THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT
"They're just some geeky un-dead bellboys" said Erica once again, as if she were assuring herself.
"D-demons aren't and never were humans" Ethan said, and the fright was apparent in his voice. "At least there's very few people who think they were. They're just . . . creatures . . .minions."
"Life isn't a comic book" Erica retorted.
The demons now appeared within ten feet of them. Ethan, with a look of irritation at Erica, again grasped her wrist.
"Sorry!" said Ethan. "You . . . have to see what we're up against."
And Ethan truly was sorry.
Erica gasped.
"I don't believe it" she said.
Benny had looked strange in his chin-strap cap atop his black hair. It didn't look half so strange as a bellboy cap atop red hair with horns in front.
Within a month of being cured of being a vamp, Rory had received a sunburn from a cheap tanning bed spa. He wasn't half so red as the demons.
Ethan's lately oversized feet weren't half so weird as the fact the demons wore no shoes at all. As in popular myth, these demons didn't have feet or shoes but cloven hooves.
"The master has had enough of you" said the demon in the middle, who seemed to be the lead. He had epaulettes on his shoulders, as if he were the bellboy captain. "We'll deal with all three. In this dimension, and with the doors barred, you're at our mercy."
"And mercy isn't one of our kinds' attributes" said another of the demons.
Their red pupil seemed to be made of flame, and their hair. Their red skin glowed in the unhallowed light.
"There's something I can do" said Ethan.
"Even a worm will turn when he's cornered" said the demon-captain contemptuously.
"I'm . . . we're more than worms" said Ethan. "Life isn't a comic book, but . . . I have a signature move."
"If you want to be possessed" sneered the demon-captain. "Again."
Ethan let go of Erica. He used every ounce of courage to step forward, and overcoming a deep revulsion (and the smell of rotten eggs), grasped the demon captain by the wrist.
The demon laughed cruelly.
There was a burning, breath-stealing blow Ethan suffered. Everything went berserk in his vision. Instead of imprisoning the demon in his mind, Ethan put himself in a startling nightmare.
Lights flickered went black and red at maddening speeds. Surrounding him, round and round, were the heads and visages of enemies.
Gord, Jesse's lieutenant. The siren, at full screech. The Maztec sky goddess. Mudrap. Anastasia and her yes-men of the vampire council. Gremlins and demon-possessed turtles. A moon going from waxing from crescent to full, waning to new and waxing to full again.
"HAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA" they laughed, as round and round the images blurred.
Faster and faster into a blur.
"Give me that, you little loser" said large teen boy, pushing the six-year old Ethan into a mud puddle.
"Try and stop me" said the kid down the street, as he took slapshots at the Morgan's garage.
"We can use our avatars" said the now teenage Ethan to the yearbook committee, who looked at him as if he was crazy.
"You geek" said Sarah, as Ethan again dropped his tray full of food on her. The cafeteria laughed loudly.
"Oh" said Rory, as he fainted dead away after being bitten by Erica at the vampire party.
Several Duskers lay dead on the floor of the Westdale.
"No!" said Ethan.
Jesse bit Ethan's arm. Sarah went in to take away the poison.
Ethan tried to read the siren's mind, and his mind was filled with a piercing shriek.
A nightmare vision of everyone in Whitechapel, dead-eyed zombies and mutilated dead.
Free-falling from a thousand feet in the air.
Turning slowly into a werewolf, being stretched into a monster.
A nightmare vision of what might well have been the surface of Venus. Erupting volcanoes, geysers pouring out sulphuric smoke, and a landscape barren and dark.
And then at once, everything went up into red flames.
All faded to black as Ethan realized he was against the firmly locked door that led out the ballroom.
Ethan gasped for breath, and opened his eyes wide.
"You thought that you could best the master" said the demon-captain in a mocking tone. "Signature move? Even if she failed, we've decided to dispose of you. But first . . . Stephanie is forfeit."
"No!" said Stephanie.
"This can't be real"
One of the demons unrolled a piece of brown parchment in red ink that dripped from the page. Ethan realized it wasn't ink, but Stephanie's own blood.
"You know why the old woman packed the magic box?" leered a demon, whose teeth were sharp as a crocodile. "To preserve her soul from us. But no magic box."
"You can't!" said Ethan.
"What's he talking about?" said Erica. "Do something . . . or I will!"
"What?" asked one of the demons.
And without a move by the demon, Erica found herself blasted to the floor aside Ethan.
"The . . . ." started Ethan.
"The only question is the door in the floor or the door through the kitchen" said the demon-captain.
"Door in the floor" said the other demons in a, for lack of a better word, demonic chorus. "Door in the floor."
The singed pentagram span around, and around, and led to the mysterious spiralled pit Ethan remembered from the defeat of Valerie Mudrap and her hold on the Mole Scouts.
Ethan's powers had matured since then. But he wasn't happy to see that the spirals faded to show what was behind them. Red-blue flames.
"Maybe it's a way out" said Erica.
"Are you crazy?"
Ethan grabbed her by the arm again, looking at her with equal parts desperation, incredulousness and pity.
"They . . . want . . . to . . . drag . . . us . . . to . . . hell" said Ethan terrified, but again with the unusual emphasis of a kid for whom swearing was unusual. "Hades, blazes, whatever you want to call it."
"No."
"Yes."
"But . . . in Dusk!"
"DUSK!" said Ethan.
"NOOOO" interrupted Stephanie.
The "door in the floor" started pulling her away. It had some sort of pull on Stephanie, and only Stephanie.
Ethan dived down and grabbed her hand.
Stephanie, finally, looked to Ethan with gratitude.
But it was too late.
In a moment, Ethan found he was holding the hand of a cold dead woman. The spirit, the ghost, the soul of Stephanie was pulled down into the door in the floor to the cruel laughter of the demons.
"Now for Erica Jones" said the demonic bellboy-captain.
"You can't have her" said Ethan.
"The master was right" said another demon.
"As he always is" said the demon-captain.
"He is becoming quite the valiant hero" said a demon who hadn't spoken; this one's voice was like that of nails scraping on a blackboard.
"She's not dead, she didn't sell her soul" said Ethan.
"Do you want to go through everything she's done as a vampire?" said the demon-captain. "She wanted to be a vampire, she signed up for destroying her soul."
"I didn't" said Erica.
"She still wants to be a vampire" repeated the demon-captain.
"But she isn't" said Ethan tersely. "And she didn't exactly volunteer. All she did . . . ."
"Don't tell them" said Erica.
"I think they know about all your sins" Ethan retorted.
But Erica was touched to see Ethan stumble up in front of her.
"In the original Battlestar Galatica" Ethan said to the demons.
"Benny Weir's favourite" sneered the bellboy-captain. "But we know you prefer the re-imagined series."
"Why should we care about your tv series?" said another demon.
"Because . . ." said Ethan, and he began on a roll, "Count Iblis . . . the devil . . . your master, kills Apollo to get to Sheba. Apollo gets brought back to life, because he never followed Iblis. So . . . not only can't you Erica, you can't really go through me."
"And who's to protect you?" said the demon-captain. "You are in the master's dimension, and in his power. We can kill you, we can maim you. We might even again make you a permanent werewolf. But this time forever imprisoned in this hotel with your memories, and your dashed hopes. But first we take Erica."
"Door in the floor" started the demons again. "Door in the floor."
Erica found herself being pulled to the trap door and the red-blue flames.
And Erica did a strange thing. She fainted.
"No!" said Ethan. "Don't! You don't know why . . . ."
"Because she was teased in school" laughed a demon. "And she liked a book series."
"And she wanted to be glamorous and rich" said the demon-captain. "There's been many who wanted to be glamorous or rich that did it our way and came our way when they finally died."
"Even the vampires, sooner or later" said another demon. "They just fall out of limbo after awhile to their final destination."
The demons laughed.
"She's not dead yet" protested Ethan. "She can change her mind. About everything."
"You don't even like her" said the demon-captain.
"Maybe I do, maybe I don't" Ethan retorted. "If she's not exactly a friend, she's a friend of a friend."
"It's too late. You're in our power. Who's going to help you!"
"H-HELP!" said Ethan as he looked, up, around and desperate.
There was a flash of white light that dazed Ethan. It sent the demons through their door in the floor which disappeared . . . along with the burnt remains of the pentagram, the unworldly red glow.
When Ethan racked his mind, he wondered if he had literally seen something with sword drawn.
But all, in fact, he did see was the ballroom lit up, Erica resting peacefully on the floor, and the body of Stephanie laid out on a table.
There was also a man, dressed in the style of the nineteenth century, patiently peeling a orange with a pocketknife.
The man looked at Ethan with curiosity. Ethan looked at him, wondering if he should be suspicious.
"It's all over, Ethan" said the man. "You haven't anything to fear from me."
The man spoke in the voice Ethan had heard a few days before, when the skeletons had taken him into the hotel. It was a untroubled, rested voice.
There was a resemblance to Ethan's father in the man about the chin, so much so Ethan asked "Dad?"
"There is no place where demons have free reign" said the man, "And they haven't any right to take you, or her" said the man. "As least, for her, not yet."
Ethan looked at him.
"What are you?" said Ethan.
Ethan wandered about his identity. Could it be a demon . . . or even worse?"
"Your great-great grandfather" said the man, with a trace of offense in his voice. "George Isaac Morgan. The man who Jesse told you had also been a loser. Come, Ethan, look."
Ethan did.
And in a brief vision Ethan could see his house, a hundred years before. The rooms were different (the living room and dining room were separated by a wall), the furniture old, but there was a painting of his great-great grandfather on the wall above a fireplace.
""Take heed, Ethan" said the man. "It is a gift to be here talking to you, there were others who would have gladly taken my place. You've done a lot. And if you're not permitted to see the guardian angel sent to save you, it's only because there are things you're not permitted to see."
Ethan looked at his great-great grandfather a moment, then anger welled up in his mind.
"Guardian angel!" said Ethan. "I went through all this crap . . . ."
"Watch your language, boy" said Ethan's ancestor.
"I've been driven out of my mind" Ethan started. "I've been turned into an animal."
"A demonic animal."
"A demonic animal. My best friend's been a zombie. Sarah's been under the power of the ghost of a vampire. I've gone against a witch. Malcolm, Malcolm's soulless double. And . . . ."
"The demons had no right to directly attack or take you or Erica. Alack and alas for Stephanie, it was too late. She chose her fate."
"Alas and alack for her" said Ethan, in a sarcastic voice.
"You're in your teenage years" said George Morgan, as he began to eat his orange slices. "It's understandable that you'll have trouble with your temper."
"I . . . have a right to be angry" said Ethan, lamely.
"Care for an orange, boy?"
"I . . . don't think so."
"Suit yourself" said George Morgan, as he finished the orange, and looked calmly at his great-great grandson. "You feel ill used. Why did you have to go through this monstrous torment at the hands of the forces of evil?"
"Of course I want to know why!" said Ethan heatedly.
"You're the first Morgan in several generations to have been the gift of foresight and prognostication" said George Morgan. "You've made good use of it. Now, when the lucifractor exploded, your friends' curses removed, and all set to right in Whitechapel; what was your one remaining fear? The fear that caused you to accidentally foresee your whole life pass ahead of you!"
"Erica" said Ethan promptly. "She desperately wanted to be a vampire again."
"A fear for which you nearly ruined your life; a fear that a king gremlin used to make you look especially foolish" George Morgan reviewed.
"I know" said Ethan irritably
"Well, now, Erica won't" said George Morgan triumphantly. "That is why Sometimes people are very hard headed. Fear is somehow the only motivator. Your future won't change much . . . I shan't tell you what it will be, but rest assure your future won't change. Erica's will. Erica won't be a vampire. She will seek her glamorous life amongst the living and not the un-dead. Sarah will write to her. And if Erica ever seeks to wallow in evil deed, the pleasant scene you just lived with dissuade her."
Ethan started to grin in spite of himself.
"The forces of evil sought to trap you. The only reason these things were allowed to go as far as they did, were to save Erica's soul. It is the one thing that's more precious than life itself. But you'll never be able to tell Erica. And it might even take months for you to recover. You know, you're of a bit of nervous disposition"
"Grandpa . . . I think I have a right to be" said Ethan tersely.
"Surely. But let's take Erica to Malcolm's car. She won't recover consciousness until she leaves the building."
George Morgan and Ethan helped a sleep-walking Erica out the suddenly open double doors.
"Now it really is 1956" said Ethan's great-great grandfather. "But they can't see us."
The hotel had changed. There were happy vacationers going here and there, and waiting for the elevator. Ethan's great-great grandfather pulled Ethan's ear when he looked at the girls in the bathing suits headed for the outdoors.
There were five or six teenage boys hired as bellboys, and rushing, Benny-like, when called by the large silver bell at the desk. One of the bellhops had a yoyo, another was covertly reading a comic-book.
The desk itself was managed by a smartly dressed young woman, and a fat man with a moustache.
"Remember what was merely a parody of reality, a false echo, is Scratch's stock in trade."
"But how do we get back?" asked Ethan.
"Watch the clock above the desk" said Ethan's great-great grandfather.
The chrome clock sped up, along with the people in the lobby. Suddenly the lobby was again deserted except for a tired looking clerk answering a phone.
It was dark outside, and the fog had returned.
"You'll be back in the pocket-dimension outside" said Ethan's great-great grandfather. "Tell Sarah to turns southwards, by way of the trestle across Gunflint Lake. And don't stop until you're across the border."
"Why?" asked Ethan.
"It's the only way you'll escape in time. The horn blows at midnight."
Ethan awkwardly gave his great-great grandfather a handshake. After all a hug seemed weird, and Ethan doubted his great-great grandfather was the high five or fist-bumping kind.
It was, after all, strange enough, to lead the now sleep-walking Erica outside into the mist.
Author's Notes
Part horror, partly just weird! But the reason Ethan was allowed to go through this horror was, he discovered, to save Erica's soul.
"War of the Gods" was a the two-part episode of Battlestar Galactica, with the devil appearing in the person of "Count Iblis".
"The Horn Blows At Midnight" was a 1945 movie starring the comedian Jack Benny, an infamous box-office failure that he joked about for years.
