Tentacle University pt. 2

When Devon Walker woke up he expected it to be just another quiet Sunday on campus.  He expected to hear the sounds of hung over shuffling down the hallway, the chatter of his roommates as they recounted the night before.  What he hadn’t expected was to hear the sound of sirens blazing past his dorm. 

Devon stumbled out of his room, into the small, cluttered living room that he shared with his two roommates.  “What the hell is going on?”

Peter stood at a window, looking down at the road that ran outside the dorm.  He glanced back at Devon, barely registering his roommate’s presence. 

“Cops are flooding the old campus.” Peter leaned forward.

The old campus? Usually police found their way over to Greek Row, not the abandoned school buildings.  Most of them were under lock and key, anyways.  Sure a few kids wandered over there every once in a while, mostly to get high and hook up out of the prying eyes of the small campus. 

“You hear what happened?” Devon shuffled closer to the window.  “Seems like a little bit of over kill.” 

“Sounds like they found two bodies.” Peter’s eyes were still glued on the road, following an ambulance that flew past.  “Cherry texted me.  Her dorm is right on the edge of the old campus.  Said one of the construction guys wandered in there around seven, then came running out, screaming like a psycho.”  Finally Peter looked at Devon.  “Want to go check it out?”

“That’s kind of morbid.” Devon shook his head.  It was in pretty bad taste to go rushing to the site of a murder.  Still… he was curious. 

“You sure?” He nudged Devon in the ribs. 

“I guess checking it out would be okay.” He shrugged.  “Just to see what was going on.” 

-*-

There was already a crowd outside of Warner Hall was already pretty large, and as Devon watched, he could see it growing. 

Hartmore was a pretty small campus, and very quiet.  The students were there because they wanted to get a degree, and eventually a well paying job.  The university prided itself on it’s high graduation numbers, and its number of successful alumni.  Other than the occasional drunk and disorderly the students of Hartmore were extremely focused.  Throw a few cop cars in and a few morbid rumors, and suddenly that focus was broken. 

Devon made his way through the crowd slowly, inching towards the chain link fence that blocked access to the rotting building.  He watched as a stretcher was wheeled out of the building, a white sheet over what appeared to be a body. 

“Dude, looks like Cherry wasn’t lying.” Peter let out a surprised laugh.  “Wonder what happened.” 

Devon couldn’t speak.  His eyes were locked on the body, on that draped form.  It looked… off somehow.  It looked so thin, like there was almost nothing underneath it.  When the stretcher hit a bump on one of the cracked steps the sheet shifted, and Devon could see clearly why the body looked so strange.  An arm fell from the covering.  It was thin and boney, the once peach skin a pale grey.  The skin clung to the bones like tissue paper.  It looked… drained.

“Oh God.” Devon felt his stomach lurch. 

“Holy shit.” Peter’s hand went to his mouth.  “Look at the wrist.”

Devon shook his head. 

“Dude, look.”  Peter elbowed him in the ribs.  “You recognize that bracelet?” 

Devon looked up, his eyes glancing back at the corpse. 

There, dangling from the boney wrist was a bright, silver bracelet.  It was a health alert bracelet, brand new, and Peter was right, it was familiar.  His roommate Tim had gotten one just like that a few weeks ago. 

“No way.” Devon shook his head violently, doing his best to choke back the vomit that seemed to be crawling up his throat.  “That body looks mummified.  There’s no way it could be…” 

“Devon Walker? Peter Thomas?” A low voice made Devon jump.  They both turned, and there, standing behind them was a tall, thin man.  He had olive skin, dark black hair, and his eyes were hidden behind a pair of dark, black shades. 

Devon nodded.  Peter was frozen. 

“We need to talk.”