Account 1-12 Case # 6392

Subject: Veronica Ruby Haig

Location: Hurricane, Utah, USA

1416 hours, July 2nd, 1985

Veronica leaned against the back wall of the parts and service room, staring blankly at the ceiling with a lit cigarette perched in her mouth. All the energy and enthusiasm she had on the first day was gone, replaced with boredom and frustration. She had dug through an entire box of papers from 9-12 and had still not gotten any closer to finding any of the documents Clay mentioned, nor any answers to why Michael had been deemed insane. Not to mention the weird humming sound she only just noticed that was giving her a headache.

"Why the fuck does this whole searching thing have to be so hard." She whispered to herself.

She was getting impatient, the only person in this town who was willing to talk about what happened were Clay and a local restaurant owner named Bronislava. However, Bronislava didn't know that much, and Clay seemed unwilling to give context beyond surface level information. The only thing she had been able to pick up was that something happened at Freddy's which caused the restaurant's reputation to tank and Mike to be arrested and released on an insanity plea. But he hadn't seemed insane when she knew him, no more than herself atleast, so what had changed?

She pulled the cigarette out of her mouth and puffed out some smoke. The only three options she had were digging through the papers here, looking for newspaper clippings in the library, or talking to Mike. Unfortunately, the library closed before she got off shift, and Clay wouldn't tell her where Mike lived nor give her his phone number. So, she was stuck here, rummaging through incomprehensible jargon until she could find some form of breakthrough. She sighed and prepared to walk back over to sort more papers, when she heard the angered screams of Clay from across the building.

"THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN ITS MISSING!"

She stumbled and nearly fell over.

"OH! AND OUR ONLY LEAD TO FINDING IT IS GONE AS WELL!"

She recomposed herself and cautiously opened the door to better hear what he was yelling about.

"DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG I SPENT TRYING TO GET THAT FUCKING THING! IF I WERE STILL SERVING, I WOULD CAVE YOUR SKULLS IN AND FUCK YOU ALL TO DEATH!"

"Jesus Christ" she muttered under her breath.

In the short period she had known Clay, she had never heard him yell like this.

"OH NO, YOU GUYS AREN'T DOING SHIT! THIS SHIT IS MY JOB NOW! AND IF ANYONE SAYS OTHERWISE! THEY CAN FINGER MY FUCKING ASS!"

She heard the phone violently slam down before Clay walked out of his office and saw her at the other end of the dining area.

"I'm guessing you heard me yelling?" he asked.

"I did" she said weakly.

"Sorry about that, I contracted some guys to look after an expensive piece of equipment we got from the uhh… remains of the previous restaurant. I told them to look after it but it uhm… got stolen."

He seemed to be stuttering more and was staring off into the distance.

"Alright, listen I need you to keep an eye on the place for a little bit. Thanks to this whole debacle I'm going to take a trip to Salt Lake City to try and figure this out, Got it?"

"Ok" She replied.

"Alright, cya"

With that awkward exchange out of the way, he ran out of the building, leaving her alone in that dingy unsettling Pizzeria with only her confusion to keep her company.

"Great! I try to find answers and now I'm even more in the dark than when I started! Is it too much to ask for some fucking information in this town!?"

She stopped and looked over at the door to the kitchen. She had been told that door had been locked by the police until they could conduct another "inspection". But seeing as she was alone.

A mischievous grin formed on her face as a very risky idea formed in her mind. If no one was going to tell her what happened here, why shouldn't she find it out herself. She knew how to pick locks, and the cameras were offline. The only thing she would have to do is obscure her fingerprints and she could go wherever she wanted. She wasted no time walking over to the Janitor's closet near the security office to get some surgical gloves. She got to the door and was about to open it when the stench of rot hit her nose.

Looking down the hallway, she noticed a large dent in the wall with small droplets of a dark purple substance around it. The humming also seemed to be louder here, drilling into her head. She covered her nose and tried to avoid vomiting from the smell. How had nobody noticed this before? She had only ever been in the front of the building, but surely the police or Clay would have done something about it. Unless this somehow got there within the past day or two. Struggling to keep her composure, she looked around the hallway trying to find any clues as to what could have created the dent. Suddenly, her eyes settled on what seemed to be a dark, lanky figure leaning out of the security office. She tried to get a better look at it, but before she could blink it was gone. Something was wrong with this place, she needed to get out!

She flung open the door to the closet and grabbed the surgical gloves before slamming the door and running away from that accursed hallway. Upon reaching the front desk she took a minute to cough and breathe in some fresh air. Then something occurred to her. The people in hazmat suits Clay had been talking to mentioned they had sealed off the kitchen and the 'Safe Room' until they could investigate further. Was that purple substance what they were looking for? And if so, how did it get into the main restaurant? Her breathing quickened and her mind began to race. Whatever was happening here wasn't good for anyone's wellbeing, she needed to get out of here and warn Clay when he got back. She turned towards the exit and fell on her ass when she saw it was being blocked by a marionette puppet.

"What the fuck!?" she screamed.

Despite not having any eyes, she could tell the puppet was staring at her. It wasn't attached to any strings but appeared to be hovering several inches off the ground. It held what looked to be a manila folder in its right arm. After staring at her for a few seconds, it began to spell out words in a rough robotic voice.

'D' 'O' 'N' 'T' 'T' 'E' 'L' 'L'

It took her a few minutes to decipher what that thing had said. 'Don't Tell'. She could only guess it meant 'don't tell Clay about the purple substance'.

"Why not?" she asked the thing.

'S' 'H' 'E' 'K' 'I' 'L' 'L' 'M' 'I' 'K' 'E'

"She kill Mike!" she repeated to herself.

Now this thing had her attention. She was still frustrated with the fact Mike didn't want to talk to her, but if his life was at risk she was inclined to listen to this thing. But who would want to kill him?

"Who's she?"

'C' 'A' 'S' 'S' 'I' 'D' 'Y'

"Cassidy? Why would she kill Michael if I tell Clay about the purple stuff?"

'B' 'R' 'E' 'A' 'K' 'T' 'H' 'E' 'S' 'R' 'U' 'L' 'E' 'S'

"'Break the rules', So, what you're saying is, if I tell Clay about the substance in the hallway, I'll be breaking the rules of some girl named Cassidy, and she will kill Mike in retaliation?"

The puppet bobbed its head up and down to confirm her statement.

"Ok so what can I do to stop this 'Cassidy'?"

'L' 'E' 'T' 'H' 'I' 'M' 'W' 'O' 'R' 'K'

"Let him work."

Like hell she was going to sit back while her old friend's life was at risk.

"Alright then you listen here you bastard! I've just learned my friend is at risk of being killed by someone and you just expect me to sit by and do nothing! You better give me a task or something, or I'm going to find this Cassidy myself!"

'I' 'H' 'A' 'V' 'E' 'I' 'N' 'F' 'O'

"You have info? On what?"

'P' 'U' 'R' 'P' 'L' 'E'

"Purple? You mean the shit that was on the ground in that hallway?"

'Y' 'O' 'U' 'L' 'E' 'A' 'R' 'N' 'I' 'N' 'F' 'O'

"So, you're giving me information in exchange for me sitting back and letting Mike deal with the threat of this 'Cassidy' person alone?"

'P' 'L' 'E' 'A' 'S' 'E'

"Ok then." she said, holding out her arm.

The puppet slowly drifted its way towards her and handed her the folder. Looking at its surface she saw 'DOI-001' stamped onto it.

"Well, thank you mis…"

She looked up to see the puppet had vanished. Sighing in relief, she sat down at the cashier's desk and pulled the contents out of the folder. After reading through countless property, tax, and shipping forms, she was pleasantly surprised to see this paper appeared to be a paper on Physics and Chemistry concepts.

"Finally, something that's speaking my language!"

Until she began to read the papers more in-depth.

"Oh, I don't like what my language is saying."