Infestation

Tick...tick...tick... The clock on the wall ticked and turned as Anda stared at the ceiling in his brother's room. His mind was bothered. His body felt uneasy. Questions swirled in his mind as he tried to make sense of what he was looking at.

"When did this start?" "I told you, man. This thing started a month ago." Theo answered with annoyance as he plopped down on his bed and stared at the ceiling.

He was in a state of confusion, trying to piece together information to explain to his brother what he was looking at. "Have you tried..."I've tried everything. Nothing makes sense and nothing works." Theo answered with frustration, continuing to stare at the ceiling.

This problem started a month ago when the area they lived in experienced an extreme storm. It had rained nonstop for three days. Inside their home, Theo's room had water pouring through the ceiling. After this event mould appeared.

In the beginning, the mould did not cause much alarm. Theo bought a mildew-killing spray and applied it to the ceiling. The spray seemed to work for a while, but then the mould returned. This time, it was spreading across.

Theo was deeply irritated by the damage it was causing to his bed and to his floor. A dark liquid often dripped on his bed occasionally. No matter how many times he moved his bed around it always found its way there. The floor was also often wet and slippery.

Theo was not the only one irritated by this situation. Anda often complained to his brother about the sounds that came from the ceiling in his room. Theo never heard them, but Anda often woke up to a scratch or a crunching sound in the middle of the night. Trying to give a logical explanation to this situation, he later on branded them as "rodents" living in the ceiling.

They reached out to a roofing contractor, but no leaks and no sign of water was found. "I don't know how your ceiling got water in it when there are no leaks on the roof. I've searched every part and found nothing." The roofing contractor informed Theo.

"That doesn't make sense because my room had been leaking when it rained." "Well, I don't know what to tell you. This house does not even have water pipes running in the ceiling."

Nothing made sense to Theo. He tried to figure things out by himself, but nothing made sense. "Maybe the contractor guy got it all wrong." "I thought so too, but through some digging, I figured out that he was not wrong. There are no holes or any pipes up there." Theo explained to his brother, who was confused by this whole situation. "How did the water get in then?" "That is what I am trying to figure out."

Both boys were baffled by this situation. It had not been easy for them to get this house from the beginning. They went through many ups and downs to buy it. Its price was affordable, and its interior design was in good condition.

The agent was in a hurry to sell it that he decreased the original price. Wanting to move out of their old home, they wasted no time buying it. According to them, this was a "once-in-a-lifetime" opportunity. Hence, Theo was bothered and frustrated by this situation. He just wanted their new home to be perfect just the way he had envisioned it.

"I'm tired. We will figure this out in the morning." Anda grumbled as he shuffled out of his brother's room too tired to think and too tired to do anything at this point.

Theo was left in his room, staring at the mould on the ceiling as if it was going to just disappear. After a few minutes, he decided to go to sleep. Instead of sleeping on his bed, he chose the couch in the living room.

The house was shrouded in silence. Theo was drifting in and out of sleep when he was woken up violently by Anda. "Wake up, you idiot!" He sprang up from the couch. "What?!"

"Shhh..." Anda put his hand over his brother's mouth. "Listen... Do you hear that?" Theo listened for a while but heard nothing. "What are you talking about? I don't hear anything."

Anda turned his head and looked his brother straight in the eyes. "Don't you hear that creaking noise? It's coming from your bedroom, man. At first, I thought it was you, but you are sleeping here."

Thud! Both brothers turned their heads towards Theo's room. Theo's ears rang, and his body hair stood up. Creak... creak... creak... A creaking sound came from his room. Without hesitation, he took a baseball bat that he kept by the TV and walked slowly towards his room.

Behind him, Anda was following. "Do you think it's a thief?" "Keep quiet." They both stood in front of the door. Theo signaled to his brother to kick the door at the count of three. One... two... three...

Bang! The door swung open, and both men stepped inside. The moment they stepped inside the room, their bodies froze in fear, and their blood ran cold.

The ceiling had a gaping hole, and the mould that infested the ceiling was now replaced by a dark red liquid that leaked on top of Theo's bed. They stood there watching as the liquid soaked the blankets and leaked on the floor.

Creak... creak... creak... The creaking noise came from the ceiling. Theo stared at the gaping hole in the roof and squinted his eyes. Then he saw it.

The creaking sound was not the ceiling falling apart, but it was something coming out from the shadows. Something that had been living in the ceiling waiting for the right moment to reach out from the dark.

Anda saw it, too. But now it was peeking out of the hole, staring at them. A large head attached to its long neck, covered by thin strands of hair. Long, thin arms and bony hands hanging out of the gaping hole. A jumble of sounds and screeches came out of it. A part of it looked human while the other was devilish.

Slowly, it crept out of the hole while maintaining eye contact with the two brothers. That is when Theo knew they had to get away. "Run!!!" He shouted. They both bolted out of the room straight into the living room.

A loud thud came from behind as they reached the door that led outside. Anda pulled the door open, but then something wrapped itself around his leg and yanked him back on top of the coffee table, breaking it in half.

Theo stared in horror as the thing stood over his brother with its mouth wide open, ready to consume him. Thinking fast, he took the baseball bat and swung it. The bat hit its face, pushing it back to the door. Their way out was blocked.

This gave Theo the chance to help his brother up. "Come on!" Anda limped his way towards the kitchen where another door led to the backyard. Theo was following behind him with his baseball bat. It rose from the shadows and, with fast movements, ran after them as they stepped into the backyard.

The backyard had a gate that led to an opposite street. Both ran towards it. Just as they were about to reach the gate, it grabbed their legs and pulled them away.

They screamed as its nails dug into their skin. Theo used all his strength to hit it on the head. That angered it as it slammed his body against the floor.

With no strength left in his body, Theo could not fight it. Instead, he watched as it dragged them inside the house towards his room. It climbed into the gaping hole and pulled a screaming Anda inside. Theo listened in horror as his brother's screams became silent. A crunching sound was the only thing he could hear as bones snapped.

It peeked out from the gaping hole and reached out for Theo, who could do nothing but stare in horror as it pulled him into the darkness. His screams echoed throughout the house until it was shrouded in silence once again. The gaping hole closed and returned into its mouldy state as blood painted the room red.