No motel rooms in sight.

That was the first thing to register. Second was the pain.

I woke up throbbing and aching all over, groggy movements and groans that no hangover could compare.

Blood had dried and crusted over the wound on my palm, one thing I noticed among plenty of others. Like the fact that I was lying on dusty floorboards, staring at a ceiling that had been decaying for a quite a long time now.

“Matriarchs…” I heard myself whisper.

It all started coming back to me like a pull of a lever.

So it was all in my head, was it? Matriarchs can just enter someone’s mind willy-nilly just like that? Those two are far from what I expected of immortal beings of death.

Now I’m awake with no sense or clue of my location. Which could only mean one thing: they brought me to their nest.

An abandoned decrepit building at the corner of a desolate street.

Going by what the angry, feisty sister had said to me, it was only a matter of time before I got to be served up on a silver platter. I had to do something.

“Protect me, my ass… where the hell are you, Irene?” I muttered under a heavy breath, straining myself steady to my feet.

No sign of her anywhere… Where was she?

As much as I would like to sit flat on my ass, twiddling my thumbs and waiting for rescue, I’m afraid I might be on my own for the time being so that wasn’t exactly an option.

What was an option, then?

Roaming. Exploring the place. My would-be killers hadn’t reached me yet, I might as well, right? Maybe I might find Ash… that was the main priority now. That, and staying alive.

The soles of my shoes crackled against shattered glass and debris as I passed over the doorway from where I woke to a long narrow hallway that was equally as dilapidated.

Haven’t the faintest clue what the building was formerly used for, whatever it was, it certainly needed a lot of empty rooms. Couldn’t go five meters without coming across another on either side of the hall. Office building, perhaps?

The lack of light from a broken window down by the furthest end of the corridor told me that it was night. A quick look down and simple depth perception clarified two things.

Number one: I was standing at the top floor of a sixth-storey building.

Two: Escape wasn’t going to be an option for me unless I somehow make it to the ground floor and I’m not exactly too keen on playing hide and seek with vampires in an abandoned building.

Gotta keep moving.

For now, I turned, walked a few steps, then, staring straight ahead, froze immediately.

A dark figure stood at the far end of another corridor. Still as a statue.

I felt my body stiffen at once.

Darkness adjusted my sight, and after a while, I could finally see that it wasn’t one of the Matriarchs. Regardless, there was certainly a person there, someone burly, big, judging by their silhouette.

Cautiously, I went on an approach.

“Hello?” I said and got no answer.

Unresponsive, unmoving, and not a Matriarch. A closer look revealed the outline of a middle-aged man, his clothes stained and ripped in places, with dried blood clinging to the surface of his throat. His expression was as blank as his hundred-yard stare… like he wasn’t at all conscious, meaning…

“Victim 2…”

I recognized his face from the news article of his disappearance. If he’s here, zombified, then that also means…

I practically raced around the corner to the next stretch of rooms just to confirm my hunch, slowing down to a walk… my breath held tight in anticipation for what next I’d find.

It didn’t take long for the next to show itself.

Victim 3, a teenage boy with ruffled hair, was bent over with his hands around his knees in the darkest corner of the room to the left. A drawled moan crackling from the depths of his throat.

Seemingly comatose, Victim 6 laid flat against a moth-eaten mattress. Upwards were her eyes, staring blankly at the ceiling, muttering silent nothings to herself in her own little corner of the room to the right.

7 was out, standing as still as a statue in the middle of the corridor. As I walked by him I could faintly smell the fragrance of cologne on him. His girlfriend stated that she last saw him walking back to his car.

Number 4 and 5 were nowhere to be seen.

All that were left was Amanda, the first victim and Ash, the eighth. They too were nowhere in sight.

Not until I turned the next corner.

The next corner…

“Amanda…”

Being the first, and the longest held captive, Amanda was the worst looking of all the eight. Her skin was pale, verging on an unhealthy shade of a corpse. The cheer and liveliness on her face was gone and gaunt, reduced to mere haggard skin and bones. Stray hair clung to her lips, which drooled a hefty amount of saliva that dribbled down her chin and onto the floor.

She was practically a dead woman walking. I could hardly believe she was still alive let alone standing upright.

Compared to the rest of the victims with the exception of 4 and 5, Ash remained the only one I saw in perfect health.

But that was hours ago now.

The sister’s voice echoed profoundly in my mind.

“I’m killing the Elf.”

Did she take her? Was that why I couldn’t find her?

If so… I couldn’t waste any time.

Amanda made a noise as I slowly walked past her. A small sound, it could have been a grunt. Maybe she knew… maybe she recognized me, saw me… and realized that I was leaving her behind.

A grunt. Maybe it was nothing.

I want to think it was nothing.

Because there was nothing I could do.

“I’m sorry,” was all that I could give.

Whether or not she understood me, I didn’t know. I’d like to think she did.

I discovered a stairwell that led further down to the lower levels. Each step descending was like an echo magnified by a hundred.

From the last step of the fifth floor, that was when I heard it. An echo reverberating from the sixth.

An echo of a grunt.