Prologue:
The dark decrepit pipes of an ancient furnace room hang inches above my head dripping with water and other unmentionable things. A drop of sweat trickles down from the top of my head through my recently cut hair and down my nose. The piercingly shrill noise of metal scraping metal snags my attention as it echoes through the piping above me. As soon as the echoes fade, my attention is drawn to a low, and creepy, laugh behind me. I spin around quickly to reveal that nothing but more rusty piping and broken heat meters. Breathing heavily I begin a slow spin so I can take in the room around me. All the broken pipes and haywire meters. The echoes of the laugh slowly fade around me, bouncing off the walls, making the source impossible to pinpoint.
"Hey there son." A low, vicious growl, almost in my ear makes me jump, nearly smacking my head onto one of the pipes.
Whipping around to look behind me, I see a little sheep bouncing in the middle of the hallway; a tall, creepy-looking man steps away from the wall and glides towards the sheep. The fingers of his right hand, already to long for human fingers, seem to glimmer in the light. He steps towards the sheep, right hand leading the way; a loud echoing bleat of pain and fear erupts from the sheep, followed shortly by the spray of blood that soaks into it's pure, white wool. The creepy man steps away from the sheep's body holding something.
"Hey kid!" He shouts looking at me with hatred and hunger glowing in his eyes, "Can you catch?"
Suddenly something is sailing through the air straight towards me. It takes me a moment to discern what it is, and as it comes half way between the man and me I soon realize it's the sheep's head, soaked in blood. I catch the head upon my reflex, blood clinging to my hands like syrup. Dropping the head I jump back in horror, slamming my bare arm onto one of the pipes.
I snap up from the lawn of the new house looking on the semi-rural street sighing deeply. Still shaken from the nightmare, I look down at my arm and see a semi-circular burn about the size of a heating pipe.
I stand up and look up at the off white house behind me with bars in most of the windows. 'Looks like a prison more than a house' I think. Roses cover most of the front pillars and windows, getting more rampant between the last owner of the house and when we moved in. Walking up the lawn, I glance at the brass plated numbers near the door "1428." After that I glance down the lawn to the street sign posted near the end of the street, "Elm St." "1428 Elm St." What a weird address. Shrugging with disgust, I walk up the lawn and into the house, a sharp cold chill racing through me as I cross the doorway.