Pure Luck

A shrill cry is clearly audible from a place so called an Abandoned Street by the east of Electronic City. It was that of a woman, most likely a young adult. it was preceded by a progression of slashes, then with silence…. “No one knows,” Ashura mutters, “no one, but me.”

************

The street was abandoned for a reason- the government had deemed it unfit to survive the earthquake that was predicted to occur that summer. It managed to live past it, but something seemed to have changed both about the place and people who used to live there.  A rumor had anonymously spread, stating people who enter the street would never return. 

Doesn’t it sound like a haunted street? 

Superstitious ones believed it and thus never even lingered around the area, while the logical ones, just to prove the others wrong, went there, ironically ended up proving the opposite, further increasing fear among people as they were found mysteriously missing or dead. 

Who knows whether it was paranormal or just a scheme to prevent the people from trespassing, whatever it was, gave the people a good scare.

***********

Eliana enters a room filled with the smell of booze, smoke and sweaty socks. The place though boomed with hustle and was lively with overlapping conversations that ended up giving an end result of noise, had abruptly become pin drop silent. People stared at her, some were curious, some agitated while others frustrated to have got more work. 

Breaking the silence, a Blonde strides towards Eliana. Her words, though intimidated others, felt somehow comforting and convincing to the utterly confused Eliana that she had come to the right location. “Hi, welcome to Pitch Black, how may we help you?” asks the woman she just met

 Eliana, unconsciously judging the women, suddenly starts sobbing, “I…. my friend Lizzy is missing since the past two days, I have searched for her everywhere, have filed a complaint to police too, but nothing seems to work. I didn’t know what to do, that’s when I got to know about this place….”

 “Dear, dear, could you please tell us about the girl? When did you meet her last?” snapped the detective, directly getting into the issue.

 “We met two days ago, she told me that she’s going to the Abandoned Street-” Gasps from the surroundings. She continues, "-I pleaded her not to, I tried to stop her, she tried to manipulate me into joining her, but I denied.” 

Genuinely interested in the Abandoned Street, the detective enquired further “what was the reason, did she mention why she wanted to go?”

 “No,” she replied filled with self pity.

 “Okay, don’t worry dear, we’ll help you find your friend. She should be happy to have a friend like you." reading the surroundings and Eliana's facial expressions, the detective tries to figure out more about her relation to her friend, she thus continues, "Was that all? Did you fight, or was there any other conflict that she was involved with?” 

Eliana hesitates to reply, then denies. Eliana, asks with a tone as that of someone suppressed, “Umm, may I know your name mam?” 

“Pure Luck, that’s my name,” the detective replies, Eliana's eyes widen out of surprise to have heard the unexpected, well, her mind then processed the knowledge of code names, which then became no Greek or Latin to her, in other words, she got used to it.

Pure Luck had been waiting for a case to open up in the Abandoned Street, she herself was curious and fixated upon the place and now that she got a case, she will solve it no matter what.

 Being a young girl of 23, she had solved a lot of cases and thus had a higher rank in the hierarchy than that of her experienced colleagues.

***********

The next day, Pure Luck leaves to the Abandoned Street. Everyone, being concerned about her gives her different things like protective charms, garlic, sacred thread said to be powerful when tied in hand etc., in the name of warding off evil, some of them try to brainwash her to stay. She respects all their concerns  but, knowing completely well that the issue is not due to some spiritual cause but the manifestation of devilish tendency of humans to possess things when they get an opportunity to, in order to utilize them in a way that favors none other than themselves, she proceeds with her plan of action.

She had already been tracking the activities going on there, and found out a lot of inside information just by logical deduction and with the support of the technical team vigilantly monitoring the external activities. Everything was already planned weeks ago but the only thing missing had been a case so that she can openly investigate the street. Now that she had got one, she immediately started off. Her decisiveness and activities were quick and definite, it might not be a surprise if she could finish the case within just a few hours.

As she entered the Street, she realized that the street really looked scary, as if the place had faced a terrorist attack or something similar of that sort. The lighting, the appearance of the place everything was so shabby suggesting nothing but one thing, ‘proceed with caution’. She ignored the signs, and went inside, found a suspicious looking asbestos that covered the entrance of a small shop.

Since she was intuitively triggered to investigate that particular place, she searched for a way to enter, which was instantly found by her. Thus without further ado, she followed her mind and entered into the shop, which was filled with nothing but dirt, cobwebs, dust and all other factors that suggested the absence of life forms in that shelter.

while this was the case, her sense gave off a negative vibe that suggested that something about the floor was odd. though it was so dirty, one could find a patch that seemed to have been swept off recently. She followed the track of cleaned flooring which led her to a small room in the deep right corner of the shop, which could not have been anticipated since the shop was already small.

As she entered the mini room, she instantly realized that something was indefinitely wrong. The room in itself was dark and now that she stood by the door, she covered the only possible sunlight entering that room. She searched her bag and used a torch to light up the surroundings, she was ready for any situation that might possibly occur. Believe me, she is not in for a disappointment.

*************

There she was, with a red scarf hanging around her neck, in fact she was the one clinging to it, or should I say, suspended from the ceiling, hanging dead? Whatever it was, Pure Luck knew her to be Lizzy.....