REVIEW RESPONSES
LaLloyd271: Thank you so much for your suggestions, they were very helpful in writing this chapter. I wanted to do a Halloween chapter because the holiday is right around the corner but unfortunately, due to the pandemic it's been all but canceled in my neighborhood, so I wanted to do something for the season.
TheNinjaOfArt: Yes I have an account under the same name on Archiveofourown.
Guest (Ellipsis_DotDotDot from AO3): I know what you mean, when I was doing my research on Iron Baron I was devastated when I heard he had killed Ultra. I actually wanted to kill him in the last chapter! But I might need him in the future so I let him live... for now anyway.
Chapter 18: It's Terror Time
It was a cold rainy night in Ninjago. It was thundering and lightning loudly as people continued with their daily lives. Suddenly a terrorized group of people burst out of the doors of a haunted house, screaming hysterically. It was the Halloween season and haunted house attraction had been opened for the remainder of the spooky month. The only person left in the house was a girl who worked there. She watched as Harumi and her friends screamed and backed away as a giant TV that was brought to life, slowly came towards them.
The screen was static and it also had glowing red eyes on the screen along with long.
Just before the TV pounced on the poor girls, however, the TV suddenly came to a halt and those terrifying red eyes dulled down. Harumi and the other cheerleaders ran away as fast as they could. The employee rolled her eyes and pressed a button. The TV came back to life and started scaring new people again. Lloyd and the others were also there, except for Cole and Kai. It had been a week since the last full moon and to say their parents were furious was an understatement.
Cole's father was very disappointed in his son's actions and had been ignoring him for a week.
Kai's only saving grace was that his parents weren't around, having returned to their business trips. However, Nya definitely made up for their absence. After giving her brother a black eye, both Kai and Cole were grounded for the rest of the year. They didn't even argue, knowing they had both messed up big time. While the others were freaking out Nya was bored out of her mind. She had read about this haunted house attraction and she honestly thought this was a complete waste of time.
"Oh wow, I am soooo petrified." She sighed sarcastically as the boys jumped at a clown statue popping up.
Pixel gasped as the small trash can that was next to her suddenly seemed to grow almost ten times its normal size and came to life. The trashcan let out a high-pitched roared and began to charge at the group. Zane grabbed his girlfriend's wrist and everyone ran for their lives and into a theater-type room where an old projector was playing old black and white horror movies with horror movie characters were sitting in the theater seats.
They thought they had found a place to catch their breath.
The characters, that they first thought were statues, suddenly jumped to life started moving towards the pack, but it didn't stop there. A horror samurai character narrowed his eyes at the teens before lifting his sword and prepared to strike them. Zane and Nya looked to their partners and felt their inner wolves growling when they saw the terror on Jay and Pixel's faces. They had to remind themselves that this was all an act and they weren't in any real danger.
Seeing Nya and Zane were close to losing it, Morro and Lloyd pushed past the horror actors and led the others through some double doors and into a kitchen.
It was full of human body parts and animal head props on plates. To make it even more disturbing, the attraction was pumping the smell of raw meat and blood into the kitchen. Pixel looked like she was going to throw up. Morro, however, was practically drooling. Having to live with vegetarian foster parents meant he had little meat in his diet. That was torture for any werewolf. All the heads on the shelves behind Jay suddenly came to life and started screeching.
Jay cried out as the head began to try and bite him and Nya quickly pulled her boyfriend to safety.
Just when they thought it couldn't get worse, Lloyd suddenly squealed like a schoolgirl at the sight of a horror character from a new movie. It was a horror movie that he had been dying to see that was called 'Wicked In The Forest'.
"WHOA! NO WAY DUDE! Wicked Scary is out on video now?!" He smiled with stars in his eyes.
"I know, it's a new one with an alternate ending and everything!" Morro squealed beside the smaller boy.
"Cool!" Lloyd grinned, but he quickly lost his grin when he noticed the evil look in the monster's eyes. "Not cool." He gulped.
"RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! IT'S GONNA EAT YOUR OUR BRAINS!" Jay screamed as the hooded monster approached them. Nya had, had enough of this house messing with her friends. She snarled loudly and violently pushed the stunned actor away and onto the floor. Before she could completely lose control, Jay and Morro pulled her off the actor and they all ran for the exit. Soon they had arrived at the end of the house where an employee was waiting for them with shelves full of horror DVDs on sale.
While the others were finally catching their breaths, Jay suddenly noticed something.
"Guys! Check it out, movie night." He grinned and held up the movie 'Wicked In The Forest'. He then walked over to the clerk and showed her the movie. While he was buying the movie, Nya's eyes glanced at the doors that led back into the haunted house, a strange feeling bubbling in her chest...
Back at Zane's house, Nya was finishing her homework. After they had returned from the haunted house, they had all gone to Zane's for a sleepover and for a horror movie night. Due to being grounded, Kai and Cole were back at their own homes, missing out. Dr. Julien had to work overnight so the kids had the whole house to themselves. The others were up in the lounge getting to watch the movie Jay had bought at the haunted house.
When she finally joined the others, she found them gathered around the TV waiting for her.
She sat next to Morro and saw that there were three big bowls of popcorn and Lloyd was clutching a small bowl full of Halloween candy.
"Pix, are you sure that you don't want some of my treat-or-treating candy?" He asked and offered the bowl to the human.
"Make it go away..." She moaned quietly as she clutched her stomach. She was still disgusted by the kitchen room in the haunted house. Morro rolled his eyes and took a seat on the sofa.
"Ladies and gentlemen, get ready for the scariest night of your lives 'cause this movie is totally gonna freak you out." Jay grinned.
"I highly doubt that." Nya sighed in a bored tone of voice.
"Can't be any more creepy than that documentary on hot dogs Zane made us watch." Lloyd pointed out and the others grimaced.
"It was fascinating, I had no idea that people ate so many pig guts and insects." Zane smiled. Pixel suddenly bolted from the room and gagging could be heard from the bathroom.
"Yeah, big deal! This movie is said to be cursed." Jay replied in a creepy voice. "When people watch it strange things happen, evil things." He cackled.
"Just start the movie." Morro groaned. Jay frowned but clicked play on the remote. Nearly two hours passed and it was now close to the end of the movie. The boys and Nya were sat frozen in fear while Pixel buried her face into Zane's arm and hugging it like a teddy bear. The movie then thankfully came to an end.
"I-Is it over?" Lloyd stuttered as he peaked over from his hiding place behind the couch.
"I dare not open my eyes to find out." Zane whimpered.
"Now I am really sick to my stomach." Pixel groaned. Nya didn't say anything as she snapped out of her fear state. The boys and Pixel suddenly burst out laughing as they recovered from their terror.
"Did I tell you?! Or did I tell you?!" Jay smirked.
"It was wonderfully horrible!" Zane exclaimed.
"I was freaking out! I wanted to turn it off." Lloyd admitted with a goofy grin.
"Admit it Nya, you were totally scared!" Morro smirked at the only werewolf girl present. Nya narrowed her eyes at the lone wolf.
"I don't do fear."...
Later that night everyone had gone to bed. Being the only two girls in the group, Nya and Pixel were sharing a room on their own while the boys were all sleeping in the same bedroom. It had started raining hard and thunder cackled in the night sky. In her room, Nya was sleeping quietly in her bed when a particularly loud thunderbolt caused her to shoot up with a startled gasp. However, when she looked around she saw that there was nothing there but dark silence and a quietly sleeping Pixel.
She sighed and led back down to go to sleep.
Suddenly a woman's scream echoed throughout the whole building. She and Pixel woke up and ran out of the room and found the others in the hallway, looking as confused as the girls were.
"Who screamed?" Nya asked.
"It sounded like something from the movie, did we leave the TV on?" Zane asked.
"We didn't, and the movie is right here." Jay whimpered in terror and held up the movie. Suddenly the lights went out.
"Ok, that's creepy." Morro gulped as he pulled out his phone and turned on the flashlight.
"The storm probably just tripped a security breaker," Pixel explained. Suddenly she felt something on her shoulder as the others backed away in fear. "Ok Lloyd, you got us." She forced a laugh, think it was one of Lloyd's pranks.
"Uh, Pix." Lloyd gulped in terror and pointed behind the girl. Pixel turned around and thought her heart stopped. Behind her was the main monster from 'Wicked In The Forest'! The monster suddenly launched one of its tentacles at them, but they managed to move out of the way. Nya tried to growl at the monster but was shocked to find that her wolf was gone! So was everyone else's!
"NEW PLAN, RUN!" Zane shouted. As they ran one of the monster's tentacles smack Nya into a wall and the monster suddenly disappeared.
"There was a monster here right?" Morro asked when they saw the monster disappear.
"But where did it go and where did it come from?" Lloyd asked.
"HELLO!? The movie's cursed! Watching it opened a portal to another dimension and it released the monster!" Jay panicked.
"Or someone's playing a prank on us." Pixel said and walked to where the monster was, trying to find some kind of device like a projector. While she was doing that, the others huddled in a circle.
"But that still doesn't explain why any of our powers aren't working anymore," Lloyd whispered.
"It ain't a dark moon is it?" Morro asked and the others shook his head. Pixel walked back over to them, unable to find any proof that this was all a prank.
"Let's split up and check for clues," Zane said, but Jay grabbed him.
"SPLIT UP!? Dude did you not see the movie?! When you split up the monster picks you off one by one! Starting with the good-looking, comic relief guy, ME!" Jay screamed.
"Get a grip Jay, the monster's not gonna eat anybody." Morro groaned.
"He's right, there's nothing to be afraid of,"...
The team stayed close together as they searched the halls of the large house. Since they had no powers and their cellphones had no signal they were armed with just some flashlights and some stuff they had found. Lloyd had a baseball bat, Morro a crowbar, Zane had a broom, Nya held a frying pan, Pixel clutched a mop and Jay carried a wrench.
"Help me... Help me..." A little girl's cry came from one of the halls.
"This way," Lloyd said and they ran towards the noise. It was coming from Zane's room.
"Help me..." The girl's voice called from inside of Zane's closet. Lloyd stepped forward and opened the closet door. They all cried out when they were hit with... a mountain of dirty laundry? Something else tumbled out of the closet as well. It was one of those creepy cymbals monkeys. Zane hadn't played with that since he was a child.
"Help me, help me, help me count!" The monkey cheered and started counting.
"I really have to get rid of that thing." Zane chuckled nervously.
"Oooooo! Look out guys, big scary monkey!" Morro laughed as they left Zane's room.
"Yeah Nya, you should have seen the look on your face." Lloyd grinned.
"You mean THIS look!" She hissed in rage.
"No that's more like angry than scared," Jay replied.
"I already told you I don't. Get. Scared." She growled with a fire in her normally calm blue eyes. A thunderous roar suddenly shook the building as the monster shot out the shadow.
"Move!" Lloyd shouted and they dashed down the hallway with the monster close behind them. Suddenly the creature wrapped its tentacles around poor Jay and began to drag him back.
"JAY!" The others screamed.
"WHAT DID I TELL YOU! FUNNY GUY GOES FIRST!" He screamed as he was dragged through a closed door. Morro ripped the door open but was shocked to find no creature and no Jay. The door led into the attic.
"Jay's gone!" Nya cried.
"But how can a stupid prank be doing this?" Pixel asked.
"I'm starting to think this has nothing to do with a prank," Zane replied.
"Well whoever is doing it, they're not gonna scare us," Morro promised, determination clear on his face. Lloyd's eyes suddenly widened in realization.
"Fear, that's it!" He then quickly turned to face the others. "The movie, the monsters, the answers right in front of us! If a prank isn't behind this then it has to be-"
Suddenly the creature's tentacles wrapped around his and Morro's bodies and mouths before dragging them into the shadows on the wall. The others tried to grab them but they were too late. Nya growled and punch the wall in fury.
"Don't suppose any of you had any idea what he was gonna say?" She asked the other two but they shook their heads. With a heavy sigh, Nya moved away from the wall and began looking for the others. The three remaining teens searched for their missing friends for an hour. But so far they had come up empty-handed.
"Jay? Lloyd? Morro? Are you in here?" Pixel whimpered as they searched the lounge.
"They're not here, we've already looked here," Nya growled impatiently.
"We've already looked everywhere," Zane added and Nya frowned.
"Almost everywhere." She muttered and the couple silently followed her up the stairs and into the dark attic. Pixel whimpered and tried to head back before Nya effortlessly picked her and dropped her back to the group. "Not yet, we still have to get to the bottom of this," She insisted and they then headed deeper into the attic.
Suddenly something scurried loudly by Pixel's foot, causing the only human in the room to scream.
"What is it?" Zane asked his trembling girlfriend.
"I saw something." She panicked.
"I didn't, let's keep moving." Nya sighed and they continued walking. Pixel saw it again and screamed even louder. "Will you stop that! There's nothing to be afraid of, it's probably just some rats." Glared Nya.
"Those are not rats!" Pixel exclaimed and pointed to the beam above Nya and Zane's heads. They looked up and saw millions of rats the size of young cats with red eyes hissing at them.
"RUN! RUN!" Nya screamed as they ran towards the door. The rats jumped down and ran after them. Pixel suddenly screamed. Zane and Nya turned around and saw the rats jumping onto her and dragging her down.
"PIXEL!" Zane shouted and ran to his girlfriend's aid. Pixel tried swatting the rats away with her mop but there were too many. By the time Zane got there, Pixel had been dragged through the floor and the rats had vanished. Zane screamed and started hitting the ground in a desperate attempt to bring Pixel back. Nya sighed, knowing that was too late and they had lost another friend.
She grunted as she dragged Zane out of the attic and into the hallway.
"We have to go back! There might still be a way to save her!" He cried as he tried to pry his arm out of Nya's grip. Even without her powers, however, Nya was stronger than him.
"We won't save anyone if whatever's going on gets us to." She snapped. "We have to get outta here and come back with help," She explained. Zane glared at her but didn't say anything. The two werewolves walked down the hallway with their weapons ready. Nya growled and went on ahead. She vowed that whatever had done this would pay.
Suddenly the flashlight from Zane's phone faded away.
"Zane, I could use a little more light," She called but received no reply. She turned around but Zane had vanished without a trace and without her enhanced senses she couldn't track his scent. "Zane?" She called but everything was silent.
Suddenly a banshee-like scream sounded from the other end of the hall. Nya whipped around and saw some kind of demon bat flying towards. She ran away as fast as she could to escape the bat, but it followed her every step of the way. She soon found herself cornered in the lounge by the demon bat. The bat was quickly joined by the tentacle monster and the rats.
"Stay back." She hissed as they started closing on on her. She clutched her head and lowered to her knees. "I'm not afraid, I'm not afraid, I'm not afraid." She chanted. The monster was now almost touching her with its slimy appendages. Nya's eyes suddenly snapped open.
"I AM afraid." She finally whispered.
Her eyes suddenly narrowed and turned completely yellow. Her wolf had returned. She stood up straight and turned to face the monsters, who were now backing away in slight fear. She may have been afraid, but that doesn't mean she couldn't fight back. She snarled at them when suddenly a wolf seemingly appeared out of thin air and curled around Nya before charging at the entire monster army.
The last thing Nya heard was the monsters screams as they were torn to shreds before everything went black...
When Nya opened her eyes the first thing she saw was that she was back in the room she was sharing with Pixel at Zane's house and it was now morning. The second thing she noticed was all her friends were hovering over her with concerned faces.
"Nya? Are you ok?" Jay asked. Nya didn't say anything as she looked from one face to the next in a mix of disbelief and relief.
"You're all ok?" She asked.
"You must have been having such a nightmare," Zane replied.
"Yeah, Pix said you were screaming, growling, and panicking in your sleep like you were possessed." Morro laughed, only to look away as the others gave him an angry glare. Nya sat back in shock. It had all just been a horrible nightmare. They were never in any real danger. All those monsters were never really there. She relaxed when she realized this. Back at the haunted house and after watching the scary movie, she had been afraid.
When she refused to talk about it, however, the fear found another way out through her dreams.
Once she had accepted her fears she regained control over it. This was all in her had. Nya's surprise quickly turned into an embarrassment.
"Uh...sorry?" She offered.
"Don't worry, I'm just thankful you're ok." Pixel smiled.
"Anyway, who would like some breakfast?" Jay suddenly asked.
"Yes please." Nya smiled and they all headed downstairs and away from the nightmares...