📻“I doubt the bank will be thrilled finding a dead body in the morning. Whatever, dead land, dead sales!”📻

📻“If they can find it stud~❤️”📻

📻“If anybody even cares to look, darlin’. Thanks for calling in Mildred with that lovely story. Do keep in touch, do keep in touch.”📻

📻“I bet our censors and the bozo fact-checkers will have a field day grasping at straws with this one. And that’s an uncensored and certified-”📻

📻*T-T-T-TRUTH BOMB!*📻 The mock air raid hits, and Luther catapults himself awake.

“Whooooooaaaaaa!” His right foot is caught on top of the oil lamp, and he’s barely keeping balance.

A lunge back, a lunge forward, a lunge back, and a-

*CRAAASH* -Luther accidentally punted the lamp through the radio antenna and directly into the portrait above the fireplace.

He picks up the snapped antenna and a shard of glass off the floor, then looks up. Squinting hard. He flips on his flashlight. It doesn’t look like there’s a single scratch or ding on the face! Must be a high-quality canvas for a high-maintenance bitch-

*crack* -Luther’s heel breaks more glass, and he winces.

He thinks that as long as the painting is intact, he only needs to sweep up for Ollie, but then it hits him again. ‘Right…sweep up for who?’ Luther huffs.

But, not even Luther would wish broken glass on his worst enemy. Although it may not be entirely beneath him to piss on the carpet and blame it on a cat that snuck its way in. Smells like stale urine up in here anyway. Ollie would be none the wiser. But seriously, someone could cut their foot on this mess, even precious Alma-

Luther shrugs in embarrassment. There’s that word again, precious. To him, it’s synonymous with Alma, but he doubts it's synonymous with him. The way he sees it, though, tonight is not a night for synonyms. It’s a night for action!

His first action being…‘Wonder if there’s a dustpan in the kitchen?’

Luther heads out through the right. The kitchen is in the same place as the cellar, after all. Luther steps into the kitchen with a boastful nod. Ah yes, the kitchen.

Luther looks left and right. Taxidermy squirrels, a bar, and paintings of lush green, green countrysides against rocky shores…

‘...’

…this isn’t the kitchen, but it should be…

Luther sees the door on the other side and smacks his head. Of course! He exited the kitchen through a door. He vividly remembers that thanks to his excellent memory, well, excellent on a good day memory. Even by old man brain standards, it's peculiar that Luther failed to notice at the time there was a lounge nearly double the size of the living room. But then again, he recalls having his light off during the first pass through here, possibly? Did he really…

‘Well, I’ll be!’ Luther's attention is grabbed by a phonograph in the corner. He hasn’t seen one of these in ages!

Luther walks over to it. Maybe he can play some tunes. Better than that than to dwell on memories of the past several hours. Speaking of which, how long has he been here anyway? No wristwatch. Luther pawned that off to wow Alma with something special later.

He glosses over the walls with his flashlight. There we are! He finds a cuckoo clock with the bird stuck out, lopsided, and covered in webs.

‘Great…’ Luther rolls his eyes.

Speaking of webs, Luther turns back to the phonograph. A strand of web connects the spindle to the turntable with a dusty record. He flicks it. It hums like a bass.

Luther continues flicking it and listening to the hums and strums. Who needs a record when you can listen to the soothing basslines of Luther Knotts? He could be a bassist. If only Ollie wasn’t a better bassist than him…

That last thought makes him seethe, and Luther plucks the strand in half. *TWING*

Luther turns away and folds his arms. Not noticing the spindle slapping the record, which begins to turn.

The phonograph plays a soothing and serene…🎺*DWUM DUH DWUM DO A DU DWUM DUBH DUN DUN DA DWUN DA DA DAD DUT DUT DUTTA DA DWUM DUH*🎺

The scratchy and as serene as a dying elephant trying to out trumpet an out-of-tune and out-of-practice participation trophy earning 2nd Grade children’s marching band melody startles Luther! He whirlwinds around, karate chopping the air. That’s one blunt edge he has over Ollie, he may not be a bassist, but Luther is a bonafide (mail order) black belt in some kind of martial “arts”.

A few chops in, Luther finally realizes the sound is coming from the phonograph! He desperately tries to shut it off. It’s definitely been a while, all these doohickeys on the damn thing are entirely foreign to him, but he tries anyway.

‘SHUT IT OFF! SHUT IT OFF!’ Luther feels as if his entire mind is hollowing out and ringing solely with the lone, loud whines of the garbled beats. 

It’s so LOUD! UGH!

…

Louder than all the clocks ringing wildly. Wind howling through windows. Floorboards creaking. Doors open upstairs with mist pouring out that envelopes and dresses the rooms above before steadily creeping downstairs in an arc. Luther hears none of it, only that grating melody from the phonograph…

…mist zips to the corners of the living room…mist zips to the corners of the dining room…mist rockets towards the lounge…

…

Luther has no choice but to karate chop the contraption in half. He bows, readies a stance, measures the distance of his arm to the record, and swings down-

“OOOOOOOUUUUUUUCCCCH!” -the record still spins. If anything almost broke, it would’ve been Luther’s wrist.

The wooden cuckoo bird springs to mechanical life, going in and out, in and out. The shakey repetitive motion crunches, readies for launch and propels out the clock door. Hitting Luther between the eyes!

Luther rubs his forehead. An unseen wad of mist massages his back.

*CLUMP* The music stops!

“Thank you so much! I couldn’t figure out how to to-” Luther sees a large clump of earthworm-filled mud right on the record. “…..t-t-t-t-t-t-t-tt—t-t-t-t-tt—t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-tt—tt-t—tt-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-TURN THE-”

Luther feels something heavy and wet hit his jacket sleeve. Then something alive slumps on top of his head. The weight pushes him down a little. As he raises his head and flashlight, Luther dares not turn around. For the love of God and all that is holy, he MUST NOT turn around…

The foul-smelling breath of a rotting zombie waits behind Luther as the worms wiggle in his hair! The creature is caked in as much mud as the phonograph, and worms slither around its eye sockets.

*GRUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU* It breathes heavily enough that the worm pile on Luther’s hair goes flying off!

More mud and worms replace what was lost and drip down Luther’s forehead. He goes cross-eyed as he watches it.

Luther rattles from his toes up to his hair in response to a powerful primal instinct. ‘GET-THE-FUCK-OUT…NOW!’ The rattling intensifies to the point that the earthly belongings he didn’t ask for from the zombie shake off his entire self.

Luther backs up as the zombie stays in place. ‘…slowly back away….slowly back away…slowly turn away, don’t look at it and-’

*HOOOOOOONK* -Luther bumps into something surprisingly firm, healthy, nearly transparent, and…

“Boo~❤️” A ghost looks down upon Luther, stuck in her ethereal cleavage that not even the cold hand of death can take away…