The Night Rolls On

Preface

The clock on the wall was ticking slowly. It was slowly turning to three that morning.

Tick...Tick...Tick.

Ryan was lazily laid back in his chair, his security tablet in his hands. However, he was on some app and not tending to the security cameras. He had a cigar in his mouth, smoke billowing out from behind his teeth. He rocked back and forth in the office chair that he was given, this was his third week at the job. It was some fake horror attraction that had no 'main' attraction yet, so it wasn't open to the public as it would most likely fail within months of its opening. So, he was in charge of watching security cameras for suspicious activity or break-ins, the building had some relics in it that were considerably expensive. Due to the fact that they were artifacts from some eighties pizzeria line, which was considerable competition for the cheese rat that plagued everyone's memories with casinos and musty kids. Rumor has it that a bunch of kids went missing and they were never found.

Ryan, however, was blind to the history of the eerie items that gave him company through the night. He was just told that the things there were expensive and to make sure no one breaks in. He soon stood from his office chair, placing the tablet down on the rusty table in front of him, he worked the graveyard shift and it showed. The area around his eyes had dark circles, and his bright green eyes had been dulled down due to his exhaustion. He stretched his back, hearing a few pops from his vertebrae then turned towards his bag. He squatted down and fumbled with the zipper, and then dug through the contents once it was open. Pulling out a small pill bottle, he turned the clicking top until it opened.

Click...Click...Click.

The top of the bottle loosened and allowed him to open it. He did so, pulling out one of the small circular yellow pills. He held it in his hands as he walked off to go grab water from one of the machines at the front of the building where the guest would enter, pay, and get ready to go through the attraction. He quietly listened to the leaky pipes as he navigated to the front of the building. The people wouldn't fix them unless they had to or someone did it for free, choosing beggars honestly, but Ryan needed the job desperately. So he didn't complain, plus the pipes weren't so bad if you thought of them like rain. It added to the creepy effect the building had on the body.

Drip...Drip...Drip.

He walked up to the machine, inserting the quarters slowly. The owners had bought a faulty machine that took money if you inserted it to fast, another cheap and fast money tactic for them, ironically, their son was the first one to fall victim to the money stealing machine. He hit the button that wasn't the drink he wanted but had learned that's where it was put in the machine. The dumbass who stocked it put them all in the wrong slots. He waited for a moment the drink tumbling into the bottom of the machine with a...

thunk..thunk...BANG!

Ryan yelped in surprise, that was a new noise. What the hell? Why did the machine make that noise? He knew it was broken, but that was straight out of hell right there...

He quickly grabbed the drink, which was a peach and pineapple soda with a small blonde dog on the front on some towel on a tropical beach. It reminded him of his Hawaiian home, as it's taste reminded him of some weird way his mom would sugarcoat his fruit so he'd actually eat it, and his favorite? Pineapple, fresh from the farm behind his house, but he had more important things to think about right now, as one of the bricks in the wall had fallen in, which was the source of the loud noise. He frowned, quickly opening the soda, taking a sip and taking the pill he had retrieved earlier.

Then, setting the soda down off to the side, curiously trying to peek into the hole that the brick left, discovering a whole room. An utterly foul odor was inside, making him step back and retch. He had to force himself to keep what little stomach contents he had down, coughing now on the drink that threatened to make a reappearance. He stood there for a minute and recollected his composure. Reaching into his pocket, he grabbed a small flashlight he had got, he had enough room in the hole to stick his to hands in. He decided to try and take pictures of the room with his phone while shining the flashlight. When he turned his hand, his left hand hit something, causing the flashlight to fall, making him curse. Damn it! That thing was ten dollars!

He sighed, deciding to pull his phone out. He soon pulled it back towards himself, curiously opening the photo album. Thinking he'd just find an empty room. Which he did, until he got to the last photo which was right before the flashlight was hit from his hand. There was something there, blurred but he could make out a large metallic and rotten hand reaching for the phone.

Ryan was freaked out, to say the least, he clocked out early and went home. His boss called, yelling at him but once he explained, his voice turned from anger to curiosity. Asking Ryan to even send the photos to him, to which he did. He never got a response back, until he showed up for his graveyard shift the next night, where there was a phone call waiting for him, with words that will haunt him for the rest of his life.

"We found one. A real one."