The smell of bleach and iron. I gripped the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white. This wasn’t a domestic dispute. This wasn’t a game. This was a crime scene being sanitized in real-time.

I swerved onto Oakwood Lane. The house stood at the end of a cul-de-sac, a pristine, two-story monument to the American Dream. The lawn was manicured to within an inch of its life. The windows were dark, save for a faint, sickly yellow glow spilling from a second-story window.

It looked perfect. But I knew that behind that heavy oak door, a monster was wearing a human face.

Cliffhanger:
I slammed the car door and sprinted across the wet grass, drawing my service weapon. Sergeant Miller and a patrol unit pulled up behind me, their lights cutting through the darkness. We stacked up at the front door. “Breach it,” I ordered, my voice low. Miller swung the battering ram. The wood splintered with a deafening crack, and as the door swung open, the smell hit us. It wasn’t just a scent; it was a wall. A chemical cloud of industrial-strength bleach fighting a losing battle against the metallic, copper tang of fresh slaughter.

2. The Door Breached