by P. T. Phronk
He grunted and stomped toward the steps, probably not even aware that I had his friend’s gun shakily trained on him, but before he began to climb, Marcus leapt from under the stairs and ran straight for him.
The two men—poppa bear Marcus and the invading black bear—became a blur as they struggled. The intruder was bigger, but Marcus was stronger, and soon the man was pinned to the floor. His rifle was strapped to his back, now jammed underneath him. Marcus’s weight wouldn’t hold him for long.
“Marcus! Take this!” I shouted down. I tossed the handgun to him, and miraculously, he caught it.
“You stay down. I will not hesitate to use this,” Marcus said, pushing the gun hard against the intruder’s temple. I believed him. In his hands, the weapon was no fairy tale. This story, finally, was coming to an end.
Except Marcus’s hands were shaky, and he swayed like he was a tree about to topple.
“We need to help him,” Craig said.
Caleb’s fingers drummed against the railing. “Where’s Mae?”
Then, on cue, the lightning outside flashed, and there was Mae. She stood on the other side of the foyer with her police-issued Glock handgun pointed at the intruder on the floor. “Freeze!” she shouted. “You’re under arrest!”
My heart leaped—in a good way, for once. I’d almost been convinced that I was crazy, and Mae really was a hallucination induced by bumping my head in the basement. I nudged Craig. “Are you seeing this?”
“She’s here, finally,” he said.
I breathed a sigh of relief.
“Mae. Girl, your timing could not have been better,” Marcus said as he eased his weight off the intruder. The man twitched as if he was going to make a run for it, but Mae’s gun in his face convinced him to sit still. Marcus let him go and collapsed backward, gripping his side.
“Mae,” I shouted down. There was no point in being quiet anymore. “The other one is locked in the basement. He’s injured.”
“Ten-four. Well done. Thank you, Amy, for everything you have done for the family.”
I realized I could hear her. The rain and thunder had stopped battering the house, and only the sound of trickling water surrounded us. Craig’s arm around me squeezed, and it was so comforting that I almost leaned into him further.
On my other side, Caleb’s grip on the railing was tight, his knuckles white. His eyes were focused wrong, as if he were seeing something beyond the walls of the foyer instead of the spectacle below. His lips twitched like he was rehearsing a speech.
Marcus kept a gun trained on the intruder while Mae reached into a belt full of tools strapped around her waist, out of place with the dress she was wearing, grey in the dim light of candles in other rooms. As Marcus chatted with his old friend, he seemed to grow confused.
“But how’d you get here so quickly?” I heard him ask.
Caleb was somewhere else. His face twitched into odd, momentary expressions. Something was still wrong here. I inhaled to suggest we go down to help deal with the men, but I was cut off by a gunshot.
Marcus collapsed. Mae was suddenly facing away from the intruder on the ground. Another crack echoed across the foyer, and her head snapped back.
Another man stepped across the foyer. He wore socks, making his footsteps nearly silent. His gas mask had two filters instead of one, forking in the middle, and his biohazard suit was old, cracking and peeling into tiny pieces in some areas. If the man in the basement was a pig, and the one on the floor a bear, then this new one was a snake.
Of course there were three of them. How could I have been so stupid? Three bears, three little pigs, three guesses to solve the riddle.
I withheld a scream. Marcus wasn’t moving. Mae wasn’t moving. The bear rose tall and collected each of their guns.
Caleb’s eyes rolled back in his head. He convulsed against the railing as if it were electrified.
The power flashed again. This time the lights stayed on, illuminating the room below, illuminating us. We had to run, but before we did, I took one last glance down.
Mae’s hat was beside her, in a spreading pool of blood, with a red rose on top. And her dress was bright orange.
Part IV
A Solution
Chapter 10
I felt safe in the control room. Even though the intruders were still downstairs, dragging the bodies of people I’d likely have considered friends if I’d spent a bit more time with them, I felt safe. I felt guilty for feeling safe.
I’d be okay as long as I could see them. The power was back on, the cameras covered the main areas of the house, and the lock to the control room was solid, so I felt like I had at least some, well, control.
That didn’t help the others. Behind me, as I monitored the house via the cameras, they each broke down in their own way.
I squeezed the mouse like it was the only thing keeping me from floating away. If I let go, my sanity would fly away as a fine mist and provide nutrients for the horrible trees outside.
Disconnected snippets of conversation reached my consciousness:
They’re still out there!
What do they want?
Daddy!
But they’re still out there!
What about Trista?
No, no, Daddy. My daddy.
They’re still out there!
Where the heck is Ash?
Jasmine had been hiding in the control room, so Ash was the only member of the household still unaccounted for. I tried clicking to switch the cameras to other views to search for him, but the controls were still locked—hacked by whoever had planned this. Whoever had killed Trista.
One of those cameras still pointed at her. Nothing had changed. She was still dead. Her final message was still scrawled beside her, still too pixelated to read. Craig avoided looking at her, instead studying books on the shelves of the office as if getting to know a stranger’s home, even though he’d probably put them there himself, and possibly even read them.
The intruders moved toward the edge of the camera’s range. One of them appeared to be struggling as he dragged Marcus.
“Daddy!” Jasmine said, reaching out, her fingertip leaving a faint smudge on the screen.
The others—The Pig and The Snake, as I thought of them—rushed to help The Bear move Marcus. They’d released The Pig from the basement, and it gave me a dark pleasure to see him limp into frame, and now struggle to help move Marcus with only one good hand.
A collection of dark-coloured pixels thrashed up and down on the screen. It was only a blur, but it very well could have been Marcus’s boot, resisting these people once again. I hoped that’s what it was. Jasmine sobbed and caressed the edges of the screen, clearly thinking the same thing, but nobody said anything, perhaps afraid of jinxing it. Hope was a rare and dangerous thing in this environment.
They moved off-camera for a few moments, then The Snake returned to the foyer. He looked around, shouting back to the others, his muffled voice audible through the door of the control room. The Pig entered the frame, scratching his head. He circled the room, his head swiveling back and forth. He checked behind a fake potted fern.
Mae’s body was gone.
The family consoled each other around me. They didn’t mention anything about Mae, so perhaps they were too distracted to notice. I tidied up my ponytail as my mind began working again. It was good they didn’t notice. It was good that the body was gone, with not even a trace of blood, as if Mae had never been there at all. It was an odd event in a night of many, but at least this was one I had been half-expecting. Like all those confused scientists trying to figure out the environmental catastrophe, I had theories about what was occurring at Foster Manor.
The intruders moved off-camera again, toward the ball room.
I felt safer for a moment, even though I knew my sense of safety was false and temporary. These intruders hadn’t killed Trista, after all. They didn’t seem sophisticated enough, nor did they have the access necessary, to hack the security system. Someo
ne from the Foster household had done that, though whether the murder was connected to the men downstairs or the corrupted universe was playing loose with horrible coincidences, I did not know.
I put my ear up against the door. There were voices out there, but they were still distant, and I couldn’t decipher anything they said. As far as I knew, the only way to get to us upstairs was to go through the foyer first, so we’d have advance warning on the cameras if—when—they came for us.
I nudged Caleb. He still acted strangely, staring at the walls of the small room like there was something written on them—transfixed by something just outside the range of vision the rest of us possessed. “Caleb, can you watch this camera?” I asked, pointing to the foyer view. Distraction would do us all some good. He slowly turned his head toward the computer screen, as if removing his gaze from the walls took physical effort. “If you see anyone, you need to say something.”
He leaned forward, suddenly more alert. “I see someone.”
It was Ash. He moved slowly, hunched over, tiptoeing as he stepped past the bottom of the staircase. “He’s heading straight for those men, the intruders,” I said. “We have to do something.”
“What can we do?” Craig asked, after clearing his throat. He was too loud and frail to do much of anything.
“Some of us should go warn him,” I said.
Jasmine shook her head. “I won’t.”
“He’s one of us. We can’t let him walk in there.” Ash was making his way further down the hall. Soon he’d give himself away.
Jasmine shook her head again, the tears zigzagging down her face. Caleb only stared at the screen until his far-off glassy-eyed look returned and he was looking past it. I thought about Mae’s speech about Jack again.
“I’ll go. But you two need to come with me.” I held up a hand when Jasmine and Caleb opened their mouths to protest. “We need to help him. If we don’t, we’ll regret it for the rest of our lives. Trust me.”
They must have realized how certain I was in this fact from the mist forming in my eyes as I thought of Todd and Wes. Both of them stood taller, silently telling me they were, reluctantly, ready to go.
“Craig can watch the screen and shout a warning—only if absolutely necessary. Okay?”
As soon as Craig gave the slightest nod, I unlocked the door, swung it open, and walked toward the stairs. Maybe I should have been more like this with my family—less turning away, more leading the way. It appeared to be working, because Jasmine and Caleb followed behind me.
Then I realized that my knee felt even puffier than before. I could barely walk, and right now the stairs looked like an obstacle course to me. But I faked it, squeezing the railing and easing myself down, one step at a time, realizing that each passing moment was another chance for Ash to get himself killed.
Who cares if he does?
I pushed the thought aside. From what little I knew of Ash, he was an asshole, but he was the family’s asshole, and I wouldn’t let another household disintegrate because of a few personality flaws and self-destructive tendencies. Jasmine and Caleb would realize that, too, if given the chance.
They rushed to help me down, trying to remain quiet, but my hand made squeaking noises on the polished wooden railing.
At the bottom of the stairs, I gestured toward the end of the hallway, where Ash approached the slight bend in the hall, leading to the rooms beyond, and the ball room at the end of the east wing where the intruders had gone. Jasmine and Caleb waved to try getting his attention, but he was oblivious. They creeped closer to him, making louder and louder pssst! noises.
That was my chance. Leading the way had its purpose, but turning away was what I did best.
I took a few steps back, then swiveled toward the west wing, and limped as quickly and quietly as I could to the basement, where Trista waited with a solution to all of this.
I hobbled down the hallway, away from the safety of the camera watching over me, away from the family. The power flashed in and out. Sconces on the walls got confused and flickered as they were fed an irregular flow of electricity. Thunder still roared outside, but it was distant now.
I almost reached the basement, but then a wave of nausea came over me, and suddenly it felt like the hallway was tipping over sideways. My knee was too weak to resist it, and I had to ease myself to the ground, clawing at the wainscoting.
I stared at the worn hardwood floor, making sure it was level with the rest of the Earth. It was. Of course it was. It’s only panic. Get yourself together, nerd.
Strands of hair that had fallen loose from my ponytail blew to the side, tickling my ear. Something breathed heavily just behind me. The same hushed, scratchy voice that I’d heard hours ago, just after I arrived here.
What if, what if, what if.
I squeezed my eyes shut and told myself it was only the heating system again, making even odder sounds now because of the flickering power.
Louder now: what if, what if.
It wasn’t the vents. I could feel the dampness of an open mouth behind my ear. Feel the heat of something large hovering there.
WHAT IF, WHAT IF, WHAT IF.
It sounded like screaming without vocal chords, just pure breath, a shouted whisper.
I swiveled and felt the heat behind me retreat. The lights went out just then, and the hall was black to my unadjusted eyes. But something moved down there. Something darker than the dark.
The power surged for a moment, the lights flickered, and there it was: the dog.
It was bigger than before, its shoulders almost as high as the sconces on the walls, occupying the bulk of hallway. Its fur was black with a few grey hairs, and slick with wetness.
I forced myself to turn and face it, then clutched at the intricate woodwork of the wall to pull myself up despite the protests of my knee.
It wasn’t the heating system, but that didn’t mean it was anything to be afraid of. “You’re not real,” I whispered.
I took a step toward it. It reared back and shook, sending droplets against the wall. The fur at the back of its neck stood on end and a low growl formed in its throat. I took another step forward.
“It’s okay,” I said in a voice as soothing as I could make it. “Maybe you don’t even know you’re doing this, but it’s okay.” I reached out, palm up and fingers curled, the way Wes had once taught me to approach a stranger’s dog when we first walked along the ravine behind our new house. His ghost helping me out with this one. “We have a mutual friend, you and I. Mae? You know Mae, don’t you, boy?”
The dog extended his neck toward my hand, yellow teeth underneath smacking lips.
It twitched toward my fingers.
I uncurled my hand and scratched underneath its chin. The fur and whiskers felt so real, just like I would have imagined them. Anyone who’s ever had a dog could imagine the feeling of whiskers flowing around kneading fingertips.
“You’re imaginary, aren’t you, boy?” I whispered, trying to project calm even as I noticed red coming off on my hand where I’d stroked the dog’s damp fur. Blood dripped down the walls from when he’d shaken the wetness off. “Just like Mae.”
He wagged his tail at the mention of her name. I giggled and stroked the side of his neck, making him flop onto his side, the ground thumping beneath him. As I scratched his belly, his long black legs, the size of a deer’s, flailed in the air. I had to move my face back to avoid getting scratched by overgrown black claws.
Keep moving, urged my inner voice of reason.
When I stopped rubbing the dog’s belly, he twisted upright and looked at me with big, sad eyes, a high-pitched whine in his throat.
“It’s okay, boy. Go find Mae! She’ll play with you.”
Sure enough, she was behind him now, standing further down the hall, alive and well. I walked toward her, and the dog followed, his big tongue flopping out as he ran ahead and approached Mae, claws clacking on the hardwood.
What colour was her hat? The sconces flicked on and i
t was green. They flicked off, then on again, and now it was orange.
She crouched to pat the dog. As he licked her face, she looked up at me with her kind, grandmotherly smile, and I tried to smile back. She turned and headed toward the foyer, like a normal old woman taking her normal blood-soaked dog for a walk.
Suddenly I remembered the camera perched outside, above the entryway. Would Craig spot them leaving? My face turned hot. The nagging feeling that I was going crazy came on again, but they’d all seen Mae’s attempt to rescue us. She wasn’t my imagination—I’d asked Craig. She’s here, finally, he’d said. But what if his insistence that she wasn’t imaginary was part of my imagination too?
Or: what if the ghosts were imaginary, but not part of my imagination?
What if, what if, what if.
Murder. Murder was easier to figure out. Murder was something that happened in the real world. Trista wasn't a ghost, not really, but maybe she could still tell me who killed her.
It was seeing Craig and Caleb’s bond that had finally reminded me of the failsafe code. At first it was only a tickle at the back of my mind when Craig touched Caleb’s chin to better examine him. I’d seen that same gesture before:
Todd fell off his tricycle—the little plastic one with a wooden handle that his dad could push and steer from behind, so it was pretty much idiot proof. Somehow, Todd fell off anyway, spilling onto the grass beside the sidewalk. Wes crouched beside him, then did that exact same gesture, pushing Todd’s head from side to side to make sure he was okay. I watched it all from the porch, worried at first, but then relieved that Todd was okay, and that his dad was there to watch over him. Perhaps this start to our new life together in this new home won’t be so bad after all, I’d thought, at the time.
The next day, getting started in the marketing department at APT, I needed a password. The glow of Todd and Wes still in my mind, it came to me easily:
