Rotten To The Core

"You think?" Laura asked. "She's a little too much like the stereotypical 'blonde bombshell' cheerleader type for my taste. Let's see. 'Well liked by everyone, comes from a good home, successful at school, captain of the cheer squad.' Ha. Knew it."

"And she must have had some pretty generous parents or boyfriends," Maria said, still looking at the attached photo. "I'm pretty sure those are diamond earrings."

"The Wilsons run a bakery on Twain Road. The shop does decent business but I think they couldn't afford to splurge for diamonds back in the Eighties," the detective said.

"Says here it was well known that Donna, along with some of her friends, could always be seen around Tucker, Sullivan and Whitting. They probably milked them for all they were worth," Laura said.

"Question is who milked who," Maria muttered. "Considering what kind of men the recently deceased were."

"All my research into our stiffs shows no history of sexual abuse," Goldbaum said. "If the girls thought they needed to fuck around to afford their lifestyle..." She shrugged, a sour look on her face.

There was a knock at the office door.

"Come!" Kelly snapped.

A cop in uniform poked his head into the office. "Package for you, Detective. Someone from the Examiner dropped it off a moment ago."

"Fantastic. I can't wait to get rid of this case," Goldbaum grumbled. "Mind bringing it in?"

"Not a problem." The cop vanished, only to return with a boxy item swaddled into a dusty cloth. "Where do you want it?"

Laura indicated some free space on the second desk, next to the TV/DVD/VCR unit. "Here would be fine."

The uniformed cop put the item on the desk then looked from Maria to Laura. "Whoa, who are you girls?"

"Stop drooling, Dillon," Goldbaum said. "Don't you have fingerprints to take or something?"

"Uh, yes, ma'am. Sorry." He trotted from the office, shooting a longing glance back into the room before closing the door.

Maria carefully unwrapped the Betamax VCR. "Good. We have a power lead. What we don't have are AV cables. Shouldn't be much of a problem though." She opened her shoulder bag and pulled a length of cable from it. The ends were formless black clumps.

"Why would anyone record on Betamax in 1983?" Laura wondered. "I thought VHS was the videotape standard in the Eighties."

"The first commercially available camcorder was a Sony Betamax unit, unveiled in 1983. Makes sense for spoiled rich boys to have access to such toys," Maria said, plugging cables into the TV. "As for Betamax actually dying -- that happened in 1987 or 88, depending on who you ask. So, back when Donna went missing, Betamax still was relevant."

"How do you know all this stuff?" Laura asked, fascinated.

Maria held the other end of the cable close to the plugs on the Betamax VCR. Metal prongs sprouted from the formless black clump at the end. With an audible 'click', the plugs connected. "I have an unhealthy fascination with obscure and obsolete forms of data storage and of course the history of electronics," she said. "I wrote one of my theoretical papers on the best media to store digital spellbooks on. At one time, there were even computer backup solutions based on videotapes. They used VHS tapes though." Maria turned on both the TV and Betamax VCR. There was a horrible grinding noise from the old recorder's insides.

"Oh my. That didn't sound healthy." The auburn-haired sorceress placed both hands on the machine and hummed something. Her eyes turned an electric blue and she stared intently at the device's top plate.

"What is she doing?" Goldbaum asked Laura.

"If I had to guess, she's using some kind of Analyze Technology magic to find out what the problem is."

"I'm not going mad? Her eyes are really glowing like miniature flashlights?"

"Uh-huh."

"Of course," Maria muttered. "At least thirty years worth of grime and the belts just decided to disintegrate," she muttered. "Shouldn't be too bad." She moved her hands in intricate patterns above the machine. There was the rattle of screws undoing themselves then the top half of the recorder lifted up. Spools, circuit boards and other electronic bits and pieces levitated at varying heights between the chassis and the top half of the shell. Thick clumps of dust, dirt and broken down belts flew out of the machine and collected in a disgusting pile on the sheet the device had been wrapped in.

"This... is pretty cool," Goldbaum admitted, indicating the exploded VCR with her mug. "No one will believe me if I tell anyone but... cool."

"Shhh. You don't want to break her concentration," Laura whispered. "It might ruin the whole thing."

A thin sheen of sweat appeared on Maria's forehead and she bit her lip in a show of fierce concentration. She dug around in her shoulder bag, producing lumps of black plastic which she gingerly inserted into the mass of floating electronic components. They seemed to melt and flow, turning into new belts which snaked around their intended destinations before looping. Maria slowly lowered her hands and balled her fists. The insides of the VCR compacted and, with the staccato rattle of screws clicking back into place, it assembled itself.

Maria braced herself on the edge of the table. "There we go," she panted. "Should work like new. Maybe the wow and flutter might be a bit off for the first couple hours, until the belts have settled, but it should be good enough to inspect the evidence." She picked up the tape. "We should make a copy, just to be sure."

"And how do you suppose we do that?" Goldbaum asked. "We only have the one VCR. Or can we copy from Betamax to VHS?"

Maria grinned and made a flourish with her open hand. A second Betamax tape appeared in it. "There we go. Should be an exact copy, down to the wear on the magnetic film."

Kelly taped a small sticker on the original and put it into her desk. "Okay then. Let's see what Sullivan and his cronies were up to."

"And I didn't bring any popcorn," Laura muttered, pulling a chair closer.

Maria fed the copied Betamax tape into the recorder, rewound it and hit 'Play.'

The TV came to life. At first Laura wondered what they were looking at because the image was terribly dark, only a few shafts of light wandered erratically through the image. Maria worked the TV's controls until the sound was audible.

There was laughter. At least three male voices and one female. The crunch of shoes on gravel. Then the camera wielder raised the lens. Towering trees could be seen, framing a narrow gravel path. Moonlight threw glittering reflections off the surface of Black Lake, visible as brighter slivers through the trees.

"Is this thing working?" the female asked, her voice slightly slurred. She twirled into frame, her blond hair a wild, unbound mane. She held a brown paper bag in her hand from which a tiny bit of a bottle neck protruded. Instead of the prim and proper clothes seen in her case file photo, she wore a deep-necked black lace number under a thin jacket along with an extremely short mini skirt and glossy knee boots.

"Guys, light me up," Donna ordered, doing a pirouette in front of the camera. Two flashlight beams caressed her body. She stopped turning with her back to the camera and bent forwards, exposing her naked butt. Her hand caressed between her thighs. "A special peek just for you, Jay," she said, shooting a lascivious look over her shoulder.

A broad-shouldered young man wearing a green jacket with an embossed "G" on his pectoral entered the picture. He pulled Donna close with an arm around her waist and kissed her hungrily. Her hand went for the front of his jeans, the palm pressing against his crotch.

"I don't know about you guys," another voice said off camera, in a slow, deliberate tone, "but I don't want to get any leaves or shit on my clothes. So can you please keep it inside your pants for five more fucking minutes?" The flashlight wandered off the moaning and groping couple. In the ensuing twilight, there was a leather-jacket wearing person with a bleached mop of hair rivaling Donna's.

"Ah. The loathsome foursome out for some hijinx," Goldbaum muttered. "The jock must be Tucker, the camera guy Sullivan and the Mötley Crüe reject Whitting." She gnashed her teeth. "Underage drinking. Lovely morals." There was a red glow emanating from Whitting's mouth. "Oh, and probably drug use."

"Seems pretty normal so far," Laura said. "Want to fast forward?"

"Are you in a hurry?" Maria asked, leaning her arms on the back of Laura's chair. "Let's enjoy the movie."

They watched as Donna, Waylan, Jacob and Stephen made their way along the path until they reached a once beautiful wrought iron gate. One of its halves hung askew in its hinges, the other was wide open. Beyond, the imposing granite facade of the old Asylum towered.

"Ooooh, spoohooky," Whitting moaned in a high register. "This is fucking awesome!"

Tucker strode up the four steps to the entrance and unlocked the front door, shoving it wide open. "Lady and Gentlemen, time for the freak show," he announced, his voice booming hollow in the empty foyer.

"How did you get the keys anyway?" Jacob asked. He was the quiet one, not nearly as boisterous as the others.

"My dad is fucking the wife of the subcontractor hired to clear this place before it will be demolished later this year," Tucker said. "He took me along to meet their daughter."

"And how was it?" Donna asked, snuggling up to Tucker.

"Fun for an afternoon. Culo muy caliente, comprenda?"

Barking laughter all around. "Anyway, after I checked out her plumbing, I simply asked if she could show me where papa kept all the important keys." Tucker shrugged, passing his flashlight between Donna's legs. She squealed in protest as the cold metal casing went along her naked nethers. "If you lick real hard, you might taste her pussy on my dick," he growled into Donna's ear.

They walked deeper into the Asylum. Their flashlights went over empty walls and the deserted reception desk.

"Now what?" Jacob asked, doing a slow panoramic shot of the foyer. Some of the ground floor windows had been smashed in and in one corner, two filthy mattresses were the center of an impromptu resting space. Halfway assembled scaffolding leaned against the back wall, along with some high-power floodlights.

"Looks like the place was a hobo haven even back then," Maria said.

The four troublemakers crept deeper into the Asylum, playing pranks on each other. Sullivan nearly dropped the camera when Donna jumped him from behind, screaming "Boo!"

Eventually, they ended up in a side wing which hadn't been fully cleared. Whitting used a long butterfly knife to crack open a locked door, beyond which was what looked like a storage room. Two hospital beds waited deeper within, while cabinets and shelves were stocked with a lot of white linen.

"Looks like we finally found our playground for tonight," Tucker announced, pulling open a cabinet and yanking a doctor's schmock from within. He wrapped it around his shoulders, grinning. "The docter is in!" he boomed.

"Not yet you aren't," Donna giggled, taking a long hit from the joint which had been going around between them. She slipped out of her jacket and put on a schmock of her own. "Doctor, doctor, gimme the news, I got a bad case of... needing to be fucked by you" she sang, leaning against a bed and shaking her butt at the boys.

"It's true what they say," Whitting said, staring at the schmock Tucker was handing him. "Girls turn into sluts once the camera is rolling." He peeled off his leather jacket and an Ozzy Osbourne shirt underneath. A long pull from his paper-bag-clad bottle later, he dropped the rest of his clothing, wrapping the schmock around his shoulders and fanning out his hair. His cock poked from the schmock.

"You know, if we really want to shoot that porno, we need better light," Sullivan said. He put down the camera and walked into frame, a thoroughly average guy with neck-length hair. He tried the light switch. Nothing happened.

The movie cut out for a moment.

When it resumed, they had rearranged the room somewhat, with one of the beds in the center and one of the battery-powered floodlights had been set up to illuminate it. Donna, now wearing a straitjacket, was on the bed, alternately blowing Tucker and Whitting.

"I think I have the perfect angle," Sullivan said, stepping into the picture, naked save for his own schmock. His voice shook with excitement and he pumped his cock as he mounted the bed.

"Are they fucking serious?" Goldbaum sighed.

"They are most certainly drunk enough to cook up the idea," Maria said. She gasped softly as Sullivan impaled Donna on his cock, her leg over a shoulder.

"This is... kinda demented but harmless enough," Laura muttered. "I wonder what happened?"

"I think I don't want to sit through some amateur porn," Maria said, brushing past Laura to get to the controls. "Might impede my concentration." She reached for the fast-forward button. On screen, all four participants in their orgy suddenly froze, with Sullivan nearly decapitating himself as he tried to locate the source of a sound they heard.

"Go back a bit," Laura said. Maria obliged and turned up the volume. Amidst the wet slapping of skin on skin, the squelching of hastily-milked cocks and the moans of all involved, there was a sudden metallic clang.

"Hey, you nearly bit my cock off!" Tucker growled, landing a nasty slap on Donna's ass.

"Sorry, sorry," she muttered, massaging her violated butt cheek. "Let me make it up to you," Donna said. "I'll let you fuck my ass, like you've always wanted."

"Finally," Tucker grumbled.

"Is nobody even a little bit worried?" Sullivan wondered. "What if there's someone out there?"

"More likely the draft knocked over some of the scaffolding," Whitting said, climbing onto the bed. "So, if Tuckie gets to nail your ass, how about you ride me while he's doing it? And you can suck off Jay."

Donna took the bottle and put it to her lips. "Shit. Empty. We should have brought more booze," she said, the ends of the straitjacket flapping around her body. "Alright boys, fill me up then." She straddled Whitting with a horny giggle which turned into a lusty moan as his cock filled her up. Tuck meanwhile was applying handfuls of spit to his cock as he joined them. With practiced ease, he bent over Donna's butt and tongued her asshole before putting his dick to work.

Sullivan looked forlorn for a moment then he shrugged, pulled a chair next to the bed and knelt on it, offering his dick for Donna to suck. Once he was busy, Whitting began to stealthily lick Sullivan's balls, growing bolder with each second the other young man didn't complain.

"They are not kidding around," Laura said, fanning herself. "It would be much hotter if we didn't know what happened to them all."

"Or what kind of douchebags they were," Goldbaum added. "Can you skip ahead?" she asked Maria.

"Sure thing."

Maria worked the controls, turning the lewd scene into a cartoon as those involved humped away at five times speed. Sullivan came first, grabbing Donna by the hair as he bucked and writhed against her face before withdrawing. She bent low and allowed the small torrent of cum to leak into Whitting's mouth. His hips jackhammered upwards and he too came. Tucker was the last to climax, pulling out just as he came. He shot thick ropes of his seed over Donna's back.

Maria released the fast-forward button and the action returned to normal speed.

Tucker produced a canister with water from one of the cabinets and the troublemakers began to cleanse themselves, discussing their next scene. Another harsh noise interrupted them, followed by some small tremors which rocked the camera.

"Do you think there's someone else in here?" Sullivan asked nervously. "The last thing I need is another run-in with the cops."

"Relax, scaredy-cat," Whitting needled. "This room faces away from Greenbury. Even if we were to light up all the rooms on this side, no one would know we're here. Or did you tell anyone?" His voice took on a threatening tone.

"N-No, of course not. I wanted this as much as you guys," he muttered. "And as promised, once I'm back home, I'll pull copies for each of you."

Another small tremor shook the camera. Tucker looked around. "Huh. It almost sounded like bricks falling."

"Do you think the place is about to collapse?" Whitting asked. "Or are you saying you can't get it up any more for the grand finale? Would be too bad, now it's my turn to fuck Donna's lovely rosebud, seeing as it is thoroughly loosened by your cock." He licked his lips while lovingly staring at Tucker's meat.

"Don't go gay on me again," Tucker growled. "Your 'accidental' blowjob the other day was more than enough."

"I thought it was hawt," Donna drawled. "I wish I could bribe you somehow to do that again."

"Not on my fucking watch," Tucker growled.

"You have no problem watching me, Sally and Bonnie eating each other out," Donna complained. "And fucking whichever hole you can stick your cock in."

"No one is sticking any cock into any of my holes. Not while I'm sober," Tuck said. "Okay then. Last one. We tie you up and play 'creepy doctor' with you."

Sullivan cocked his head. "Is it me or is there a constant rustling now?"

"It's you," Whitting said, cinching his schmock tight around himself. He almost looked respectable -- save for his glans poking through the buttons at navel height.

Tucker used the ends of Donna's straitjacket and several straps he pulled from random cabinets to tie Donna spread-eagle to the bed, lovingly caressing her exposed pussy. "Are you all nice and tight, baby?" he purred.

She tried to get at his cock with her mouth but her movement had been severely restricted. "Yeah. Play with me, play with meeee," she sing-songed, rolling her eyes theatrically.

"Okay, let's turn the light down somewhat, make it extra creepy," Whitting said. "Or at least turn it around so it's not facing the bed and we can play with the flashlights. Hey Jay, you dreaming?"

"Huh? Oh, okay." Sullivan turned the floodlights around, plunging the room into twilight.

The next few minutes, all three men played up the lecherous doctor schtick, caressing the near motionless Donna or mounting her for a quick face fuck. The interruptions came more often now and even Whitting fidgeted, even while his cock was deep Donna's mouth.

Suddenly, something clattered to the floor in the room they were in. A brick fell out of the wall above a cabinet, bouncing off it and crashed to the floor where it exploded into a dozen sharp-edge pieces. Whitting yelped, falling awkwardly off the mattress and cupping his junk. The camera picked up the sound as well, a rhythmic scraping, interspersed with crumbling and breaking sounds. And something else -- agitated breathing.

"What... what the fuck is happening?" Sullivan yelled, yanking his flashlight up. There was the sound of something scratching against a cabinet's back, followed by a dull thumping.

"You lunatic bitch, you drew blood!" Whitting moaned. He held up a blood-smeared hand. The sounds coming from behind the cabinets intensified.

"Whatever it is, I'm not staying to find out," Tucker growled, grabbing his clothes. He was the first to flee, followed by a limping Whitting.

"Guys? Guys!? Untie me!" Donna whimpered. A new sound mixed in with the scratching and thumping -- a low, multi-voiced growling, like ravenous beasts. Sullivan, frantically fiddling with a knot in the straitjacket's arm, shot a glance over at the cabinet. The angle was bad but one could see two cabinets wobble precariously. Sullivan paled, turned tail and ran. Donna tossed her head from one side to the next. "This isn't funny, guys. Help! Help!"

One of the cabinets toppled over, hitting the floor with a deafening crash. A heartbeat later, emaciated humanoid figures poured into the room, their skin a mottled gray. Some of them flashed through the camera's field of view, in hot pursuit of the fleeing men. The rest though turned to Donna.