Category : Books-Fiction

Sub Category : Suspense/Mystery

As the ten remaining YouTubers run screaming through the door, leaving the ashes of their time-traveling car behind them, Matt's heart is beating faster than a pronghorn antelope on cocaine. He can hear Justine screaming Joey's name, as well as several people shouting expletives, but all of the craziness seems so far away...like he's a character in a movie, and this is all just make-believe, and he isn't trapped in a house that's possessed by the freakin' devil or something.

This can't be happening. It can't be. Not to him.

"Okay, what just happened?" Tim asks loudly. He still appears to be the calmest of the bunch, and Matt's glad of it. At least somebody managed to keep his head.

The group gathers around a table in the library, all of them rattled by what they just saw. The images are still seared in Matt's mind—fire and smoke everywhere, that horrific cracking noise, his friends' terrified screams...and the man, the man they passed on their way back in, lying on the ground with his face in the grass...

"I don't understand what just happened," says Oli, his voice shaking.

GloZell has a hand to her forehead and a panicked expression on her face. "I can't believe it!"

"Who was that guy?" questions Lele, who's grabbed a seat next to Justine. "Was that the driver?"

"Yes! He was just lying on the ground!" shrieks a still-hysterical Sierra.

This prompts a flurry of comments from the group about whether they should go back for him, but the debate is cut off by a clearly livid Lele. "I'm not going near that car at all!" she seethes, crossing her arms in defiance.

And that's when Matt realizes: they're stuck.

They're trapped in this house, which means that they're going to have to go get those artifacts Shane spoke of, which means that (if that letter was right) people are going to die. Which means that he could—

No.

It won't happen. He won't let it. He has a family, friends, a girlfriend, a career...he has a life. He, Matthew Haag, otherwise known as Nadeshot, is not going to die tonight.

He'll make sure of it.

 

Justine's sitting at the table, nestled between Eva and Lele, trying to process what she's seen tonight. Everything happened so fast; one minute, they were having fun and enjoying the party like normal people, and now...Shane's dead, the house is evil, she saw a car blow up right in front of her, omigod what if we actually were in that car we'd all be dead oh God...

"Here's the thing." Matt's trying to keep his voice steady, but Justine's known him for too long to fall for it—he's just as terrified as the rest of them. "I'm trying to get back to 2016. We've got to find the four artifacts, or...we can't go home. That's really what it comes down to."

Can't go home...the mere thought is enough to send Justine dangerously close to a full-blown panic attack. Fortunately, she manages to restrict herself to a few quick, sharp breaths (and maybe one or two tears, but nothing noticeable).

GloZell, hilarious as she is, is not helping Justine's nerves. "Well, somebody's gon' die—maybe we can just decide who gon' die."

"No!" Joey stares at her as if she just suggested sacrificing the butler to Satan. "Omigod!"

Justine shoots a quick smile his way. Even if what the note said is true—even if somebody really has to die—she's still got Joey Graceffa on her side. And Joey would never let them hurt her...would he?

Don't think about it.

"People are going to die, regardless," says Matt. "It said that we have to vote people in to do the challenges."

But Justine has had enough talk of death and dying for one evening, thanks. "I wanna get the hell out of here," she snaps. "I don't know about you guys, but I haven't checked my email in, like, forty-eight hours."

To be honest, her emails are the least of her worries. But hey, if she focuses on the small stuff (like how she's still waiting for a reply from Olga Kay about that collab they were thinking about doing), she can try to ignore the possibility of her impending death.

For now.

 

While everyone else is panicking and debating what to do next, Sierra's still waiting for the inevitable "it's just a prank, bro."

I mean, come on. It has to happen. Pranksters are all the rage on YouTube these days...there's no way in hell that I just witnessed an explosion, let alone a murder. Shane's playing us, Joey's playing us...this is all a sick game, and it's gone on too long, and I just wanna go home.

(A smidgen of doubt surfaces in her mind, but she pushes it away and sticks with her story.)

"What do we know?" asks GloZell.

Joey sucks in a breath, and Sierra can tell that he can't possibly keep up the charade for much longer. "Okay, well, we know from Shane's pocket that that symbol that was on the square—" (he's referring, of course, to that weird Society Against Evil scribble, as if there really is a Society Against Evil) "—is what's gonna lead us to our next clue."

"So we've got to look for more of those symbols throughout the house." Matt's keeping calm (mostly) and trying to think his way out of this situation. Prank or no prank, Sierra has to admit that he's got the right idea.

Plus, he is attractive, in a dweeby sort of way.

Tim, who's standing next to Andrea (as usual), suddenly lets out a loud squawk of annoyance. "Dammit!" He throws his hands up against his temples. "My wallet was in the car!"

He turns away, muttering curses under his breath, and Sierra tries her best to suppress a giggle.

"Okay, you know what?" says Lele, paying no attention to Tim and his lost wallet. "I think that we should just, like, start looking now."

Eva squirms in her seat, the panic on her face giving way to a resigned determination. "So should we just split up?"

"I think we should split up," Joey agrees.

"Omigod." Sierra cannot believe these people. Putting aside her "it's all a prank" theory, has no one seen a horror movie around here? "Splitting up is never a good idea, okay?"

"How much time do we have?" asks Lele.

"We have until the sun comes up." This is the first time Andrea's said anything in ages, and to be honest, Sierra kind of forgot she was here. Ah well. There's one in every barrel, isn't there?

GloZell's standing behind Lele, eyes wide, mouth open. "What?"

"We have the one night," says Matt, as if they didn't hear it the first time, "or we're stuck in 1920."

Sierra doesn't believe it, of course she doesn't, it's all a load of crap and she knows it, but even she can't help but feel a rush of panic at the thought of being trapped in this freak show forever. "Why are we standing here? Let's do it."

"We need a clue," says GloZell.

Speak of the devil...

Seconds after GloZell's remark, Sketchy Sarah walks in with a giant wooden box. The last time she walked in with something, it was a head, so...to borrow a line from Star Wars, Sierra's got a bad feeling about this.

 

The maid places the box on the table, and Oli instinctively steps away. He doesn't know what's in there, but it's probably something horrid, and whatever it is, he doesn't want it near him.

"This arrived in the post earlier today," says Sarah, as if everything's normal, as if a car did not just blow up, as if they didn't just watch Shane die. GloZell was right; everything about this woman screams danger, stay away.

She whisks the box off and there's a flipping hand in there what the hell.

Cue more screams.

"What the hell is that?" Oli gasps, unable to take his eyes off the hand. It's long and skinny, pale white, black nail polish, with the strangest tattoos up and down the arm. Also, there's a glowing yellow star of some sort on its wrist (clearly this hand's former owner has been to some shady tattoo parlors).

As he stares at it, all Oli can think about is the "dessert" they were served earlier. Does this hand below to the same person whose head was...

He stops his train of thought right there before he has the chance to throw up.

"Did this come from the bayou?" Matt asks, as if he's talking about a dead beaver and not an actual human hand.

But then everyone notices the note attached to the hand, and of course they all start pestering "what does it say, what does it say" until finally GloZell takes the initiative and begins to read it aloud.

Her essence can speak to you through the spirit board...

"Uh-oh!" gasps GloZell.

"I don't mess with boards," announces Sierra.

Justine points to a strange-looking Ouija-board type object next to her. "Spirit board!"

Eva, who seems to have become the designated reader of notes at this point, takes over for GloZell.

Her essence can speak to you through the spirit board in the library, giving you clues; however, it requires great strength to speak from across the grave and can only occur once an hour.

"So she's kind of like a lifeline," Eva explains.

"Okay, may I make a suggestion?" pipes up Arthur the butler, who's standing behind Tim and has pretty much gone unnoticed until now. "Someone should act as the voice and read the invocation."

Oli shrugs. Spirit board. Why not. Just as long as it's not another body part, he's not going to complain.

 

Tim doesn't mess with spirit boards. Never has. He doesn't want to open up that door and give a ghost a path to peek its way in. And he sure as hell doesn't want that ghost to then haunt his life forever and ever.

So, of course, when it turns out that they have to mess with a spirit board, he swallows all possible sarcastic remarks and inches as far away from that thing as he can.

Thank God for iJustine. The blonde, who's clearly either hella brave or hella stupid, picks up the invocation note thingy and starts to rattle it off. "We call you now to bless our meetings," she recites in a trembling voice. "Heavens promise our spirits thrive, so now for the living let the...dead come alive?"

This results in a bunch more yelling from everybody around her, as if they haven't done enough of that tonight. Tim locks eyes with Andrea, who smiles weakly in his direction. He shoots back a reassuring whatever, it's cool, it's cool kind of grin (of course, this is totally not cool, but hey, at least he's still got his homegirl, so how bad can things be?).

"Greetings, spirits." Justine's voice is flat and emotionless as she finishes the invocation. "Speak to us."

And if you could maybe not kill us all right now, that would be great.

 

For a good five seconds, silence lingers over the group.

Eva stands farthest away from the spirit board, her earlier fear replaced with a grim resignation. She knows now what she and the others must do to escape this house—and though the particulars of the situation are too horrible to think about, she can't run around in a panic any longer. Maid or no maid, she's got to keep her cool and figure out these clues before she...no, it kills them all.

So when one of the letters on the spirit board lights up, she allows herself a single second of surprise, then turns her attention to what it's trying to tell them.

Justine has no such inhibitions. "Omigod!" she screams, practically jumping away from the spirit board. "It just lit up, I'm not even joking, this just..." She's a stuttering mess. "This just lit up."

"Okay, so ask it something else," says Eva. Don't be scared, pretend it's a game, it's all a giant puzzle and we must solve it. Puzzles are fun. Everything's fine. They can't hurt you if you outsmart them.

It's Oli who notices the spirit board's pattern. "Oh, wait, hold on, there's B..."

All eyes are fixed on the board as it continues to spell out a word.

"O..."

"O..."

"K..."

"Book!" several people shout at once, but the board is not done yet.

"S."

And then, finally, it goes dark.

"Books." Joey's already up and about, heading straight for the bookshelves. "We need to look at the books."

Eva takes a deep breath. Books. Okay. They're in the library. That could mean anything. Books are everywhere. But that doesn't matter; she'll look through every book in the world if she has to. If it means escaping this house and leaving behind the memories of Shane choking and dying on the ground, she's all for it.

She just hopes that she comes out of this alive.