The door to the cabin's basement creaked open, and Madison coughed as she inhaled the exposed dust particles. She wafted them away with one hand, and searched for a light switch with the other. Her hand soon settled upon one, flipping it and illuminating the basement with a dirty light bulb. Madison looked around at the neatly stacked furniture, most of it looking quite retro. She assumed that it had all been moved down here during the renovation process. Some of it was still in good condition, including a couch, some chairs, coffee tables, even a few wall hangings. Madison smirked, having an affinity for vintage items. Her pickup truck served as an example of this; a restored 1984 Chevrolet Scottsdale. She continued her exploration of the basement, opening one of the closets out of curiosity. However, once she opened the doors, her eyes widened in shock.
"What the hell?" she muttered before reaching inside.
"Dibs!" Matt called out as he looked around one of the upstairs bedrooms, dropping his and Lizzie's bags on the floor before flopping down onto the bed. He sighed, getting a chuckle from Lizzie as she entered the room.
"Comfortable?" she asked.
"Very. This might be the weed talking, but this is the most comfortable thing I've ever laid on," Matt stated. Lizzie smirked before flopping down beside him.
"Speaking of weed," Lizzie began, reaching over the flicking the side of Matt's head with her index finger. "That's for letting my dad see you smoking."
"Ow! You have nails!" Matt yelped, reaching up to his temple to see if she had drawn blood.
"You deserve nails," Lizzie said. "I mean, you're not making it easy for my dad to like you."
"Weird. You sound just like your sister," Matt commented playfully, only to earn a frown from his girlfriend in response. "I'm very sorry. Please don't flick me again."
"Matt, can we just be serious for a minute?" Lizzie requested, only for Matt to let out a sigh.
"Liz', I want your father to like me. I really do-"
"Then why do you keep doing stuff like that?" Lizzie asked.
"Well, he already hates me. So I figured...why bother?" Matt asked in response.
"Look, Matt. I can understand why you'd think that, but what you're doing is throwing gasoline onto a fire that's already pretty big. I know my dad might not be the easiest guy to get along with, but something tells me that he's trying to make things work between you and him," Lizzie explained. "I mean, he's letting us stay together in a separate cabin. That's got to mean something, right?"
"I guess," Matt muttered.
"And maybe you could do something nice in return? Like stop smoking pot around him?"
"I guess," Matt repeated with a slight smirk. Lizzie smiled back at him, giving him a peck on the cheek.
"Thank you."
"But in my defense, I really didn't expect him to check on me in his mirrors," Matt added jokingly. Lizzie rolled her eyes, still smiling at him.
"So, now that we've got that out of the way, I wanted to talk to you about something," she revealed, regaining Matt's attention.
"What's up?" he asked. Lizzie sat up on the bed, gesturing for Matt to do the same.
"Since we're going to be staying away from my parents during this trip, I thought that maybe...we could...you know." Lizzie gave Matt a look, hoping he would catch on.
"Really? You want to do it right now?" he asked.
"Matt, I've been stuck in a car all day, and I'm all sweaty. Do you really think I want to have sex right this second?" Lizzie asked in response.
"I don't know. Your dirty talk is making it very hard to resist," Matt teased. Lizzie sighed, trying not to smile as he kissed her cheek.
"My sister could still hear us."
"Where is she anyway?" Matt pondered. "I thought she would've followed us up."
"I think I saw her go down to the basement," Lizzie answered. "Could you go down and see if she's okay?"
"Why can't you go?"
"Because I want to get a shower. Don't you want me smelling all nice and clean before we engage in any bedroom shenanigans?" Lizzie asked, pouting playfully.
"Oooh. Shenanigans? Your dirty talk is on point today," Matt commented. The two of them chuckled as they stood up from the bed. "I'll go down and check on her. See you later." He then exited the room, leaving Lizzie to open her bag and fetch her toiletries.
As Matt followed the trail to the basement, he noticed that the door was ajar. A single light bulb illuminated the dark and dusty room. "Madison?" Matt called out, heading inside and looking around. Aside from the door being left open, there was no sign of his girlfriend's sister being down here. Matt walked past most of the old furniture, only stopping when he noticed that one of the closets was open slightly. With a smirk, he carefully creeped up to the closet, being careful not to make a noise. And after slowly taking hold of the closet doors, he flung them open dramatically. "Ha!" he exclaimed, only to find a pile of old toys inside it. Matt looked over the abandoned possessions, letting his guard down long enough for a greenish-brown head to appear over his shoulder. Matt leaped away in fright as the head let out a roar, its mouth opening to reveal two rows of teeth, each baring two sharp fangs. But as he looked back at the monster, he found himself looking at a very amused Madison. She laughed at Matt as he laid on the floor like a ragdoll, covering her mouth to try and calm herself.
"I'm sorry. I didn't think you'd be that scared," she sighed, holding out a hand to help him stand up.
"Christ. You almost scared the apple juice out of me," Matt said. He looked at the monster head puppet on Madison's other hand, noticing how its neck led to a mesh tube where someone could stick their arm inside. "Where did you even get that?"
"It was in the closet. I heard someone coming, so I thought I'd put it on and mess with them," Madison answered, opening and closing the monster's mouth to flex her fingers. Matt frowned at her.
"Are you're telling me you forced this poor and innocent monster out of the closet?" he asked in a fake tone of sterness. "It's his choice to make, and you just outed the poor fella."
"Oh my gosh. You're right. I don't know what I was thinking," Madison gasped, playing along with Matt's joke. "What if...I'm the real monster?" she proposed, taking off the puppet and allowing Matt to hold it.
"To him, aren't we all monsters?" he countered. The skit ended with the two of them laughing to themselves, and Matt placed the puppet back in the closet. "Where do you suppose it came from?"
"It must've belonged to the last owner," Madison assumed, heading back towards the basement door. Matt soon followed behind her.
"Jim Henson?" he guessed.
"Probably." The two of them left the basement, turning off the light and closing the door behind them.
Jenny grunted as she pulled the kettle grill over to the area in front of the cabin, wiping sweat from her brow once it was in placed near the small fire pit. She turned around at the sound of footsteps, only to see Richard heading across the path towards her. He had donned a brown coat, and was carrying a Winchester Model 70 rifle over one shoulder. "What the heck is that?" Jenny asked with a look of worry.
"Well, all our bags are unloaded, and we've got a while until we get dinner started. I figured I'd take out the old boomstick for some shooting practice," Richard answered, patting the stock of the rifle.
"Please don't tell me you're hunting dinner. We have perfectly good meat in the cooler," Jenny pointed out.
"Of course not," Richard assured her. "But since I'm going out there, do you want me to pick anything up?"
"We're running low on squirrel," Jenny responded sarcastically.
"What if they don't have squirrel?"
"Just go before I take that gun away," Jenny insisted with a chuckle.
"Yes, ma'am," Richard answered. He was about to walk towards the woods before he noticed Madison and Matt coming back up from the basement. "Find anything incriminating down there?"
"Just a Dark Crystal reject," Madison quipped. Though perplexed by the answer, Richard shrugged it off.
"I was about to go shoot some pine cones. Want to tag along?" he offered. Madison stopped, glancing at the rifle curiously.
"These pine cones. Did they cross us?" she asked.
"They disrespected our whole family," Richard answered sternly.
"Well then, we need to show them who's boss." Madison walked over to her father, ready to follow him into the woods. "You coming, Matt?"
"Oh, I'd love to. But Lizzie and I were…" Matt trailed off, somehow maintaining his composure despite the predicament he had put himself in.
"Were what?" Richard asked with a slight frown. It took a few seconds, but Matt eventually answered.
"You know what? It's not that important. It can wait until later," he said.
"I'm sure it can," Richard agreed with a stern tone. He began striding towards the woods, leaving Madison and Matt to follow behind him. Matt gained a look of absolute fear, while Madison just smiled at his misery.
"It can wait until later? Did you really just say that?" she asked in disbelief.
"Do you really think he knew?" Matt whispered back to her.
"He has a gun, and he's taking you deep into the woods. What do you think?" Madison teased, putting a comforting hand on Matt's shoulder as they followed behind Richard.
The trio walked for a short while, passing by numerous trees and taking the time to admire their surroundings. It was only until they came across a fallen tree that Richard brought them to a halt. "Ah. This will do nicely," he murmured. Richard then approached the log, reaching down and picking up some stray pine cones along the way. He carefully placed them along the fallen tree, leaving a decent amount of space between each one. Once he had procured six, he walked back over to Madison and Matt.
"Do you do this a lot, Mister Garrett?" Matt asked out of concern.
"Oh, of course," Richard answered, retrieving a box of rounds from his coat pocket and passing them to Madison. She opened the box for him, letting him take a total of five rounds. "When I was a kid, my father used to take me out shooting all the time. I went on to take Madison out shooting, and even Lizzie on one occasion." With the firearm loaded, Richard raised it up and took aim at one of the targets. A deafening crack echoed around the woods as he fired, hitting a pine cone and blowing it apart. He then cocked the weapon and repeated the action, decimating a second pine cone. "See? Want to give it a go?" Richard offered.
"Uh...sure. Why not?" Matt answered warily, taking the rifle from Richard. He then remained limp as Richard helped him into the proper position for firing a rifle. "Make sure you keep hold of the grip, and exhale before you fire." Matt nodded as he was given this advice, looking down the sight of the rifle and taking aim at the third pine cone. With a nervous squeeze of the trigger, another loud crack filled the woods. Matt grunted as the butt of the rifle recoiled into him, a burst of sawdust launching into the air as the bullet lodged itself in the fallen tree.
"Well, that hurt," he groaned.
"Not bad. You've just got to keep the butt steady against your shoulder," Richard instructed, cocking the rifle and helping Matt into position again. "And keep your neck relaxed. You don't want to strain yourself."
"Okay." Matt nodded, aiming at the same pine cone. With a bit confidence, he pulled the trigger once again. And this time, the pine cone exploded. However, as the loud crack faded away, a pained shout could be heard just ahead of the fallen tree. Richard, Madison, and Matt all looked shocked as the shout hit their ears.
"Oh god," Richard uttered, taking the rifle from Matt and running in the direction of the shout. Madison and Matt were quick to follow. A few feet away, a figure could be seen getting up from the ground, grunting as he brought a hand to his left upper arm. "Jesus! Are you alright?!"
"I'm so sorry! I-I didn't see you!" Matt stammered, his hands shaking out of shock.
"It's okay. Really," the figure insisted, taking off his backpack and slipping his arm out of his denim jacket to inspect the injury. "See? It's just a graze."
"Just a graze? How are you so calm right now? You just got shot!" Madison exclaimed.
"What's your name, son?" Richard asked.
"Luke. Luke Webber," the figure introduced, wincing as he flexed his arm.
"Okay, Luke. Come with us. We've got a vacation house nearby. We can patch you up there," Richard offered.
"Oh, you really don't have to do that," Luke replied.
"No, I insist. Madison, take his bag," Richard instructed. Madison picked the backpack up and swung it over her shoulder, following the rest of the group as they began their walk back towards the vacation houses. But as they walked away, they failed to spot the second figure lurking behind one of the trees. With his only working eye, he watched the group until they were at a safe distance. And then proceeded after them on foot.