The Internship

Chapter 6: Introduction to Murder 101

"I get why you killed Markie boy," started Greg, after hearing out Mara's frantic explanation on why she was kicking the already kicked body. "But I don't get why you would go so far as to slash his face off." He huffed a quizzical note to his tone.

Mara, too engrossed by her surroundings, failed to catch Greg's words.

The abandoned yet somehow lived-in house gave her chills as soon as she stepped foot inside. With only a flickering boob-shaped ceiling light, the barely illuminated back entrance gave way to a brick half-wall kitchen layout. Mara couldn't take in the kitchen in all its glory as she swiftly weaved through the house —now illuminated by the moonlight through gaps of broken, tapped windows—down to a corridor. The tattered wooden floorboards creaked under their heavy footsteps.

Maybe it was the night crickets chirping, the rustling of leaves in the cold midnight breeze, or even the distant creaking swing set of a neighboring backyard, but Mara felt a chill run up her spine as she quietly followed behind Greg, slightly picking up pace.

At the turn towards the end of the long, narrow corridor, Mara felt a pair of eyes staring at her back. Looking behind only provided pure darkness. The night and their current activity are definitely creeping up on her. A faint humming caught her ears as they were about to ascend the basement stairs, stopping Mara in her tracks.

"Get moving, Even." Came the whispering yell halfway down the stairs.

"Did you hear that?" Mara asked, unmoving, peeking down at the shadowed Greg over Mark's body. An annoyed huff left Greg's mouth before he drowned any frightened concerns from Mara by simply stating it was fear. Fear. Maybe it was her fear. Sightly assuaged, Mara decided to go along with what Greg said.

If that faint, possibly a fear-induced mind play, humming sent chills down Mara's spine, then what awaited down the creaking dark basement stairs was a whole bucket of chilled ice dumped down her spine.

A thick, pungent smell was what welcomed Mara as a slap to her face as soon as she stepped off the last stair step. The same pair of boob-shaped ceiling blubs as the kitchen slightly flickered before adjusting to a muted yellow glow, coating the dingy basement in an out-of-place warmth. Greg animatedly talked about something, but Mara's fear-stricken, wavering eyes scanned the relatively large basement. The creaking wooden floorboards shifted to cold concrete flooring just below the hollowed-out wooden stairs. Despite the dull light situation in the room, Mara could point out that there were two other doors in the room, both colored differently. She didn't heed any mind towards that as the elephant in the room still needed to be addressed.

The walls of the huge, dimly lit basement were covered in a collection of equipment. The only objects from that collection she recognized were a saw and an axe. Shivers ran down her spine as Greg jumped into her line of vision, making her stumble back with a mouse-like squeak.

"Do you like it?" Greg asked, his large hands spread out in front of the collectibles' wall, his eyes twinkling.

"I—" Stammered Mara, trying to swallow the lump of dryness in her throat. "Where are we?" Came her quizzical voice instead.

"So you didn't hear anything I said? " Greg replied in a low voice, dejected. "Look around you," Greg started, urging Mara to look around. "What do you see?" He ended, scanning the room before dropping his eyes on the marbled concrete floor.

Mara followed his line of sight and froze. Upon further examination of what she was looking at, unwilling goosebumps spread across her body as the marble-decorated concrete floor she thought was pretty at the back of her mind turned out to be blood spattering from god knows how long ago.