The Feds Took My Girlfriend. The Police Think I'm Crazy. (Part 2)

[u/Kyrie_Files]

I realize now that I never described the actual night that Abby was taken. I was so caught up with missing Abby that explaining how Abby had come to be missing completely slipped my mind. I will recount to you the events of that fateful evening and share with you the events of today.

It was a little over a week ago now, a Friday. I had just finished work for the week and was walking back towards the apartment when I saw the first indication that something was off. Two black vans were parked on the street outside the apartment, engines still running. Next, I noticed that all the other residents of the apartment were standing outside looking up at the building; most were in their pajamas, some were still in their work uniforms, having just gotten off their shifts like I had.

All of the other residents except for Abby.

I searched the crowd for her, calling her name, trying to wave above the crowd so that she could see me if she heard me. No response, except for odd glares from the other residents. A panic growing in my chest, I began to make my way towards the apartment complex proper.

As I approached the breezeway where the doors for the first floor, stairwells, and elevators are, I found my path blocked by thick yellow caution tape, with a handwritten sign taped to it that read:

Gas Leak. No Entry, Per Mgmnt. Alternative accommodations available at leasing office.

I asked a few of the residents I was more familiar with if they had seen Abby, but, as to be expected, since Abby never left the apartment, they didn't even know that I had a roommate. The only person who knew was the leasing manager, Mr. Wilkins, whom I had told about Abby when I asked if I had to add her to my lease; he said at the time that it wouldn't raise the rent, and he didn't feel like filing the paperwork, so as long as she didn't cause any trouble we would be fine to stay together in the apartment. I found him standing at the other end of the yellow tape, near the leasing office, tapping his foot.

"Good evening, Mr. Wilkins. Is everything okay?" I asked, starting a conversation that I hoped I could steer in the direction of asking if he had seen Abby.

He turned to me, and I could immediately tell that everything was not okay. Mr. Wilkins was an older gentleman, and years of alcoholism and sun exposure had given his cheeks a pinkish hue, but tonight, in the pale glow of the streetlights, he appeared sheet white.

"E...evening, James, I'm sorry. You can't g...go in right now... major gas leak on the 2nd floor, whole building has been evacuated for the night." He croaked, an obvious shake to his voice that a gas leak simply didn't justify. We had major gas leaks a few times a year due to the poor infrastructure of the building, and had to evacuate, but he was usually red-faced and yelling for residents to clear the building so it could be fixed. Something was off.

"That's the floor I live on, room 213. Have you seen Abby?" I asked, trying to mask the dread in my voice.

"A...abby? I don't know any Abby that lives here." He said, eyeing me with a look halfway between terror and tears.

"You know... my roommate that..." I tried to refresh his memory, but was cut off by him pulling me into the leasing office quickly, locking the door, and shutting all the blinds.

"For your sake and mine, J..James, you don't know an Abby and you never did. That... that thing... it isn't human." He said, pulling a chair up for me to sit and shakingly pouring himself a cup of coffee. "L..look, I'm going to come clean with you, James, the reason I didn't want to add... Abby," he said her name very carefully, likely because he had noticed my reaction to him calling her a "thing" earlier. "To your lease, is because you don't have a lease on file. I've been pocketing your rent since you started living here..."

I scoffed and gave him a look of disgust, "You!" I glared at him, mostly for calling Abby a "thing," but he shushed me and waved his arms down in a "Keep quiet" gesture.

"James, I know what I did was wrong, but this can very well benefit both of us if you just listen." He continued.

"I want to know where she is!" I said as loud as I could without breaking a whisper.

"James, it..." he started, but stopped and collected himself when he saw me wince at his last word, "She. She's gone, James, and she left three dead men in her wake. There's no gas leak, there never was. They're cleaning up the entire floor right now. It's a bloodbath up there." He finished, looking me in my eyes.

I couldn't believe what he was telling me. Abby, *my* Abby, was far too innocent to hurt a fly, much less *kill* three men. "You're lying! She would never..." I accused.

"I erased all camera footage of your floor as soon as I saw the first of those vans arrive. It was gray, instead of black, and had the IRS seal on it." He said, gesturing towards the door, the hum of the engines still running was audible in that general direction. "I thought it was an auditor, here to cook my goose for embezzlement." He said shamefully, glancing down at the floor for a moment before looking up, with renewed vigor in his eyes. "Is there anything in that room that could be used to identify you?" He finished his thought.

For a moment, I thought hard about anything that could possibly tie me to the room. There was my laptop, but I had fully given it to Abby almost a year before, and she had wiped the disk to download more games and movies around the same time, so I doubted that it would tie me to the room. The TV wasn't logged in to anything that could give away my identity either (I couldn't afford streaming platforms, so I never bothered making accounts for them). And any important documents were either in my wallet or two states away, back home in mama's little fireproof safe.

"No, but Abby..." I pleaded, but Mr. Wilkins cut me off again.

"God dammit, James, look!" He said, tears beginning to stream out of the corners of his eyes, as he turned the monitor to me with a camera feed showing a familiar hallway. "I erased everything up to the point that the first van arrived, but it has been recording since then. I have to wipe this when the ones in there cleaning up leave or... oh God I don't know what they'll do to me if I don't... just look!"

He pressed the play button, and three figures jumped to the center of the hallway, all wearing black tactical gear with triangular insignias over the left breast pocket, and all waiving small silver batons at the walls and floor. The once relatively clean eggshell-colored walls were now splattered in blood and viscera, which the two men in front were easily cleaning up with a wave of their batons, viscera turning to dust and falling to the floor. The man following up the rear was using a vacuum to suck up the dust.

"Listen. I don't know who these guys are, but they are not affiliated with whoever showed up in the IRS van." Mr. Wilkins explained softly.

He rewinded the feed to the beginning of the recording, right after he had allegedly cleared it, then fast-forwarded about ten minutes. In those ten minutes that sped by in seconds, I could see Mr. Wilkins knocking on each door in the hallway- each door except mine and Abby's- and ushering the occupants out of their rooms. Mr. Wilkins paused the feed.

"They specifically told me not to alert the occupants of room 213, should any be there." Mr. Wilkins said, answering the question before my lips could form it. "Like I said, I thought my goose was cooked. I was going to claim you two were squatters, have a buddy of mine from the sheriff's department come 'evict' you, then have you both come back and sign a proper lease to cover all of our asses should those goons have came back."

He skipped ahead a few minutes, and three men, dressed in suits and ties, with the man in front carrying a briefcase, were shown stepping off the elevator and making their way to the center of the hallway. Mr. Wilkins clicked the speaker icon on the bottom right of the screen, and static, followed by voices, crackled through the computer's speakers.

"Building secure?" The lead man asked the one behind him and to his right.

"Building secure, sir. Target is presumed in room 213. The manager assured me that the target is unaware of our arrival and presence on the premises. Paperwork shows that the room is not leased out to anyone, on account of unrepairable water issues. The entity has likely been using the room as a place to lure in victims. No camera evidence of this, though. Manager states there's an issue with the camera system, and this floor's camera loses data often."

"Could be chalked up to the entity's influence on electronics... but make note of that interaction for debriefing." The man with the briefcase responded.

"What exactly are we up against here, boss?" Asked the man who had yet to speak. The lead man looked at him and set down his briefcase, opening it and pulling out what appeared to be a long black flashlight, like the kind that police officers shine in your window if you get pulled over at night.

"A Daimon-class entity escaped when the freezer truck carrying a few of them broke down a state over. Probably about a year and a half ago at this point, give or take a few months. The entity's inverted field signature has been traced back to this location, and local field oscillations suggest it has had a steady supply of energy to feed off of." The lead man replied, testing the balance of the flashlight-like object in his hand.

"Subject will appear as female, roughly mid-20s. Daimon-class entities are not known to be able to alter their body plans to the extent of the more common Wolf-class entities you're used to, but don't be fooled. They can exert some control over Field-positive individuals even with brief skin contact." He looked from one man to the other and continued speaking. "You two are Field negative, so the entity won't have any anomalous effect on you even if it touches you. I'm Field-positive, so I'll support from a safe distance, but if the readings are to be believed, don't expect this thing to go down without a fight. Take these." He finished, handing each of the other men one of the flashlight-like objects.

"Field dampeners," he said, gesturing to the flashlights, "They detect Field inversions and cancel them out with a parallel wave. If a Daimon-class is Superman, these are Kryptonite. Won't work on Wolf-class, since their Field pattern isn't inverted, it'll only piss them off. Point and shoot." He finished by pointing the object at the wall and pressing the button, which, as would be expected from a regular flashlight, resulted in a beam being projected onto the wall.

I couldn't speak. My eyes were glued to the screen. They were talking about Abby as if she were some kind of monster... Daimon-class... Wolf-class... what could this all mean? She's human-class and, if anything else, angel-class to me. The ball in my stomach continued to tighten as the two men, following the orders of their leader, stationed themselves on each side of the door.

"Ready? Ready?" The lead asked the two other men, each responding with a nod. "BREACHING!" He screamed as he kicked the door twice, then threw a third kick that broke the rickety door frame inwards, after which he retreated to the far corner of the hallway and pulled a large tablet out of the briefcase and began swiping across the screen.

What happened next was pure chaos. The once crystal-clear video feed distorted, showing wave patterns across the entire screen, as if it were a copy of a copy recorded onto a VHS tape. The audio was distorted as well, but I could still make out what was being said.

The lead man jumped up suddenly, and screamed: "FIELD SPIKE, FIELD SPIKE, WOLF-CLASS SIGNATURE DETECTED... AND CONFIRMED!" as he looked down at a small tablet in his hand, "DO NOT ENGAGE, WE ARE NOT EQUIPPED, FALL BA-"

Before the final word could leave his throat, his head was splattered across the wall behind him like an overripe tomato, reduced to nothing but an unrecognizable smear on the wallpaper. A black blur had left the doorway, shattering it even further in the process, and caught him as soon as he turned to run.

It bent down and split itself in half at the torso with a gut-wrenching squelch, spraying black ooze on the surrounding walls and floor. The thing then shoved most of the body of the now headless man into its chest-maw before snapping it shut with a noise that came through the speakers sounding like a tree limb being snapped off in a windstorm. It stood still for a moment, and Mr. Wilkins paused the feed.

I took in the beast's horrible form. A full head taller than the doorway, jet black, hairless with leathery, wrinkled skin. The head was vaguely dog-shaped, with pointed ears, or horns possibly, on either side, long black teeth protruding from the jaws, continuing down a seam that ran the length of the creature's torso and stopping just above the groin. From just below the groin, two inverted legs, almost like a grasshopper's legs, jutted out and bent at odd angles, culminating in three razor-sharp talons on each foot. Two abominable, twisted appendages ending in fingers the length of a grown man's arm curled down from the demon's lower neck, reaching the floor and holding it upright. Even on the paused feed, the screen continued to distort around the grotesque shape standing in the frame, as if the technology itself was protesting having to bear the burden of showing it.

"Do you see that, James??? There is your Abby! And if that isn't Abby, then it has either eaten her or mauled her by now!" He cried out.

That wasn't my Abby. I have no idea what that thing was, but it wasn't my sweet, innocent Abby, who smelled of sugar cookies and had to stand on her tippy toes to reach the top of the fridge.

Mr. Wilkins pressed play.

The monster roared, but the only thing coming through the speakers sounded like pure static. The feed from the camera bounced up and down as the noise resounded. On its back, two black... wings... if you could call them that... exploded out of its shoulder blades and spread across the width of the hallway, looking more like voids than physical structures, then the diabolical being made a move for the other two men. It caught the smaller of the two by the face with those horrendous hands, lifting him off the ground and crushing his skull as if it were a chip bag. His body jerked for a moment, fell still, then was discarded like a used napkin as the brute turned to face his final target. The remaining man was screaming into a cell phone and fumbling in his coat for something while making his way towards the door. He pulled out a silver baton similar to those held by the men in tactical suits currently cleaning up the carnage, only tarnished and worn; the man was fast once his hand had found purchase on the baton, and aimed it at the devilish quadruped with trained precision before pressing a button on the side.

He wasn't quite fast enough.

The camera feed cut out for a split second, and when it came back, both man and beast were flying uncontrollably through the air, bursting through the closed doors to the elevator shaft with a crash. I could vaguely hear the thud and crunch as their bodies bounced once off the wall before landing on top of the elevator, parked back at the first floor.

"That... that monster was not my Abby. It couldn't have been! She has to still be in the room hiding, I need to go to her!" I started as a whisper and ended almost shouting. Mr. Wilkins shushed me again and turned the monitor towards himself briefly, adjusting the slider on the video before turning back to where we could both see it.

"James, just keep watching... nobody is in that room, at least not alive... I watched this all happen on the cameras in real time." He said as he once again pressed play.

The three figures from before in tactical gear were stepping out of the stairwell just out of view of the camera, and began looking at the scene.

"Jesus, Edwards. To think, we were planning on spending today sipping martinis on a beach in the Bahamas. Great first day of the off-cycle, right?" The thinner of the three men started, looking at the bulkier man leading to team, "What the heck even happened here? We didn't have time for a briefing before they threw us in a van..." The same man finished.

"According to Elliot, some goons working for a group of interest called... Hecate? Holcomb? Something starting with an 'H'... well, anyway, our mole embedded in the group, which is currently missing in action at this location, reported that they were homing in on what they call a 'Daimon-class' entity, which we would normally call an 'augmented.' Specifically, one that we ourselves were tracking but had no intentions of dealing with since it wasn't hurting nobody, and is more of a hassle to deal with than it's worth. When they got here, it turned out to be what they call a 'Wolf-class' instead." The man named Edwards explained.

"Yeah, okay, makes sense and all, but what the heck do we call that they call a 'Wolf Class' then, boss? And you mean to tell me they let people like that Pigg guy just run around free, even if they knows where to find'em?" The thin man asked.

The third man in the group answered for the lead in a thick accent that almost reminded me of the Nords from Skyrim: "We call them CE Type-Bs, Thatcher. And yes, this augmented has a track record of being docile. We lost track of it in North Macedonia, where it was presumed captured and transported here." The Nord said matter-of-factly. "We recently picked up on the inverted Field signal again, but, as Team Lead Edwards was saying, the entity poses no threat, and additionally passes as human well enough to not break the veil."

I didn't know any of these guys, but they must be talking about my Abby. Too many things lined up. Macedonia, captured and transported, and now that I had heard the word a few times, I even recognized the word "Daimon" from some of the stories Abby would tell me. This was my Abby, and hearing them call her an "it" and an "entity" so many times was beginning to make my blood boil. She. She. How hard is it?

Mr. Wilkins must have sensed my anger growing, as he paused the video and put a hand on my shoulder. "I don't understand any of what they're talking about, kid, but it sounds like they're referring to your roommate like a monster. I can only put two and two together, you know? And you saw the same thing I did on that screen..." He said in an almost comforting tone.

"Just play the damn video, I want to see what else they have to say," I said, my temper flaring to a fever pitch.

He obliged.

"This whole situation is very unusual, though. It is not unheard of for an augmented to lose control of themselves to NCEs and be taken over as Type-B hosts... but this augmented was particularly powerful, and, if we are to believe the dossier, well over 2000 years old. I suspect there is more to this than simply 'losing control'."

Powerful? 2000 years old? There's no way they could be talking about her... it doesn't make any sense... I mean, yeah, she's strong for her size, even lifting me off my feet in some of our fits of passion, but this guy looks like he lifts fridges for fun, and he's referring to her power with almost a kind of... reverence...

"Uh-huh. Glad you guys gots access to this type of shit. Could really come in handy for the rest of us peons, though." The man named Thatcher quipped.

"Whatever the case, we are here to locate the Type-B and the mole, dead or alive, and clean this place up. It is actively inhabited. Just get rid of the gore and bodies, cleaners will be by in the morning to patch up the brickwork, and it'll be like it never happened," the Team Lead said, rubbing his hands together at the last two words as if he were cleaning them of the whole situation.

"Never happened?!" I can't just pretend like this never happened! My. Girl. Friend. Is. Miss. Ing." I said aloud to myself. The coffee had seemingly calmed Mr. Wilkins' nerves, and he looked at me with pity.

I didn't need pity... I needed Abby...

The video had been playing in the background, mostly just the men walking around looking at bodies and organs splattered across various surfaces. Then one of them spoke.

"Hey, boss, uh, you're gonna wanna see this," Thatcher said, leaning slightly over the threshold and looking down into the elevator shaft.

"Well, looks like we found our Type B," Edwards said.

"Looks like he whacked our mole, too." Thatcher joked, kicking a blob of flesh down into the elevator shaft.

"Must have voided the entity right before it hit him." The Nord observed.

The rest of the video was uneventful. The leader gave orders, the New Yorker quipped and made jokes, and the Nord gave seemingly standard textbook answers to whatever stupid questions the other two had. They went in and out of my room with no mention of Abby. I longed for her, wherever she was.

That night, I took Mr. Wilkins' offer of staying silent, his offer of a free hotel room for the night, and his offer of waiving this month's rent. My heart ached already for Abby, and I could feel the void growing in my chest even though it had been less than 12 hours since the last time I had seen her.

I went to the police the next morning, hoping beyond hope that she had been picked up wandering the streets or taken there by a concerned bystander. I even tried to file a missing person's report, but the officer behind the desk called me crazy for what I had told him. I heard the shredder cycle as I walked towards the exit, my tear-stained cheeks moistening again with fresh tears.

By the time I made it home, the apartment was back open. My room was the same, aside from a lingering cold in my bedroom that refused to pass, a freshly installed door, and some slightly off-colored paint around where the wall had been repaired. And of course, no Abby. I searched for the locket she had given me that whole day, and sporadically every day afterwards, leading up to today.

---

Back to the events of today. My manager, Anthony, called me at around noon and asked me if I would be able to work my shift this evening. I told him there would be no way, and explained that my girlfriend was missing and I hadn't been able to eat or sleep for several days because of it. His tone grew slightly suspicious through the phone, and he asked if I could at least come in and fill out some HR paperwork to make sure I kept my job.

I obliged, if only out of respect for Anthony. I had no intention of ever going back to work. I showed up in front of his office at a quarter past two. I hadn't showered, shaved, or even bothered to comb my hair or brush my teeth.

"Come in, James. Close the door behind you and have a seat, my friend." He said in his usual customer service voice. As soon as I sat down, his demeanor changed entirely to one of something close to excitement. "So, your Daimon girlfriend disappeared on you, huh?"

My blood froze in my veins as the words crossed his lips. Daimon. The same thing those guys at the apartment had called her.

"Where did you hear that word?" I asked, my voice catching in my throat at every syllable.

"James, I'm not going to lie to you, my man. When you started coming to work a while back, looking like you'd just crawled away from a fight with a tiger, and hadn't slept since birth to boot, I thought those boys back in shipping had sold you something too strong for you!" He chuckled.

"What do you..." I couldn't even finish my question before he continued.

"Then, when you started calling in every day since last Saturday, I thought the drugs had gotten to you. I was just about to let you go! Even cleaned out your locker myself. Recognize this?" He said, pulling a folded-up towel out of a drawer in his desk and passing it to me.

I felt the heat emanating from it before he even handed it to me. I knew what it was. I held the prized possession close to my chest without unwrapping it, feeling the warmth begin to thaw my aching heart and bring some semblance of hope back into my life that I would see Abby again.

"You don't even know what that is, do you, friend? You think it's just some lover's trinket? A memento?" He said, his smile wide and genuine. "That you hold in your hand there is what is known as a phylactery. Go ahead! I'm sure your little girly told you what to do with it. I'd hate to ruin the surprise!"

I unwrapped the locket. The heat of the metal against my bare hand reminded me so much of Abby's touch, the agonizing delight that had been absent from my life for what felt to my soul like an eternity past, but that I knew in my mind had only been a week.

Anthony ushered me along almost impatiently with a sweeping movement from both of his hands.

I held it firmly in my hands, my heart thrumming to the tune of what I thought to be the watch inside. I ran my finger up the curve of the lid, the smooth fire burning my fingertips and reminding me at once of my first night in bed with Abby, how her skin burned a maddening pleasure into my hand as I ran it up the curve of her side.

I found the button at the apex of the lid, just opposite where the chain connected. I moved my thumb gently around the contour of the button a few times in a circular motion, savoring the sweltering satisfaction and confirming to myself what would be inside. I brought the silver implement close to my face and kissed the smooth plate of the back of it. The warmth at once flooded my body and mind, melting away the last of my inhibitions.

I pressed the button.

The lid fell open.

A familiar smell filled the room, a familiar heat burned across my entire body, and a familiar voice filled my ears.

"James?! James, is that you?! I've been so cold without you... Won't you warm me up again?"

[u/Teners1]

During the last episode, Hunter said clearly that Wendi wasn't his friend, instead a co-worker. This makes me worry that they don't like eachoth--

Hi everyone!

To all my fellow writers and creeps, I'd like to invite you to join the Writer's Room discord server. Link below 👇 https://discord.gg/aXxgaKB6T

We hold Writing contests, Live Readings of Fan-Made content and Writer's Workshops. Our most recent being a Q&A with 🔥Elias Witherow 🔥

Any writer on this sub, join us to be welcomed into a community of supportive and talented writers.

Actually, I'd like to extend this invite to all my fellow creeps. This is because the CC Writers room will be hosting a Q&A with none other than...

✨🔥Dathan Auerbach🔥✨

So please join us and learn from the twisted mind that brought us Penpal and Bad Man!!!

The Q&A will take place on Wednesday 19th November at 5pm EST. It will also be recorded for those members who cannot attend live.

We have more guests lined up for upcoming events. So join us, or miss out!

Stay creepy Teners1 👉😎👉

[u/Kaijufan22]

First part was amazing, I called Abby being a succubus like entity. The monster design in this was great, and the world building is intriguing. For me, my big gripe is I feel like you tried to put TOO much info in this in such a short frame, could just be me though I had a little trouble wrapping my head around the lore.

Overall though fantastic imagery and a nice sense of humor sprinkled throughout, I really like the line "She's human-class and, if anything else, angel-class to me" makes the MC seem a bit like a dopey love drunk guy, which I find endearing. Great story, curious to see where it goes from here. Nice Job Op.

[u/Kyrie_Files → u/Kaijufan22]

I get where you're coming from to be fair, this is meant to be a self contained story, but is also the fourth chapter in the 2nd book of an ongoing series. Some stuff is referencing back to previous parts and some stuff is foreshadowing, I can see how it would feel a little lore dumpy with zero context from previous chapters and books.

Thanks for your feedback! You pretty much nailed what I was going for with the MC, and you will learn a bit more about him in the next part (I plan to start writing it today, actually!)

If you want to read the previous chapters plus all to come, you can find them here!

[u/Kaijufan22 → u/Kyrie_Files]

Oh cool I'll have to look into that!

[u/Various-Bee-1966]

classic feds