The abandoned chicken farm was off the main highway about two miles, down a washboard dirt road that forced you to drive at least five under. It’s been on my list for a couple months and now the bank’s threatening to pull the contract if I don’t get it done. I hate having to inspect property that’s sat for years, mainly after my tetanus ordeal from stepping through floor rot into a nest of rusty nails at an old sawmill.
I pulled up to the first building and got out of the car. It was small with a low, flat roof, encased in that gray metal siding that all old poultry farms seem to wear. The other buildings were long and narrow with peaked roofs and the same gray siding. There were five buildings total, including the office. It was going to be a long day.
The door to the office was unlocked and I walked in to find a couple government style metal desks and chairs, file cabinets, paper strewn about, and a water cooler in the corner half full of sludge. A space heater next to one of the desks was tipped onto its face.
I pulled out the digital recorder from my front shirt pocket and an electrical outlet tester from the cargo pocket in my pants. The bank had the power turned back on for the inspection, and I walked around to each outlet, plugged in the small orange cube tester, and spoke the results into my recorder.
“South outlet good. East outlet good. West outlet good. North outlet faulty ground.”
The office was a small square. Three of the walls looked in good shape, but the north wall was bowed outward more than I liked to see, so I noted that in the recorder as well. Floor felt solid. Always a concern. Ceiling tile was orange and dropping off in some places. Noted. I went outside and surveyed the walls and foundation. The north wall siding was cracked and rusted where the bulge was. Noted. I grabbed the telescoping ladder from the trunk of the car, slid it open with some difficulty, and climbed up to the office roof. Moldy dark spots corresponding to the water-damaged ceiling tiles. Noted.
The four remaining buildings were long and set in a row, forming a line to the back of the property with five foot gaps between them. I heaved the ladder onto my shoulder and started toward the furthest one. It was all dirt and dead weeds, and the sun was already hot even though it was only late morning. I rubbed sweat out of my eyes with my free hand.
I set the ladder down and tried the door at the back building. It was unlocked but jammed, the metal casing warped and jagged like it had been pried open at some point. Putting my back into it, I yanked hard and the door gave a grinding screech and swung open on rusted hinges. The gray metal siding shook and moaned, and a half-dozen house sparrows exploded from under the eave at the back corner, giving me a start.
“Let’s get it done, John,” I said under my breath, and went in.
The air smelled stale and dusty. There was an old refrigerator, like from the fifties, unplugged and off to the side. I opened the door and looked in. Various laboratory glassware, beakers, petri dishes, pipettes.
On the top shelf were a number of sealed glass jars, and inside bulbous black eyes stared out at me. I took a step back, stiffening. Each jar held a chicken embryo at a different stage of development. They hung in the formaldehyde solution like astronauts in the vacuum of space. Motionless. Cold.
“Biological material in refrigerator of building five,” I spoke into the recorder.
I closed the refrigerator door gently and turned to survey the rest of the room. The peaked roof had no ceiling, only exposed rafters crisscrossing above and casting abstract shadows below. The sheetmetal roofing had pulled apart in places, allowing sunlight through. Noted.
There was a wide stainless steel counter that ran the entire length of the building against the far wall, with large steel sinks that dropped down into it at regular intervals. Some had snake faucets and others had amputated pipes sticking out of the wall behind them. Feathers, turned gray with age, scattered the floor, counter, and sinks. Must be the processing building.
I felt a twinge of sadness, which was irrational since I ate meat, including chicken. I thought about my cat, Shirley, right now sleeping on her cat tree in the sun. A statistically sound guess.
An open stairwell, dark and gaping, cut into the back corner leading down. Basements normally didn’t bother me, but the thought of this one caused the pit of my stomach to twitch for some reason. Focusing back on the processing room, I noted the condition of the walls, floor, industrial counter, plumbing, and then headed for the stairwell.
There was a broken light switch at the top (noted), which never bodes well when entering a strange basement. I took out a flashlight from my other cargo pocket and clicked it on. My steps echoed into the darkness below as I started down. A damp, musty smell with the clinking of water drops against concrete met me at the bottom of the metal stairs.
I shined the flashlight around, the beam of light cutting into the murk a few feet out before being swallowed into darkness. The floor and walls were concrete, pockmarked and wet in places. Felt like a bunker.
Metal shelves lined the wall to my side. Mostly empty, save for some three-ring binders stacked haphazardly and threatening to fall off, and some lab equipment. Glassware, burners, mixers. I wondered why this was at a chicken farm.
“Basement north wall deteriorating at halfway point. Possible foundation instability,” I said to the recorder, looking at a pile of concrete rubble, rebar, and dirt at the base of the wall just past the shelves.
Continuing along the wall, my eyes followed the flashlight beam into the dark until it landed on some objects in the middle of the floor. As I got closer, I had to bend down to see what they were.
Black candles.
Two were directly in front of me, burned down to almost nothing, and three more were a few feet out sitting at the end of white chalk angles. The chalk outline formed a pentagram on the floor.
“What the…,” I said, and took a step back.
I shined the light around me, even though it was clear that this was old. I reached down and touched one of the charred wicks to make sure. Cold.
This was a first, and I wasn’t sure if it needed to be documented in the report or not. “Evidence of ritualistic behavior in the basement,” I said to the glowing red light on the recorder. “Five black candles, used. White chalk pentagram design on the floor, candles sitting at each point. Unknown black fluid inside pentagram.”
The hair on my arms became static. A cold chill jittered down my spine and the nethers clenched.
I pride myself on performing work diligently, providing my clients with the most accurate, detailed property inspection reports in the state. This was not one of those reports.
I beat feet up the stairs, plowed through the last three buildings, filled with cramped chicken cages, and tore ass out of the dirt parking lot. Just like in movie scenes that my sister makes fun of, the tires on my car squealed when I peeled out. On dirt. How’s that even possible?
When I got home I must’ve looked a little peaked because my girlfriend, Patricia, rushed to the front door and asked if I was alright.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Had a strange day is all.”
“What happened?” she asked. “Zombie chickens?”
That caught me off guard and I snorted. She had a knack for keeping me on my toes.
“No, but it’s up your alley. I found some kind of ritual thing in the basement of one of the buildings.”
Patricia’s eyes widened and she clapped her hands together. “What kind of ritual?”
“No idea. There was a pentagram with black candles around it, and some kind of goo inside it. Black goo.”
“Blood?”
“I didn’t touch it.”
She scrunched her face up in mock disappointment and punched my shoulder. “Boo.”
I dumped my keys in the bowl on the antique table next to the door, along with the pocket recorder, flashlight, and electrical outlet tester. Normally I’d transcribe the recording and write up the report that evening while everything was fresh in my mind, but I was spent. Between out-of-place lab equipment, chicken fetuses, and satanic rituals, I’d do it in the morning.
I went to bed early and was asleep by the time Patricia joined me. Apparently I was groaning and wincing because she asked me the next morning if I’d had a nightmare.
I needed to make a follow-up inspection at the chicken farm and found myself in that damn basement again. My flashlight was flickering, the battery threatening to give out, while I made my way along the concrete wall toward the far end. Something was there that I thought I missed, another broken pipe or crumbling wall. I had to make sure.
The air was heavy and smelled slightly of smoke. I thought I heard shuffling feet, and then my flashlight died. Darkness for what felt like hours, but was maybe only a few seconds.
A match was lit off to my left, silhouetting three figures in black robes with hoods drawn low over their illusory faces. The five candles of the pentagram suddenly lit by themselves. My breath caught somewhere between my throat and sphincter and I stumbled backward into the hard wall.
Hissing sounds came from the three individuals and I could see wide grins in the shadows. They snapped their heads back in unison, flinging off the hoods and revealing gaunt, pale white faces and red eyes. Hisses turned to growls and then howls as their mouths opened abnormally wide, rows of razor sharp teeth glinting in the candlelight.
They advanced in choppy movements, like rusted animatronics, and I froze against the wall. A pale, bony hand with cracked, black fingernails stretched out of the gaping cuff of the robe, reaching for my neck. My feet melted into the concrete floor, my legs rotted deadwood that refused to move. The tip of a skeletal finger slid along my throat and it was like an electric jolt.
My legs woke up and I was running wildly through the dark space toward where I thought the metal stairs were. I ran for what seemed like much longer than it should take to get to the end of the basement, but no stairs and no exit materialized. The smoke smell, like burning matches, mixed with dust and wet mold, hit me in the face and I gasped, lungs constricting.
The dark void began to spin and it felt like an earthquake under my feet. I fell on my face on the cold concrete floor, ground shaking, the sound of footfalls rapidly approaching. A cracking sound above me went off like gunshots and the ceiling rained down concrete chunks, metal, powder. I covered my head and felt the pressure envelope my body.
“Damn, babe,” Patricia said. “That’s intense.”
“I know. I can’t remember the last time I had a nightmare,” I said.
We were sitting on the sofa in the living room. She reached over and rubbed the back of my neck. I leaned into it and closed my eyes.
“How about Sue’s for breakfast?” she asked.
I shook my head and said, “No, I want to get the report done and sent in. Get this one behind me so I can forget about it.”
“Gotcha. I’ll make some more coffee.”
She kissed me and went into the kitchen. I leaned forward and opened my laptop on the coffee table, started up the dictation software, and plugged in the digital voice recorder to the USB port. A window opened on the screen and text began to stream across the page. Automatic transcription was a beautiful thing.
Interior building four contains chicken cages, three rows spanning length of building, six levels tall. Steel wash basin on north wall. Plumbing good. Electrical good. Exterior building four no issues. Building structurally sound.
Interior building three contains chicken cages, three rows spanning length of building, six levels tall. Steel wash basin on north wall. Plumbing good. All electrical outlets not receiving power. Breaker panel on south wall receiving power from main, circuit breakers charred and melted inside. Electrical hazard.
Exterior building three no issues. Help me. Building structurally sound.
Interior building two contains chicken cages, three rows spanning length of building, six levels tall. Don’t go. Steel wash basin on north wall. Plumbing good. Electrical good. Trapped. Pain.
I scanned the ongoing transcription for proofreading mistakes and stopped. Even though I speak clearly into the recorder, sometimes the dictation software makes mistakes, but it doesn’t usually add new words. This was new. I leaned back on the sofa and watched the words continue to scroll across the screen.
Patricia brought me another cup of coffee and I took a sip, my eyes staying on the screen. For some reason I felt a nervous sensation in my stomach. You’re being ridiculous, I thought.
“I need to drop off a box of clothes at the shop,” she said. “Be back this afternoon with lunch.”
We kissed and she left. Right before closing the door she glanced back with the briefest look of concern in her eyes. She could read me like a book. I was both annoyed and glad.
The transcription finished and I leaned forward toward the laptop, opened a web browser, and logged into the property inspection site. I filled out the relevant information, my inspector ID, the address of the property, the bank involved, and began pasting in the transcription notes, editing them as I went. I paused briefly when I got to the randomly added words that I hadn’t spoken, and quickly deleted them from the report. Another numb twinge in my stomach.
I took a drag of coffee and burned my mouth, almost spilling it on the sofa. I set the cup down and scrolled to the bottom of the transcription page. Last note to copy and paste. I highlighted it, and the words took shape in my mind before I could paste them into the browser. I forgot about the burning in my mouth.
Exterior building two north wall rusted siding near ground, open hole through wall. Remainder of building structurally sound. Don’t go. You will die, John.
| Part 2 | Part 3 |