"What friends you guys are!" Andy yelled in the direction of the barn doors, now closed behind him by his group of friends. He could hear them laughing, even through the thick wood of the barn. The laughter slowly diminished as Claus, Margret, Melody, and Felix walked away, leaving Andy all alone in the dark building.

"Man... who steals your keys and makes you go through a dark barn just to get them back? I really should have installed lighting..."

The apple shook his head, trying to think of what to do now. He put a hand to his chin, tapping his foot as he racked his brain for any particular thing he could do to help find his keys. After thinking about it for a few moments, an idea snapped into Andy's head, cheering him up a little.

"By golly, that's right!" He smiled brightly, relaxing his foot and arm. "I definitely left a lantern somewhere around here! Just have to find it..."

Andy nodded to himself, as he slowly began to make his way around the barn, carefully moving his arms around to feel for the lantern. Since the barn was dark, he couldn't really see more than a foot ahead of himself, which made Andy feel a little anxious…

The apple spent a few minutes searching the first floor of the barn, failing to find the lantern.

"Huh, I swore I left the lantern here... Must be on one of the upper floors."

With that, Andy felt around for the stairs, finding them quickly and making his way upstairs to the second floor.

The barn was quite different from other barns. It was four floors tall, and much smaller in size compared to your average barn. All the floors were basically empty too, minus the very top where there was a haystack maze that Andy and his friends had worked on a while ago. The apple didn't quite know what to do with the barn, leaving it to build up cobwebs and dust, and the structure became a home for some bugs. At least the barn looked like any other from the outside, with red walls and a white roof, all made with wood, paint, and elbow grease.

In a blink of an eye, Andy finished searching the second floor, no lantern there either. He made his way to the next set of stairs, walking up them as he shook his hands. As he walked up the stairs, one of the steps made a small creaking noise, causing Andy to stop in his tracks. He took his foot off the step, placing it back down to hear the creaking again.

"Gonna have to replace that sometime... And clean the place up," Andy commented, continuing on his way forward.

Once he made it to the third floor, a chill ran down Andy's spine, as the third floor was strangely cold compared to the other two he was just at.

"Aw, I hope the lantern is here so I don't have to go up another floor! It's starting to get cold and creepy in here."

The apple began his sweep of the floor, starting on the left as he felt around the floor once more. When the apple turned from the top left corner, he saw a flash of white on the right wall, causing Andy to stop what he was doing and look up. As his head turned up, the white disappeared just as quickly as Andy saw it, and the apple stared in confusion.

"Could have sworn I saw something..." The apple mumbled to himself, as his feeling of anxiety rose greatly. He tried to keep a cool head about it, rationalizing that it was just one of the many hallucinations he tended to have. They usually were horrifying, the images of strange people dying often haunted Andy.

"Can't think about that now, gotta find the lantern," Andy reminded himself, latching onto the wall as an anchor while he shakily used only his right arm to feel for the lantern.

After scaling the wall where the final set of stairs were for a few seconds, the apple felt the cold metal of the lanturn, even through his pristine, white gloves. Andy sighed a sigh of relief, picking up the lantern and turning it on. Thankfully the lantern still had a ton of oil left, and the room was illuminated slightly by the lantern's light, casting a golden hue on the nearby walls and floor.

"Now I can look for my keys!" Andy exclaimed, turning to search the lower floors once more for them. As he turned, however, a figure's shadow could be seen on the floor, and as Andy walked forward, the figure stepped into the light of the lantern, prompting Andy to be startled and scream.

"Hiya friend! No need to be scared, it's just me, Peter the Pumpkin!" The figure said, having a pretty deep voice. He was a pumpkin, obviously, that looked just like Andy other than having tired eyes and a slightly larger build.

"What the heck are you doing in my barn? How long have you been here for?"

"Do you want to play a game of tag?" Peter responded, completely ignoring Andy's questions. The apple blinked twice in succession.

"Do I? No, I'm busy looking for my keys! And you didn't answer-"

"Great! Let's go to the haystack maze upstairs to play," the pumpkin interrupted Andy in the middle of his sentence, grabbing him by the arm as he forcibly dragged Andy to the stairs. The apple tried to resist, but to no avail.

"H-Hey, cut it out! I just want to find my keys and get out of here!" Andy nervously said, still trying to escape the pumpkin's grasp. Peter continued to ignore the apple, focused on playing a game of tag with him.

"Alright, here's the rules. We'll play two rounds of tag, one where you chase after me and one where I chase after you. The person who runs away also has to collect all the pumpkins I've scattered around. If you wanna get out of this barn, you have to beat me in both rounds. I'll even give you your keys back!"

Andy gasped in surprise as the two finally made it up to the fourth floor, after what seemed like minutes. The room was slightly colder than the last, but Andy didn't care as much now that he knew where his keys were.

"Okay then, let's play!" The apple said, wanting desperately to get out of the barn as soon as possible. It was a good thing that the two were playing a game Andy was exceptional at.

"Alright, now you're talking! You can be 'it' first," Peter said, his smile turning into a devious grin as he finally let go of Andy's arm. "Let the games begin."

With that, the pumpkin quickly dashed off into the darkness of the haystack maze, leaving Andy stunned for a second.

"Wait, how can you see in the dark!?" Andy yelled, beginning to run off after Peter. He took a left and followed the path forward, seeing the outline of Peter's shadow in the dark.

"...I have really good eyesight!" Peter shouted back, stopping to pick up one of the small pumpkins on the floor before he continued forward in the maze.

Andy was still a little confused, but didn't mind the fact that he definitely had an advantage thanks to his lantern. It also seemed that the apple was a little faster at running than the pumpkin, especially since Peter had to stop and grab pumpkins as per the rules. Andy was confident in his ability to win, maybe a little too confident...

The chase continued, and thanks to the lantern's light, Andy was always able to see Peter's outline in the dark. It also helped stop him from bumping into the haystacks that now surrounded the two.

Peter took a right, left, and another right, and Andy followed his movements through the maze. Peter stopped to grab his second pumpkin, allowing Andy to catch up even more. The two were only a mere eight feet apart now as Andy, slowly but surely, got closer and closer to his target.

Peter tried to take a right turn sharply, failing to do so as he bumped into the haystack. The pumpkin gave up despite still being able to get away, feigning that he had just made a fatal error. Andy made a final rush for Peter, not noticing as he put his arm out, touching Peter's right shoulder.

"Tag, you're it!" Andy said triumphantly, taking his hand off Peter as the pumpkin laughed, the laugh being very... off-putting.

"You got me! Good job!"

Andy smiled, thinking of how he only needed to win one more game of tag before he was able to leave and get his keys back... and that he should kick Peter out of the barn once they were done playing.

"Okay, I'll put these pumpkins back, and you can get a headstart since you're going to need it," Peter said, his voice turning demonic towards the end of his sentence. Andy's breath hitched, his eyes widening in fear as the pumpkin before him started to transform, and the pumpkins he had been holding disappeared from his hands into thin air.

"Better start running."

Andy felt like he wanted to scream, but all he could think of was to run. Run like he's never run before.

And so he did, the apple darted away as quick as he could back in the direction he had initally ran after the pumpkin. He didn't dare to look back, partially because he couldn't see without the lantern, but also because he didn't want to see what Peter was turning into.

Andy reached for his first pumpkin, the second pumpkin Peter had picked up. He swiftly grabbed it, turned left, and continued running all in one motion. He went around the bends of the maze, right, left, and ran straight down the maze to make it to the next pumpkin, the first one Peter picked up.

Peter's footsteps grew louder and louder as he ran after Andy, his transformation complete. Andy's breathing also grew louder as he ran at his max speed, and the thoughts in his head began to beat his brain once more.

"Gotta... focus..." Andy harshly whispered, trying to block out the thoughts. They continued to repeat in his mind, "You killed them, you're a monster."

Andy recognized the voice, he remembered it all too well. The voice that had been nagging him was exactly the same as Peter's now demonic voice. The apple had always wondered why he had those thoughts, he had never hurt, much less killed, another person in his life!

Yet, at the same time, he did have horrible flashbacks he could remember clear as day, of a man who brutally slaughtered another man, and that same man killed a woman. They were strange people, much different from anyone Andy had ever met before. The voice had popped into Andy's brain only a year ago, accusing him of killing those people. It never made sense to Andy since he and the murderer were obviously not the same person… right?

Andy shook his head, snapping out of it as he realized he had three pumpkins in his hand now, and Peter was just a little ways away from the apple.

"Aw, crap!" Andy said, losing his balance as he tripped over himself, BAM into the haystack wall. He let go of the pumpkins and lantern in his hands, both rolling away from the apple as he turned over to look behind him. Andy had his back to the wall now, and he held his knee in pain as Peter slowly walked into the light, knowing that he had won.

Andy tried to get back up, hissing in pain as he slid back down the wall. The fall made him sprain his ankle and scrape his knee on his right leg, and his left leg was a little banged up too.

Peter just stared at him, getting a sick kick out of Andy's pain. Meanwhile, the apple gulped, finally looking up to see what had become of Peter. His breathing became shakily, and the apple was slightly hyperventilating now as the sight shocked him.

Peter didn't change too much to be fair, but his transformation was quite unsettling. His eyes were gone, now black holes devoid of life, and some black goop was dripping out of his eyes and onto the floor. His mouth was agape, wider than a normal mouth should have been, making his smile even more sinister.

Peter stepped forward, reaching out for Andy slowly. The apple couldn't watch, so he closed his eyes as tight as he could, feeling Peter grip his throat with his cold, gloved hands. Peter lifted Andy off the ground, leaving the apple slightly elevated, his back still against the wall. Andy gasped for air, moving his hands to Peter's arm, trying to make Peter release him. He also tried to flail his legs around, unsucessful due to how much pain he was feeling.

As Andy choked for air, Peter's smile somehow turned brighter, stretching across his now distorted face. The thoughts in the apple's mind grew more intensely, making it even harder for Andy to hear anything. Even so, Peter spoke up for a final time, with Andy's eyes beginning to close, his eyelids slowly sliding downwards.

"Tag... you're it."