“What are you talking about? We passed the test, now let us go!”
“Not so soon, I’m afraid. You see, that was only one part of the test. We have one more part to go before I can let you leave.”
None of them moved. Jacky’s hopes evaporated like snow in the sun. They’d come this far, nearly escaped this madhouse, only to—
“Cassandra Grey,” the man said, turning toward Cass. “You’ve convinced everyone that you’re afraid of your own shadow, but honestly you’re just afraid of yourself, of the dark things you can see, of the person you are deep inside.”
“No!” Cass cried out. “I’m not like that. I don’t see ‘dark’ things.”
The look of panic on her face told Jacky all she needed to know. Why had Cass never told her, though?
“And you,” the figure said, turning toward Ben. “You’re afraid of what everyone thinks of you. You act tough because you don’t want others to think badly of you.”
Ben clenched his fists but didn’t say anything.
Then he turned to Jacky. “What you’re afraid of the most is being alone, being invisible. Your parents ignore you most of the time, and it’s your worst fear that someday, everyone will ignore you.”
“Who are you?” she asked. “How do you know all this? Why are you doing this to us? We already survived your sick game.”
The man chuckled, then took his hat down, revealing the same gaunt face that had been haunting Jacky and her friends from the moment they entered the fair: the ticket booth guy, the pencil-mortician, the ride manager, the axe murderer.
“I’m Balthazar,” the man said with a slight nod, almost a bow. “I’m a fear demon.”
“A demon?” Ben asked in a trembling voice.
“Yes, the kind who lives on fear. I make people see their worst fears, and if they survive them, then they’ve won the game and I let them to go. If they don’t survive… well, then their souls, their fears, are mine.”
Cass reached for Jacky’s hand and squeezed it.
“You didn’t honestly think that little show of just a minute ago was you facing your worst fears?” Balthazar asked. He let out a dry laugh. “Being buried alive. Axe murderers. A wicked, old woman. That’s all fun and games. True fear is deeper, more personal, and you’re about to meet true fear.”
This time his laugh echoed off the walls. “Good luck,” Balthazar said. Then he snapped his fingers, and the lights went out.
Jacky pushed the button on her cell phone, scolding at the low battery. Her hope, which had flared up just minutes ago, was now completely gone, but she had to keep up pretenses, for Cass.
Then she realized Cass’s hand wasn’t touching hers anymore. She turned around on her heel, but Cass was nowhere in sight.
“Cass? Ben?” she asked. “Where are you?”
No response.
She inhaled deeply, but the air wouldn’t reach her lungs. It stayed stuck in her throat. She took another deep breath, and another, but she couldn’t breathe. Panic took hold of her, panic because she was in the dark, in this House of Horrors, and….
She was all alone.
Chapter 11
Jacky slumped to the ground. She held her hands to her mouth and tried to steady her own breathing. So she was on her own, yes, but that didn’t mean the situation was hopeless, that she couldn’t get out of here somehow.
It’s an illusion, she told herself, just like the axe murderer, Cass’s great aunt and the closed coffin. This guy is just pulling your leg. Demon or not, he can’t do anything more than conjure up illusions, or he would’ve done so already.
Unless he was saving the best for the last.
Her parents ignored her most of the time. It wasn’t because they were bad parents, but because they were occupied with other stuff. So the demon had a point in saying her worst fear was that one day, they’d forget about her altogether. They wouldn’t, of course, because they loved her. They might ignore her now and then during breakfast, or forget to laugh at her jokes, but they wouldn’t forget about her altogether. If they knew what was going on, they’d come and save her.
They weren’t here, though, so she had to fend for herself.
Her breathing calmed down, and Jacky got up again. Her knees were a little wobbly, so she held on to the walls for support as, step by step, she made her way through the room.
Part of her wanted nothing more than to run toward the exit doors and scream for help. But even if help came, what would they do against a demon? Besides, she kept replaying in her head how, if the demon had separated them, Cass and Ben were still in this madhouse somewhere. She had to find them. She owed them that much.
A scream startled her, and she nearly bumped into the coffin ride. The scream came from deeper inside the house.
The coffin ride looked inviting, in a morbid way, but there was a reason the demon had left her here on her own. Being alone was her worst fear, but she’d have to go out on her own to find the others.
She’d been a little scared the first time she stepped inside the coffin ride, her own mild fear fueled by Cass’s terror. This time around, fear raced through her when she stepped inside, scorching up her arms and legs until it nearly paralyzed her.
The ride started moving all on its own this time, since there was no one to operate it. Jacky clutched the seat, and it took all her willpower to stay put while all her instincts screamed to run away.
The coffins passed through the doors into the hallway with the fake skeleton, and she didn’t even flinch when the skeleton dropped down. Then the ride went through the grandfather clock, but this time ended up in a completely different room than the withered hallway they’d landed in the first time around.
This room was an exact replica of her classroom, complete with rows of tables and chairs, a chalkboard, and closets with the same books her teacher had made them read earlier this year.
Her fellow classmates stood at the front of the class, near the chalkboard. They were laughing out loud, as though someone had just told a hilarious joke. Jacky’s spider sense tingled again, as a thousand little legs seemed to make their way up her back.
Her classmates were pointing at one figure lying in the center of the room, hands clutched to his ears: Ben.
“Always knew you were such a loser,” one person said.
Jacky couldn’t make it out their voices, which sounded distorted and wrong, like the kind of voice people had who wished to stay anonymous on TV—too low to be human.
“You’re stupid,” someone else said. “You can’t even remember stuff they taught us years ago.”
“Your clothes look like they came straight from the trash bin,” yet another person chimed in. “How can you even look at yourself in the mirror?”
Jacky didn’t hesitate once she figured out what was going on. Ben was clearly being bullied. She jumped out of the coffin and rushed toward them.
“Leave him alone!” she yelled, but her classmates pretended not to hear. She pushed one of them aside as hard as she could. “Leave him alone!”
She pushed the crowd away and made her way to her friend. “Come on, Ben, let’s get out of here.” She held out her hand. “None of this is real.”
He looked up, gazing at the escape route lying in front of him. He struggled to get up, but ignored her out-stretched hand. His eyes were distant, teary, and he looked right past her.
“Come on, Ben, we’ve got to find Cass.” She reached out to help him up, and grabbed his arm, but he yanked it back violently.
“You know what?” He looked at the crowd surrounding him. “I don’t care. All I want is to get out of here, and go find my friends. I don’t care about you, or your opinion.” He pushed one of the bullies aside. “If you don’t like me, then so be it. I don’t like you either.”
He rushed forward, eager to get out of there, and bumped straight into Jacky.
“Hey! Watch out!” she said, falling backward.
Ben took a step backward too, his eyes wide with panic. Then, instead of off
ering to help her, he ran straight past her to escape the bullying gang, and left her there alone. He hesitated for a second before getting into the coffin ride, as if wondering how it had gotten there, but then climbed inside.
Jacky jumped up and chased after him. “Hey, wait up! We’ve got to find Cass!” She pushed another two people out of the way to reach the line of coffins.
Ben climbed in the front seat, buckled up his seatbelt, and stared straight ahead, pale as a sheet.
“Ben, wait!”
She started to climb into the backseat when the coffin ride started its terrible journey again. Half in and half out, she tumbled forward into the back seat.
“I told you to wait,” she scolded.
He didn’t reply.
“Ben?”
This time he did turn around, but instead of looking at her, he looked straight through her to the group of bullies he fled from.
That’s when Jacky figured out she was invisible.
Chapter 12
The coffins stopped suddenly, sending Jacky flying forward, her nose nearly bumping into Ben’s back.
A closed door stood in front of them in an empty room. The room had the same eerie, discolored wallpaper as the previous rooms, but it was much wider than the hallway they passed through earlier. The coffin ride had come to a dead end, the only way forward through the door.
Ben seemed to come to the same conclusion at roughly the same time. He unbuckled the seat belt and got out of the coffin. He looked from left to right, as if he expected someone to sneak up on him any moment.
She followed him toward the door, not as afraid as she had been before. The thought of being invisible had numbed all her senses—worse than being chased by a mad man, worse than being buried alive. It was her worst nightmare, and she was living it.
As they neared the door, screams erupted from inside. Ben must’ve heard them too, because he stopped, startled. Then he squared his shoulders and continued onward. He pushed open the doors, only hesitating slightly.
They entered a strange new room. Everything in the room was covered with mirrors: the walls, the ceiling, and even the floor. In the middle of it all stood Cass, tears streaming down her face, screaming like a banshee.
The mirrors reflected her, except it wasn’t Cass at all. The figure in the image was a corpse, a decaying skeleton. The only thing vaguely resembling her was its pale, blonde hair. Its eyes were completely black, infused with evil.
“Cass!” Jacky cried out, running toward her friend. “It’s not real. Don’t look at it.”
Cass kept on screaming when she saw her, except she didn’t see her at all. She looked straight through her to Ben.
“It’s okay,” he said, reaching out for her. “None of this is real. You have to face your fear, Cass. Look in the mirrors, and then this will all be over.”
“I can’t,” she said in between sobs. “They show me who I really am, and I can’t take it!”
Ben looked at the mirrors and horror flashed across his face. “You can do it. Trust me, you’re strong enough to take it. This isn’t who you really are. It’s just who you think you are.”
“You don’t get it,” she said. “I’ve seen things… terrible things. I’ve had visions of terrible things happening, and then they actually do happen, weeks later, and….”
He walked toward her and grabbed her arms. “Snap out of it, Cass.”
She stood paralyzed in place.
“This isn’t you. Even if you can somehow predict the future, that doesn’t define you.” He paused for a minute. “Listen, you helped me snap out of my fear for your aunt. That fear was totally ungrounded. Your fear for yourself is ungrounded as well. One ability doesn’t define who you are.”
Cass nodded and looked up, staring past Ben and into the mirror. She swallowed her fear, took in her own reflection, and began to relax again. She sighed and straightened her shoulders. “Thanks, Ben. Any idea where Jacky is?”
He shook his head. “No, haven’t seen her yet. The coffins showed up out of nowhere, though, and brought me here, so maybe if we step in again, it’ll take us to Jacky.”
“Okay.”
“You idiots!” Jacky screamed. “I’m right over here!” She waved her hands up and down, but it was useless. They didn’t see her.
Cass stopped suddenly. “Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“Do you hear me?” Jacky asked. “Hey, I’m over here!”
Cass listened intently, but then shook her head. “Never mind. Thought I heard something.”
“Probably just your imagination. Let’s go.”
“Yeah.”
Cass followed him, but then stopped dead in her tracks. She glanced at the life-sized mirror in front of her and let out a gasp. She turned around, blinked at Jacky, and then turned back to the mirror. Her mouth fell open. “Oh my God.”
“What?”
“Look.” She pulled Ben’s sleeve, stationing him right in front of the mirror. “Jacky’s in there.”
Ben’s eyes grew wide. “How…? Jacky, can you hear us?”
Jacky looked at both of them, bewildered. She nodded, trying to indicate that she could hear them.
“Are you stuck inside the mirror?” Cass asked.
She shook her head.
Ben bit his lower lip. “Cass, I think she’s behind us.”
“Behind us? As in invisible?”
Jacky’s mirror image nodded.
Cass spun around on her heels, facing the emptiness behind her. “I’m so sorry, Jacky! Any idea how to stop you from being… invisible?”
Jacky shrugged, because she honestly had no idea. Her brain was working overtime, but was there a magical cure for being invisible?
“Well, the point of all this is to face our fear,” Ben mused. “So maybe you have to face your fear of becoming invisible. Although that’s kind of hard to accomplish, I guess.”
“Maybe if we can get out of here, everything will go back to normal,” Cass offered. She held out her hand. “Come on, Jacky, take our hand. Else we won’t know if you’re with us or not.”
Jacky reached out and grasped her hand.
Cass froze up for a moment, and then relaxed again. It must have been weird to have someone she couldn’t see touch her.
“Look there.” Ben nodded toward a lonely coffin cart standing at the end of the mirror room. “That wasn’t there before, was it?”
“No.” Cass shook her head. “Let’s go.”
She pulled Jacky along to the coffin. Already, she looked more confident, more at ease, now that she’d faced her fears.
Jacky felt more lost than ever.
Cass briefly let go of Jacky’s hand to climb inside the coffin, but quickly reached for it again.
Ben climbed in the front seat.
As soon as they were all seated, the cart moved forward.
Two mirrors pulled apart, offering an exit into another room. The coffin screeched to a stop, even though it wasn’t going all that fast.
There, right in front of them, was a place Jacky knew all too well: her kitchen, complete with white kitchen cabinets, an old wall calendar they hadn’t looked at in years, the art-deco table with four matching chairs, and the table cloth her mother had purchased from an online shop in France.
Her Dad sat at the table, his nose buried inside a newspaper. He didn’t even look up when the coffin stopped right in the middle of their kitchen.
Her mom stood behind the kitchen counter, making scrambled eggs.
“Are those… your parents?” Cass asked.
“Yep,” Jacky replied, not that it was any use, because Cass wouldn’t hear her anyway. She squeezed her friend’s hand instead.
Those were her parents, and even worse, she had the feeling they weren’t an illusion at all. They were real. The coffin ride had somehow brought them straight into her home.
Chapter 13
Jacky let go of her friend’s hand. She had no idea what to do, except that she
had to do something. She climbed out of the coffin and walked toward her Dad.
“Hey Dad,” she said.
He didn’t look up from his newspaper, which actually wasn’t all that different from how things were most of the time.
A deep breath. “Hey Mom,” she said, turning toward her mother.
No response. Again, not that different from what she was used to.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do,” Jacky mumbled out loud. “Any advice, Mr. Fear Demon?”
She had meant for it to be rhetorical, sarcastic, so she nearly jumped out of her skin when the demon actually replied.
“You know,” Balthazar said. “I don’t really like killing people and all that. Trails of bodies are always such a hassle.” He appeared right behind Jacky’s mom, leaning against the kitchen counter as if he owned the place.
“Why do this then?”
“I thrive on fear. I need it to survive, and the three of you have plenty of fear to go around.” He paused. “Oh, all right, the other two I’m not that fond of. Could’ve lived with letting them wither and die there. But you have a nice imagination. Axe murderer? Classic, but always fun. Besides, I like how you try to fight your own fear, tried to from the get go. You wouldn’t leave your friends behind, even though you were scared out of your mind.”
The demon paused and toggled his fingers on the kitchen cabinet. “I like that in people, so I’m willing to give you a chance here. Facing your fears is about letting go of them, getting over it. Would it be truly that bad if your parents ignored you even more, if you were invisible to them?”
“Can’t think of anything worse.”
“There are benefits to being invisible.”
Jacky imagined the benefits: stealing cookies when no one was looking—she’d done that a bazillion times before, but it never got old; sneaking out of the house and hanging out in the garden when Mom was too busy with work and Dad was out.
Plus, even if her parents ignored her, she always had her friends. Maybe they couldn’t see her, but they were there for her; had been throughout this entire ordeal. If that wasn’t true friendship, Jacky didn’t know what was.
Weirdville: House of Horrors (Lower Grade Spooky Fun Adventure) Page 4
