Jason, Brian and Matt were three average teen-age boys. All three of them were best friends, so they naturally did everything together. So, on Halloween night, they dressed up in costumes and went to receive their free candy- probably for the last year. But, although they were good boys, this year they decided to have some fun and bring along a few rolls of toilet paper. They should have known that playing their pranks would come to no good. For an hour after they had left home, they went around the town collecting candy like greedy little monkeys, and yelling "boo!" at little kids until they decided they had enough and the fun should start. At Matt's house they dropped off their candy bags and replaced them with identical Halloween bags- except with toilet paper in them. Out on the street, they glanced around quickly to find their first victim house. They settled on their history teacher's house first. Matt, being the cautious one, tried to convince the other two to forget about the pranks. After a few more houses, Brian nudged Jason in the ribs while Matt wasn't looking and whispered an idea to him. " Hey, Jason, what do you say we go up to Loony Largh's house then ditch Matt?" "Yeah," whispered Jason. " He's never any fun on Halloween. He's as scared as a cat in water." Brian rolled his eyes- Jason loved cats. They told Matt that they should go TP the old Largh mansion. Matt refused furiously at first, fighting like his life depended on it but he finally consented to go along. He told them he would go, but on the condition that they didn't go any farther than the old dead oak about twenty feet from the front gate. Quietly and a bit nervously the boys ran up the crooked lane to the gate. All three stopped dead at the slowly swinging gate, which creaked ominously at them. Brian laughed apprehensively. " Nothing, it's nothing, just the wind. We're being dumb." Then, as quiet as mice- or maybe even quieter- they slipped past the gate and continued a short way up the lane. But something caught their eyes that they had never seen from below. Twisted black trees crowded against the sides of the narrow path- but wasn't it a broad lane before?- they asked themselves. All three felt sure that the disfigured trees had not been there when they had stood on the other side of the gate. " No worries," said Jason, shivering in spite of his words. " We probably were just too nervous to see them before." But, if they had been nervous then, they were even more so now, for Matt had shakily raised his hand from his side and pointed to a bunch towering granite tombstone through the trees.. " Let's go back- now!" Matt muttered, unsteadily swaying. All turned around, about to run, but they saw there was no gate, even though they had only walked in a few feet. They were surrounded on all sides by looming trees. There seemed to be creatures leering at them. Then, a small boom! sounded through the forest. Their eyes widened as they watched the ground come alive; small explosions of dirt in front of the tombstones as hands, legs, heads shot out of the ground. " A j-joke," Brian squeaked as undead creatures surrounded them. But their screams told all that it wasn't a joke. And the creatures returned to their graves to wait for what would probably be thousands of years until their next unwary victims wandered into the grounds of the Largh Mansion.