Museum Security

[Scales]

I don't usually do horror, but I have started writing short stories as a means to bulk up my writing experience faster, so I don't have to go through an entire great novel idea just to scrap it. This is probably the first short story I've done where everything was kept tight, tied together, and as professional as I possibly could get right now. I'll probably write more later on to keep getting better.

Museum Security

He was growing sick of working security. The same long tiresome shifts for a business that didn't respect him. It simply wasn't worth it anymore.

It was late one night in the museum, the lights were dimmed and the business was closed with one man gazing down at the floor from the lobby. The man was a guard who was wearing a blue uniform, on duty alone, sitting on the farthest bench on the left; he was looking down in disgust as if he couldn't tell whether he wanted a pay raise or a vacation.

The environment was cold and abandoned. One of the lights distanced about two hundred feet or so high up from the ceiling over a skeleton of a dinosaur kept flickering and it triggered a kind of deep insecurity in the man sitting there on the bench, that something horrible was going to happen that night. The old grandfather clock across from the man began chiming and had struck twelve; it was midnight and the only thing that could be heard was the sound of some god forsaken dog barking from outside.

The museum lobby was medium-sized and clean cut, almost all white with streaks of gray for a pleasant office look that would drive almost anyone insane. The admission booth was empty but there was a strange presence that came from it when no one sat in it, as if there was something invisible sitting in the chair. The security guard felt a chill go up his spine looking at it, and shook for a second at the thought of a ghost occupying the creepy, antique piece of furniture inside the booth.

There was a loud tap on one of the four glass doors that startled the security guard; he ran his hand over his face the way someone does to check if they're still awake. Then the tap was there again and louder. So slowly the security guard turned his head and stood up, gazing at the individual from outside.

From behind the glass there was a man with long, dirty-dish blond hair, a scruffy beard just barely coming in, and a pair of cheap sunglasses he picked up at some party store in the middle of nowhere. He wore a light brown duster, black biker boots, and had a muscular build with a slight limp from a couple years ago when he was shot twice in the leg by some double-crossing piece-of-shit. The middle-aged man carried around a couple butterfly knives and always smelled like cheap wine and gasoline cause those were his two favorite things.

The security guard gave him a hand gesture to get lost. The man in the duster started pounding on the glass instead of tapping. So the somewhat frail security guard went up to the door and opened it with his hand on his taser, "I'm sorry sir, the museum is closed."

The long-haired man grinned, chuckling to himself a bit. Someone fifty feet away could still probably smell that cheap red wine on his breath, or hear his deep booming voice, "I know that.. but I came here for the late night tour."

The security guard's eyes narrowed and he began sensing how much he was sweating. His hand gripped the taser as if he was going to be attacked at any second, he couldn't take any risk. Completely on edge, "I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

The drunk man in the duster took his sunglasses off and cocked his head a bit. His eyes were bulged out, with the left eye gazing off into nowhere, and a great big grin to boot; he looked like the devil during a massacre, "Your telling me there ain't no late night tour?"

"All tours are during the day," The security guard clearly replied.

"Well that's no fun." the man in the duster grinned, and reached for one of his butterfly knives. His other hand was on the edge of the door holding it open, "maybe tonight you can make an exception."

The giant man in the duster pushed the door into a swing and pulled out one of his knives, flicking it open with ease. The security guard pulled out his taser and put voltage through the drunken man just as the four-inch blade pierced itself upwards through the security guard's stomach.

The guard and the man fell to the ground. The giant man in the duster was completely unconscious, a hundred thousand volts had knocked him out for the time being. The security guard was lying on his side in a growing puddle of his own blood, moaning in horrible pain.

Before the security guard radio'd for help, he slowly pulled the blade out, gritting his teeth from the enormous sharp stinging of doing so. The museum employee raised his arm with all his strength and pierced the blade through the drunk man's chest; then, the guard feeling his life draining out of him with each second that went by, rolled to his back, affirming to himself with words out loud echoing throughout the cold spaces of the abandoned museum, "I quit."

The security guard spoke faintly into his radio with no reply and took in his surroundings one last time. The single light still flickered carelessly from a bigger room distorting the grizzly, bloodstained lobby. The drunk man laid dead next to him in a mixed pool of the two men's blood. Before passing out, the security guard saw the reflection of his face in the back window of the old admissions booth.

The End.

[jadnifer]

That was very good. I enjoyed reading it. The only advice I can give you is to give the security guard and the man a name because it gets kind of boring and redundant to hear security guard and drunk man over and over again.

[Scales]

Thank you. I'm done with this since I'm working on new stuff, I agree that the lack of names gets tiresome.

[jadnifer]

Thank you. I'm done with this since I'm working on new stuff, I agree that the lack of names gets tiresome.

Please post them as you finish. You seem to have some very good ideas.