M2K 2018 HALLOWEEN SPECIAL
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By Dan Dolan
Just Outside of Pawling, New York
Clare Bidding was not what you would call a cautious person. The woman, a buxom blonde in her late 20s, still dressed as if she were a great deal younger. Teen trends, in fashions, bubblegum pink bra sticking out under her flimsy shirt for all to see. She had to look the part you see, if you look too old or responsible: they won’t buy from you.
Tonight was her night off however, or it should have been till one of the greatest finds of her so called career landed in her lap, so instead she was here on Calvary Bluff with Ned and some of his stoner friends.
She’d complain more but she did manage to make a decent sale to some nervous little stick figure of a boy they others just called Twig. Nicknames, particularly demeaning ones were big with this group and telling sign of that was that Ned with the only one without one. The big bully could dish it out but he couldn’t take it.
Clare poked fun but Ned was a hoot sometimes and she occasionally enjoyed the security he offered so she suffered his stupidity and terrible taste in friends/victims. Tonight though he had her future quite literally in his hands (as they were a bit surrounded she felt it may be safer to leave it with him and she was regretting that more and more with each passing moment) and as such she had been forced to endure a lot more than she usually would have put up with, making her feel like she had more in common with poor Twig that she would like to think.
Not helping was that despite her trademark carefree demeanor there was a shiver running up her spine that she just couldn’t shake. Though… it was October 31st after all…
“Ned… why are we all the way out here?” Clare asked chugging down from a beer handed to her by some tall blonde hunk: ‘Danny Boy’ the others called him. She found him a nice distraction, looking at the younger man (or more specifically his exposed abs) in a way that made Ned wish he hadn’t brought the big lunk along.
“Because,” The aforementioned Ned said forcefully, cutting in-between Clare and Danny Boy, “We’re planning a little Halloween adventure.” Ned finished pulling her towards the edge of the bluff and pointing out, there in the distance was a dilapidated old building, huge and foreboding surrounded by marsh.
“What’s that?” A short ethnically ambiguous dark-haired kid named Rider asked, another of Ned’s toker friends, now sharing a leering look at Clare with good old Danny Boy, even as his loud girlfriend tried to get the short man’s attention.
“It used be a nut hatch.” Ned snickered, “An asylum, they’d lock up maniacs and mad dog killers and electroshock ‘em or chop up their brains like that.” Ned emphasized with a snap of his fingers, “Been empty for decades, ‘cept for the frogs and snakes that is,” He laughed darkly, “but every now and then people hear things… voices… and every now and then… blood curdling screams.” Ned finished just as Rider and his girlfriend, Tangy, jumped up behind Clare causing her to shout much to the laughter of all.
“We’re going in?” Rider asked excitedly as Clare caught her breath.
“Now, now fuckwad,” Clare spat angrily, “I never agreed to that.”
“I thought you wanted to make some kind of deal?” Tangy laughed, teasing her frizzy hair.
“Yeah but…”
“It’ll be no big deal, I’m just playing with yeah. The worst things down in that marsh are some garter snakes like I said and probably some cracked out ducks.” Ned said cutting his would-be girlfriend off, “Come on, let’s go. Danny Boy you aint chickening out.” Ned shouted back to tall blonde who lingered near the back of the group, giving Clare a moment to think without Ned watching her, “Don’t make me regret inviting you.” The lead man finished.
“Snakes?” The word was so meek it seemed odd coming out of the mouth of Danny Boy who looked like he’d be at home swinging a hammer with the Avengers, after a sharp look from Ned though his face hardened, “No, I’m fine, I’m coming.” The gigantic young man said finally much to Clare disappointment, had he opted out she could have used that as her excuse, instead she looked to Twig as her last option to weasel out of this pointless charade.
“What about you kid? I’ll stay out here with you if you want.” She tried to sound reassuring but the way Ned flared his eyes at first her and then Twig she realized it had backfired.
“No thanks.” Twig meeped under Ned’s furious glare and trodded along with the group.
Thus reluctantly she let Ned pull her along as they descended from the Bluff to the swamp below towards the former hospital, the place abandoned it nonetheless seemed alive with shadows dancing… perhaps only in the wilds of Clare imagination.
The place rattled, not just in the way old houses do but an actual nails on the chalkboard like rattle that seemed to be coming from the very walls. The six of them clung in a small clump as they slowly made their way with only the light of their phones to guide them.
“This is creepy as fuck.” Tangy squealed delightedly, holding on to Rider’s arm even as the olive skinned boy still watched Clare perversely.
“Guys quiet I hear something.” Ned demanded urging them down one of the wings, towards what must have been a patient’s room at one time. It still looked like a hospital room but it had been allowed to be overrun by plant life either leaking in from the marsh outside or perhaps even grown out from forgotten succulents abandoned with the rest of the hospital however many years ago.
They were so taken aback by the greens languidly growing from the walls that they almost failed to even notice that there was someone in one of the beds.
“What the fuck…” Claire whispered under her breath seeing him first, the others following her line of sight to the elderly man.
“Holy shit!” Twig spat, jumping back, looking like he might wet himself.
“Christ…” Rider sighed with a sick grin, “There’s actually some freak in here still?”
The person, a man, was elderly and shaking. His withered skin pale and his eyes haunted… he stared right at them and yet Clare was quite sure that he didn’t seem know what he was looking at never mind where he was.
“Do you think he’s one of the patients? Did he just stay here?” Tangy asked, mouth agape.
“Don’t be an idiot.” Rider snapped, “He’d be dead by now this place hasn’t been up and running since the ‘60s. He’s probably some kind of homeless loser who just crawled in here to die.” The boy laughed.
Even as the others peered closer to the mysterious old man, Clare tried to decide whether or not to make a break for it. Things were getting a little too crazy, even for her, but she needed what Ned had to make it to her next meal.
“Death is just around the corner.” The old man said, laughing himself, “It always has been ever since they came into my life. Into my mind.” He rattled on to himself.
“Who?” Ned said looking around.
“The snakes.” The old man said as if it were obvious, in a tone as if Ned were a moron.
“What the hell?! What does that mean?” Tangy gasped.
“Heh he IS a madman, don’t freak out Danny… boy?” Ned said turning to the quiet young man before finding that he was no longer towering just behind them, in fact he and Twig were both gone, “Hey! DB?! Danny?! Where’d you go?” Ned yelled animatedly running back into the hallway but the two young men were nowhere to be found.
“He’s gone…” Ned said quietly stepping back into the room.
“The little pansies must have run off.” Rider laughed.
“Shut the fuck up!” Ned snapped, causing the darker skinned boy to pale and sheepishly back up.
“Ned stop freaking out.” Clare demanded only for her erstwhile lover to grab her roughly by the wrist and pull her back into the hallway.
“Danny Boy’s got the stash.” Ned whispered furiously. Clare nearly fainted at the words.
“What the fuck?! Why would you give him that? You just met him!” Clare asked madly, slapping and smacking Ned wildly as she did so.
“Clare!” The oaf snapped grabbing her hands roughly, “If we were gonna make a deal tonight something could’ve gone down, he’s the biggest. I thought if any of us they’d try and jump him last.”
“Hey guys…” Tangy said apprehensively, poking her head out of the room, “I just tried to text Twig and… my phone has like no bars… either of you getting any service out here?”
Ned scrambled for his phone like he forgot he had it.
“Shit me neither.” He hissed.
“So what now? We go?” Rider asked lackadaisically throwing an arm around Tangy’s shoulders.
“Like hell. You two go that way try to find him… them.” He said barely bothering to correct himself, “Me and Clare will take this half of this shithole.” Ned ordered, pointing his hand down one direction of the hall.
“No way. Those shitheads are probably long gone.” Rider smirked only to choke on his laughter as Ned grabbed him roughly by the t-shirt and practically lifted him off the floor by it.
“I don’t remember asking you a question.” Ned raged before dropping the other young man to the floor with a thud.
Clare would almost have pitied him if she didn’t want to do the same thing to Tangy that Ned just did to Rider. She needed that stash, more than she needed any of them.
Rider picked himself up even as Tangy knelt to help him and he shot one last dirty look Ned’s way before grabbing Tangy’s hand and marching off in the direction Ned told him to. Ned took Clare’s hand and started to march her out of the room as well but then they heard the strange old man coughing behind them.
“Don’t worry so much…” The frail man called, wheezing as he did so, “The snakes will find him…”
Tangy thought she may have been a “good girl” once and if only doing what her parents told her to brought her half as much joy as when Rider actually looked at her she may not have ended up in an abandoned insane asylum on Halloween, feeling like there was something lurking in every shadow just waiting to cut her young wasted life short.
“I wish that damn rattling would stop.” Tangy said clinging to Rider’s coat but the boy had barely said a word since his confrontation with Ned, except for grumbling to himself and stomping his feet.
“How can he talk to me like that? We’ve been friends longer than he’s known that bitch Clare.”
Tangy brightened just a bit upon hearing Rider talk about Clare like that, hoping his wandering eye was just that and nothing he’d ever act on. Denial was something of an art with her, just because a part of her knew he’d cheated on her before doesn’t mean she couldn’t convince herself he was the man of her dreams. Just like how she now was able to convince herself that the rattling had stopped and there wasn’t now a strange hissing accompanying it…
“Rider come here.” She smiled sweetly.
“What?” He said, her change in tone taking him by surprise and managing to catch his attention. She answered by dragging him into a nearby room.
“Let me make you feel better.” She cooed pulling him close and despite how focused he was at being angry, a part of him began to fall for it. He smiled despite himself and leaned in and began nuzzling at her neck, his hand raking its way up her skirt causing her to moan.
“That’s it baby, be loud… drown out that damn hissing.” He laughed but she clutched his hand in a vice, “Ow! What’s up?”
“You mean you hear that too?”
For a moment they just looked at each other, their silence only seeming to increase the wet his that now filled their ears.
“Shit.” Rider smiled after a heated pause, “It’s probably noth---“ But the boy was cut off mid-sentence as green blur came up behind him and before either them knew it a scaly green arm coiled it’s why around his neck pulling him back like a ragdoll.
All Tangy could do was scream.
Clare was just at the point where she felt that no payoff was worth this. She had been traipsing through this Amityville wannabe hospital for what seemed like at least an hour if not more and for what? She needed a better class of accomplice. One that wouldn’t go handing out her livelihood to the first Teutonic lunkhead they meet, one who wasn’t so immature that he stool hung out with his college dropout friends and needed to visit local urban legends to feel like a “big man”.
It was the thought that Danny Boy might be in the very next room they looked in that kept her going, knowing she’d regret it if she didn’t give getting back that supply every chance she could.
“Clare we’ll find him, it’ll be all cool.” Ned was begging now. Rage had subsided a while ago and now he just saw his chance of being with Clare, the girl all the low level criminals wanted but could never get, slipping through his fingers.
“Just shut up.” Clare spat, not looking at him, her phone held up in front of her like a lamplight, “Dan!” She shouted, walking faster head swiveling in every direction save Ned’s.
“Is Dan even his real name?” Ned mumbled before finally getting what he wanted in the worst way: Clare looking at him at last in the form of a furious glare.
“You tell me he’s your friend.”
“I barely know the guy.” Even as the words left Ned’s mouth he knew it was a mistake.
“Know him well enough to give away my stash.” Clare said, just as he knew she would.
“He’s harmless, he didn’t even want to come here.”
“So he knew you were taking us here first but you didn’t think to tell me? This was supposed to be the night for our big deal not your chance to “prove yourself” to some losers.” Clare sighed.
“No he just told me about this place and it sounded fun. I thought we could just be… I don’t know like a real couple. Have some fun, a few laughs, and it is Halloween after all…”
“We are not a couple. You’re the muscle, you got it? You stand there and growl while I sell to your deadbeat friends and we get paid. That’s it.” Clare raged, loudly flinging doors open in her frustration.
Ned was about to respond when instead something in one of the rooms Clare had practically kicked into caught his eye.
“Wait what is that?” He said moving slowly inside, raising his own phone up in front of him. Clare’s better judgement lost out to her need to get what was hers and get out of there so she followed him, hoping it was Danny Boy crying in a corner.
Instead it was something altogether else. In the center of the room which looked to be an examination room, or at least had been at one point, was a hospital table converted with strange science-fiction level equipment and on that slab lay a woman.
She appeared to be about their age, mid 20s give or take, beautiful, wearing only plain white sports bra and briefs. She had pale skin and what seemed to be short bright pink hair. She seemed unconscious or at least asleep and most worrisome of all she was hooked up to those very machines by wires and implants in her shoulders and head.
“Abandoned hospital Ned?” Clare gaped.
“It IS abandoned… what’s she doing here?” The thug responded as they both crept ever closer. Slowly Ned reached out his hand.
“What’re you crazy? Don’t touch her!” Claire shrieked but he had already done so, laying his hand on her thigh.
“She feels cold… but not dead,” He spoke from experience she noted, “And something else…” His words drifted off.
Her curiosity piqued Clare too reached forward, he was right she radiating cold in the same way a normal person’s body would warmth, unnatural but also clearly alive. Like he had said there was also something about her Clare couldn’t put her finger on, something not all together right with her.
Before they could question it further Tangy’s scream rung out, echoing through the silent halls.
“Oh god…” Ned groaned.
“I’ve had it.” Clare said hurriedly, “I’m done. Fuck this. Fuck Danny Boy and fuck you, I’m out of here.” She took off out of the room, Ned close at her heels.
“Wait! We’ll get it back!” But even as he shouted after her she heard him trip and fall with a thud. She sighed and whipped around, illuminating the corridor with her phone only to drop it with a crash as she saw what he had stumbled over… the largest snake, the largest animal of any kind really, she had ever seen… eating what was left of Twig.
Sheer horror was painted on their shock white faces as they slowly tried to both back away and keep from vomiting. Out of abject terror alone they wildly clung to each other’s hands despite the fact that at this point they may not have even remembered the other one was there: the only thing in their sight and minds was the dead milky eyes of Twig, his head lolled back as his torso slowly disappeared down the serpent’s maw.
Tangy was running for her life. It wasn’t even a conscious choice really, fight or flight never even being a contest for her. She ran the moment she was able to register what had just happened to Rider, the sight of him, eyes pleading, arms reaching out for her as that reptilian man-beast dragged him back, would surely haunt her the rest of her days. Though right now… she wasn’t sure she had many more of those.
Holding her phone up in front of her as a she madly crashed through the dark halls, she was as much in danger of injuring herself as she was of snake-like monsters coming out of the shadows to devour her. She tried to focus on her own heavy breathing and not that perpetual rattling noise nor the memory of that wet slurping sound the creature made as it made fast work of Rider.
She was trying to remember which direction they had come from originally but she kept getting turned around. Every time she thought she had it right, she’d just find herself back where she started again. The twists and turns only increasing her panic, causing her breathing to quicken all the more and her mind to race faster than she could possibly hope to match.
She stumbled her way through a series of doors and before she knew it; she spotted a soft glow ahead. At first she mistook it for the light from her phone but as she neared she saw it was coming from under a door: Clare and Ned? She hoped.
She crept closer and tried to listen for their voices, instead hearing the sound of a woman singing. A low gently lullaby it sounded like.
She tried to open the door as quietly as possible, inching it open at a snail’s pace trying to avoid making any sound. When she was finally able to peak through, she saw steam and more overgrown brush, like in that first room they saw, but here it was clearly intentional: it frankly looked landscaped. Some sort of arboretum that got out of hand? The tropical foliage gave wave to more steam and as Tangy’s eyes focused she saw a figure at its center, bating in some sort of artificial hot spring.
It was a woman, a stunningly beautiful woman in her early thirties Tangy would guess, pink supple skin, a body both curved and athletic, long wavy auburn hair and the greenest eyes. Tangy considered herself straight but the sight of the naked woman had even her flummoxed. To the point where even when Tangy realized the woman could see her she didn’t run.
A soft grin grew on the strange woman’s comely face and with one hand she beckoned Tangy towards the pool. Some part of the girl knew she should run but this thought occurred to her only as she realized she was already walking towards the woman.
“Aren’t you a sprite young thing?” The godiva cooed rhetorically, laying a warm most hand on Tangy’s forearm.
Tangy’s eyes moved dreamily to the water as she noticed movement in her peripheral vision, such was her trance-like state that she barely registered what she was seeing… the pool was filled with living snakes. They wound and coursed through the water, circling the strange woman like a dance.
Her attention drawn to snakes beneath the surface she barely noticed how the woman’s gently caress of her arm had progressed to a grip as she pulled Tangy into the water…
Clare was still pulling forward even as Ned fell back winded. With a grunt she turned and tried to pull him forward, only for him to lurch to the floor nearly dragging her with him.
“Fuck it.” She spat, “If you don’t get up right now: I’m leaving without you.”
“Give me a fucking second alright?” Ned coughed as he pulled himself to his feet, “Shit.” He exclaimed as he lifted his phone, “No... no... My phone’s dead! Shit!!!”
“That’s just fucking great.” Clare sighed, now having that on her conscience if she tried to leave him behind. Not that she had much in the way of a conscience but it might bleat at her a tad if she added the image of her accomplice and sometimes lover being eaten alive by mutant snakes to her subconscious.
The two just stared for moment, Ned pressed against a wall like he might collapse and Clare leaning forward on her knees like she was trying to rally herself to sprint for the nearest exit. Just their panting and that infernal rattle filling their ears.
Clare took her own phone back out and shined the light back and forth trying to get a better read on their surroundings but she couldn’t get herself to even think straight. Her mind swimming.
“Can you stop wheezing?!” She snapped whipping towards Ned, “I gotta focus.”
“Clare…” Ned started but the girl wouldn’t let him finish.
“Christ Ned… Maybe I should. You are useless. We wouldn’t even be in this situation if you didn’t go around acting like you had something to prove!” She rambled.
“Clare!” Ned repeated, louder and grabbing her shoulders.
“What?!” She yelped, surprised at his sudden burst of energy.
“Turn your phone back that way.” He whispered with gritted teeth, eyes wide like saucers, pointing at where she had flashed her phone’s light just a few minutes ago, “I thought I saw something…”
Clare, still a bit taken aback, complied and turned back to the adjoining hallway a hit the flashlight feature on her phone once more. With a bright burst of light their eyes averted for just a second before returning quickly to the sight of a hulking reptilian humanoid creature, dripping with blood, heaving as it stared at them down.
“What…” Clare started but was cut off as the beast broke into a run from a standing start. She felt her muscles freeze up, even as she attempted to run, the internal conflict causing her to fall forward just as Ned had done mere moments prior. The irony completely lost on Clare however as she tried to crawl to her feet.
She heard a gnashing sound behind her and even as she turned to look a blur of motion blocked her sight.
“ARGGGH!!!!” Ned screamed gutturally as he threw himself on the beast, “Clare run!” He shouted back even as the monster appeared bite down on his arm to the point where it appeared he tore it clean off in a single stroke. Blood pouring out like a fountain.
Clare ran.
The entire time she felt like it was right behind her, whether it was or wasn’t. She felt its hot breath if only in her mind.
The pain in her legs only seemed to push her faster as adrenaline took over and she began knocking into different rooms and around hallways at a breakneck speed, trying to put as much as she could between her and that thing.
She felt tear streaming down her face but she put that thought aside, being weak wouldn’t help anything now. Ned was gone, she’d have to be her own muscle.
When her vision misted up she assumed it was just the crying getting worse but she soon realized that she’d stumbled into something. Her view blocked by what appeared to be a gigantic leaf she moved it aside to reveal glowing sanctuary. She almost wished she was dreaming… or that she was dead already but it was quite real.
The greenery around her belied the still present rattle in the air and the eerie energy running through the scene.
“Clare.” The voice took her by surprise. It was Tangy. She stood smiling in the middle of a faux-natural pool, steam framing her seemingly content face, “There you are.”
Clare stepped towards the curly haired girl warily.
“What are you doing here?” Clare said looking around, expecting something to jump out of the shadowy brush.
“It’s so lovely right?” Tangy said dreamily.
“Where’s Rider?” She asked softly as she stepped forward again, right to the edge of the water.
“He left, what a loser.” Tangy laughed, “Couldn’t take it. It’s just a bunch of cheap scares.”
“No… no it’s not. I’ve seen… Ned and Twig they’re dead… I mean I think Ned’s dead… I don’t know… There was a creature.” Clare sputtered, the tears flowing faster. Tangy held out her arms and to her own surprise Clare fell into them, burying her head into Tangy’s neck.
“It’s alright… It’s what we deserve.”
This caused her head to shoot up, even though she still remained in the other woman’s embrace. She was about to question her as to her meaning when she locked eyes with a figure just behind her… the naked woman who just stared ahead smiling… seemingly mouthing along to Tangy’s words.
There was something haunting about this woman, this vision in the mist. Her nudity was unearthly, the steam seeming to create a glow about her. Her eyes were sharp through the mist though… and predatory.
Clare struggled to move away from her brainwashed acquaintance and in doing so found herself looking below into the water: there were snakes. Not just some but seemingly tons of them, they swarmed around Tangy’s legs… they bit into her, even as she stood smiling calmly… they were eating her alive.
Clare pushed Tangy back but the girl held on.
“Just give in Clare…. We deserve it…” Tangy said in a zombie-like fashion, one of the serpents in the water now beginning to wind its way up her leg.
Clare fought back the urge the retch and instead slammed her face forward, headbutting the other girl. Dizzily watching as she crumpled into the spring and the snakes now overwhelming her. Clare stumbled back into the grass and to her horror he snakes rose up like a wave and broke the hot springs banks and slithered on to the ground, coming straight for her.
She scrambled to her feet and turned to run when standing smack dab in her way was none other than Danny Boy: alive and well and seemingly unharmed, holding perhaps the biggest gun Clare had ever seen and she’d seen her fair share.
“Hello Clare.” He smiled.
“Danny Boy?”
“That’s what my momma used to call me. Right ma?” He smiled.
“You’ll always be my Danny Boy no matter how old you get.” A strange female voice rang out, presumably from the bathing maiden in the pool.
Clare held up her arms in surrender, trying to think.
“I don’t… I mean… Danny Boy you… you don’t want to do anything you can’t take back here…” She sputtered.
“Don’t going playing that game with me. I still got a baggie of your prize product in my back pocket bitch, I know exactly where you were going with it too. Halloween huh? Handing tricks to the little kids? Don’t try to pretend you’re anything other than a monster too…” He whistled and with his free hand lowered a mask onto his face, it resembled a skull.
Clare’s face transformed into a scowl. Red heat taking the place of white fear. If she was gonna die, she wasn’t going out simpering like some mark.
“I’ve never hidden what I am… I make a living. I get by at any cost. But this? This is sick… what are you people?”
Daniel DuBois raised the gun.
“A higher class of evil.” And with the bang of the shot as his punctuation mark the snakes speeding their way under Clare’s feet had their second meal.
A soft clapping came from the greenery and Ophiuchus and his bride, Queen Cobra revealed themselves. They wore less armor than the others were used to, instead softer cloaks with their arms exposed. They were flanked by their former Hydra troops per usual.
“How positively bourgeois and yet entertaining this all was for All Hallows faire.” Queen Cobra chortled, “Dear Diamondback will be sorry she slept through it.”
“We at least proved that alarm system Monica made from old Rattler’s dismembered tail works like a charm,” Ophiuchus grinned through his pearly whites, “By the way can someone shut that fucking thing off?” He asked with a laugh to one of the goons at his back, who relayed this into his intercom and almost immediately the ever present rattling noise ceased and the lights in the whole hospital went on.
“Sligguth must still be off… finishing his meal.” Queen Cobra said her nose scrunching up ever so slightly.
“It was fun.” Daniel murmured, hoisting his rifle over his shoulder like a teen heartthrob might do a skateboard.
“Fun is a luxury however,” His mother Princess Python chastened lightly as she exited the pool, having found a loose green strap of cloth to cover herself in, “Better get it out of your system now before the real work begins.”
As she said this her giant pet slithered through the grass, passing its more naturally sized cousins, to wind its way around the Princess, it’s mouth still a bit bloody as it licked at her face affectionately.
“Ah yes.” Ophiuchus said warmly, “For in ancient times this time of year was known as Samhain. A festival where death was viewed not as a threat but as a great change that swept through the land,” He walked up to Clare’s corpse before looking back to his ‘family’, “A blessing that ushered in the new.”
Clare Bidding was not what you would call a cautious person. The woman, a buxom blonde in her late 20s, still dressed as if she were a great deal younger. Teen trends, in fashions, bubblegum pink bra sticking out under her flimsy shirt for all to see. She had to look the part you see, if you look too old or responsible: they won’t buy from you.
Tonight was her night off however, or it should have been till one of the greatest finds of her so called career landed in her lap, so instead she was here on Calvary Bluff with Ned and some of his stoner friends.
She’d complain more but she did manage to make a decent sale to some nervous little stick figure of a boy they others just called Twig. Nicknames, particularly demeaning ones were big with this group and telling sign of that was that Ned with the only one without one. The big bully could dish it out but he couldn’t take it.
Clare poked fun but Ned was a hoot sometimes and she occasionally enjoyed the security he offered so she suffered his stupidity and terrible taste in friends/victims. Tonight though he had her future quite literally in his hands (as they were a bit surrounded she felt it may be safer to leave it with him and she was regretting that more and more with each passing moment) and as such she had been forced to endure a lot more than she usually would have put up with, making her feel like she had more in common with poor Twig that she would like to think.
Not helping was that despite her trademark carefree demeanor there was a shiver running up her spine that she just couldn’t shake. Though… it was October 31st after all…
“Ned… why are we all the way out here?” Clare asked chugging down from a beer handed to her by some tall blonde hunk: ‘Danny Boy’ the others called him. She found him a nice distraction, looking at the younger man (or more specifically his exposed abs) in a way that made Ned wish he hadn’t brought the big lunk along.
“Because,” The aforementioned Ned said forcefully, cutting in-between Clare and Danny Boy, “We’re planning a little Halloween adventure.” Ned finished pulling her towards the edge of the bluff and pointing out, there in the distance was a dilapidated old building, huge and foreboding surrounded by marsh.
“What’s that?” A short ethnically ambiguous dark-haired kid named Rider asked, another of Ned’s toker friends, now sharing a leering look at Clare with good old Danny Boy, even as his loud girlfriend tried to get the short man’s attention.
“It used be a nut hatch.” Ned snickered, “An asylum, they’d lock up maniacs and mad dog killers and electroshock ‘em or chop up their brains like that.” Ned emphasized with a snap of his fingers, “Been empty for decades, ‘cept for the frogs and snakes that is,” He laughed darkly, “but every now and then people hear things… voices… and every now and then… blood curdling screams.” Ned finished just as Rider and his girlfriend, Tangy, jumped up behind Clare causing her to shout much to the laughter of all.
“We’re going in?” Rider asked excitedly as Clare caught her breath.
“Now, now fuckwad,” Clare spat angrily, “I never agreed to that.”
“I thought you wanted to make some kind of deal?” Tangy laughed, teasing her frizzy hair.
“Yeah but…”
“It’ll be no big deal, I’m just playing with yeah. The worst things down in that marsh are some garter snakes like I said and probably some cracked out ducks.” Ned said cutting his would-be girlfriend off, “Come on, let’s go. Danny Boy you aint chickening out.” Ned shouted back to tall blonde who lingered near the back of the group, giving Clare a moment to think without Ned watching her, “Don’t make me regret inviting you.” The lead man finished.
“Snakes?” The word was so meek it seemed odd coming out of the mouth of Danny Boy who looked like he’d be at home swinging a hammer with the Avengers, after a sharp look from Ned though his face hardened, “No, I’m fine, I’m coming.” The gigantic young man said finally much to Clare disappointment, had he opted out she could have used that as her excuse, instead she looked to Twig as her last option to weasel out of this pointless charade.
“What about you kid? I’ll stay out here with you if you want.” She tried to sound reassuring but the way Ned flared his eyes at first her and then Twig she realized it had backfired.
“No thanks.” Twig meeped under Ned’s furious glare and trodded along with the group.
Thus reluctantly she let Ned pull her along as they descended from the Bluff to the swamp below towards the former hospital, the place abandoned it nonetheless seemed alive with shadows dancing… perhaps only in the wilds of Clare imagination.
The place rattled, not just in the way old houses do but an actual nails on the chalkboard like rattle that seemed to be coming from the very walls. The six of them clung in a small clump as they slowly made their way with only the light of their phones to guide them.
“This is creepy as fuck.” Tangy squealed delightedly, holding on to Rider’s arm even as the olive skinned boy still watched Clare perversely.
“Guys quiet I hear something.” Ned demanded urging them down one of the wings, towards what must have been a patient’s room at one time. It still looked like a hospital room but it had been allowed to be overrun by plant life either leaking in from the marsh outside or perhaps even grown out from forgotten succulents abandoned with the rest of the hospital however many years ago.
They were so taken aback by the greens languidly growing from the walls that they almost failed to even notice that there was someone in one of the beds.
“What the fuck…” Claire whispered under her breath seeing him first, the others following her line of sight to the elderly man.
“Holy shit!” Twig spat, jumping back, looking like he might wet himself.
“Christ…” Rider sighed with a sick grin, “There’s actually some freak in here still?”
The person, a man, was elderly and shaking. His withered skin pale and his eyes haunted… he stared right at them and yet Clare was quite sure that he didn’t seem know what he was looking at never mind where he was.
“Do you think he’s one of the patients? Did he just stay here?” Tangy asked, mouth agape.
“Don’t be an idiot.” Rider snapped, “He’d be dead by now this place hasn’t been up and running since the ‘60s. He’s probably some kind of homeless loser who just crawled in here to die.” The boy laughed.
Even as the others peered closer to the mysterious old man, Clare tried to decide whether or not to make a break for it. Things were getting a little too crazy, even for her, but she needed what Ned had to make it to her next meal.
“Death is just around the corner.” The old man said, laughing himself, “It always has been ever since they came into my life. Into my mind.” He rattled on to himself.
“Who?” Ned said looking around.
“The snakes.” The old man said as if it were obvious, in a tone as if Ned were a moron.
“What the hell?! What does that mean?” Tangy gasped.
“Heh he IS a madman, don’t freak out Danny… boy?” Ned said turning to the quiet young man before finding that he was no longer towering just behind them, in fact he and Twig were both gone, “Hey! DB?! Danny?! Where’d you go?” Ned yelled animatedly running back into the hallway but the two young men were nowhere to be found.
“He’s gone…” Ned said quietly stepping back into the room.
“The little pansies must have run off.” Rider laughed.
“Shut the fuck up!” Ned snapped, causing the darker skinned boy to pale and sheepishly back up.
“Ned stop freaking out.” Clare demanded only for her erstwhile lover to grab her roughly by the wrist and pull her back into the hallway.
“Danny Boy’s got the stash.” Ned whispered furiously. Clare nearly fainted at the words.
“What the fuck?! Why would you give him that? You just met him!” Clare asked madly, slapping and smacking Ned wildly as she did so.
“Clare!” The oaf snapped grabbing her hands roughly, “If we were gonna make a deal tonight something could’ve gone down, he’s the biggest. I thought if any of us they’d try and jump him last.”
“Hey guys…” Tangy said apprehensively, poking her head out of the room, “I just tried to text Twig and… my phone has like no bars… either of you getting any service out here?”
Ned scrambled for his phone like he forgot he had it.
“Shit me neither.” He hissed.
“So what now? We go?” Rider asked lackadaisically throwing an arm around Tangy’s shoulders.
“Like hell. You two go that way try to find him… them.” He said barely bothering to correct himself, “Me and Clare will take this half of this shithole.” Ned ordered, pointing his hand down one direction of the hall.
“No way. Those shitheads are probably long gone.” Rider smirked only to choke on his laughter as Ned grabbed him roughly by the t-shirt and practically lifted him off the floor by it.
“I don’t remember asking you a question.” Ned raged before dropping the other young man to the floor with a thud.
Clare would almost have pitied him if she didn’t want to do the same thing to Tangy that Ned just did to Rider. She needed that stash, more than she needed any of them.
Rider picked himself up even as Tangy knelt to help him and he shot one last dirty look Ned’s way before grabbing Tangy’s hand and marching off in the direction Ned told him to. Ned took Clare’s hand and started to march her out of the room as well but then they heard the strange old man coughing behind them.
“Don’t worry so much…” The frail man called, wheezing as he did so, “The snakes will find him…”
Tangy thought she may have been a “good girl” once and if only doing what her parents told her to brought her half as much joy as when Rider actually looked at her she may not have ended up in an abandoned insane asylum on Halloween, feeling like there was something lurking in every shadow just waiting to cut her young wasted life short.
“I wish that damn rattling would stop.” Tangy said clinging to Rider’s coat but the boy had barely said a word since his confrontation with Ned, except for grumbling to himself and stomping his feet.
“How can he talk to me like that? We’ve been friends longer than he’s known that bitch Clare.”
Tangy brightened just a bit upon hearing Rider talk about Clare like that, hoping his wandering eye was just that and nothing he’d ever act on. Denial was something of an art with her, just because a part of her knew he’d cheated on her before doesn’t mean she couldn’t convince herself he was the man of her dreams. Just like how she now was able to convince herself that the rattling had stopped and there wasn’t now a strange hissing accompanying it…
“Rider come here.” She smiled sweetly.
“What?” He said, her change in tone taking him by surprise and managing to catch his attention. She answered by dragging him into a nearby room.
“Let me make you feel better.” She cooed pulling him close and despite how focused he was at being angry, a part of him began to fall for it. He smiled despite himself and leaned in and began nuzzling at her neck, his hand raking its way up her skirt causing her to moan.
“That’s it baby, be loud… drown out that damn hissing.” He laughed but she clutched his hand in a vice, “Ow! What’s up?”
“You mean you hear that too?”
For a moment they just looked at each other, their silence only seeming to increase the wet his that now filled their ears.
“Shit.” Rider smiled after a heated pause, “It’s probably noth---“ But the boy was cut off mid-sentence as green blur came up behind him and before either them knew it a scaly green arm coiled it’s why around his neck pulling him back like a ragdoll.
All Tangy could do was scream.
Clare was just at the point where she felt that no payoff was worth this. She had been traipsing through this Amityville wannabe hospital for what seemed like at least an hour if not more and for what? She needed a better class of accomplice. One that wouldn’t go handing out her livelihood to the first Teutonic lunkhead they meet, one who wasn’t so immature that he stool hung out with his college dropout friends and needed to visit local urban legends to feel like a “big man”.
It was the thought that Danny Boy might be in the very next room they looked in that kept her going, knowing she’d regret it if she didn’t give getting back that supply every chance she could.
“Clare we’ll find him, it’ll be all cool.” Ned was begging now. Rage had subsided a while ago and now he just saw his chance of being with Clare, the girl all the low level criminals wanted but could never get, slipping through his fingers.
“Just shut up.” Clare spat, not looking at him, her phone held up in front of her like a lamplight, “Dan!” She shouted, walking faster head swiveling in every direction save Ned’s.
“Is Dan even his real name?” Ned mumbled before finally getting what he wanted in the worst way: Clare looking at him at last in the form of a furious glare.
“You tell me he’s your friend.”
“I barely know the guy.” Even as the words left Ned’s mouth he knew it was a mistake.
“Know him well enough to give away my stash.” Clare said, just as he knew she would.
“He’s harmless, he didn’t even want to come here.”
“So he knew you were taking us here first but you didn’t think to tell me? This was supposed to be the night for our big deal not your chance to “prove yourself” to some losers.” Clare sighed.
“No he just told me about this place and it sounded fun. I thought we could just be… I don’t know like a real couple. Have some fun, a few laughs, and it is Halloween after all…”
“We are not a couple. You’re the muscle, you got it? You stand there and growl while I sell to your deadbeat friends and we get paid. That’s it.” Clare raged, loudly flinging doors open in her frustration.
Ned was about to respond when instead something in one of the rooms Clare had practically kicked into caught his eye.
“Wait what is that?” He said moving slowly inside, raising his own phone up in front of him. Clare’s better judgement lost out to her need to get what was hers and get out of there so she followed him, hoping it was Danny Boy crying in a corner.
Instead it was something altogether else. In the center of the room which looked to be an examination room, or at least had been at one point, was a hospital table converted with strange science-fiction level equipment and on that slab lay a woman.
She appeared to be about their age, mid 20s give or take, beautiful, wearing only plain white sports bra and briefs. She had pale skin and what seemed to be short bright pink hair. She seemed unconscious or at least asleep and most worrisome of all she was hooked up to those very machines by wires and implants in her shoulders and head.
“Abandoned hospital Ned?” Clare gaped.
“It IS abandoned… what’s she doing here?” The thug responded as they both crept ever closer. Slowly Ned reached out his hand.
“What’re you crazy? Don’t touch her!” Claire shrieked but he had already done so, laying his hand on her thigh.
“She feels cold… but not dead,” He spoke from experience she noted, “And something else…” His words drifted off.
Her curiosity piqued Clare too reached forward, he was right she radiating cold in the same way a normal person’s body would warmth, unnatural but also clearly alive. Like he had said there was also something about her Clare couldn’t put her finger on, something not all together right with her.
Before they could question it further Tangy’s scream rung out, echoing through the silent halls.
“Oh god…” Ned groaned.
“I’ve had it.” Clare said hurriedly, “I’m done. Fuck this. Fuck Danny Boy and fuck you, I’m out of here.” She took off out of the room, Ned close at her heels.
“Wait! We’ll get it back!” But even as he shouted after her she heard him trip and fall with a thud. She sighed and whipped around, illuminating the corridor with her phone only to drop it with a crash as she saw what he had stumbled over… the largest snake, the largest animal of any kind really, she had ever seen… eating what was left of Twig.
Sheer horror was painted on their shock white faces as they slowly tried to both back away and keep from vomiting. Out of abject terror alone they wildly clung to each other’s hands despite the fact that at this point they may not have even remembered the other one was there: the only thing in their sight and minds was the dead milky eyes of Twig, his head lolled back as his torso slowly disappeared down the serpent’s maw.
Tangy was running for her life. It wasn’t even a conscious choice really, fight or flight never even being a contest for her. She ran the moment she was able to register what had just happened to Rider, the sight of him, eyes pleading, arms reaching out for her as that reptilian man-beast dragged him back, would surely haunt her the rest of her days. Though right now… she wasn’t sure she had many more of those.
Holding her phone up in front of her as a she madly crashed through the dark halls, she was as much in danger of injuring herself as she was of snake-like monsters coming out of the shadows to devour her. She tried to focus on her own heavy breathing and not that perpetual rattling noise nor the memory of that wet slurping sound the creature made as it made fast work of Rider.
She was trying to remember which direction they had come from originally but she kept getting turned around. Every time she thought she had it right, she’d just find herself back where she started again. The twists and turns only increasing her panic, causing her breathing to quicken all the more and her mind to race faster than she could possibly hope to match.
She stumbled her way through a series of doors and before she knew it; she spotted a soft glow ahead. At first she mistook it for the light from her phone but as she neared she saw it was coming from under a door: Clare and Ned? She hoped.
She crept closer and tried to listen for their voices, instead hearing the sound of a woman singing. A low gently lullaby it sounded like.
She tried to open the door as quietly as possible, inching it open at a snail’s pace trying to avoid making any sound. When she was finally able to peak through, she saw steam and more overgrown brush, like in that first room they saw, but here it was clearly intentional: it frankly looked landscaped. Some sort of arboretum that got out of hand? The tropical foliage gave wave to more steam and as Tangy’s eyes focused she saw a figure at its center, bating in some sort of artificial hot spring.
It was a woman, a stunningly beautiful woman in her early thirties Tangy would guess, pink supple skin, a body both curved and athletic, long wavy auburn hair and the greenest eyes. Tangy considered herself straight but the sight of the naked woman had even her flummoxed. To the point where even when Tangy realized the woman could see her she didn’t run.
A soft grin grew on the strange woman’s comely face and with one hand she beckoned Tangy towards the pool. Some part of the girl knew she should run but this thought occurred to her only as she realized she was already walking towards the woman.
“Aren’t you a sprite young thing?” The godiva cooed rhetorically, laying a warm most hand on Tangy’s forearm.
Tangy’s eyes moved dreamily to the water as she noticed movement in her peripheral vision, such was her trance-like state that she barely registered what she was seeing… the pool was filled with living snakes. They wound and coursed through the water, circling the strange woman like a dance.
Her attention drawn to snakes beneath the surface she barely noticed how the woman’s gently caress of her arm had progressed to a grip as she pulled Tangy into the water…
Clare was still pulling forward even as Ned fell back winded. With a grunt she turned and tried to pull him forward, only for him to lurch to the floor nearly dragging her with him.
“Fuck it.” She spat, “If you don’t get up right now: I’m leaving without you.”
“Give me a fucking second alright?” Ned coughed as he pulled himself to his feet, “Shit.” He exclaimed as he lifted his phone, “No... no... My phone’s dead! Shit!!!”
“That’s just fucking great.” Clare sighed, now having that on her conscience if she tried to leave him behind. Not that she had much in the way of a conscience but it might bleat at her a tad if she added the image of her accomplice and sometimes lover being eaten alive by mutant snakes to her subconscious.
The two just stared for moment, Ned pressed against a wall like he might collapse and Clare leaning forward on her knees like she was trying to rally herself to sprint for the nearest exit. Just their panting and that infernal rattle filling their ears.
Clare took her own phone back out and shined the light back and forth trying to get a better read on their surroundings but she couldn’t get herself to even think straight. Her mind swimming.
“Can you stop wheezing?!” She snapped whipping towards Ned, “I gotta focus.”
“Clare…” Ned started but the girl wouldn’t let him finish.
“Christ Ned… Maybe I should. You are useless. We wouldn’t even be in this situation if you didn’t go around acting like you had something to prove!” She rambled.
“Clare!” Ned repeated, louder and grabbing her shoulders.
“What?!” She yelped, surprised at his sudden burst of energy.
“Turn your phone back that way.” He whispered with gritted teeth, eyes wide like saucers, pointing at where she had flashed her phone’s light just a few minutes ago, “I thought I saw something…”
Clare, still a bit taken aback, complied and turned back to the adjoining hallway a hit the flashlight feature on her phone once more. With a bright burst of light their eyes averted for just a second before returning quickly to the sight of a hulking reptilian humanoid creature, dripping with blood, heaving as it stared at them down.
“What…” Clare started but was cut off as the beast broke into a run from a standing start. She felt her muscles freeze up, even as she attempted to run, the internal conflict causing her to fall forward just as Ned had done mere moments prior. The irony completely lost on Clare however as she tried to crawl to her feet.
She heard a gnashing sound behind her and even as she turned to look a blur of motion blocked her sight.
“ARGGGH!!!!” Ned screamed gutturally as he threw himself on the beast, “Clare run!” He shouted back even as the monster appeared bite down on his arm to the point where it appeared he tore it clean off in a single stroke. Blood pouring out like a fountain.
Clare ran.
The entire time she felt like it was right behind her, whether it was or wasn’t. She felt its hot breath if only in her mind.
The pain in her legs only seemed to push her faster as adrenaline took over and she began knocking into different rooms and around hallways at a breakneck speed, trying to put as much as she could between her and that thing.
She felt tear streaming down her face but she put that thought aside, being weak wouldn’t help anything now. Ned was gone, she’d have to be her own muscle.
When her vision misted up she assumed it was just the crying getting worse but she soon realized that she’d stumbled into something. Her view blocked by what appeared to be a gigantic leaf she moved it aside to reveal glowing sanctuary. She almost wished she was dreaming… or that she was dead already but it was quite real.
The greenery around her belied the still present rattle in the air and the eerie energy running through the scene.
“Clare.” The voice took her by surprise. It was Tangy. She stood smiling in the middle of a faux-natural pool, steam framing her seemingly content face, “There you are.”
Clare stepped towards the curly haired girl warily.
“What are you doing here?” Clare said looking around, expecting something to jump out of the shadowy brush.
“It’s so lovely right?” Tangy said dreamily.
“Where’s Rider?” She asked softly as she stepped forward again, right to the edge of the water.
“He left, what a loser.” Tangy laughed, “Couldn’t take it. It’s just a bunch of cheap scares.”
“No… no it’s not. I’ve seen… Ned and Twig they’re dead… I mean I think Ned’s dead… I don’t know… There was a creature.” Clare sputtered, the tears flowing faster. Tangy held out her arms and to her own surprise Clare fell into them, burying her head into Tangy’s neck.
“It’s alright… It’s what we deserve.”
This caused her head to shoot up, even though she still remained in the other woman’s embrace. She was about to question her as to her meaning when she locked eyes with a figure just behind her… the naked woman who just stared ahead smiling… seemingly mouthing along to Tangy’s words.
There was something haunting about this woman, this vision in the mist. Her nudity was unearthly, the steam seeming to create a glow about her. Her eyes were sharp through the mist though… and predatory.
Clare struggled to move away from her brainwashed acquaintance and in doing so found herself looking below into the water: there were snakes. Not just some but seemingly tons of them, they swarmed around Tangy’s legs… they bit into her, even as she stood smiling calmly… they were eating her alive.
Clare pushed Tangy back but the girl held on.
“Just give in Clare…. We deserve it…” Tangy said in a zombie-like fashion, one of the serpents in the water now beginning to wind its way up her leg.
Clare fought back the urge the retch and instead slammed her face forward, headbutting the other girl. Dizzily watching as she crumpled into the spring and the snakes now overwhelming her. Clare stumbled back into the grass and to her horror he snakes rose up like a wave and broke the hot springs banks and slithered on to the ground, coming straight for her.
She scrambled to her feet and turned to run when standing smack dab in her way was none other than Danny Boy: alive and well and seemingly unharmed, holding perhaps the biggest gun Clare had ever seen and she’d seen her fair share.
“Hello Clare.” He smiled.
“Danny Boy?”
“That’s what my momma used to call me. Right ma?” He smiled.
“You’ll always be my Danny Boy no matter how old you get.” A strange female voice rang out, presumably from the bathing maiden in the pool.
Clare held up her arms in surrender, trying to think.
“I don’t… I mean… Danny Boy you… you don’t want to do anything you can’t take back here…” She sputtered.
“Don’t going playing that game with me. I still got a baggie of your prize product in my back pocket bitch, I know exactly where you were going with it too. Halloween huh? Handing tricks to the little kids? Don’t try to pretend you’re anything other than a monster too…” He whistled and with his free hand lowered a mask onto his face, it resembled a skull.
Clare’s face transformed into a scowl. Red heat taking the place of white fear. If she was gonna die, she wasn’t going out simpering like some mark.
“I’ve never hidden what I am… I make a living. I get by at any cost. But this? This is sick… what are you people?”
Daniel DuBois raised the gun.
“A higher class of evil.” And with the bang of the shot as his punctuation mark the snakes speeding their way under Clare’s feet had their second meal.
A soft clapping came from the greenery and Ophiuchus and his bride, Queen Cobra revealed themselves. They wore less armor than the others were used to, instead softer cloaks with their arms exposed. They were flanked by their former Hydra troops per usual.
“How positively bourgeois and yet entertaining this all was for All Hallows faire.” Queen Cobra chortled, “Dear Diamondback will be sorry she slept through it.”
“We at least proved that alarm system Monica made from old Rattler’s dismembered tail works like a charm,” Ophiuchus grinned through his pearly whites, “By the way can someone shut that fucking thing off?” He asked with a laugh to one of the goons at his back, who relayed this into his intercom and almost immediately the ever present rattling noise ceased and the lights in the whole hospital went on.
“Sligguth must still be off… finishing his meal.” Queen Cobra said her nose scrunching up ever so slightly.
“It was fun.” Daniel murmured, hoisting his rifle over his shoulder like a teen heartthrob might do a skateboard.
“Fun is a luxury however,” His mother Princess Python chastened lightly as she exited the pool, having found a loose green strap of cloth to cover herself in, “Better get it out of your system now before the real work begins.”
As she said this her giant pet slithered through the grass, passing its more naturally sized cousins, to wind its way around the Princess, it’s mouth still a bit bloody as it licked at her face affectionately.
“Ah yes.” Ophiuchus said warmly, “For in ancient times this time of year was known as Samhain. A festival where death was viewed not as a threat but as a great change that swept through the land,” He walked up to Clare’s corpse before looking back to his ‘family’, “A blessing that ushered in the new.”
By Gavin McMahon
CENTRAL PARK
NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK
She loved New York.
Not simply because of the mysticism that she could feel charging through her bones with every step she took but for the fact that she, even dressed in vibrant scarlet as she was, could so easily feel lost and at peace in the crowds that stumbled through the concrete jungle, too focused on their own existence to see the world around them as it truly was. Wanda Maximoff had had her fair share of celebrity, maybe more so, during her time as the Scarlet Witch. She’d served prominently on many iterations of the Avengers, but that chapter of her life seemed to be closed once again, at least for now. In the absence of loud and often brash personalities, particularly her brother Pietro’s which had guided her for years, Wanda had come to see her existence anew. For most her life, the Transian had been coddled and shielded from the darkness, even as she had faced it head on. Finally freed to live on her own terms, Wanda found strength that she had never known existed because, until now, no-one had allowed her too.
Turning from the beaten path, the mutant sorceress made her way through the blooming bush rows and high-arching trees until she came to the ornate bridge, unoccupied and peaceful. She drew the scarlet shawl tighter across her shoulders as the autumnal breeze shivered across her porcelain skin. It had been remarked by many throughout her time as a heroine that superhuman women were amongst the most beautiful. Wanda had always found that train of thought to be peculiar, misogynistic even. Her male cohorts were viewed almost exclusively by their traits, skills of physicality that made them admired. Wanda had known no such reaction as an Avenger. Instead, articles had focused on her costume or her physique, neither of which she considered to be her most interesting quality.
It was true, Wanda was unparalleled amongst most women. Although, the Transian was able to spot her flaws more acutely than others. At twenty-seven years of age, Wanda remained svelte with a slight musculature earned through her years of rigorous battles. Her battle style wasn’t physical and so she’d retained her femininity. Even now, dressed in hues of scarlet and waltzing through Central Park as midnight approached, Wanda exposed her body for the world to see. She was out of her costume, finding it thankless for the mission she’d undertaken, and wearing shorts and a sports bra, swaddling her body in a luxurious silk shawl. Chestnut coloured hair spiralled freely across her shoulders to the bottom of her spine, unkempt enough to be viewed as something out of the ordinary, something wild. That was, had anyone been around to look. It brought a smile to her cherry-red lips, so often she’d concerned herself with being refined, being cautious, and too often she’d lost her way.
Magic wasn’t careful, it was scarcely to be controlled. Born a mutant, to the megalomaniacal Magneto, Wanda’s power had once been simply to channel bolts of energy – she’d dubbed them “hex bolts”. In the years since, under the tutelage of the mistress of the arcane known as Agatha Harkness, Wanda had been allowed to flourish. Simple hex bolts had been transformed into glorious displays of chaos magic, energy that had been present at first sunrise on a hostile earth or perhaps even longer. In truth, there was still much to learn, and she had never fully managed to distance herself from the mentorship of Agatha. Wanda believed the old woman kept tabs on her, worried that her often fragile state of mind would one day lead to the collapse of the universe. It was a thought that caused her to shudder more than any cold wind could.
Wanda had found herself in her traditional worship during the festival of Samhain, the ancient pagan holiday that had been stripped of value and commercialised across the world as Hallowe’en. She knew there was no need for her propitiation to the Aos Sí, Wanda needed no crops yielding, but Agatha had taught her the importance of tradition even when they seemed distant. If she had once identified herself as a mutant, she now knew that she was a witch. As she’d made her offerings of bread and honeyed milk to the fair folk of the Emerald Isle across the sea, Wanda had been overcome by a sense that all was not right in New York. It was more than the usual ill-feeling that etched across a person’s skin as they rushed through the darkness, it was darkness. Completing the ritual in a hastened fashion, Wanda turned to another tradition and allowed the energies inside her to search for the cause of her discomfort.
Although she seemed to stand innocently beneath the trees, watching the bridge with mild curiosity, Wanda was on the hunt.
Her mind drifted from her task to the moments she’d spent staring into the silvery liquids of the scrying bowl, fingers delicately imbuing the arcane tool with crimson, chaos energy that swirled and burst to life. Anyone stood at her shoulder would’ve seen nothing more than two colours swirling and mixing through one another. It took the eye of a witch to discern the truths revealed in scrying. As she looked around her, lips pursed and pouting, Wanda was amazed that it looked exactly as she’d foresaw. There remained an air of amazement when she utilised magic, she wasn’t sure she would ever lose the sense of accomplishment and pride that followed a well-done spell. Clearing her throat, the former Avenger stepped forward and smiled coyly as she leant to the side, peeking beneath the grey-bricked bridge and the water than ran through it.
“Isn’t it a little on the nose, dark one, to be hiding beneath bridges in wait of children?” her rasping words were teasing, forcing a familiarity she knew she didn’t have, but they were laced with the bewitching remnants of her Eastern European accent. It had faded but she clung to the last of it, it was her identity and the life she’d once had.
For moments it seemed like there would be no change, that the idyllic scene would remain just as it was, but then she noticed a clawing hand gripping the underneath of the bridge as the creature pulled itself into view. It was exactly as her scrying had foretold. At five feet eight inches, Wanda wasn’t particularly tall, but the creature towered above her by at least another two feet. Shadow seemed to seep from the creature, spilling into the river that slithered around its feet, and revealed the scarred flesh that was slightly pinker than she’d seen. Bone ridges jutted from its upper arms to its elbows and crowned the demon’s head. He was hunched forward, an attempt to appear menacing towards her, but Wanda wasn’t intimidated.
She had faced demons before, both internal and external, and Wanda had proven herself to be steelier than she appeared.
Wanda tilted her head. “Just because the veil between our worlds has weakened, does not mean that we should pass through. No good can from this. I’m sure you understand that.”
He growled but remained unmoving.
“Really, you’re lucky it’s me that found you. Elsa Bloodstone would have sent you back to Hell in pieces. Believe me. She’s always loved Samhain and the hunt that it brings.”
It laughed, or that was how it seemed to the witch. The sound was a low, guttural noise that erupted from the pit of its bulging stomach.
Wanda was used to being underestimated. It was so consistent that she almost relied upon it. The demon scooped some water from the river, allowing it to sieve through its fingers until it exposed several gold silkworms. It devoured them before it spoke.
“You speak to me as an equal, little witch. You are far from that. I am a demon, the scourge of hell, and I will not cower before any waif of this mortal realm. I will devour your heart and the hearts of all like you. I have no fear.”
“I was once told by a very wise man,” she stated, her lips curling into a smile as she thought of her adoptive father, Django. “Fear is not something to ignore, to cower from, it’s to be embraced. Fear guides us in a way that courage cannot, it lets us see the world as it really is and not as we wish it was. You are wrong to feel no fear. I do not want to fight you. If you cannot return to hell, then I will send you. You need only remain there.”
Again, the guttural noise echoed. “Puny peasant. A half-breed witchling who controls none of the power to follow through on her bluster. I am bored of you. I will not deign your self-righteousness with further response.”
It stepped forward.
“I read once in one grimoire or the other, that the true control of a demon is in its name. I know you, even if you don’t sense my power, I know,” Wanda shrugged. “Chadoe.”
The demon found reason to pause as its name, ancient and oft forgotten, slipped from her sorcerous tongue. Wanda was perplexed for a moment; the creature had seemed ready to strike but was now frozen as if she had spellbound it. There was power in a name but none that she had invoked outright. For all the uncertainty that rushed through her mind, the Scarlet Witch of the Avengers never allowed it to permeate her façade of strength. Confidence was as key as the mastery of mystic arts she’d attained throughout her years of training. As if sensing her tension, Chadoe roared and launched forward angrily.
“If that’s how it is.”
The Scarlet Witch’s eyes burst to life with energy drawn from the realms of chaos as her waving fingers summoned a glowing orb between the palm of her hands. Forcing her hands toward Chadoe, the sorceress released the hex bolt and struck the demon dead centre in his abdomen. He was thrown backward, collapsing to the sound of displaced water, but she knew such a simple spell wouldn’t cause much disruption. Disrobing the shawl, the former Avenger paced towards the water’s edge. Her eyes, still burning with the intensity of new-born sun, focused as she controlled her breathing and accessed the recesses of her mind. Each movement she made was elegant, graceful as a dancer, and appeared to be without strain. With as much raw power as her body housed, Wanda had never felt the need to become a brawler like her teammates.
She’d always relied on something else entirely.
Chadoe was quick to bounce back, once again towering above her and notably more infuriated than before. As it roared, the hellish scent of brimstone permeated the scene and spittle fired haphazardly. Golden energies sprung to life between his clasped claws and he fired, but Scarlet Witch threw out her arms and held the continuous energy beam at bay, at least for now. The demon’s musculature tensed as it poured more of its own life force into the attack and Wanda’s face started to register some of the strain. Her knees felt as if they were about to buckle but she mustered strength from some unknown place in her mind and turned her shield into an explosion that separated them, throwing them both in opposite direction. Water sounded as Chadoe was thrown backwards but Wanda, also flung from the blast, skid across the pathway and straight through a bush.
Her calm and calculating composure seemed to be on the verge of collapse as she stood, walking forcefully towards him with her hands burning with scarlet energies. Rapid thrusts upward cracked and shattered the earth around Chadoe, soil and concrete colliding into it as the demon attempted to bat the projectiles away. Chadoe threw another blast of golden energy but the Scarlet Witch swung her arms, deflecting it straight into a nearby tree that shuddered and groaned as it collapsed under the assault. Narrowing her glistening eyes, Scarlet Witch again turned the earth into her weapon as soil and dirt wrapped around Chadoe. Flinging herself backwards, her spine awkwardly positioned, Wanda threw Chadoe threw the air and the demon landed with a thud behind her.
Spinning, creating hex bolts between her hands, she approached him. “We can stop right now. You can go back to hell and stay there.”
Chadoe spat dirt and autumnal leaves from its mouth, focusing on the witch. “It will take more than that to banish me, witchling.”
“Fine.”
Scarlet Witch thrust the energy at the creature’s abdomen, holding it in place as she whispered ancient enchantments that bounded through her mind. Auric veins lit up across Chadoe’s form as the demon attempted to escape from her grip but, despite the exhaustion quickly registering on her face, Wanda held firm. She pushed harder, her muttering quickened as the stream of scarlet energy erupted. In the explosion, Chadoe made his guttural shriek as Wanda banished him to damnation. Momentarily blinded, the witch failed to see how bone and sinew snapped under her blast and, when all that remained before her was a deep chasm, she gave a sigh of relief. She’d been successful, at least for now. Chadoe would be bound by her spell until the sun rose and the veil between worlds was once again able to defend against invading forces.
However, she knew that Chadoe was one of many. She’d seen it when she’d been scrying for the ancient evil that lurked in New York. Chadoe had been much like herself, an individual gifted in the mystic arts but, unlike Wanda, he – for he had once been a man – had allowed himself to be seduced by the raw power of black magic. Displeasing his God, the mighty Eshu, he had been banished from the safety of his coven. All that worshipped the dark arts would succumb to them eventually. His tale was a tragic one, grasps for power and control that had transformed him into the grotesque beast before him. Yet, there were many more like him, even in the cold, concrete streets of New York.
And so, now that her worship and sacrifice had concluded for the evening, the witch known as Wanda Maximoff knew that her path that evening was to face the monsters lurking in the shadows, to protect New York.
ARCANE ANECDOTES
I mean, I can’t begin this without thanking Dan Dolan for the opportunity to write the Scarlet Witch, who is without a doubt one of my favourite Marvel characters. This might the first time in years that I’ve written a work that included her, and it appeared in a medium that others can read, rather than half-works that have yet to see completion.
Getting to right this piece, even though its unfortunately a one-and-done, was an amazing bit of wish fulfilment. When I was writing for Marvel Omega, I’d been presented with an opportunity that could have allowed me to write a full series that focused entirely on the Scarlet Witch and the mystical world of Marvel. Unfortunately, none of that came to be for reasons pertaining to the site, and those notes remain languishing in a “shelved” folder on my laptop. Portions of this issue are stripped from the original issue of that series, recalibrated to the Hallowe’en (or Samhain, as Wanda would say) theme of these stories and stripping some of the subplot dimensions that had been introduced during the issue.
Maybe someday I’ll get a chance to bring her to life fully in a series of her own, until then . . .
HAPPY HALLOWE’EN!
(or, BLESSED SAMHAIN!)
Gavin McMahon
October 31, 2018
NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK
She loved New York.
Not simply because of the mysticism that she could feel charging through her bones with every step she took but for the fact that she, even dressed in vibrant scarlet as she was, could so easily feel lost and at peace in the crowds that stumbled through the concrete jungle, too focused on their own existence to see the world around them as it truly was. Wanda Maximoff had had her fair share of celebrity, maybe more so, during her time as the Scarlet Witch. She’d served prominently on many iterations of the Avengers, but that chapter of her life seemed to be closed once again, at least for now. In the absence of loud and often brash personalities, particularly her brother Pietro’s which had guided her for years, Wanda had come to see her existence anew. For most her life, the Transian had been coddled and shielded from the darkness, even as she had faced it head on. Finally freed to live on her own terms, Wanda found strength that she had never known existed because, until now, no-one had allowed her too.
Turning from the beaten path, the mutant sorceress made her way through the blooming bush rows and high-arching trees until she came to the ornate bridge, unoccupied and peaceful. She drew the scarlet shawl tighter across her shoulders as the autumnal breeze shivered across her porcelain skin. It had been remarked by many throughout her time as a heroine that superhuman women were amongst the most beautiful. Wanda had always found that train of thought to be peculiar, misogynistic even. Her male cohorts were viewed almost exclusively by their traits, skills of physicality that made them admired. Wanda had known no such reaction as an Avenger. Instead, articles had focused on her costume or her physique, neither of which she considered to be her most interesting quality.
It was true, Wanda was unparalleled amongst most women. Although, the Transian was able to spot her flaws more acutely than others. At twenty-seven years of age, Wanda remained svelte with a slight musculature earned through her years of rigorous battles. Her battle style wasn’t physical and so she’d retained her femininity. Even now, dressed in hues of scarlet and waltzing through Central Park as midnight approached, Wanda exposed her body for the world to see. She was out of her costume, finding it thankless for the mission she’d undertaken, and wearing shorts and a sports bra, swaddling her body in a luxurious silk shawl. Chestnut coloured hair spiralled freely across her shoulders to the bottom of her spine, unkempt enough to be viewed as something out of the ordinary, something wild. That was, had anyone been around to look. It brought a smile to her cherry-red lips, so often she’d concerned herself with being refined, being cautious, and too often she’d lost her way.
Magic wasn’t careful, it was scarcely to be controlled. Born a mutant, to the megalomaniacal Magneto, Wanda’s power had once been simply to channel bolts of energy – she’d dubbed them “hex bolts”. In the years since, under the tutelage of the mistress of the arcane known as Agatha Harkness, Wanda had been allowed to flourish. Simple hex bolts had been transformed into glorious displays of chaos magic, energy that had been present at first sunrise on a hostile earth or perhaps even longer. In truth, there was still much to learn, and she had never fully managed to distance herself from the mentorship of Agatha. Wanda believed the old woman kept tabs on her, worried that her often fragile state of mind would one day lead to the collapse of the universe. It was a thought that caused her to shudder more than any cold wind could.
Wanda had found herself in her traditional worship during the festival of Samhain, the ancient pagan holiday that had been stripped of value and commercialised across the world as Hallowe’en. She knew there was no need for her propitiation to the Aos Sí, Wanda needed no crops yielding, but Agatha had taught her the importance of tradition even when they seemed distant. If she had once identified herself as a mutant, she now knew that she was a witch. As she’d made her offerings of bread and honeyed milk to the fair folk of the Emerald Isle across the sea, Wanda had been overcome by a sense that all was not right in New York. It was more than the usual ill-feeling that etched across a person’s skin as they rushed through the darkness, it was darkness. Completing the ritual in a hastened fashion, Wanda turned to another tradition and allowed the energies inside her to search for the cause of her discomfort.
Although she seemed to stand innocently beneath the trees, watching the bridge with mild curiosity, Wanda was on the hunt.
Her mind drifted from her task to the moments she’d spent staring into the silvery liquids of the scrying bowl, fingers delicately imbuing the arcane tool with crimson, chaos energy that swirled and burst to life. Anyone stood at her shoulder would’ve seen nothing more than two colours swirling and mixing through one another. It took the eye of a witch to discern the truths revealed in scrying. As she looked around her, lips pursed and pouting, Wanda was amazed that it looked exactly as she’d foresaw. There remained an air of amazement when she utilised magic, she wasn’t sure she would ever lose the sense of accomplishment and pride that followed a well-done spell. Clearing her throat, the former Avenger stepped forward and smiled coyly as she leant to the side, peeking beneath the grey-bricked bridge and the water than ran through it.
“Isn’t it a little on the nose, dark one, to be hiding beneath bridges in wait of children?” her rasping words were teasing, forcing a familiarity she knew she didn’t have, but they were laced with the bewitching remnants of her Eastern European accent. It had faded but she clung to the last of it, it was her identity and the life she’d once had.
For moments it seemed like there would be no change, that the idyllic scene would remain just as it was, but then she noticed a clawing hand gripping the underneath of the bridge as the creature pulled itself into view. It was exactly as her scrying had foretold. At five feet eight inches, Wanda wasn’t particularly tall, but the creature towered above her by at least another two feet. Shadow seemed to seep from the creature, spilling into the river that slithered around its feet, and revealed the scarred flesh that was slightly pinker than she’d seen. Bone ridges jutted from its upper arms to its elbows and crowned the demon’s head. He was hunched forward, an attempt to appear menacing towards her, but Wanda wasn’t intimidated.
She had faced demons before, both internal and external, and Wanda had proven herself to be steelier than she appeared.
Wanda tilted her head. “Just because the veil between our worlds has weakened, does not mean that we should pass through. No good can from this. I’m sure you understand that.”
He growled but remained unmoving.
“Really, you’re lucky it’s me that found you. Elsa Bloodstone would have sent you back to Hell in pieces. Believe me. She’s always loved Samhain and the hunt that it brings.”
It laughed, or that was how it seemed to the witch. The sound was a low, guttural noise that erupted from the pit of its bulging stomach.
Wanda was used to being underestimated. It was so consistent that she almost relied upon it. The demon scooped some water from the river, allowing it to sieve through its fingers until it exposed several gold silkworms. It devoured them before it spoke.
“You speak to me as an equal, little witch. You are far from that. I am a demon, the scourge of hell, and I will not cower before any waif of this mortal realm. I will devour your heart and the hearts of all like you. I have no fear.”
“I was once told by a very wise man,” she stated, her lips curling into a smile as she thought of her adoptive father, Django. “Fear is not something to ignore, to cower from, it’s to be embraced. Fear guides us in a way that courage cannot, it lets us see the world as it really is and not as we wish it was. You are wrong to feel no fear. I do not want to fight you. If you cannot return to hell, then I will send you. You need only remain there.”
Again, the guttural noise echoed. “Puny peasant. A half-breed witchling who controls none of the power to follow through on her bluster. I am bored of you. I will not deign your self-righteousness with further response.”
It stepped forward.
“I read once in one grimoire or the other, that the true control of a demon is in its name. I know you, even if you don’t sense my power, I know,” Wanda shrugged. “Chadoe.”
The demon found reason to pause as its name, ancient and oft forgotten, slipped from her sorcerous tongue. Wanda was perplexed for a moment; the creature had seemed ready to strike but was now frozen as if she had spellbound it. There was power in a name but none that she had invoked outright. For all the uncertainty that rushed through her mind, the Scarlet Witch of the Avengers never allowed it to permeate her façade of strength. Confidence was as key as the mastery of mystic arts she’d attained throughout her years of training. As if sensing her tension, Chadoe roared and launched forward angrily.
“If that’s how it is.”
The Scarlet Witch’s eyes burst to life with energy drawn from the realms of chaos as her waving fingers summoned a glowing orb between the palm of her hands. Forcing her hands toward Chadoe, the sorceress released the hex bolt and struck the demon dead centre in his abdomen. He was thrown backward, collapsing to the sound of displaced water, but she knew such a simple spell wouldn’t cause much disruption. Disrobing the shawl, the former Avenger paced towards the water’s edge. Her eyes, still burning with the intensity of new-born sun, focused as she controlled her breathing and accessed the recesses of her mind. Each movement she made was elegant, graceful as a dancer, and appeared to be without strain. With as much raw power as her body housed, Wanda had never felt the need to become a brawler like her teammates.
She’d always relied on something else entirely.
Chadoe was quick to bounce back, once again towering above her and notably more infuriated than before. As it roared, the hellish scent of brimstone permeated the scene and spittle fired haphazardly. Golden energies sprung to life between his clasped claws and he fired, but Scarlet Witch threw out her arms and held the continuous energy beam at bay, at least for now. The demon’s musculature tensed as it poured more of its own life force into the attack and Wanda’s face started to register some of the strain. Her knees felt as if they were about to buckle but she mustered strength from some unknown place in her mind and turned her shield into an explosion that separated them, throwing them both in opposite direction. Water sounded as Chadoe was thrown backwards but Wanda, also flung from the blast, skid across the pathway and straight through a bush.
Her calm and calculating composure seemed to be on the verge of collapse as she stood, walking forcefully towards him with her hands burning with scarlet energies. Rapid thrusts upward cracked and shattered the earth around Chadoe, soil and concrete colliding into it as the demon attempted to bat the projectiles away. Chadoe threw another blast of golden energy but the Scarlet Witch swung her arms, deflecting it straight into a nearby tree that shuddered and groaned as it collapsed under the assault. Narrowing her glistening eyes, Scarlet Witch again turned the earth into her weapon as soil and dirt wrapped around Chadoe. Flinging herself backwards, her spine awkwardly positioned, Wanda threw Chadoe threw the air and the demon landed with a thud behind her.
Spinning, creating hex bolts between her hands, she approached him. “We can stop right now. You can go back to hell and stay there.”
Chadoe spat dirt and autumnal leaves from its mouth, focusing on the witch. “It will take more than that to banish me, witchling.”
“Fine.”
Scarlet Witch thrust the energy at the creature’s abdomen, holding it in place as she whispered ancient enchantments that bounded through her mind. Auric veins lit up across Chadoe’s form as the demon attempted to escape from her grip but, despite the exhaustion quickly registering on her face, Wanda held firm. She pushed harder, her muttering quickened as the stream of scarlet energy erupted. In the explosion, Chadoe made his guttural shriek as Wanda banished him to damnation. Momentarily blinded, the witch failed to see how bone and sinew snapped under her blast and, when all that remained before her was a deep chasm, she gave a sigh of relief. She’d been successful, at least for now. Chadoe would be bound by her spell until the sun rose and the veil between worlds was once again able to defend against invading forces.
However, she knew that Chadoe was one of many. She’d seen it when she’d been scrying for the ancient evil that lurked in New York. Chadoe had been much like herself, an individual gifted in the mystic arts but, unlike Wanda, he – for he had once been a man – had allowed himself to be seduced by the raw power of black magic. Displeasing his God, the mighty Eshu, he had been banished from the safety of his coven. All that worshipped the dark arts would succumb to them eventually. His tale was a tragic one, grasps for power and control that had transformed him into the grotesque beast before him. Yet, there were many more like him, even in the cold, concrete streets of New York.
And so, now that her worship and sacrifice had concluded for the evening, the witch known as Wanda Maximoff knew that her path that evening was to face the monsters lurking in the shadows, to protect New York.
ARCANE ANECDOTES
I mean, I can’t begin this without thanking Dan Dolan for the opportunity to write the Scarlet Witch, who is without a doubt one of my favourite Marvel characters. This might the first time in years that I’ve written a work that included her, and it appeared in a medium that others can read, rather than half-works that have yet to see completion.
Getting to right this piece, even though its unfortunately a one-and-done, was an amazing bit of wish fulfilment. When I was writing for Marvel Omega, I’d been presented with an opportunity that could have allowed me to write a full series that focused entirely on the Scarlet Witch and the mystical world of Marvel. Unfortunately, none of that came to be for reasons pertaining to the site, and those notes remain languishing in a “shelved” folder on my laptop. Portions of this issue are stripped from the original issue of that series, recalibrated to the Hallowe’en (or Samhain, as Wanda would say) theme of these stories and stripping some of the subplot dimensions that had been introduced during the issue.
Maybe someday I’ll get a chance to bring her to life fully in a series of her own, until then . . .
HAPPY HALLOWE’EN!
(or, BLESSED SAMHAIN!)
Gavin McMahon
October 31, 2018
By Travis Hiltz
Tommy stood on the sidewalk, looking up at the looming old house.
He looked back across the street at his friends.
He couldn’t see their faces, what with the dark and the masks of their costumes, but he could feel the mental waves of ‘Go on, don’t be a chicken!’ coming off of them.
It was his own fault. He knew that Jimmy would get all pissy if anybody made fun of him. They all saw how freaked out he’d been by that old zombie movie, but Austin and Craig were smart enough to just laugh, then shut up.
Tommy had to make a joke.
Which meant he was the one Jimmy challenged to knock on the door of the old Tower House on Halloween.
“This sucks,” Tommy muttered, clutching his plastic shopping bag of candy tighter and pulling the hood of his ghost costume back up over his head.
He pushed open the old wooden gate, which creaked just like it would if this was an old horror movie and he was the stupid kid about to get eaten by a…
“Shut up!” Tommy hissed, hitting the heel of his hand against his forehead. “Stupid imagination…!”
He took a deep breath and stepped through the gate and then took two more steps up the crooked walkway.
Some people said Tower House had been an old hotel. Other people said it had belonged to some old movie actor who got rich way back when movies were all black and white. People also said it used to be a funeral home.
All versions involved somebody going crazy and killing a bunch of people.
Everybody agreed though, that there was a fire and that was why the house looked like a tower, the other parts had burned away.
The path snaked its way up the front yard to the house, tall, dried, neglected grass, and thin gnarled trees crowded in on both sides.
A thin, chill wind made the whole yard look like it was moving.
One of the trees, all bent and leafless held a scarecrow, dressed in tattered, old clothes. Its suit and floppy-brimmed hat were green and the sack that made up its face was yellow. It hung, slack and boneless. It looked heavy, like the rags contained a dead body, rather then straw or leaves.
Tommy walked by it quickly, not looking back to check if its head had really turned to watch him as he went.
He moved so he was on the far side of the walkway. The dried grass made a raspy sound as it brushed against his ghost costume.
Halfway to the house, Tommy stopped, trying to get his breathing under control.
“Almost there,” He whispered to himself. “Just knock, then run like crazy… easy…I hate Jimmy…why’s he such a …?”
Up ahead the grass was pushed apart, revealing a narrow dirt path. From down the path, Tommy could hear a noise, like someone digging.
“Oh, this is stupid,” Tommy breathed, as curiosity moved his feet onto the path. He crept along, staying low enough that the grass would hopefully hide him from…whatever was there.
The path opened up, revealing a clearing, that in the light of the full moon was a…
“Graveyard,” Tommy muttered. “Course, it is…I’m gonna die…I hate Jimmy sooo much…!”
He could see a freshly dug hole in the ground and tiptoed over, knowing how stupid an idea it was to see what was there, but unable to just run away not knowing.
There was a coffin, grey old wood, criss-crossed with chains.
“Oh, that’s bad.”
“Sorry, you’ll have to wait your turn,” A gravelly voice said, behind Tommy. “That one is already full.”
Tommy dropped his bag of candy, but did manage to keep from peeing himself and the little ‘eek’ noise he made, technically wasn’t loud enough to count as ‘screaming like a girl.’
He slowly turned.
The man was wicked tall and thin. His hair was shaggy and matted and his skin looked sickly, almost yellowy-green in the moonlight.
His clothes were ragged and caked with dirt. The hems of his pants were so frayed they almost looked like bell-bottoms.
In one hand he held a shovel.
He squatted down, until he and Tommy were face to face. He didn’t look any healthier close up. His skin was leathery and pulled tight around his skull.
“Huh, you would think you’d already have a grave, wouldn’t you, little ghost?” The man with the shovel rasped thoughtfully. “Misplaced your corpse have you? Too dark to read the writing on the stones? Digger can help find which grave is yours. Dug them all myself. Know them all by heart…and the story that goes with each one…”
“I’m…I’m…I’m…not a ghost!” Tommy finally was able to exclaim, pulling back his white hood. “I’m not dead…!”
“Well, that’s easily fixed,” Digger replied.
Tommy made another ‘eeking’ noise and almost fell to the ground as his knees turned to water.
“No sense of humor,” Digger muttered, catching Tommy under his arm with his free hand and holding him up. “No place for children. Let’s send you on your way.”
“How…uh…how do you …muh-mean that…?” Tommy asked, breathlessly.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Digger replied, absently. ‘Night like this…the walls between the realms are thin…there’ll be monsters on the prowl. Come on.”
The cadaverous caretaker straightened up, slung his shovel over his shoulder and placing a large hand on Tommy’s shoulder, steered him back towards the path.
“How’d you find Digger?” He asked as they made their way back to the paved walkway.
“I just…I just heard you,” Tommy said. “Followed the path…the scarecrow…looked like he was pointing at it…”
“Was he now…?” Digger muttered.
The path seemed longer then it had been leading to the graveyard, but it had to be the same path. It was the only path.
Out in the night, things seemed to be moving. Some were ghostly forms, drifting on the wind, others massive, lumbering along.
They stepped off the dirt path and onto the uneven paving stones of the walkway.
Tommy turned to look up at his creepy guide, expectantly.
Digger leaned down, his own sickly yellow eyes peering into Tommy’s wide blue ones.
“You know the stories, about the Tower?” He asked.
“Um…sorta…some.”
“You believe them?”
“A little, I guess,” Tommy said, thoughtfully. “ I…used to…like ghost stories. Which ones are…uh…true…?”
“All of them.” Digger said, with a grim, thin smile. “You seem full of stories yourself. You tell stories?”
“Sorta,” Tommy shrugged. “ I write them down…my English teacher says she can’t decide if I have a vivid imagination or need to talk to the school counselor.”
He paused, unsure why he was sharing with this person who he was pretty sure might be a serial killer or something just as bad.
“Here,” Digger said, handing him back the plastic bad he’d dropped.
“Um…thanks,” Tommy said accepting it.
“Say the words,” Digger told him.
Somehow, Tommy knew what he meant without having to ask.
“Trick or treat,” He said, opening his bag.
Digger nodded and dropped something into the bag.
“Happy Hallows Eve,” Digger said. “Come again, Thomas Royes.”
Tommy took a few steps down the path, and then turned back.
“How’d you know my name…?”
“Write your stories, and should they bring you back, stay on the path…the walls have crumbled in places, there might be creatures on the loose.”
Tommy ran back to the gate.
Only to find not just his friends, but also his parents and a police car.
His friends had freaked out when after three hours he hadn’t come back.
Tommy stood on the sidewalk, his mom kneeing, crying and hugging him, as his friends gathered around babbling apologies and worried talk.
He looked over his mom’s shoulder, up at the old Tower house and its field of tall, dead grass.
The moon broke through the clouds, and for a brief moment, he saw the scarecrow in the bent tree.
The wind picked up and made it looked like it was slowly waving goodbye.
Digger jabbed the scarecrow with his shovel.
“That’s enough of that,” He grumbled. “You’ve caused enough trouble.”
He sighed and looked down at the departing cars.
The wind made the tree branches wobble and the scarecrow’s stuffing made a crinkling-rustling sound.
“He could be,” Digger muttered thoughtfully in reply. “Something’s coming and we could use all the help we could get.”
To be continued…
He looked back across the street at his friends.
He couldn’t see their faces, what with the dark and the masks of their costumes, but he could feel the mental waves of ‘Go on, don’t be a chicken!’ coming off of them.
It was his own fault. He knew that Jimmy would get all pissy if anybody made fun of him. They all saw how freaked out he’d been by that old zombie movie, but Austin and Craig were smart enough to just laugh, then shut up.
Tommy had to make a joke.
Which meant he was the one Jimmy challenged to knock on the door of the old Tower House on Halloween.
“This sucks,” Tommy muttered, clutching his plastic shopping bag of candy tighter and pulling the hood of his ghost costume back up over his head.
He pushed open the old wooden gate, which creaked just like it would if this was an old horror movie and he was the stupid kid about to get eaten by a…
“Shut up!” Tommy hissed, hitting the heel of his hand against his forehead. “Stupid imagination…!”
He took a deep breath and stepped through the gate and then took two more steps up the crooked walkway.
Some people said Tower House had been an old hotel. Other people said it had belonged to some old movie actor who got rich way back when movies were all black and white. People also said it used to be a funeral home.
All versions involved somebody going crazy and killing a bunch of people.
Everybody agreed though, that there was a fire and that was why the house looked like a tower, the other parts had burned away.
The path snaked its way up the front yard to the house, tall, dried, neglected grass, and thin gnarled trees crowded in on both sides.
A thin, chill wind made the whole yard look like it was moving.
One of the trees, all bent and leafless held a scarecrow, dressed in tattered, old clothes. Its suit and floppy-brimmed hat were green and the sack that made up its face was yellow. It hung, slack and boneless. It looked heavy, like the rags contained a dead body, rather then straw or leaves.
Tommy walked by it quickly, not looking back to check if its head had really turned to watch him as he went.
He moved so he was on the far side of the walkway. The dried grass made a raspy sound as it brushed against his ghost costume.
Halfway to the house, Tommy stopped, trying to get his breathing under control.
“Almost there,” He whispered to himself. “Just knock, then run like crazy… easy…I hate Jimmy…why’s he such a …?”
Up ahead the grass was pushed apart, revealing a narrow dirt path. From down the path, Tommy could hear a noise, like someone digging.
“Oh, this is stupid,” Tommy breathed, as curiosity moved his feet onto the path. He crept along, staying low enough that the grass would hopefully hide him from…whatever was there.
The path opened up, revealing a clearing, that in the light of the full moon was a…
“Graveyard,” Tommy muttered. “Course, it is…I’m gonna die…I hate Jimmy sooo much…!”
He could see a freshly dug hole in the ground and tiptoed over, knowing how stupid an idea it was to see what was there, but unable to just run away not knowing.
There was a coffin, grey old wood, criss-crossed with chains.
“Oh, that’s bad.”
“Sorry, you’ll have to wait your turn,” A gravelly voice said, behind Tommy. “That one is already full.”
Tommy dropped his bag of candy, but did manage to keep from peeing himself and the little ‘eek’ noise he made, technically wasn’t loud enough to count as ‘screaming like a girl.’
He slowly turned.
The man was wicked tall and thin. His hair was shaggy and matted and his skin looked sickly, almost yellowy-green in the moonlight.
His clothes were ragged and caked with dirt. The hems of his pants were so frayed they almost looked like bell-bottoms.
In one hand he held a shovel.
He squatted down, until he and Tommy were face to face. He didn’t look any healthier close up. His skin was leathery and pulled tight around his skull.
“Huh, you would think you’d already have a grave, wouldn’t you, little ghost?” The man with the shovel rasped thoughtfully. “Misplaced your corpse have you? Too dark to read the writing on the stones? Digger can help find which grave is yours. Dug them all myself. Know them all by heart…and the story that goes with each one…”
“I’m…I’m…I’m…not a ghost!” Tommy finally was able to exclaim, pulling back his white hood. “I’m not dead…!”
“Well, that’s easily fixed,” Digger replied.
Tommy made another ‘eeking’ noise and almost fell to the ground as his knees turned to water.
“No sense of humor,” Digger muttered, catching Tommy under his arm with his free hand and holding him up. “No place for children. Let’s send you on your way.”
“How…uh…how do you …muh-mean that…?” Tommy asked, breathlessly.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Digger replied, absently. ‘Night like this…the walls between the realms are thin…there’ll be monsters on the prowl. Come on.”
The cadaverous caretaker straightened up, slung his shovel over his shoulder and placing a large hand on Tommy’s shoulder, steered him back towards the path.
“How’d you find Digger?” He asked as they made their way back to the paved walkway.
“I just…I just heard you,” Tommy said. “Followed the path…the scarecrow…looked like he was pointing at it…”
“Was he now…?” Digger muttered.
The path seemed longer then it had been leading to the graveyard, but it had to be the same path. It was the only path.
Out in the night, things seemed to be moving. Some were ghostly forms, drifting on the wind, others massive, lumbering along.
They stepped off the dirt path and onto the uneven paving stones of the walkway.
Tommy turned to look up at his creepy guide, expectantly.
Digger leaned down, his own sickly yellow eyes peering into Tommy’s wide blue ones.
“You know the stories, about the Tower?” He asked.
“Um…sorta…some.”
“You believe them?”
“A little, I guess,” Tommy said, thoughtfully. “ I…used to…like ghost stories. Which ones are…uh…true…?”
“All of them.” Digger said, with a grim, thin smile. “You seem full of stories yourself. You tell stories?”
“Sorta,” Tommy shrugged. “ I write them down…my English teacher says she can’t decide if I have a vivid imagination or need to talk to the school counselor.”
He paused, unsure why he was sharing with this person who he was pretty sure might be a serial killer or something just as bad.
“Here,” Digger said, handing him back the plastic bad he’d dropped.
“Um…thanks,” Tommy said accepting it.
“Say the words,” Digger told him.
Somehow, Tommy knew what he meant without having to ask.
“Trick or treat,” He said, opening his bag.
Digger nodded and dropped something into the bag.
“Happy Hallows Eve,” Digger said. “Come again, Thomas Royes.”
Tommy took a few steps down the path, and then turned back.
“How’d you know my name…?”
“Write your stories, and should they bring you back, stay on the path…the walls have crumbled in places, there might be creatures on the loose.”
Tommy ran back to the gate.
Only to find not just his friends, but also his parents and a police car.
His friends had freaked out when after three hours he hadn’t come back.
Tommy stood on the sidewalk, his mom kneeing, crying and hugging him, as his friends gathered around babbling apologies and worried talk.
He looked over his mom’s shoulder, up at the old Tower house and its field of tall, dead grass.
The moon broke through the clouds, and for a brief moment, he saw the scarecrow in the bent tree.
The wind picked up and made it looked like it was slowly waving goodbye.
Digger jabbed the scarecrow with his shovel.
“That’s enough of that,” He grumbled. “You’ve caused enough trouble.”
He sighed and looked down at the departing cars.
The wind made the tree branches wobble and the scarecrow’s stuffing made a crinkling-rustling sound.
“He could be,” Digger muttered thoughtfully in reply. “Something’s coming and we could use all the help we could get.”
To be continued…