This story came from an idea thought of based on the history of a small island off the shoreline of Leelanau county Michigan. This will have elements of mystery and elements of horror but like many other stories it is deeply rooted in history. There was no crime on the island aside from some vandalism in the 1950s. I was working a job delivering building materials and one of the orders took us to a house in Northport where the island, now called Gull Island due to the overwhelming population of seagulls. After looking for information on why the chimney stacks still were there I found out that the island had been bought by a wealthy Michigan resident. He then went on to build an expansive vacation home for his family there. After the original owner died his son inherited it and the home was left empty for many years. It was in these years that some local teens from Northport went to the island and vandalized the home. There is where its crumbling remains remained.
1
When the sun came up over the island that brisk morning in mid-October no one had any knowledge of what evil had come in the night. The sun was bright and life continued as it had for years. As the sun came through the large window the red on the wall looked like a piece found in a gallery. The house was built on the top of the only hill so no one could see the vicious macabre art framed by the window. It was almost Halloween before anyone laid eyes on this, by then the bright red had become a dull brown and the flies had arrived. When the phone rang at the small island police station it was the neighbors at the bottom of the hill. They had not seen or heard from ____ in nearly two weeks. The neighbors inquired about checking on the ___ to clarify that they were alright. Detective ___ said he would check on them as he was heading that way.
When he arrived and looked at the long dark house he had no idea what he was walking into. The darkness that had touched this family was still looking in the shadows and in the lifeless eyes of its victims. When the detective got out of his car he knew something was of. All wrong. When the detective entered the large house the buzz of the fly’s wings was almost overwhelming. He could smell evil in the air, almost taste it. He walked around the expansive house that spread almost an acre. There was no sign of activity aside from evidence of wild animals in the garden. As he got closer to the house he could see the door was slightly open His instincts kick in and he drew his gun. He reached for the door and the smell that met him knocked him back. The horror behind the door brought tears to his eyes as it slowly swung open.
He saw the walls first, covered in blood. This once bright red fluid that carried life was now a dull sticky brown plastered to every surface in sight. He came around the corner he saw the first body, a young girl. Based on her clothing she looked about 17. The face of the girl was almost completely unrecognizable; it was ripped in half as if the flesh had been just an unwanted sheet of paper. Her arms were nowhere near her body. The shoulder joint looked as if a wild animal had torn it out. Flesh and tendons hung from the open wound in to the dried blood. The blood underneath looked like a brown puddle with dull white string going through it. His gaze moved toward her feet and saw one was missing. The difference between this and the other wounds was that this was a clean separation, surgical even. The victim looked as if she had been alive while her attacker was mutilating her. The final strike had nearly severed her head.
Detective ____ continued to move through the house and into the kitchen. Here he saw the next victim, another female. She looked like she could be the girl’s mother. She was slumped in a chair her hands were bound to it and several of her fingers were missing. The first thought he had was that she was put here to watch the evil destroy what she held so dear. He thought for a brief moment that she was still breathing. He then realized it was the rise and fall of his own breathing. He walked around the chair she was in to look behind her; now he could see what had taken her life. The bullet had entered right behind her left ear. He looked closer for an exit wound and saw it under her long hair on the upper right side of her skull, the brown sticky substance that was once her life source had blended in to her hair. This made it especially hard to see in the dimly lit room with only the single beam of his flashlight to illuminate. He immediately pointed his flashlight up searching for the bullet.
______ had acclimated to the smell and the feeling of immediate repulsion from the flies and rot had gone away. His mind clear and aware of what he was facing in this darkness he made his way down the stairs to the basement through the door in the kitchen. Light held high and gun ready he walked down the stairs slowly and they creaked like they hadn’t been walked on in years. As he reached the bottom he saw one light far in the corner as soon as he saw it his gun went up without a thought. Slowly he moved closer the light through the empty basement. A chill ran through him as he pushed the door open. The sight that met him was so horrifying that he immediately became ill and tears welled in his eyes. “What kind of monster was here? Who could do such evil?” he thought to himself. The door swung open and there inside were two boys. They looked between sixteen and eighteen years old. They were tied together at the hands. The bruising on what seemed to be the older one was very clear. The other boy had almost none. What the detective notice was that one of the boys seemed twisted and sat somewhat unnaturally, while the other had near perfect posture. The contrast was odd looking. He moved his flashlight around the first body examining the wounds. There were several deep cuts in both his arms, through the muscle. Fingers, eight to be exact were missing and they weren’t anywhere in the room either. Kneecaps had been severed exposing bone and muscle.
