John was out of luck with his neighbors. Shana didn't even look at him, and just left when he tried to talk to her. Elizabeth wasn't even a choice, and that was bad; she was the best teacher, and almost everyone learned from her. His best option was Crying Willy; like him, Willy was a pariah. To his knowledge, while Elizabeth was everyone's angel, Willy was the leper. No one liked him because of his individualistic, lonely, and egotistical decisions. On the plus side, he was the older survivor there and probably the most skilled leecher. The one rejected by others was John's best choice.
"One man trash is another man treasure" John said to himself while walking to Willy's room.
"Hi Willy, can I come in?" Asked John from outside the old lady's room Willy was leeching off from.
Willy just moved his left hand in the air, like an inviting sign.
"What do you want?" Asked Willy.
"Straight to the point; I like that. Well, the thing is, I need training; I need to learn to leech from the living so I can survive." Explained John.
"I see. What's in it for me?"
The question left John lost; it was a miscalculation on his end. He didn't have anything to give in exchange for Willy's help. While John was thinking about his mistake, Willy raised his head and looked at John. If John could, he would have goosebumps. Willy's face had a cruel, twisted, scary smile.
"You are done for; you know it, right?"
Willy passed his tongue between his lips. There was no saliva or taste. But the gesture had the desired effect. John realized there were rules here; it was like a jail, and the prisoners had their own code. Elizabeth and Willy were the two unassuming kingpins.
"There will be a Muncher incursion sooner than later; when that happens, you will get eaten, and your screams will be heard all over this building until the sun rises again. Your existence will become nothing more than suffering while the Munchers ravage your pathetic soul forever." Willy said these words while looking at John's face with his creepy smile, then, with his left hand, made a go-away motion signal while saying:
"Shu, shu," like if John were a dog.
John left Willy's room looking into nothing; he was lost; there were a lot of people around that didn't like him; he needed help and had nothing to bargain with.
"Ramon," he thought.
After finding Ramon in a room, the man rejected him directly.
"Sorry kiddo. You just took the chance to survive off one of us. You have no idea what it is; no one of us does, but soon you will see it. You just condemned Sofia to a fate worse than death. And now you want help?" John was about to go beg Elizabeth for mercy when Martin invited him.
"Follow me".
With no other choice, John followed behind Martin. After going into the room of an old lady, Martin started speaking.
"I know what you are thinking; you were about to beg for help from Elizabeth. Don't bother; she will not help you. No one will. You know, I get your point; you want answers, and you want choices. I did too—the first year at least. As a man of science, I was baffled by many things. How can we speak if we don't breathe? I still don't know the answer to that one. I saw Sofia before she died and became a ghost, but after she died, the woman I saw was at least ten years younger. I think that after death, we take the form of the last clear image we have of ourselves. With time, I learned a few things. Then I made many hypotheses and explanations for a few things happening here. I annoyed a lot of people by asking too many questions, but something I never did was cause someone to turn into a Muncher."
"I didn't." Protested John.
Meanwhile, Martin looked at him with a doubtful face. He knew John was trying to justify himself.
"She was about to turn on her own anyway. I didn't do it on purpose."
"Are you done making excuses?"
John didn't answer; he knew Martin was right, and he had some blame for Sofia's unfortunate change.
"Listen, kid, I can try to teach you how to leech. The problem is that everyone has their own understanding of it. To me, I think of it as the liquid surface tension theory. It helps me do it in a way I can understand. However, that method never works for others. And to be sincere, I am bad at teaching this esoteric stuff. But I can try; we will practice with this old lady. Her name is Lucia. Try at least to be respectful towards the ones you are leeching."
The old woman was sitting in a wheelchair, oblivious to the things surrounding her.
"Try to touch her."
John did as instructed; of course, nothing happened.
"To me, it is like trying to land a soap bubble in regular water and making it stay there without bursting. Physics, help me."
Martin lowered his stance and watched his finger and the skin of the woman. He had to have perfect control to maintain that moment in which his ghostly fingertip and the old lady's skin fused together. Then a minuscule, almost nonexistent, vague feeling of touch proved that the leeching was a success. However, the recently deceased had such memories of how touching something feels that they couldn't accept this new, diluted, pathetic excuse for a sensation as something real. The older a ghost was, the easier it was to learn this skill because it had been so long since they felt something.
"You have to practice and try your best to feel the connection."
"How long did it take for you to learn this?" Asked John after several failures. "Eight months to grasp the general concept and start identifying the connection. Almost two years to do it well enough to survive on my own to the munchers."
"I'm so dead." Complained John after failing again and again.
"That's a fact," Martin signaled.
"Why are you helping me?" Asked John, curious.
"Because I decided to, and because, like you, I don't trust Elizabeth or that weirdo Willy. They have been surviving here for too long. I don't buy it. They must know something we don't."
"Shana told me you use your knowledge of physics to give explanations for many things happening here."
"Yes, I do," admitted Martin.
"And I know what you want to ask: Why is this happening?" Martin got out of the room and stood there, looking at the wall at the end of the hallway.
"It is the building. That is my conclusion. Something about this building's construction isn't right. The idea came to me just a few months ago. I remembered that back when I was alive and my mind could still work properly, this place got a visit from some technicians; they wanted to know why we had blown fuse problems every once in a while. The technicians said that there was some weird configuration in the metal frame of the building, and sometimes it seemed to create some kind of static energy saturation. Well, those total power cuts coincide with the Munchers attacks."
"Oh, okey, lets say the building is the problem, but what can we do about it?"
"Kiddo, if I knew that, I would have fixed it long ago. The thing is, I don't think this is random. I think there is something intentional here. This place has been around for more than forty years. The older ghosts in here must know something; it doesn't make sense if they don't."
"Did you try getting some information out of them?" Asked John.
"I did; they don't want to talk about it. Willy didn't even listen to me. Elizabeth told me to not waste my time and instead practice my leeching to survive. There is something fishy here. Now keep practicing."
John went back to his training, but there was no sign of progress. That was the reason a lot of people took refuge in Elizabeth's room; they didn't have the patience, the skill, or the desire to learn how to leech. It was boring and hard to grasp. When the night came, things got scary again: the lights flickering, the noises, some suffering wailing coming from the walls—everything came with more intensity than ever before.
"This is bad. I think we are about to have an attack." Said Martin.
All other ghosts were either taking refuge with Elizabeth or those that could leach moved to their hosts. Some went for the less safe option, the pantry for the workers. It had one of those doors that closed themselves after people went in or out. The problem was that if the door got opened during an attack and the Munchers got it, there was no escape. This is where John had to take refuge; he didn't have a choice. While the lights were flickering and the walls were screaming, the workers chatted, oblivious to the situation of the ones surrounding them.
"Oh my god!, that shop is great. I went there and got an awesome top for the gym; it has great quality and it was so cheap." A girl with a bullring in her nose and the purple uniform of the nurse asistants said.
"Yeah. I got some nice stuff there too. Let's see how long it lasts. All shops start great, then become too expensive or start selling bad-quality stuff," a blonde nurse said.
A male nurse came through the door.
"Well, I think Mr. Santana is going to croak soon."
"Nothing surprising there. How old is he?" Asked the bullring girl.
"One hundred and one years old," answered the nurse.
"Wow, over one hundred. I won't make it there, and I don't want to. That man is more like a potato than a person. That is not living." The male nurse said.
"Well, that is going to be a problem. It might probably affect us." Said the nurse.
"Us? Why?" Asked the male nurse.
"You see, Mr. Santana is the owner of this land and a few others. This nursing home was built on a lease from him. One of his sons is managing the business. But the land is still under the old man's name. When he dies, the sons will probably start an inheritance war." Explained the nurse.
"So what? Why would that affect us?" Asked the bullring girl.
"Well, this building is old; it should not be able to pass some of the regulations required. They were supposed to do an overhaul of the building ten years ago, but they never did. We passed the inspection because Mr. Santana son wrapped things up under the table. But if he loses control of this place... well, we will probably need new jobs. I'm pretty sure this place is closing down as soon as that man dies."
The ghosts in the room were listening. Those were bad news, for sure. The personnel kept talking about many things, none of them really important. The night passed, and in the morning, the walls went silent and the lights stopped flickering. The Munchers didn't attack this time either.