I was enjoying a Saturday evening at home, watching TV, when my telephone rang at 11:35. It was Bill. He told me to switch to the news on channel 6. I did. There was a live report in progress. I could see fire engines, and a smouldering building behind the reporter. I recognized the building: it was the Hemery High School gymnasium.
"There are conflicting reports of how the fire was started," said the reporter. "Most witnesses agree that the trouble began when a gang invaded the Hemery High prom, but none of the gang members have been identified, or taken into custody."
I turned off the TV. There was little chance of actually learning anything useful from it. "Meet me at the school," I told Bill over the phone.
"You're on my way," said Bill. "Maybe I should pick you up."
"No," I said. "I want to get there as quickly as possible."
"Alright, Joe. I'll meet you there."
I called the station, to report to the captain that Bill and I were going Hemery High, before I grabbed my coat, and car keys.
Uniformed officers were directing traffic around the school, detouring motorists, and keeping sight-seers away from the scene. I showed them my identification to be admitted.
The scene was organized chaos. Fire crews were still working, spraying water onto the remaining hotspots. Paramedics were tending to injured students in their prom clothes. The scene was lit by the flashing lights from the patrol cars, ambulances, and fire engines.
A perimeter had been set up, to keep all of the civilians away from the scene. I could see vans from three local television stations, outside the perimeter, in addition to the crowd of curious onlookers.
I approached Sergeant MacDonald, at the police command post, and asked him what had happened.
"Reports are pretty confused," he told me.
"Just give them to me straight," I told him.
"Well, it seems that a gang disguised in some sort of Halloween fright masks crashed the prom," said Sergeant MacDonald.
"What happened next?" I asked.
"They surrounded the building, and demanded that the people inside send out one of the students." He consulted his notes. "A Muffy Winters. They said that if they sent her out, they wouldn't hurt anyone."
I nodded. I wasn't the least bit surprised to learn that she was involved.
"It seems that Miss Winters volunteered to go out, and hardly anyone tried to talk her out of it, except for her boyfriend." MacDonald checked his notes again. "A Mr. Bass."
"Go on," I told him.
"Miss Winters went out, and some sort of fight began in the parking lot, before she ran off into the school. Some of the gang members followed her, and the rest turned their attention to the people in the gym."
"After promising not to."
"They lied," said Sgt. MacDonald. "Imagine that!"
"What happened next?" I asked.
"That's when things get really confused," said Sgt. MacDonald. "Half a dozen witnesses claim that they were attacked by 'monsters' with fangs, who tried to bite them."
"Is there any evidence that they were taking drugs?"
"Not so far," said Sgt. MacDonald. "We might want to test for that, though. We've asked if any of them were taking anything, but they all denied it, of course."
Bill had arrived while I was talking with MacDonald. "It's possible that someone spiked the punch," he said. "It used to be that kids would just empty a bottle of gin into it at things like this, but these days, who knows what someone might have added."
I looked toward the gym, that was still smoking, and being sprayed with water. "If that's the case, any evidence has probably been washed away by now."
I spotted Miss Winters, near where a couple of paramedics from the fire department were giving oxygen to a boy. It looked like the white skirt from her prom dress had been ripped away. I thanked Sergeant MacDonald, and moved toward them.
The boy was trying to push the mask away from his face when I approached them. "I'm fine," he told them. "Go take care of someone who's sick!"
The second paramedic was removing a blood pressure cuff from his arm. "BP's good Roy, 120 over 70. Pulse is 85."
"I told you I'm okay," said the boy. He coughed a couple of times. "Just a little smoke."
"Smoke inhalation can be serious," said Roy. "You should go to the hospital, have the doctors check you out."
"I'm fine!" said the boy. "I'm sure that you can find someone around here who needs you a lot more than I do!"
Roy packed up his oxygen. "Come on, Johnny," he said to his partner. "Let's go find someone who will appreciate us."
There was a pair of uniformed officers keeping an eye on Miss Winters. I recognized them. Malloy and Reed were good men. I asked Malloy if she'd said anything.
He shook his head. "Not really. She's been mostly worried about her friend Bass, there."
I approached Miss Winters. "Good evening, Miss Winters."
The look she gave me was tired, like she just wanted to go home and sleep. "Sergeant Friday," she said, her voice flat, and emotionless.
I still couldn't question her without her mother's lawyer, so I turned my attention to her friend Bass. "Care to tell me what happened here tonight?" I asked.
"Why bother," he said. "You won't believe me."
"Try me."
"A gang of vampires attacked the prom. They mainly wanted to take Muffy to their master: a guy named Lothos. He's been around for hundreds of years. While some of them were trying to do that, the rest of them attacked the prom.
"I tried to help defend everyone, but there were too many of them, until Muffy came back. We dusted the vamps in the gym, but then Lothos showed up again. They fought; she dusted him."
"Dusted?" asked Bill.
"Yeah, vamps turn to dust when you put a stake through their hearts."
"Actually, it was a pencil," said Muffy.
I was beginning to think that these two were truly delusional, perhaps schizophrenic, unable to distinguish between their delusions, and reality. I'd heard of cases where two people shared the same delusion. They even had a name for it: folie a deux. Unless they actually found a body in the remains of the gym that had been killed by a pencil, I didn't think that Miss Winters had to worry about any homicide charges being filed against her. I asked Bass the next question. "How did the fire get started?"
"I don't know," said Bass. "It must have been the vampires."
I sighed. This was getting me nowhere. I waved for Reed and Malloy to come and take both of them away. We could call for Mrs. Winters to come pick up her daughter from the station.
Bill and I watched as Reed and Malloy escorted Bass and Winters toward their patrol car. The flashing lights, and smoke from the fire obscured our view, so we didn't have a clear view of what happened next. When the smoke cleared I could see that Reed and Malloy were down on the ground, with Muffy Winters on top of them, and Bass was running. I drew my weapon and shouted for him to stop, but there were too many people in my line of fire. Bill and I, along with other officers attempted to give chase, but he vanished into the crowd.
We returned to where Reed and Malloy were holding Miss Winters. "What happened?" I asked them.
Reed and Malloy just looked confused. Miss Winters smirked. "Sorry. I tripped."
I frowned at her for a moment before I removed the laminated plastic card from my pocket. Now that she'd helped her friend get away, I had something I could arrest her for. "Miss Winters, you are under arrest." I started to read from the card. "You have the right to remain silent…"