Found And Lost - Ch. 01

Never before had a package felt... ominous.

It sat on the passenger seat in order to be returned to the depot as the destination address on it was just a bunch of random symbols, and there was no return address. What a waste of money for whoever sent the package.

Part of him wondered what was in it, of course. He wondered what was in every package he delivered. Sometimes it was obvious; clearly, the box saying "Air fryer" would have an air fryer in it. The box with a stamp on it with "fragile" would most likely contain something made out of glass, like a vase or a lamp. But more often than not, they were unmarked brown boxes with far too much tape on them and no clues as to what treasures or atrocities might be hidden inside.

The rumbling of his van halted as he parked up at his next stop.

Ah yes; Miss Caren. With a C.

The older lady was obsessed with one-day delivery and knew him by name by now. Seeing how he showed up to her door nearly every day, that was to be expected. He had a few customers like her, but luckily not too many on his particular route. Thank fuck for that.

Several large boxes and a slew of smaller ones were unloaded from the back of the van, loaded up on a dolly and carted to Miss Caren's door. He rang the doorbell and checked his watch. Nearly done, then he could head back to the depot, leave the mysterious package in the lost and found and go home.

Not that his empty apartment really was something to look forward to. But he got to sit down, do his own thing and rest from a hard day's work.

Before his thoughts could wander any more, the door opened and there was Miss Caren. She was a portly older lady with large round spectacles and a myriad of trinkets in her hair where it was pulled back and hung down in too many braids to count.

"Ah, Aaron! What a way to brighten up my day; a handsome hunk with a bunch of gifts I bought myself." Her high pitched, slightly grating voice was about as joyful to listen to as cats fighting late at night.

He grinned awkwardly at her compliments, nonetheless. While he wasn't ugly, he wouldn't exactly land on any front pages of model magazines. Aaron was a 23 year old delivery driver. While he wasn't muscular, he wasn't flabby either, having gained some lean muscle from lifting boxes all day every day. He was 5ft8 in height which was too short to even think about becoming a model, not that he wanted to. His blonde mop of hair and brown eyes did catch him a few lingering looks now and again but never enough to land himself a girlfriend, or maybe his shy nature drove them off.

"No problem, Miss Caren. I hope you have a nice day." He pulled out his work phone and took a picture of the selection of boxes now surrounding Miss Caren's feet which had been stuffed in gaudy purple slippers. Once done, he was on his way again, strange package in tow.

Unease gripped him as he got back on the road, this time in the direction of the depot. He knew it was stupid, but he felt... watched, almost. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end the entire time he was near the parcel beside him.

A bead of sweat gathered on his sideburn area, and dripped down his neck as his heart raced. Fear gripped him. He could almost feel a looming shadow closing in on him from his side, malevolent and primal.

He felt like a hunted animal, caught in a trap. His chest heaved as his breathing sped up to match his racing heartbeat. The darkness was closing in, shadows forming on just one side; the passenger seat where the innocuous package sat.

And then it was gone.

Everything was perfectly normal.

The van rolled to a stop in front of a stoplight and he struggled to calm himself down, shirt stuck to his back in cold sweat.

What the *hell* was that?!

He was going crazy.

Did he forget to eat?

Aaron's eyes flicked over to his lunch bag, deflated and empty. They turned to his water bottle next, mostly empty. He should be fine. Why was he acting crazy?

A mental breakdown was really something he couldn't afford at this point in his life. He was living pay check to pay check and couldn't be taking time off to go to a mental facility.

The light turned green and he drove on with a white-knuckled grip on the gearshift. It was fine, just some paranoia. Everyone got that once in a while.

A little anxiety!

Right?

Just some anxiety making him feel like there was a looming presence emanating from the package he was about to return to the depot's lost and found, there was nothing to worry about. His eyes flicked between the small box with the weird symbols for its address and the road as he drove onwards.

The van pulled into a parking lot, the cabin rattling as he came to a rough stop. The glint of a box knife shone in the evening sun as he tore into the package, cutting through the ridiculous amount of tape. He just had to know what was in it, he just had to see. It wouldn't harm anything, it would be taped up again with the packing tape he had on his dashboard and no one would be any the wise-

Ouch.

A bead of blood welled up from his thumb where it had been in the box-cutter's way. He brought it up to his mouth to suck on the wound as he looked within the box and cussed under his breath when a thick droplet of blood fell onto the object before he was able to quell the bleeding with his saliva.

Within the box - now with its tape covered flaps roughly opened - was...

A necklace.

It was a gaudy thing; big and round with seven jewels around the outside, each a different colour. In the middle was a piece of circular stained glass with a tree etched into it, which now had a droplet of his blood on it.

He wiped the surface with the hem of his shirt, then turned to hold it up to the light which made the glass reflect all the colours of the gems around the central piece of glass.

What a weird object. The jewels could be made of anything including plastic, but something inexplicable made him think they were real.

A ruby, pink quartz, amethyst, malachite, amber, black pearl and diamond. Those were what he guessed the seven gems were made out of. How he knew the names for these gems was beyond him. Maybe some information his witchy ex-girlfriend had left behind in his head one one of the occasions where she was raving about new crystals she had gotten.

Either way, it was far too gaudy and flashy for Aaron's tastes. He carefully placed it back into the packing peanut-filled box and stared at it for a moment.

It was ridiculous. There was nothing weird about it, or threatening. Just a stupid necklace for some maximalist influencer, probably.

With a grumble at his own lack of self-control regarding the mysterious package, he folded the flaps closed again and taped it back up.

Good as new. Kind of.

A grimace curled his upper lip at the haphazard job he had done of the taping. No matter, it would be getting lost in the system anyway, without a return address.

The van lurched to life again as he finally continued on to the depot where he dropped the package off without any further issues or anxiety or weird looming shadowy figures.

Good riddance.

Following the end of that little adventure, Aaron headed home.

-

A soft sigh passed his lips as he climbed the stairs to his single bedroom apartment. It was in a quiet part of town and he was on the top floor. On one side of his building was a laundromat with an Airbnb above it, on the other side was a three story department store that seemed to be closed more than it was open.

The door creaked open and fell into the lock behind him. His apartment building had once been an office block but had since been converted. As such, each room including the hallway had their own enclosed space and individual door, except for the kitchen which had a welcoming archway.

Aaron slipped out of his shoes and left them by the door before heading into the little kitchen. Several connected windows covered one wall. It was an east-facing window so he wouldn't be seeing the sun again until the morning when it would be shining far too brightly directly into his kitchen and into his grumpy face as he tried to make a cup of coffee to start the day. He could buy blinds for the windows, but he had yet to get around to that, two years into living there.

With a mug of tea in hand, he headed for his living room and set the mug on the coffee table, next to the ominous package. His butt hit the seat of the armchair, fingers wrapping around the TV remote before leaning back and getting comfo-

His face grew pale and his throat tightened up as his gaze settled on the package that hadn't been there when he left his flat that morning. The same package that had no return address. The package that had the weird symbols written on it and its tape cut, only to be taped up again but badly. By him.

No way.

It wasn't real.

Aaron screwed his eyes shut for a few long moments where he could feel his heart beating in his throat, sweat beading on his forehead. It was just his mind playing tricks on him, surely.

One eye opened and screwed shut right away again; it was still there! Was one of his co-workers playing a trick on him?

No... they couldn't be, how would they have done it? Broken into his apartment, left the box on his table and shut his apartment again without any tampering to the door? Was it even the same box? Maybe he had put a random box there and it had slipped his mind.

With a shuddering breath, he opened his bloodshot brown eyes once more and reached for the box with shaking hands. He pushed his tea out of the way and set it right in front of him on the table, making quick work of the shoddily stuck on tape. The flaps fell open and Aaron's heart stopped.

It was the weird, gaudy amulet. Its gemstones glinted in the dim light of the weak and yellow bulb hanging from the ceiling in his living room. His throat felt dry as he picked the piece of jewellery out of the box and looked at it closer.

His thumb rubbed over the gemstones, from the pink quartz all the way around as he thought about ways the package could've ended up in his apartment. It truly was a mystery. No one he knew would have been able to do it. Plus he left work as soon as he'd deposited the package, there was simply no logical answer to this puzzle.

The central glass of the amulet, depicting the tree of life, started glowing a rich pink. Aaron blinked a couple times. He hadn't seen any place for batteries or any charging ports for it to be powered and lighting up.

It glowed brighter and brighter until pink, sweet smelling smoke started pouring out from the central glass.

"What the hell?!" Aaron exclaimed, dropping the amulet on his table and standing up from his armchair, taking a few steps back.

A voice, silken and filled with salacious promises suddenly sounded in the silence his shout had left. "Hehehe, what a greeting. Bow before your new master, mortal."

Before Aaron's eyes, a silhouette appeared within the pink smoke. Blood drained from his face again. He really was having a mental breakdown, hallucinating like this. What was going on? Was he really going crazy?

The smoke started dissipating, sharpening the silhouette into luscious curves, a whipping... tail?

Long hair and... horns?!

The smoke made way for pink skin, darker pink than even the harshest sunburn he'd seen on anyone. A long, thin tail that finished in a blunt end swished into his vision. His eyes trailed up the naked body of a woman. Shapely legs that led to a shaven V in between two thigh thighs. Long, flowing onyx locks that created a background for her voluptuous hips and the dip of her waist to stand out against.

His eyes trailed up further to feast themselves on sizable breasts, each with a dark purple areola, leading into sharp collarbones and a fanged grin surrounded by black lips which reflected in greens, golds and pinks, like an oil slick. A slender nose and eyes the colour of molten gold.

What had she said?

Bow?

His brows furrowed at his hallucination. Something deep inside of him compelled him to obey the command, but logic held him back.

Why would be obey an illusion? A making of his own mind? That was even worse than being insane enough to hallucinate!

The demoness' grin widened at his struggle, sauntering the few steps closer to him, reaching out to grab his arms. Aaron stared on, expecting her hands to just slip through him as though she was a hologram, because she wasn't real. Yet his eyes widened in shock when her surprisingly strong fingers clamped around his biceps.

Her face neared his and his heart thumped even harder in his chest. He was sure she would be able to hear it with those pointed elf-like ears. His breath hitched as her cheek brushed past his and he clenched his eyes shut. A hot breath ghosted over his ear and sent shivers down his spine.

A sudden realisation crossed his mind; this was no hallucination, and he was in danger.