Common Items #5: Midnight happenings

I suddenly awoke . . .

What's that noise?  It sounds like footsteps . . . well ordered footsteps. 

Yofi and Wally heard it too, by their low growls. I whispered to them to "hush" and to "stay" and they obeyed, trusting us completely. 

I had heard there had been a burglar in our area, but I thought that he had been caught by now.  But to be on the safe side, I grabbed my camera. I wanted to make sure that whatever we saw or did, we have evidence. 

By now, J had heard it too.  We both thought we had a home invasion.  He grabbed the shotgun and I grabbed the 'Glock'. 

We stopped and listened. . . we both continued to hear the footsteps.  They seemed almost rhythmic.  

We slowly and cautiously crept downstairs - where the footsteps seemed to come from.  We stayed in the dark, using all that we had learned from Quantico. 

At the base of the stairs, J motioned me to the left, while he hugged the wall to the right. Both of us slowly crept through the living room.  As we stood at the threshold of the dining room, J motioned for me to go first and low and he would cover me.  I ducked down low and quickly entered the dining room, swinging the Glock in front of me.  J followed so quickly that no one would have noticed. 

We were now on the tile floor and had to be incredibly careful as even barefeet are easily detected.  We both stopped for a moment to listen. The rhythmic footsteps continued only slightly louder now.  And I thought I heard a low, murmuring chant.  

We carefully crept through the dining room, realizing that the sounds emanated from the kitchen.   

The kitchen is tiny and we realized that only one of us could enter safely at at time.  But there is a large opening between the kitchen and the dining room - as sort of pass-through - that the other could come through if necessary.  

J motioned to me that he would enter the kitchen.  He had gone through extensive leadership training at Quantico, and I knew to follow his lead.  That meant that I would come through the pass-through.  

We could both hear the low chanting now and the rhythmic footsteps were louder.  No one had discovered us yet, thankfully.  

It was time.  

J rushed into the kitchen with the shotgun fully extended. 

I jumped up into the pass-through with the Glock extended.  

We couldn't believe our eyes.  We say something moving around the stove - not something, but somethings.  

As J reached to turn on the light, I reached around and grabbed my camera.  But as soon as the lights came on, I pressed the shutter button. But the somethings had stopped.  

No more footsteps.  No more chanting.  

We looked all around the kitchen.  Everything was where it should be. All that we saw were our oil containers on the stove top.  J hadn't put them there and I had not left them there after cooking.  

We hastily checked the pantry and the laundry room.  Nothing.  

We put the oil containers back where they belonged.  Interestingly, we noticed that the spouts of the red ones were intertwined.  It took some doing, but finally J was able to work them apart.  

While we were up, we grabbed a quick snack and talked and laughed about things, then finally turned off the lights and went back to bed, where Yofi and Wally anxiously awaited our return.   

The next morning dawned bright and beautiful.  I was up first, took the pups out and went downstairs to make some coffee.  

I routinely made the pups their breakfast.  A few minutes later, J came into the kitchen as asked "Where did that come from?" pointing to the stove.  "What are you talking about?" I asked as I turned around to look at the stove.  

There, right in the center of the stove, was a very tiny red oil decanter.