The Pseudo Semicolon

CHAPTER 8: Ghost Hunting

Night blanketed the tiny town of Halderberry, the stars sparkling like jewels despite the grey clouds. Devland kicked a random stone onto the road, his hands digging into his pants pockets.

The house he was going to break into stood opposite to him, the scene closed off by yellow tape clearly warning everyone to keep out. The neighbouring houses all had their lights out and even through their windows, Devland could see that none of them were awake at this ungodly time.

Except Devland and maybe a few other owls and rats.

It was 2:55, he was early and keeping an eye out for cop cars–just in case Akira called the police. Devland was dressed in full black with a mask covering half of his face and the other half covered by the hood of his hoodie. He wore gloves and combat boots and had already drawn up a quick plan on how to enter the house.

During parties, when the party-thrower's parents got home, Devland would usually throw himself out the window of a room and hope he didn't break a leg. Regardless of his quite reckless and rather life-threatening escape routes, he had never gotten caught before. Ever.

Right now, his plan was to enter from the side. Considering the height of the windows facing Dr. Rogers' house, it was difficult to see the first floor's window on the right side, obscured by a ridiculously high wall. In order to get there, he had to go through a pretty open driveaway, which was a huge no-no considering the security cameras set up on the lamp post could detect him.

So, he had to enter from a neighbouring house, scale up the wall and land on the other side. With the lacklustre security around these parts, it's no wonder a whole family got murdered. The security camera was placed at a weird angle where it could only view from the left side, and thanks to the walls, it hid the right part of the house.

Devland waited for Akira to arrive for a little longer before sighing and moving in with his plan. He walked towards the neighbouring house, making sure that the security camera caught him going away. Then finally, when he was sure that he had reached the spot where the camera couldn't see, he took a quick turn and hauled himself up over the nearest wall.

He was careful, calculating his every move with precision and quietly but stealthily got the house nearest to Dr. Rogers'. Devland took out a simple stool from his bag, placing it on the sturdy ground and making sure it didn't leave any marks. He attached a rope to it so that after he made it to the other side, he could pull it over the wall.

As he reeled in the rope after he made the climb to the opposite side, he was careful not to make any noise, checking the window of the house with every second.

His heartbeat stopped when the rope stopped moving.

'Fuck.' Devland panicked, 'Fuck fuck fuck.'

How was this possible?! He didn't hear anyone opening their doors—and he made sure he could hear them—so how? Devland's mind raced at top speed as he took out a sharp knife from his pocket. Of course, he predicted some shit like this would happen–but he never thought it actually would.

Regardless, he started cutting the rope, quickly sawing through the hard material.

The person on the other end didn't make any move until suddenly, with a hard tug on the rope that grazed Devland's palms, they vaulted over the wall as nimble as a cat and landed near Devland noiselessly.

Devland immediately regained his composure [He had to thank his mother for his quick reflexes] and managed to land a quick kick on the stranger's stomach, They hit the floor with a thud and almost immediately Devland was on top of them, his knife's blade tenderly grazing the stranger's throat.