If only Jake had faith. This is a spin on both the movie version and the books (as I am halfway through the books) and there are things I like from both of them. Like Movie Enoch is better, because the book one is a lil whiny bitch who needs to get socked in the face sometimes :). But the main difference here is instead of Jake disregarding the home and children as "fairy tales" he instead, believed, and Abe had told him everything.
I was six years old, when I had brought my grandfathers photos to class for show and tell. After being humiliated and called "fairy boy" by the majority of my class, and having my stories torn down, I walked back to my grandfather's old Pontiac, slammed the door a little harder than I intended, and sat down, never looking up. Instead choosing to glare at my worn sneakers.
"What's wrong?" Grandpa asked with a concern look, one hand on the stickshift ready to put the car into gear.
For a second I had a great urge to get angry with him and repeat what I had heard about my grandpa's stories, how he lied to me all my life and filled my head with fairy tales for pants-wetting babies. But then I hesitated, "What did these kids ever do for me? They never cared about me, but my grandpa did, he was always there for me," I thought. "Why should I trust them more than him?"
"Well?" he repeated after I had said nothing for a good while.
"The kids at the school don't believe us," there, I said it, us. I knew from that moment that I trusted my grandpa more than anything in the world and that he would never lie to me.
He smiled deeply at that, "Who cares about them?" I had just come to the same conclusion, "They wouldn't understand, how about, when we get home I'll tell you more stories. New ones!" He finally put the Pontiac into drive and slowly pulled away from the school. Hyping me up for the new things he was going to tell me.
Flash forward 10 years and here I am, in all my glory, standing at the foot at my marvel of adult diaper architecture. I couldn't feel any prouder, then Shelley came up.
"You used Never-Leak," she said to me in a monotone only matched by the automated messages you hear on the phone. She was the store manager, at the Smart Aid near my house. The Smart Aid I've been trying to get myself fired from for ages. But due to my family running the entire thing I just couldn't seem to pull it off.
"That's correct," I replied, never taking my eyes off of it.
"I told you to use Stay-Tite," taking her eyes off of it to look at me.
"No you didn't," I nonchalantly replied.
"Either way, the sale's on Stay-Tite."
"And?" I hid my smile, at this point I no longer cared, I could toy with them all I wanted and if they eventually fired me I'd be free.
"Well-" she started only to get interrupted.
"Jacob, someone's on the phone for you, they're kind of spooked," I walked past Shelley and the tower, kicking at one of the corners as I walked, knocking the whole thing down resulting in a tidal wave of adult diapers. I tried not to burst out laughing as I strolled over to the phone.
"Hello, this is Jake," I said holding it to my ear.
"Yakob! Where is the key to the gun cabinet?" I heard the very alarmed voice of my grandfather through the phone, along with crashing and shuffling in the background.
"Shouldn't it be in your drawer?" I replied with a concerned look on my face. Slowly walking closer to the corner of the room, as a coworker of mine was sitting at the table nearby.
"No, it's not, I already checked there, it seems to have disappeared," he nearly shouted, another crash in the background was picked up by the phone.
"It must have been Dad, he wouldn't tell me because of how close we are," I realized.
"What am I supposed to fight them with? A butter knife?" he shouted in anger, his accent getting thicker with each word. Something that only happened when he was really upset.
"Grandpa, who's them? Is it who I think it is?" I started to fidget with my name tag as I feared the worse.
"Stay away from here, Yakob. It's too dangerous," he replied solemnly, avoiding my question. I immediately hung the phone up and took off my vest and ran out of the front of the store.
"Family emergency!" I shouted at the still purple Shelley whose mouth was half open and finger in the air, shutting her up.
"What's up, Special Ed?" said Ricky, my only friend in this forsaken town.
"We need to get to my Grandpa's, ASAP," I said jumping in the car without another word.
"Alright, whatever you say, boss," Ricky replied, still confused, but did in fact step on it. The closer we got to the house this sick feeling in my stomach began to rise up, I disregarded it as worry for my grandpa. We made it in record time, I immediately threw myself out of the car and turned back to him.
"Let's go, quick, grab your .38!" I shouted at him. He complied but was about to demand an answer when we were interrupted by barking and howling. I didn't ran into the house with Ricky behind me, the place was torn apart. Either in the struggle or in Grandpa's search for the key, who knows.
"Jeez," was all Ricky said as he had his gun now at the ready in front of him. I continued through the house in search of any signs of life. The pantry door to the backyard was torn open, slipping through that I made my way outside. On the ground was a bloodied Maglite that I picked up, wiping it off on my jeans. Hoping to god that it didn't belong to who I thought it did. The pain in my stomach began to increase as I walked further into the fog. Flashing the light at anything that so much as twitched. Trying not to trip on the various roots and vegetation scattered across the ground.
Then I knew where to go, this gut feeling guiding me through the dark. I finally stumbled into a small clearing and froze at the sight of my grandpa, on the floor, with blood around him. After a split second I ran up to his body and shouted for him as I flipped him over. I jumped when I saw it. In place of his eyes were two blank ungazing sockets, the appendages held there removed. A sign of only one thing.
A Hollowgast.
Yes my grandfather had told me of them, when I had gotten a bit older I had asked for him to tell me everything, and although he didn't all at once. He eventually got around to explaining as much as he could to me. From the Ymbrynes and their loops, to the Wights and their Hollows. Upon him telling me the dangers ensued a long argument. Resulting in him relenting and agreeing to train me somewhat in how to fight them, as well as coming up with plans in case we were attacked.
It seemed at the time that we were being a bit paranoid, but these circumstances have proved us correct in our caution. One of these contingencies planned for this particular scenario, but I didn't think of that, instead I was focused on the dying man in front of me and calling for medical aid.
Then all of a sudden he reached out and grabbed my forearm, "Get out of here, it's not safe. Go to the loop."
I dropped my phone when he did that and just nodded, fighting the tears from showing themselves. Instead choosing to hold him closer as I heard him take his last breath before his body relaxed in my arms.
I probably would have stayed like this for much longer, but two things happened. I heard Ricky, who, to be honest, I had forgotten about. He had finally finished his investigation of the house and jogged towards me. But at the same time I felt the sick feeling in my stomach tighten and grow, then it occurred to me, this wasn't any normal feeling, it was the feeling that Grandpa had told me about. My eyes grew wide and I looked in the direction of Ricky to warn him off.
Right behind him was the monster itself, the one that found itself in many a nightmare, I had only seen it through my own imagination as my grandpa had described it as well as he could. As the photos of him standing with his rifle, in his British army uniform, over an invisible body didn't help much at all. My imagination definitely went easy on me, what this was, was much worse than you could ever imagine. And it creeped up behind Ricky, who stood there staring in sadness at the body in my hand.
"Ricky! Behind you!" I shouted. He immediately turned around and shot into the vegetation behind him, the Hollow got away, and I just realised how crazy I must seem. I just made Ricky shoot at "air".
"I thought I saw something, sorry," I apologized. Before turning back to the body in my hands.
He didn't say anything, just nodded, and with shaky hands dialed 911.
.oOoO Line Break OoOo.
I sifted through piles of nothing in particular as we were cleaning out my grandpa's house weeks later. After I finished with the room I was in, I saw my aunt packing junk into garbage bags, and walked past her to the locked gun cabinet. The lock had scratches showing the bright steel under the black paint, evidence of my grandpa attempting to lockpick it. And even the metal of the door slightly bent in places, probably done by the crowbar near it on the ground.
"Where's the key?" I asked my dad who had just entered the garage with a black bag of his own.
"I have it, why?" he replied nonchalantly. I did my best to contain my anger.
"I want to see if he kept any other valuables in here," I replied through clenched teeth, keeping my grandfather's instructions in mind.
"Alright here," he fished it out of his pocket and tossed it to me before taking the bags out of the garage. I opened the cabinet and picked around at the stuff inside, looking through the contents until my aunt left the garage to go back into another room and collect more junk. I quickly grabbed my grandpa's favourite handgun, the Colt M1911, the one he used in the war, with countless tally marks engraved into the metal slide, each one representing a Wight or Hollow he had shot and killed. I checked over my shoulder again and took several loaded magazines and dropped them into my drawstring bag before slinging it over my shoulder and walking outside to my dad.
He glanced up from his work to make eye contact with me, "Find anything?"
"Not much, just some pictures. I think I want to go home," I replied, doing my best to look forlorn, which wasn't very hard, and making sure to keep the bag as hidden as I could.
"It's alright buddy, I understand."
I nodded in reply and left.
.oOoO Line Break OoOo.
"It's to my understanding that you're taking a trip to Wales, a request in your grandfather's will?" Dr. Golan asked me, her legs crossed with her hands on her clipboard. She was a psychiatrist that my parents had paid to help me through this "difficult time", as my mom calls it. Not that she was wrong, every night I had the same nightmare, of the Hollow that killed Grandpa to come after me instead. I woke up in cold sweats and got little sleep, and my parents noticed.
"Yes," I said, "To spread his ashes near the orphanage where he grew up."
This was the cover he used to reasonably get me to the loop, to safety. After spreading the ashes I was to go into the cave near the house and to immediately talk to Miss Peregrine of what happened. Whatever that was that would lead to this case scenario, my grandfather had told me.
The only problem was how to get the gun overseas, but he had already told me how to do this, and so I was to ship his M1911 to an old friend of his under the disguise of it being an antique gun for display purposes, not that that was a particular lie, it was an antique gun and was going on display in the WW2 exhibit... Until I got the UK then he was to drop it off to me in private.
"Do you know anything else about the orphanage? The children there or the significance of it?" Dr. Golan asked, probably sensing something else, being a psychiatrist. But after 1st grade show and tell I learned not to tell anyone else about peculiardom.
"No, not really," I lied. She could probably tell I was lying but didn't pry any further.
.oOoO Line Break OoOo.
It was my dad and I on the ferry heading to Cairnholm, I was looking over the side at the many sunken ships pretending to laugh at the joke the sailor had said, something about half a navy, as I fought the butterflies in my stomach.
Just then I heard a screech above my head, looking up I saw a blue falcon flying in the sky above the ship, looking directly at me. I winked at it, before it flew away off to who knows where.
"Jake! Look!" My dad pointed through the fog at the growing land mass in front of the ship. I wondered if we have to do some climbing to get onto the island before we pulled into a half moon shaped bay with a dock that had dozens of fishing boats tied to it, rocking back and forth with the crashing waves. Just watching it made me a little queasy.
As we made our way to the Priest Hole, I took note of the diesel generators everywhere. Apparently this island wasn't significant enough for lines from the mainland to be wired. When we made it there the bartender took us to our room and we unpacked, but I made sure my backpack was ready with all of the things I needed. I picked up the ornate vase that contained the ashes of my grandfather.
"Would it be okay with you, if I did this alone?" I asked my dad, who was grabbing his ornithologist equipment, taking note of that I added, "you can go look at the birds on the beach in the meantime."
He stopped and thought about it, obviously thinking of my safety going alone and also my privacy before deciding, "Yeah, I guess that's alright, closure and everything. Try and be safe though, alright?" I nodded, trying to hide my excitement.
I was finally going to meet them Emma, Millard, Enoch, all of them. But then the thought of me showing up at their doorstep with my grandfather's ashes made me sad again. I slung my backpack over my shoulder and made my way out of town, referring to the written instructions that my grandpa had written for me.
Later, as I made it to the house I inspected the ruined remains of it, I decided to go in and look around. The house was in ruins, dust collected on every horizontal surface, doors were unhinged, walls were blown open, there were large holes in the roof. I was afraid to even climb the stairs. But up there I had found a large trunk with a nearly indestructible lock. So I decided on dragging it over to the landing, and pushing it down from the second story.
The weight had actually pulled it down into the basement, and with a click of a flashlight I found myself surrounded by mason jars filled with formaldehyde and assorted animal organs.
"This must have been Enoch's room," I thought to myself.
I had finished looking through the pictures and put them away in my backpack, and as I climbed the stairs I heard something behind me.
I don't know exactly what I expected to be there. But it certainly was not a beautiful blonde girl in a dainty dress looking down at me, perplexed.
"Abe?"
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