The Psychopath Next Door

35: Captive

Cooper stared at the dark shape across the room in horror.

When Cory had first dumped him here, he'd barely been conscious, reeling from the agony of getting his hand sliced open. His mouth still tasted like vomit from the experience.

But eventually, the pain subsided—at least to a tolerable degree. Which was how Cooper found himself sitting alone in a dark room, his hands bound by some sort of hard plastic; the only source of light filtered through a window on the opposite wall. And even that was slight. Outside, the sun had already set, draping the world in the pre-dark of twilight.

I wonder if Mom's still at work...

Cooper blinked into the darkness. At first, he could make out nothing beyond vague shapes: a square on the wall; the angles of what looked like a queen-sized bed in the center of the room; a dark oval on the floor; the blocky shape of what he guessed to be a dresser and, closer to the bed, a nightstand. He squinted, but his eyes stubbornly refused to adjust.

His ears, on the other hand, still worked fine. So when he heard the sound of rustling sheets, he froze.

What the hell?

He stared at the bed—hard. Waiting for something to move. Waiting for the monster under the bed to come crawling out and bring his worst childhood nightmares to life.

The room was silent. Still.

Cooper gave a sigh of relief. But that relief quickly evaporated when he saw a dark shape move on the bed.

Nopenopenopenope—

His first reaction? Panic. His heart crawled into his throat as he pressed himself against the wall, shrinking away from the unknown danger. The most horrific scenes from Resident Evil played on a loop in his head, and he immediately broke out in a cold sweat.

Get it together, you imbecile.

He wasn't sure why he heard Calla's voice in his head just then. He'd always liked to think that if he absolutely had to die young, he'd at least get to hear his mom's voice. Or maybe it would be Vincent in his head, cheering him on from the sidelines to take down the bad guy in an impressive (impossible) feat of strength.

So why he had to hear the voice of his psychotic neighbor...well, that was beyond him. Cooper personally felt he'd suffered enough for one lifetime.

The thing on the bed—Cooper did his best not to envision a rotting corpse—moved again. Only this time, it groaned.

"Okay. I'm out." Cooper scrambled to his feet and whirled around. He knew the door wouldn't open. The door never opened. But he gave it a shot anyway, fumbling for the doorknob with his bound hands.

The knob twisted, but the door didn't so much as budge. He threw his weight against it, and still—nothing.

More groaning from the bed.

Cooper began banging on the door. He barely noticed his injured hand throbbing with each jolt. "Hey. Hey! I didn't sign up for this!"

"Wha-gah?"

It's speaking. And it sounds...really familiar?

A different sort of horror gripped Cooper. He slowly turned around, his back pressed against the door. He tried to swallow past the fear clogging his throat, but his mouth was too dry.