Hey, guys! Happy belated Halloween and Día de Muertos! (though technically Día de Muertos is still going on over here...). I hope you like this late little story.
Disclaimer: Don't own DP, blah, blah, blah...
Haunted House
"Are you sure we won't get caught?" a small trembling voice asked.
"Shhh!" the older boy in front of him hushed, careful not to raise his voice any more than necessary. "If you keep whining, you'll be the one to get us in trouble."
The first boy, who was no older than eight, shifted nervously on the spot where he was standing, his black and red cape flowing softly with each movement. Even if he was dressed appropriately for the part, his uneasy stance took away the entire frightening aura his Count Dracula costume was supposed to project.
The pale trick-or-treater turned to look at his companion, trying to stop him for the umpteenth time that night from doing something stupid. "It's already late and mom said we shouldn't go too far," he insisted.
Dracula's big brother, a considerably taller twelve-year-old dressed as a zombie, rolled his eyes. "It's Halloween and, technically, this house is still in her radar," he replied tiredly.
The last fact was true, although the dark and silent house wasn't as ordinary as the preteen zombie made it seem. It was well known by all their peers how dangerous that big and peculiar building was, and how none of them should get close to it, much less wander inside. There were of course all kinds of stories behind those warnings, ranging from crazy experimenting to vengeful beings inhabiting the residence.
With uncertainty still in his mind, the younger kid held his candy sack tightly against his chest. "I'm not sure she would like us coming in here."
"Duuuh," the eldest kid mocked. "That's why we're not telling her."
"But what if she finds out?" little Dracula whined.
A sigh escaped the chapped lips of the zombie kid. "I knew I should've left you with mom," he muttered, not really remembering why he agreed to let him tag along in the first place.
"Nuh-huh," his brother protested, anger replacing the fear he showed less than a second ago. "You promised me to take me with you this year."
Oh, now he remembered. "That was just to make you shut up last year."
A hurt expression crossed the younger boy's face. "Ok, I'm going back with mom. And I'm telling her where you dragged me to."
"All right, all right!" the zombie said quickly, but still managing to keep his voice down. He hated being blackmailed by his sibling and, worst of all, accepting any of his brother's terms. But if that brat ruined his chance to visit the scariest place he could think of in all of Amity Park, chances were mom would totally ground him for the rest of eternity. And that was definitely a pretty long time. "I'll play nice, but keep it quiet and don't tell anything to mom. I'll even take you to that huge house with the party down on Maple Street later, okay?"
Dracula seemed to consider this for a second. He gave his brother a skeptical look. "You promise?"
"Yeah. Promised," the zombie replied solemnly, even going as far as crossing his heart.
When he realized his little bro was done with the nagging, the zombie kid resumed his pace and continued silently down one of the house's dark corridors on the second floor.
"Why are we even here?" the small voice asked after a couple of minutes.
This promised to be a long night… "Well, you remember the guy next door, Johnny?" Dracula nodded. "He made fun of me for still going out trick-or-treating. He said I was too chicken to go anywhere spooky on Halloween. Ha, bet he wouldn't dare come anywhere near here. I'll show him who the chicken is," the zombie ranted mostly to himself, not liking to be challenged by anyone, much less someone who smelled like stinky cheese.
"So that's why you picked this scary house," his brother mused out loud, followed by a slight shudder. "But everyone knows bad things happen in here. I even heard a kid died in the basement."
Zombie kid gave him a confident grin. "That's why this place is perfect!"
"But mom said—"
"Ugh, mom doesn't want us anywhere out of sight," the older sibling interrupted, slapping his forehead in irritation. "We could be sitting quietly at the ice cream shop and she would still freak out. Be thankful we can enjoy Halloween alone."
Dracula rubbed his arm as his eyes stared at his feet. "But… I-I'm scared, Alex."
Sympathy won over the older boy. Alex kneeled in front of his brother and placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "Relax, Jay, this place is definitely deserted. I even made sure no one was patrolling near the house. We just take a look around, take a picture of me hanging out here, and head back home."
Truth is, Alex wanted to do much more than taking a simple picture. He wanted to convince smelly Johnny to come over and see him go inside. He wanted to see his awed expression as he came out in one piece and without a tinge of fear. He wanted to show not only Johnny but also everyone else he was not a chicken. He wanted everyone to see he was all grown up and to be taken seriously.
"Cool!" he heard his partner in crime exclaim excitedly. "You brought a camera?"
Oh, no, Alex thought, paling at the sudden realization."Aw, darn it! I knew I forgot something…"
The one thing he needed to get the evidence and make everyone believe he waltzed inside the scariest house in Amity Park and he forgot it?
The defeated preteen sank to the ground and held his head in his hands. A small hand patted him in the shoulder. "S'okay, I'll tell everyone you're really tough and that you took me here."
A smaller kid was comforting him? No way! He had to get his act together and think of something else…
Alex snorted in response. "That'd be lame. No one would believe us. Maybe there's something here we can use as proof," he said while standing up, as if nothing had even threatened to ruin his plans just a minute ago.
Roles back into place, Jay gulped and frowned in worry. "I don't think we should touch anything. What if there's something here ready to hurt us?"
"Don't be such a scaredy-cat," the older brother muttered.
Jay immediately took offense. "I'm not a scaredy-cat!"
"Oh, yeah? Prove it," the zombie taunted, crossing his arms challengingly.
The little vampire stared at Alex. He hated as much as his brother to be treated like a baby and made fun at. He knew he wasn't as brave, but he wasn't a scaredy-cat either.
With thinned lips, he exhaled out of his nose. "Okay… I'm gonna take that picture from the wall," Jay conceded as he pointed to a family portrait hanging near the stairs.
"No," Alex replied simply.
Jay furrowed his brows in confusion. "No? But you just said—"
"You'll take something else," the zombified companion interrupted, a look of pure mischief shining in his eyes. "From the basement."
"The basement?" the kid yelped, all the stories of the particularly dangerous and spooky basement coming to mind. "But… but… but what if I break something and the house falls down?"
"See? Scaredy-cat."
"Stop it!"
"Sorry, I meant to say chicken!"
"I'm not a chicken!"
The older brother smiled. He was definitely enjoying getting a ruse from the other kid. "Of course you are, chicken!"
"Who's there?" a voice boomed from below, or was it above? The echo the supposedly deserted house provided didn't help.
Both children paled and rushed into an open closet door. "Shh, not one peep," Alex whispered as he covered Jay's mouth.
"I know there's someone in here," the voice continued. "Show yourself before you make me do something drastic."
Alex was at a loss of what to do. If someone was in there, odds were they could no longer leave the place unnoticed and they would definitely get in trouble, big time. That's assuming the voice was coming from some nosy neighbor and not from someone or something residing in the house.
The voice, though, sounded a bit young. Maybe it was just another kid trying to sneak into the house? Maybe he thought the noise the two brothers had made were simply other kids out to scare him?
Forget the dare. The nervous zombie just wanted to get out of there,pronto.
A pair of footsteps sounded closer and closer; they seemed to climb the stairs to the second floor, almost reaching the spot where the kids were hiding. "All right, you asked for it," the annoyed voice called out from the corridor. They couldn't react in time as the closet door opened suddenly. "What are you two doing here?" a teenager, barely visible among the shadows asked them.
Both boys relaxed slightly. He didn't look ready to hurt them. "Sorry. We got here by accident," Alex lied quickly. Hopefully, he hadn't noticed anything. They could still walk free. "We'll be on or way."
The teenager, clad in regular jeans and a white T-shirt with red accents, scratched his head full of dark messy hair. "How did you even get in here? I locked the portal weeks ago. That was supposed to keep ghostly visitors on Halloween at a minimum."
Alex paled. This kid knew what they were… and didn't freak out or attack them?
Jay, however was the first to find his voice. "We can only come here on Halloween, mister," he spoke softly, more embarrassed than scared, apparently.
The older brother punched his shoulder, eliciting a quick protest from the little vampire. "You can't just go around blurting that out!"
"But he seems nice…" Jay protested.
The teenager cleared his throat, getting back the boys' attention. "So, let me get this straight… you can only come to the human world once a year… and you decided to break into a ghost hunter's house?"
Alex hunched. When the other guy put it that way, it seemed really stupid, come to think about it. What if they got blown to smithereens? What if it had been the ghost hunters who found them? The house was dangerous by itself, their sudden inability to use their powers proving as much. What was he thinking dragging his brother into this deadly trap?
"Johnny dared him to go somewhere spooky," Jay's voice snapped him out of his thoughts. That kid definitely was going to get them into some serious trouble if he didn't stay quiet…
Before Alex could say anything, the living boy groaned in annoyance. "Don't tell me he's starting all those rumors again about our house…"
Wait, he knew who Johnny was? And he knew about the rumors going around The Ghost Zone, too? Just how much did this guy know?
Jay, who was apparently getting too chummy with the weird guy, spoke again before Alex could stop him. "We just know the ghost hunters ripped a kid apart molecule by molecule in the basement and he died. Is that true?"
The zombie kid had a lot of questions in his head, but that sure was not at the top of his list. He wanted to question the teen about how he knew so much and how to get out of there without being hurt by some crazy invention. He didn't care if a kid had died in the basement. If he had, why would there still be a ghost haunting a ghost hunter's house? That was totally stupid, but he knew his little brother wasn't good at catching on with what was real or fake.
"Well…" the teen paused and crouched to meet the two brothers. "I wouldn't say he died, exactly," he added in an eerily lower voice, cackling madly as his eyes flashed green.
Alex and Jay screamed and rushed out of the closet as fast as they could. Once the older brother realized they could use their ghostly abilities again, he phased them both out of the residence, deciding they had enough for that Halloween night.
The dark-haired teenager looked through one of the house's windows at the two flying figures crossing a swirling green vortex in the sky. He sighed tiredly, turning back to the white and green thermos he had originally stopped to pick up. He was glad he could keep those two out of trouble, at least for that night.
"Two down, two dozen more to go," he muttered to himself as a white halo surrounded his waist and transformed him into a white-haired and green-eyed phantom.