. Looks like a normal guy, but you can’t be sure.
He turns around. It’s our teammate, the one who fell off the stairs. Well, not quite. It’s something pretending to be our teammate, quite poorly. Skinner.
We pull the triggers, and once again, gone. Dead, just like that.
I’m starting to get pissed. 4 Anomalies down, and it wasn’t even hard. Sure,we lost 2 good soldiers, but that’s nothing. These things killed so many people, and they died so easily. Barely put up any kind of fight. It’s disrespectful to all the people they killed. These things are weak and pathetic. Farcical excuses for monsters.The fact they were able to kill anyone angers me. These things should have been killed a day after they appeared, but no, they were allowed to wreak havoc for 2 months. I’m angered at the unfairness of it all. My organisation didn’t need to get involved at all. The neighbourhood watch could have taken these things. I mean Skinner, for God’s sake. 100% fatality rate. Didn’t put a scratch on us.
But mostly, I’m angry about Man On Fire. There’s no doubt in my mind. He’s as much of a bitch as his friends. All this time obsessing over him. Fighting to get this assignment. Wasted. I should have gone for that rock monster in Egypt. I look at my teammates, and I know they feel the same way.
And then it happens.
The teammate on my left combusts. Just turns to dust. We feel intense heat, and something casts light against our backs.
Me and my last teammate turned, and the room has changed. The door’s gone, and there’s a long corridor in its place. And at the end, guess who.
Man On Fire.
Slowly walking towards us.
My teammate and I lit him up. Nothing. It did nothing. The bullets had no effect. I can’t tell if they’re going through him, or hitting him and just being ineffective.
He keeps walking towards us. He’s getting close now.
I fire the grenade launcher at him. The grenade hits him. It made contact, for sure it did. But… it just didn’t do anything. It’s like it vanished when it hit him.
He’s out of the corridor, in the room now. He looks at my teammate. She combusts instantly.
Me and him. Him and I. Yet again.
I look at his face, at where his eyes should be. And suddenly, I understand.
The other Anomalies. They were nothing. They were weak. And they knew that. That’s why they came to him. So he could protect them. He’s beyond them and they understood it. I know now. He cared for them. And now, he will avenge them. He’s not a monster. That’s not enough to describe him. He’s a protector. Just like me. Looking after people who can’t care for themselves. He’s a deity, one who can’t be killed. No matter how much time passes, he’ll be here. Forever. I’ll never quite know what he is, and I’m okay with that. He’ll be just one thing to me.
Man On Fire.