||Series Removed|| OTB

14 - Snitches Get Stitches

14

Pinning Tanner up against the dank archway of the main sewer tunnel, I tried to get his muffled screams under control as my hand failed to clasp over his panicked mouth.

"Shit, dude!! He's dead! He's dead!! We need to get out of here-"

"God damn, stop freaking out! You saw what happened, it was self-defence!"

My words did nothing to calm the sheltered teen, but soon he stopped wriggling enough to slump down onto the mossy floor. Not for a second could he take his eyes away from the red-stained body in front of us.

I understood his paralysed reaction. After all, it was similar to my own when I'd first seen a human corpse. Growing up in a town like this one though, hidden away from the bandits and the Lost, only hearing jokes and urban legends about them... It was a darker world that he had been left unfamiliar with.

Leaning down by the O-Saint's side, my hands shakily fumbled around his soaked pockets and bloodied chest, trying to find some sort of clue about what he could possibly have been doing down here. The fact that he had nothing on his body at all worried me even more. This was a man with nothing to lose.

There wasn't any chance of Tanner recovering and becoming helpful anytime soon, so I started off by dragging the body by the feet further into the maze of sewer tunnels. If I couldn't dispose of it entirely, I could at least make it difficult for anyone else to stumble across on future maintenance excursions.

That was the plan, but it only took a couple of seconds before Tanner started shouting "Oh fuck... Fuck!! We have to tell someone!" as he examined the bloodstains. Almost in response to his cries, my leg send out a silent buzz that made me drop the stiff O-Saint right on my toes.

My phone's slightly-wet screen lit up discreetly from the hip, and my eyes peered down in horror as I turned away from the wailing teenager to read the text.

"-THE PIPES TALK. BETTER SHUT HIM UP."

The lump in my throat throbbed painfully, and my eyes darted around into the unknown darkness. That was far too specific to be a coincidence... Someone knew.

Torn between my new dead friend and my living one, I decided it was best to get rid of the body as fast as possible. After all, Tanner wouldn't be able to 'shut up' if my kill was still stinking up the already-foul waste tunnel.

I had worked on a good rhythm of 'two-steps dragging, three-steps yanking' as I continuously pulled the O-Saint further into the reaches of nowhere. Just as I was starting to feel safe though, something in the air changed for the worse.

Was it the pathway? I glanced all over the area in curiosity, making sure that I'd kept track of where I had been travelling. Then it hit me... there wasn't anything. Tanner hadn't uttered a single sound in ages.

Dropping the blood-infused body with a disgusting squelch, I made a beeline back for the main tunnel with my flickering flashlight poised. I almost shot straight past the archway where I had last seen him, barely able to recognise the winding route I'd left in my wake.

Another buzz made me jump at my own shadow, and after nearly dropping my phone into the waterway again, my adjusting eyes could barely register the second text. I felt more aware than ever of the darkness all around me, taunting and preying like this was all a child's game.

"-SNITCHES GET STITCHES."

Gritting my teeth, I smacked my flashlight against a nearby pipe, letting out a loud echoing ring to accompany my roar. "Get out here!! Show your face, you filthy coward! I know it's you, that sick Flesh fuck!"