WIP: Intro Chapter

Austin stood in a small circle of flashlit smoke on the corner of Barr and Straton, willing himself to move forward. What loomed before him was a ruined hulk, once the largest block of offices in the Annik Setka business park.

The place was in a miserable state of abandonment now, everything covered in graffiti, tangled threads of ivy and a fine layer of broken glass and plaster dust. Austin thought it looked much better now than it had when it was occupied, but had to admit it looked significantly more murder-y at night. In daylight it was a place he had often imagined exploring; taking a couple old cameras, wiggling through the fence gap and spending a pleasant afternoon cataloging the destruction. In the dark it looked like it wanted to eat him. It made him feel small and seen, like an unwitting bug about to be snatched by the slimy tongue of a chameleon.

Was it just what he knew of the buildings history that was making him feel this way? Once part of a network of a thousand or more PsyLabs Incorporated offices stretching all across the country. PsyLabs, a company whose name was now synonymous with one of the most horrific and mind-bending child abuse scandals of the 20th century. Austin read every file ever leaked by whistle blower or dug out by FOIA request -- this shit, as Molly would put it, went all the way up-- and it was a truly nasty story. Children seperated from their parents by the promise of treatment, only to be used as lab rats, experimented on and neglected. If a place could be haunted, this would a prime location for the spirits of rage and vengeance to gather en masse.

Austin's eyes moved from window to window as he took another drag from his half-smoked cigarette. No movement, no light, nothing out of the ordinary. It was stupid of him not to bring Molly, he realized that now. They would already be inside if he'd brought her along. She wasn't afraid of places like this at all-- actually, he was sure that wasn't true. She must be scared to death of them, but Molly had a clever way of converting her fear directly into anger and a stubborn-headed determination to run headfirst into whatever was scaring her. Austin admired that about her even though he thought it was crazy and stupid too. He had no difficulty imagining her yelling and waving her arms at a grizzly bear, or punching a bloodthirsty shark in the nose.

But without his shark-puncher, Austin felt like a twig in the mist. He wondered what he must look like out here, mop-haired and shivering, willing himself to either go in or leave. Probably like a homeless tweaker, which would make Molly snort.

Home it was then. He wasn't even sure what he was here for. He'd walked out to the park so many times and just looked at this grimy dilapidated monument to greed, facism, and bad science, and he guessed he'd keep doing it until the night he could look at it and define the feeling it gave him.

Austin turned away, pinching out the end of his cigarette and grinding it into the sidewalk. He pulled out his phone, shot a quick text to Molly, and started back down the path home.

As he turned the corner and left the office park, something disturbed the shadows in the doorway of the old PsyLabs offices. A winking shine in the darkness; a pair of inky black eyes.

"Call Anderson. He was here again tonight."