Everyone gathered in the school gymnasium to plan for the annual fundraiser. Mr. Mason stood on a platform holding a microphone. From the end of the bleachers, Rachel was doing homework with her friend, Martha.
"Alright, students. This year's charity bazaar has to be our best one ever! We have volunteers for the penny toss, pie in the face booth, and the dunk tank. And who will like to run the haunted house?"
But no one raised their hand.
"Come on kids, I'm just doing my job." Mr. Mason replied.
"You're not doing the haunted house, Martha?" Rachel asked.
Martha shook her head. "No way, Rachel. You know how I get when I'm scared."
Rachel laughed. "Yeah, you loose all rational thought and you freak out. Besides, I'm not a fan of haunted houses, either."
A hand was raised. "Mr. Mason, I nominate Rachel to do the haunted house this year!"
Rachel looked down and saw it was Bethany who raised her hand.
"I mean, Rachel does live in the Grant Mansion, anyway." Bethany explained smugly. "So, she would be perfect for the job."
"I'll say, can you imagine living in a haunted dump like that?" Bethany's sister, Stephanie added. "Usually, she's too big of a chicken to even come near there!"
"The mansion is not haunted!" Rachel snapped back. "And I am not a chicken! I accept, and I'm going to make this year's haunted house a success! Right, Martha?"
Martha almost jumped out of her glasses. "W-Well, I have to study for an algebra test, but I could loan you some of my brother's tricks he uses to scare me, hopefully they'll suffice."
Bethany and Stephanie snickered amongst themselves.
After school, Rachel began setting up the haunted house, which was really a giant black tent in the gym. Since there's rain in the forecast today and tomorrow, the charity bazaar will be held in the school.
Inside the huge tent, Rachel was putting the finishing touches on the interior. She pulled out a remote control and made a hairy spider the size of a small dog crawl around the floor.
It took her all day by her lonesome, but the haunted house was ready. Rachel looked around, seeing the fake skeletons, cobwebs, ghosts and vampire bats hanging around the place.
"This would be scary," Rachel said. "for a one year old..."
And she had a point, none of this would scare a bunch of college kids tomorrow.
Suddenly, the lights went out.
Rachel squeaked when she found herself standing in the dark tent all alone.
Outside the tent, Stephanie and Bethany went up to the entrance with their flashlights on. Bethany reached into her backpack and pulled out a clown mask, then she gave a camera to her sister.
"Alright, here's the plan, I'll scare Rachel and you take the picture."
"Wait a minute, I get to scare Rachel and you take the picture!" Stephanie said, shoving the camera to her sister.
Bethany shoved the camera back. "Just shut up and take the picture!"
"You take the picture!"
"No, you take it!"
"You!"
Then a claw-like hand reached out and grabbed the camera. "Here, I'll take the picture."
The sisters nervously moved their flashlights to see who was there.
"Say cheese!"
The camera flashed.
Bethany and Stephanie dropped their flashlights and ran out of the gym, screaming in absolute terror.
Rachel heard their screams and jumped almost three feet in the air, those screams made her even more scared.
It was too dark to see where the exit was, but Rachel had to get out without messing up her scare traps.
Then Rachel felt a tap on her shoulder. She went stiff, her lips started to tremble.
Her shoulder was still being tapped.
It took everything in Rachel to not turn around, but that infernal tapping wouldn't stop.
She looked over her shoulder, a single green eye was staring right in front of her.
Rachel screamed at the top of her lungs and ran as fast as she could. She ducked into a corner and took a much needed breath.
When Rachel turned, she saw the same eye looking back at her.
Rachel squeaked and fell backwards, a cackle was heard from the eye. Rachel could make out a tall, inhuman silhouette in the darkness.
When the creature came closer, Rachel's fear grew when she saw that he had huge bumps all over his body, but none on his face. Just a pair of bat-like ears and a mouth grinning an evil smile.
The monster raised his hands, and to Rachel's shock, the 'bumps' on his body opened up, revealing that they weren't bumps, but giant, green eyes! There were even eyes on his palms!
"Peek-a-boo!" the monster shouted.
Rachel screamed, scared out of her mind as she scrambled away from this horrifying creature. She manged to get her legs to work again and she took off like a rocket. But the monster kept chasing her.
In her attempt to get away, Rachel tripped and fell down hard, when she heard the monster's laugh, she turned and whimpered as the beast came closer.
"Now I've got you..." the monster came close, and closer, and closer.
Just then, his foot tripped over a wire, then a plastic skeleton dropped down in front of him.
The monster gasped and his pupils shrunk.
"AAAAAAAAH!" he screamed and ran the other way, leaving Rachel very suprised and confused.
The monster kept running until his foot tripped another wire, making a sheet with a ghost face painted on it pop up.
He cried out in fear as he stumbled on his back. His large ears heard something, he looked around and saw the fake spider coming right at him.
"Aye, aye, aye! Shoo! Go away!" he wailed. The creature curled up with his hands over his head and shivered.
The spider stopped moving, Rachel came up to the not-so-scary monster.
"So, you can dish it, but you can't take it." she said. "Who are you? And why did you scare me like that?"
The monster saw how angry she was. "Alright," he sighed. "my name's Eye Guy. I came here to get out of the storm. Then I saw these two girls hanging around here and I scared them off."
He took out a picture and handed it to Rachel.
"That's Bethany and Stephanie!" she gasped. "So that's why they wanted me to do the haunted house! They were planning to scare me!"
Eye Guy nodded. "Yeah, I got such a kick out of that, well, I guess I got carried away..."
"You guess?! You scared me half to death, you, you, bug-eyed jerk!" Rachel huffed as she turned away.
"Come on, kid! I'm sorry!" Eye Guy pleaded.
Rachel wavered her hand. "Nope, it's too late for that. I will not be swayed by an apology."
"Oh, come on." he whined. "Lighten up, will ya?" He said as he poked her side, Rachel yelped a little.
Noticing this, the muti-eyed alien grinned. "Oh, ticklish, huh?"
And with that, he began lightly tickling Rachel's sides. The young girl pressed her lips together in order not to laugh. She flinched away from his fingers, but he wouldn't stop, making it harder to hold back.
"Heeheeheehee! S-Stop that!"
"Then say you'll forgive me!" Eye Guy demanded with a huge smile on his face.
"What?! Nohohohoho!"
Rachel tried to push him away, but couldn't. She laid down trying to escape, but Eye Guy took the chance by pinning her down and tickling her stomach. Rachel squealed and laughed even harder.
"Okay! Okahahahay! I forgive you! Just stop!" she begged.
Satisfied, he stopped. As Rachel took in her breath, she said, "Now what will I do? It took me all day to set up this haunted house and now it'll take even longer to set it back up!"
Eye Guy really felt the guilt. "It's gonna take a group effort to scare up a miracle..." he said idly.
Rachel blinked. "Wait a minute! You just gave me an idea!"
"I have?"
The next day, the school bazaar was in full swing. But the main attraction was the haunted house. There was a line practically a mile long.
Inside, a group of scared students were backing away as the toy spider crawled towards them.
A jock felt a tap on his shoulder. When he turned around, Eye Guy roared at the teens, making them shout out even louder.
In another part of the haunted house, Snare-oh was chasing a pack of screaming cheerleaders while Frankenstrike and Blitzwolfer were terrorizing other people.
Rachel heard her customers' screams from outside the tent. She smiled with pride. The haunted house was a major scare!
"Congratulations, Rachel!" Mr. Mason exclaimed. "Your haunted house has already broken last year's record! How did you do it?"
Rachel shrugged casually. "Well, I have friends in high places...very high places."