Chapter 27: Cockroaches (2)

The source of the screaming was the new art teacher at the school. She was clutching a can of insecticide, huddled against the corridor wall, her face deathly pale, staring in terror at the art classroom.

Everyone followed her gaze into the classroom and saw a writhing mass of reddish-brown dots.

Cockroaches. Cockroaches. Cockroaches. As far as the eye could see, the classroom was crawling with them! Countless cockroaches surged out like a tide from the ventilation ducts at the top of the classroom, scuttling rapidly along the ceiling and walls. Accompanied by a spine-chilling rustling, these tiny, fingertip-sized creatures quickly spread throughout the entire room.

Desks, chairs, floor gaps, even the easel racks… everywhere was covered in crawling reddish-brown shadows. As the countless dense dots flickered across their vision, the deep-seated, instinctive human disgust for insects awakened, and a thick layer of cold sweat broke out on Everly’s back.

While she stood frozen, some of the faster cockroaches had already silently reached the door, their backs marked with conspicuous V-shaped black spots, attempting to climb up the wooden door toward the corridor wall.

“Ahhhhh!”

The students watching immediately erupted into a chorus of screams.

This time, even the teachers who had come to help joined in the screaming.

Without anyone telling them, everyone turned and ran toward the stairs leading downstairs. Thanks to a few teachers maintaining order nearby, there were no falls or stampedes—but just thinking that the cockroaches pouring from the vents would soon crawl everywhere sent chills down everyone’s spines.

“I… I just saw one cockroach in the classroom and wanted to spray a little insecticide to get rid of it. I never expected so many cockroaches to suddenly come out of the ducts… sob sob sob…” Teacher Diana cried afterward, comforted by her colleagues.

She was the new art teacher at the elementary school, and also the daughter of the mayor of Lemot Town. Although she was new, her colleagues were all very considerate of her.

The cockroach outbreak in the art classroom finally caught the principal’s full attention. To ensure the health and safety of everyone at the school, Ms. Gray called a pest control company from Micano City and scheduled them to come on Saturday to treat the school.

Everly rested at home for two days. The extermination was effective—by the time she returned to school on Monday, the cockroaches were practically gone.

Meanwhile, in places no one noticed, a wingless, reddish-brown cockroach had rapidly spread throughout the entire town of Lemot. In supermarkets, brushing against a shelf would reveal a flash of cockroach shadows darting underneath; in butcher shops, thin antennae constantly twitched from filthy cracks in the walls; and in kitchen trash cans, which were hit the hardest, the rustling sounds were almost nightly. At first, people didn’t pay much attention—after all, the U.S. had never been particularly clean. On the streets and in the sewers, running rats, cockroaches, and bedbugs were common sights.

Even though these cockroaches changed form day by day, swelling in just a few days from the size of a date pit to nearly two inches (about 5 cm) long, no one seemed alarmed enough. Only housewives constantly complained, hoping the municipal government would organize a pest control effort so they could worry less…

Everly was glad she didn’t live in town; her home had yet to face such troubles.

That day after school, she held Buddy’s leash and walked across the street with her grandfather, preparing for a big shopping trip to the town supermarket.

American families tended to buy ten or fifteen days’ worth of supplies at once and stock them at home, and today happened to be their “stock-up” day.

The summer vacation had just ended, and the next official holiday was still some time away. Right now was the slowest season for the town’s tourism industry.

The once-bustling street was now quiet and deserted; as far as the eye could see, there were barely any tourists.

As they walked, passing by a narrow alley on the side, Everly suddenly felt a tug on her hand.

It was Buddy.

For some reason, it had stopped at the mouth of the alley. Its ears folded back, its back arched, its tail drooped, and its sharp teeth bared as it barked furiously into the alley.

“Woof! Woof woof!”

“What is it? What’s wrong, good girl? What did you find?” Old John squatted beside Buddy, patting its head reassuringly.

“Woof! Woof!”

Buddy kept barking, and with each bark, it lifted its front paws and made a lunging motion toward the alley. Because its collar leash held it back, it couldn’t rush inside—but the strong pull nearly made Everly stumble as she held onto the leash.

“Looks like there’s something in there,” Old John said, steadying Everly’s shoulders and taking the leash from her hand.

Now freed to some extent, Buddy leapt about half a meter into the alley, one paw landing on a black plastic garbage bag.

“Rustle-rustle!” The sound of plastic scraping echoed like a nightmare replaying itself. Everly’s eyes widened as seventeen or eighteen large cockroaches crawled out from under the bag. Each one was bigger than an adult’s thumb, reddish-brown, glossy, with a striking black V-shaped mark on its back. They lined up one after another, racing across the ground, disappearing into other trash or the cracks between floor tiles, as if they had appeared suddenly and then vanished just as quickly.

Everly jumped back in fright.

She had heard townspeople say the cockroaches had been unusually large lately—but this… this was enormous, and there were so many of them.

So disgusting…

“Woof! Woof woof!”

Buddy nimbly dodged the crawling cockroaches on the ground. Once this wave of cockroaches vanished, it continued barking furiously down the alley, mouth wide open, refusing to calm down.

Old John narrowed his eyes and peered carefully into the alley.

It was a dead-end alley, not very long, ending at a tall brick wall. The place was filthy and looked aged; the walls were covered in graffiti, and three garbage bins sat side by side on the ground. The trash in them had long since overflowed, forming thick piles on the ground that no one had bothered to clean. Countless flies circled above, and even before getting close, a stench hit him like a wall.

The bins were too large to see past, blocking the view further in. After a moment’s thought, Old John released his hold on Buddy. Together, man and dog carefully avoided the foul, sticky trash on the ground and took a few cautious steps into the alley.

By the time he made it past the third garbage bin, the sight at the very end of the alley made even the seasoned Old John’s throat tighten, sending goosebumps across his skin.

There, lay the body of a dog—its chest and abdomen ripped open.

It was a pure white Samoyed, frozen in a running posture, mouth wide open, tongue hanging out, eyes staring sideways as it lay on the ground at the alley’s end. Blood and innards had spilled across the floor. In the heat, the body had begun to rot, filling the air with a sickening stench. On the wounds swarmed carrion flies and one cockroach after another, large and glossy, like twisted flowers blooming on the snow, exuding a repulsive, sticky odor.

As his gaze unintentionally swept across the dog’s neck, Old John stiffened.

He searched the surrounding ground, picked up a stick, and lifted the broken collar at the base of the neck. The metal tag on it bore the dog’s name and the owner’s address and phone number. The break in the collar was smeared with blood, the edges smooth and clean—as if cut deliberately by a sharp, blade-like tool.

Someone had been ab*sing this dog.

With decades of experience in criminal investigation, Old John’s mind immediately jumped to that grim possibility.

Old John had assumed Buddy was barking like crazy because it had smelled the decaying dog corpse on the ground. But even after reaching the body, Buddy remained restless, barking furiously, its muscular body lunging forward and tugging at Old John, trying to pull him further into the alley.

“What’s the matter, good girl?”

Old John patted its head. Seeing that Buddy was still hyper-excited, he loosened the leash slightly and followed it, stepping over the countless cockroaches that scattered across the ground, moving deeper into the alley.

The agitated dog finally led him to a narrow vertical gap at the end of the alley. Buddy barked nonstop at it. The crack was about three or four dozen centimeters long, at its widest roughly half a finger’s width. On the ground in front of it were swarms of reddish-brown cockroaches, each one fat and sluggish. At first glance, they almost looked like a layer of fallen red leaves.

The arrival of man and dog startled the cockroaches. Frightened by the barking, the “leaves” shifted and scuttled away, revealing bloodstains beneath.

They had been feeding on flesh.

“This is…”

Seeing the bloodstains, a flicker of unease crossed Old John’s eyes. The marks were long, irregular smears, mixed with fragments of meat and fat, as if something had dragged part of the dog’s corpse from nearby into the wall gap… but what could have done that?

Thinking this, Old John instinctively leaned closer, trying to see what was hidden in the crack. The alley was already dimly lit, and the gap was pitch black, with only the faint outline of something moving inside. Beyond that, a pungent, oily, sour stench assaulted his senses.

“Woof! Woof woof!”

Buddy kept barking, each urgent yelp like a frantic command. Instinctively, Old John raised the stick in his hand and jabbed it toward the crack—an action that was like poking a hornet’s nest.

The next second, a dense skittering erupted from the gap. One cockroach after another, countless in number, poured out like a boiling pot of reddish-brown soup, splashing violently from the wall crack and rapidly spreading over everything around them: walls, the ground, Old John’s stick, even Buddy’s legs.

Old John finally remembered what the stench had been just moments ago—that nauseating smell came from a mass of living cockroaches, a mix of their secretions, excrement, and the stench of decaying bodies.

The scene of the swarming cockroaches was so horrifying that even a tough, seasoned man like Old John felt goosebumps rise across his skin, his scalp tingling.

“Buddy, run!”

Seeing the cockroaches multiplying with no sign of stopping, the old man couldn’t take it any longer. He yanked the leash, took the lead, stepped over the dead pet dog on the ground, and ran toward the alley’s exit.

“Woof!”

Buddy followed immediately, tail tucked, retreating from the onslaught of the cockroach swarm.

TN

Buddy… I didn’t know you were a girl. They should’ve named you Baddie instead! XD