Freddy vs. Ash

by A. Eggleston

  Steven adjusted the bandage on his collar bone. "Yeah, don't remind me."

  Ash, after being excluded from the conversation, decided to join in. He figured if he told them what he knows about the Deadites, maybe they wouldn't be so quick to dismiss him. "Let me guess." he said. "The guy had white eyes."

  Almost simultaneously, everyone's faces had dropped. Their eyes darted at him.

  He described further. "You know, all glassy and dead. He moved and jerked around, like he wasn't in his own body. And," he realized the similarity between Freddy and those Deadites when it came to this one. "he just smiled and laughed as he was trying to kill you."

  "Yeah...how did you know that?" asked Steven.

  "Because," Ash replied. "I've been fighting these things my whole life, that's how I know."

  There was a moment of silence between everyone. They were astonished at how much he knew about what had happened.

  Evelyn just stared at the floor, trying to piece everything together in her mind. The more she thought about it, certain things started to make sense. Seeing Ash at work desperately trying to stay awake. How he was always so secretive and paranoid. The murder at the party. It didn't really click for her until she remembered her and some other kids being questioned by the police earlier. She remembered them asking how Meg and Kyle had died, if any of them were asleep at the time, but mostly they kept asking about their dreams. Have you been dreaming lately? What are they like? Do you see someone in your dreams at night? Evelyn had a feeling Ash wasn't crazy or lying. But now, she felt worried about what might happen next.

  "How do we know you're not lying?" Cooper asked Ash.

  "He's not." Evelyn asserted. "I know he isn't."

  Cooper turned over in his seat to face Evelyn. He looked at her, confused.

  She read the expression on his face and explained. "Earlier, I heard the police questioning everyone. They asked me and a few others about our dreams."

  "Yeah." Steven added. "One of them wanted to know if I've had any nightmares lately. I asked them, 'What the hell does that have to do with anything?' but they never gave me a straight answer."

  "See?" said Evelyn.

  Cooper turned back to Ash. "Okay." he agreed. "So, what do we do then?"

  Ash had been thinking about that for a while. Even then, he still didn't know exactly what to do. "Freddy has the book." That much he was certain about. "If I can get it from him soon enough, I can stop him before..."

  Ash had realized just how dangerous Freddy and the Necronomicon are together, and how little time he had. His mind brought him back to that cabin, how his life had been ruined just from reading the book. He remembered the hell he had gone through fighting an army because he misspoke a few words. Ash couldn't begin to imagine the horrors that would arise with the book in Freddy's possession.

  "Before what, Ash?" asked Evelyn.

  He spotted Evelyn from the reflection in his rear view mirror. "Before he becomes too powerful for me to do a damn thing about it." he said. "If a guy like Freddy can maneuver his way around the Necronomicon, he'll kill every last one of us, and let the dead walk the earth."

  Everyone had stopped talking at that point. They simply laid back in their seats with worry on their faces. Cooper rested his elbow on the door, and set his head in his hand. Faith had gone back to staring out the window. Jill frantically picked at her fingernails, chipping away her nail polish. Evelyn sat with her arms crossed over each other. Steven brought out his silver crucifix and clutched it, hoping to give him comfort.

  Ash looked at the watch that wrapped around his left wrist. It was 3:08 AM. He had now reached the apartment building and pulled over by the street.

  The building was three stories tall, with concrete stairs that led to the front door. There wasn't anything particularly grand about it, except for the line of shrubbery surrounding the building. There was no light coming from it, not even the one above the front door. It was too late in the night.

  Everyone had gotten out of Ash's Oldsmobile seconds after he stopped. All five of them walked over to him before he could drive away. Cooper leaned over to face him. Ash promptly rolled his window down. Cooper placed his hands on the door.

  "So, O wise one," said Cooper.

  Ash quickly turned to Cooper, his lips smirked and his eyebrows scrunched together. Haven't heard that one in a while.

  "you sure Freddy's the one pulling the strings here?"

  "Take my word for it, kid." he said.

  "Okay." Cooper tried not to sound irritated from being called "kid" all the time. "Any words of advice before we meet our doom?"

  "Yeah." The friendly smirk had left Ash's face. He was now utterly serious. "Don't. Fall. Asleep."

  As soon as the words left his mouth, Ash put the car in gear and drove off.

  Everyone had settled in Evelyn's apartment, which was just down the hall from Cooper's. They saw each other every day. Every morning, they would walk down the hall together as they left for work. Those thirteen months of her life had been perfect and happy, until now. Before, her biggest concern was paying rent and getting to work on time. Now, she just hoped that she and her friends weren't going to die.

  The apartment was small and under-furnished. Everyone was forced to take refuge in the tiny living room. The walls were a warm beige color, and decorated with a few picture frames mounted above an old, ratty couch. A thick, fuzzy, blanket was draped along the right side of the couch. In front was the television that was held up by a small entertainment center that Cooper had helped her build when she first moved in. It didn't take very long to assemble it since most of the parts were made out of plastic. Most of that part of the wall had been covered with bookshelves. The room had been plastered with so many books that they almost served as decorations. In the corner, was a small stereo held up by a table. Various CD's were strewn around it: Avenged Sevenfold, Megadeth, and her favorite: Black Sabbath's first album.

  Steven and Jill sat on the futon while Faith sat on the chair next to it. Cooper was too restless to stay still. He stood back behind the wall, occasionally pacing back and forth through the living room.

  Jill had just finished filing down her nails after picking at them earlier. She worriedly touched her hair and looked at her own bloodshot eyes.

  Steven waved his hand in front of her to get her attention. "Hellooo?" he teased. "What's wrong?"

  "I think I'm losing my hair." she said. "You know, from the stress." She rubbed her eyes. "And look at my eyes, they're all red."

  "Ah, you're fine." he assured her. He pointed at her face. "You just got that one ugly thing right there. What's that called? Oh right, your face!"

  Jill slapped away his hand from her view. "Oh, real nice, bro!" she said. "Do I tell you that you look like a douche bag?"

  "Yes!" Steven confirmed.

  Jill laughed. "Okay, so at least I'm being accurate..."

  Steven quickly put Jill in a headlock and started rubbing her hair.

  "Quit it!" Jill put her hand on his face and tried to push him away.

  "I'll knock the bleach right off your hair!" Steven said, muffled from Jill's hand smushing the side of his face.

  "So, are we really doing this?" Faith asked after not speaking since being in the car. "Not sleeping? Just staying up for, what, days?"

  "I guess we have to." Cooper answered.

  "Well," Jill broke out of Steven's headlock. "I don't know if I can do that."

  "Yeah," said Cooper. "me neither."

  "We'll sleep in shifts." Faith proposed. "Just to be safe. If one of us looks like we're having a nightmare, we'll wake each other up."

  Cooper realized that Evelyn had been in her room for a long time. He worried about her. "I'm gonna check on Evelyn." said Cooper.

  She had changed out of her jeans and wore a pair of flannel shorts. She sat with her legs crossed, on her bed, reading from one of her books. It was one of her favorites, "The Raven" by Edgar Allen Poe. She needed to read something to calm her ner
ves. Evelyn wanted to find out first-hand if Freddy was real, but was worried about what might happen if she dived right in. I need to know if Ash is telling the truth. If you are real, you'll show yourself to me tonight.

  KNOCK! KNOCK!

  Evelyn raised her head. "Who is it?" she asked.

  "Can I come in?" asked Cooper.

  Evelyn set the book down, rushed to the door, and opened it.

  "Are you okay?" he asked.

  "Yeah, I'm fine. Why do you ask?"

  "Well, you were gone for a while, I was just checking. What are you doing in here?" he asked.

  "I was reading." Evelyn walked to grab her book and set down on the edge of the bed. Cooper sat beside her.

  "Why'd you change?" he asked, regarding her clothes.

  "Because the pants I was wearing are covered in blood."

  "Right." he remembered, trying not to sound embarrassed. "What are you reading?"

  "'The Raven' by Edgar Allen Poe."

  He scrunched his eyebrows in confusion. "Why?"

  "Seemed fitting, I guess." she explained. "Here, listen: Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word spoken was the whispered word, 'Lenore!' This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, 'Lenore!' Merely this and nothing more."

  Cooper gazed at her, confused. "Are you trying to give yourself nightmares?"

  "No." she lied. "I just...felt like I should read something to calm my nerves."

  "Why'd you come here alone, then?"

  "I wanted to get away from everyone for a few minutes." she answered. "With everything that’s happened today...it's overwhelming."

  "I know it is." Cooper began to inform her about the plan. He took her by the hand and gave her a comforting smile. "Speaking of which, we decided we're gonna sleep in shifts tonight."

  "Yeah, that sounds like a good idea right now."

  He helped her up to her feet and led her out of the door. "Come on. You need to be out here with everyone else. I know it sounds weird, but, if what Ash said had some truth to it, I feel like you need to be where I can see you. At all times."

  She agreed. "I feel the same way."

  Cooper grabbed the blanket from her couch. "Okay, guys." he announced. "Evelyn's going first. We'll wake her up in an hour, and move on to the next person."

  As Evelyn laid down, Cooper gently covered her with the blanket. He pushed a string of her dark hair away from her face and smiled at her. "I'll wake you up in an hour." He kissed her forehead and walked off.

  He turned off the lamp that was on the coffee table next to her before making his way into the kitchen. The room was now pitch black and everyone was quiet. She pulled the covers to her until they were up to her elbow. She stared at the ceiling for a moment before clasping her hands together, and closing her eyes. She whispered,

  "And now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, and if I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take..."

  Chapter Fourteen

  The next thing Evelyn knew, she was walking down the short, narrow, hallway in her apartment. She had no memory of how she got there. How did I get here? she asked. This doesn't feel like a dream. It feels too real. But it has to be. She could hear and feel everything as if it was actually there. She could feel the carpet fibers between her toes, the wood paneling on the walls as her hand grazed it, and her dark hair brushing against her arms. The room was completely silent, aside from the floorboards creaking with each step she made.

  Emerging out of the hall and into the living area, Evelyn looked to her left, wondering if she would find Cooper and her friends all settled on the couch. She turned on the lamp, and there they were, in their chairs, asleep. She walked over to the chair that faced away from her. Evelyn swept her hands across the cushions until her fingers met Cooper's neck. He didn't move or flinch at all. She heard a creak coming from behind her. Her black hair flipped as she turned, only to find nothing there.

  She muttered to herself. "Come on, I thought you were scarier than that." Stepping back, Evelyn looked all around her, the living room, the hall, the kitchen right across from her, even the ceiling. But, Freddy was not there.

  Well, if he won't come to me. Evelyn decided to see if she could bring him out. She thought that, after all, if Freddy was as bad as she heard, the least he could do is prove that he was there. "FREDDY!" yelled Evelyn. "ARE YOU HERE?!"

  Immediately, Evelyn felt a brush against her neck, and hot breath against her ear. In a deep, petrifying voice that could only be Freddy's, what he whispered to her echoed through the whole room. "I'm everywhere." he said to her.

  Evelyn gasped and turned around to look behind her, but he was already gone. Freddy's words had sent a chill down her spine. Her eyes widened. She returned her gaze back to the floor. She felt her heart beating faster, the thump-ing of her heart echoed in her eardrums. When she turned, she noticed that the room was completely empty. Cooper was no longer sitting in the chair in front of her. Jill, Faith, and Steven were also gone.

  Before Evelyn could calm herself, the floor began to shake, not violently, but enough for her to take notice. She quickly looked up, and no longer recognized her living room. The atmosphere had changed in an instant. All around her, the room was surrounded by dark lights mixing from red to green, to purple to blue, and back again.

  She also heard a ferociously loud whirring noise. She couldn't tell where it came from, because it seemed to be traveling everywhere. It was horrible and screeching, like something trying to force its way into her world.

  Evelyn felt something touching her feet and legs. Her eyes darted to the ground where she saw tendrils of black smoke covering the ground, and wrapping around her legs, like snakes. The tendrils planted her feet to the floor, trapping her.

  The objects in her apartment: the lamp, her books, her CD's, her pictures, and the silverware in her kitchen, began to levitate high above the ground.

  Evelyn braced herself as the objects began flying at her at high-speed. She protected her head by covering it under her arms. Even though she couldn't run, she was able to dodge away from most of them. From the corner of her eye, Evelyn saw a butcher knife from the kitchen flying towards her. She ducked down quickly enough for it to miss her and hit the wall by the front door instead. She gasped and short screams left her mouth as she avoided more. Finally, one of her own books from her bookshelf and hit her hard, knocking her to the ground. She looked at the book that hit her: Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury.

  She could feel some blood running down from her nostril, but she didn't bother wiping it off. She saw the wisps of smoke crawling higher up her legs, past her knees, and closer up her thighs. Evelyn struggled to break out of its grip by shaking and jerking her legs. Suddenly, another hover of smoke shot up from the ground. This one had red and green stripes, with four long, silver, claw-like tendrils pointing at her. It smacked down and grabbed her left thigh. The tips of the claws left tiny puncture wounds on her leg. Evelyn screamed in pain, still fighting off her captor. She rapidly pushed and brushed the red and green cloud of smoke away from her. Eventually, the smoke had dissipated, and the ground was clear again.

  Four little ribbons of blood streamed down her leg as she picked herself up from the ground. As she stood up, she heard a low, humming, growl.

  From her hallway, the evil force, spawned from the Necronomicon, barreled down the narrow halls and closer to Evelyn. The force roared with an unholy growl, its voice growing louder and higher to closer it got to her.

  The poor, young Evelyn, for a moment, was left breathless at the sight of it. Its appearance was inexplicable. She reached for the doorknob and swung the door open. As soon as she did, she saw that there was no outside beyond that door. There was only endless darkness.

  She turned and saw that the entity was but a few feet from her. Without a s
econd thought, Evelyn leapt into the dark void to fall for what she thought might last forever. Just until I wake up. she thought. Hopefully, I’ll wake up soon.

  It was a short fall that caused her to land right on top of a small bed in a dimly lit bedroom. She pushed herself up, recognizing the thick, patchy, quilt beneath her. She looked all around her as she slowly got up from the mattress. Evelyn remembered the floral wallpaper surrounding every wall, the old, mahogany, dresser on her right, and the open window next to it that allowed her to gaze outside when she was a child. She was in her old room. The very same one she used to run away to when she was afraid.

  Of all the places Freddy could have taken her: on a boat surrounded by shark-infested waters, a desert filled with deranged axe murderers, or even Hell itself, this was someplace Evelyn never wanted to be. Not again. Because to her, this was Hell. For so many years, she was trapped here, left to cower in the corner. She would listen as her father's footsteps became louder, and her body would freeze as she feared that he was walking to her. You bastard...

  Everything was exactly as she remembered it. Even the closet to her left contained the clothes she used to wear back in her elementary school years: Some blouses mixed with sports jerseys, jeans, two dresses shoved in the very back, and a pair of tennis shoes thrown on the floor.

  Not long after she familiarized herself with where she was, the quiet atmosphere was soon filled with a faint noise. She listened attentively. She could hear it clearly now.

  (crying...sniffling...whimpering.)

  Evelyn walked to the end of the room, towards the door. She grabbed the doorknob and turned it, slowly and quietly. Opening the door by an inch or so, she peeked outside in the hall. It was dark, so she couldn't see much. She could only see what the shadows weren't hiding. Evelyn felt cold and nervous, not wanting to know what was on the other side, but she knew she had to in order to go further.

  It looked like the silhouette of a man peeking out in the hall, but he was immersed in black shadow. His face was not visible, only the direction in which he moved. He stood in front of an open door in the hall just across from where Evelyn was standing. She remembered it. That was her parents' room.