The Shadow Man (Part 14)

There is no way that any family would be okay with staying in their house after a loved one was brutally killed in their bedroom. Officer Perez wasn’t surprised to hear that Jesse and his mother, who Perez had learned was named Camilla, decided to spend the next few days in a hotel room. Captain Mercer must have sympathized with them so strongly that he had the hotel room paid for by the precinct. Perez wondered if that was common, or if the Captain had finally gone soft. Jesse’s father Martin chose to stay in the house, and as the crime scene was thoroughly examined, he was cleared to do so. Officer Perez wondered if that was common, too. She had never spent the night in a house after someone she cared about was murdered in it. Maybe, Martin just couldn’t believe what happened. Or refused to…

Officer Perez was meant to be going home. However, even after her shift ended, she couldn’t stop thinking about what Jesse had told her about Olivia also seeing the “Shadow Man” Jesse referred to. Perez wondered if that had something to do with Izzy’s death. And if it did, what condition would her squad find Olivia in?

“This must be what a burglar feels like the first time they go to break into a house,” Perez said to no one in particular. She was alone, after all. She had remembered what Jesse said about the cave on the other side of the woods and felt there might be clues to Olivia’s disappearance there.

“I’ll just wait until I get past the trees to turn on my flashlight. Don’t need anyone catching me stalking through their backyard.”

Officer Perez brought her hand down to her utility belt, wrapping her hand around the textured grip of her state-issued Mag-Lite.

“A flashlight might be a better weapon against a guy made of shadows.”

This might have been true, but she brought her sidearm just in case the shadow person had more substance than she expected him to. To be entirely honest, she had yet to completely accept that what Jesse saw was, in fact, a shadow. People tend to see things differently than they appear when they are scared. It was very likely that he just saw a living person who was covered in the shade of the trees. But, Perez didn’t want to discount Jesse entirely. In her twelve years on the force, she’d seen some weird shit. This would be another of those things to add to her list of things she never thought she’d see.

Perez walked slowly through the woods, careful not to bump into any trees or trip over nothing like they do in horror movies.

“I’m far enough away…” she muttered while retrieving her Mag-Lite from her utility belt. The officer turned it on, sweeping the light from left to right and back again. Part of her was wishing a sign of Olivia, or this shadow man Jesse mentioned, would materialize in front of her; make her job easier.

“Oh, shit…!” Perez felt her heart jump in her chest. She was a bit more than halfway to the end of the forest, happy that she hadn’t walked into any spider webs, when she found a grey piece of fabric with pink and blue stars trailing down one side. Officer Perez had known what it was as soon as she saw it. The drawstrings gave it away.

“Is that a hoodie?”

Perez walked closer to the jacket draped over a bush that was low to the ground. Given what happened to Izzy she didn’t doubt there would be a trap near it. Or under it. Instead of picking it up, Officer Perez took several pictures with her cell phone. When you find a piece of evidence you’re not suppose to move it. Doing so could contaminate it with her DNA, making it more difficult to identify the real culprit.

For the first time since the investigation began Perez felt that she was on the right track. She continued on, looking for more clues as she walked.

“If this is here, then maybe Olivia left her watch on the sidewalk for Jesse to find. She’s left a trail! …Maybe. Don’t get your hopes up. This could have just been a coincidence.”

The Officer finally reached the end of the woods. She stood there for a minute, looking around cautiously. There was no man as far as she knew. But, this wouldn’t be the first time a suspect snuck up on her. Well, tried to. Actually, there was nothing there between the trees and the cave. Perez walked toward the cave, leaning against the left side of the opening as she peeked inside. There was nothing but darkness. And, the smell of iron floating out of the quiet, black hole that resided in the cave. She smelled blood.

The Shadow Man (Part 13)

Having to deal with the police twice in one day was exhausting. And, at this point, terrifying and confusing. How do you explain something to the authorities when you don’t even know what happened? Izzy was asleep in bed when everyone left the house. But, when they came back he was…gone.

Jesse sat on the couch in the living room, absentmindedly massaging his left arm. When he saw his father covered in blood Jesse jumped out of fright, smashing into the curio just outside of the kitchen door at full force. Now, the floor was covered in pieces of broken china and glass, while his arm had potentially suffered further damage. Jesse barely noticed. His mind was very far off, at the moment. He was in shock; eyes staring out of the window toward the moon, hand rubbing his arm, mind blank. Jesse might as well have been asleep.

Standing only about six feet away at the base of the stairs, Officer Perez wrote notes as she took Jesse’s father’s statement. Although, it was hard to make sense of the hysterical man was saying. No one blamed him, though. While she wrote down Martin’s recount of how he found Izzy in his closet, Perez made a note in the margin of her notepad the last time she glanced over at Jesse: Glassy eyes, refuses to talk, possibly in shock. She also made sure to write in her notes that all three of Izzy’s family members were with the police earlier in the evening when the boy was potentially killed. They all had an alibi.

‘Complicated circumstances. Good thing I like a challenge…’ Perez thought to herself. ‘But, they’re kind of an unlucky family. I feel bad for them. One kid survives getting hit by a truck and passes out on the sidewalk looking for his missing friend. Then the other son is found…like that.’ The officer had a flashback to twenty minutes earlier when she saw the young teenager sitting disemboweled in his closet with a petrified look on his face, while everyone did their best not to step in the puddle of blood surrounding Izzy. Many of the other officers called to the scene couldn’t stand being in the room, much less looking at a victim as young as Izzy who had been murdered so violently. It was all just too much.

Perez finished taking Martin’s statement and he went to sit with his wife. This time, she was the one who couldn’t stop crying. Her face was buried in her hands as she sobbed. Officer Perez and her captain glanced over at the broken family.

“You’re not supposed to bury your kids,” Captain Mercer said quietly so the family didn’t overhear something they already knew.

“Yeah, I’m guessing they’re thinking something similar, right about now.”

“It seems everything’s getting wrapped up here. The family’s going to spend a few nights in a hotel until we get the scene cleaned up. You wanna head back to the precinct and write your report so you can go home?”

“Uh, sure. Just give me a minute. I need to ask the brother a few more questions.”

Captain Mercer glanced over at the teenager sitting on the couch seemingly lost in thought. “Okay. But, I’m not sure you’ll get anything out of him while he’s in shock.”

Officer Perez and Mercer nodded at each other as the Captain walked out of the house, presumably to write his own report. After tonight, he felt the need to spend time with his own children when he left work. He’d instructed many of the other officers whom had children to go home and do the same. Perez walked over to Jesse, sitting down on the couch next to him.

“I’m sorry about your brother…” she said softly. “Losing a family member is difficult, but, it gets easier to cope with after a while.”

The officer watched Jesse, waiting for him to respond. He didn’t, and Perez was expecting that. Out of everyone, he’s been the most traumatized by everything that had happened since his return from the hospital.

“I know that you’re probably in shock, but if you can hear me…” she put a hand on Jesse’s should squeezing gently. “…you can call me if you need to talk.”

She sat there next to Jesse for a bit noticing that his eyes were still glazed over. Captain Mercer was right; there was no getting through to him in this state. However, Officer Perez had an idea about what was going through Jesse’s mind. She recalled the last time they had met, only about an hour and a half earlier. Jesse mentioned something about shadows.

“You think it was them, don’t you? The shadow…creatures?”

For the first time since he had seen his father covered in his little brother’s blood, Jesse seemed to be focused; his mind clearing of the fog that weighed almost as heavily as his brother’s passing. He looked into Officer Perez’s eyes, not sure if he heard hear correctly.

“How…did you know?” Jesse asked her. ‘What, can she read minds, now?’

“Because you told me about them, earlier,” Perez smiled at the teenager. “No, it wouldn’t make sense, but I can see why you’d think that. If these things have been bothering you for a while. Did Izzy know about them?”

Jesse wasn’t sure if he really wanted to have this conversation. But, she knew it wasn’t his fault. She also knew that in situations such as this many victims’ minds replace what really happened with something that would be much easier to comprehend or deal with: a defense mechanism.

“Yeah…he’s seen one of them, before. It creeped him out. Olivia…saw it, too.”

Roulette (2)

Harper slammed the trunk a bit too hard after finishing putting her bags inside eliciting a loud yell from Miles. “I said be careful with my baby!”

            “Calm down, dude! Your ‘baby’ is fine!” Harper climbed into the front passenger seat happy that she didn’t have to sit in the back, for once. She glanced back at Miles and gave him the finger before sitting back and putting on her seatbelt. KayZee had already started driving away when Harper realized she forgot her favorite headphones. The cordless ones that were grey and had flashing blue lights on the ear cups. ‘Crap…Now I have to listen to Jenna talking shit about people at school.’

            Fortunately for Harper, Jenna pretended to be asleep almost the entire ride to the cabin, only giving herself away a couple of times when she started smiling. To be honest, she was loving the fact that Luka and Mateo were sitting close enough to each other. She kept waiting for them to start talking to each other, but it never happened. Mateo had fallen asleep only a few minutes after the group began their trip, and Luka had his earphones in listening to music the whole time. He must have been trying to avoid Mateo and just gotten bored, electing to continue playing his same favorite songs on repeat.

            “Uh…that’s no fun,” Jenna whispered to herself.

            “What isn’t?” Miles asked.

            Jenna glanced at Miles, suddenly getting the best idea shed ever had in her life. She quickly took out her phone opening the texting app. Miles stared at her confused. Jenna was shady sometimes, and apparently this was one of those times. Which meant Miles wasn’t going to like where this was going. Jenna furiously typed something into the text box, then stared blankly at the headrest in front of her, holding her phone tightly in her hands as they rested on her lap. Miles felt his phone vibrate. He never turned the ringer on. He got annoyed at the sound when he’d receive several Twitter notifications at once.

            Looking down at the screen, he read the text message that he’d gotten. It was from Jenna. ‘The fuck is she planning?’ he thought. The message read: “Let’s play Roulette”.

            Miles looked at Jenna, who was still acting as if she couldn’t turn her head to the left. His eyebrow raised involuntarily as he looked back down at his phone. By now, he knew not to say anything about this out loud. ‘What the hell is Roulette?’

            “I don’t have a revolver, Jen…” Miles sent his own message to Jenna who looked down and read it.

            Miles watched her Jenna type her response so quickly he wasn’t sure he’d be able to understand it when it reached his phone.

            “Not Russian Roulette. This is different. Its like truth or dare, without the dare.”

            “Where’s the fun in that?”

            “You have to ask a question and if someone knows the person is lying they figuratively take the bullet. I brought vodka, though. So, if someone gets called out they have to take a shot of Belvedere. All the fun you could ever want.” Jenna finished the message with a winking emoji which Miles stared at for a few minutes. He felt that it was weird for her to send the emoji when her face was so stoic.

            “You’re crazy…but it does sound like fun.” He felt a large smile spread across his face. He wasn’t sure what Jenna was up to, but there was alcohol involved. Any reason to party was good enough for him. And Miles loved to party.

***

            KayZee pulled into the driveway of her parents’ cabin, and everyone except for her was impressed at the beautiful building. The house stood two stories tall and was surrounded on all sides by huge, bare trees collecting snow on their branches. Harper wouldn’t stop talking about how much she loved the paint color; brown on the outside with white window and door frames, and shutters. The sun room built off to the side that didn’t get much use in the winter was also painted white. Mateo, thinking the walkout basement was the front entrance, walked directly towards one of the sliding glass doors.

            “Hey, KayZee! Why are your front doors made of glass? Isn’t that dangerous, or something?”

            “Because those aren’t the front doors!” Harper yelled. “Stupid…”

            “Oh…” Mateo picked up his bag and joined everyone else at the real front door as they funneled in.

            Harper grimaced at the mounted heads of a wolf, a buck, and a bear above the fireplace. She hated that people hunted animals for sport but understood the point of hunting for food. Even if she didn’t like it.

            “Uh…so, does your dad hunt, KayZee?” Harper asked, bumping into a wooden coffee table.

            “Nope. He just thought they looked cool, so his friend gave them to him,” KayZee replied. “My dad just likes to show off. Anyway, there are three bedrooms upstairs, two downstairs, and there’s a murphy bed in the basement. I’ll let you guys pick where you wanna sleep.”

            “Dibs on the basement!” Mateo said much too loudly before running off the wrong direction.

            “It’s the other way…” KayZee stated.

            Mateo ran across the room to the other side of the house where the stairs to the basement were. The lights were off, and even with the floor-to-ceiling windows, it was rather dark. He turned the light on, half expecting there to be a masked murderer standing at the base of the stairs with a bloody chainsaw. Of course, there wasn’t so Mateo walked down the stairs to check out the basement, excitedly pulling down the murphy bed and placing his bag on top of the mattress. Pulling the bed down revealed a shelf at the top of the large, wooden case that housed bed sheets.

            “This is awesome!” Mateo began to happily jump up and down. “It’s like Scooby-Doo! Without a secret room to get dragged into.”

            Miles stared in the direction of the basement stairs. “The funny thing is…he doesn’t like basements. He’ll probably end up sleeping on the couch,” He chuckled. ‘Or on the floor next to my bed.’

The Shadows' Empress (Part 8)

Roland sat on his bed thinking about how he was going to complete his task. There was no way he could open it by any conventional means. Which, to him, sucked. It seemed the most important things were never easy, and he hated that life worked that way. The young man listened, sitting quietly to the noise coming from outside of his room. There was none. He felt like people were listening to him through the door, but he had to get another look at the box.

            Sliding down onto the floor, Roland sat on the cheap, clue carpet on his bedroom floor. He scooted over to his left a bit so that he could reach behind him and slide the box out from it’s hiding spot while watching the door. No one entered his bedroom, so he slid the box into the light of his bedroom, making sure to keep it concealed behind his right leg so that if someone did open the door they wouldn’t see the box.

            As soon as Roland felt the old, wooden box against the outside of his right thigh he glanced down at it, then back at his bedroom door. He suddenly began to feel as if there were security cameras in his room where there were none before. Ignoring the feeling, he studied the box, noting the red symbols that he’d remembered from his dream. For a second, he contemplated breaking the box open. His dad would be going into town tomorrow to pick up some groceries—a task the kids rarely participated in. He could destroy it with one of the hammers that Jacob kept in the shed while the twins were busy playing outside.

            It sounded like a decent plan. However, despite how frail the box appeared, Roland seriously doubted he would succeed. If the virile young man couldn’t open a box that was barely holding itself together with his bare hands, there was no way a hammer would work, either. There was something about it that seemed supernatural. The markings had an innocuous feeling that meshed with a demonic one. And one of them was gone.

            When had that happened? There were seven when he put the box under his bed, and now there were only six. The area where the seventh symbols was felt cold under Roland’s fingers while the rest emitted a faint heat.

            And then he remembered the visions he’d had in his dream. The dream within a dream. Roland hated those.

            There was a brisk knock coming from the other side of the door. It sounded like it was coming from the top.

            “Hey, bud… It’s pizza night,” Roland’s father said, quite cheerily through the large wooden slab.

            Roland quickly pushed the box back underneath his bed, making sure his sheets were perfectly draped over the edge so no one would suspect anything. Then, he stood up and rushed over to the door and opened it up.

            “Pepperoni!” Jacob heard his son’s stomach growl and he laughed until he cried.

            “One large pepperoni…check,” Jacob typed Roland’s order into the memo app on him smartphone.

            The pair walked downstairs, and Roland sat on the couch to watch television with his younger siblings. They were watching cartoons until the pizza arrived at their house. It was also movie night, and they’d picked out a superhero movie. Spencer was huge fan of Harley Quinn, and Batman.

            Roland looked over at his dad who was placing the order as he paced around the kitchen. The phone in Jacob’s hand reminded Roland of when he took a picture of the map on top of the blueprints. He leaned to the right, sliding his own smartphone out of his pocket. He opened the photo gallery app. The first photo that came up was the picture he took of the map. In his dream.

            His heart began to pound in his chest as he turned the screen off and put the phone back into his pocket.

            ‘No fucking way!’ Roland tried to keep a straight face, maybe smile a little at his siblings rolling around on the carpet. But in his mind, he was jumping with joy!

            ‘I can’t believe that worked!’

            The joy didn’t last too long, though. Roland could even feel his appetite slowly dissipate when he realized that the vision he’d had must have been just as real as the picture he took.

            Spencer stared at his older brother, noticing Roland’s attitude go from “normal” to “my dog died” in just a few second. He climbed up onto the couch and hugged his older brother.

            “What’s wrong?” Spencer asked looking at Roland. The younger boy stared directly into his brother’s eyes the way he did when he was trying to read people’s minds. He couldn’t actually do so, but he liked to try.

            Roland smirked at his brother to reassure him that things would be fine. “I’m alright. Just had a weird dream.”

            “Like a nightmare?” Spencer asked?

            “Exactly. Been having them a lot, lately.”

The Pits (12/12)

For the first time in several months, Max felt his life was getting back to normal. If you can call it that. He was going through a major transition in his life; starting college and moving out of his mother’s house. Max decided to go to a school that was two states away from home. After the events that occurred months ago that resulted in the deaths of his two closest friends and having to go to their funerals, he felt like he wouldn’t be able to move on if he stayed too close to home. A university in Michigan sounded nice. Far enough away that he could leave his past behind, but close enough to home that he could visit on longer breaks.

The new college student was more excited to leave home than he felt he should be. But, that was okay. He had always felt like he was in the way; a nuisance to his parents. This way, he wouldn’t be in their way and wouldn’t suffer the consequences for it. Who was Max kidding? He hadn’t had to deal with any of that since he was sixteen. Still, he’d never been able to get used to things being normal. Now was a good opportunity to finally feel like his life meant something.

Max and his new roommate, Ethan, had hit it off immediately upon meeting each other. The two young men found themselves in a new environment, completely alone despite being surrounded by people for most of the day. They decided to explore the campus, looking for the locations of all of their classes so that neither of them would get lost on the first day.

Ethan was a Biology major, which Max—a Chemistry major—thought was cool. He figured they could help each other since they had some of the same classes together. It would be like when he asked Simon for help back in…Max shook his head to make himself stop thinking about his friends. They were gone, and he wanted to move on, which Max found a more difficult task than forgetting people used to be.

“You alright?” Ethan asked? He’d seen Max shake his head, but a bit confused because he hadn’t asked a question.

“Huh? Yeah! I’m fine,” Max replied. “Just realized what homesickness was.”

“Yeah…I know what you mean,” Ethan said offering a small smile. “I’ve never been away from home until last night. I could barely sleep.”

“You’ve at least slept over at your friends’ houses, right?”

Ethan shook his head, “Nope. I was homeschooled, and most of the kids in my neighborhood were either a lot older or a lot younger than me. Didn’t have many friends.”

“That sucks…” Max thought for a second that maybe it was for the best. Ethan never had friends to lose in the first place. “On the bright side, you never had to leave any friends behind. That sucks, too.”

“I’ll bet,” Ethan nodded. “I’m guessing…you’ve had to do that a lot?”

“With a couple friends, recently. And all of my family accept my mom.”

“Damn…” Ethan felt bad knowing his new best friend’s life must have been more tragic than his own. However, it gave Ethan an idea. “Well, we’re nowhere near home, so we should just start over here!”

Max chuckled at how suddenly Ethan’s happiness could manifest itself. “Sure!”

The two friends were walking down a hallway that supposed to lead to a game room. Max forgot what it was called—something related to the school mascot—that was at the end of the hallway. All of the lights were out, so Ethan suggested they go downstairs to get some food from one of the many restaurants that operated on-campus. As they turned around, Max was instantly on edge, something he hadn’t felt since his escape from the Pits. Something about the janitor that was moping an area near to the intersecting hallway put Max off.

‘Where’d he come from?’

An image of Simon yelling at Max to run flashed in his mind, and he instinctively grabbed Ethan’s hand. Ethan looked at Max’s hand grasping his, thinking Max’s life had been rougher than he’d thought. To reassure Max, Ethan reciprocated, holding onto Max hand. After all, his parents had always told him to help other people when given the opportunity.

As they walked, Max could feel his heart beat faster. By the time the two were close to the janitor, he was feeling chills running down his spine almost as fast as Max wanted to run from the man cleaning the floor. The janitor’s hat concealed his face, and his coveralls covering nearly everything else. Max was afraid the janitor was lash out at him and his new friend as they walked by, but he didn’t. Max felt his heart rate decrease and he began to relax when Ethan whispered, “I thought the janitors wore jeans and a polo shirt with the school colors on it…”

Max’s heart rate increased again, and he almost ran away, with Ethan in tow, when he noticed that Ethan wasn’t walking anymore. He turned to see what was wrong with Ethan to see blood dripping from the other young man’s neck. It started at a trickle at first, but Ethan’s head began to tilt back tearing more of the skin as it did so. In seconds, the front of Ethan’s body was covered in thick, shiny, crimson blood, and he collapsed backwards onto the floor where the janitor had been mopping.

“Damn kids. I just cleaned the floor,” said a raspy, familiar voice.

Max looked up in horror, still holding onto Ethan’s hand. The Janitor took off his hat with the same hand he was holding his knife in.

“You’re shitting me…” Max muttered. He looked into the eyes of the old man who murdered his friend, Gio, and several cultists.

“I told you, if I could still see you when I finished killin’ them cult bastards, I’d be commin’ for ya,” The old man growled. “When I was done countin’, you were hangin’ upside down from a tree.”

“B-but…I wasn’t…I mean…” Max stammered. He didn’t know what to say, but that wasn’t stopping him from trying to talk.

The old man put his hat back on, raising his knife to Max’s throat. “Should’ve just dies with your friends.”

The Pits (11/12)

To say Max was stunned was an understatement. This weird old man didn’t look like he could walk more than fifty feet without needing a break. But he’d nearly vaulted down the stairs, swinging around a rather heavy sledgehammer; the same one that had incapacitated him just minutes earlier. ‘Just like the killers in horror movies…’

            Before Max could ask the old man how he was still standing after losing so much blood, the old man swung the hammer to his right with a force that seemed more than what a man his age should have, hitting one of the other cultists in the jaw. Their jaw hung down connected only to the rest of their head by the skin of their face. They collapsed to their knees trying to hold their lower jaw in place and, unsuccessfully, attempting to limit the loss of blood.

            There was a sound of bones breaking, bringing Max’s attention to a cultist standing to the left of the old man. Only the cultist was no longer standing. Instead, she was lying on her side, clutching the right side of her face. The murderer had slammed the sledgehammer into her to bring her down, then brought it above his head.

            “You must have a death wish,” the older man said to Max. “If you’re still in my line of sight when I’m done, you’re mine!”

            At that, Max took off running past the old man. He didn’t wait to see him hit anyone else. Although, he did hear the dull thud of the hammer coming down, probably finishing off the second cultist. After that, the old man began counting down from ten. Max barely heard the old man yell “Eight!” as he ran out behind the tree line.

            He knew there were more cultists than what were in the house. Max only had a limited amount of time to get back to the parking lot before the leader of the cult realized his so-called family was being picked off.

            Max ran through the woods as fast as he could, paying attention to what was on the ground, so he didn’t trip. That was the last thing he needed.

            “AAHHH!” Max screamed as he was pulled up into a tree. He’d fallen into a trap. The rope tightened around his ankle and yanked him into the tree so quickly he almost didn’t register that he’d taken a heavy hit to the head against the ground. For a minute, he flailed in the air, spinning in the grip of the rope. Max stopped, calming himself so that he could figure out the best way down, when he noticed he could still see the old man’s cabin from where he was hanging. The man’s words echoed in Max’s head ‘If you’re still in my line of sight…’

            Remembering the one good thing his father had ever done for him, Max reached up into his boot to pull out the pocket knife he was given for his birthday years ago. The only reason he’d kept it was to remind himself that there was good in everyone. He flicked it open before reaching even further to saw at the rope next to his ankle; he didn’t need a long piece of rope getting caught on something, or by someone. Just before he could finish cutting the rope; however, an arrow whizzed past, grazing his hand. A second arrow followed, slicing through the rope, leaving gravity to pull Max to the earth as hard as it would allow.

            Winded, Max sat up, leaning on his left arm to balance himself as he stood. A third arrow pierced his arm.

            “Son-of-a-bitch!” Max screeched. ‘At least their getting better at hitting moving targets.’

            Max stood up, and began to jog, but couldn’t stand the pain the arrow was causing him. He knew it would continue to bother him if he didn’t do something.

            ‘The arrowhead is interchangeable’ he reached to the arrowhead and began to unscrew it. In the past, he’d seen professional archers switch the safety arrow tips with ones meant for hunting. The blades on the arrowhead were sharp and cut his fingers as he jogged, but he cared more that his bloody fingers might make it more difficult to grasp things. Finally, with the arrowhead off, he pulled the arrow out of his arm from the back. Max felt a wave of intense pain followed by relief noticing his wound hurt less now.

            Max dodged more arrows as he ran onto the main trail.

            ‘Finally, something familiar!’

            He began to run faster, getting a second wind from the realization that he was no longer lost. His shoots kicked up dust as he pounded his way up the trail that opened to a field that was used for extra parking during events that were held during the summer. Just before he got the sidewalk that encircled the majority of the park Max felt something sharp hit his left leg half-way up his shin. He tripped sliding across the grass, wet from the sprinkler system doing its’ job. Max didn’t even have to look. He already knew it was another arrow. He did, however, look back to see the cultists that were chasing him were much closer than he thought.

            ‘Gonna have to suck it up. I don’t have time to take it out. Just pretend it doesn’t hurt.’

            Max pushed himself up, trying to run as fast as he could, given his newly acquired handicap. He ran across the football field hoping the shortcut would get him to his car without anymore injuries. As he ran past the pavilion Max noticed there were two teenagers playing basketball.

            ‘They wouldn’t attack me in front of other people, would they?’

            One of the cultists took aim and fired and arrow at the teenagers, hitting one of them through the back of his head, poking out his right eye. The girl he was playing against began to scream as loud as she possibly could, prompting the second cult member closer to catching Max to switch he focus to the girl; firing an arrow that flew into her open mouth, through the back of her head.

            By this time, Max was in his car, and the cultists stopped chasing. They had used their last arrows on the kids playing basketball and couldn’t do any damage to someone enclosed in plastic, glass and metal parts. He turned on the headlights flashing beams of light onto the hill behind the cultists. On top of the hill was the old man, saturated in the blood of his enemies. Holding the head of the cult leader.

 Max panicked, putting the car in the wrong gear before he hit the gas, causing his car to charge backwards into, presumably, the car the teen drove to the park. ‘They won’t be needing it, anyway.’

With all of the thoughts running through his mind, Max decided the first thing he’d do was drive to the police station. He didn’t feel safe driving directly home. Plus, he needed to go to a hospital for his injuries, and he vaguely remembered promising to Simon that he’d get help. Or was it Gio? Did he even say it at all? Who cares. It had to be done.

Max pulled up and stopped at a red light. He looked to the glow-in-the-dark rosary his grandmother had gotten him.

“Hey, Grandma. You think the cops’ll believe me with an arrow in my leg?

Shadow Man (Part 9)

Izzy stood next to his window, staring out at the trees in the back yard. He’d heard something that made him feel uneasy. It sounded like a muffled scream. At first, he wondered if anyone else in the house heard it. But, the faint sound of his parents who had decided to continue their argument in the living room told him that—in the very least—they didn’t. He doubted his older brother heard it, too. The last he knew, Jesse was sleeping. Izzy had been woken by a nightmare and, despite being thirteen, felt too afraid sleep alone. He went to ask if he could sleep in his brother’s room that night, but he saw the open bottle of pill on his desk and knew it wouldn’t be easy waking Jesse up, so he went back to his own bedroom, lying awake in bed. After a while, he’d managed to fall asleep, but the scream he’d heard woke him up again.

            ‘It wasn’t in the back yard,’ Izzy thought to himself. ‘It sounded too far away.’

            Taking one of the notebooks and his favorite blue pen from his backpack, Izzy began to write a note for his parents, and older brother. Given what he knew his parents were arguing about he figured one of them was going to come u to talk to him about…issues he’d been having with his Uncle. ‘Not like they can’t just ask Jesse. He dealt with it, too,’ Izzy thought before beginning to write his note.

            Only two words into writing his letter, there was a quiet bang coming from the inside of Izzy’s closet. He looked over, noticing the doors were shaking a bit. Then, there was another thump causing the doors to rattle some more.

            ‘In a horror movie, I’d die if I went to open the doors.’ Izzy thought about all the things that had happened that day, particularly the shadow man that appeared in Jesse’s window. Instead of walking up to the doors to his closet, Izzy slowly backed away from the door while moving to the right. There was a gap between the two doors through which Izzy tried to look into his closet. At first, he didn’t see anything. He stared for a few minutes, wondering if he should get a flashlight when a round white ball appeared through the gap in the doors. Izzy had no idea what the object was, until he saw the white spot disappear and then quickly reappear.

            It was an eye. Izzy turned to run for his bedroom door, but something wrapped around his mouth, and right ankle. After a few second, he felt something else encircle his torso and pull him backwards a bit. Izzy fought to reach the door, not understanding how something that barely felt real could have so much strength. He looked down to see solid black chains slowly wrapping around the rest of him, making it much more difficult to pull away.

            Izzy let out a muffled cry as he attempted to throw himself at his bedroom door, reaching out with his left hand. He didn’t make it. The chains were stronger than Izzy was, pulling him backwards. The doors to his closet flew open, and then shutting when the chains dragged him inside.

            He did what he could to force the chains to release him, but in the darkness of the closet, Izzy could feel the chains envelope his entire body several times. He struggled for a few moments before there was a snapping sound, and all was still. Izzy could no longer breathe, but he could feel a warm liquid pouring out of his stomach. He could see it, too. Through the crack between the doors, he could see red liquid oozing out and creating a large puddle on the floor just outside of his closet. And then, he felt nothing at all.

            “…up. Get up…” there was a sound that Jesse couldn’t quite place. It sounded as if he was underwater. “Jesse, get up!”

            ‘Wow. Even in death, people like to rush you…’ Jesse told himself.

            “Jesse!” The sound was clearer, now. “Oh, please wake up!”

            Taking a second to think, Jesse realized that the voice he was hearing sounded familiar, in a good way. And then he realized: he could think. His eyes snapped open when he figured out what was happening. He wasn’t dead.

            He started blinking rapidly to clear the blurriness from his eyes before looking around to see his parents and Mrs. Sandoval standing over him. In the corner of his eye, he could see red and blue flashing light getting closer. Jesse sat up.

            “What happened?” He took a second to examine his surroundings. He was lying on the sidewalk, exactly where he’d found Olivia’s watch. ‘How’d I get here? I was in the woods…wasn’t I?’

            “Are you okay?” Mrs. Sandoval asked Jesse. Looking her in the eyes, it was obvious that she had been crying for quite a while. That’s when Jesse remembered why he was outside in the first place.

            “I’m fine. Did you find Olivia?” Jesse asked, speaking quickly.

            The adults all looked at each other, then back to Jesse. His parents shook their heads. Mrs. Sandoval began to cry again.

            “No, but they’re looking,” she said as clearly as she could through her tears.

            Jesse held up the watch that he was still holding. He’d squeezed it so tight at one point that the glass on the clock face crumbled, cutting his hand.

            “Where did you find that?” Mrs. Sandoval asked.

            Jesse looked down at the ground. “Right here…”

The Pits (10/12)

With the old man incapacitated, Max dropped the sledgehammer and walked into the back room. He did so slowly as Max had a feeling that he was already too late to be any real use to his friend. At this point, Max felt he would only be able to say his goodbyes.

            It was very dimly lit in the small room. There was a fine layer of dust on every surface, and even more dust floating in the air, glittering in the single ray of moonlight shining through the boarded-up window. Max’s eyes did their best to adjust to the darkness. Before they could he heard a quiet moan coming from somewhere near the left wall a few feet ahead of him.

            “G…Gio?” Max called into the darkness; he was still having trouble seeing. He decided to try to feel his way toward his best friends, hoping he didn’t accidentally touch anything sharp on his way over.

            “Max…” Gio whispered softly. He likely wouldn’t make it much longer. Gio’s voice sounded so weak. He sounded defeated. The fighting spirit of the strong guy he was had left him, and his soul would soon follow.

 “I’m sorry…didn’t mean…to…leave…you guys…” Gio wheezed between breaths.

“Don’t apologize, bro,” Max had finally reached the edge of the bed and grabbed hid friend’s hand. “I should be the one apologizing. I dragged you guys out here. Figured it’d be a long time before we’d be able to meet up again.”

“…You said…Simon…didn’t make…it.”

“Yeah. I’m sorry about that, too.” Max’s eyes began to tear up as he realized he would soon be the only member of his friend group left alive.

“How?” Gio’s voice rasped in the darkness.

Max wasn’t sure how to tell Gio about what happened. Should he tell the truth, or let his dying friend thin he did the right thing by trying to save Simon? Max decided to go with the truth. Either way he’d have to live with it the rest of his life.

“Gio, I…I tried. I mean, I wanted to.” Max said quietly, trying not to cry. “The big guy grabbed him, and I wanted to take him back, but Simon told me to leave. And I did. He wasn’t gonna get far on his messed-up leg. They’d just catch us again. But, I didn’t wanna leave him there…”

“I know,” Gio said, turning to face Max. The old mattress springs creaked under his weight as he turned to place his right hand on Max’s.

“What?”

“I was…waiting for…you guys…to catch up. But…the cult guys…caught you. I saw the whole thing. But, I couldn’t help. I saw…what you did. It was…the right…thing.”

Despite trying his hardest not to cry, Max felt his tears rolling down his face and falling on his hand next to Gio’s. He felt a sense of relief that Gio wouldn’t die hating him. But, he also felt a bit of anger that Gio did nothing to help them. ‘He couldn’t have done anything.’ Max repeated the thought over and over, trying to convince himself that his current anger was misplaced. There was nothing Gio could have done to help Max and Simon in that moment.

‘But, he could’ve tried.’

Max looked over at Gio’s legs, and realized they were no longer attached to his body. A glance at a large bucket near the foot of the bed showed the new location of Gio’s legs. Gio watched as his friend looked at his injuries. Max knew the old man had cut his legs off, but a large part of him was hoping it was a bluff.

“Canyon Lake…” Gio whispered.

“What about it?”

“You have to go there, and ride around…in an inflatable kayak…like we always…said…we would…”

 “…Even if there are trees in the water like everyone says,” Max finished Gio’s sentence. “I will, buddy.”

“And tell my…parents…”

There was a long pause making Max think Gio had passed away, until the injured boy continued, “I’m sorry…I was a …bad son…”

Max could hear Gio expel his last breath. He couldn’t believe Gio was gone. Or Simon, for that matter. Max stayed where he was, kneeling next to his best friend’s body. He didn’t want to leave, anymore. He didn’t want to live knowing his best friends were dead in these woods. For a while, Max thought about going to the place where he and his friends had originally met the cultists and ask them to kill him. But, he realized that wasn’t what Simon and Gio would want for him.

Standing up, Max wiped the tears off of his face. He took deep breaths as he walked out of the back room, ignoring the smell of rot that permeated the air. Nothing mattered anymore, except getting home. Before he left, Max looked at the sledgehammer he dropped on the floor. He thought about bringing it in case he was attacked again but decided it would only weigh him down. Besides, the cultists had arrows. All Max could do was run. Fast.

He walked down the stairs, two at a time, trying to get the hell out of the old house. However, Max slipped when he was half-way down and tumbled to the base of the stairs. As much as it hurt, he refused to stop. He forced himself to stand up, and almost pissed himself. When he got himself into an upright position he realized he was face-to-face with Gabriel, the biggest of the cultists.

“Oh, shi--!”

“GET THE FUCK OUTTA MY HOUSE, WEIRDOS!” Yelled a raspy voice behind Max. There were loud footsteps coming down the stairs, causing Max to jump to the left and out of the way. The old man jumped off of the stairs near the bottom, swing the sledgehammer that Max left behind down on Gabriel’s head. The large man dropped to the ground, bleeding from a massive hole in his head.

The old man looked around all of the other cultists that felt it was okay to break into his house; all armed with knives and swords. Then, he looked to Max.

“If you’re still here when I get done with these fuckers, you’ll be next…”

Shadow Man (Part 8)

“No ma’am,” Jesse replied feeling his heartbeat intensify. “The last time I saw her she was leaving my house. But that was around half an hour ago.”

            “Oh…” Olivia’s mother sounded defeated. “Olivia got home a little while ago, but she and I had a fight. She stormed off to her room, and when I went to tell her it was time for dinner I realized she wasn’t in her room. Her window was open…”

            Mrs. Sandoval began to cry. “I figured maybe she would have gone to see you since the two of you are so close.”

            “I’m sorry, Mrs. Sandoval. She didn’t come back here. But, I’ll start looking for her.” Jesse opened the top drawer in his desk and fished out a small, red flashlight that he kept for when the power when out. The area where he lived received more than its fair share of thunderstorms strong enough to knock down powerlines.

            “Thank you so much, Jesse.” Mrs. Sandoval began to weep. “My poor baby…”

            Mrs. Sandoval hung up. Jesse got dressed and went into his younger brother’s room. Maybe Izzy would be willing to help Jesse—and presumably various others—to look for Olivia.

            “Hey, I—” Jesse began to speak, but stopped when he heard Izzy’s light snoring. Jesse was tempted to record his brother, remembering that Izzy refused to believe that he snored in his sleep when Jesse mentioned it. Instead, Jesse walked over to his little brother, pulling the comforter up over Izzy’s shoulder.

            “Promise me you won’t leave,” Jesse whispered, imagining something unfortunate happening to the younger boy given the circumstances that had recently arose, as well as some from the past. “I don’t think I can take it…”

            Jesse silently walked back to the bedroom door, closing as quietly as he could behind him. He then headed downstairs intending to tell his parents about his missing best friend. However, they were nowhere to be found. ‘Maybe they went out back.’ Jesse went into the living room, seeing—and hearing—his parents arguing on the deck just outside the sliding glass door that led to the back yard. Deciding now would not be a great time to interrupt their argument, Jesse walked out the front door to begin his search for Olivia. ‘Fuck it. I don’t have time do deal with their crap, right now.’

            It wasn’t dark outside, yet, so Jesse put his flashlight in his front, right pocket for safe keeping, until it got dark out, and began walking. It didn’t take very much walking to find his first clue. After only going about a block and a half away from his house, tracing Olivia’s rout to her house, Jesse found his friend’s golden watch on the sidewalk, the glass of the face cracked in three places; all of the cracks joining near the middle of the clock face. Jesse noticed that the hands had stopped. ‘5:37 pm… That was about twenty minutes ago. She can’t be too far away,’ Jesse thought. And then his stomach sank when he had a horrible thought. ‘Unless someone pulled her into their car.’

            Jesse looked around for other clues to see which direction she could have gone. If Olivia had already been home and her watch was where Jesse found it, chances were that she didn’t go back in the direction of her house. There was always the possibility that Olivia could have calmed down and gone back home, but she was known for holding grudges for at least a few days.

            “What the…?” Jesse said quietly. Looking toward the woods that was behind the row of houses where Jesse found Olivia’s watch, he noticed there was a spot just behind the tree line that was much darker than the surrounding areas. Taking a few steps off of the sidewalk and into the grass, he realized that the spot had a shape; the shape of a tall man with antlers. It had no features other than its silhouette. Just when Jesse thought he might be seeing things the figure turned and began walking deeper into the woods.

            “I should’ve brought a knife, or something,” Jesse told himself as he began to run towards the woods. He felt that Olivia’s disappearance had something to do with the shadows that had been plaguing him recently. ‘This is all my fault. I shouldn’t have told her about them.’

            The anxiety built up in the nervous teen more and more the further he ran into the woods. He had a feeling that something bad was going to happen. Or worse, that he’d find Olivia in less than good condition. And then, he saw something orange a few more feet ahead through the trees. Upon getting closer, Jesse realized he was looking at the outside of a cave that must have been made of clay or something similar. He stopped in front of the cave entrance, staring into the darkness thinking that there would be many places for the shadow figures to hide.

            Something about the area was a bit confusing to Jesse. The danger was most likely in front of him, but he felt like the someone was behind him, watching his every move. Knowing he could be attacked if he turned his back on the cave, he slowly turned around to see what could be behind him, other than the woods he’s just run through. Standing in a semicircle was a group of those cats that Jesse saw in his hallway at home. Something about these shadow animals was different, though. They didn’t have any actual features, but Jesse could see that they were in a position as if they were waiting to pounce on him. He felt a wave of energy that somehow didn’t feel right. The cat directly in front of Jesse began to make a motion moving the dirt under it’s paw; A scratching motion.

            “Aw, hell…”