Through The Hollow

Chapter 2

The night was cool and cold. Hallows Eve was but six days away. Less than a week. Now was the best time for planned deeds to be taken and ploys to be executed for if they were that close to the night of all Hallows Eve they would surly have great effect on the victim and bend to the desires most needed.

Thomas Well had gathered together a small group of people that hated Jack. The group consisted of the twins, Ben and Becky Hawthorn, Razvan Revan, Akrem Kip, Kurshan Gregarious, Elizabeth Taylor and himself.

They wandered up to Jack's house and Razvan took the first job. He snuck up to the door and took out a piece of loose wire from inside his pocket. He then took a strand of straw and picked the lock of the house with the two inside. He opened the door to the house and allowed the others to make their way inside. The twins headed straight for the kitchen. Becky pulled the herbs and hanging spices that she had out of her satchel. She sprinkled some old sage all over the kitchen floor while her brother, Ben, stood on the very tips of his toes and hung the spice by the ceiling with string. The red haired twins admired their work and left the kitchen in a hurry leaving behind an assortment of goods only a witch would have. Akrem stayed in the hallway as the others made it through the house. He pulled out the slide box he had within his pouch and noticed that it was dripping a little. After confirming that his satchel was clean he set the box on the floor and dipped a brush into the red fluid and laid stroke after stroke onto the bare, wooden walls. He decorated them with the designs and indications of the devil finishing his masterpiece with the number '666' and spilling the remaining contents on the floor. Kurshan Gregarious had the simplest task of them all. He wandered into the kitchen with the twins and carried with him a great black cauldron. He pulled away the original pot that had sat above the snuffed fire and replaced it with the black ore container. He smiled with delight and, using an axe later on that night, smashed the pot and then scattered the pieces into the sump behind the church. Razvan remained outside the house. He took various worms and insects out from a box that he had. A few ticks bit him but he drenched them in alcohol and ripped them off of his skin before dropping them into the garden. Only a person baring the servitude of Satan could bear to stand these creatures near them in the garden. Thomas worked his way around to the back of the house. He took from his bag a group of dead cats, crows, foxes, and one dead pig and one dead lamb and one dead sheep. All had been taken from surrounding villages to work up to just that night. Thomas climbed a tree closer to the house and tossed three cats onto the roof and onto on the ground next to a pile of chopped wood. He set the pig by the door with the lamb and scatters the foxes across the small area. Then he positioned the crows in the tree to look like they had fallen from flight and earlier that day he had burned them with a mirror in various parts of the body. Thomas climbed back down, surveyed the area and, content with the job he had done, left with a sneer on his face and grim mind set for the very next day. Before he exited the house he crossed into the living room and spotted a black dog in a basket of straw. Thomas smiled and wrapped the dog in the satchel that he had. He slung it over his shoulder and took leave feeling even better. The last in the group, Elizabeth Taylor was shy girl that just wished to get through this night and end this horrible deed. She had fallen in love with Jack as an adolescent but he had not loved her in return. He had broken her heart and although she hated him for it she also loved him and it pained her to do such an unspeakable act to him. Elizabeth crossed into Jack's bedroom. She tiptoed across the wooden floor and leaned down on the panels. Her eyes met his closed ones and she was tempted. Oh how she was tempted. She tried her best to suppress her feelings and reached into her front pouch. She retrieved three stones that were half the size of her palm each with strange marking of them carved directly in. She lifted his pillow slightly and inserted them underneath. Jack stirred but he did not wake. Elizabeth could take it no longer. She leaned over and, quick as a rabbit, kissed the subsequent adolescent before dashing out of the room. The small, vengeful group left the house with happy thoughts. They had finally done what they had wished to for all those years of life. They had finally done it and they felt good. Elizabeth crossed to home and sat by her bed that night. She clasped her hands over her mattress and prayed. "Dear god, please, let no harm come to Jack. Merely let him feel the pain he caused me. Nothing more. God bless mother, father, Jack and Aunt Marie. Amen…"

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Jack raised from bed that morning feeling refreshed and well awake. He looked over to his side and grabbed his clothing. He slipped into his black overalls and put on his white shirt and straw hat. Then he walked out of his room and crossed the hall. However he slipped in a pool of something and landed hard of his side. Jack looked up and shock was all that escaped his face. There, all over the floor, was blood, pigs' blood. It was spilled all over and was written in devil's writing on the walls. He gapped in awe and surprise.

Jack got to his feet and walked to the door. He called to Zero but the dog did not come. He checked his bed but the small, black canine wasn't there.

There was a chanting outside the door. He opened it a crack to see the townsfolk stomping through the street with torches in hand as well at pitchforks and long gaffs fashioned from sticks. Jack knew what was happening. A witch had been found and she was to be burned at the stake for serving Satan. He wondered who could have been found out. Everyone in the village was so kind and he could think of no one that was a witch.

He walked out into the air and stepped on something crunchy. He lifted his bare foot and saw a scorpion. Jack counted himself lucky that he had not been poisoned. He wondered how a scorpion, so far from home, had managed to get into the garden. He carefully lifted his foot and continued on.

There were great chants ahead of him. "Burn the witch!"

"The witch must die!"

"Do not let her take the mind of another innocent!"

An old man with a long face and long grey hair tied back behind his head gripped Jack's shoulder. It was Mr. Smith. Jack sighed with relief. "You shocked me sir. It's not polite to sneak up on the unknowing fool."

"So you call yourself a fool do you boy? Don't. Shouldn't you be in bed anyhow Jack?"

Jack shook his head. "I don't think so. Why do you say that?"

"Because you were being bewitched m'boy."

"Bewitched?"

"Yes. You were told to do things that you may not have wished to and you were told to see things that you did not and told to not see what you weren't supposed to even if you looked at it. You poor boy. Do you feel alright to stand?"

"I feel fine, sir. Thank you. Tell me, who was the one that cast the spell?"

"Why, your auntie Marie." Jack's eyes widened and tears began to form. "You poor lad. First your mother a witch and now your aunt. You were surrounded from birth. Poor lad. Are you all right? Jack? Jack…?" Mr. Smith looked around. Jack was no longer with him.

Jack pushed his way through the crowd of people. They gathered at the centre of the town. He made his way past a black family and then jumped onto a barrel so that he could see that wooden stake and the stand in which the witch would be burned upon. He saw a man in a black man standing on the wood. He could see no one else.

Then the crowed jeered with delight. He looked over to see his auntie bound with roped behind the back. Two men were escorting the struggling woman to the stake. She had been shaved bald and her face was horribly cut and bruised from beats. Jack jumped down and pushed his way through the crowd. He begged to be let through but the crowd would not disperse. He pushed with all his might but he could not make it to her.

He watched from within the crowd as he ran as she was pulled onto the stand and tied to the stake. Jack called out: "Auntie Marie!"

She heard him and called his name back.

Jack pushed through the crowd as best as he could. He was almost there. Two men popped out from nowhere and stood in front of him. They each gripped one of his arms and then pulled him back. Jack struggled against them but he could not free himself. He tried so hard to get free. "Let me go!"

"Calm down Jack!"

"Aunt Marie!"

"She's a witch!"

"You've been hexed to love her!"

"No! Auntie!"

"Jack! Stay here!"

"Jack!" This person was his aunt Marie. She was calling to him with fear in her voice. "Jack! Please! Help me!"

"Auntie! I'm coming!" Tears welled within his eyes. He was crying now, lightly but he was crying nonetheless. He couldn't break free of the men's grasp. He tried so hard, he really, truly did. Jack watched helplessly as the man in the black hood poured the hot oil from a lamp onto her bald scalp. Aunt Marie cried out in pain and Jack cried for her too. The crowd cheered and jeered with joy. A witch burning was the perfect was to start a day within their minds. They had loved her and the minute that evidence came up they turned on her like a pack of ravenous wolves. It was a sick and twisted wave that flowed over the village. Who had once been nice grew horrible in Jack's eyes and prepared to kill. They were disgusting and grotesque not to mention homicidal. He could hear people's thoughts on the matter from around him.

"A witch being burned… Hasn't had one of those for a while."

"Burn! Burn! Burn the witch!"

The crowd began to chant.

"Burn the witch! Burn the witch! Burn the witch!"

"NO!"

"Burn the witch! Burn the witch! Burn the witch!"

"She's not a witch!"

"Burn the witch! Burn the witch! Burn the witch!"

"Aunt Marie!"

"Burn the witch! Burn the witch! Burn the witch!"

"Ya! Burn'er good!"

"Burn t'witch!"

"Kill! Kill t'witch!"

Jack began to sob when he saw the children. They were chanting the very same as the grown-ups around them. In an effort to stay within the crowd they had turned against the kindest woman to them. Aunt Marie had given them all apples from the tree she had grown in her backyard and was kind enough to tell them stories each day after the church bell rang if they came to her house. Jack had always loved the children that came. Now he saw them within the witch-burning crowd and all he felt towards them was hatred and antipathy and umbrage.

Torches and lanterns began to move towards the stand. Straw was placed at his aunt's feet and all over her body along with gas from lanterns. A sick person even dared to throw animal feces at Marie. It struck her face and left a large brown mark. The torches around her gathered into a group and the man with the black hood came over to examine each like it was an instrument of torture and he was choosing the best one for the operation of torment that he would be performing for the village that day. Jack struggled towards his aunt within the grasp of those men. He neared closer but not close enough. The man in the hood selected a very large and oddly shaped torch. It was thick at the bottom and the top curved into the flame within a spiral. Jack's eyes widened as the flame approached his aunt. As an evil deed before the sentence the man took the flame and blew it into her tear stained face. She cried with fear at the burning of the flame.

"NO!" Jack suddenly felt a burst of strength. He charged forth towards the stand. He pushed people out of his way to do so. As a block came a head of him again he used his long and powerful legs to leap onto a nearby edifice. He stood there for a moment, surprised that he had gotten so high up within one bound and then rushed along the structures to the edge where he was now facing the centre of the crowd. It was as close as he could get from on top of the structures.

Jack bounded onto the ground and the crowd cleared for him out of sheer surprise. The expression that he wore on his face at the moment was that of a killer. He charged through the gap that had been made for him and went straight for the stand. "I'm coming aunt Marie!" He could hear people calling to him from behind as he ran. Most were muffles out by the rest but he did hear a few.

"Jack! She a witch!"

"Don't do it m'boy!"

"We don't want to hurt you!"

"Jack! Don't!"

Hurt me…?

"Jack! Please! Stay away!"

"Get the…"

"Don't hurt him! He's only a lad!"

Jack reached the stand and climbed up. The man in the black hood was stalk still. He had frozen at the sight of that face, that horrible killing face, moving towards him with such speed. He was still as a statuette now. Jack thrust his arm out towards the man and stole the flaming torch from within his grasp. He stood on the stand with the torch in his grasp. He turned to face the frightened crowd. Jack stood with his legs spread wide and his torso leaning in towards the ground. His arms were out and his neck was bent like that of a behemoth grazing the in the pasture by the mountain's base. Jack had never stood like that before and it terrified the villagers into a state of panic.

Within that panic came a shot that echoed through their minds.

BOOM!

Everyone stopped at the sound and they shook hard and long with fear.

There was a fizzling sound that came after the sound and to Jack came pain. The pain was in his torso. His stomach to be exact. The blonde man nearly dropped the torch at the pain. He looked down towards his stomach and could see, through the white fabric of his shirt, that he was bleeding. He was not bleeding a little however; he was bleeding a lot. He felt himself get sick and queasy from the pain. Jack coughed up spit and then threw up a globule of blood. He felt the pain twang towards his mind and he fell. Jack fell off of the stage and landed with a hard thump on his side on the cold ground below him. He heard his aunt cry his name from within her fearful sobs for life.

Jack's eyes began to go blurry. He could hardly see anything. Whether it was from his tears of from the pain did not matter to him. All that came to his mind was the fact that he had failed his aunt.

The torch landed dangerously close to his face as his hand fell to the soil. He was frightened once more; this time for his own life. He could feel the heat of the flame bearing down on him and, for that moment, feared that he and his aunt would die at the same time from the same foundation. Fire was such a beautiful thing but when used in an improper way could kill a single person and then an entire village.

Jack closed his eyes.

The burning sensation that he had expected, and secretly wanted, to come did not. The heat on his face dies down and he no longer felt the twang of the warmth on his body. He was cold once more.

He opened his eyes and wished that he had not. The hooded man stood above him and held the torch in his hands. Then he tossed it onto the stand and withered into the crowd. Jack eyes widened as his aunt Marie was burned. He could hear her but he could not see her; he was thankful for that but still wished her to live. He cried out to her but she did not answer, the flame engulfing her mass and writhing at her form muffled her voice.

She was in pain and so was Jack.

Then there was black.

Nothing more…

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Brooke:'( Poor Jack. I feel so sorry for him. To see that spectacle must have been horrible.

Jack: It was. I still hear her voice.

Brooke: (pats Jack on the back) There, there…

Impmon: Oh! Lighten up! That was… what? Five hundred years ago?

Jack: Three.

Impmon: Whatever… (throws dart at Gallantmon sketch)