Poison Paradise - Damned of the 2/19th

Bedbugs

It took three kicks for the door to suddenly break apart, shattering into rotted wood. Mike stumbled forward, getting his sleeve caught up on a chunk of the door still attached to the hinges. He cursed, pulling himself away, and looked inside.

"Weird. Mannequins in the front room," Mike said. He shrugged. "Let's check it out."

Sarah glanced at Renee, who shrugged, and together they walked up to the house. On the plywood was another one of those X's with the scrawled letters and numbers on it.

"What do you think that means?" Sarah asked Renee, pointing at the plywood that covered a large window.

"Date, time. Probably who cleared it, when they cleared it, and what they found," Renee said. "Makes sense, that way they don't waste time clearing the same houses over and over," she stepped over a fallen tree branch. "Bet if we had a map of the town and colored the houses and buildings in by date and time with who cleared it we'd have a nice little grid that spread out from one point."

"We found a big tank," Sarah said, pointing back toward the center of town.

Renee frowned. "They left behind a tank?" Before Sarah could answer she nodded. "Makes sense. Was probably difficult to get here, so why take it with them when they would just have to bring it back. Probably cheaper too."

Sarah stepped through the door, stopping and staring once she got inside.

Wood paneling on the walls, big windows with the glass missing and plywood covering them, carperting, with a couch, loveseat, recliner set, a large console TV with antenna on top of the TV. Sarah noticed that the console was the size of a dresser while the TV screen was maybe fifteen inches across, with dial controls. The pictures on the wall looked like mass produced art to Sarah, and she noticed that a few had fallen down.

There were two mannequins, both of them at the base of the wall, dressed in 1950's style clothing that was scorched and rotting. Someone had spraypainted several numbers and letters on the wall above the two mannequins.

"Looks like Leave it to Beaver, doesn't it?" Kevin snickered, walking into the kitchen. "Fridge, stove, no dishwasher. Lots of linoleum and formica."

Renee chewed on her lip, looking around.

"What?" Sarah asked.

"I've seen this before..." she mused. "PBS? History channel? Somewhere..."

Emily went down the hallway. "There's bedrooms! It's a three bedroom house!" Sarah heard a door open. "Oh my God, toilets!"

"Probably no water," Kevin said.

The sound of a toilet flushing put a lie to that.

"Probably an artesain tap," Sarah said, looking around. "We know there's enough water pressure below the surface to push enough water up for the waterfall we saw on the side of the mountain. If I was putting this town here, I'd use the natural artesian pressure in order to supply water to the town."

Renee grinned at her. "Civil engineering?"

Sarah nodded. "Yeah."

"No toilet paper, but I'm first," Emily said.

Sarah shook her head, looking at Renee. "Don't."

"Why not?" Renee asked.

"Give them a few flushes. The sewer system might not be intact or might be flooded with seawater. Might flush fine the first few times as an air pocket gets equalized, but a later flush might shoot seawater everywhere," Sarah said.

Renee nodded. "Let's check the bedrooms," She suggested.

Kevin was backing out of one of the rooms, shaking his head. "Don't go in there."