Cold Fear

by Timothy Friesenhahn

  Shutting the door, she asked Arthur, “what brings you over in this terrible weather? Your grandson is in the basement.”

  Before she finish speaking, the old man cut her off. His face changed, his look of happiness on seeing her, turned to urgency. He held up the tote-bag which held the crystal ball. His free hand was shaking as he tried to fish a cigarette from the pack with his mouth. When he began speaking, he spoke in a whisper as not to be heard by anyone but her.

  He spoke frantically, “look, Cici, I know Moloch came to see you. Ask no questions, there’s not much time to explain. Look, I don’t care what you do with this fucking ball, but it’s your problem now.”

  Dropping the ball at her feet, he exited the house without saying another word or even lighting his cigarette. Cici picked up the bag and peered inside. Within the bag the crystal ball sat glimmering even in the dull lighting of the old house. Opening the door to call out to the old man, she realized it was no use, Arthur was gone. He had sped out of the house faster than she had ever seen him move before.

  Hearing the door to the basement shut, she quickly took the crystal ball to the kitchen and hid it in the pantry. Tanner and Hannah returned with the lamp and jumped at the sight of Cici in the candlelight, standing in the corner of the kitchen, next to the pantry door.

  Hannah startled and almost screamed out.

  “Woah, you scared us a little,” Tanner said as he switched the lamp on.

  His nose was turned to the ceiling and he asked, “is it almost finished? It smells delicious.”

  “Yes, it’s done, let’s eat. I don’t know about you two, but I’m hungry.”

  Cici made their plates and the three of them sat around the small kitchen table; mostly ate in silence. Not once did she tell them of her newly dead parents and she didn’t show signs of emotional distress. Her mind was set, she knew what she wanted to wish into the crystal ball. She didn’t know if any of it would come to be, but as the day seemed to unfold and nightfall fell over the land, she decided she would wish Tanner to be hers. The feeling was as elusive as a slippery fish. It forced her thoughts to flop through her mind endlessly as the three ate the Caldo. As far as the other two wishes, she could care less. Having considered wishing her parents back to life, she knew better. Her mother was religious, but not crazy religious and her father believed in the afterlife. They were at peace, away from the corrupted world. She knew there was no bringing back the dead, that power only existed in the hands of God.

  As the night began to come to an end, she said goodnight to Tanner and Hannah; offering them the room that was furnished. They asked her if she would stay the night, because walking in the horrid weather wouldn’t be an option. She lay on the couch with her eyes wide open, waiting until she could be sure they were asleep. More than an hour passed, before she sat up; ready to go into the kitchen and retrieve the crystal ball.

  From behind her she heard a whisper, “you’re still awake. Good.”

  Tanner turned from the small hallway and entered the living room. He sat next to her and in the embrace of darkness they could feel each other staring into the other’s eyes. Their souls were connected, within the darkness and the silence, they made passionate love. Cici held her breath doing her best to hide her moans so they didn’t wake Hannah. Tanner thrust Cici with fiery fluidity, it had been so long since he could even form an erection and now, he couldn’t force it away if he tried. As he made love to her, he felt his eyes water. Love ate its way into his soul. The spark between them was destiny. Her nails dug into his back and he could feel her legs tight with pleasurable tension. His pale skin and bony body thrust into her faster, then faster, and before he could pull away from her, she locked her legs. Not fighting her embrace, he let himself go inside of her. They lay connected by flesh for what seemed like hours.

  She whispered into his ear, “please, come back here to me. Please, don’t let this be our only encounter.”

  Kissing her lips then her forehead he gushed, “don’t worry, I don’t think I’m going anywhere. What I feel for you, I have never felt before, and I know you feel it too. If you’re worried about Hannah don’t be. Her and I have had problems for a while now; we have been separated for long time, even though we stayed together. This feeling I have for you, its unexplainable. Can you feel my heart? It hasn’t beat that fast in ages. Feel my skin, I have goosebumps. We know nothing about each other, but I feel like I have known you my whole life.”

  They stayed connected for a moment longer just holding each other and then made love a second and third time.

  While Tanner and Cici were discovering the fate that unknowingly intertwined them, Hannah was awake, caught in sleep paralysis. She couldn’t move or speak. Staring into the solid white eyes of a figure standing over her, she lay helpless. Looking to her right with her eye as far as she could without being able to turn her head, she could tell Tanner was not in the bed with her. Turning her attention back to the figure with solid white eyes, she realized it was no figure at all but a man. The man possessed a smile more solid then she had ever seen on a person. The smiling man ran his fingers up her leg. The hairs on her body stood from toe to neck. His hand opened her legs and she lay helplessly watching him smile as he touched her. From between his legs under his muscular torso she saw a tentacle moving towards her. It slid slowly in between her legs until it was inside of her. At first, fear had locked her in so tight she thought she may have a heart attack. That was short lived as her eyes closed, she began to feel a pleasure she had never felt before. Her body released fluids between her legs she had never released before. Her legs twitched uncontrollably and her body spasmed. Pleasure beyond her wildest dreams coursed through her body. Right before she was going to scream out in existential ecstasy, the smiling man covered her mouth to mute the yell of rapture she let out. The smiling man retreated out of the room and she lay twitching in an orgasmic state for several minutes.

  Tanner entered the room and the pleasure had left her body, but not her mind. She could smell the scent of sex on him as he lay beside her. He and the Mexican girl had made love. The thought left her; she didn’t care. The satisfaction the smiling man with the tentacle gave her was what her soul longed for. Pretending to sleep, she lay awake and quiet until Tanner was sound asleep. Once she was sure he wouldn’t wake she masturbated to the memory of the smiling man. When she was finished, she too went to sleep.

  Cici lay naked for several minutes keeping her eyes shut tight, savoring every moment she just had with Tanner. Her virginity lost, the pain she felt at first only lasted a mere second. True love ran through her veins. She knew, she and Tanner were meant to be. Some unknown force was at work but she didn’t care what it was. Love had found them, and together with him she wanted to stay.

  The crystal ball sat where she had left it in the pantry. Her phone light reflecting off it and she had no idea what she would do with it. She set her phone down and held the ball within her hands. An image came into the crystal ball. The smiling man, Moloch, was looking at her.

  He requested, “do what I requested of you, do it now, or else.”

  The image disappeared and she sat holding the crystal ball. The one wish, the smiling man wanted from her, seemed to have already come true. Deep in her heart, she knew the way she and Tanner felt for each other, it wouldn’t take long for him to accept marriage. In fact, she was considering asking him before he left. She knew he would say yes.

  To be sure she looked at the crystal ball and wished, “I wish that the weather be cleared up by morning. I wish that Tanner accepts my proposal.”

  Feeling a bit guilty for her second wish, she set the ball on her lap. The feeling of guilt was short lived, for a plethora of other feelings flooded her body. Her parents had just died hours earlier, she hadn’t even had the time to properly grieve.

  Shaking her head, she felt a shame bigger than she had ever known come over her as she sat and looked into the crystal ball and murmured to herself, “what’s wrong with me? Why
am I so foolish? It doesn’t matter now, if this ball does hold power. Then Tanner will marry me. That isn’t so bad.”

  Tears poured from her eyes in a sudden stream as her voice quivered, “too bad my parents won’t be able to see me get married. How am I supposed to explain what happened to them to Tanner. What if the government runs a background check and finds out my father and I were living her illegally? This is all too much. This is stupid. What’s wrong with me?”

  As she sat there, questioning herself, and finally grieving over her parents, she noticed that the sound of the snow falling heavy on the roof had lightened up. She set the crystal ball on the tote which sat at her feet and got up to peer out the kitchen window.

  The window was icy, but she could see well enough to tell that the snow had just about quit falling. She looked from the window to the crystal ball. Picking it up, she forgot about her dead parents for a moment and investigated the still glimmering sphere.

  Could this ball truly grant wishes? She thought to herself.

  Walking quietly, carrying the ball with her, she went to the front door of the house and stepped on to the porch. The snow was falling no longer, and when she looked up at the sky, she noticed the clouds had separated and the stars were poking through. She looked from the stars to the crystal ball. The smiling man said she had three wishes. That meant she had one more wish to make.

  Holding the glimmering ball in front of her, she looked in to see nothing but a dim reflection of herself. For the thousands of years of the crystal ball’s existence, she was going to be the first person to ever ask of it what she was about to wish.

  As she held the ball before her eyes, she thought of her father, and how he had preached the corruption of society to her time and time again. The crystal ball, if had the power to clear out the weather, then it could be used for things far worse. Her reflection stared back at her as she rubbed the crystal ball with her right hand.

  Unsure if her third and final wish would make a difference, she spoke unto it anyway, “my last wish is for the self-destruction of this crystal ball.”

  The crystal ball instantly vanished.

  The next day Hannah left alone, and Tanner stayed and accepted Cici’s hand in marriage.

  Chapter 22

  When Moloch left Hannah’s room, he was satisfied. If something was to come of him before he was prepared to go; he had a backup plan. Hannah would unknowingly carry his seed within her. Not a seed of growth, but a seed of possession. Should he fall before he was ready, he would awaken himself within the lustful woman. As he stepped up to the wall of the basement where he had traveled to and from for several years, he realized something had went through it.

  Nothing living could have traveled through the wall. Any living person wouldn’t even have ever known the wall was a portal. Only he could make living people see the gate. He could smell the spirit of someone, however, and he knew his portal had been used. His portal must have stayed open when he returned earlier in the day.

  But why? And how? He thought to himself.

  Then, he recognized the scent of the spirit that had traveled through the portal. It was the old hag. Mathelda’s spirit found his portal and traveled through it. If her spirit made it to the other side successfully, then she would be in the time he had left. Only he could choose when and where he wanted to travel to through the portals when he made them. His powers were limited, and he could use the portals to travel a few years forward or a few years back. Never, could he alter anything while he was there, he could only observe and interact if he felt like it. The portal he had left open by mistake had been where he left last, and the last thing he was doing on the other side wasn’t resting as he usually did. It wasn’t observing nor was it interaction. He had gone a few years ahead to see what had come of the very night in which he stood in the basement, baffled by the old hags use of the portal.

  Then, the light at the bottom of the wall on the floor went out. Astonished at what he was seeing, because only he could turn off the portal, he bent forward to inspect the wall. The light was gone, and the portal closed. Then his chest began to burn, and pain ran thru his body. He hadn’t felt pain in thousands of years. Then he realized what had happened. The girl, Cici, destroyed the crystal ball. He was bound to it and it to him. As he stood there, he felt himself evaporate into the air, he chuckled. Luckily, he had been clever enough to place himself within the woman, Hannah. He knew the Mexican girl didn’t know by destroying the crystal ball she would destroy him too. That was a question he long awaited the answer for, now he knew. Also, he knew, if he ever came across another one like it, if one existed, he would not touch it.

  For now, he would vanish from the form he stood in and, in a couple of years, awake within Hannah. Then he could fulfill his plan, he can retrieve his protégé. His protégé in which he knew was born. He traveled through his portal to the year 2022 and knew that Tanner and Cici gave birth to a beautiful daughter. A daughter they would surrender to him or die trying to protect. Time meant nothing to him, and he knew that a few years to humans were seconds to him. Fully possessing the new body he would wake in would take some time, and he was unsure what lay ahead of him once he owned the woman’s body completely. His powers would be weak, that he was certain of. He would have to feed, and he knew he would have to on his own.

  Unless, he thought as his body was disappearing. Unless the old fool, Arthur, was still alive. I can use my new vessel to seduce the old man. Make him my servant once more.

  Before his thoughts could wander any further, his mind became, once again, attentive to the fact that he would have to deal with Mathelda first.

  Would she look like she did as she died? Would she possess any kind of power? Something must be hidden within her, for she was able to cross through the portal. If she did it successfully, her body would be restored. Maybe, even her youth would be revived. After all the years he had known the woman, he should have realized that she may hold some power unknown to herself; she was in fact a descendent of Lilith and himself.

  A mere second before he vanished entirely, he realized how foolish he had been. So arrogant in his ways, he had never even considered that the old hag may have powers hidden within herself.

  And if she held hidden powers, then that would mean that her grandson may possess powers as well.

  His last thoughts frightened him, a sensation he had long forgotten. But it didn’t matter, because he knew with a new body, he would be able to grow stronger than he had in his wilting structure that now vanished completely. The basement where Arthur had fed him so many bad boys, sat empty and cold.

  Chapter 23

  While Moloch was disappearing, frightened by his thoughts, Hannah was driving away; lost in ecstasy from her encounter with the smiling man. Tanner and Cici held each other, deep in love. Tanner felt his soul’s contempt for the first time in a long time. Cici was preparing the moment to ask his hand in marriage, and she thought about the destruction of the crystal ball. She was happy with herself, trying to keep her emotions under control.

  The old man, Arthur, sat alone in his camper; chain-smoking. He had finally let his grief for Mathelda take hold of him. A gun with one bullet lay before him on the table full of empty beer cans and cigarette butts. He had held onto the gun and bullet for fifteen years. He felt it was time to use it. He placed the gun in his mouth.

  Mathelda was in the year 2022, standing a distance away from her house. It had been remodeled and looked as elegant as it had when she and Arthur first built it. Even the grass was green again. The sun beamed down on Tanner and Cici as they smiled and watched their daughter run around in circles, playing happily. If Moloch was still alive, then she was too late. He would come for the small child, and unless a miracle from God fell from the heavens, he would take the baby girl.

  PART TWO

  THREE YEARS LATER

  Chapter 1

  The old man sat alone, three years older and three years sadder. Only time drug on, he had not. All he
left his home for was food and cigarettes. His life had become a well of loneliness and regret. Cici visited him only once, and he made sure she would never visit him again. People were the last thing he wanted to see, and friendship was off the table. When he opened the door to see it was Cici knocking with Tanner standing at a distance, he sent them off with fury. Their visit may not have triggered anything but as it happened, the girl was pregnant, and he knew what that meant. Moloch’s plan was in the works.

  Time passed as he sat day in and day out, staring at the small handgun which still held the one bullet. His memories had become but fragments, jumbled up like puzzles in their boxes.

  How Long would he keep on living? It was a question that frightened him more and more.

  Most nights, he would put the gun in his mouth, remembering the last victim he had ever fed to the demon. That night he had seen the smiling man’s true form.

  Gary was the boy’s name, and he was a sick kid. Not sick with an illness but sick in the mind. Arthur had watched him for a few days as he always watched the terrible children Moloch sent him after. However, even though the kids were terrible and probably would grow to be worse, he still felt they didn’t deserve the fate that waited for them in his lover’s basement. When he opened the door that night and peaked in, out of morbid curiosity; he knew he made a mistake. The smiling man’s true form was monstrous. Terror in all essentialities. The figure that stood hidden in the darkness of the basement was massive, its claws were huge humanoid like hands. Black nails shined in what little light had come from behind the beast.

  Where had the smiling come and gone, when he always appeared and disappeared out of nowhere? That was a question that was stayed unanswered for the old man.

  Three years passed since the day his sweet Enchantress perished. Two years had passed since the day Cici and Tanner had showed up unannounced. The small town of Sullivan was annexed and belonged to Atkinson. His money he received from Moloch was running out. The smiling man disappeared, and he had never stayed away so long.