Mystery Lake

[32] Hunted

The ensuing silence frustrated Roxy, as time they could've devoted to planning and creating more barricades slipped away with every frantic, pulsing heartbeat. Were they wrong? Were they just panicking and overreacting to a silly message meant to scare them? The darkness of the sky could have just been a rogue thundercloud.

Well, all they had to do was wait and see. The others tightly held their breath, straining for every single trace of sound, trying to parse it as a threat. Eugene made up bags of salt with little horseshoes for them to grab once the worst of it began.

Roxy rubbed her eyes, which had only gotten a minimum of rest and recovery. The vigorous, sandpaper-like rubbing sounded more like scraping against a sensitive live microphone. The nervous feeling almost triggered a coughing fit, which would have been like firing off a rocket in a hungry forest.

Silence soon resettled over everything. And that was part of the problem. The walls of this old building were thick with stone and brick. But there was still a sense of the world outside of them, of cars ambling through the town center, of small-town business continuing, of people talking in the waning afternoon. All that had now been swallowed up, as if a spiky, hostile blanket had been draped over the world that was.

Roxy tried to get a peek outside through one of the side windows, but the tinting was too harsh, or they had been covered over. Still, the scent and essence of darkness swallowed everything. And through that darkness came a sense of stalking hostility, emanating from every crack. It moved and slipped across barren pavement.

It was followed by a faint sound of shifting, scraping, and crunching gravel. The air had a palpable, increased weight to it, slowly squeezing her entire body. Her fingers curled back and dug into the fabric of her clothing, until it was either her nails or the material that would rip and tear. Eventually, her grip relaxed, and the tension migrated to her heart, thundering her pulse. Her mouth felt so dry and crusty, as if it had never touched a drop of water.

And in that blanketed, relative silence, nothing could be heard, and her body sought to fill that void with a single note of endless ringing.

Suddenly, a piercing screech split the air, louder and more mind-numbing than anything she could ever imagine. The sound roared between a looming train whistle and a mournful, dying last scream. Roxy felt as if a bucket of stinging ice had been dumped over her head. Instinctively, she dove behind the main counter and covered her ears.

Her efforts did nothing to lessen the infernal noise, and it didn't cease or pause to catch its breath. It seemed to come from everywhere at once, both outside and within, behind and in front of her. She tried to get her bearings, but the assault threw all her directions off. Eventually, it did cease.

Looking around her, she noticed that the previously clear but darkly shadowed room seemed to fill with hazy smoke. An oppressive blurriness consumed her sight. It made her think of what Jess told her things were like for her without her glasses. No amount of blinking or waving could dispel it. She tried to find Jake, Eugene, Layla, or anyone else in the mottled, confused, colored blobs. Statics of pain and uncertainty passed through her head as the needle was being driven. She wanted to call out, but she knew that would be the worst thing she could do.

Just as she felt like she could begin to figure out where she was and where the others were, a cold, prickly hand traced over her shoulder. She muffled her breath before she could scream, but hopped and staggered back. She twisted around in all directions, but there was nothing there. Fuck!

A few moments later, the others fumbled towards her, making urgent, soft sounds to signal their presence. Jake fussed with his glasses, rubbing them vigorously. Clearly, whatever was happening wasn't confined to her. Jake shivered and continued to clean the lens, but Roxy held his arm and mouthed with a faint whisper, "Not that." Layla crawled back nervously, cracking her neck and pressing a useless knuckle into her forehead.

Eugene wrote out and shared that something was blurring their vision. He looked like he had much more to write, his tongue aching to say it, but he withheld his words as everyone slowly moved back to their places.

Looking around the dark space just stressed her out. She could see features and blobs and suggestions of forms, but it was as if she were going blind, losing touch with the world around her, falling into an uncertain abyss that wanted to clamp its teeth around her soul. She thought about turning some of her clothes inside out. Eugene passed around the small bags of salt and miniature horseshoes for each of them. Layla grabbed hers before heading back to her puppetry plan post.

Roxy didn't feel much different holding the junk, but some of the panic edge waned away. Whether that was a real effect, or a placebo, remained to be seen. Massaging with her knuckle seemed to have a more immediate effect than any token.

During a lapse in attention, her head suddenly snapped up. There had been a sound, like distant thunder. Something roiling with heat in a microwave, deeply heated and hiding a screaming fury about to be unleashed. She did her best to pay attention to the sound, but she couldn't pick out the notes from the ringing in her ears. Calm continued for several moments until that horrific noise resounded again. Soon, she didn't have to pick it out of a well of swallowing silence. It was obvious, and it came closer with every heartbeat. Other sounds joined the chorus.

Thump... scrape... thump... drag... thump...scratch...thump...

Even though she came to expect each horrifying new iteration of and addition to those sounds, they always made her flinch, as if some secret claw were plucking at the very strands of her essence. It was impossible to tell how many there were and how many legs they had. Every time she tried, it was as if the echoes and reverberations created a distracting cacophony in her head. She just couldn't focus, whether from natural fear or something surely supernatural.

Roxy checked behind her again, fearing that whatever had somehow crawled behind her might make a second appearance. The haze got worse; she could only see the faint details of the trinkets and table behind the counter. The time on the clocks and any of the written labels were completely indistinct.

Jess explained how she was browbeaten by her teachers to get glasses, but the image of the classroom becoming so indistinct and the writing on the board difficult to parse without squinting inhabited the dark recesses of Joel's brain like an insidious mold growth. He took care of himself, but he was probably destined one day for the ailments that his grandparents had. But that was far away—some horrible future he didn't have to think about for a long time. That alone, creeping up on her, made her legs weak from pain rather than pleasure.

Whatever was out there, she couldn't see it, and apparently it didn't want to be seen. She just prayed silently, hoping that once it was gone, things would return to normal.

Eugene brought a tablet computer down to her level and held his phone, which was connected to his mother's footage. There was just enough light to see the others on the relatively grainy camera. All alerts and sounds were shut off with brief typing and some silly emojis to keep each other updated.

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Looking at the tablet, Roxy had no trouble seeing that, at least. Several of the camera views were rough, distorted, and at low FPS. They could see the tops of their own heads in the main one. Another looked down at the stairs, with just some spill light from beyond and the fancy old sconces looking like tangled black licorice ribbons. The basement cameras, despite receiving the least light, appeared the most cheerful.

The exterior cameras were a very rough black and white, with every motion translated into a pixelated wiggle, especially the trees along the street. Unfortunately, it could just look out straight and not check to the left, right, and below it. There was absolutely nothing to see, despite the wretched sounds. She could feel the malevolence just beyond the frame. Every single shadow that flickered and shifted caught her attention, even though the closest scrutiny revealed nothing. The sounds had to be just outside the locked door before the steps. They were right there! What are they going to do?

She tried to ignore the fact that she felt like a noisy diesel machine coughing out breath, taking cavernous inhalations, a heart machine beating against her rib cage, and every laborious, shifting creak announcing itself to the world.

Slowly but insistently, a force pressed against the door like a grizzly bear peeling bark from a tree. The frame squeaked and squawked as if it were being crushed to death. And then it simply settled open, as if the tiniest crack was enough to wedge it all the way. They were inside.

Roxy could tell, even though she couldn't say exactly how. A soul-sapping cold pummeled every exposed patch of flesh as if a massive walk-in freezer had been opened right above her. Nervously, she did check above her, but the blurring reduced it to a brown interference pattern. Nothing there, not yet.

But something was methodically and persistently mounting the stairs not far from them. The teasing distraction of the elevator didn't even slow it down for a moment. This didn't feel like something she could talk to, insult, or disgust.

The only clarity was like a nervous, rapid interference pattern from an old VHS tape that had been played too many times. Roxy wanted to spring out of hiding and hurl something that would burn it or splash it with the water and see a stunned, black-haired girl with bright red eyes instead of a monster. Maybe that would work, but there would only be one chance.

She glanced through the many twists and slivers of glass throughout the shop, looking for some reflection or trace of what was approaching. It took a long time, filled with frantic heartbeats, and she saw a mass of shadow shift unnaturally. The thudding echoed through her being, and the scrapes assaulted her senses. Everything felt washed out except for her booming presence. It was hard to tell how many there were, but it felt like a pair. Hungry dogs, hunting and sniffing the air for their prey.

Suddenly, Layla started singing.

"Oh, I do believe in the light... it's always such a pretty sight. Everything will be all right. I won't feel a fright. Because there is the light. Let me dance with you tonight, together in the light."

Layla's voice wavered in the first verse, as if she were gathering together everything she had into a tight, woven rope of words to haul her up a mountain. Roxy could still hear the edge of tears in her voice, but the bright, enthusiastic girl pushed through the words.

Trying to peer through the tangled prism of glass and check the image on Eugene's screen, Roxy had no idea what was going on behind the counter because all the damn angles were wrong or off by frustrating inches.

What she could sense from the mood in the air was that the creatures had stopped their advance and were scrutinizing the sounds and the area around Layla. A distraction, but what the hell did they do now about it?

Layla continued singing, louder, more confident, and with a faster rhythm. The coherence swiftly fell away as it became clear that she was making everything up as she went along. Some of it sounded like scrambled fairy tales. Looking at the camera, Roxy could see a puppet near the wall dancing to the melody.

The creatures advanced as it sounded like Layla was pulling back from her hidey-hole. Soon, the working speaker projected Layla's voice toward the door at the front of the shop.

Layla continued to sing like a joyous bird, loud and true. She was trapped in a terrifying cage with predators all around her, but none of that dimmed her spirit. It was as if she had a stage all her own.

"I won't run away, no matter what fear. I'll hold you close, I'll always be here. I want to share in my whimsical mood, and always get closer to you. We'll open the door and I'll lend you my voice. I have the courage, my wings shall be yours, just never let go. There's so much to share, there's so much to do. Spending my life long with you. We delight in the sensible view. I promise to always be true..." The creatures weren't distracted by the multiple sound sources.

Layla's words were louder, but Roxy could hear the cracking. They all knew what was on top of them, Layla included. There was something wrong with a universe that allowed such a cheerful, sweet girl to be on the verge of tears.

Though the universe might allow it, Roxy would not.

She grabbed the edge of the counter and hauled herself over it, vaulting as if it were nothing.

A pair of swollen, raging black masses twisted in her direction the moment her feet landed on the hardwood floor. At least they seemed to be black masses, their presence blotting out practically everything in front of Roxy. Everything inside her just wanted to scream and retreat, but she swallowed that down with her arm stretched out like a sword.

With her other hand, she scooped up a small paperweight, the closest one sitting on the counter, and heaved it with all her strength over the center of the nightmare mass. It struck something, and a sharp clang rang through the store like a hammer striking a pipe. The mass actually staggered, and she pivoted with her arm outstretched.

She had no idea what she was doing, but all she could think about was slicing open the world to escape the empty place that bastard had taken her. There had to be enough room in that empty space for a set of monsters who didn't deserve to be here.

Roxy cleaved the air along the side and pushed as close to the mass as she dared. It howled, hissed, and shrieked, but the sound soon smothered, as if several layers of plastic bags had been wrapped around it. Dropping to the floor, Roxy rushed over and told Layla to grab her hand. The trembling blonde dashed and scrambled to her feet. She hugged Roxy tightly as they made their way around the created obstacles and back behind the counter to catch up with Eugene, who mercifully looked much clearer. Everything did.

Before he could ask what the heck that was, a relapse of blurriness affected Roxy's eyes. The air rippled, and muffled roars persisted.

"I tried, but we gotta do like it said and hide."