Chapter 6: The Night Shipment

The alley was a different world after midnight. The cheerful pink and teal of the diner’s back door seemed like a cruel joke in the oppressive dark. A single, buzzing security light cast long, distorted shadows that writhed like living things. The air, thick with the humidity of a Southern night, carried the cloying scent of the dumpster and the faint, metallic tang of old grease. This was the diner’s ugly, hidden face, and tonight, Caroline was its sole attendant.

She stood with her arms wrapped around herself, the thin fabric of her uniform doing little to ward off the nervous chill that had nothing to do with the temperature. Brenda should be here. This was Brenda’s job. The thought was a painful splinter in her mind. She pictured Brenda standing in this same spot, her face pale in the gloom, performing this grim duty out of a loyalty Caroline had so brutally misunderstood. The rejected necklace felt like it was burning a hole in her pocket, a small, silver monument to her own foolishness.

But Miranda’s words echoed louder than her shame. I see your loyalty, Caroline. It’s time you learned the whole business. This wasn't a punishment; it was an ascension. She was being trusted with the final, foundational secret. If she could do this, if she could prove herself capable and unquestioning, maybe… maybe Brenda would see her differently. Not as a stalker, but as an equal. A partner.

The grumble of an engine cut through the night, growing into a rattling roar. Headlights swung into the alley, blindingly bright, before cutting out. The refrigerated box truck, caked in filth and road salt, idled for a moment with a sound like a dying man’s cough before shuddering into silence. Mr. Wilson’s truck.

He climbed out, a hulking silhouette against the streetlights beyond. The foul, sweet scent of his cigarillo preceded him.

“You the welcoming committee?” he grunted, his voice like gravel in a tin can. He didn’t wait for an answer, instead yanking on a heavy lever at the back of the truck. The roll-up door screeched open, revealing a cavern of cold, dark steel.

“Get to it,” he ordered, gesturing with his head. “Produce first. Then the stock. Don’t dawdle.” He clearly had no interest in helping, leaning against the cab of his truck to smoke, his small, dark eyes watching her every move.

Caroline’s hands trembled as she pulled on a pair of thick work gloves. She grabbed a metal handcart and began the work. The produce was just as Miranda had said. Crates of onions, their papery skins flaking everywhere. Boxes of potatoes, heavy with damp earth. Sacks of wilted-looking lettuce. It was all mundane, routine. Her anxiety began to ease, lulled by the simple, repetitive labor. This wasn't so bad. It was just a delivery.

When the produce was stacked by the back door, she rolled the cart back to the truck. “Stock’s in the back,” Wilson growled around his cigarillo.

She clambered up into the refrigerated trailer. The cold hit her instantly, a damp, biting chill that smelled of raw metal and something else. Something coppery and rank that clung to the back of her throat. It was the smell of the basement, magnified a hundred times.

Hanging from meat hooks that ran the length of the ceiling were a dozen or so large shapes, wrapped tightly in stained, off-white canvas. They were long and lean, their weight pulling the canvas taut in ways that revealed unsettling curves and angles. There were no broad shoulders of beef, no stout, rounded haunches of pork. They were simply… wrong.

Caroline swallowed the bile that rose in her throat. This was the source. This was the raw material for the grinder’s song. She forced herself to breathe, to compartmentalize. This was the job. This was her test. She reached for the first one, her gloved fingers sinking slightly into the cold, firm flesh beneath the canvas. It was heavy, an awkward and uncooperative weight. As she wrestled it off the hook, she grunted with the effort, staggering back with her grim cargo.

She hauled the first two out and loaded them onto the cart, her muscles screaming in protest. As she climbed back into the truck for the third, a sound from the very back of the dark trailer froze her blood.

Scrape.

It was a soft, dragging sound. Metal on metal. She froze, every nerve ending alight. It was probably just the load shifting. The truck settling on its suspension.

She reached for the next canvas-wrapped form.

Thump.

This one was louder, more distinct. A muffled, desperate sound, followed by a faint, rattling chain. It came from the darkest corner of the truck, behind the last row of hanging carcasses.

“Everything alright in there?” Wilson’s voice was sharp, impatient.

“Fine,” Caroline called out, her own voice sounding thin and reedy. “Just… one of them slipped.”

Her heart was a frantic drum against her ribs. Forget you saw it. Forget the door exists. Never ask questions. Brenda’s terrified warnings screamed in her head. This was the ultimate question, the one she was absolutely not supposed to ask. Do the job. Stay quiet. Prove your loyalty.

But Miranda’s words came back to her, too. You have a hunger in you. A desire to know things.

The desire was a physical, gnawing thing. She had to see. She had to know.

Her movements were stealthy, her feet making no sound on the grooved metal floor. She edged past the hanging bodies, their cold, wrapped forms brushing against her shoulders like ghosts in a morgue. The coppery smell was stronger back here, thick and suffocating.

In the deepest, darkest corner, partially obscured by a hanging side of what she now refused to call meat, was a small, grated section of the floor. A drain, perhaps. And chained to a thick metal ring bolted beside it was… something.

A soft whimper reached her ears.

With a trembling hand, Caroline reached out and pushed the heavy, canvas-wrapped carcass aside. It swung slowly, like a pendulum.

And then she saw them.

In the sliver of space she had created, through the forest of the dead, a pair of eyes stared back at her from the darkness. They weren't animal eyes, wide and uncomprehending. They were human. They were wide with a terror so pure, so absolute, it was like looking into the face of a soul being ripped apart. They were blue, and they were pleading with her, begging her for a salvation she could not possibly give.

The fresh meat had arrived. And it was still alive.