I didn’t feel like a hero when all this happened, which is why I kept my anonymity. I still don’t feel like one. I might’ve started off brave, but I was a snivelling coward by the end. You won’t hear about any of that in the news. So I might as well talk about it, now that everything has calmed down.
I passed the Del Pacifico everyday too and from work. I thought it was a closed down factory. It was always quiet, with no cars in the parking lot, and most of the windows were boarded up. Plus, the place plain reeked, at least when you got up close to it. My roommate, a native of Acapulco, confirmed my suspicions, claiming it was an old factory, shut down many years ago. He couldn’t remember what was made there. He was always on marimba so I probably shouldn’t have believed him, but I was new to the city and didn’t know the town’s history. It looked like an old factory, so how was I to know any different?
For the first month I lived there nothing unusual happened. But one day after I’d gotten home from work, I saw out the window smoke coming from the factory. I was worried it might have been a fire. I alerted my roommate, who was high at the time and thought it was interesting but nothing else. I watched a little longer as the building didn’t go up in flames. No one else paid any attention to it, so I tried to ignore it too. Perhaps they factory had been reopened?
I didn’t think anything of it until a few days later when, on the way home from work, I realized the place was still deserted. Smoke plumes continued to rise from the lone chimney. But who was inside? What was going on in there? Curiosity got the better of me, and I crept around to the back of the building where I found a few windows just above my eye level. One of them was broken. It was one of those windows with two panes, an inner and outer. The outer glass had been shattered, but the inner was still in one piece, and open. I likely wasn’t the first person to sneak in this way. Hoisting myself over the ledge, trying to be careful of any leftover glass, I entered the building.
I crashed loudly and painfully to the cold, dusty floor. I immediately held my breath, listening for any noise or telltale signs my entrance had been noticed. All was quiet, except for the sounds of the city following me through the window.
After a few minutes of waiting, I gingerly got to my feet and took stock of my surroundings. I was in what was probably a small office. A dilapidated desk took up most of one wall, with some filing cabinets and bookshelves running opposite it toward the door. With the window broken, plenty of rain had found its way in, and things had begun to rot. Surprisingly, even though the weather outside was quite warm, it was cold inside, as if the air conditioning had been left on all this time. I could actually see my breath in front of my face!
A shadow moved across the open door, causing me to dart back further into the room. Although the squishing of the carpet under my feet caused far too much noise, no one came to investigate. Still, I knew I wasn’t alone in the building.
I know I should have gone back out through the window, escaped while I could, but something drew me in. I had to know what was going on. So I crept to the doorway as quietly as I could and peered out. There was nothing; no sound, no movement. Then: shadows. Down the hall, cast though a doorway of a room adjacent to the one I was in. As I snuck down the hallway towards them I wondered whether or not I should announce my presence. Was I breaking and entering? Where shady dealings going on? Perhaps I should just turn and run before this gets out of hand?
Opposite the doorway was another corridor, wider than the one I was in and in better shape. A row of decrepit chairs and vanities lined one side. Much like the hallway I’d come down, this one was also carpeted, and I couldn’t find anything resembling footprints in it. Upon peeking my head into the room I found no one there. Perhaps my mind was playing tricks on me. The room was large with a high ceiling but mostly empty, save for debris littering the floor. A row of windows lined the roof on opposing sides, and an industrial oven sat in the far wall, its cast iron door hanging open on creaky hinges. It reminded me of a blacksmithing forge. And it was lit.
What had I stumbled upon here? Who started the fire? Was it homeless people looking for warmth? No, that wouldn’t make sense; it was warm enough outside. Perhaps it was shady businessmen looking to dispose of evidence from some unknown crimes? If so, how far would they go to keep things quiet? Was my life in danger just being here?
I glanced around, ensuring I was alone, before entering the room. The garbage on the floor seemed to consist of ashes, great heaps of them, like anthills. They crunched softly under my feet as I made my way cautiously towards the oven, relishing the heat it gave off as I drew near.
I jumped as the door slammed behind me, its glass rattling so loudly I wondered how it hadn’t shattered. There was no wind inside, leaving me to believe someone must have done it. But as I turned to investigate, the fire began to rage uncontrollably, as if someone had thrown a can of gas on it. I jumped again, backward this time, away from the roaring flames. Even from a few feet away the heat was intense. Flames shot out the oven door, licking into the brick chimney. Something inside was burning; smoke began to fill the room – as did whispers.
Undecipherable gibberish met my ears. There was no obvious source for the voices; I was alone, surrounded only by four drab, paint-peeled walls. Smoke billowed from the oven, clouding the room. In less than a minute the air supply was being choked off and the daylight obscured. I looked to the windows that ran along the ceiling; it late afternoon and there should be plenty of sunlight. But the windows were dark, as if night had fallen. The whispers seemed to grow louder and more insistent in the brewing darkness.
Knowing I had to get out of that room, I made for the door. Then I felt the hands. Sporadic and random, invisible hands touched and grabbed at me; ruffling my hair, tugging on my clothing, caressing my skin. I tried to pull away from them by they followed me. Soon the hands became more violent; yanking my hair, scratching and pinching my flesh, pushing me around the room.
Eventually I realized that I was being forced towards the burning oven. I would try to lunge away, only to be shoved backwards. Which each passing minute and despite my attempts to fight it, I drew closer to the inferno. When I was within arm’s reach, the fire took on new shapes. Flames licking the air became fingers, reaching for me, and I could see faces inside, buried in the scorching ashes. In a desperate move I slammed shut the oven door.
Everything stopped. It was eerily silent now. No hands pawed at me. The heat from the oven mysteriously dissipated – not that I welcomed the cold or seeing my breath again. Even all the smoke completely disappeared. Aside from the windows still being strangely dark, everything returned to relative normalcy. I started to wonder if I’d hallucinated the whole thing.
When I again headed back to the door, the oven door flew open behind me, as if shoved from inside, slamming into the wall with the sound of a shotgun. Almost instantly the heat of the inferno reached me, and smoke began clouding the room once more. The whispers did not return, but instead were replaced by something worse: shadows. Cast by the oven’s glow, my shadow stood against the wall in front of me. And on either side of it were two others, vaguely human-shaped. One was standing next to me.
Chills went down my spine. Not wanting to take my eyes off them, I craned my eyes around the room to confirm that I alone, at least allegedly. Yet the shadows had to come from something. Timidly, I reached out with my left hand, moving my own shadow to connect with the one beside me. I felt nothing. The shadow to my right suddenly moved in my direction, and that was enough for me.
I bolted for the door, but the shadow got there first. Whatever presence dwelled in this room would not let me leave. The door wouldn’t budge. The knob wouldn’t even turn. I was trapped. The two shadows now silently guarded the door from either side. Unfortunately it was not them I needed to fear; a new threat entered the room.
As I scanned around, looking for some other escape route, I noticed a thick, black slime pouring from the oven. It flowed out in every direction, even spreading up the wall, defying gravity, coating everything it touched. But the smell, laying somewhere between roses and cinnamon was intoxicating. It was warm and, inviting, almost hypnotic, and I think meant to lull me into a false sense of security. How could anything that smelled so heavenly be evil? Thankfully I realized this, and it spurned me into action.
I took off my shirt and wrapped it around my elbow, then bucked it backwards into the glass. The window just shuddered but held. I tried again, and again, never taking my eyes off the advancing darkness. My elbow began throbbing in pain, but it barely registered as panic began to take hold. I continued swinging my arm harder and harder, until finally, as the goo was inches from my feet, the glass shattered.
I immediately flung myself backwards though the window, heedless of the broken shards still embedded in it, landing awkwardly on my head in the hallway. Unharmed but a little disoriented, I scrambled to my feet, tripping over a long, canvas-wrapped object that hadn’t been there earlier. I thought it was just a roll of carpet, until I took a closer look; it was vaguely humanoid. I didn’t stick around to investigate since the black slime began spilling out the window, chasing after me.
Kicking away from the corpse-like sack, I got to my feet and ran down the hall. I know I should’ve ran back the way I’d come, to the office with the broken window, but I wasn’t thinking. I just ran. I checked the doors along way, and the ones that would open were useless; bathroom, broom closet, one that looked strangely like an operating room.
At the end the corridor turned right and another door stood opposite. Skipping nothing, I checked this door too; it opened, and I was met with darkness. I froze. Then my eyes adjusted to the dark and I found myself peering into a cellar, about half a storey down into the ground. I was also struck by a ghastly odor. Whatever stench was haunting the building was emanating from in here.
Glancing back over my shoulder, I saw that the creeping shadow was drawing closer, now less than a dozen feet from me. Despite the overwhelming reek I darted through the door and slammed it behind me, hoping it would keep out the darkness. I held my breath, looking at the cracks, waiting to be followed inside the cellar, but I seemed safe for the moment.
It wasn’t as dark in the cellar as I’d first thought, and I walked carefully down the steps to the floor to check the place out, hopefully find another exit. Similar to the furnace room, a series of dirty windows ran along the slanted ceiling, letting in traces of daylight. I prayed they would continue doing so. Aside from the light, it was also quite cold in the room – like being in a walk-in freezer. I could see my breath again.
More long canvas shapes, like the one in the corridor upstairs, were everywhere. I’d come to realize they were corpses, which would explain the smell of death and decay. They were stacked like rolls of carpet. Twenty, thirty, forty…they were beyond count, and I had no doubt they were connected to whatever evil inhabited this building. But so long as they remained dead…
Of course, that would be asking too much. As I was pondering a stack of corpses, wondering if they’d be stable enough for me to climb up to reach the windows, I heard shuffling behind me. I turned around to see one of the canvas sacks atop a pile a few feet away had sat up. Soon, all around me, they were rising, struggling to stand.
I bolted up the stairs, not looking back. I was not going to be in that room any longer. Opening the door a crack, I peeked out to find the hallway clear. The darkness had returned to wherever it came from. I stepped out, closing the door behind me, confident that in their bindings the bodies wouldn’t be able to follow me. That’s when I noticed the one body on the outside, the body I’d tripped over earlier, was gone. Had the darkness claimed it or did it just get up and walk away? And if so, where was it hiding?
I wanted to go back to the office, the first room I’d entered when I broke into this godforsaken place, but I dared not head back that way, since that path passed by the furnace room. So I continued around the corner, looking for a way out.
The hallway in that direction was in worse shape than the rest of the building, at least from what I’d seen so far. The ceiling was crumbling, collapsed in some places, letting in all manner of debris and weather. What carpeting I could see was withered and mouldy. The walls actually looked burnt, as if there’d been a fire. The first three doors I came across were dilapidated and wouldn’t budge.
I’m not sure when the moaning began. At first it was just a humming in the background, but it slowly and steadily got louder, becoming a deep, continuous wail. Like the whispers before, it seemed to come from everywhere, echoing around the corners, reverberating off the walls. The sound of a hundred souls trapped in this place.
The sudden squealing of hinges made me stop. One of the doors behind me, which had previously been wedged shut, had just opened on its own. Chills infested my spine and I hesitated before turning around, not knowing what it meant. When I finally had the courage to look, I saw the missing wrapped corpse standing there, fully upright. The moaning increased in volume but did not seem to be coming from it. Slowly it began coming toward me, almost hovering, as if pushed by an invisible force. The canvas dragged along the carpet, making a soft scratching sound.
I took off down the hallway, pursued by the floating corpse. The moaning followed too, as did a cacophony of opening and slamming doors. The factory was coming to live with paranormal activity. As I rounded a corner I chanced a look back to find three bodies now slowly chasing me.
On the verge of panic, I almost missed the open door. Pausing, I backed up to find a rotting door off its hinges, leaning precariously into the room. The afternoon sun slipped around it into the corridor. Light meant a window, and a window meant escape. I tried barging into the room but something was blocking the way. The door bent around some obstruction but held fast. As the floating corpses drew closer I began kicking and shoving the door, feeling it give further with each blow.
At last the door finally split in two, the top half bending into the room. I clambered over top and fell into the same office I’d first entered the building through. It had changed since I’d last been there, which couldn’t have been more than twenty minutes ago. Papers and books were strewn all over the floor, as if a tornado had passed by. But the window, which previously had been open, was now closed, with the broken outer pane now inaccessible. Lastly, a filing cabinet had been tipped over in front of the door.
Someone, or something, clearly did not want me leaving.
The bodies, four of them now, piled into the room after me, tripping over the filing cabinet. I scrambled to the window and began shoving it upwards. It took every ounce of strength I had to budge it. The same force trying to keep me here was undoubtedly holding down the window, preventing my escape. But I was not to be denied. When I had the window open wide enough, I shoved my foot through, all the way to my hip. Behind me the corpses were rising again. I didn’t know what they wanted or what they would do to me but I wasn’t going to stick around to find out. I swung the rest of my body around and stuck my head through the gap. It was tight, but it cleared. The rest of my body wasn’t so lucky. When I let go of the window it came pressing down on top of me, like someone was trying to split me in half. I never felt so fat as when I was trying to wriggle the rest of my body through that small gap. It was a panic-fuelled, agonizing process, slipping out inch by inch, but I was getting there.
Then I felt a hand grab my ankle and pull. It couldn’t have been from the corpses, right? They were wrapped up pretty tightly. I could barely crane my head around to look back in the window at whatever was trying to yank me back inside, but I didn’t want to. The next few minutes were a crazy, manic fight to free myself, thrashing and kicking wildly, scared to have come so close to freedom only to get caught at the last second.
Eventually I won the struggle, falling to the grass and landing painfully on my neck and shoulder. Nothing broken, at least. I didn’t immediately get up and run; I lied there, breathing in the fresh air. Although it still stunk out here the air was definitely more palatable. Upside down, I stared back up at the now closed window. With the sun glaring off the inner pane it was impossible to see inside, at least not from my current angle, but I could feel something glaring down at me. I told myself it was just my imagination, that I was safe now. Then the window began to jerk open.
I got up and ran.
Two blocks later I stopped, huffing and panting, with a dull pain on my left ankle. I sat down on the grass to rest, and found swollen, scarred markings on my ankle where I was grabbed. I was unsure if I was infected, whether I should get help for it, or what. I would just have to keep an eye on it. In the meantime I had to do something about the factory before someone got seriously hurt. Perhaps someone already had; I shuddered to think where all the bodies had come from. That was one evil building.
I found a phone booth and called the police. Knowing they’d never believe the factory was haunted, I told them the place smelled really awful, like there were a bunch of dead bodies in there or something. That worked.
Later I learned that it wasn’t a factory like my roommate had said, but an abandoned funeral home. That would explain all the bodies, I guess, but not why they were left behind. How many had been left there, and how many had accumulated since? Whatever the case, I hope those souls can now rest.
One thing, however, still bothers me. The official police report stated that sixty-one bodies were found in the building, but that later changed to just sixty. No explanation as to why. What had happened after the police investigated?
The Del Pacifico is still there, but I don’t walk by it anymore. I take the long way to and from work. Though the bodies have been removed, I fear that something still lurks inside. Something still waits for me to come back. Or maybe it had crawled out of the window after me and is out there hunting me down. I told you I’m not a hero. I’m just a scared little man, wondering if one day I’ll find out what was causing those shadows.
The Chris Effect 