Adrian Moss World of Darkness: Attrition - Coventry House: The Vampire's Story[FIN]

[Adrian Moss]

Thomas Coventry had made a fortune gaining water rights in the Owens Valley. He swindled hard-scrabble farmers and ranchers of the water beneath their feet. He turned around and sold these rights to the City of Los Angeles when they decided to build the aqueduct to feed the growing city's thirst. He profited off other people's misery, robbed them of not only their fortune's, but their livelihoods. The city's growing thirst drained the water table, drying up Lake Owen and lowering the water table. Plant's couldn't grow, even those that were normally drought resistant. Thomas Coventry destroyed hundreds of lives.

Thomas Coventry built the Coventry House in 1923. His friends thought it terribly odd that he built it so far away from the city center, in the heart of Bundy Valley. He claimed to have loved the isolation for him and his growing family. The Coventry family was a constant fixture in the LA social scene. Coventry invested shrewdly, showing as much financial acumen in Hollywood as he had shown in Real Estate. People who crossed Coventry tended to come to a bad end. It was rumored he had ties to the burgeoning Mob presence in the city. His ties to the local government were well established so no criminal investigations were ever pursued.

On November 1st, 1930, when a local produce grower went up to the house on his weekly deliveries, he discovered a horrible bloodbath. Mrs. Coventry, all of their nine children, and all five of their staff were found murdered throughout the dwelling. The police immediately investigated the property. They searched the surroundings hills for Thomas' Coventry's body. They waited for someone to contact them with ransom demands. Finally, they accepted the thought that Mr. Coventry had done the deed. Descriptions were sent out across the country and to Canada and Mexico. Nothing ever came of these inquiries.

Privately, the police and political leaders came the realization that Coventry was most likely dead. None of his accounts had been touched. If he was on the run, he was penniless. For that matter, he was a man in his fifties, in Depression Era America. They decided that Thomas Coventry had been murdered by one of his shady cohorts and that they would never find the body. In 1937, they quietly seized his accounts and lands, adding them to the city's coffers. By the end of World War II, the story of the Coventry House was forgotten.

[Adrian Moss]

The House would have remained lost if it was not for the efforts and dogged persistence of one man, a banker named David Grey. When David joined the bank fresh out of college in 1960, he immediately was given the onerous job of settling overdue, or inactive accounts. David was thorough and energetic. When he came across the Coventry House in the records of a bank recently acquired. He went through the Public Records, found the location of the property and handed up a request for an estate auditor to be sent out to assess the claim. The next week, David Grey's bank was bought out. David kept his job, but was transferred to another office. For eight years, David plugged away until he was finally transferred back over to Overdue and Inactive Accounts.

Two years later, while doing an internal audit, David came across the Coventry House again. He ordered an appraiser to investigate the site. The man went out, came back, and gave his official report on the property. The next day the Bank was bought out. David was transferred to branch office in Anaheim and he dropped the matter from his mind. Six years later, at an industry function, David came across his old auditor friend. Over drinks, his old friend told David about his 'unofficial' report. The Coventry House was haunted. He was sure of it. The House hated life and the malice was palatable. He felt lucky to leave the place with his life. David was thunderstruck. He decided that he had to see the House for himself. It was Friday night.

Monday morning word came down that the bank had been bought out by a larger firm. David was transferred to an office in San Diego. Slowly his desire to see the house diminished. His wife got cancer and died. So he had to raise his kids alone. A trip up to Los Angeles became impractical. In time, he nearly forgot about the House.

His kids had grown up and gone about their own lives. He had grand-kids now. He had been brought up through the managerial ranks until he stood near the pinnacle of his profession. He was looking forward to retiring. He felt he had earned it and that would have been that, except one day he was transferring some of his work files onto his computer (he was meticulous that way) when he came across the old assessment of the Coventry House. The next day, instead of retiring, he asked an old (though much younger) friend to be allowed to stay on for a few more years - in Overdue and Inactive Accounts. He asked for a year; it ended up being six. In the end, as he was facing forced retirement at the age of 72, he shifted through all of the bank's assets until he found out that the bank still owned the property. It had only been sold twice (1978 & 1999), but both buyers had defaulted on their loans in less than one year for unexplained reasons. Now more than ever, David had to know about the mystery of the Coventry House.

[Adrian Moss]

"Mr. Moss ... yes, you come highly recommended," began David Grey. He didn't really like meeting after dark, but those were this detectives hours.

"I was?" queried Adrian. "I don't normally advertise and I'm afraid I'm not well known in the business."

"Well," David licked his lips; this young man was unsettling, almost predatory, "it was more a case that you seem to be the only one who both answered my enquiry about going to a house that may well be haunted."

The young Vampire nodded. "Tell me more, please Mr. Grey."

David cleared his throat, then began his tale. It was rambling tale, with various segue-way's off subject. The picture became clear to Adrian though. He had a haunted house of some kind, but no clear definition of what kind style of haunting it may be.

"What do you want me to do?" Adrian asked.

David looked at him for a moment, "Why, I want to know what's in the house, my boy. I'm too old to take that journey now, but I ... I just need to know. This house and its fate has been with me my entire career."

"You want video evidence? I can get that for you, though I can't guarantee anything that will confirm the existence of the supernatural. I'll go out tonight and get a lay of the land. I'll follow up tomorrow with an in-depth inspection of the house itself. What me to download the video to you, or will you want me to deliver it directly to you?"

"We can do it in person," he said then grinned and added, "I want to see the look on your face as you describe it to me."

Adrian chuckled. Most likely he would pocket several hundred dollars for two nights works and disappoint an old man looking for some sign of the afterlife. Going in with an open mind was only wise though. After all, Adrian had already had one close encounter of the dead kind. It hadn't been all that pleasant. He wondered whether or not he could involve Sam Spade. Her talents could be invaluable. On the other hand, bringing her one step deeper into the darker world that most people were ignorant of. That made Adrian queasy. Sam had a son.

Adrian rose and extended a cool hand to the old man.

"I'll get right on it."

Grey stood up and shook the hand, noting how cool to the touch it was, "Thank you, Mr. Moss. I expect to hear from you in two days, three at the most."

Grey moved slowly but steadily out of the restaurant, Adrian sat back down. The waitress come over to top off Adrian's coffee. He never accepted it, but it had become a ritual with her. If it ever bothered her, or made her suspicious, Adrian's continuously generous tips eased them. She would let him stay here hour after hour, because she knew the longer he stayed, the greater the tip she would get (and the less work she had to do). At that moment, it was clear that Adrian wanted to go through some files on his iPad.

Adrian scrolled through all the data that Mr. Grey had gathered over sixty years of service at the bank. The story made sense, in a supernatural way. The House was secluded, but slowly residential communities were closing in on it. It was on Bundy street, or what was now Bundy street, though it wasn't paved all the way up to the house as far as Mr. Grey could tell. The only picture of it was from 1930 and not very good. It seemed to be a two story house built in the Santa Fe style, but Adrian couldn't be sure. He wasn't an architect after all. Mr. Grey hadn't been able to locate any floor plans of the place, though it had been assessed at over 7000 square feet. That was huge. It would have been nice to know what was inside.

The history was more troubling. If there ever was a house that deserved a haunting, the Coventry House was it. All those dead, their lives brutally ended. The missing father was also troubling. Had something come through and taken him? Had he gone insane and gone off to die in the mountains? Was his ghost, if there were any ghosts, haunting the place of his greatest sin? The only way he might find out any of this was to go to the house. Adrian pulled the coffee cup up to his mouth. He didn't drink, but he did take in the smell of the fresh brew. He put the cup down, stood up and put a few bills on the table. Time to check out the House.

[Adrian Moss]

Finding the place wasn't the easiest thing in the world. It wasn't as if the place was hiding, but the address didn't match up with any of the other houses on North Bundy Drive. When he ended up at the final house, he almost missed it. A dirt track, chained off from trespassers, was the only indication that there might be something further up the valley. For that matter, it was hardly a valley. It was more like a broad ravine. Whatever it was called, it was wrapped in shadows because the walls of the valley were so high.

In the darkness he almost missed the place. The road went on up the valley, but there was a weed choked turn to the left at the first western draw. Adrian had to back up the car. He kept the lights on as he went up the draw until he saw the front of the house. It was a adobe structure, apparently one story, with several squat trees around it. The trees turned the dim light positively black. Adrian stopped the car and 'adjusted' his eyes to make the most of what little illumination that managed to sneak through the gloom.

The house was surprisingly well preserved for its age. It must have been something to do with the 1999 restorations. The desert trees didn't shed their leaves the way pines or deciduous trees would have, so the place wasn't buried in debris. It seemed eerily still, as if those halls were holding their breath. That was when Adrian noted the dampening of the sounds. It wasn't a dampening, he thought, but a fearful quiet, as if the crickets were afraid to chirp too loudly, and no bird would nest close by. The Vampire filed that away for later. Instead, he checked his gear: flashlights (one large/one small), video recorder with flexible wire, pistol(for close encounters), knife, lock picks, and measuring tape.

Adrian glided up the steps, looking over the veranda as he moved to the door. Things looked ... quiet. There was neither no breeze stirring the leaves nor thunderclouds overhead to add to the creepy air. Instead, there was the sound of distant traffic up on Mount St Mary Fire Road. Something so normal sounding compared to the lack of sound in his immediate vicinity weirded Adrian out.

[Adrian Moss]

Adrian pulled out his lock picks and got ready to have a go at t he door when he remembered the first lesson of B&E 101. He checked to see if the door was locked. It wasn't. Carefully he turned the knob and slowly opened it. The hinges creaked, but not as much as Adrian felt they should have. He cut on his big flashlight and peaked inside. There was a rug upon what seemed to be a hardwood floor hallway, eight feet wide. A pair of tables stood to his left and right just inside the door. The Vampire took a tentative step inside. The floor felt firm so he entered. No creaking of the floorboards, nor the scurrying of any rodents. Adrian was totally alone.

The flashlight looked down the hallway. Eight feet in there were openings to the right and left. The one on the right was closed off with double doors. The one to the left was open. Adrian snuck forward to the left side and looked in. He hated the fact that the two windows into ther room where shuttered and barred. The space was a large sitting room with furniture arranged in the style of a family room. There was something that looked like a TV cabinet. There were even toys on the rug circa 2000. In the far corner of the rear(right) wall was a door. On the far side the wall opened into yet another room. The thing was, it looked as if the house was waiting for the previous owners to come back. He realized this must have been the family that lived here briefly back in 1999. Did the house know they would never return? Did it care?

The Vampire crossed the Living Room, avoiding the toys, and looked into the far room. This seemed to be an office. There was an ancient computer screen on the table, a rug on the floor, and another television in the left corner. The bookshelves on the far wall were filled with all kinds of technical manuals, self-help books, and the like. From the look of the room, it was a Man-Cave, but circa 1900 vs 2000 all combined in a mess. There was a door on the right wall, but he didn't check this one either. The two windows (front/left and the far walls) were barred and shuttered as well. This place was beginning to feel like a cage.

Adrian shook his head. That kind of thinking was counterproductive. He had a job to do. He brought up the camcorder and swept around recording the scene. So far, he commented, there was nothing suspicious. He walked back into the hall and scanned farther into the house. A set of stairs were on both side of the hallway, inset into the walls. Apparently there was a second story after wall. I must have been inset in the building and covered by the trees. What he had mistaken for a old Mexican adobe roof was probably the balcony. Great, he thought, another whole story to look into.

He decided to check across the hall first. What looked like double doors were in fact sliding doors that were fitted into the walls. Inside was a classic Victorian reading room/library. Again, there were two barred and shuttered windows. As he looked around, he heard his first noise. It was barely audible. He wouldn't have heard anything if his senses hadn't been ramped up. He froze and listened intently. What he could barely make out was as cross between a gulp and a sob. He wondered if it was a small child's cry? Now he had to question what he'd seen. There hadn't been any signs of any feet coming before him. Had she/he come in another way?

Adrian weighed caution against his rash desire to help. Rashness won and he began making his way back to the hall. He went quickly past the double stairs and into the door at the end. He listened carefully, but no longer heard anything. He went through the door and was face to face with a large kitchen, maybe twenty by twenty-five. There was a large island in the middle of the room, kitchenware everywhere and the continuation of the retro-1900's look. There was also no sight or sound of any little girl or boy.

"Hello?" he called out tentatively.

[Adrian Moss]

There was no answer.

He was about to write it off as fright when he heard something creaking on the stairs. He glided back down the hall and looked around. There was no one, but he smelled ... something. It was barest of fragrance to it; a kind of putrefied, rotting stench combined with ozone. The problem was that Adrian couldn't home in on the scent. It was as if it was coming upstairs, or was from the elevated hallway here in the rear of the house. Adrian swung the light around carefully. The paintings and photographs on the wall looked expensive, but what did he know about art? The stairs were wood, but with those little, gritty strips that they used in modern houses to prevent slippage. There was still no visual sign to indicate anything except that the Vampire was alone. This perplexed and scared Adrian. He shook his head and went back to cataloging the place.

Adrian went back into the Reading room and looked around carefully. There was a fireplace against the rear (left-side) wall that was big enough to roast a small boy in. The chairs were high-backed and over-stuffed. The books looked real, and real expensive. Here were works he had only heard about during his brief stint at UCLA; Homer, Burke, Yeats, Hemmingway, Creighton, Kerouac , and Clancy. All the greats. Best of all, there didn't seem to be any Anne Rice, or Laura K. Hamilton. Adrian suppressed a shutter.

After filming the majority of the collection, Adrian went into the next room ahead. Just like it's mirror on the other side of the hall, it was reached through an opening in the Reading Rooms far wall. The floor was wood with a rug that nearly covered the entire floor. There were the windows for and to the right, both barred and shuttered. Instead of the oppressive office appearance of the room on the opposite side, this one felt more open. There was an office here, but it was in the left corner of the room, with its back to the rest of the room. Adrian looked it over and decided this place screamed of the feminine persuasion. There was the antique computer, of course, but there were also things like a magazine rack with the latest (in 1999) fashion, news, and gardening rags. The rest of the room had lighter rattan chairs spaced around the room with various potted plants (even the cacti were long dead) and vases (holding equally dead flowers). There was even a ceiling fan.

Adrian was being watched. He tried to act nonchalant, torn between the desire to flee and the need to face this potential aggressor(s). He chose the latter. Adrian spun around and faced ... nothing. He cursed himself. His heightened senses were telling him he was being watched, and watched with some kind of hostile intent, but he was alone. He even pressed himself to see through any obfuscations, but to no avail. It took him a second to realize that the room had grown colder, since vampires don't breath, or even really feel any temperature variations.

"Hello," he said again. "Hello, is anyone there? Listen, if you want me to go, just let me know and I'm gone."

Nothing.

Adrian was beginning to wonder if he was losing his mind, but decided instead that it was more likely that this place really was haunted, which meant ....

[Adrian Moss]

"What do I do now?" he asked himself.

Well, he could A ) go to the Ordo Dracul, but what could he really tell them. Telling them that he was contracted to investigate this haunted house by someone not in the Know, had investigated it and gotten scared ... No.

He could B ) continue investigating the house and try to figure out what was going on,

Or, C ) he could leave, right here, right now, and mark this as yet another bad decision in a month full of bad decisions.

If he backed out, he'd have to give the money back and things were tight right now. He had a new (and only) mouth to feed. There was also the fact that he WAS a private eye, and this is what PI's did to earn a reputation in the trade. You took cases and solved them.

Adrian sighed. Option B was it. He knew he wasn't brave, or more to the point, foolishly brave, but this was a job, and jobs got done. He walked out of the Mother's Office as he called it and into the Reading Room. There was a door leading into the unknown and the exit out into the all. Adrian tried the door and it opened. He heard something, or almost heard the echo of an echo of something, and froze. There was nothing else, so he finished opening the door and stepped into the next room.

'It's a ten by ten room, with an orc in the corner. The orc has a club and he's guarding a chest'

Adrian giggled. True, most of his Role-Playing experience came second hand from kids at community college, but it somehow seemed to fit his current dilemma. Besides, the room was way bigger than a ten by ten.

The room was clearly a Dining Room. There was a table cloth on the table (where else would it be?) and a place setting for six laid out. The table could hold twelve, but most of the chairs were pushed up against the walls. There was a hutch on the far wall, a cabinet on the wall next to him, and a door on the wall to his right, and another door at the end of the left wall. Simple math told Adrian that the door on the left went out to the hall next to the kitchen. Adrian scolded himself for not bringing graph paper. He walked slowly around the room scanning everything with his light. He felts something the same the same time he heard it. The floor had become hollow beneath him. That was interesting and terrifying all at the same time. Now he had to go into the basement.

He checked off that the cabinet had two sets of nice china. The hutch had all kinds of silverware and trays, probably worth a small fortune. One drawer even had the key that would have locked the hutch ... but it had never been used. This was just getting better and better. Adrian knew from Mr. Grey's records that the family in '99 had gotten out alive. He knew they came back the next day and gathered up a few precious things. It was obvious that they had left a whole lot more behind. Having made a complete circuit of the room, Adrian found himself facing the only other door out.

"Spooky Door No. 3," he muttered into the uncaring darkness. He found himself chanting, Please be locked, over and over again. It wasn't locked. He turned the handle and the door swung open slowly. The beam of light cut through the pitch black to reveal a ... bedroom? There were moving boxes still in the room, but it was clearly a large bedroom with one bed to the right and the other to the left; both on the far wall. The one window was in the middle of the far wall, and barred and shuttered like the rest. As Adrian moved the light around, the boxes broke up the beam into shadowy shapes that seemed to struggle one against another. He tried not to concentrate on it. The Vampire checked behind the boxes and under the beds. As he was rising, his nose was suddenly assaulted (if you can describe a small fart in a large room an assault) by the reek of ... shit and piss ... and blood. A normal human couldn't have detected it, but he was by no means normal.

Adrian had been around the block long enough to realize what that scent meant. Someone had died there, somewhere in the bedroom. What bothered him was that he hadn't scented it until after he was moving away from the beds. How could he have missed it? That didn't matter so much as that sensation that someone was watching him came back with a vengeance. To Adrian's fright-enhanced sixth sense, it was several some things, or some ones. Worse, it wasn't even something he could localize as the sensation he got was as if he was surrounded.

The Beast hammered at its cage. It wanted out. It wanted to get the fuck out of this place, and it wanted to do it now.

The Vampire took several deep, and unnecessary breaths. He calmed down enough to take special stock of his situation. He couldn't see a threat. He couldn't hear a threat. He was afraid, but he was in a dark and spooky house all alone, and really right now kicking himself for not getting Sam. He grit his teeth and headed for the door on the left wall (which he had almost missed when he came in). He turned the knob, it opened, and he looked inside, him and the ten thousand spooks looking over his shoulder.

[Adrian Moss]

It was a bathroom. A bathroom. All that fear for a bathroom. Adrian felt like kicking himself. Sighing, he took stock of the room. A door directly across the way. Two sinks on the opposite wall. A tub in the right side, and by tub, he meant tub. It looked to be porcelain with iron lion's claws for feet. There was a cabinet directly on the right. Adrian checked it out, discovering towels, hand towels and wash clothes. He shut the cabinet and ... nearly jumped out of his skin! There had been a hand about to touch him, except when he turned and faced it, there was no one there. His head darted from side to side - nothing. Slowly the panic subsided and he his reasoning mind came to the fore.

The figure had been a woman ... or maybe a man in a night shirt. The top of which had been darkened with what might have been blood. The face had been unrecognizable, and the hand had been more ephemeral. If it had been a hand. If this wasn't his mind playing tricks on him, then what was it then? But, there was no evidence of anything around him now. Neither current in the air, nor the tiniest tap of footfalls, no hint of footprints, or the slightest sound to betray movement. Adrian growled in frustration. This wasn't right. It wasn't fair.

Angrily, he went to the next door, turned the door, and went into ... the kitchen. It really had been a large kitchen and this door came out near the right corner of the room ... right being from the place he had first entered the kitchen, that is. Two larger than normal doors were on the right wall and yet another was at the right corner. There was a door on the opposite wall, directly opposite the bathroom door. The vast kitchen was pretty much as he had first seen it. Adrian shuttered, trying to expel excess tension. He took in the door on the left wall, then made out a door on his wall, but at the opposite end from him, making that a total of seven doors. He started going through the cabinets and drawers. To add yet another eerie chapter to this story, the boxes of food was intact. No mice had come into the house to raid the abandoned shelves. There had been enough food here to feed a family for over a week. He checked the frig and was rewarded with a pungent stench when he broke the seal of the door. The food inside had long since succumbed to rot and decay, but the air inside had no were to go. Only the slow seepage of air over the past twelve years had stopped the odor from blowing Adrian across the room.

As it was, the stench was so strong that it overwhelmed his heightened sense. He staggered back against the kitchen island, waving his arms in front of him trying to ward off the attack. Blood tried to rush into his eyes, mimicking tears. Coughing and chocking, he made his way around the island. His eyes cleared (no blood) and his nose slowly came back on line.

Great', he thought,' I was attacked by the refrigerator. That will look good in the report.'

After another moment, he went back to cataloging the items in the place. He had just finished going over the wonderful world of pots when he heard a voice. This time the hair rose up on the back of his neck. He heard the voice again, but still couldn't make out the words. Adrian concentrated and waited and was rewarded by hearing the voice once more. It was a female voice, a child perhaps - no definitely a child. She said the words again ... it sounded like 'I hurt', in a mournful voice. The room got colder and the voice ceased. Without standing, Adrian turned around. There was no one there; no surprise. At least he had this recorded all of these encounters. Maybe he could figure out what it was later.

[Adrian Moss]

Adrian looked around trying to decide what door to take next. He opted for the one closest to the bedroom door. It was large, with a handle as opposed to a knob. It opened easily enough and turned out to be ... a walk in freezer, or it would have been had there been any electricity in the place. Gratefully, there hadn't been any food in here when the power went out. Nothing much to scan, so the Vampire went to the other big door. This one had a knob, and when turned gave off the faintest of smells. Adrian thought about it for a moment, processing what his nose was telling him. Dried foods, some rot, and cleaning supplies. Sure enough, once the door was fully open, the air wafted around him. Unlike the refrigerator, the walk in Pantry wasn't attempting to be air tight. The worst of the rotting smell had long since dissipated. He looked around, flashlight beaming and camcorder recording. Canned good that were way passed expiration, and a few that weren't. There had been other produce in here as well, mainly onions, potatoes and ... the door tried to shut him in.

Adrian jumped to the door and it caught his body half way in and half way out. There was no force behind it, so it could have been some sort of normal incline, except he couldn't see any and the door hadn't tried to close when he was standing in the kitchen. Once again, there was no one in the room, no sign of disturbance, no sign of nothing. Adrian shook for a minute. He hated being afraid, especially being afraid of absolutely nothing. With some hesitation, Adrian went to the third door. He stopped with his hand on the knob, because he saw that the fourth door had a small bared window on it. Through the dirty glass he could make out what looked to be a garage of some kind. There were no cars, or motorcycles in evidence. He tried the door, but it was locked. He actually sighed in relief. This room he could put off until later.

Turning back to the third door, Adrian opened the door. Stairs went up, and stairs went down. Both had light fixtures on the walls. The Vampire shrugged and shut the door. He would look into this later, he hoped. Adrian looked around the rest of the kitchen. Three doors left. The closest one led back into the hall, so he mentally scratched that one of his 'Doorway to Terror' List. He crossed the room and stood between the two doors. Finally he opted for the one on the left wall, since theoretically it led back toward the first room he had investigated. Door unlocked - door opened - shining the light in and it was ... a gym. A small home gym was set up in here, the first truly non-Victorian retread room he'd seen. The gym had weights, a treadmill and some Stair Master styled device. It had that some sad, 'waiting for my humans to return' look. There was the door on the left that led back into the hall and the one on the opposite wall that led into the Living Room.

Adrian turned around and went back into the kitchen and stopped. All the cabinet doors were half open. He hadn't heard a sound, and he hadn't been out of the room for more than thirty seconds. The frightened Vampire slowly took in the room. He hesitated, not sure what to do. With shaky steps he went over to the closest door and opened it. Nothing happened. He looked inside and there was nothing out of the ordinary. Adrian sighed, feeling someone was having a terrible practical joke on him. He shut the door and all the doors slammed shut! Adrian jumped out of his skin and he ran into the Gym Room and shut the door. He listened intently, but heard nothing. Steeling up his courage he peeked back into the Kitchen once more. All the cabinets were shut. There was nothing out of the ordinary. Adrian took another useless breath and he heard the treadmill come on.

Adrian blinked. Sure enough the treadmill was running at a sedate pace. He pulled out his gun and approached the hellish device. It didn't attack him. He reached out with his gun hand and cut it off ... except it was already off, so he cut it on. Nothing changed. He cut it off. The device running on electricity that wasn't present was running while off. Weren't there OSHA regulations about such shit, Adrian pondered. Curious, he pulled the devices plug from the wall, and it stopped. Adrian stared at the cord, then the machine, and then back to the cord. He dropped the cord and headed back to the Kitchen. He opened the door and the treadmill came back on. Adrian shrugged and left the Gym.

[Adrian Moss]

With the treadmills hum behind him, Adrian went to the last door. SOP followed and revealed a hallway. There were two doors on the right wall and one on left at the rear. Oddly, there wasn't a window at the end of the hall, so there was only the overhead lighting to brighten the place, had there been electricity. Maybe the treadmill was using it all, Adrian's hysteria-addled mind thought. He giggled. First door on the right was ... a bedroom. It was about half the size of the first one he'd seen, but it had a wardrobe, cabinet, desk, chair and a double bed. This must have been a servant's room, he figured. Adrian checked out the room, but found nothing particularly interesting. Sense of damnation fading, he got ready to leave. As the door shut, he noticed something under the bed. Adrian stopped and cautiously knelt down to look at the ... blood under the bed. It looked like fresh blood, smelt like fresh blood and ... felt like fresh blood. He decided not to taste it.

Adrian looked underneath the bed. Sure enough, he saw blood slowly dripping down from the bottom. He reached up and touched the top of the blanket covering the bed. It felt dry. He stood up. He reached up and pulled down the blanket and found nothing. The same results came from the sheets. Adrian looked under the bed again and found nothing. No blood of any kind. Two impulses warred within him. The first one was the urge to tear the place apart. Someone, or something was screwing with him. The second urge was taking the same information and screaming for him to get the hell out of there.

"Alright you Mother-Fuckers!" he shouted into the darkness. "I'm not going anywhere, hear me?"

In the deep recesses of his mind, Adrian heard snickering.

Adrian stormed out of the first room and tried the next door. He turned the knob and kicked it in.

"I'm here, Bitches!" He spun the light around, but found nothing. It appeared to be a bedroom much like the last. He slowed down enough to catalog the room. No noises tantalized the ears. No scents attracted his nose. Adrian huffed and went across the hall to the last door. SOP, the door was kicked open and Adrian stepped in. This was a larger bedroom, with two double beds set close to one another. The right corner was stacked with moving boxes. He stalked around the room daring anything to challenge him, but nothing did. It was as if they, whomever they were, had their fun and were leaving him to his own devices. In retrospect, it was naive.

[Adrian Moss]

The young Vampire walked back into the kitchen and waited a moment, seeking equilibrium. He put up his gun up and shifted his flashlight out of his free hand. Now his choices were upstairs and downstairs. Then he realized that he had missed a room, the one off from the Office Room aka Man-Cave. He walked down the main hall into the Living room, noted that all the toys were now stacked carefully on the sofa, and went into the office. The unopened door was to the right. He went up to it, checked the knob and opened it. Inside was the bathroom from hell, or maybe heaven. There was a tub, a three-person shower stall, two toilets and a sauna. There were two doors on the left wall, barred and shuttered as normal. Everything was so shiny and new, with only dust marring the out-of-the-box feel. There was even a double sized cabinet full of bath supplies and towels. Adrian shook his head and backed out of the room.

Adrian opted for the Upstairs. That way if he had to flee he could jump out a window. He got to the top of the landing and looked down into the main level. His phone rang. He put his flashlight down and answered.

"Hello?"

"Get out ..." came a voice straight from the grave.

Adrian looked at his phone as if it had sprouted horns. He reluctantly put it to his ear.

"Excuse me?"

"Get out, vampire, or die."

Adrian cut the connection. Robotically, he placed it back on his belt. He picked up the flashlight gingerly and walked back down the stairs, gaining speed as he went. He raced out the main doors. As he shut them, he could have sworn he heard a young person's voice saying, "Help us." Shutting the doors behind him, he all but ran to his car.

[Adrian Moss]

Adrian sat behind the wheel, wondering why he hadn't already turned the key and left. Running away made perfect sense. In desperation, he knew he was going to do the stupid thing. He couldn't let it go, even though he didn't know exactly what he could do about the situation. Well, if he didn't know, he might be able to get the information to someone who could. That meant he went back in. He got out of his car, popped the trunk, and pulled out his sword. He knew it probably wouldn't do any good, but it made him feel better.

Steeled for battle, Adrian strode back onto the veranda. He turned the knob and ... walked into the door. They'd locked it! Cursing himself, he kneeled down and picked the lock. It clicked in no time and the door swung open. As he stepped in, the door attempted to slam into him, but Adrian dodged into the hallway before it could shut him out. Moving at a quick step, the Vampire raced up the stairs and to the first door he came to. He turned the knob and entered the room. This was a bedroom; a large one with a double bed by the door and a king-sized bed with a canopy. There was a variety of other furnishing, but didn't have a lived in feel. It screamed 'Guest Room'. Everything was clean and both the beds were made. Adrian swept through the room scanning with his flashlight and camcorder and then it hit him. There were three large windows in the room, with two large French Doors at the far side. The thing was that the windows were open. Moonlight could trickle in. It was heartening.

His phone rang. Adrian didn't answer it. Instead he muttered a 'Fuck you' and kept going. Across the hall was another door, which lead to what must have been the Master Bedroom. It had a much more lived in look. The wardrobes were open, the bed was unmade, and there was even a magazine on the floor. It must have been dropped their in haste, he reasoned. The windows were un-shuttered, as in the Guest Room. Adrian turned to leave when he tripped over the body. He stumbled and caught himself. Looking back, he saw no body on the ground. He blinked and tried to remember what he'd seen. There had been the body, smallish, but not a child. The hair had been long and played out. The body had been that of a teenage girl, he surmised. There had been no visible wound though. The rest had been hazy. Adrian realized that he actually not stumbled upon a body, but caught himself before he stepped on something that he had assumed was a body. His only remaining question was this: what was the girl doing in what must have been her parent's room?

Adrian found himself back in the hallway and taking stock of the situation. The hallway went farther down that he thought it might, as if it overlapped the lower floor. Maybe he did have to go to the garage after all. There were two doors on the left and two doors on the right, plus there seemed to be a cutback between the two doors on the right. After a moment of mental geometry, Adrian decided that the cutback was the stairs leading down to the Kitchen.

"Well," he muttered, "at least getting to the basement will be easy."

Randomly, Adrian chose the door on the left and went to it. It swung open and was blasted with as sense of sadness and betrayal. There were two beds in the spacious room, but he could tell that there must have been more at one time. It was a girl's room. There were posters on the wall, a computer table on the side, and three wardrobes. He checked them out and sure enough, there were girls clothes from the previous decade. Both beds were unmade and one had a small duffel bag at the foot. The wardrobe closest to that bed was empty, while the one next to it was only half full. Adrian referenced bank records he had read. Two adults and two children. The adults were in the Master, and there seemed to be only one child here, but ... with a guest perhaps.

[Adrian Moss]

He moved back into the hallway and crossed over to the opposite door. Inside he found a boy's room. Once more, there were two beds with room for another. Instead of a computer there was a PlayStation with two controllers and a TV. Only one bed was made, and only one wardrobe had cloths in them. From the look of the room, boy had to be in his early teens - no girls, plus plenty of carnage and gore. Adrian moved through the room, slowly coming to the realization that this is what he would have wanted ten years ago, in his own lost childhood. Not being in a haunted house would have been nice too.

'Father,' whispered a voice next to his ear.

Adrian spun around. He caught sight of a boy, maybe ten or twelve, chest bloody, out of the corner of his eye. As his head snapped to that direction ... there was nothing - again.

The Vampire backed out of the room, light scanning.

'One step forward, two step spooked.'

Adrian took a moment to screw up his tattered courage. He counted out the five rooms he needed to look out before he could tell himself that this place had been investigated. He edged over to the alcove. Sure enough it led to some stairs going down ... to the Kitchen ... to the Basement. He tore his eyes away from the gloom. The door down the hall beckoned the way Jack the Ripper must have coaxed a doxy in. Adrian's head began to hurt.

It was a room like the others, this one at the back on the right. It turned out to be a large bathroom broken up into two sections separated by a four foot partition. On the closest side, there was two vanities, a shower stall, and a commode. The room inside had another vanity, another commode, a large bath tub ... with a body lying in it ... girl, maybe seven ...

Adrian blinked. The phantom corpse didn't go away. She was there. Worse, there was someone, or even someones beneath her. The Vampire, who didn't need to breath, gulped for air. He was frozen in indecision. They were real apparitions alright. Almost against his will, Adrian was drawn to the bodies. They were all children. The girl on top had her throat slit and her eyes were wide open. Beneath her was a boy. Adrian's clinical mind was going on without his raging emotional turmoil interfering. The boy was barely older than the girl, putting him somewhere between nine and ten. His throat was slit as well. The bottom child was definitely a teenager. Unlike the others, he had defensive wounds on the arm he could see. He could see the wound that had killed the teen without touching the bodies. That was something he wasn't willing to do.

Instead, the undead retreated from the dead. As he made it to the partition, the girl sat up. Adrian froze. The girl pointed at him and tried to speak. No sound passed her lips, but the slice in her throat quivered. That was more than enough for Adrian. He bolted out of the room and slammed the door shut. Had his heart been alive, it would have been pounding through his chest. Looking for something to do, he looked at the camcorder to see if it had recorded the event. His eyes bugged slightly. It had ... it had recorded everything, including the ghostly girl rising up. Adrian realized that this video could never see the light of day. He had to get this to the Ordo.

The urge to flee was overwhelming, but some suicidal sense of purpose. There were only two rooms left, he told himself. Two rooms and he'd be out. Two more rooms and he would be free of his obligation. Adrian turned the knob and went into the last room on the floor. It was a large bedroom with three queen-sized beds. Three wardrobes were opposite the beds. On the right side of the room was a Playstation and several controllers. On the far right wall was a large screen TV. Two of the beds looked slept in and both had travel bags at the foot, one open. A peek inside revealed girls clothes. That made ... three girl guests? It didn't make sense that there would be a guest boy in a room with a guest girl - not at those ages.

[Adrian Moss]

Adrian stepped out into the hall. One room, he reassured himself. One trip down to the basement and he was on the way home. Down the alcove he went. The steps didn't creak, they moaned ever so slightly. He made his way down to the kitchen level without too much to wig him out further. As he took the first step down though, he heard that little girl's voice once more. This time he could make out what she was saying.

"Don't go," she wailed ever so softly.

He froze.

"I have to," he replied terribly afraid, yet feeling trapped.

There was no response.

He took another step down. He took another step down. On the third step he felt two conflicting sensations coming up from beneath him. One felt like it was beckoning him down, like a shadow lover of long familiarity. It was Death's caress. The other sensation was of palatable hate. Something down there meant him harm, and more than just blind malice, but something directed specifically at him. Adrian took a fourth step, then a fifth. His feet took on a life of their own, stumbling down into the soul-sucking darkness. His light was failing. He could catch the screen on his camcorder was getting snowy. In the back of his mind, the Beast didn't rage, it whimpered.

Once he stepped onto the last landing to the downstairs area, the depressive atmosphere lifted, like the Moon suddenly bursting out from the midnight sky. It had all kinds of bricka-brack against the walls, old trunks and barrels that probably dated back to the original owners, boxes, and all kinds of furniture. The floor was bare flagstone with a massive carpet in the middle. Adrian came off the last step onto the floor. His light slowly swung around again. There was something odd about the room, but Adrian couldn't grasp what it was. It was a mystery vastly beyond his experience, so he didn't run. He took two more steps into the room.

He nearly kicked over a can of soda on the edge of a soda. There were three more. Beside two were a bundle of clothing that turned out to be bathrobes. There was something else on the floor, but movement to his left caught his eye. The light flashed over to the wall. A line on the wall glistened. There was something there, but he couldn't make it out. There was something ... waiting, hungry, something he couldn't define. His light went back to the rug. There was some sort of rectangular object in the middle. Something glistened next to it. We gingerly walked over to objects. The rectangle was a pressed cardboard board. The object was a triangle with a clear glass circle in the center.

It was a Ouiji board. Something in Adrian's animal brain kicked in. Something 'else' wanted him to use it. To touch it and reach out. He found himself leaning down to do just that, when he caught himself. Something suddenly became very, very angry. He felt it before he saw it.

It was as if - no, it was a thousand face staring in at him, clustered all around and only kept at bay by the thinnest of barriers; barriers that threatened to burst every second he stayed there. Horror and fear drove him up those stairs. Reason had fled him. The flashlight was dropped -forgotten. The camcorder survived due to being corded to his wrist. The Beast was calling the shots now. In his pop culture- addled mind, his reasoning brain, while no longer in charge, was still capable of some thought. This wasn't a haunting. This was a Hell Mouth. Something far beyond the ken of a vampire still in his first decade had gone on here, and it was something that had gone horribly wrong. Adrian fled into the night.

[Adrian Moss]

"Mr. Grey," Adrian began with as much calm as he could muster, "the house is definitely haunted."

Mr. Grey, for his part, could see the strain on the young man's pale face. It had a haunted, empty character to it that he hadn't seen before.

"Can I see ... the footage, that is?"

"Mr. Grey, there are other people working on the problem now, People used to dealing with such things. I can guarantee you that this matter isn't over."

"What about the murders? What happened in Coventry House back on Halloween, 1930?"

Adrian's drilled into the man's soul. He had to judge how much he could tell this man. This was an Ordo matter now. Still, they wouldn't have come across this matter without his persistence for all these decades.

"Mr. Grey, the family is still in that house. Of that, I'm as sure as I am about anything else I've ever encountered." Forestalling another question, Adrian added, "They are not alone. Something, or things, are in that house with them. They are hateful things, filled with rage and despair. That House is a dangerous, dangerous thing."

"But, but, the Happners, they stayed in the house for three months. How did they ... how did they last so long?"

"I'm looking into that. I promise you I - we will come to the bottom of this and I will share with you as much information as is safe."

Adrian stood up. The meeting was over, despite Mr. Grey's great many questions. He had thrown thousands of dollars at this mystery called Coventry House and had little to show for it. What he did have was the look on Mr. Moss' face. That spoke volumes in and of itself. Mr. Grey had no doubts as to Mr. Moss and the trip to Coventry House. The man had been there. Whatever he had seen there had scarred him, but also left him with a desire to pursue the case. If he had allies, all the better. For Mr. Grey, it was more important that the mystery be addressed than any personal sense of satisfaction of knowing himself.