The Tenebris Creek, guarded by the supposed ‘haunted’ forest located towards the northern outskirts of the sparsely populated city, is widely known for its eerie scenery. One does not dare enter the creek since the forest is the only way to reach the water way. But that never stopped humanity’s curiosity. And various missing person reports have accumulated where the last seen have always been near the forest. Naturally it’s existence became shrouded by mystery and had rumours circulate in various forms—some not even remotely related. Children are told varied amounts of tales to never stray into the anomalous nature of the peculiar forest. The entrances were soon sealed off as missing person reports piled up, they were fenced up and forbidden to the public. As the situation eased, rules desaturated and weakened. It is now a part of everyday life and no one had the time to glance twice.
It is certainly not surprising that the forest is a ground for the manifestation of abnormalities, which brings us to the sprouting human mirroring husks…
Blank Human as coined by the William—who was the first to catch sight of it— happened to chance upon them on a regular evening outside his room’s window. To him it appeared pale, almost close to white and had long limbless features. It moved around aimlessly and sloppily on its legs while the arms flayed about staggering through the chilly night wind. It’s face—if one could call it that — did not possess eyes, nose or a mouth. Just a white flat blank slate. William found it obscure and frightening, to see something as grotesque as that, it would put anyone in a spiral of horror, but he soon recovered and wanted to look more. And just like that he lost sight of it as though it dissipated into thin air.
This was six days before the twins went on their own search. A few days after the first encounter when William had already brushed the incident off as a daydream he stumbled across the husk once again this time on his way home near the forest. It was close to dusk this time as well. William was overcome by a vigour to chase it down, he eventually lost it but to him it seemed to have noticed his presence. Although one could not make head or toe of the figure, it turned in response to William’s steps. The last thing he remembered seeing was static all over the head and a twitch in the neck. It felt like a mirror for a second and the face reflected his own body.
When chances of finding the husk became sparse that’s when a news article was published. It basically confirmed the husk’s being to be real and proposed it on accident to the twins. He was keen on making them believe his words even though his sanity was at stake. Eventually they agreed to a deal— the twins were to explore the vicinity where Will had last seen the husk and Will would procure footage of the day the picture in the article was taken. With some time to spare they had ample time to theorise and named the entity. After the course of events, the twins gained a sense of seriousness on the matter and experienced the first hand adversity of the situation.
“So? What are you up to this time?” The question seemed to be directed only to William.
“R-Ray..! Who let you in?!” William screamed while standing up.
The twins watched without a word.
“I feel like this has happened multiple times to the point that you should really consider locking that damn door of yours…” Ray slipped past the door and slammed it shut. He took off his helmet and tidied his dark strands.
“Part time ended early so I came to crash here for a while...” he said with his usual lazy tone and facial expressions lacking any form of strain.
“Hey Ray! Long time no see.” Dylan started up casually.
“Yeah, it has been a while. Anyway I have ice cream.” He shoved his hand into the plastic bag he was carrying and presented two bars for the twins and a cup for himself.
“Where’s mine..?” Asked William innocently.
“Here.” Ray handed an ice cream sandwich, one of William’s favourites.
Will gleefully took the treat and immediately noticed a decrease in weight of the item. He held it high and crushed it inside his palms– it was no more than an empty wrapper.
With an unimpressed look in his eye, he turned to Ray.
“Hmm, it’s empty? I guess I ate it on the way.” Ray is not one to play tricks but seemed to particularly enjoy doing it to Will.
“Is this about that security camera I hacked earlier today at Uni?” He rested cozily on the couch munching on ice cream.
“Oh? So it was you who got hold of those images? Hm? I almost misjudged the fact that Will was capable of such things, I guess not.” Dylan asked in an undermining tone while shooting a smirk.
“Sigh… yeah, he helped me and maybe I didn’t do justice for his work… That would be the reason for this petty revenge.” Will wallowed in sorrow.
“We had to make a run for it after a security guard caught hold of us. But it wasn’t all that difficult to shake him off...” Ray contemplated.
“I suddenly feel bad for the security guard…” Dylan let out nervously.
“Yeah, two overgrown men shaking off a helpless old security guard…” Demi’s face was tainted with disgust.
“Anyway aren’t you taking this playing detective thing a little to seriously?” Ray once again started prying for answers.
“It does not concern you! Why do you insist on getting involved?” Will said forcefully.
“Tch-” Ray’s hawk-like eyes filled with fury as his face morphed into something inexplicable. An expression, they felt to be more terrifying than their previous encounter.
“Things are starting to heat up!” Dylan whispered to Demi. “And we have front row seats..!” She added.
“They will probably make up before we know it, that’s how their every other squabble always ends. Anyway should we go home?” Dylan didn’t seem too keen on staying since the little house guard with a tail he very much adored wasn’t present today.
“You’re just uninterested since Anggy isn’t here right?” Demi smirked as she stood up and headed for the door.
“Am I an open book or are you just incredibly perceptive?”
“I could say both!” Demi joked as she held the door open for Dylan.
“See you later guys! Sort this mess out before our next visit!” Demi waved goodbye and closed the door while the two argued endlessly.
As they both took tiny steps descending the stairs they started to take note of their surroundings more closely than before.
“So, weird humanoid creatures? Still haven’t fully grasped the idea yet...” Dylan muttered.
“I could say the same as well. Who would have thought it was more than a figment of our imagination? Also should we be glad it’s not a zombie apocalypse..?”
She continued, “But the more I think back to what happened… we clearly tried running away and yet, somehow managed to collapse.”
“Yeah… I found it strange as well. It felt surreal. How time felt distorted and how my memories don’t connect.”
“This is so freaky…”
“I still don’t know if telling the authorities is good or a bad idea…” Dylan was deep in thought.
“Since nothing has escalated we should be fine for now.” Demi weakly reassured.
“But you know how fast things go south in apocalypse movies..!”
Night befalls and soon the sun shines as though the creepers at night had never even laid foot on earth. The twins realised they could never properly adjust to their lives after the incident, it racked their brains tirelessly. They continued their day like any other, go to school and pretend it never happened.
Dylan couldn’t get much sleep last night and was extremely groggy throughout the day that even his friends took notice.
“Yo? Bud, you okay?” Coltan, one of the people Dylan found himself having close by all the time, noticed the unusual blankness on Dylan’s face.
“Hm? I guess, actually I don’t know…” Dylan looked out of the window vacantly. The view was the school gates and swarms of students scattered around the campus like ants.
“You’re not sick are you?”
“Huh? Since when did you pay close attention to things like that?” Another familiar voice emerged from behind them.
“Wow! If it isn’t our class rep in the flesh..! Coltan trumpeted loudly.
“How about sticking to the usual ‘Emily’ for now?” She grew tired of all the newly profound attention she’s been receiving upon attaining the title of class representative as well as vice presidency for the student council.
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She pushed her glasses up and noticed a not so bright Dylan, sitting like a blob on his desk with a vacant expression. “What’s with him?”
“No clue! Been here for about 10 minutes without him chasing me with a chair.” Coltan said proudly.
“Sounds serious. Hey, Dylan! If anything’s bothering you then-” She was suddenly interrupted midway through her sentence by Dylan who had suddenly sprung up from his seat.
“Gosh! You scared me! What’s wrong now..?”
He didn’t say a word while he stared intently outside of the window. It seems he had noticed something strange happening in the campus. Without a second to spare he bolted out of the classroom squirming past the crowd of students blocking the classroom door.
“HEY! What the heck?! Where are you going, class is about to begin?!!” Emily gave chase but immediately gave up.
“Is he really alright?” Coltan enquired.
Both his friends stood defeated near his seat without a clue as to what just occurred.
“Why would he be here? It doesn’t make sense! And that robe… please, don’t be him..! Whatever it is I have to check it out now…” Dylan instructed himself as he zoomed past a teacher who was on his way to class.
The teacher noticed the familiar brown haired troublemaker and warned him.
“HART! No running in the halls!”
“Gasp! Mr C-Charles! Good to see you. You see I really have to rush to the restrooms, it’s urgent..!” He ran off without turning back.
“Sigh…” The teacher seemed a little too accustomed to his antics.
“What’s with the commotion outside?” The class next door took notice of Mr Charles’ outbursts.
“Dunno.” Demi shrugged, she could not care less. “But I just found myself the comfiest sunbathing spot in this room…”
“I know you’re always unusually cold but this is a bit much even for you..” Her friend looked at her in disbelief.
“Lor, you don’t know my pain…” Demi pulled herself from the window she was resting and got back into her proper posture.
Just then, two not so familiar figures approached them.
“Hey, Demi!”
“Hm? Emily! What’s up?”
“Oh, nothing. It’s just that we want to know where Dylan is…”
“Dylan..? I don’t know, if anything you guys should know more than me…”
“I see..”
They exchanged worried glances at one another not sure of what to do next— all except Demi, she didn’t seem very bothered my her brother’s disappearance until she looked away from the class and out the window.
She noticed an unmistakable black robed man standing stuck to the school wall as if waiting for someone. And just as she rose to get a better view, she saw her brother dashing towards said figure.
“Is he crazy?! Why is he going alone!!?” Demi screamed as she slammed the window with her palms, and sprinted towards the door.
“What the hell..?” Coltan mumbled standing quietly behind Emily.
“The Harts are a complicated species…” Lorraine exhaled as she tilted her head to the side.
“Lor...Was it?” Emily took a seat.
She scoffed and answered, “Actually it’s Lorraine, Lor is just a nickname. Are you guys friends of Dylan’s ?”
“Yup! More like we’re the only ones he’s got, with that nasty personality of his..” Coltan grumbled.
“Nasty?” She was mildly surprised by that statement.
Emily clears her throat and responds, “He’s merely talking about himself.”
“Haha!” Lorraine found herself entertained by the new faces.
His heart beat fast both from sprinting as well as from terror.
“HEY!” He pounced past the flower bed which was in his away and found himself face to face with clone Will.
The robe swayed peacefully in the breeze as they turned to see what could possibly obstruct its day.
“My, my! If it isn’t the little one I met not too long ago. Where’s the other little one?”
Dylan was pressed on the fact that it kept calling him little one but came to a throbbing realisation that it was tall, exponentially taller than before.
“Uh…uh…” Words struggle to leave his mouth.
It leaned closer, “What is it? Cat got your tongue?”
Dylan stood frozen in place, terrified of the sudden spine chilling breeze that bombarded him. It’s origin seemed to be coming from it’s face— was it his breath, he wondered.
Just as it tried to corner Dylan to the wall whilst placing its icy cold fingertips over his neck, a foreign object came flying in their direction. It was a bullseye— a knock straight to the head.
“Cough! Cough!” Dylan held onto his neck while breathing unsteadily.
“A shoe, really?” The robed figure spoke in a mocking tone.
Demi instantly caught a tight hold of Dylan and dragged him to her side. “Well, in a school there really isn’t much to arm yourself with.”
“Hm? This one can at least hold up a conversation. How delightful! So, would you care to talk over some tea?”
“Wha..? What kind of joke is this?” She desperately rustled Dylan’s head to wake him from his trance.
“I can assure you I’m terrible at jokes…” The figure pulled its hood on and brought it’s fingertips together—as though in a position of praying but not quite, their palms didn’t rest on each other. And once again a tremendous surge of energy emerged and pulsated through every bone and muscle in their body. In the blink of an eye they found themselves in an unfamiliar territory.
“GASP!” Demi inhaled sharply as she found herself clenching onto a purple coloured velvet cushion snuggled under her arms as she and her brother were each seated on their respective antique rocking chairs.
Demi frantically looked around the dark room lit only by a small oil lamp, whilst Dylan seemed to have passed out cold. To their front– a large teak office table with a white embroidered tablecloth neatly placed over it. The ceiling felt endless and a magnificent glass chandelier seemed to have emerged out of thin air with no base holding it in place. The tiles although not very visible seemed spotless and even their reflections were clear. The walls were decorated with silver portraits with no faces.
“H-how..?!” Even Demi was baffled. “WHERE THE HELL ARE WE?!”
The figure stood behind the table with a pleased expression. “What’s with the attitude? Didn’t you want answers..?”
“I-I…” She didn’t know what to do next, her mind went blank and turned to the only person trustworthy.
“Not to worry, he’s fine! Although passed out he will soon recover. He’s just having an after shock from the teleporting. This is what happens when you control a mortal body for too long. But as for you...”
Demi was confused at its rambling. “What are you even saying? Who even are you? Where are we? What are you trying to do with us?!”
“You talk a lot don’t know? Also do you have memory loss or what? Aren’t you two supposed to be aware of your seniors?”
“Seniors?!” Demi had enough of the nonsense and sprung up from her seat.
“Huh? Interesting. And sit back down we ain’t done talking.”
Demi found herself pulled back and glued to her seat unwillingly, even after multiple attempts she failed to get back up. The figure pulled Dylan by the collar and placed its finger on his forehead.
“Wake up sunshine! You’ve got to pay close attention as well.” They forcefully pushed Dylan backwards almost out of his seat but he soon regained consciousness.
Dylan awoke in the same confusion as Demi, but soon realised the situation they were in, but his heart could not contain its pounding.
“Now, it’s seems we have quite the predicament. You guys are not apprentices, are you?”
They both shook their heads in disagreement.
“Then a proper introduction is due.”
The once cloaked dark figure as though part of the night sky soon disappeared. A bright, bloody red light flashed from within the robe, and the face that they had been seeing the entire time faded away.
A pale complexion not by human standards emerged just like a porcelain doll but with no shine to it. Pupils like the blood moon in the night sky appearing so unnaturally and eerie, whilst a scar that resembled a crack ran down from the left eyebrow to the cheekbone. Burgundy hair swept past the shoulders and swayed unevenly. Topped with a wide brimmed hat and brown coat reaching the knees and finishing with shiny buckled boots. It looked like men’s attire straight out of a 19th century painting but adorned by a women of tall proportions.
The twins were speechless to discover the sudden morph.
“That’s better! The name’s Forsyth. Pleasure to meet you, Dylan and Demi.”
Dylan, with his mouth still open from the shock, stuttered, “How… how do you know our names?!”
“I know a lot of things little one.” She grinned with mischief.
“I was originally planning on teaching you brats a lesson, but it seems to me you are no more than actual human children…”
“Your eyes speak more than your words… unlike us. Anyway, I am what you would call a Karma Collector. A title that only goes to the deserving dead.”
“In laymen script, there is life after death and I happen to be tasked with a complicated field of after life — karma collection. So, I’m essentially a wanderer in constant search of karma. Which one thing led to the other and here I am.”
“As for the two of you meddlers, you found yourself in an unpleasant situation with an undead. How do you suppose you explain yourselves before I erase you?”
“Erase us?! But we didn’t do anything wrong..!” Dylan protested.
“You loitered into MY territory and somehow got past the barrier, took me quite a while to chase you down. The lengths I had to go to dispose you two, I had to alter time and it was ridiculously hard to do in this vessel.” She seemed angered by their ignorance.
“Look karma lady, we went in to look for the very thing you just made go poof.” Demi seemed to have lost access to her vocabulary from the information overload.
“You mean this vessel? You can have it. But what is a mortal like you going to do with it?”
“That ‘vessel’ why does it look like our friend?” Dylan muttered anxiously.
“I don’t know.”
“Huh?!” They both sounded at the same time.
“What?”
“How do you not know? Weren’t you the one in possession of it all this time?!!” Dylan screamed.
“Well, I happened to find it stuck on a tree not too long ago and thought to make use of it. If anything only the creator of the vessel knows of its origin.” She said casually. “Sigh… to elaborate, the vessels appearance depends on the creator and if not given the right instructions it can manifest into the creator themself.”
“What? There’s no way Will could have…
Hey! Can these vessels copy humans they encounter..?” Demi enquired.
“Classified information, imp.”
“Imp…?
Anyway, I think we have proved ourselves innocent. Why are we still stuck to this chair?”
“I’m not done with you yet…” An evil grin sent shivers down the twin’s spines.
The slowed clacking of her shoes approaching them echoed through the soundproofed walls, building tension as they hold their breaths in the hopes they would survive whatever was in store.
“Forsyth! Those are children..!”
A mysterious voice emerged from a corner of the ceiling pleading her to stop. Like a beacon of light, it seems the twin’s prayers were answered. They got to breathe one last breath before more unexpected chaos ensues.