Mabel
had been trying to not think about what she had done. The thing that
had caused her to pack up her life and toss it into a backpack. The
life before didn’t exist anymore. It was now little vignettes of
checking into an hourly hotel to shower, grabbing something to eat
from a gas station buffet, or stealing a new disguise from from a
department store. She tried not to look into the eyes of anyone,
afraid that they might tell she was on the run, and then inform her
pursuers where she was. Someone had to have been telling on her, how
else did they know where to find her? They always kept Mabel looking
for a new town, and she had just run out of towns to hide in.
The
last town she was in was on the edge of the wilderness. Everything
beyond it was uncharted territory. Mabel looked at her wrinkled map
as she sat over her meal in a diner. Red X’s covered all of the
towns she had used. There were no names left on it. All that was
left was the edge of the map, the unknown. She took a bite out of
the greasy burger and wiped a bit of ketchup off her cheek. As she
chewed on the sandwich, Mabel hoped that she could make it beyond the
map, that maybe the others wouldn’t think to look for her there.
If it was empty and soulless, there wouldn’t be anyone to tell on
her. She swallowed the meat and as she started to take a sip from
her pop, she heard the warning sound that told her it was time to go.
The
sound was less a sound and more a feeling. Her life of running had
given her a second sense on when it was time to go. And the warning
feeling was blasting high-alert in her head. She grabbed her green
canvas backpack, threw some money on the table and ran out the back
door. The fog hit her as she exited the building, mist coated her in
a cool wet blanket. The lights in the parking lot had halos around
them as she peered around the corner of the building. Some
headlights appeared in the lot. She turned and headed into the woods
behind the diner.
Inside
the woods, everything was behind a vale of a gray cloud. The edges
of the trees and ground were faded making it feel as if she was
running through a dream. The trunks of the trees were dark brown and
black from the moisture in the air. The moisture entered her lungs
as she ran, filling them with water, causing her to cough. Inside
the foggy forest every sound seemed to fall flat, yet she had to
stifle her cough in case the others heard it. She was running blind,
peering behind her shoulder to look for the tell tale signs of
flashlights. Mabel knew what they would do if they caught her, so
she pumped her legs harder and ran deeper into the woods.
Time
in the forest seemed to stand still for Mabel. It felt as if she
were running on a large treadmill with fake trees that popped up
along the track. The only way for her to tell if any time had pass
was the growing pain in her lungs and the aching in her leg muscles.
Nothing else changed; tree trunks appeared out of the mist and
disappeared behind her into the mist. But, she couldn’t tell if
she had made any progress, if she had been running for an hour or
just ten minutes. Could they be hidden in the fog behind her, slowly
following her, waiting for her to get tired and then pop out to catch
her in their net? Maybe they were in front of Mabel, digging a hole
and filling it with razor wire and sharpened sticks, waiting for her
to impale herself as they fill it back up with dirt? She pushed
herself harder, and kept her eyes peeled for any possible traps. As
vigilant as she thought she was, it shocked her when she came out of
the woods and ran into large clearing with a massive house at the
center.
Mabel
stopped in her tracks at the sight of the mansion. It felt out of
place in the middle of the woods. There were no signs of a driveway
leading up to it. The house seemed to have been dropped here by a
giant. She thought about turning around and going back into the
woods, when she thought she heard someone calling out in the forest.
Mabel crept over to a large tree and looked back and forth between
the woods and the house. It felt like she was being watched from
both directions. Yet there was only silence. Mabel sat on the wet
dirt and leaned against the tree staring at the mansion. She felt
something, a presence maybe, but there were no lights on in the
house. It appeared to be abandoned. The wind bit at her skin and
froze her wet clothes. As she shivered against the tree trunk, the
mansion looked more appealing and worth checking out.
The
fog and trees crowded around the edge of the perimeter of the
clearing, as if afraid to get too close to the unnatural structure at
the center. Grass in the clearing was not afraid, however, it grew
long and full, grabbing at Mabel’s jeans. She looked up at the
mansion, with its tower and gables, its black windows all focused on
her. The windows reminded her of the hollow eyes that were behind
her every step. They watched her, and waited with the expectancy she
saw in junkies waiting for their heroin being cooked. Mabel hiked up
her backpack and ignored them.
Chipped
paint littered the wooden steps up to the house-sized front porch.
They creaked at the pressure Mabel put on them as she lightly
sprinted up the steps. The porch was bare and faded into the
distance as it reached around the house. She bent down into the
shadows of a pillar and watched the fog. Her heart pounded in her
ears and she caught herself holding her breath. She wished the thick
mist had been around the house to conceal her path. If they hadn’t
seen her come up, she might be safe here for a while. They might
have lost her in the woods and maybe they won’t notice the house.
If she could get into the house, she could go up to the tower and
watch the woods. If they did see her go to the house, maybe she
could lose them in the large mansion. But, first she needed to get
in.
The
door was as tall as some of the diners she had eaten in. It towered
over her, lost in the shadow of the top of the porch. Mabel touched
the bowling ball sized handle and wondered if giants lived here. She
started to turn the handle and then stopped. The thought of giants
made her wonder if the house really was abandoned. Just because the
lights were out didn’t mean it was empty. They could just be
asleep. Mabel came up with an alibi about being lost in the woods
and needing a place to get out of the cold until morning, just in
case. A strange and distant howl broke the silence and Mabel decided
giants would be better to deal with than what was out in the woods
looking for her.
She
struggled with the handle and her heart stopped as it didn’t budge.
She put both hands on it and threw her weight into it. The knob
cried out as years of rust began to crumble away. The bolt slowly
pulled into the door and it began to move. Mabel pushed as hard as
her body could and the large wooden door silently gave away, throwing
her balance off and she fell to the floor. Mabel was in the house.
The
door swung toward the wall and then bounced back. It slammed into
her as she was getting up and knocked her back down before closing
with a thud. Inside, the house was too dark. Windows along the
walls allowed a small amount of light in to puddle on the floor. It
seemed like the light was afraid to go much further into the house,
leaving Mabel alone. Mabel stifled a sneeze and stood up. She
instinctively tried to look around but couldn’t see much else than
the windows. With her hands out, she backed into the door and felt
for a light switch. Light might have warned the inhabitants of the
house or the things outside, but the dark was too much.
As
she felt the walls, her other senses tried to make sense of what was
around her. The house creaked and moan, and there was a slight
breeze that flowed around her. Her fingers felt the smooth wood,
carved with shapes she couldn’t decipher. Despite the breeze, the
room had the musty smell of moldy furniture and rotten vegetation.
After a couple of minutes of feeling the walls, she decided to give
up. Maybe the house was built before electricity or if there truly
were giants living in the house, the switch was up higher on the
wall. She cursed the lack of time she had to prepare her bag,
otherwise she would have a flashlight right now to use.
Mabel
decided if she was going to follow this strange fairy tale logic she
had spinning around in her head, then maybe she could be in
wonderland and there was a giant table with a magic potion on it.
She shuffled to the side of the door, hoping to touch a large table
leg. Her foot kicked something that made a loud clank, and she could
hear something wobbling back and forth. She blindly reached out,
half expecting to feel the huge table leg, but felt the smooth glass
of a normal-sized table. Mabel swept her hands back and forth above
the table and felt a lamp. Her hands patted the lamp until it
brushed the pullchain, she pulled it.
Light
exploded in the room, blinding her. After a moment her vision came
back and she was able to get her first real look of the room. The
lamp didn’t offer much light, much of the room was outside of the
light’s glow. But she could see that the room was large. Golden
starlight twinkled throughout the room, along with something large in
the distance. The starlight appeared to belong to other lamps on
tables, all normal size. So no giants,
she thought to herself. She left the comfort of her light and
started going to the other
tables, leaving a trail of little islands of light.
After five minutes all of the lamps in the room were lit and she
saw the room in most of its glory.
The largest open staircase she has ever seen was the centerpiece of
the room. There was a fireplace that she could have stood in on one
of the walls. Four doorways of darkness punctuated the room. Each
table had dirty white tablecloths with the tarnished brass lamps.
The light from the lamps were not bright enough to light the ceiling,
though Mabel could see the shape of a huge chandelier hanging down.
Besides the tables, there were also chairs and couches covered in
graying white sheets. Underneath the tables were Persian rugs,
dotted with dirt and dead bugs. The rugs laid on top of a
checkerboard tile floor.
Mabel
stood awed by the room.
She had never been in anything so beautiful before. If the room
hadn’t been covered in filth she would have felt out of place.
However, the dirt and disrepair of the place matched how she felt.
What was this place,
she thought. If the lights still worked, could it be abandoned?
Shit! If it wasn’t
abandoned, she just announced to everyone here that someone was in
this room. She dove under a table and listened.
The
room was silent except for
the lonely moan she had heard earlier. Something
felt off as she sat under the
table. There
was something missing. She looked around and touched
her backpack. Three
legs held up the table.
Cobwebs
hung down from the table and stuck to her blonde hair. When
a couple of minutes passed and she couldn’t stand the strange
feeling under the table, she decided it was enough time. She
climbed out from under the
table slowly, then put her hand on the tabletop
to help her stand up. The lamp caught her eye. That
is when it dawned on her,
there was no power cord for the light.
Streaks
of black and gray tarnished the lamp, giving it an ancient
appearance.
Mabel picked it up, to see if there was a slot for batteries, but
the bottom was smooth except for some tiny screws. She sat it back
down on the table and decided it had to have been battery powered.
Maybe they didn’t want to ruin the look of the room with
power cords or outlets, she
thought. She hitched up her backpack and headed for the stairs.
As
she climbed the large steps, she tried to picture where the tower
was on the house. The steps creaked quietly and some bent under her
weight. When she got to the top, she
saw that the balcony was part
of a hallway that connected each wing of the house.
She looked out at the room as
she thought about
which way to go. The room
seemed much larger from the balcony, it looked like she was above
the night sky. From this
height she could just make out the large chandelier. It was made of
bones. Each light bulb
was being held by a skeletal hand. Dusty cobwebs completed
the ensemble. Mabel moved
away from the rail, horrified at the sight. The
chandelier began to sway back
and
forth. Then the stars below
started to go out one by one.
Mabel
watched the lamps
blink out. The darkness began to grow. Panic filled
her stomach at the thought of
being in the house in the dark. Then
the moaning increased. Mabel
was at a loss on what to do next. She put her hands over her ears to
try to block some of the sound. A warm moist breeze began to blow
out from the openings.
It felt like the house was breathing. The bone chandelier creaked
and rattled in the breeze. The tablecloths on the tables floated
around the tables knocking over some of the lamps. All
of the lights were now
out except for one next to the bottom of the staircase.
The room was now a cacophony of sound. Lamps rolled around on the
ground. Some light bulbs popped as they hit the floor. The
chandelier bounced back and forth on its chain, sometimes smacking
the ceiling with a crunch. The moaning would hit high pitches at
times and other times a deep bass. Mabel’s screaming added to the
choir of noise. Her eyes spun around in her head, trying not to land
on the strange dance happening in the room below. Eventually her
sight landed on the one source of light and she focused on it.
While the room was in a state of madness she went down the stairs.
Mabel knew she needed the light. She knew she needed to get up to
the tower and see if she had been followed. No matter how crazy the
room was acting, it was better than what was after her. It was
better than what would happen if she was caught. The house was
big and old, she thought. She had opened the door
and had messed with the pressure of the house. Clearly no one was in
the house, so the logical explanation was that she had caused some
sort of destabilization, maybe shifted something and the air was
coming in from outside. The lights probably went out because of
old batteries, she thought. She would grab the lamp, take it
back up stairs and try to find the tower. Eventually everything
would calm down.
The bottom step was the last sanctuary of normal before the swirling
insanity of the room. She stood there with blinders on, focused on
the one table still acting like a table. It was just within reach so
that she wouldn’t have to step onto the floor. Mabel was sure if
she did touch the ground she would be caught up in the madness and
wouldn’t be able to recover. She bent over as far as she could and
her finger tips brushed against the cool brass of the lamp. The lamp
wobbled for a moment and settled down. She grabbed the tablecloth
and gently pulled the lamp closer. Her hair whipped around her head,
blinding her while she reached out again, this time getting a good
enough grip to bring it to her. She hugged the light and ran up the
stairs and down a hall, not looking back.
The hallway stretched out before Mabel in darkness. Doors and
antique tables marked her way. A plush green carpet muffled her
footsteps. The light in her hands allowed her to see a few feet
around her, but not enough to tell her how far the hallway went. All
of the big oak doors looked the same, with ornate carvings on them.
She thought about opening them, but was sure that the staircase to
the tower wouldn’t be behind a door.
The sound from the main room slowly disappeared as she traversed the
hall. She wondered if the things chasing her were outside. If they
heard the noises from the house and knew she was in here. Would they
be able to ignore the craziness and know she was upstairs? She knew
they would. She knew that they were part of something much crazier
than what was happening in the room. They were something that lived
in that type of world every day, they fed on it, lived for it. Maybe
they were the cause of it, she thought. This could all be some
elaborate trap to drive her into their arms. What she had of theirs
was enough for them to do this. She clutched her backpack tighter
and picked up her pace.
A sound behind a door brought her out of her thoughts. She stopped
and looked at the door. It was like the others, big, wooden, with
shapes carved on it. She walked over to it, her light reflecting off
the varnished wood. The shapes on the wood came into focus. They
were people. Each person looked to be in agony, contorted into
strange positions. The sound called out again. It sounded like
something crying. Mabel watched the door.
Nothing happened. Then she heard whispers and what sounded like a
smack. Could there be people in there? Mabel touched the handle as
she heard some whimpering. She got down on her knees and looked
through the keyhole under the handle.
Blue permeated through the room, giving everything inside a cold
look. From what Mabel could see, the room didn’t match the rest of
the decor in the house. The walls were bare and there was a dirty
mattress in the corner. On the mattress was an emaciated person. It
was hard to determine their sex because of the torn rags they wore.
She stared at the body and wondered if it was a corpse. Then the
body gasped and made the same whimpering she had heard before. A
shape came out of the area of the room she couldn’t see from the
keyhole. Mabel fell away from the door horrified at the sight.
Mabel slowly got back up and looked into the keyhole again. The
shape edged closer to the body. It was human shaped, but definitely
wasn’t human. In what might have been its hand, but resembled a
tentacle, was a large syringe. Mabel instinctively itched her arm as
the shape tied off the body’s arm and injected something into the
exposed vein. There was a pleasurable moan as the body curled up.
Mabel jumped up away from the door and started to run down the hall.
Cries, whimpers, and moans echoed out of each of the doors in the
hallway as she ran. Mabel fought the urge to stop and reach into her
bag. The metal container rattled around in the bag, and Mabel’s
mind. What is this place, she thought, trying to push away
thoughts of pulling out the box. Could there be people behind each
of these doors? Is there something she could do for them?
Selfishly she thought these people could be a blessing for her. The
things chasing her would have a hard time finding her if they stopped
to check any of these rooms for her. They might even get trapped and
she wouldn’t have to worry about them any more. She smiled at that
idea. Maybe she could use these rooms of hell to her own advantage.
If she could set up some sort of signal for them, they would come
into the house and then it was just a matter of getting them to open
a door.
A plan started to form as she ran down the hallway looking for the
staircase. Mabel used the sounds to push her further, to steel
herself for what she needed to do. She ran past the tortured souls,
the hallway lasting longer than she thought it would. It felt like a
dream, as if she was running in place. She was reminded of running
through the woods and wondered why this kept happening to her.
Mabel’s lungs were on fire and her legs felt like rubber when the
stairwell appeared on her left. It wasn’t as grand as the main
staircase, just a normal wood stairwell that you would see in any
house. She stopped to catch her breath when she noticed a room
behind her with the door open. The light didn’t give her much view
into the room, but she could tell it wasn’t like the blue room. It
looked like a room that actually belonged to the house. There was a
canopy bed, modern dresser, and a table. The bed looked inviting and
she was exhausted.
First, she was going to execute her plan, and then she was going to
take a nap.
Mabel turned away from the room and went up the stairs. Purple
wallpaper coated the walls of the staircase. Some was peeling and
hanging down, there were strips laying on the stairs. Light danced
around the walls from the windows up in the tower. She clamored up
the steps to get into the natural light, her eyes and mind gasping
for the light after being in the dark house for so long.
The tower was a lot bigger than she thought. It also seemed to be
the most neglected room of the house. Creaky wood planks covered the
floor, along with bird and bat droppings. The walls were plaster and
lath with four big windows looking out at the four points of the
compass. Mabel crept over to a window, the floor crying out from her
weight. Mist dominated her view. Beyond the fog, Mabel could make
out the forest, a dark shadow behind the white fog. She went to each
window to see if she could determine where she had left the woods.
It all looked the same.
Mabel had a moment of panic. If she put the light in the wrong
window, would they know someone was in the house? Wind blew through
the tower, shifting something above her. Mabel looked up at the
sound to see a wooden chandelier hanging from the ceiling. There was
a wire coming down from the light leading to a push button switch on
the wall. Mabel crossed her fingers and pushed the button, the
chandelier flickered for a moment before coming on. The entire room
lit up like a beacon. Her plan was falling into place and Mabel was
excited at the chance to possibly be done with running. Then she saw
the shape in the corner.
A pulsing black mass that looked like a bunch of snakes squirmed in
the corner. The shape was too dark for the room, as if the light
stopped when it came to it and ran back to its source. A wet
slurping sound emanated from it as it quivered. Mabel slowly backed
away from it, her hand outstretched behind her to feel for the
staircase. The thing didn’t seem to notice her, too busy writhing
around itself. She went down the stairs watching behind her. When
her foot touched the carpet of the hall she let out the breath she
had been holding. She went into the bedroom across the hallway and
opened her backpack. It was time to enact part two of her plan.
After twenty minutes of wandering around the hall she was back in her
room with the door closed. Her backpack was empty of everything she
had collected, except for the metal box. Most of her clothes were
also off. She had spread little clues from the big staircase to a
couple of different doors in the opposite wing of the house. It was
much worse than hers, so many noises of pain and suffering. She had
heard the crying so much that she was used to it. In fact, she
almost welcomed them, knowing that they would be the sounds of her
salvation. Mabel sat down at the table and looked at the metal box.
Her bare arms were exposed in the tank top she was wearing. The
metal box was cool to the touch. The house and the forest had
distracted her, but now that she had time to relax, her thoughts went
to what she wanted. She fought the urge and looked around the room.
Coziness permeated the bedroom. Mabel felt comfortable and relaxed
as she examined the objects throughout it. The bed was hidden
beneath a large heavy canopy. The mattress was thick and plush, she
imagined sinking into it and letting it envelope her in softness.
The wooden dressers were tall and dark with a thick coating of stain
on them. There were pictures of scenery on the strange wallpapered
walls. The pictures were the only things that unsettled her.
Strange scenes of other worldly landscapes. She walked around the
room on her bare feet, letting the pile of the carpet caress her
feet. If the house wasn’t some horrible hell, I’d live here
forever, she thought. She yawned and sank into the mattress, the
metal box and her hunters forgotten.
Voices and evil laughter seeped into her dreams. She rolled over in
her sleep, trying to shake the sounds out of her head. A light touch
on her skin woke her up. The sheet covering her slide off and she
bolted up out of her sleep. Different colored lights danced around
the bed. She rubbed her eyes, but the lights were still there. The
room was freezing, she reached for the sheet when she saw that a silk
ribbon had been tied around her legs and attached to the bedposts.
The lights congealed into shapes.
She wanted to scream, but she was confused at the sight, her mind
not comprehending what she was seeing. The shapes were outlines of
humans. It was like looking at living drawings, they had no bodies
-just blackness in between the lines- but the human shapes had
weight. They all looked like men. Some of them leered at her half
naked body; a blue one touched her with its outlined finger. She
recoiled from the touch, it was cold, but there was more in that
touch then temperature. Memories of her past life came rushing back.
The urge to fight pulsed through her body and she clawed at the silk
binding around her legs. Laughter boomed in the room, freezing her
in place.
A different shape in the bedroom appeared out of the darkness. It
was holding her syringe. The outlines grabbed her arms and tied them
to the bedposts. She fought, but they were stronger. Her mind
reeled as the shape came at her with the syringe, the needle
sparkling in the darkness. Her body craved the blackness inside it.
Mabel’s mind shattered leaving her with nothing. She numbly
watched the shape push the needle into her arm. Her arteries opened
up, welcoming the blackness worming its way through her body,
corrupting everything and instantly making her want more. A few of
the shapes began to touch her slowly. She stared up at the ceiling,
trying to slide into the darkness of her mind.
A wooden door closed in a big house. A light in a tower went out,
and a shape in a tower squirmed and quivered in delight. A room full
of tables and lamps settled down and reset themselves. Outside of the
house the mist drew a curtain around it, muffling the screams and
moans that radiated out.
