Author's Note - Hey guys, and welcome back. Some of you may have read the original version of this story I posted well over a year ago and have been waiting more than patiently for it to be continued, and I am finally here to tell you that I am back from a ridiculously long hiatus and will now be updating this renovated story far more regularly. For those of you who are new, I want to say welcome, and count yourselves lucky that you don't have to suffer like my current followers have been. (And to said current followers, I grovel for your forgiveness. Please, please forgive me!) My life has been ridiculously crazy and writing had dropped to the very bottom of my list in favor of making sure I had a roof over my head and food on the table. Things were very rough for a long time, but thankfully now everything is beginning to look up and I have finally been able to get back in the saddle for a humongous overhaul of my entire profile. As some of you may have noticed, everything is getting a bit of a facelift and hopefully now I will be able to settle into a fairly steady rhythm of updates for your enjoyment. So again, I want to thank everyone who has added me to their follow/fave list and anyone who has been keeping up with my pitifully small story base. Please bear with me a little longer guys, and I promise it'll all be worth it!
And now I will note that I own nothing belonging to the Friday the 13th franchise, including but not limited to our favorite masked killer: Jason Voorhees. I merely use him for my own nefarious purposes and would spend every waking moment of my life snuggling the stuffin' out of him if only I could... *Sigh*
ONE ~
A sudden storm wasn't quite the way Krystina had imagined her summer vacation would start; but then again camping hadn't been on her agenda either. As fat drops of rain drummed harshly on the windshield of her mud-spattered Toyota she wished again for the hundredth time that she had more willpower to say no to people, and that she were back in her own little apartment sitting in her reading nook with a hot cup of coffee and a good book or even curled up beneath her favorite afghan on the couch binge-watching some mindless TV show while this freakish storm raged on harmlessly outside the shuttered windows. Not out here in the middle of the woods on some godforsaken dirt road trying vainly to dodge potholes and keep her truck from sliding into the ditch.
In her rear-view she could just barely make out the smaller Volkswagen trailing behind her as it fought through the mud and muck, and inside she knew were four true-born city kids who were most likely having panic attacks as their two-vehicle caravan struggled to navigate the twisted mockery of a road deeper into the heart of the forest. Krystina had seen worse in her younger years - having grown up with her grandparents on a rural farm in back country just like this, and she'd weathered her fair share of summer storms behind the wheel with her grandpa riding shotgun when she'd learned how to drive in her teens. But her only company today was the crackle of radio static and the jumble of suitcases and duffle bags in the back seat while her tires gouged out new trenches in the rain-washed clay.
After what seemed like an eternity Krystina could finally see a break in the trees and a sign on her right reminding her that she was currently entering a wildlife preserve belonging to the state and to remember to respect the local fauna. Beneath that was a smaller plaque welcoming her to the old historical lakehouse that used to be a part of the bigger Crystal Lake campgrounds before it closed down years ago. The foliage around her thinned out and gave way to a sprawling open field that stretched out down to the banks of Crystal Lake proper and formed a near-perfect semicircle right in the middle of the surrounding woodlands. She navigated the truck onto the graveled driveway and after nearly three hours behind the wheel she was able to park beneath the carport adjoining the house and clamber ungracefully out of the cab. Close behind the Volkswagen followed and she moved out of the way so it could pull up alongside before her companions spilled out of the interior amidst a chorusing of groans and complaints.
"Dammit, this rain sucks!" one of the two males griped as he rolled the kinks out of his stiff neck. Miguel Gutierrez was lanky and long-limbed with dark copper skin and thick inky curls; and the only reason Krystina was here in the first place. The two twenty-somethings had been close friends since fourth grade and Miguel had helped her out a lot during their friendship. His family had taken her in for a few years at one point and she learned a lot about his Hispanic roots during her tenure under their roof. At his side the other male in their group was busy pulling a pair of coolers from the VW's trunk.
"Well you know this was mostly your idea, right?" Adam Burtress responded with a raised eyebrow. He was the oldest in their crew at thirty, and his sister Bethany was the youngest at nearly thirteen. The little girl was the spitting image of her older sibling - both with gorgeous blond hair and a friendly demeanor always ready to offer a helping hand or a kind word. Adam had been a golden boy and linebacker in high school before winning a scholarship to college where he completed a degree in Business while riding on the back of a professional football career; but a shattered kneecap ended that dream and now he was taking a break from his high-class job in the city to join them on Miguel's 'Super Summer Extravaganza'. Little Beth had been forced to accompany Adam by their mother so she could gallivant off to Haiti with her current love interest, but the blue-eyed teen had no complaints and was happy to be included with a group of adults - it made her feel privileged that she was out here with all these older people while her friends from school were stuck at home or doing summer classes with kids their own age.
"I swear the weatherman said it wasn't supposed to rain for another week and a half!" Miguel was still venting while he helped Krystina unload all of the luggage from the back of her truck. Around them the storm still raged, and the pounding of rain on the tin roof of the carport was nearly deafening.
"You should know the weatherman is full of shit by now, dumbass," came the retort from the final female in their group, who was observing haughtily from the sidelines as the rest of them worked diligently to get everything out of the vehicles.
"Watch your language, Miranda," Adam warned while he hauled the second cooler into the enclosed garage. "I've told you a dozen times that Beth is too young for that mouth of yours."
"I know what isn't too young for this mouth, sweetheart," the brunette purred with a knowing smirk, her dull-as-dishwater eyes roving blatantly across the older man's backside as he scooped up her third suitcase. He shushed her halfheartedly and Krystina made a silent gagging noise to Miguel while the pair slung backpacks over their shoulders. They shared a chortle and Adam rolled his eyes in good nature but Miranda glowered at them sourly before stalking inside where the rain couldn't make her poor hair frizz anymore. The blond male muttered something beneath his breath about taking things too seriously before following after his beau while Krys and Miguel remained behind to finish hauling their things in. Little Bethany was deeply engrossed in a brightly colored Almanac she'd kept tucked beneath her arm and wandered aimlessly inside as well while the two old friends continued to make faces.
"I swear that loca has a stick up her rear so big, it's a wonder she can walk without waddling."
The pair laughed even harder at his joke while they finally shut the garage door behind them, and they were all finally able to come in out of the humidity where the bright interior of the lakehouse awaited.
"She's been a total bitch since high school," Krystina chuckled in low tones while they sorted through their things. Miranda had been the bane of her existence since their initial meeting nearly ten years ago during Freshman year - she, Miguel, and Adam had been good friends through their time in middle school and on into their high school years, and then Miranda had come in from left field with her saucy hourglass figure and her perfectly styled everything and her manipulative ways. She became popular with the male population very quickly and made every effort to edge Krystina out of their little circle - playing everyone around her with her act as a sweet little debutante. But Miguel was doggishly loyal and included Krys in everything while Adam had enough room in his soft heart to love everyone, and yet despite Miranda's bitchy ways Krys accepted her because the others did and had she had skin thick enough to withstand the shallow girl's veiled jabs and joking taunts. Shortly before Adam's graduation the two had started dating, and so they say: the rest is history. "Why did you even let her come in the first place? She hates anything related to the outdoors and she pitches a huge fit if a nail breaks. There's not even a Wifi signal for her to keep up with her stupid reality shows. She's gonna have a terrible time here!"
"'Randa is Adam's novia," he responded with a shrug of his lanky shoulders. "Besides that, we've all been friends since high school - It would've been rude to not invite her. Plus, she would've thrown the fit of the century if her rich boyfriend went off anywhere without her for more than like, two hours."
The pair dissolved into a massive fit of giggling that left them clutching at stitches in their sides while outside the rain finally slackened off into a soft mist and fog began to creep in off the water to envelop the lakehouse and the surrounding trees in a shroud of white. Thunder still continued to rumble above their heads, but inside the house they were dry and warm and blissfully happy; drunk on dreams of warm sunlight and adventures to come.
The dawn of a new morning arrived to find four bodies still in bed, slumbering deeply after an exhausting day prior, and one figure standing alone on the back porch with a mug in her hand and thoughts on her mind while across the flat surface of the lake the sun rose to cast golden light across the crystalline waters that earned it its infamous name. Krystina leaned her weight on her elbows, propped on the porch railings, and let her unbound hair fall in thick waves across her slumped shoulders. Her tea was hot in the cup, warming her hands and causing her cheeks to flush as her head bowed over the rising steam, but it had soured in her mouth when she took a sip. Flashes from last night flitted through her memory as a frown pulled down the corners of her lips, and she filled her lungs deeply with jasmine-scented air before straightening up and using a free hand to push a stray lock away from her shadowed eyes.
After they had all settled in for the evening, once the last of their belongings had been unpacked, a fire had been built in the main living area's hearth and they'd gathered eagerly around its welcoming heat. Adam had commandeered the kitchen to scrounge together a quick meal of canned stew and cold biscuits for their dinner, and for a while they all ate in companionable silence. Then Miguel had regaled them with the story of how his uncle had bought the ramshackle old cabin by the lake and renovated it to all it's former glory, and had been more than happy to allow his favorite nephew and his friends to use it for the summer. Apparently it was one of several small lodgings surrounding the sprawling lake, but most of them were either abandoned or hadn't been visited in years. When Krystina had asked why, Miranda was more than happy to interject with the grisly legend of Camp Crystal Lake and its bloody history.
"The locals say that a boy drowned in the lake years ago, while the counselors were too busy fucking to watch the kids properly. The other campers would bully the kid because he was deformed or retarded or something like that, but when his mom found out what had happened she lost her mind and went on a psychotic killing spree to avenge her son's death."
The brunette's lips had twisted in a cruel smile, like it was all some big joke in her eyes, but Krystina's stomach had tied itself in knots at the thought of a poor innocent dying so helplessly just because he was different from the rest. She could relate to his plight, and as if she'd read her thoughts Miranda had turned her sharp tongue back to the present.
"Maybe you could have been his buddy, Kryssi," the other female had simpered sweetly, "Seeing as how you're both pretty fucked up in the face."
Miguel came to her defense with a sharp retort, but Krystina had already gained her feet and was halfway upstairs by the time Miranda shouted a half-assed apology at her retreating back. She flicked on the switch in her room and slammed the door shut behind her with a satisfyingly loud bang, and as the faint sound of Miranda's voice drifted up the stairs to her ears with the rest of the story Krys stood before the floor length mirror on the back of the closet door and yanked her cotton t-shirt off over her head to bare her torso to the fluorescent lighting.
She could imagine the distraught mother: her heart and mind ravaged by debilitating sorrow, surrounded by blood and death and bodies - and a child that had somehow managed to escape the claws of death himself only to watch in horror as the one thing he has in the world is taken from him in one fell swoop; beheaded and left to rot in the muck. It really was a frightening tale to spread among outsiders who would be brave enough to visit the little town with the dark stain on its history, especially with the string of murders and disappearances that followed in the wake of the woman's death. Some said it was the boy, Jason, avenging his mother and laying claim to the lands abandoned by the camp's owners. They said the area was cursed and tainted - sometimes it was his spirit or his tormented ghost who frightened off campers who dared to encroach on his territory, while others whispered that it was Jason in the flesh, very much alive and surviving off the land.
The thoughts had clouded Krystina's mind as she studied her reflection in the mirror, and she had seen where Miranda made the connection between herself and the deformed little boy from the legend… Everywhere she looked she saw scars - a horrid spattering of glossy white tissue marring otherwise unblemished flesh. She'd been living with the scars since childhood; since the horrifying crash that had claimed the lives of her parents and very nearly her own life as well. The right side of her face was intersected with a thin filigree of lines that networked like some kind of horrid road map from her hairline down to the curve of her neck, over her brow and one mossy-green eye, and across her temple, cheek, and jaw: a grisly reminder of where her face had impacted with a shattered window. Her shoulder and collarbone bore the delicately precise incisions from multiple surgeries to repair shattered bones and torn muscles, and while most of her arm had been covered by skin grafts, the brush of her fingers revealed the strangely taught texture of the relocated flesh where new hair refused to grow. Her right hand curled into a loose fist, and she felt the rounded stumps where parts of her fingers had been amputated - only three of the digits remained whole but damaged nerve endings had left them all but numb to any outside stimulation; she could grab a pan hot from the stove and not feel any pain. Her ribs had been shattered and her hip fractured, and still more scarring overlapped her torso: ragged patches were her skin had been peeled away like a flayed fish and then sutured back into place as well as the doctors could. She prodded gently with her left hand and could feel the multitude of metal plates that now held her rib cage together, and she remembered the x-rays showing the dozens of pins and screws it took to put her broken body back together. Her eyes had pinched shut against the fuzzy images of the wreckage and she'd stepped blindly away from the mirror, tugging her shirt back into place while faint laughter had drifted up to her from downstairs.
She'd spent the rest of the evening tucked away in her own mind with a book laying open on her lap, the words going unread as she stared unseeingly out the window to where she knew the lake lay below her like a dark abyss ready to swallow her whole. The moon had been a tiny sliver in the inky sky, but she admired its beauty nonetheless as it hung surrounded by a glittering blanket of stars. At some point Miguel had come up to apologize again for Miranda's inconsiderate remark, but she'd smiled and laughed it off like it had meant nothing to her. She was just tired, she'd told him; it had been a long day. He had promised that tomorrow would be better, and then left her alone once again while the house settled into sleep around her.
It was well into the night before she'd finally retired to her own bed, and now the dawn found her awake well before the sun rose properly into the lightening sky, still clothed in the over-sized sweatpants and faded tank top she'd been sleeping in. Leaving her cup sitting on the railing, she wandered down the porch steps and felt her feet sink slightly into the moist earth as the dewy grass left her toes chilled and damp. The edge of the lake met land a dozen yards in front of her down the slope of the yard, and she had to squint to see the small wooden dock stretching into the water as it was nearly overshadowed by the early morning light reflecting off the surface. To her left she could see the end of the carport that edged the side of the house, and the bumper of her Toyota glinted dully beneath a spattering of dried red clay. To her right, closer to where the trees encroached on the clearing, stood a fairly good-sized shed housing what she assumed would be gardening equipment or power tools. Beyond that the woods stretched out for miles, and this early in the morning the foliage was thick with shadows, but she could hear the soft twittering of birds high in the canopy and the occasional chitter of a squirrel going about his business. Krystina felt surrounded by the peaceful tranquility as she curled her arms around her midriff, and for the longest time she merely stood there in the yard bathing in the morning sunlight as the world seemed to lounge in a sleepy daze around her.
Several minutes passed as Krystina let last night's mishap fade from the forefront of her mind, but soon she noticed that the gentle dawn chorus had all but silenced completely, as if everything around her was holding its breath. She opened her eyes, blinked away the fog from her vision, and glanced around with a furrowed brow. The hair on the back of her neck prickled and her skin puckered with goosebumps - she knew the feeling in her gut of being watched, but even a closer inspection of the shadows beneath the tree's canopies revealed nothing to her. Curiosity had her feet carrying her towards the shed and the forest beyond, but before she made much progress Miguel's sleep-heavy voice called her back to the cabin with the promise of food and coffee. She hesitated for a breath; considered ignoring his call and continuing on towards the draw of the unknown; and finally turned her back on the woods to trod back inside where several bleary faces greeted her along with one snide comment about crazy people wandering around outside at the butt-crack of dawn. Back beneath the trees, deep in the shadows - the rest of the world continued to hold its breath.
