The Third Shift: Third Shift, #4

By D.S. Ritter

This is a collection of the first three books in The Third Shift series. Contains books 1-3.

Sam's job has always been a nightmare, but when actual monsters begin to appear, it's not just the boredom that's deadly.

In Cthulhu's Car Park, Sam faces off against an ancient evil buried beneath her feet. In Last Cull, she and her friends find themselves caught up in a secret vampire civil war, threatening to tear their city apart. In Dawn of the Brain-Dead, the gang find themselves lost in a sea of zombie football fans.

Catch all the thrills, chills, and spills with The Third Shift: The Collected Edition.

• Language: English
• Publisher: D.S. Ritter
• Release date: Feb 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201176327

D.S. Ritter

Writes fantasy novels

Book preview

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Copyright © 2022 by D.S. Ritter

All rights reserved.

No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

Contents

Cthulhu's Car Park

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Epilogue

Last Cull

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Dawn of the Brain-Dead

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Epilogue

Thank You

About the Author

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It’s not working.

Sam looked down at the customer from her post beside the automatic parking machine and assessed the situation. It was a woman, driving a red sports car, Sam didn’t know the model. The look of contempt on the woman’s face made her suspect it was expensive. She held a blue parking ticket.

Ignoring that the woman had not even tried to put her ticket into the machine, Sam took it and slid it into the slot.

You need to put it with the stripe up and to the right, she explained for the millionth time, unsurprised when the screen showed the woman had not paid for her ticket yet. There were a number of signs posted suggesting she prepay in the elevator lobby, but many customers seemed to think those signs were for other people. It’s going to be a dollar and fifty cents.

Following instructions did not seem to be this lady’s strong suit; she dug through her purse and withdrew two crumpled dollar bills.

I’m sorry, ma’am, said Sam, using her best customer-service tone and pointing to a big sign posted right on the machine, we only accept debit or credit cards at the gate.

The woman’s frown turned into a grimace. That’s ridiculous! It’s two dollars!

I’m sorry, that’s just how our system works, ma’am. This machine isn’t built to handle cash.

With long, manicured nails the customer plucked a card from her purse and thrust it toward Sam, who inserted it into the slot and waited for the transaction to clear.

The payment machine was a sleek looking device, sort of resembling an ATM, with one slot, two buttons and a screen. One might think a machine that simple would be easy for people to use, particularly with a big board of instructions right in front of them.

Sam’s job was to stand beside it, putting people’s tickets in correctly, assuring them that yes, their credit card did go there, and clearing mechanical jams. This time, she could hear the machinations inside working, and out popped the credit card. She handed it back to the customer.

Would you like a receipt?

The gate had gone up and the sports car was already wheeling onto the street, so she plucked the piece of paper out of the machine and put on the small pile on top of the nearby garbage can.

The job wasn’t a hard one in terms of skill level. Be polite. Help people operate a system designed to be completely automated. No cash register to mess around with. Very little handling of cash at all, assuming the machine in the lobby was working. But, sometimes easy or hard didn’t have to do with skill.

An idling engine drew Sam's attention to the entrance. Two men sat in a black sedan, staring at her. At eleven o’clock at night on a Wednesday, the parking structure was close to empty, so Sam prepared herself for a hassle. Can I help you?

The driver had an expression of slack-jawed determination. Yeah, uh, where’s a spot?

Sam disliked this question, for a couple of reasons, the first being it was a reminder that management expected her to stay by the gates at all times, so there was no way to know which spots were available. The second was the question’s lazy nature. Drive around for two seconds and find it yourself, she thought.

What she said, politely, was, It’s pretty empty right now, I’m sure there’s one just up that ramp. To be clear, she pointed out the ramp to the next level.

When the customer had driven off, not saying much other than cool, Sam stood there for a moment and enjoyed the quiet. The night was winding down, the electronic sign in front of the garage said there were almost two-hundred spaces available, and in a few hours, she’d be able to go home.

It was summer in the college town of Ann Arbor, and the night, a pleasant, balmy one, so she wore her uniform polo, khaki shorts and tennis shoes, because sandals went against the dress code. A breeze tickled the sad little urban trees, pushing a receipt across the concrete floor of the structure, and the only sound was radio traffic on her walkie-talkie. Cashiers and maintenance workers checked in with the home office from all over the city, clearing transactions and reporting problems. In a few weeks, the university would be starting up again, and then the calm nights would be a memory until around Christmas.

As her mind really started to wander, the sound of puking echoed over the concrete from somewhere within the structure. Already imagining the smell, Sam unclipped her radio from her belt. Seven-One to HQ.

HQ, crackled the radio, go ahead, Seven-One.

I think I’ve got someone throwing up somewhere in the structure. Permission to check it out?

Okay, Seven-One, go check it out. Let us know if you need any back up.

Ten-four.

Returning the radio to her belt, Sam looked around for any customers. Seeing none, she made her way to the up-ramp.

Seven-One was a small structure, with eight split-levels containing only about thirty spaces each. It didn’t take her long to locate where the sick person had been. There was nobody on 3b, but a pool of vomit beside the black sedan that had just entered gave her an idea of who the culprit might have been. Sam almost gagged, smelling the alcohol from ten feet away. She informed HQ what she’d found.

You got sawdust over there, Seven-One? asked Marcus, the night manager.

Should be some in the basement hold, replied Dave, one of the maintenance workers.

Just spread some of that sawdust and we’ll send someone over to deal with it later, said Marcus, who sounded distracted. What’s this guy doing? Hey, Seven-Six, you got that guy’s license plate?

Her part of the conversation over, Sam went back to ignoring the radio traffic and took the elevator to the bottom floor of the structure. It had three half levels underground, besides the eight split levels above.

The basement levels creeped Sam out. Their ceilings were lower than the upper levels and there were no windows, giving them a claustrophobic feel. And worse, the lights were motion activated. This wouldn’t have been so bad if it weren’t for the fact that they took a second to register, leaving you in pitch-blackness for longer than Sam was really comfortable, and once they came on, they had a tendency to flicker, like in a low budget slasher movie. Every time she had to go down for a car count or whatever, she found herself imagining the lights coming on, and seeing someone waiting, perfectly still.

Today, she was too annoyed at the prospect of cleaning up a puddle of sick to be scared, and made her way to the supply hold, closed off with a chain-link fence. She shoved her electronic key into the lock. It chirped merrily.

The fluorescent lights were still flickering when she heard another chirp.

It didn't sound electronic.

She glanced down behind her and jumped. Mice were not unheard of in the structure. They ate garbage, and nobody cared since they mainly stayed out of sight. But this was not a mouse.

First of all, it was green. Not lizard-green, with scales. This was booger-green and looked like one of those disgusting oozy toys that were popular in the nineties.

The thing had smooth, glistening skin, too many legs and far, far too many eyes. And they all looked up at her. It chirped again though she couldn’t spot any sort of a mouth or nose.

Um, hello, she said, and immediately felt stupid. But really, she could either talk to the thing, or let panic overtake her, so she said, Where did you come from?

It chirped again, which would have been cute if a large, fang-filled mouth hadn't emerged from the slimy thing like an angry suction cup. The chirp lowered in tone as the teeth extended. Before it finished its transformation, Sam had picked up the heavy snow shovel they kept next to the bag of sawdust. She slammed it down on the creature with as much force as she could. It made a disgusting, stomach-turning squash-clang!

Gingerly, she lifted the metal shovel head and peered at what was left. The corpse was totally smashed and bright green goop seeped out of it like the insides of a rotten melon. And the smell! It was something like burned hair mixed with old garbage.

One of the thing’s arms twitched, and Sam threw the shovel down and ran back upstairs and into the staff bathroom. With the door locked behind her, she got on the radio.

If she hadn’t been working for Empire Parking for years, she might have gotten on her phone and called the police first, but it had been drilled into her mind, just about every weekend, that unless someone was about to die, you called management first. Hey guys, she said, her hand shaking as she held it to her mouth, I need someone over here now.

Who is this? demanded Marcus, who had heard her on the radio almost every night for two years.

Sam almost screamed with frustration. This is Seven-One, she said, trying to keep her voice calm.

Okay. Go ahead, Seven-One. His tone was both calm and infuriatingly patronizing.

There is some sort of… animal in the basement. I don’t know if it’s still there. Can someone come check it out?

Okay, we’ll send somebody over. Sam listened as Marcus arranged for Dave to drive over and take a look. She also listened for customers driving down, but had no intention of leaving the bathroom until there was someone else there.

Sam looked at herself in the mirror over the sink, and tried to stop shaking. Her long, black hair had come out of her ponytail. Her face looked somber and pale under the fluorescent light.

What the hell was that thing?

She put her hair back up and rubbed her arms, imagining its green, slimy remains sliding under the door crack. The lights had probably gone out in the basement again. It was just sitting down there, in the dark, hopefully dead.

Only the sound of one of Empire’s big blue maintenance trucks idling outside brought her out of that bathroom. Dave rolled down the window of the big F150 and leaned over. Where is it?

Down by the hold, she said, rubbing her arms again. I don’t know what the hell it is, but it’s gross.

Dave nodded, closed the window and rolled the truck down into the basement. Not an easy task, considering how tight the structure was.

Sam stood near the bathroom door, ready to bolt back inside or run to help, she wasn’t sure which. Her fight and flight instincts warred with each other while she waited what seemed like an eternity of silence on the radio. After about ten minutes, Dave drove back up, and she got him to roll down the window while he was trying to get the gate to read the truck’s automatic pass. Did you find it?

I didn’t find anything but some spilled coolant. No animals or anything. I put some sawdust on it for you.

That wasn’t coolant, that was— but, it was too late; the gate had popped up, and he was already driving away. —its blood, I think… she finished.

Left alone in the silent structure, the semi-darkness of the city night surrounding her beyond it, Sam wondered if she’d seen what she thought she’d seen. Maybe it had been just a goober of coolant? Or something non-living, at least.

With the lights flickering like they did, and her tendency to get creeped out in the basement without any reason, it was plausible that her imagination had run away with her. She got out her phone and put some music on, something not strictly allowed, and tried to calm down while she waited out the clock until two in the morning.

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Got training tonight?

Thursday night found Sam in the break room at HQ, sipping a Coke and reading a novel on her phone. Tina Gerardi, sat across from her, looking over time sheets.

I guess so. ‘Joe’ somebody, said Sam, barely looking up from her novel.

I heard he’s a burnout. Shelly over at Seven-Three said she smelled weed on him in the booth, said Tina, completely matter-of-fact. She doesn’t like him.

Shelly was a fifty-year-old woman who’d been working the parking booths for eight years. Frankly, she didn’t like anyone, though Sam guessed she was probably right about the new guy being a stoner. So many prospective employees had come in expecting they could be high on the job.

Well, we’ll see how long he lasts, said Sam, trying to get back to her eBook.

Training employees meant an extra fifty cents an hour, though the four dollars almost wasn’t worth the energy spent babysitting them all night. Sam had signed up out of some ridiculous loyalty to the company, hoping to improve things.

Being a bit of a loner, she didn’t always like having to make conversation during the slow periods. Sometimes it got awkward, though it could be interesting getting to know the new guys. Eight hours with plenty of downtime often proved more than enough to get a person's life story. Or at least, the skinny on their last three marriages.

The two parking attendants sat in the break room in silence, savoring the last ten minutes before they could clock in. It was a featureless room containing the table at which they sat, three bulletin boards and a counter, taken up by an ancient microwave and the time clock widely known to be three minutes slow.

Sam looked up from her phone when the door opened. A young man she didn’t recognize let himself in. He had a long, thin face and mud-brown hair, cut close to his head.

I’m looking for Sam? he asked, addressing both women. Sam stood up, and he held out his hand, which she found interesting and maybe just on the kiss-ass side of being polite. Also interesting? His green eyes were already a little bloodshot. I’m Joe Huckabee.

Nice to meet you, Joe, she said, shaking his hand. Your other trainers showed you how to clock in, right?

He ran his hand through his hair in a shucks, ma’am, sort of way. Yeah, I think so.

The three employees sat quietly for another few moments. Almost together, Tina and Sam got up and walked over to the clock, stamped their time cards and put them in a slot on the wall. Tina headed for the elevator, and Sam waited for Joe to finish filling out his card.

They went up to the office where assignments were handed out. Are you going to need a ride? asked Sam as they headed back out.

No, I’ll follow you.

When they got there, Seven-One was quiet, despite rush hour starting. Carter Evans was manning the machine, a bored look on his face. He was more senior than Sam. She thought he was nice. Maybe a little too smart to be at Empire, but that could be said about a lot of the people she worked with.

Hey man, ready to go home? she said as she and Joe walked up.

You know it, said Carter, handing her his bank bag. She had Joe count it and looked around.

See anything weird today?

Weird? I had an asshole try to dump his garbage upstairs--

No, I mean like, I don’t know, really weird.

No, nothing like that. Why?

She shrugged. Thought I saw something real weird last night. It’s nothing.

Carter packed his stuff up and headed back to HQ, and Sam showed Joe the machines, including everything that could possibly go wrong with them. Before long, she had the back of one unlocked and was demonstrating how to clear ticket and credit card jams.

Ok. So, if there’s a ticket jam, you stick your hand in there and feel around for the metal tab. Lift it up. It should swing easily.

Uh huh.

Joe had a vapid look on his face, indicative of a wandering mind. Sam continued with her instructions anyway.

The likelihood of Joe having to deal with one of these machines was growing smaller every moment. She’d seen his type before. He’d come in, having seen the other attendants sitting idle in their booths and thought, Man, this job’ll be easy. And sure, in the middle of a shift on a Tuesday afternoon in certain parts of the city, it was an incredibly easy and lucrative job. But the laid-back positions were coveted by more senior attendants, the waiting list for which might go on for years.

New hires tended to face trials by fire. Chances were, Joe would end up at the one of the structures on Liberty on a Friday and have to ring up hundreds of customers at a breakneck pace all night, dealing with drunks and young obnoxious kids out to party. He might find himself handling a thousand dollars in cash, or more on weekends when the Wolverines played. One wrong move, one moment of complacency, and all hell would break loose. Honking, angry customers cursing him out, or worse, someone might reach through his service window and snatch the two hundred dollars he was frantically counting out for a deposit, and so long, Joe, thanks for playing. Dismissal.

That would be pretty dramatic though. A safer bet would be that after a week, he’d just stop coming back.

Sam watched him as they served customers and decided he had to be the laziest trainee she’d ever had. He did almost nothing, sometimes didn’t greet customers, or even acknowledge them unless they spoke to him first. She doubted he would last until that first Friday.

Do we get breaks? he asked as another nonplussed customer drove away.

We get thirty for lunch whenever we feel like taking it, she said, straightening her growing pile of discarded receipts. You can take bathroom breaks whenever since I can cover you right now, but you’ll need to call them in later.

Can I go down to my car for a sec? I forgot something.

Sure, go ahead. Sam felt a little relieved as the guy walked away. Sometimes, no conversation was more awkward than too much.

She didn't dislike all trainees. She’d bought a few of them lunch over the years, but this guy was going to be on his own.

The machines at Seven-One were terrible, constantly needing supervision. Sam didn’t know if the machines were dirty inside or had seen too much abuse over the years, but they often had mechanical trouble, requiring a lot of attention during high volume periods, so she dealt with ticket jams and finicky credit cards for about forty-five minutes before she realized that Joe hadn’t returned from his car yet. A little worried, she got on the radio.

Seven-One to HQ.

Go ahead, Seven-One.

I’m hearing some stuff down in the basement. Is it okay if I check it out?

You got a trainee out there with you, Seven-One?

Yeah, I’ll take him with me.

Ten-Four. Just wanted to make sure you weren’t leaving him on his own.

Ten-Four.

Even if Joe wouldn't be around long, Sam wasn’t going to snitch on a coworker unless it was her job or theirs. She wasn’t down with being a pariah, though some people certainly were. If the offending party had absolutely pissed everyone else off, she might hope to get away with it, but getting other people fired was generally frowned upon. So Sam had lied, and now she checked traffic would continue smoothly before she went downstairs, where she and Joe had both parked.

Joe drove a rusted green clunker with the muffler almost hanging off. The passenger-side mirror was attached with duct tape.

Here’s Joe’s car, she said to herself, peering inside, but, where’s Joe? Sam decided to check out the rest of the basement, wondering if maybe he’d just wandered off.

She found him a half-level down, sitting on an old milk crate in the corner. He was asleep with half a joint hanging from his lip. Beside him was the cistern with a steel cover which, the one time it had been open had revealed pitch blackness with water dimly reflecting at the bottom. In short, it creeped Sam the hell out.

Dude, you gotta come back up, she said, shaking him.

Huh…? he said, his eyes fluttering open. What?

You gotta get back to work. You were gone for like, an hour.

Joe stretched and stood up. Shit. Anyone notice?

Not yet. Sam pointed at the joint, barely able to keep her irritation out of her tone. They use any excuse to drug test, by the way. Bump literally anything with your car, ever, you’re going to be peeing in a cup before you can do anything else.

Good to know. He put the joint in his pocket and headed toward the stairs.

Sam found her gaze falling on the steel lid of the cistern. It seemed like it might have been opened; it had shifted a little and she could see a wide crack. It might have been her imagination, but she thought she heard the water swishing below. Telling herself it was nothing, she went upstairs and back to work.

Sam no longer questioned Shelly’s opinion of Joe. Over the course of the next seven hours, she gained a deep understanding of how much of a burnout Joe actually was. She was a bit surprised he came back after lunch. When not taking one of many bathroom breaks, he stared off into space like he was absolutely not there. Truly a master of zoning out.

They didn’t collect any cash, so Joe’s paperwork at the end of the shift was pretty painless.

Once that was over, Sam felt herself relax; he was no longer her responsibility.

It wasn’t that Sam liked the job or the company, but she’d worked at Empire for two years and it was one of the best-paying jobs she could get without a degree. She took it seriously even though, in the grand scheme of things, her work didn’t mean anything. She filled a space that shouldn’t even exist; a middle man between customers and a machine they should be able to use themselves. She didn't create anything; she facilitated a moment that everyone would forget, just so it wouldn’t take any longer than absolutely necessary, but it was better than working at McDonald’s. If she didn’t take some pride in her work, she’d either burn out like many of her coworkers, or sink into depression.

Thus, she tried to be the best parking lot attendant in Ann Arbor. If only in her mind.

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Even in the dead of summer, the parking business heated up during the weekends. Friday night proved no exception. There was some event at one of the theaters downtown, which meant fielding questions all night about where it was, if parking was free for the event, why wasn’t parking free, where was there free parking? Sam dealt with customers patiently though there were a few instances where things got a little tense.

Is the lot full? demanded a woman driving an Audi full of her friends. They were all dressed to the nines and the woman in the passenger seat was haphazardly applying a very expensive brand of eyeliner using the rear-view mirror.

Sam, who had been rushed off her feet since getting on shift, leaned over, looked at the big electronic sign outside that read FULL and said, Yep, it looks like it.

Are you sure there isn’t a spot open?

We just had a car count, ma’am, so I’m pretty sure. You’ll have to wait a few minutes for someone to leave.

The woman huffed. She waited a second to see if the customer needed anything else and then turned to return to her post.

What a bitch.

Sam didn’t even turn around, but kept walking. She'd heard worse.

There had been one time, almost a year before, when she’d been dealing with a late night customer and his girlfriend.

Empire’s unwritten policy was that unless a customer damaged property, you didn’t call the police on them, even if they were drunk. So, when Sam saw that the man couldn’t line his ticket up with the slot, all she could do was ask if he needed assistance. No, spat the man, I’m fucking fine. It’s this stupid fucking machine.

The man continued trying to stick his ticket in the slot, becoming more aggressive. When it finally went in, the total came up on the screen. That’ll be a dollar-fifty, said Sam, deeply regretting that their interaction would continue.

What the fuck? demanded the man. I already paid.

Do you have a receipt?

‘Do you have a receipt?’ he mocked, running his hand over his shaved head. No! I don’t have a fucking receipt.

Sam ejected the ticket and looked at it. There was no paid time stamp. Did you pay with cash or a credit card?

This is fucking bullshit, just let me out.

Sir, I can call this in, but unless you’ve got some proof, they’re probably just going to make you pay the dollar-fifty. You can pay with a card here, or cash in the elevator lobby.

Bitch, I don’t have a credit card.

Then, you’re going to need to pay cash in the elevator lobby, sir.

She handed his ticket back, though it scared her to be even that close. When he got out of the car to go pay, leaving it idling in the lane, she gave him a wide berth, moving over to the other exit, as though she were on the lookout for more customers. His girlfriend flipped her the bird from inside the car.

Hey, stupid bitch! screamed the man from the lobby machine. This piece of shit ain’t working!

The blood drained from Sam's face as he continued to scream obscenities as loud as he could until she walked over. The few people walking home from the bars had stopped to listen, and frankly, if they hadn’t been there, she wouldn’t have gone anywhere near him.

Can I help you? she asked, doing her best to remain even.

This stupid piece of shit isn’t working! I should go take a shit in this fucking piece of shit structure. I’m going to piss and shit in this structure every time I come, he ranted as she reinserted his parking ticket and watched the screen, desperately hoping the machine was working right. The screen flashed and went through the payment process. She almost sighed with relief.

And if I see you again, I’m going to fucking beat the shit out of you. I’m going to to shoot you in the fucking head.

Shock at his words rolled over her, and for a second, Sam didn’t say anything. Have a good night, she uttered, not looking at him as she walked away.

Then, she locked herself in the bathroom and cried for about ten minutes.

When she came out again, he and his terrible girlfriend had gone, and she tried to pretend nothing had happened. She’d never seen him again and figured he was so drunk there was no way he’d remember her, or that he’d threatened to kill her over a dollar fifty.

But she never forgot how afraid he’d made her, or how much she