VI: Sleepless
It was Sunday night around 8:00 pm, the last night before Spring Break would end. A house not too far away from Sakura's house had a single light on in there. The light came from a small desk lamp on a table next to a computer where a woman sat working. A mother was wide awake working on her project for work that was needed in a few days.
"Mommy," cried a little voice coming towards the room, "There's a monster in my closet." It's was her 6 year old daughter holding her pink blanket.
"What?" said mom a bit distracted, "Oh, a monster? Let me see where this thing is." The little girl led her mom towards her room and pointed towards her closet where the monster, she said, was hiding.
The mother opened the door wide and peered inside. There was nothing. "See?" said the mom stepping out of the way, "There is nothing inside there." The small girl looked in slowly and saw nothing.
"But I heard a voice from in there," said the girl terrified.
The mom sighed and asked her, "What did you hear exactly?"
She expected to hear something childish from her daughter, but she was surprised as what she heard from her. "It said this," said the girl, "Stay awake as long as you want. I'll be waiting. I'll be waiting for as ever you can stay awake. Once you fall asleep you naughty little girl, I'll come."
The mom looked worried and said, "It must have been a bad dream. Just go to sleep, nothing can harm you at all."
The little girl stared at her mom for a few moments with worried looks in her eyes. But she yawned, crawled back into the bed, and closed her eyes. "That's it," said the mom, "Be a good little girl. I'll see you in the morning."
She stopped at the doorway and looked back at the closet and then closed the door behind her. The girl fell asleep as soon as the door closed. The closet was just an inch open, but that's all it took. A small fog rolled out of it and onto the floor. 5 long slimly green fingers with long yellow nails opened the door slowly.
"Back home finally," said Sakura jumping back onto her bed. After her vacation into the countryside with her family and friend, it was nice to return home to where she feels she belongs. It was nighttime around 8:30 when she returned home.
"Is it safe to come out?" said Kero from her backpack she dropped off next to the bed.
"Yeah," said Sakura to Kero, "No one is around."
Kero came and sat in front of Sakura and said, "When do you think Eli is going to get here? It's been like 2 weeks or something."
"He should be coming soon enough," said Sakura flipping over onto her back. She then thought about JD and Dot and probably thought they were waiting for her, but she'll do it tomorrow after school.
The next day after school, Sakura was heading for her house to change clothes before she would meet up with Madison at the hotel to meet JD and Dot. As she was rollerblading, she came up to a crowd of people in front of a house that was being taped off. She looked around a saw a crying woman talking to a police officer as he took notes. "What's going on here?" said Sakura to a person in the crowd.
"You didn't hear?" said a man, "Oh right, you were probably at school during that time. This morning, my neighbor, Mitsuki, came to wake her daughter up this morning and didn't find her. It's believed she was kidnapped."
"Oh no," said Sakura sadly, "That's too bad." She then headed away from the crowd and towards her home thinking about what happened.
"Hey Sakura," said JD to her as she entered his room, "You seem sad, something happened?"
"Yeah," she said to him and everyone else, "A little kid is missing in my neighborhood. The police are looking for her."
"Oh," said Dot, "Well I hope they find her soon. It's really sad to hear when someone disappears, even if the person isn't someone you know personally or just heard about the person right then."
"I wish there wasn't something we could do to help the mom," said Sakura.
"Sadly there really isn't anything," said JD, "We are just normal teens, maybe not you, who are unable to help the police in anyway at the moment."
"Hey shrimp," called Tory from the living room to Sakura as she entered back into her home, "There was a message for you when you were gone from a person called Eli. He wants you to call him back at this number." Sakura came in, took the number from Tory that he written down and she went upstairs to call Eli.
"Hello?" said Sakura, "Eli?"
"Hello," he said to her, "I'm here now. I'm at the apartment building a near by your old school. I would like to meet you, Madison, and Kero in person. My apartment is 4 floor; room 47." He then hung up the phone.
"About time he arrived," said Sakura
"Here?" said JD to Sakura, "I figure this guy would be living somewhere more impressive. Like a mansion!" They had all regrouped and meet each other outside the building during the night.
"He used to," said Madison as Sakura knocked on the door. The door opened up and Eli stand at the doorway with a smile.
"Nice to see you all again," said Eli to Sakura, Kero, and Madison and then turned to Dot and JD, "And who are you two and why are you here?"
"I feel so unappreciative and not as important as I feel I should be," said Dot with a frown.
"I would be JD and this is my girlfriend Dot," said JD to him.
"I don't think you two should be here," said Eli letting the others coming in, "I don't sense anything magic powers from either of you two."
"I'm so normal," mumbled JD sadly to himself.
"Just let them in here," said Sakura to Eli, "Here's with us and he is the one who gave me the book." Eli didn't seem to agree with that, but he reluctantly let them in.
The room wasn't too big and two suitcases laid on top of bed. "I just came here," said Eli to everyone looking around, "It'll luck better after I been here a while longer."
"Why did you want to meet in person?" said Kero.
"Better than people eavesdropping on the phone call me and Sakura were having," he said to him, "The reason I wanted to talk in person is because I can sense one of the monsters active at the moment and a very dangerous one at that."
"What is it?" said Madison moving in closer to hear better.
"I believe some of you would recognized the monster easily," said Eli, "It is called the Namahage here in Japan and many names in Europe. Such as Baboulas, morko, and the black man. It lives in the shadows and hunts for misbehaving children and eats them or steals them away."
"You don't mean…?" said JD realizing what the thing is, "It's the…"
"I'm sorry for your little friend that's gone missing but you have to go to sleep tonight," said a dad to his son, "The thing isn't going to come here and take you either."
"But I'm afraid!" said the little boy crying, "I'm so scared that I'll come."
"It won't," said the dad closing the door to the room. The little boy looked around his darken room, he saw nothing. Nothing but shadows and darkness he could see.
"It won't come," said the boy stopping his crying, "It won't come here."
"What makes you think that?" said a voice from the darkness of the room, "What makes you think I won't come? Little Joshua, you been a bad boy. I prefer bad little kids, they make the best supper for me."
The boy gasped and looked around to see still nothing. He called out quietly, "Who's there? Who's in my room?"
"Me…" said the voice, "It's me, the person who took your little naughty friend. She was just a sweet little girl, but now she is mine. Like you'll soon be, as soon as you fall asleep."
"No," said the kid trying hard to keep his eyes from closing, "I'll stay awake and I'll won't sleep."
"Oh but you will!" said the voice, "I sense the tiredness in your voice, you long to sleep soundly. But as soon as you are asleep, I'll come. After, you can't run and you can't hide from me."
"No…" said the boy drifting off to sleep, "…no…" And soon he was sleeping. A small fog rolled out of his bed and soon covered the floor. A long green hand slowly stretched out from under his bed and towards the sleeping boy.
"Yes," said Eli, "You may not believe it, but it is really the one. The real monster out right now, the bogeyman."
"But he can't be real!" said Sakura, "He's just a thing parents made up to scare little kids into doing things for them."
"There are so many legends about him," said Madison, "Which one is the real one? One legend said he is an old man with a bag that would come to houses and put them in the bag and take them away. Another one said it was a monster that would take them back to its cave and eat them."
"It's not one of the legends," said Eli, "He is real, he would appear and disappear from different areas during Clow Reed's time. He would take kids who are naughty and take them back to his world dark world. He would make them his dinner. He could keep certain ones as slaves and others to steal their life force and add it to his own to keep him alive."
"How do we stop him?" said Dot.
"He is invincible," said Eli, "Except when he is in his own world. The only real thing that can hurt him outside of his world is the light."
"Where is that?" said JD getting very interested in the subject now.
"It's a way only he can travel to," said Eli, "It's a dark horrible world and it looks like a swamp. His home is supposed to be a cave at the edge of his world."
"So the only way there is through him?" said Sakura.
"Sadly yes," said Eli, "Plus, he only can take one person at a time."
"So who is going to go in alone?" said Madison thinking. Everyone turned their attention on Sakura with a smile.
"What?" she said, "No way! Can't someone else go instead of me? I don't want to go down into the dark depths. Plus, what if I can't come back?"
"You're the one with the magical powers here," said
Kero, "And you did release all those monsters from their prison. So who all wants to volunteer Sakura? Say aye if yes and say nay if no."
"Aye!" said everyone there besides Sakura who was shocked that she had to go into the dark world where he resided.
"Wait a minute!" said Sakura, "How am I supposed to get there anyways? The bogeyman is supposed to go after bad little kids. I'm 14! I'm out of his age range now!"
"Actually," said Eli, "I think he might go after you, because you have Clow magic. He may want revenge on any person with it because Clow Reed is now gone or maybe one of the people around you who are close to you."
"WHAT?" said everyone shocked.
"Hmm…" thought Sakura, "It could possibly happen. You never know. Good thing I'm sleeping with key around my neck." She was in her bed thinking about the possibility of he bogeyman coming for her.
"No way," said Sakura, "It probably won't." Then she drifted off to sleep.
Meanwhile, across town at Madison's home, she was fast asleep. Across the room in front of her was her closet slowly opening. A fog emerged from it and a tall green creature slowly came out of it. The eyes were yellow like its fingernails and all the skin of it was slimy green.
Madison slowly opened her eyes after hearing footsteps on her floorboards. She saw the creature and screamed. But the thing grabbed her by her feet and dragged her away back into the closet, by the time her mom came, she was gone.
When Sakura arrived at school, Madison was missing. "Hey Chelsea!" Sakura said to her, "Where's Madison? Is she sick today?"
"I don't know," she replied to Sakura, "Haven't seen her yet. Maybe she is or maybe she is running late." But the whole school day went by without her.
"I'll go to her home," said Sakura to herself after school, "She probably sick today. I'll go see her." She headed towards Madison's home to see another crowd near the entrance.
"Oh no," thought Sakura and then she ran over to a guy looking, "What happened here?"
"That kidnapper struck again," said the man, "Last night; he took a little boy on the other side of town and the teenager in here."
"Madison," was the only word Sakura say.
"WHAT?" said JD to Sakura, "It took Madison now? This is horrible!" She went to JD's hotel room to tell him and Dot about what happened.
"Did Madison have any secrets or did any bad things that would give the bogeyman a reason to take her?" said Dot.
"Only one has crossed my mind," said Sakura, "She joined this… I can't really say it."
"Gang?" said JD, "Club, group, team?"
It can be all of those things," said Sakura, "But she recently joined it even though there are bad rumors around it."
"So she basically joined something that could be dangerous or could not and mostly against her mom's wishes right?" said Dot, "I guess that could count, even though you are not making this really clear."
"Yes," said Sakura, "But how are we supposed to get this thing?"
"I think it might come for me next!" said Dot scared. Everyone turned their attention on her with confused looks.
"Why would it want you?" said JD.
"I have a prefect reason why it would want me!" said Dot shaking, "It'll for sure come after me with this thing hanging over my head!"
"Maybe you should tell us," said Sakura, "You we can understand why it would be coming after you."
"That I can't say," said Dot not looking at them, "It's… to private and too much of a secret for me. I refuse to say anything! I want it to stay a secret from you all. But for sure it'll come after me with this thing!"
Sakura and JD looked at her and then at each other trying to figure out what she had hidden from them, but they decided it didn't really matter. They had to save their friend from the bogeyman and rescue Madison and the other two kids before it was too late.
After managing to convince her dad, Sakura got to spend the night with Dot and JD. She slept on the sofa with the key around her neck and the light card in her pocket. JD slept in a chair with a flashlight in his pocket. None of them were going to take a chance here and both them pretended to be asleep while they watch Dot. Dot slept on the bed in the center of the room while cuddling with a flashlight to be safe.
"Nothing," thought JD to himself with his eyes partly closed, "Will the thing come and fall for the bait?"
As soon as he finished thinking it, fog came out from under the bed. JD pulled out his flashlight slowly and aimed it at the long green body slowly coming out from underneath the bed. The thing stood high and reached for Dot. It uttered, "You have been a bad girl. You are coming back with me."
"Now!" shouted JD. Sakura turned the lights on and JD flashed his light on the green creature. The creature howled in pay and turned its attention on JD.
It grabbed him by the foot and started to drag him under the bed with him. "HELP!" he screamed as he grabbed onto the bed with his one free arm while the other hold his flashlight. Dot woke up and grabbed his arm and Sakura grabbed her and started to help her pull him up.
"NO!" shouted Dot, "I refuse to lose my boyfriend this way! Especially when it's my fault I got him into his mess!" Then both of them lost their grips and let go of JD
"Whatever you do," shouted JD slowly disappearing under the bed, "Please don't give up and never forget me!" Then he was gone.
"No…" said Dot starting to cry, "Please don't be gone!"
Author Notice: This chapter I really tried hard to describe the horror of the monster. I hope it was scary enough for you all.
Sadly, all things must come to end sooner or later. For example, Weezer seemed have broke up and my story The Secret of the Storm ended. But here is some good news, the sequel to my story, The Underground Quake is now out!
Are JD and Madison now gone forever? Hardly, the next chapter is about what happened to JD once he was inside the Dark World of the bogeyman and his daring attempt to save everyone and escape.
Next to Come: VII: Nightmare
Date: 8/7/06
Reviewers: AshK
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