Eternal Maze

by Alexie Aaron

  PEEPs Lite 3.1

  Eternal Maze

  A Hauntings novella by Alexie Aaron

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ~

  Bought by Maraya21

  kickass.so / 1337x.to / h33t.to / thepiratebay.se

  Copyright 2012 – Diane L. Fitch writing as Alexie Aaron

  Revised 2013

  ALSO BY ALEXIE AARON

  HAUNTED SERIES

  The Hauntings of Cold Creek Hollow

  Ghostly Attachments

  Sand Trap

  Darker than Dark

  The Garden

  PEEPs Lite Novellas

  Eternal Maze 3.1

  Homecoming 3.2

  CIN FIN-LATHEN MYSTERIES

  Decomposing

  Death by Saxophone

  Discord

  To Kelly Noelle who generously shares her gifts, time and ideas with me.

  Without you, Kelly, this book would be just words on a page.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Homecoming PEEPS Lite 3.2

  Alexie Aaron

  Chapter One

  The dry leaves crackled in the cool autumn breeze. Alice squeezed Doreen’s hand as they followed their older sister, Rita, and her friends through the corn maze. Rita’s boyfriend, Dane, held the maze identification flag with one hand and her hand with the other. Craig and Melanie took turns dropping back behind the group to scare Rita’s little sisters. The girls were becoming used to having their hair tugged, their shoulders tapped, and the word boo ceased to make them jump. Alice and Doreen, aged six and eight respectively, were good sports and wouldn’t complain to their mother when they got home. They had learned early that complainers never went anywhere with their exciting teenage sister.

  On this sunny Saturday in October, Rita and her friends had planned to go to the local haunted house but were vetoed by the inclusion of the two little girls in the day’s activities. Rita’s mother had been called into work and had no one to watch the two youngest girls. She offered to pay for Rita and her friends’ entrance fees if they took the girls to the Carver Country Corn Maze. The teenagers reluctantly agreed. After all, they could visit the haunted house later that day after Rita’s mother got off work. It would be busy considering this evening was Devil’s Night, but for teenagers, the more the merrier when it came to haunted houses. Screaming and running around, enjoying the scare of being grabbed and frightened by things popping out at them, was just the ticket for the night before Halloween.

  Carver Country’s maze was advertised as the biggest corn maze in the Midwest. It was a popular October harvest event and a precursor to Halloween. When the group arrived and saw the long line of people, there were groans from Craig and Dane. Rita got out of the car to investigate and found that the line was moving swiftly, considering the time it took to set up each group of maze participants. Each small group would be issued a tall, colored flag, and their start would be staggered. Most other corn maze flags consisted of a tall, bendable, slender fiberglass pole with a brightly colored pennant flag on top. Carver added a two way walkie talkie this year to theirs. When a group got into trouble or hopelessly lost, they could press a button and get instructions from the team of watchers in the high tower at the start of the maze. Rita approved of this system. Normally they would have to wave the flag madly and suffer humiliation by a booming amplified voice directing them through the maze. This way no one but the tower would know that the group had gotten lost.

  Rita gave the girls three rules before they started the maze. They were to hold hands. Under no circumstances were they to let go of each other’s hand. They were to follow close behind the person holding the flag, even if they had to run. And most important, Rita did not want to hear one word out of the pair. Giggles and laughter were fine. Talking was off-limits. The only voices Rita wanted to hear were her friends.

  Alice and Doreen thought, considering that they were going on a grown-up date, that they could abide by Rita’s rules. So far they had only broken the first rule when Alice got a bee on her sweater. Alice received a warning, another one would have them sitting in the car while the rest finished the maze.

  Their group had reached another dead end. Frustrated, Dane handed the flag to Craig while he argued with Rita over signaling that they wanted help. Rita was a diehard maze solver. She would find their way out. They just had to backtrack.

  “We’ve been walking for miles,” Dane over exaggerated, “We haven’t even found the middle yet.”

  “I think we should have gone right when we went left,” Craig said.

  “Now you have a suggestion. Where the ef were you when we were at the fork?” Rita snarled.

  “Leave him alone,” defended Melanie.

  Alice and Doreen stood patiently watching the group of teens arguing. Doreen felt a tap on her shoulder. She ignored it.

  Alice’s long braid was tugged. She sighed, bored.

  Doreen felt arms go around her waist. She giggled as it tickled.

  Alice felt a chill next to her, and her arm was yanked as Doreen was pulled backwards into the dry corn. Alice did not let go. She followed her sister crying as the leaves cut into her hands and bare ankles. She fell but still held on to Doreen’s hand and was dragged after her. She was about to complain but remembered the rules. Silently the girls disappeared into the corn.

  Dane listened to Craig and Rita trading jibes for a few minutes before speaking. “Who cares if we cheat? Let’s get this maze done and get something to eat, I’m famished.”

  “I care,” Rita said looking around. “Hey, where are the girls?”

  Melanie saw a movement in the corn. “There they are.” The petite teenager walked over and stuck her head through the break in the wall of corn and called, “Ollie ollie in come free!” Strong hands grabbed her head and pulled hard. She screamed, “Someone’s grabbing me!”

  Craig ran to help her, putting his hands around her waist and tugging hard. The two of them fell backward as Melanie’s head was released. There were bright red finger-shaped welts on each of her cheeks.

  “What the hell was that?” Craig asked getting to his feet.

  Rita stood with her mouth open, paralyzed. Dane was fighting with something he couldn’t see. It pushed him, and he pushed back. Melanie ran to Rita and shook her, pleading, “Let’s get out of here!”

  Craig went to the aid of Dane who still had the flag in one of his hands.

  ~

  Ted smiled as he watched from the tower. He was field testing his mini micro-coms or m-coms for short. He wanted to call them M and Ms, but that name was taken. The Carver people were delighted when he proposed the idea to them. This year they had expanded the area of the maze and the number of groups that could be in the maze at one time. Ted suggested putting a GPS tracker on the flags, but the cost was too great. They would have to raise the entrance fee to cover the trackers. They knew from experience how much a person would pay to traverse the maze, and they were already at the upper limit.

  Early in the day a couple of groups had called in. They identified themselves with the color of their flag, and one of the spotters directed them back to
the correct turn. A few younger kids clicked the mic and giggled words like poopy and worse. The spotter had to advise them on the proper use of the walkie talkie. But overall the experiment was a success as far as Ted was concerned. Next year Carver would be buying his product. And if he found a way to cut the GPS price in half, well, then they would buy that too.

  “The black flag isn’t moving,” reported the west side spotter. “Been stationary for quite a while.”

  Ted watched as the spotter walked over to the control panel and picked up the microphone.

  “Black flag group, is there a problem?”

  No answer.

  “Black flag group, wave your flag if you are hearing me?”

  The flag remained still. The spotter pointed the flag out to Ted and asked, “It’s in the far west corner. Do you think the mic is out of range?”

  “All the mics have been tested for twice that distance,” he informed the tall young man.

  “Probably some teen couple making out,” he said. He called down to the entrance and asked for them to look up who was in the black flag group. Upon hearing that the group had two teen couples and two young girls in it he said, “Nah, I don’t think they would be doing the naughty with the kids around, at least I hope not.” He picked up the mic and called again, “Black flag team, do you need assistance?”

  They were greeted with silence and no movement from the flag.

  “Ted, I’ve got to get someone down there to…”

  “Help! This is red flag!” A high toned female voice shouted into the mic.

  The spotter looked over and saw that the red flag was waving wildly. It had moved into the area where the black flag was resting still.

  “This is spotter, what’s the problem?”

  “There is a man on the ground, and he’s not moving! I’ve got young children with me. I am going to take them away from here. Please give me instructions to get out of the maze.”

  “Red flag…”

  Ted watched as the spotter guided the red flag away from the area. He then opened an all mic channel and told everyone to stop where they were. He said there was a medical emergency, and they needed to get a first aid team through the maze. He apologized for the inconvenience.

  Ted descended the ladder and met up with a group of adults equipped with first aid gear. As he followed them through each turn of the maze, an all too familiar dread came upon him. It reminded him of Cold Creek Hollow. Not the pleasant feel of the country lanes, but the raw feel of evil building, of nature being shoved aside. And through the breaks in the corn, there was something dark watching. They swiftly made their way to the dead end, past the quivering red flag team to where the black flag stood immobile.

  It was firmly planted in the ground through the chest of a teenage boy. He lay there on the blood soaked ground, clutching the flagpole as if to keep it upright. His eyes were open in shock. The frozen expression on his face Ted had seen many times before. The dead boy looked as if he had seen a ghost.

  Chapter Two

  The police had arrived and were interviewing everyone who was in the maze or had just exited and were still on the premises. All the flags were accounted for. Ted had the foresight to take a few snapshots of the maze from the tower to confirm at least where the flags were at the time of the discovery of the dead teen. He rushed to the PEEPs command vehicle and printed the police several copies of the pictures.

  The immediate concern was for the safety of the rest of the party. Cars were searched before they could leave. License plate numbers were run.

  Fortunately, Carver had insisted on checking ids at the gate of those that had them. They wanted each group to have a person sixteen or older in it before they would issue a flag. They quickly assessed that the missing females were Melanie Douglas and Rita, Alice and Doreen Anderson. Craig Sherman was missing and Dane Harper was identified as the dead male with the flag shoved through his chest. Already there was speculation that Craig must have killed Dane and kidnapped the girls. An AMBER Alert went out for Alice and Doreen Anderson. Their mother was on her way, and the parents of the other missing teen had been notified.

  Ted volunteered his equipment to be used in the methodical search of the maze. Dane’s body had been removed, and the forensic team was processing the kill area plus fifty feet in all directions.

  He put in a call to Burt the team leader of the paranormal investigative group, Paranormal Entity Exposure Partners (PEEPS), that Ted belonged to. He wanted to get his and Mike’s, the other founding partner, okay to use the long range thermal imager.

  Ted paced the tower using his digital camera’s telephoto lens to scan the fields beyond the maze. His phone rang and he answered, “Talk to me.”

  “It’s Burt. Mike and I officially give our ok. Any news?”

  “They put out an AMBER Alert on the little girls.”

  “So it looks like a cut and dried kidnapping?”

  “There’s a dead teenage boy, Burt, I’d say that was more than cut and dried,” Ted pointed out. “Plus the look on the kid’s face spoke volumes.”

  “And?” Burt urged.

  “My gut says this is a paranormal event. The kid looked frightened, like he saw a ghost.”

  “How’d he die?”

  “Coroner’s not being official, but from the amount of blood on the ground. I’d say he was stabbed through the heart by the flagpole while he was on the ground. His hands had a death grip around the pole. It went through his chest and two feet into the ground. This is hard clay out here, and the flagpole has a blunt, capped end.”

  “Ouch. So you’re talking a lot of force.”

  “Yes, by all accounts this Craig was a bean pole. And how’d he control the girls - there were four of them - while he stabbed his friend?”

  “Trust your instincts, but keep out of the cops’ way,” Burt advised. “Let me know if you think PEEPs can be of use.”

  “Will do.”

  “I’ll alert Beth and Mike to not make any plans for this weekend.”

  “What about Mia?”

  “Don’t bother her unless you’re sure it’s a paranormal event.”

  “I hear you. Sure could use her speed in bilocation mode though. She could navigate the field in no time,” Ted said.

  “Call her, tell her what’s up, and leave it up to her,” he advised. “And tell her I said hi.”

  “Really?”

  “No, I just said that to freak you out.”

  “Mission accomplished,” Ted said before hanging up.

  ~

  Mia’s phone rang. She pulled it out of her back pocket. “Hello?”

  “How’d you like to bilocate over here and help me out?” Ted asked in his sexiest voice.

  “Kinda busy at the moment,” Mia said, as she looked at the handful of leaves she just extracted from the second story gutter of April’s house. She was balanced precariously on a ladder that had seen better days. The only thing between her and certain death was the nervous apparition of a farmer transferring his axe from his shoulder to the ground every few minutes.

  “K. Just listen,” Ted instructed.

  “Let me put you on speaker. I need both hands.”

  “Where are you?” Ted’s voice came over the speaker clearly.

  “On April’s roof cleaning out the gutters.” Mia buttoned the phone in her shirt pocket and continued pulling leaves and pine cones out.

  “Sounds like a manicure ruined,” Ted said dryly and laughed along with Mia.

  “You know how I love my painted nails,” Mia laced her words with sarcasm. “But a girl’s got to make a living, so into the gutters I go.”

  Ted commiserated briefly before getting down to business. Mia listened to the reason for his call as she rushed to finish the job at hand.

  “Carvers, is that the place that advertises with the giant pumpkins saying, ‘Be amazed at the maize maze?’”

  “Yes, that’s the place.”

  “That’s not too far from here, maybe an hour d
rive tops. Let me clean up, and I’ll hit the road. I can’t OOB over as there are two rivers between here and there.”

  “Oh, stupid me. Just get here. I have a bad feeling about this. I think time is running out for those kids.”

  “Okay, I’ll head straight over.”

  “You weren’t doing anything tonight were you?”

  “Nah, just a homecoming alumni dance that I did not want to go to.”

  “With Whit?”

  “You think I would submit myself to that torture for any other reason? He was homecoming king when he was a senior. He is obligated to go.”

  “Makes sense. You?”

  “He’s older, not my class, plus I wasn’t going to see much of him anyway. There he’d be dancing with the alumni homecoming queen. I would be hugging the punchbowl, while being glared at by the ladies that thought he was available.”

  “Mia you’re beautiful and…”

  “I was voted ‘most likely to end up in an institution’ when I was a senior.”

  “Oh.”

  “K. Do me a favor and send me a good map to my phone and I’ll see if Murphy wants to go for a ride.”

  “Cool, Axe Man. Oh, before I forget, Burt says to tell you hi,” Ted said mischievously.

  “That’s freaky, the boy must be on meds,” Mia said descending the ladder.

  “Nah, I think he’s over you.”

  Mia wrinkled her face. A girl didn’t need to know that the man that had dumped her was over her, even if she had moved on. She sighed and drawled, “I’m easily forgotten.”

  “Stop being dramatic and get your ass here. I need you.”

  “Yes sir, as soon as I fish Murphy’s axe out of the pond. I’ll be there.”

  “What’s his axe doing in the pond?”

  “I grounded him. Too many late nights,” Mia lied.

  It took Ted a minute to catch up, “Very funny. Sending you a map. Drive like the wind.”