An Unfortunate Tale of Unlucky People

Chapter I: Off to The Wonderful House we go!

In the small American town of Pompeii, no relation to the Roman one, a group of five friends were out and about looking for some fun to liven up their somewhat boring lives. It was around Halloween, and as such they decided for a more 'spooky' theme, so Jun Smith, the group's handy man and ideas guy, thought it would be a brilliant idea to break into the town's 'haunted house,' for fun. It had been abandoned for years, and no one who had ever went into it had ever come out, or so they said, but Urban Legends were never true, right?

XxX

"This is a terrible idea Jun," said Charlotte Salvador, the owner of a local bakery, as they were walking to the abandoned house.

"I almost agree, but the worst thing that could possible happen is us catching something, it probably has all kinds of mold inside it," said Christopher Jensen, simply called Chris by everyone he knew, he was studying at the local University to become a Neurologist, and was the group's resident 'smart guy.'

Susan made a scoffing noise, "We'll be fine, and I still don't understand why you guys insist we should go to that decrepit house," said Susan Le-Claire, she was one of the town's librarians.

Trent Carlyle, the final man of the five person group had nothing to say on the matter, the 6'8 buff accountant followed the motto of, 'Don't talk unless you have something relevant to say,' or at least that's what he told people when asked about why he rarely spoke.

And after several minutes of conversation filled walking, the group of young twenty something year olds had arrived at the rather dirty looking house. It was covered in only the faintest remnant of black paint, showing almost all of the gray colored wood that the house was made of, it was surrounded by and ancient wrought iron fence, the yard was completely overgrown by weeds, except for the small cobble stone path leading up to the front door, most of the windows were covered by wooden planks. A small orange piece of paper was nailed to the front of the house, reading, "Condemned." Oddly enough the house was essentially in the middle of nowhere; there was nothing for several blocks in any direction, even though the house was nearly in the middle of town.

A howling gust of wind swept past the group and in the distance a murder of crows took flight.

"Well that's rather ominous," muttered Jun. Trent walked up to the gate and after a minute of fighting with it, he managed to slowly open it up, with a loud grinding noise accompanying every inch it moved.

"This is a terrible idea, we should just go back!" Squeaked out Charlotte nervously, she seemed to have second thoughts about this.

"We will be fine Charlotte, calm down," said Susan with an annoyed look directed at the young baker. Charlotte made a nervous whimpering noise but none the less followed closely behind as they walked up to the front door.

"So how exactly are we supposed to get in…" Chris thought allowed, Jun hefted the crow bar he'd been carrying with him, but Trent stopped him with a gesture. He walked up to the door and tried the handle, it slid open without a sound. Jun looked quite surprised at this development.

"Well, I can't say I expected that to happen. Y'know, you'd think the door would be locked, or something," Jun said.

"I concur, but next time Jun, try the easy way first, before trying the hard route." said Susan to the novice welder, he looked rather sheepish. They filed into the house's large entrance hall, it was strangely clean, there were no cobwebs, dust, or rot, it was spotless. In front of them there was a long faded red carpet leading up a wide set of stairs, there were eight doors in total spread along the walls leading up to the grand staircase.

"So gang, are we gonna split up and look for clues?" Chris said with a snicker and a smirk on his face, earning a few chuckles from his joke.

"No, we aren't." said Susan, she glanced around the group with a stern look, she continued, "We are not splitting up, don't act stupid, and be careful, we went over this."

Jun, looking annoyed said, "Sheesh Susan, calm down, it's just a joke," he said with a chuckle, Susan glared at him mildly but didn't continue in her mini rant.

"Now," he said gesturing forward, "Let's start exploring, we're here to have fun, after all," he walked forward confidently, the rest of the gang following him, Susan sighed deeply, and jogged lightly to catch up with them. They walked up the stairs, past large paintings glaring down on them, they took a right through a mostly empty bedroom, straight through a small room filled with old cleaning supplies, left through an empty room, and finally right through a bathroom. They slowed to a halt, in front of them was a door splattered with a brown colored substance.

Chris knelt down in front of it, examining it, he paled, "I think that's blood," he said slowly.

"We should leave, like, right now, I mean c'mon guys, this is a terrible idea..." Charlotte nervously said, her voice wavering. Susan sighed and barged past them and threw open the door, inside was a sight none of them would ever forget.

There was a dead man hanging from a noose, a very dead man. He was completely naked, not that that really mattered, his genitals were missing along with the majority of his lower body, they only thing that remained of his legs were bony stumps. The rest of his body was a sickly green with large chunks missing from him, they looked like someone had taken a bite out of him. His lower abdomen was completely empty, his spine(and ribs) clearly visible. His eyes were a milky white. A cheshire grin was slowly growing on its face.

It looked up at them, its cheeks were beginning to rip from the strain of its grin, making it even wider. And then, it laughed, not a normal laugh, or even a regular creepy laugh, no, it was the laugh a psychopath would laugh before skinning someone alive with the express purpose of wearing their skin like a coat.

And then, it spoke, with a voice that would make nails on a chalkboard sound pleasant, "WELCOME!" It screamed at them, it cleared its throat, and continued in a voice only slightly more bearable, "I haven't seen another person in sooho long!" It laughed it's inhuman laugh once more.

"Now now, I can see the looks on your faces, just take a seat, it will be sooo much easier if you just let them kill you, they might even make it quick if you do, then again, they do love to hunt you mortals, it's their favorite pass time," he finished with a reminiscing chuckle.

They stared at it for a full second before bolting, with Trent in the lead they sprinted back the way they came, eventually the front door was insight and they slowed to a stop in front of it, Trent impacted the door lightly and jerked on the handle, but the previously unlocked door didn't budge.

"Crowbar!" Shouted Trent, thrusting his open hand towards Jun, he shakily pulled it out of the small loop where it was being held and slapped it into his hand. Around the front door were panes of glass just wide enough that they could slip through. He ripped off the cloth drape that covered it and reared back the crowbar to smash the glass open, and then he froze. It was black, almost completely black, the only thing visible outside was a portion of the lawn and then it was just an inky blackness, he could even make out a few dots of light that he could only assume were stars. Wait, no, they were moving, and they were attached to vaguely humanoid bodies, and now they were staring at him.

His jaw dropped and the crowbar almost slipped from his fingers. He tightened his grip and turned around, eyeing their faces, they each showed varying degrees of shock and horror.

"As you can see, we are not in Kansas anymore," he said in a strained voice, his usual stoic silence broken by the sheer madness of the situation.

"This may be terrifying, but we must remain calm, panic will only lead to our deaths," he took a deep breath and continued, "Do any of you have any suggestions as to what we should do?" He finished what must have been the longest sentence he'd said to them in months in a very strained voice, just on the edge of panic.

Susan spoke up, saying in a tense voice, "Our best chance is to try and find another way out, so, since our lives seemed to have turned into a horror movie, treat this like a horror movie. Trent you take the lead," the tall ginger nodded slowly, face grim. He straightened his back, and walked to the nearest door on the left, he tried the handle, it slid open with a loud squeaking noise, he groaned internally. Inside was a set of stairs leading down, oddly enough it was well lit and the stairs leading down were covered in fluffy pink carpet.

He took a step downward, and glanced back, they were right behind him, a very assuring sight; with a slight nod he set off down the stairs, crowbar in hand.

After nearly thirty minutes of walking down the of so fluffy and very much pink carpeted stairs they found themselves in front of yet another door, this one not stained with the blood of another human being. Trent slowly walked up to the door, muscles tensed and crowbar at the ready, the rest of the group doing much the same, minus the crowbar. He slowly twisted the door handle, he paused for a moment and then flung the door open.

Inside was an odd sight, the room was completely barren except for a padded table with a young child sitting cross legged on it, in his (because Trent could clearly make it that it was male) lap was a massive book. The boy looked up at them, the only thing that denoted him as not being human was his eyes, or lack thereof. His eyes were black pits, with a tiny red dot in the center acting like a pupil. He smiled a brilliant smile, the kind of smile only an innocent child could have, well, that and human hunting monsters that masqueraded as their prey.

"Greetings. I have to say I certainly did not expect you guys to make your way here," said the not-child in a deep baritone voice.

"I'm glad you found your way to me, otherwise you'd all have died horrendous deaths but amusing deaths. Now, I could explain to you in detail how you could have died, but I'm not particularly in the mood, suffice to say, it would have been... Painful, yet hilarious at the same time, well it would have been hilarious for myself at least, not for you obviously."

He continued, having not taken a single audible breath since they entered, "I'm sure you're wondering what exactly I am but unfortunately for you I'm to lazy to tell you. But, what I can tell you is how to get out," he finished with a grin. The not-child snapped his fingers and blackness in the vague shape of a door appeared a few feet behind him.

"I am feeling particularly generous and so, I give you your salvation, i.e. your only possible chance of making it out of here alive," said the not-child.

"You have two choices, A, be complete and utter morons and reject my oh so generous offer and try to find another way out, of which there are none, or B, which is the only rational move, which is to accept my help, take my advice, and step through that gateway. So, I ask, what will it be, humans?" he said, with an impossibly large grin on his face, he continued, "Oh, and you may address myself as... Bob."

Chapter II: Follow the Bloodstained Road

Trent idly noted that they had moved forward some time during that things mini speech, because the door was now behind them and appeared to be quite firmly shut. He also noted that 'Bob' was still grinning ear to ear, unblinking (did it even have eyelids?) and its gaze never wavering.

Susan took a step forward, seemingly oblivious to their change in position and said, "Well, if this truly is our only way out, we'd have to be fools to reject your offer," she turned to face the them, "Well, should we accept, er.. Bobs offer?"

Chris shook his head and sighed, "Well, there's a good chance that he's lying, but if we try to figure out whether or not he's being honest, there's a good chance we'll get killed, assuming he's not lying about that as well, " he looked down, with a pensive look, after a moment of thought he looked up towards Bob and asked, "Is this a one time offer?" Bob nodded.

Susan looked each one of them in the eye and asked again, "Are we going to accept Bobs offer?" Chris and Jun nodded right away, Charlotte looked around nervously for a moment before nodding, and Trent just made a grunting noise that sounded vaguely like approval.

The Librarian gave them a strained smile and then nodded herself, she turned to face Bob and asked, "Well, now what? Do we just step through the, erhm, gateway?"

Bobs grin seemed to widen even more, if such a thing were even possible, "First, a few words of advice before you go, ahem, firstly, do NOT stop to smell the roses, secondly, do NOT enter go, thirdly, if offered pesos take them, but don't ask for any more and move on immediately, fourthly, question everything you see, trust no one, fifthly, do not give up under any circumstance, oh, and for the love of all that is unholy, do NOT feed the birds."

A first sized orb with a red arrow inside of it appeared in Bob's hand, "This, will guide you to your destination, follow it and do not deviate from the direction it points. And now, you may step through that wonderful portal over there."

Trent walked up to the not-boy and took the orb, he walked around the padded table until he stood in front of the wall of blackness, after a moment's hesitation he stepped through completely disappearing, the rest of the group followed suit only a few moment later.

After stepping through the portal, Trent really didn't know what to expect, monsters? Terrifying hellscape? Things so foul as to drive a man beyond the bounds of rational though? Well, fortunately that was not what he found, not at all, after a few seconds of vertigo he found himself standing in the middle of a verdant grassy field surrounded on all sides by massive (what he assumed to be) Sequoia trees, under a beautiful blue sky, though as he examined his surroundings further he noted that the trees were arranged in a grid pattern, even the clouds were, oddly enough, and that as he stared off into the distance there was an odd blue fog obscuring the distance. The only thing to disturb this mostly idyllic scene however was the odd path cutting through the middle of the small clearing he was in, looking down he noted that it was white, bumpy, and covered sporadically in a glistening red substance, and oh, oh dear, those are skulls.

Susan, Jun, Chris and Charlotte appeared out of nowhere a few feet behind Trent only a few seconds apart. The massive ginger turned around to look at them, broken out of his examination of the skull road. He glanced down out the relatively small sphere in his hand, this tiny object given to them by what he could only assume to be an alien would be their salvation, he sighed, this entire situation was insane.

Trent cleared his throat to get their attention, he made a 'follow me' gesture with his hand and set off in the direction that the red arrow pointed him, which unsurprisingly enough required him to walk along the skull road.

Two and a half hours, two and a half hours of nothing but utter silence, no birds chirping, no idle talking, not even footsteps! The only noise that he'd heard since he'd entered this place were the voices of his friends, and they had stopped their idle chatter almost immediately after it began. To make matters worse the scenery seemed to only be composed of the three things he had seen the instant he'd arrived, grass, trees, and skulls, all of which (even the grass!) were evenly spaced in a grid pattern, nothing to break up the monotony, no animals, no small plants growing in the underbrush, nothing but, grass, trees, and skulls. Though, he supposed it was better than being dead (or slowly dying) inside of that hell house, wait... are those flowers in the distance?

After nearly another hour of walking it was revealed that he was infact not hallucinating and that there were indeed flowers, lots of them to, stretching as far as the eye could see, which really wasn't too far because of that annoyingly blue fog. As he examined the flowers, whilst continuing forward, he noted they were roses. He felt the oddest desire to kneel down and smell them, but he dismissed the thought with a shake of his head and continued forward.

Susan Le-Claire, loved plants, they were her second favorite thing, aside from books of course, she was a librarian after all. She just liked them and she wasn't really sure why, though her love of plants showed through in many aspects of her life, well, not really, though she did have a massive garden in her backyard that she obsessively pruned every day and her house was stuffed to the brim with plants (and books, there were more books than plants, but still, she had a lot of plants). And her favorite type of plant happened to be flowers, specifically roses, oh the memories they brought back of her childhood, ah, she could reminisce for hours about it.

Suffice to say, when she saw the massive field of roses, she was quite happy, it even brought a smile to her usually stoic face. And when the wonderful scent hit her, it was impossible to resist kneeling down and taking a whiff.

Chris knew something was off the moment Susan disappeared from his peripheral vision, for the past several hours she had been on his left, Jun on his right, Charlotte in front, and Trent in the lead, so when Susan stopped moving, he noticed it immediately.

"Guys, stop," he said, breaking the utter silence they had been in. They immediately halted and turned around to look at him, he then turned to Susan, and their eyes also drifted to her kneeling form. Jun made a rather unpleasant sounding noise, the kind of noise someone makes when their OCD is agitated.

"Susan! What are you doing?! He said not to smell the roses! Stop that! Who-" he interrupted himself with another noise of agitation as she stood up and began striding into field of roses. Jun started to run after her but was stopped by a rather bulky arm smacking into his torso.

"Stop," said Trent, "Look," he gestured towards the roses, which were rapidly turning from beautiful flowers into venus fly traps on steroids. Their flowers were warping into gaping maws filled with razor sharp teeth that drooled a rather nasty looking saliva like substance. And then there was Susan, who was striding deeper and deeper into them…

She abruptly stopped, and turned around, a rather dopey smile on her face, "Come on guys, the roses… They're just gorgeous, they smell so good!" then she giggled and kneeled down infront of a massive rose with a mouth so big it looked like it could swallow a person whole. And a few seconds later it was shown that it was, in fact, big enough to swallow a human being whole, Susan to be specific.

Charlotte sobbed, it wasn't particularly loud, nor particularly quiet, well, maybe just a wee bit on the quiet side, but who knew, but that really didn't matter did it? Carrying on Charlotte was crying, boohoo, and the whole group looked rather shaken, wimps, but they carried on, for waiting would only get them killed in even stupider ways than Susan, I mean how stupid was she? Am I right? I told her not to smell the roses didn't I? Sheesh humans can be stupid sometimes am I right or am I right? Ooooh I just can't wait to see if these morons will actually make it out of here alive!

Chapter III: If Only You Had a Brain

With a few encouraging (read: stern reminders that sitting around would get them killed) the group of fiv- er, four, carried onwards. After another hour of silence filled walking the four people came to a rather odd sight, ahead of them reality seemingly came undone, with the field of roses abruptly ending, and the only thing beyond it a black void, in the distance they could almost make out specks of something, but what they were, none could tell, and one would never know.

The skull path terminated into a vaguely door shaped white blob, it even had a door handle, albeit it was only three inches of the ground. Inevitably they reached the 'door' and Trent kneeled down to twist the door handle, and with a little bit of force it swung open to reveal a hallway composed of an off colored black substance, with only a tired sigh they set off down the hallway.

After only ten more minutes of silence filled walking the gang' entered into a large empty space, still surrounded by the off colored black material, and standing in the middle of this was a bewildered looking woman dressed in only a bathrobe and some slippers.

Chris tripped over his own feet in shock but managed to right himself before his face became better acquainted with the floor, the woman standing in the middle of the room was his girlfriend.

"Cynthia? Is that you? What are you doing here?" asked Chris. The woman in question looked quite relieved to see him.

"Chris?! Oh thank god! I was using the bathroom and the next thing I knew I was here, I've been stuck in this place for hours!" said Cynthia. Chris almost ran up to the woman to embrace her but was once again stopped by Trent's arm across his chest.

"Trust no one," he said, echoing the words of Bob. He continued, "His advice has already been proven correct." A pained look crossed Chris's face, but he nodded.

"Alright Cynthia I need to know that you're you, so I just need you to answer a few questions, alright?" he said in a strained voice, the bath robed woman nodded.

"When's our anniversary?"

"The 3rd of June,"

"Your favorite color?"

"Brown,"

"My favorite type of ice cream?"

"That's a trick question, you're lactose intolerant," a look of relief spread across his face as she answered everyone of his questions correctly. He quickly ran to embrace her, and this time Trent did not intervene. After closing the gap the embraced in a way only those who cared for each other deeply could. And she smiled a smile only a happy woman could have. Or a hungry predator.

The last thing Chris ever felt was his throat being devoured by needle like teeth, and the last thing he ever heard was an annoyed voice saying, "Honestly, no one ever listens to my advice…"

Trent sprinted forward, clearing the distance between himself that the monster that had just killed Chris in an instant, he had dropped the orb the instant he took off, Trent dearly hoped it wasn't as fragile as it looked. And once he closed the distance he swung Juns crowbar with all of his considerable might. Unfortunately for him the piranha mouthed impersonator was faster than she appeared and dodged his attack, mostly, his swing only clipped the top of her skull, just enough to stagger her.

He moved to bring down the crowbar on top of that things skull but was interrupted by Chris's now lifeless body smacking into him. He brushed his dead friend aside and took another swing, this time clipping her, or it, he supposed in the nose, which promptly was removed from her face in a tiny shower of blood. And once more he took this opportunity to bash the monsters skull in, and unfortunately for the monster, he succeeded.

A crunching noise radiated from where he had hit it, and a deep trench was left in it's skull where that ever so useful crowbar had made contact. He raised it again, Cynthia's clone too dazed to react, and brought it down once more, and again, and again, it toppled to the ground, its head nearly split in half. But he didn't stop them, another strike followed after another until the abominations head had been reduced to a fine paste.

He took a deep breath, calming his racing heart, he turned around, Charlotte was on her knees sobbing and Jun looked like he was about to vomit, a look of absolute terror on his face. Oddly enough he was looking at himself, he looked down, his entire frontal torso was covered in blood, bits of bone and brain matter. He sighed.

He walked back to where he had dropped the orb, fortunately it appeared to be perfectly fine. Then, he walked over to the now heaving Charlotte, he kneeled down infront of her and gave her a hug.

"We can make it through this Charlotte, we just need to fight through the pain a little while longer otherwise their deaths will have been in vain," he said quietly in a reassuring voice to the sad baker. He released her from the hug and stood up, she sat there for a moment, took a deep heaving breath and stood up, she wiped the tears from her face and nodded. He glanced over at Jun who had seemed to have composed himself, a blank look spreading across his face.

"Well, come on then," he mumbled. And he set off, to the white blob that just so happened to be vaguely shaped like a door. It opened automatically when he got within a foot of it, which was convenient he supposed. Beyond the thing that he called a door was an odd sight, the skull road started back up and continued on for as far as he could see. Around it though, was what was truly odd, they were in a presumably infinite black void, populated by random stuff floating around, trees, buildings, whole planets, birds, what he assumed were people, and there was even a massive human heart floating off in the distance, each thing was seemingly stuck in place, completely immobile.

He shook his head in exasperation, after all the crap he'd been through, he found it more funny than unnerving. With Jun and Charlotte behind him, they set off down the road made of skulls.

Chapter IV: The Emerald City in Sight

After another hour of walking in utter silence they once again came across an odd sight. It was a man, well at least it kind of looked like a man, to Trent though, it was obvious that it was not human, the proportions were off, its eyes were bright pink orbs, and it's hair was a dark green. To make the sight even stranger he, because saying he was easier than it, was dressed in stereotypical Mexican attire, with a large sombrero on his head, a poncho draped over his shoulders; he was even holding a taco in his hand.

"Ey! 'hEllo seenyors!" said the odd being in a terrible Mexican accent.

"Oh ho! You're dressed up like humans too! Cool!" he looked them up and down envy in its solid pink orbs.

"Man, I wish I had costumes as good as yours, where did you get those anyways?" he didn't wait for a response and continued before they could even think about answering.

"Ah well, not that that really matters, here, have some traditional human food, I think they call them pesos," he pulled out a wad of Mexican currency and handed them to Trent who awkwardly accepted them and shoved them into his pocket.

He gave a slight nod and said quietly, "Thank you, have a good day." The human imposter smiled a perfectly believable and bid them safe travels to wherever they were going.

After roughly another hour of walking they came upon an odd sight, it was a large square with the word 'GO' printed in big white letters inside of it, it was attached to the left side of the road. Above it was a massive block of metal as big as the square, he guessed it was meant to drop down on anyone who entered the square. In the middle of the square was a piece of paper floating in mid air with '$200' printed on it. He could only assume that it was meant to be a trap, though who would be stupid enough to walk under it he had no idea. And then something odd happened, Jun disappeared into thin air.

Jun simply raised an eyebrow as he noticed that he was now in a completely different environment. He looked around and saw that he was in a large circular room made from a dark organic looking material. He felt a what he could only assume to be a gun in his right hand, looking down his suspicion was confirmed and that it was infact a large pistol with the number forty two displayed in blocky holographic letters just an inch above the gun. He also noticed a rather hideous looking monster running at him, he calmly raised the gun, aimed in the things general direction and pulled the trigger, it dropped like a sack for potatoes, even though he was pretty sure he missed, he shrugged, an auto aiming gun would be quite handy, considering he wasn't a very good shot, and then two more creatures appeared.

After several more minutes of pointing in a general direction and pulling a trigger he was starting to run low on ammo, one second later and one more dead monster, he was down to his last bullet, he sighed. Jun looked at the gun, and then up to the monsters running at him.

'Get eaten alive or shoot myself, get eaten alive or shoot myself… Well, looks like my cause of death is going to be suicide.,' he thought to himself.

"Well," he said aloud, "I honestly can't say I expected this to be the way that I died." He mutely raised the gun to the side of his head and pulled the trigger. The last thing he ever heard was the deranged sound of a child's laughter.

A loud thump broke the incredibly uncomfortable silence that had developed between Trent and Charlotte after Jun's untimely disappearance several minutes ago. Trent whirled around to respond to whatever threat it happened to be this time and Charlotte nearly jumped out of her socks in fright. Lying there behind them was Jun, a large hole through the side of his head, blood slowly trickling out of the wound.

He could only sigh, after seeing so many of his closest friends die… He just couldn't let such things distract him right now, he could grieve later. Charlotte though, had apparently opted to not adopt such a mentality, as she was on her knees tears falling down her face.

She began to speak, "Just kill me… I can't ta-" but before she could finish her statement she exploded into a shower of gore. Trent just stared at the spot where Charlotte had just been, he wiped the blood off of his face and just stood there.

"At first, I had hoped this was just a dream, but it's obvious that this is not," he thought allowed, abandoning his silence in lack of his friends, and sanity.

"I wonder, how such a thing could happen… how the Universe could be so… malevolent," he sat down, he was absolutely covered in blood, some browned with age and some still fresh, a vibrantly red color, it made him want to vomit.

And then, the 'boy' that had sent them down this path appeared a few feet infront of him, hovering mid air with his legs crossed, a victorious smirk spread across the not-childs face.

"Congratulations, you have survived my gauntlet, you are still alive, I am impressed, to say the least, most die before they make it this far," he said, sounding quite happy with himself.

"I knew you all were the right group to pick, just not which one."

The blood soaked man stared at the floating not-child for a second, and then said, "What in the hell is going on? I just, sigh, I'm not even surprised anymore, heck, this doesn't even bother me any more; all of my friends are dead, and after all of this insanity, eugh," he groaned.

The boy smirked at him, "Let me explain, I orchestrated this entire event, all of your friends are dead because of me, I caused their deaths, and oh boy were they fun to watch, I haven't seen such comedy in centuries!" he laughed a gleeful bellyaching laugh, but only for a moment, "Now, you may wonder why I went through all of this trouble, see, being a nigh omnipotent being gets boring after a while, and I do find mortals such as yourself so entertaining, so I, am going to give you a gift, though some would call it a curse," he paused and cleared his throat, "Immortality," he said, his voice dripping with power. "From now on you will never know true death, and I, will be watching. Good bye, Trent Carlyle." And then everything went black.