#eid is the most distant (barely shows up to work) and ends up saving them after dragging cody out of harm's way

[ipatrichor]

OKAY SO. content warnings for near-drowning, injury, death, and eldritch horror stuff typical of a call of cthulu oneshot. (dw tho i promise no pets die)

in the back of the cabinet under the front counter, there's a tiny coraline door that leads nowhere- just a white wall. however, when you touch this wall you go right through it into an unknown space beyond. ronnie spots it first and decides to ignore it until the old man who works with us, van (yes we called him old man van) crawls through and disappears at which point we investigate.

the premise is that we all work at 7-11. no one schedules the shifts bc the manager doesn't fucking care, so we've all showed up today. our group is comprised of:

- ronnie, she/her, a herbo with a dog who shits on the floor of the 7-11

- morgs (short for morgan), she/they, a punk lesbian who used to date ronnie before things ended badly

- cody, they/them, an amateur ghost hunter who's always high and has more parkour skills than sense

- eide (pronounced eed), they/them, a mystery with a backpack they keep almost as close as they keep their secrets.

ronnie's dog, commander ozzy, goes through and eide ends up following to retrieve him. thankfully commander ozzy didn't go far, and all eide sees is a room with winding tunnels leading away from it and pipes along the walls. when they return they tell us not to go in, closing the cabinet and keeping watch. the group splits- cody and morgs smoke outside and discuss their curiosity, eide texts an unknown party, and ronnie waits behind the counter.

eide goes to the back to snack on inventory while leaving their phone behind. morgs and cody return while the coast is clear, and cody takes their backpack and sneaks inside. two men come looking for eide, but ronnie and morgs lie and say they don't know an eide so the men leave. eide comes back out, learns what happens, and goes out into the front parking lot but is too late to catch them.

around this time, the manager comes back and insists on going after old man van despite ronnie's protests. after sticking his head inside, though, his sanity is greatly damaged and he returns nearly catatonic, barely aware of the world around him. ronnie does her best to deal with this, but is left with no assistance.

meanwhile, cody records their trip and leaves a trail of pencils. they begin to explore the tunnels while morgs keeps watch back in the 7-11 with cody's beloved pet lizard, galcan (short for galactic cannibalism). morgs glances inside to take another look, and while she does ronnie returns from stuffing the manager in a closet and yanks her out despite her resistance.

they argue, bringing up their messy breakup. morgs reveals that cody is in the tunnels, and ronnie is horrified and insists on going to find them and bring them back. the two do so, following the pencil trail.

eide comes back inside, finds them gone, and frustratedly enters the tunnels to find them. ronnie and morgs argue again, and morgs ends up splitting off from the group while eide finds a sacrificial dagger and ronnie follows the pencil trail looking for cody, who is having just a lovely time filming things.

they all hear a loud banging noise and rush towards it, reconvening in a cafeteria-esque room. galcan is happily returned to cody’s pocket, and a child's ball bounces by itself from a hallway leading to a weird door with an old-fashioned padlock and a tray of food next to it. ronnie is desperate to leave, and morgs teases her for being scared while eide investigates the food and cody films the door.

morgs promises to leave if ronnie goes and touches the scary door, which she reluctantly does. on the way out, though, a curtain separating the cafeteria from the kitchen moves somewhat and morgs just has to investigate. she calls cody over and the two joke around about the meat grinder and the gross hair in the sink. cody pokes it with a pencil and it feels squishy, which grosses them out. the drain starts to bubble and flood, alarming the trio who quickly make up their minds to leave- much to ronnie’s relief.

meanwhile, eide has gone further down the hallway, past windows that reveal only flat blue, and finds the bridge of a submarine. there’s a radar with nothing showing up, and a parascope that reveals nothing but more blue. the other three follow, and are trying to all get their shit together and persuade everyone to leave when something shows up on the rader. it’s getting closer, and when ronnie looks through the parascope she sees huge, indescribable creatures heading toward the submarine at impossible speeds. they slam into the submarine, loud bangs sounding and pipes beginning to burst.

they start running, only to find that there are several inches of water and rising on the floor. the pencil trail has been washed away, but ronnie remembers the way back and runs that way, cody pulling morgs along after her while eide pauses to investigate the strange door that’s now unlocked. they find a book and some information in a car’s glove box, and then take off to try and catch up with the others.

the water is rising fast, and as they come to an intersection all three see something that gives them pause. off to the right, ronnie sees commander ozzy swimming and runs towards him. on the left, cody sees galcan swimming and checks their pocket, confused to find her still safely inside. directly ahead, morgs sees a horrifying disproportionate creature waiting for them.

when ronnie reaches commander ozzy, instead of her dog she finds a piece of broken off pipe floating in the water and takes it. further down the tunnel is a green sign that she hopes will lead to an exit, and she wades toward it. eide catches up as the others follow her, all panicked.

the sign says exeunt, but cody points out that they’re in a submarine- any exit here will likely lead to the ocean instead of to the 7-11. despairing and resigned to swimming back through the tunnels looking for the original passage, they turn back only to find space bending around them and the green sign in front of them again. out of options, ronnie opens the door next to it. water rushes out into the rooms beyond, and they follow and quickly work together to shut the heavy door behind them to trap the water out.

they find themselves in a room with a single table in the middle, and a pitch black doorway on the other end with a bloody handprint on the wall next to it. with nowhere else to go, the group ventures onward- ronnie in the lead with a phone flashlight and metal pipe, morgs next with two knives she doesn’t know how to use, eide following and keeping their backpack close, and cody bringing up the rear with galcan and a vape pen because there’s no way they’re dealing with any of this sober.

as they move, the walls around them become narrower. they move, remaining metal but rhythmically expanding and contracting as if breathing. this tunnel ends in another room, empty except for what looks like a person sitting in a chair with their back towards the entryway. they breathe oddly, in a way that moves their whole body, and it’s the same rhythm as the walls.

ronnie, pushed to her absolute limit, wastes no time attacking the figure. she gets in a few solid swings with the pipe, refusing to stop as the others stare. the creature rises and turns, revealing itself to be a twisted abomination, and roars- lashing out at ronnie, who ducks out of the way and hits it again. she keeps attacking it until it lashes out and grabs her with a massive hand, squeezing and doing a fair bit of damage.

cody is afraid enough that it turns to anger, shouting ‘hey! that’s my coworker!’ and lunging. they latch onto the wrist and stab it, causing pain but failing to make it let go of ronnie. she manages to struggle out of its grip, but its other hand lashes out and impales cody through the ribs- missing vital organs and galcan’s hoodie pocket, but now dangling them from its hand as it moves.

meanwhile, the sound of the roar reverberating through her head and now cursed with the knowledge that the submarine itself is alive and the creature is just part of it, morgs examines the walls and pipes and starts turning nozzles, hoping to hurt the entity in some way.

catching on to her plan, ronnie hefts her pipe and starts smashing the pipes on the walls. these attacks cause steam to fill the room and hallway, gradually reducing visibility but also seeming to hurt the creature as the submarine itself screams.

kept functioning by adrenaline, cody starts sawing at the three fingers impaling them, trying to cut themself loose without removing the objects to minimize blood loss. it’s slow going, however, because all they have to work with is their pocket knife.

with the hand not wearing cody as a decoration, the creature swings at ronnie and morgs. morgs manages to dodge, rolling and coming up with knives ready and a wildness in her eyes, but ronnie is less nimble and gets slammed into a wall. behind them, eide finally pulls the secret from their backpack- a double barrel shotgun- and fires, staggering the creature. they then move to help cut cody lose, using the sacrificial knife they found earlier.

ronnie continues to attack the pipes, more steam spilling out and greatly impacting visibility. morgs tries to escape but gets turned around, running into the creature and getting grabbed. it knocks her unconscious and tosses her aside as eide gets cody loose, dragging them away to relative safety and reloading their shotgun.

ronnie, meanwhile, can hear the cries and yelling of her coworkers. she has a moment, remembering their frequently shit interactions and all the things she calls them assholes for, and decides- fuck it, if she’s going to die for her shitty coworkers, then so be it. she keeps breaking the pipes, even as the steam spilling out keeps burning her, until she’s gone.

ronnie is dead. morgs lies on the floor unconscious. cody still has three giant fingers impaling their stomach, likely bleeding out. eide stands functionally alone, their shotgun and their determination against the creature. they stand their ground, take aim, fire-

and everything goes black.

when they’re aware again, they’re sitting in a chair next to two hospital beds. in one lies cody, asleep but on the road to healing. in the other is morgs, who still has yet to awaken. her heart moniter flatlines, and all eide can do is watch, barely aware of the world around them, as the hospital fights to keep her alive and manages to restart her heart. whether she’ll ever wake up again or not, there’s no way to know.