The air was filled with the sound of digital beeps and boops as dozens of customers were being rung up at their cashier lanes. Accompanying the sounds were squeaky shopping cart wheels along with crying babies, some kind of music that was playing too quietly, and the usual high-pitched eagle screams that everyone always hears in retail stores but no one can fully explain away.
Nearly a mile deep into the retail giant’s massive building, little Lisa stood tugging at her mom’s dress trying to get her attention. “Mom. Mom. Mom. Can we please go now? Mom!”
“Just a second Little One,” Mom replied in her raspy voice, then continued her conversation with the store employee. “What do you mean you’re all out of the eight-ply toilet paper?” Mom snapped aggressively. “I didn’t walk all the way down this God-forsaken aisle just to settle for six-ply, let along four or five!”
“I’m terribly sorry, ma’am. I’ve already checked the back of the store, we’re all out of stock,” the employee replied honestly and shrugged.
“Well, go check again!”
An eagle screeched during the silence. The employee looked down the aisle toward the warehouse. The back of the store was so far away that one could only see about two miles before fog and haze took over, like viewing a distant skyline from a mountain top.
“Well?” Mom said, growing frustrated at the delay.
The employee looked back at Mom. Another eagle screamed. The employee slowly began to walk toward the warehouse, realizing that he’d much rather walk the five miles to the warehouse than deal with a bad customer’s attitude. Mom immediately called a friend and began venting and insulting the employee while he was still within earshot.
Lisa continued to tug at Mom’s dress, but Mom swatted her hand away and continued ranting on the phone.
Lisa stomped her foot on the ground in frustration. She looked around to try to find something to entertain herself with. She looked down one end of the aisle and saw the employee slowly disappearing into the haze. She looked down the other end of the aisle and saw another customer off in the distance. “Hmph!” she pouted.
Why can’t we just get this one? Lisa thought as she got onto her knees and shoved a package of two-ply toilet paper off the bottom shelf. The package was so dusty that it created a cloud in the air when it hit the floor, making Lisa look like she’d fallen into a bowl of grey flour. She hadn’t stopped to think about why the two-ply was so dusty. Youngsters can be so naive sometimes. Everyone knows that people only buy two-ply if they’re looking to wipe their muddy holes with the equivalent of steel wool, which no one ever is. The clear wrapping also revealed a print of marigold flowers covering the toilet paper rolls. An obvious attempt to add some elegance to the dark and dirty wiping process.
She crawled between the newly created gap in the bottom shelf, and, though everything was covered in dirt and grime, she was happy to see that she had plenty of crawling room behind the merchandise. She glanced back at Mom and saw that she was still distracted, waving her hands wildly as if it was adding to the point she was making to her friend. So, Lisa began to crawl.
She was about twenty minutes into her crawl on the bottom shelf when she came upon an enormous stock of canned sweet potatoes, and that’s when she realized why the bottom shelf was so dusty. They place all of the stuff down here that no one wants to buy! She scooted past the disgusting canned poison as quickly as she could, then she stopped abruptly and froze.
Lisa was not alone, as a small being half her size and able to stand upright was present about a stone’s throw from where she was. It was dressed in a pitch black hooded cloak that seemed to turn to smoke at the ends. It was a quick creature, running back and forth from an opening to the aisle and, presumably, a hole in the wall. Lisa crept closer for a better look and noticed that inside the hood was a black void of nothingness save two solid yellow eyes shaped like almonds. It was a nefarious thing, Lisa knew, just by being in its presence.
She crept close enough to the being to smell something like sulfur emitting from its body, but kept herself concealed behind a stack of mayonnaise. A customer approached and stopped directly in front of the aisle opening, giving the creature a perfect view of the man’s sandaled feet. The cloaked creature extended its arms, but they looked like nothing more than black wisps of thin threads from what Lisa could see. Wrapped in one thread was a smooth-edged knife, and in another was a syringe holding a purple liquid.
The creature drew closer to the man’s feet, and in one confident and clearly experienced swing, it severed eight of his toes and simultaneously filled him with the liquid from the syringe. The man’s scream was loud and clear for a split second, but once the serum kicked in, the scream turned ethereal and distant, like the far off screeching of an eagle beyond the clouds. As the second wave of the injection took effect, the blood coming from the man’s wounds congealed like melted cheese left sitting for too long.
The man attempted to walk, but was unable to given that only his pinky toes remained. He stumbled to the ground, still in pain but no longer bleeding. The hooded being swiftly gathered the toes and placed them into a burlap sack before anyone in the aisle could notice. Turning for the hole in the wall, it stopped, its eyes meeting Lisa’s. They both stood in silence and motionless for a long while, then the creature slowly lifted a tendril that morphed into the shape and color of a human index finger. It placed the finger over what would’ve been its mouth if it had one, but Lisa got the message anyway.
Several more eagle screeches sounded before the being continued through the hole in the wall. Upon leaving, Lisa noticed that the back of its cloak had writing on it. Mister Chicken, she read to herself in shock, knowing it as the name of Mom’s favorite fast food joint. She cautiously peered into the hole in the wall and was astounded to see a grandiose system at work. Hundreds of these hooded hellions were scrambling to and fro, some working an assembly line and some delivering fresh toes to a conveyor belt with a sign above it that read Chicken: Ready for Processing. Those working the assembly line were sorting through the toes and ridding them of their nails and bones, then placing them on a new conveyor belt with a sign above it that read Chicken: Ready for Sale. Above them, in a glass-walled office, was a man with a tall chef’s hat on and a sleeveless shirt that revealed unusually hairy biceps. Over the intercom, he was screaming something that Lisa didn’t understand but it made the treacherous creatures work even harder.
Needing to satisfy her curiosity, Lisa began her descent into the factory, but just then, she heard Mom’s raspy voice shouting Lisa’s name in a panic. Lisa stared down at the factory, still tempted. Mom shouted again, followed by an eagle’s screech. Lisa reluctantly forced herself back up to the bottom shelf and put on her innocent face as she bounced into the aisle.
“Surprise! You found me!” Lisa yelled, as if she’d been hiding all along.
“Lisa! Do you have any idea how worried I was? I couldn’t find you anywhere! Don’t you ever do that a - oh wait, Sooz is calling. Hey Sooz, how you been girl?” Mom became lost once more in her conversation, neglecting poor Lisa again.
One thing about retail stores of this size is that it’s incredibly easy to get lost. And the chief strategists usually elect to not install directories throughout so that customers are forced to walk down aisles and see merchandise that they may have an urge to purchase. So after three hours of trying to locate the store exit, Lisa and Mom finally made it out.
“I don’t know about you Deary, but I. Am. Starved. And I know the exact thing that will do the trick. Mister Chicken!”
Lisa, so enraged at how Mom had treated her in the store, didn’t even bother to share what she’d experienced. Instead, she went along with it. “Sure, but I think I’ll just get a drink. I’m not that hungry. But hey, I hear their chicken bites are on sale!”
“Oh, wonderful!” Mom replied.
