Not All Imps Are Demons... Part 2

Ian sat at his desk and poured himself another drink. He wasn't certain there was enough whiskey to calm his nerves. He ran back over the events of his visit to Alisa's house. The sounds he heard and the curtain falling down stuck out in his brain. They hammered away at his thoughts like someone beating him with a sledge.
"That's right, Ian, mix a few pain-killers in with the whiskey", he said aloud to no one but himself. "That will dull the senses nicely."
HE leaned down and lifted his pants leg. The redness was still there. Something for sure had stung him, he just wasn't sure yet what. When Alisa had first come to him, he felt she was a quick cure and away she would go. Now, he wondered if she were curable at all. Perhaps putting her in a hospital where she would be looked after daily would be the best thing for her. At least she would be safe there. A window suddenly slammed shut behind him. Ian tossed his glass of whiskey when he jumped from the sound.
"Damn man, get a freaking hold of yourself." Again, he spoke it to no one. The phone rang and he turned to look at the caller I.D. "Shit..." It was from Alisa. He let it ring several more times before reaching for the phone.
"Hello, Doctor Lansing speaking."
Her voice was panicked now. She had a rasp in her voice that sounded eerie to Ian. "They are taking me away, Doctor. I don't know where they are taking me. Please, please help me."
Ian thought he heard sounds in the background. Voices and shuffling. He heard a door slam shut and then what sounded like a car start.
"Alisa, are you driving somewhere? Where are you going?"
Her voice was now a whisper. Ian had ti strain to hear her speak.
"They are driving, Doctor. They are taking me somewhere to hide me from you. They said you were going to lock me up forever! Are you, Doctor Lansing!? Is that what you want to do to me!?"
"Alisa, listen to me, please. Turn the car around and go back inside your house. I will be there in a few minutes. Can you do that for me?"
"It's about Mark, Doctor. They want whatever he took from them. I don't know where it is or I would give it back to them."
"Alisa, Mark is gone. He is dead. We have talked about this before."
"Of course he is dead, Ian." Her voice had become calm and sultry again. "They killed him."
"Mark died in a car accident, Alisa. I know you miss him terribly, but he is gone. And not at the hands of any tiny creatures from Atlantis."
"He found it, you know."
"He found what, Alisa?"
"Atlantis. Mark found Atlantis in one of his dives. That's what he did for a living. I told you that once."
"Alisa, listen to me. Atlantis never existed. Mark never found anything and..."
"He DID find it and he took some things from there! And now, they want it back! You must find me, Doctor Ian. Look near the ocean for me."
The phone went dead suddenly. Ian swore he heard the same laughter in the background he had heard at Alisa's house. This time, he was sure it wasn't coming from Alisa. She was still talking when he heard it. He drove to her house. The front door was open. Ian walked in and found the house all in shambles. It looked as if someone had gone through every part of the house, almost... like they were looking for something. Ian walked through the house, looking inside drawers and closets. What he was looking for he had no idea. He called out to Alisa, knowing somehow that there would be no response. he opened her bedroom door slowly. A sound came from inside the closet. He thought perhaps she DID have a cat after-all. Standing in front of the closed closet, he noticed the light was on inside. Slowly he opened the closet door. A box on the shelf fell out and struck him in the head. He jumped back and felt his heart racing faster than he thought it had ever raced. He caught the movement of something out of the corner of his eye. There was no cat in this closet, or for that matter, anywhere in the house.
"Damn mice," he mumbled to himself. Inside the box, Ian found clippings from magazines and newspapers. They were from a paper in Spain that probably never reached the United States. They spoke of a Mark Warden, an oceanographer from California, who claimed to have found the lost city somewhere in the Atlantic off the coast of Spain. He claimed to have found artifacts that proved the existence of Atlantis. He returned to America without ever displaying the things he had found. Only one small reference in a magazine made reference to it. It told of pottery and a boat that was found. Ian stared at the next passage and shook his head as he rad it.
{The pottery and boat appeared to be made more for a child than that of an adult. The articles were of tiny scale model, some measuring only an inch to six inches in length. The boat was filled with even tinier items such as watering bags and petite boxes.}
The article went on to say that it was believed the Mark had sold some of the artifacts to a Museum, which brought him Millions of dollars. If this were true, then Alisa would have been Heir to that fortune. Why would Alisa have lied and swore Mark had found nothing? Ian was startled again by the ringing of his phone.
"Hello?"
"Ian, you must get out of the house! They will kill you!" It was Alisa again and her voice was a soft whisper again. "I heard them talking about you. They know you are there right now."
Another sound came from the closet. This time it sounded like scuffling of tiny feet. Ian stepped back away from the closet and slammed the door shut. He heard what sounded like a soft wind coming from the closet. How did they know he was here? Who the hell were they? His mind was reeling from it all when the closet door flew open. It exploded in his face, knocking him off balance. Ian fell backwards and tripped over his own feet. He felt the dizziness hit him just before his body crumpled to the floor. He could hear Alisa screaming his name through the phone. The last thing he heard was the laughter. Laughter like tiny demons at a free for all.