Lincoln Velazquest had many interests, some of which came and went like a passing breeze. Comic books, video games, and making money were mainstays, but his fascination with auto mechanics, astrology, and woodworking didn't last very long. Of course, he didn't know going in that he would no longer dig it three weeks later; he approached every single one with the same zeal and determination that he did anything else, and always assumed that his passion would stick around forever.
His latest obsession was the paranormal. One night, as he lay awake in bed, he watched a video on YouTube where some dude used a "spirit box" to talk to ghosts. A spirit box is essentially a specially programmed radio that constantly scans stations. The idea is that the spirits of the dead can somehow speak in the white noise. They don't have full conversations or anything, but they do use simple phrases. One of the ghosts in the video Lincoln watched said In hell...so hot…
CHILLING.
After that, Lincoln devoured every spirit box video he could find, then scoured the internet for more information. His brother, Johnny, wound up getting sucked in, and together they begged their parents to buy them their own spirit box. Dad, of course, said no, because the only time the word yes exists in his vocabulary is when Danial Bryan's on Raw. They were bummed out, but putting their heads together, they fashioned their own homebrew spirit box from an old Walkman they found in the attic. They tested it out in the basement - AKA the creepiest room in the house - but didn't pick up much except for a few snatchets of song and some guy saying It's me, Charles Manson over and over again. Dude, Johnny said, wide-eyed with fear, I think this Manson guy's a ghost.
Lincoln blew a raspberry. A ghost wouldn't announce itself over and over again.
You're right.
Next, they took it around the neighborhood in hopes of running into a ghost. They were crouched in the Louds' backyard and listening when Lucy walked up. What are you doing here?
We're hunting ghosts, Johnny said.
Lucy stared at them with one of her patented blank expressions. Wicked, can I help?
Over time, Lucy's friend Haiku joined in, and Lincoln brought in Maggie because God forbid he not be shoved up her butt 24/7. Sergo, tired of listening to the same forty year old rap records with Dad, followed suit, and by the end of the week, they were basically a low-rent Scooby-Doo knock-off wandering around and looking for mysteries to solve. Sergio even had his own catchphrase. That's scurry, yo. Every time they were in an abandoned house, a creepy stand of forest, or a deserted building, and there was an unexplained sound, cold spot, or flicker of movement, he'd cover his eyes with his wings and shiver. That's scurry, yo. Lincoln got so sick of hearing it that one time he straight up slapped the bird off Johnny's shoulder and called him a punk. Man up a little bit.
Johnny looked at him funny. He's a bird, Linc.
No, he's a chicken, Lincoln said and fixed Sergio with a baleful glare. A big green chicken.
Aside from traipsing around at random, they set out to investigate every urban legend, reputed haunting, and case of paranormal phenomena in Royal County, their initial preoccupation with communicating beyond the grave leading organically to a broader interest in the supernatural. In those first few weeks, they learned that Royal Woods and the surrounding countryside was lousy with supposedly true tales of the bizarre. A cave south of town was said to be home to vampires who caused an outbreak of tuberculosis in the 1880s; numerous people had spotted UFOs and Bigfeet; a man in a rabbit costume was alleged to have attacked several hikers in the seventies (that one was definitely a true story, Lincoln looked it up online); and way back in the eighties, a bunch of farm animals were ripped apart by an unseen predator that left a baffling mix of paw tracks and human prints.
In early May, they spent three hours roaming the dimly lit corridors of St. Eligius, an aging, rundown hospital where entire floors were abandoned and coated in dust, and hallways twisted, turned, and switched back on themselves. St. Eligius, like every other hospital in the world, had a reputation for being haunted. That's to be expected, since people literally die there on the regular, and Lincoln was convinced that they'd run into something.
Alright, gang, he said, let's split up.
They had just come off the elevator on the sixth floor, two boys, three girls, a rat poking out of a pocket, and a bird quivering in terror.
Lucy and Haiku, you check out the old psych ward. Johnny, you and Sergio check the old crematorium. Maggie and I will check one of the rooms. He winked at Maggie, and she shook her head in the coldest and firmest no ever.
Sigh.
Despite his high hopes, they found nothing.
He was so bitterly disappointed that he almost gave up ghost hunting.
As with past ventures, though, he climbed back in the saddle and kept going. By the beginning of June, they'd turned over every metaphorical stone and exhausted every haunted house in a five mile radius. There was nothing left.
Then Haiku suggested a, ahem, field trip.
It was a sweltering day in early July, and they were sitting in a big circle on the floor of Lincoln and Johnny's garage playing a half-hearted game of Uno. The A/C was busted again and the house was hotter than Austin vs McMahon. Out here, with the door open, there was at least a breeze; in there, only suffering. They had been brainstorming places to ply their trade for nearly half an hour, but they'd looked everywhere. "We can go to the river," Maggie said.
"Why?" Johnny asked.
"To swim."
Oh.
"Boring," Lincoln said.
Johnny pointed at him. "He's right, you know."
"It's 93 degrees," Maggie said, "can we please forget about the ghosts for a little while?"
"Not until we find one," Lincoln said. "Or a cryptid. Or a wormhole. Or something."
Maggie rolled her eyes and made a sound of disgust in the back of her throat, and Lucy sighed. They'd been at it for over a month now and had nothing to show for it. The girls were starting to get bored and if something didn't turn up soon, they'd bail. While that wasn't the end of the world, Lincoln had come to enjoy hanging with Lucy, Maggie, and Haiku, and he wasn't exactly looking forward to their merry band of ghost hunters splitting up for the final time. "Come on, guys, we can't give up now," Lincoln said.
"Yeah," Johnny echoed, "we gotta keep looking."
"We've already looked everywhere," Lucy said. "There isn't a single ghost, zombie, or alien in this town. Just mortals." She shivered as though mortals repulsed her. In her defense, though, they did.
"There's gotta be something we missed," Lincoln said. He threw a +4 onto the mess of cards in the center of the circle.
Haiku slapped her own +4 on top of it and he sagged. Darn it. Now he had to draw eight. "Well," she said, "there is something, but not in town."
"What?" Lincoln asked hopefully.
Johnny sat up straighter. "Yeah, what is it?"
Looking behind her as though afraid of eavesdroppers, she said, "The Hill People."
"The who?" Johnny asked.
"The Hill People," she repeated. Her voice lowered to a conspiratorial whisper, and everyone leaned in to hear her better. "They're a race of humanoid creatures said to live in the hills around Scratchy Bottom Campground." Her eyes shifted from side to side. "They're seven feet tall, have wings and leathery skin, and their eyes are big...black...bug like. Their teeth are knives and their claws can cut through bone like it's butter."
Her voice cast a dark, mesmerizing pall, and Lncoln swallowed thickly.
"No one knows where they came from, but the first sighting was reported a hundred years ago. A guy out walking in the woods saw one hanging upside down from a tree branch, and when he tried to leave, it opened its eyes, let out a shriek like a dying baby, and flew at him. He barely escaped with his life."
Sergio covered his ears with his wings. "That's scurry, yo."
For once, Lincoln agreed.
"Every once in a while, a hiker or backpacker will glimpse one in the trees, and every so often, one will go missing. If their family's lucky, some of their body parts will turn up. Most don't because the Hill People eat every last scrap of flesh."
Lincoln and Johnny exchanged a nervous glance, Maggie looked mildly concerned, and Lucy was as inscrutable as ever. "Is that true?" Johnny asked.
"It's very true."
Lincoln considered Haiku's story for a long time before speaking. It was creepy and all, but the more he thought about it, the more he was sure that she was either lying or relating an outlandish old myth. He was born in the morning, but not this morning. He could buy ghosts and even Bigfoot, but leathery bat-creatures that ate people? That might work in a horror movie, but come on, if there were really monsters nomming on tourists in the woods, do you think Scratchy Bottom would still be open?
No, it'd be closed and no one would go anywhere near it.
On the flip side, this might be the gang's last big hurrah.
Hmmm.
He had an idea.
That night, he and Johnny approached their father.
Esconded in his armchair like a king on throne, Dad stared up at the wall-mounted TV, where Fall Brawl: War Games 1995 unfolded one boring, pre-NWO era match at a time. Hull Cogan, Dandy Savage, Lex Loser, and Ring (short for Ringworm) battled the Dungeon of Doom in a double steel cage encompassing two rings. Dad cheered every time the faces got a good turn and booed for the heels, just like he was programmed to do. "Hey, uh, Dad?" Lincoln asked.
Dad shot him a withering look. "What? I'm busy."
Lincoln and Johnny looked at each other. You take over, Lincoln said with his eyes. Johnny rubbed the back of his neck. "Do you, uh, wanna go camping?"
Like a shot, Dad jumped to his, and Lincoln and Johnny fell back a step like heel Hogan meeting his match in Billy Kidman - LOL. "Hotdog I do!"
And that, in a nutshell, was how Lincoln, Johnny, Lucy, Haiku, Sergio, and Maggie wound up at Scratchy Bottom Campground, a sprawling parcel of land spread out between the Ojibwe Lake and the foothills of the Lackawanna Mountains. Dense forest crowded against its southwest border and the lake lie to the north, the land sloping down to its muddy banks. Their campsite was along a gravel lane in the middle of camp, the woods off to their right and the lake to their left. Campers and RVs occupied overgrown lots, some with skirting, lawn ornaments, and power hook-ups. These belonged to what Dad called the lifers - the rugged and hardy souls who lived here either full time or only during the summer. The airstream trailer next to their campsite belonged to an old couple; the man dressed in cargo shorts and sandals and the woman wore white slacks and flowery Hawwian style shirts that made her look like something from GTA: Vice City.
They set their tents up around the fire pit in a rough semi-circle: Lincoln and Johnny shared one, Lucy, Maggie, and Haiku took another, and Dad's stood proudly in the center, all dormers, overhangs, and vaulted mesh windows. It was bigger than most people's houses. "Why is your dad's tent so...extra?" Haiku asked.
"Because he's extra," Johnny said.
As soon as they were finished setting up, Dad emerged from his tent wearing blue trunks, a glittery Ric Flair robe, wrestling boots, and a plastic NWA World Heavyweight Championship belt around his flabby waist. He put his hands on his hips and looked left, then right as if greeting a multitude of rabid fans packed into the Charlotte Coliseum just to get a glimpse at him. Maggie arched her brow, Lincoln blushed, Johnny rolled his eyes, Lucy didn't do anything, and Haiku looked at him with pity. Dad strutted out and grabbed a towel. "I'm going to the lake, you slapnuts coming?"
Lincoln answered before anyone else could. "No, you go ahead, we wanna go on a hike."
"Have fun and be safe," Dad said. He passed in a swish of robe and was gone.
"Alright, guys," Lincoln said, "let's go."
They made their way through the campground in a big group, Sergio perched on Johnny's shoulder and Cinnamon poking out of Lincoln's pocket to look around. At the edge of the compound, tall pine trees towered into the cloudless blue sky. A dry wind scoured their faces like sandpaper and the harsh chirping of cicadas found their years, reminding Lincoln of a science fiction movie he'd seen where the aliens communicated with clicks.
Shiver.
Several different trails lead into the woods and Lincoln did some quick math. "Alright, gang, let's split up. Johnny, you and Sergio go together. Lucy, you and Haiku take the middle path. Maggie and I go west."
"Of course you pick Maggie to go with you," Johnny said.
Yeah, duh, she was his girlfriend after all.
"Just go with Sergio."
Johnny sighed. "Fine."
"Keep your eyes peeled for anything funny," Lincoln said.
Haiku said the Hill People were active at night and slept in the day, sometimes in the boughs of the trees in which they made their nests but more often in a network of caves underground. The plan was to come back after dark, when there was a higher chance of glimpsing one...if they existed, which Lincoln doubted. This was a dry run to familiarize themselves with the lay of the land and maybe find something.
What, Lincoln didn't know. Tracks? Droppings?
Whatever there was to find, he guessed.
"Do you believe Haiku's story?" Lincoln asked.
Maggie took his hand and threaded their fingers together. "Not really," she said, "I just came to hang out with you."
Rays of sunlight fell through the treetops and dappled the ground, and swaying branches sent shadows scattering across the trail. The landscape stayed relatively flat for the first half mile, then became steeper. As they walked, Lincoln and Maggie played I Spy. "I Spy, with my little eye," Lincoln said, "something beautiful."
"You?" Maggie deadpanned.
Lincoln grinned. "You're good."
She gave his hand a playful squeeze.
"I Spy," Maggie said, "something cute and sweet."
"That flower over there?"
"No, dummy, you."
Lincoln laughed. "I was trying not to pick the obvious."
"Because you're a boy," Maggie said, "and all boys do is play games."
"Pfft, okay."
Elsewhere, Johnny dropped onto a canned rock flanking the path and looked around. The interlacing branches overhead blotted out most of the sun's light and the wind slipping through the trees sounded eerily like the ghostly whisper of a thousand dead voices calling from beyond the grave. He swallowed thickly and glanced at Sergio, who shook like a leaf. "This place, like, gives me the creeps."
"Me too," Sergio chattered.
Johnny reached into his jacket and brought out a Ziploc baggie filled with Chex mix. He opened it, took out a pretzel, and held it out. Sergio took it in his beak, tossed his head back, and swallowed it whole. "Hey, you think Haiku was telling the truth about there being Hill People and stuff?"
By way of answering, Sergio pressed his wings to his ears.
Right.
A twig snapped behind them, and Johnny rocketed to his feet with a cry of terror. Sergio dug his talons into Johnny's shoulders, perhaps to keep from being wrenched off by a bloodthirsty Hill Person, then, in a flutter of wings, he took off, squawking and piddling. Johnny spun around, and Sergio hovered above the trail, matching expressions of horror on their faces. Something rustled in the bushes, and Johnny's heart blasted. Oh, no, it was coming, all wings and fangs and hate. He was too young to die, he was too handsome to die, he was too girlfriendless to die.
"This is it, Sergo," he said and squeezed his eyes closed. "At least we'll go out together."
No answer.
"Sergio?"
He creaked one eye open.
The parrot was gone.
"Gee, Lincoln was right, you are a chicken."
The bushes shook again, and Johnny tensed. Alright, guess I'll die alone. Tell my mother I -
Something popped out of the brush and Johnny screamed.
A tiny gray rabbit with a cottony tail looked inquisitively up at him, its whiskers twitching. Johnny breathed a sigh of relief and pressed his hand to his. "Whew, for a second there I thought -"
Issuing a rasping hiss, the rabbit sprang at him.
Screaming, Johnny ran, the angry vermin hot on his heels.
A mile east, separated from Johnny from Johnny by a rolling sea of oaks, pines, and bogs, Haiku and Lucy came to a halt. "Did you hear that?" Haiku asked.
"It sounded like screaming," Lucy said.
"Girlish screaming," Haiku agreed.
They looked at each other. "Johnny."
Rolling their eyes, they turned around and started back to camp, meeting Johnny in the meadow between the tree line and the edge of the campground. He lay curled up in a fetal position, shaking and babbling about killer rabbits from outer space. Lincoln and Maggie came rushing out of the forest and all four of them stood around Johnny. "What happened?" Lincoln asked.
"Rabbit...tried to kill me...barely escaped."
Maggie looked around. "Where's Sergio?"
"He abandoned me," Johnny said.
They helped Johnny to his feet and led him back to camp, Lincoln patting his back. "There, thee, it's okay, we'll protect you from the big bad rabbi."
The girls snickered and Johnny flushed.
At camp, Dad and Sergio sat before a fire and vibed to Dr. Dre while roasting hotdogs on the ends of sticks. Johnny pulled roughly away from Lincoln and stalked over to the bird. "You left me to die," he charged.
Sergio, though much shorter, somehow managed to look down his beak at him. "But you didn't, did you?"
Flushing red, Johnny balled his fist and sprang, but Lincoln caught him around the neck and put him in a sleeper hold that came as reflexively as drawing breath. "Dude, stop."
Johnny thrashed against him in an attempt to escape but went limp when Dad's voice thundered forth. "Knock it off."
He glared at Johnny, then at Lincoln. Lincoln released his brother and stepped back, hands raising (hey, dad, don't shoot). The girls went deathly silent, and the air crackled with suspense. Then Dad turned back to the fire and rotated his weiner. "Dogs are in the cooler."
That night, under the watchful eye of the full moon, Lincoln and Johnny stole out of their tent and met Maggie, Lucy, and Haiku on the dirt road running before the campsite. Owls hooted to each other from perches unseen and a cool wind blew over the land, knocking branches forlornly together. The fire had burned down to a bed of glowing coals and chainsaw snores emanated from Dad's tent. After his dust up with Johnny earlier, Sergio punked out and stayed with Dad. Good riddance, Lincoln thought.
Quiet so as not to wake Dad or any of the other sleepers along the road, Lincoln and crew stole across the campground at a crouch. At the woods, they stopped and Lincoln unshouldered his pack. He unzipped it, rummaged around inside, and took out a flashlight, which he passed off to Johnny. He handed one to each girl, then took the last one for himself. He clicked it on, and a clean white beam carved the night. "We stick together for this one," he whispered. The wind roared in the trees and the nearest campsite was 500 yards away, but he didn't want to take any chances. "Me and Johnny will lead the way in case any Hill People come. That way you can get away while they eat us."
Beside him, Johnny gulped.
"Come on."
They started up the trail, the woods closing around them like a wicker noose. Inside the dense thicket, the moonlight filtered away and the breeze fell slack. Lincoln swept the flashlight back and forth, chasing shadows off the path, and Johnny whipped his head left and right, his teeth chattering lightly together. "I-I-I wish S-S-Sergio was h-h-here," he stammered.
Ahead, the path bent to the left and dipped down into a dry creek bed. Lincoln shone the flashlight on the trees on either side. Apart from the occasional hoot and the soft, ever present cricket song, there were no sounds but the wind.
In the safety of day, Lincoln didn't believe the Hill People were real. Here, now, in the darkness, the world black and endless on all sides of him, he wasn't so sure. Anything could be crouching anywhere, waiting to strike - a Hill Person, a vampire, a Mormon missionary. Something crashed through the underbrush on his right, and his heart jumped into his throat. A pair of shining green eyes observed from the left, and he spun around to point the beam at it.
Only a possum.
"Keep close," he said over his shoulder, trying to keep the apprehension from his voice and largely succeeding.
No one spoke, wary of making noise.
They were on the other side of the creek, the path climbing into the hills, when Maggie broke the silence. "Uh, where's Lucy?"
Lincoln's heart jogged and he turned around. Everyone faced Maggie, their lights interrogating her. "What?"
"Lucy...she was right behind me a minute ago," Maggie said.
A quick headcount confirmed it. Lucy was gone.
"Lucy?" Lincoln called. The trees and thick vegetation prevented his voice from echoing, rending it flat...hollow...dead.
Haiku cupped her hand to her mouth. "Lucy?"
"What do we do?" Johnny asked.
Lincoln missed a beat. "We'll retrace our steps."
Taking up position at the head of the pack, Lincoln gripped his flashlight tightly and swept the beam back and forth. Haiku and Maggie shouted for Lucy and Johnny hugged himself. "A Hill Person got her, man," he muttered, sounding like he was going to cry, "it ate her whole."
"Calm down," Lincoln said, "nothing got her, she just got lost. She's probably sitting in the woods enjoying the dark."
While that sounded like something Lucy would do, Lincoln didn't believe it. She wouldn't just wander off like that.
Maybe she fell and got knocked out.
Yeah, that sounded plausible. They'd come across her any -
"Guys," Maggie said, "Haiku's missing."
Lincoln and Johnny wheeled around at once. "What?" they asked in unison.
Maggie twisted in a quick semi-circle, her eyes flicking here and there. "She was just right here."
Okay, this was not good. Two of their friends were missing.
Johnny shook and panic throbbed in the center of Lincoln's chest. He took a series of deep, calming breaths. "Alright," he said, "we go back to camp and get Dad, Hurry and stay together."
They started down the trail, Lincoln in front; he held onto the flashlight, ready to brain anything that came his way, and stepped quickly, sweat sheening his forehead. They had just crossed the creek bed when Maggie let out a high pitched shriek. "HILL PEOPLE!"
Johnny wailed and Lincoln took off like a shot, his survival instincts taking over. "Wait up!" Johnny screamed but Lincoln didn't, couldn't, his feet were flying over the ground and his arms were pumping, propelling him forward. He caught flashes of movement on both sides and ran harder, the back of his neck tingling and his heart thundering against his ribs. Ahead, a dark figure jumped out of the woods, and lowering his head, Lincoln ran right through it, knocking it aside.
A moment later, Johnny was right behind him. "IT GOT MAGGIE!"
"NO!"
The trees rustled, and Lincoln imagined Hill People leaping like cats from one to the next in pursuit.
He pushed himself harder, and a moment later, he tripped and went down, Johnny colliding with him and falling too. Their lights hit the ground and rolled away, and in a second, dark shadows surrounded them. GIving voice to his terror, Lincoln clung to his brother, and Johnny did the same.
One of the things picked up the flashlight and held it under its chin.
"Boo," Haiku said.
Lincoln's scream cut off like throwing a switch. Johnny's, however, went on and on until Lincoln shook him.
"You should have seen your faces," Maggie said. She stood over them with her hands on her hips and an evil smile on her lips.
"I've never seen anyone that scared before," Lucy said flatly. "It was actually kind of disturbing."
A joke? It was a JOKE?
Now Lincoln felt stupid. He should have known. There's no such thing as -
A high, mournful wail, like the crying of a baby in pain, rose from somewhere in the higher hills, and everyone froze.
"Uh...let's get out of here," Haiku said.
"Yeah, good idea," Lucy said.
When the cry came again, they bolted and ran all the way back to camp.
Meanwhile, the cry was answered by another, and another, and another still until the whole night was ablaze with fear.