Ridley was standing over the evidence with no perpetrator in sight. Alexander was partially relieved as he felt she had a more confrontational personality than these types of employee interactions merited. She looked around and turned back to look at him. That was why she didn’t see the teeth. Opening up on the side of a pallet box was a giant mouth with teeth the size of his hand. It opened to reveal a slimy purple tongue. It bore somewhat similar characteristics to the sandwich he had put a minor illusion on a few weeks ago.

  These boxes were about five feet tall and three feet wide. The massive box started to bend down as if to lunge, the cardboard rippling as if made of thick cloth rather than creasing or folding as cardboard normally would.

  Alexander did not hesitate. “Floating disc,” he whispered and launched Ridley into the air just as the box pounced right past where she was standing. Ridley screamed as she was hurled seven feet in the air. She came crashing back down on the disc, and he lowered it slowly.

  “What the hell, Alexander!?” Her face shifted from agitated to excited. “I knew it! You are a telekinetic!”

  “Crew member Ridley, if you could divert your attention to the giant box with a mouth, I am going to suggest we classify it as a hazardous material.”

  She turned and was shocked to see the… thing.

  “A FREAKING MONSTER!” Ridley shouted, her eyes lighting up with… joy? Alexander would assume it was some type of glee. It seemed to have a menacing quality to it.

  “We have to destroy it!” she said, sounding more pleased than determined. At this point, the box was moving toward him.

  Alexander stood up straight and told the box, “I suggest you become a normal box again.” It continued to charge as Ridley shouted and jumped on top of it. She intertwined her two fists and smashed downward as she connected with the box.

  The box arched backward and screamed into the air, an odd thing for a box to do. It spun in a circle as it swung its—what, upper box? Ridley was unable to hold on to it and was flung off. She crashed into a corner of the offloading ramp and landed in a pallet box that was full of four-by-eight bubble mailer envelopes.

  Alexander felt a bit unprepared for the situation, a vexing feeling. It might be a bit irrational, but a part of him felt as if he should have expected that a giant box monster was a possible threat to their facility. The box charged at Ridley, who was having difficulty maneuvering on the slick bubble mailer envelopes.

  “Floating disc,” Alexander aimed beneath the front corner of the box monster and lifted just as he had with Ridley. It did a backflip before crashing to the ground. It seemed disoriented as it tried to reorient itself upright. As Ridley was slowly standing back up, he opened his spell list and quickly sifted through the spells that he had put on his ‘to consider’ list. He clicked on the first one that looked useful for the situation.

  This is why researching beforehand was beneficial. He thought.

  The box monster morphed its body upright as Ridley was finally able to stumble out of the pallet box. Alexander pointed at the back of the monster near where it met the ground and said, “Webs.”

  A giant sticky spider web wrapped itself around the back of the monster and anchored it to the ground, halting all of its forward movement.

  Ridley jumped toward a cardboard discard pile and grabbed a box knife she spotted. As she turned she saw a long purple tongue shoot towards her.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  "Oh no freaking way are we going into that genre!" she shouted as she threw herself backwards while slashing with the tiny knife, missing by a wide margin.

  Once she regained her feet she felt a burst of energy and rushed forward surprising herself with her speed. Moving around to the side of the box, she lunged forward, piercing its side and started cutting the thing as she had done to hundred of used boxes over the past week. Its shrieks were ear-splitting this time. Alexander covered his ears with his hands, but Ridley continued to hack the box apart before it grabbed Ridley by the ankle and threw her into the box shoot.

  With Ridley out of the way it turned to see Alexander. He considered using his one offensive spell, but piercing wind would damage to many packages causing significant losses to Congo's profits and credibility. As it opened its mouth to attempt to skewer Alexander with its tongue he used webs again on its open mouth.

  It shook in frustration as it tried to free its tongue. Ridley shouted at she jumped onto one of the box chutes turning it into a slide. At the end of the chute she jumped box knife in two hands ready to cut the monster down the center. Unfortunately for Ridley the box monster could hear her shouting and it morphed its mouth from facing Alexander to facing Ridley, simultaneously freeing its tongue and it swallowed her.

  Alexander, temporarily shocked, got ready to throw the monster in the air but it streaked as Ridley's box knife began cutting through the wall from inside of the box monster. She cut about halfway through the box before she pulled it open and jumped out, Then spun around and punched a corner of the box, causing it to cave in. The monster began to fold in on itself and let out another shriek that faded slowly as the box collapsed upon itself. They paused for a second, waiting to see if the box would attack again, but instead, it started emitting putrid black smoke.

  “Fire!” Alexander shouted. He proceeded to walk briskly with the longest strides he could manage, as running was always prohibited in the distribution center. He moved to a designated fire extinguisher station marked with a red triangle eight feet up one of the support beams.

  “Wait,” Ridley shouted. “I think it’s just dissolving into smoke, like in games.”

  Ignoring Ridley, he grabbed the fire extinguisher anyway and quickly walked back over to the ruined, corrugated monstrosity. He removed the safety pin and stood with preparedness. It quickly became apparent that his preparedness was unnecessary as Ridley’s observations were correct. The box, tongue, and all started to deteriorate and break apart into a hazy smoke. He was not about to applaud her for the value of her video game knowledge, however. He didn’t want to encourage those types of hobbies.

  ^

  Quest Complete!

  The Unboxing:

  Boxes are being destroyed and their contents disappearing. Find and neutralize the perpetrator!

  Objective: Find the one who is vandalizing boxes

  Quest rewards:

  -750 xp

  -4 silver

  You have defeated a Mimic!

  You have gained 500 xp

  After Ridley smiled and tapped the air in front of her, she turned toward him and shouted excitedly, “Did you see that! I was eaten by a freaking monster! And you! You’re a telekinetic and Spider-man too!?”

  “I really have no idea what you are talking about. You were obviously tossed in the air initially when the monster first attacked you. The webs may be some form of discharge from the monster itself. A very interesting study, to be certain.” Alexander took a relaxed stance and crossed his arms. His improv skills were improving; maybe this was tied to charisma as well.

  “So you want me to believe you stood around doing nothing while I defeated a giant box monster on my own?” She still at him incredulously.

  Now for the self-deprecation.

  “Indeed, I should have run for help and called the authorities. I do ask you to forgive me, Ms. Ridley. I froze up in fear. Truly a man not worthy of any powers or adventure.” He shook his head attempting to portray a sense of shame.

  Ridley shook her head with a look of exaggerated disbelief as Alexander pulled out a little pocket notepad. He tore out a perforated piece of paper and started filling it out.

  “What’s that?”

  “You weren’t wearing safety gloves while handling the box knife,” he said as he handed her a written warning slip. “Please try to follow company policy next time."