Writing from a picture prompt

 (Writing time limit: approx. 22 minutes, edited later)

SOMETHING ON THE STAIRS

by Adrian

Ellen was sure she had heard something on the stairs. Positive in fact. But she was a nervous sort and lived alone so she was hesitant to investigate. She considered phoning down to the super, but he was a surly old Portuguese gentleman, who spoke little English. Ellen thought this to be a ploy to avoid as much work with the tenants as possible, but she couldn’t be sure and didn’t want to cause a ruckus.

So, she took the chain off the door and took a peek out. What she had heard wasn’t somebody climbing the stairs. She would have recognized that. It was more like a heavy, sliding sound. Very odd. It had been loud enough to snap her out of this week’s episode of Matlock. (The new series).

She waited a moment and was about to close the door when she heard the sound again. This time coming from the stairs towards the roof. Ellen lived on the floor second from the top and she had rarely ever ventured upwards. Besides there were only two apartments on the fourteenth floor. One was owned by a retired military man who was away most of the time travelling. The other was sitting empty and had been for years. Or at least as long as she had lived there.

There was the sound again only this time it seemed closer and somehow a little bit wet. Ellen didn’t have much curiosity, but the little she had was becoming too powerful to ignore. She went back into the apartment and took a flashlight from the drawer. One of the bulbs was burnt out on the fourteenth floor landing and she didn’t like the dark.

She went to the bottom of the stairs and peered up. Slowly, she started to climb, turning the light this way and that as she ascended.

When she got to the top of the flight, she paused on the landing. She could see up to the next floor and saw the doors there., The military man’s door was closed, but she realized with a start that the door to the empty apartment was open by a good ten inches.

Oh no, she thought, a burglar must be in there. She certainly wasn’t geared for this, so she started to turn to go back down the to the safety of her own place. Then she saw the two eyes, close to the ground and further down the hallway.

She stood there, transfixed, as the eyes began to get larger and gasped when she realized they were getting closer. Then, from the shadows, there emerged the head of a huge snake.  Its green slit eyes blinked rapidly, in the glare of the flashlight. Its red, forked tongue flicked nervously in and out as it slowly made its way towards Ellen.

Ellen shrieked and turned to run but she slipped and fell, twisting her ankle as she collapsed on the landing. The giant snake was at the top of the flight now and was just about to descend on Ellen when another figure appeared behind it. A hand flashed out and grabbed the snake just behind its head. It was Major Jonathan Stevenson Pike, retired.

“Come with me, Robert,” the Major said, disapprovingly. “Naughty boy. Sorry about that miss. I brought him back from Borneo with me. I’ve been keeping him in the spare apartment for the time being.”

“Why would you keep a huge hideous beast like that here!” Ellen complained, wincing in pain.

“Oh, Robert’s not so big,” said the major glancing over his shoulder towards the open door of the dark apartment. “You should see his mother.”