Fifteen people. That's how many had simply vanished in the past 10 years. And all of them had gone into the abandoned mansion on the top of the hill.
After the first six disappearances, a pair of police officers had been sent to the mansion. One male, one female. Their car was found parked outside 3 hours later, but no trace of them.
Two more officers were sent in. They disappeared. After that, the police stopped sending officers to check it out.
Three punks had tried to light the mansion on fire on Samhain two years back. They vanished, and the mansion was untouched. One of them had concerned parents, who went to the mansion and were never seen again.
Since then, not a soul would approach the place.
My parents had both died years ago. I was an only child and had no other family in the country. At age 24, I had an unimportant part time job and no romantic entanglements, hardly even any friends. So I figured I was the perfect person to find out, once and for all, just what was going on in the mansion.
I dressed in my all-black stealth outfit with the body cam that was continuously sending its recordings to the cloud, and simultaneously to my personal web site. I made sure the cam was in working order, picked up a stout cudgel to use for self defense if necessary, and marched my way to the mansion.
I looked around the perimeter of the property. No sign of danger. I carefully circled all the way around, checking behind every tree and bush. Nothing.
I took a deep breath, marched up to the front door, and carefully pulled it open. I peeked cautiously into the hallway. Not a soul to be found. I eased the door closed behind me and started moving slowly along one of the walls. The hallway turned right and entered into a large living room. And I do mean large. My entire studio apartment was smaller.
An enormous bed, that could easily fit 20 people on it, was in the center of the room. I carefully edged forward.
"Hello."
The voice was soft and feminine. I turned my head. Standing near a corner was a tall, curvy redhead with a very pretty face. She was wearing something silky and filmy.
"Hello yourself. I'm Benny."
"I have no name. But you may call me Fiona. And you can discard your weapon."
"15 people have disappeared in here, Fiona! Of course I need my weapon!"
"I will protect you. Set down your bludgeoning stick."
I thought about it briefly. The cops, at least, were fully armed. That hadn't stopped four of them from vanishing like smoke in a windstorm. Perhaps weapons were of no use here.
I set my weapon down, hoping Fiona would be able to protect me if it came to that. She smiled.
