Chapter 3: The Welcoming Committee

Chapter 3: The Welcoming Committee

Zach spent the day in the sterile confines of Apartment 6A, trying to scrub the memory of the pulsating tissue from his mind. He couldn’t. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw it twitching on the end of his plumbing snake. Every time he ran the tap, he imagined what else was flowing through the building’s veins. Jerry’s journal sat on the coffee table, an open wound, its final, frantic words a constant, screaming reminder: It’s not a building. It’s a body.

His desire was simple, primal: to make sense of the madness, to find a crack in the wall of this prison. But he was trapped, and his fear was a physical weight, pressing down on his chest.

Late in the afternoon, a second envelope slid under his door. It was the same crisp, white stationery as the work order, his name written in the same elegant script. This time, it wasn’t a task, but an invitation.

Zachary, You are cordially expected to attend a welcome dinner in your honor. Communal Dining Hall, 7 p.m. sharp. Attendance is mandatory. - R.

Obstacle: A mandatory social event in a place where social interaction is terrifying.

The word ‘mandatory’ felt less like a requirement and more like a threat. The thought of facing Mr. Rags again, of being in a room with other ‘residents’—people who might have things like the Miller baby for children—made his stomach clench. He thought of Jerry’s warning: Don’t trust the food. But refusing was not an option. Jerry’s clean, empty apartment was proof of what happened to employees who didn’t follow the rules.

Action: He forces himself to attend the dinner.

At five minutes to seven, Zach walked down the silent, buzzing hallway to the dining hall on the ground floor. The room was large and cavernous, with a dozen small tables arranged in a perfect grid on the polished linoleum floor. The lighting was flat and unforgiving, making the space feel more like a morgue than a place to eat. A handful of other residents were already seated, one person to a table, staring blankly at the walls or their empty plates. He recognized the pale, gaunt woman he assumed was the mother of the elevator infant. She met his gaze for a flicker of a second, and her eyes held not malice, but a chilling, exhausted apathy.

At the head of the room, Mr. Rags sat at a larger table, observing the scene with the placid air of a king surveying his court. He gestured to the empty chair opposite him.

“Zachary. Punctual. An admirable quality.”

As Zach sat, a door to the side of the room swung open. A family entered, moving with an unnerving, synchronized grace. A man and a woman who looked like they’d stepped out of a 1950s catalog, with perfectly coiffed hair and brilliant, empty smiles. They were followed by two children, a boy and a girl of about eight and ten, dressed in matching sailor outfits. They were the Stevenson family, the evening’s chefs.

“The Stevensons have been kind enough to prepare a special meal for us tonight,” Mr. Rags announced to the silent room.

The family moved with practiced efficiency, placing a plate in front of each resident. The food looked incredible—a thick slice of roast beef, perfectly browned potatoes, and bright, glazed carrots. The aroma was rich and savory, a stark contrast to the antiseptic smell of the hall. It made Zach’s stomach rumble with genuine hunger.

He watched as Mrs. Stevenson placed a plate before him. Her smile was a work of art, wide and flawless, but it never reached her cold, distant eyes. “Welcome to The Complex, Zach,” she said, her voice a pleasant, melodic chime. “We’re so happy to have you.”

Zach mumbled a thank you. He remembered Jerry’s note about Mrs. Gable’s cookie. Tasted funny. He looked down at the roast beef, steam rising from its surface. He was starving, but his throat was tight with anxiety. He glanced at Mr. Rags, who gave him a slight, encouraging nod. Hesitantly, Zach cut a small piece of meat and lifted it to his mouth.

Result: He learns the rules of his imprisonment.

It was delicious. Incredibly tender, rich, and juicy. For a moment, he forgot his fear, lost in the simple, satisfying flavor. Then, a secondary taste emerged on his tongue. A faint, but unmistakable, metallic tang. It was the coppery aftertaste of blood, the same flavor that had filled the air in the elevator with the infant, the same scent that had wafted from the drain in 3B. The food was of this place. He forced himself to swallow, the bite of meat suddenly feeling like a lead weight in his stomach.

Mr. Rags dabbed his lips with a napkin. “Now that we are all settled,” he began, his voice cutting through the silence, “it is a perfect time to go over the community guidelines. There are only three, and they are for the safety and continued harmony of all our residents. They are quite simple.”

He held up a single, slender finger. “One. You are not to leave the grounds of The Complex without my express permission. The desert is a treacherous place, full of dangers best left undisturbed.”

He raised a second finger. “Two. You are never to enter another resident’s apartment unless you are expressly invited inside by them. Privacy is our most cherished commodity here.”

Zach thought of the porcelain dolls in 3B, of the giggling infant. The rule wasn’t about privacy; it was about quarantine.

Mr. Rags’s dark eyes swept the room, landing on Zach. He raised a third finger. “And three. The most important rule. You will, from time to time, notice a… resonance. A hum, if you will. It occurs most nights. You are not to investigate it. You are not to speak of it. You are not to question the nightly hum.”

Jerry’s journal screamed in his mind. The hum is its heartbeat. Or maybe it’s digesting.

The meal continued in oppressive silence, broken only by the scrape of cutlery on ceramic. Zach pushed the food around his plate, the metallic taste now overwhelming everything else.

Turning Point / Surprise: The Stevenson child’s unnatural "fit."

Suddenly, a loud clatter echoed through the hall. The Stevenson boy, Timothy, had dropped his fork. Every head turned. The boy stared down at the utensil on the floor, his perfect smile gone, replaced by a slack-jawed vacancy.

His head twitched. Once. Twice. Then his back arched violently, lifting him from his chair in a grotesque, unnatural bow. His limbs began to move, but not like a seizure. They bent and twisted at impossible angles, his joints seeming to dislocate and snap back into place. His jaw unhinged, and a sound tore from his throat—not a human cry, but a high-frequency chittering, a clicking, scraping sound that vibrated in Zach’s bones. It was the sound from the desert. The sound of the thing that had hunted him.

Zach recoiled, his chair scraping loudly on the floor. He looked around wildly, expecting screams, panic, someone to help the boy.

But the other residents simply averted their eyes, focusing intently on their meals. Mr. Rags watched the display with detached, clinical curiosity.

Mrs. Stevenson let out a soft sigh, the sound of a mother mildly inconvenienced by a spilled glass of milk. “Oh, Timothy,” she said, her smile returning, strained but intact. “He gets so overexcited around new people.”

Mr. Stevenson calmly folded his napkin, placed it beside his plate, and stood up. He and his wife walked over to their contorting son. With no sense of alarm, they each took one of his flailing, unnaturally bending arms.

“Come along, dear,” Mr. Stevenson said, his voice level. “Time to settle down.”

They lifted the chittering, convulsing boy and carried him from the room as if he were merely a child having a common tantrum. The side door swung shut behind them, cutting off the horrifying sound.

The dining hall was silent again. The Stevenson girl, who hadn't moved a muscle, picked up her fork and took another delicate bite of roast beef.

Zach sat frozen, his blood like ice in his veins. The metallic taste in his mouth was suffocating. He looked at Mr. Rags, who simply offered his thin, predatory smile.

“Children,” Mr. Rags said softly, as if nothing had happened. “They can be such a handful.”