Dead by Daylight – Expanded Universe

by KnightMysterio

Chapter 1: Not the Bees!

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The Realm of Trials…

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"This is new," Bill Overbeck said as he emerged into the realm, Claudette Morel and Nicolas Cage coming behind him. And indeed, they were in a new realm.

Bill didn't like new realms. That almost always meant there was a new psychopathic killer out there to do horrible things to them. "Where are we?" Claudette said, adjusting her glasses. "I see the generators, and pallets and hooks, but I can't really tell where this is…"

"Cabrini-Green, in Chicago. The inside of the old housing project, I guess," Bill said. "My group passed through it while on the move… Place was infested with zombies…"

The place looked like a ruin. There were all the signs of urban decay. Leaky pipes, spraypainted gang signs, all with the trademark 'wrongness' of the Entity, as if their captor was creating the realms from descriptions rather than actually seeing them… in addition to that, there were cobwebs and plants growing through everything. There was also a persistent buzzing that set all three survivors on edge.

"I don't like this…" Bill muttered. "Too many tight, long corridors. Huntress, Artist, and Trickster will thrive here…"

"Probably Hillbilly too," Nicolas muttered. "Good place for charges to hit…"

"C'mon," Claudette said. "Let's get generators done."

Nicolas and Bill nodded, the three of them heading over to the nearest generator, which was in the lobby of the building. Before they could get started, though, they all heard a voice.

"H-Hello?" came an unfamiliar woman's voice. "Is anyone there?"

"New place, new people," Bill muttered, shaking his head as he pushed a gear back into place. "I'll keep this going. You two get the newbie set up. And watch out for whoever else is here."

"Right," Claudette said, both she and Nicolas trading grim looks. Like Bill, both of them understood what a new place and a new person at the same time meant – a new killer. "Ma'am? Ma'am, this way?"

A young woman with short blonde hair and a sweater, around college age by the looks of her, staggered into view, a dazed look on her face. "Hello? I… I don't know what's going on," she said. "The last thing I remember is… is fire… and… and getting a baby to safety and…" She gasped, as if realizing something. "I… I died. Oh my god, I died…"

She staggered, and Nicolas caught her. "Easy there, newbie," he said. "I know its a lot to take in…"

"Oh god… I should be… Am I dead?" she said, looking up. "You're Nicolas Cage, from Honeymoon in Vegas. Are you dead?"

Nicolas smiled weakly. "No… But that'd be nice, wouldn't it?" he quipped, cringing a little at the reminder of one of his earlier movies. The 90s were not good for his career.

Claudette smiled gently, stepping forward. "Ma'am? I'm Claudette Morel. The grumpy fellow working on the generator is Bill Overbeck," she said, Bill waving idly. "What can you remember?"

The young woman gulped. "I'm… I'm Helen Lyle. I was doing a thesis on urban legends, including one called the Candyman…"

Claudette, Nicolas, and Bill immediately thought about the Unknown, one of the newer killers in the Entity's repertoire. They already didn't like where this was going.

Helen brushed her hair back, continuing. "He… He's supposed to come when you say his name in a mirror five times…" she said. "I… I just did it as a joke, and he started killing people around me… Said I affected 'belief' in him… He kidnapped a baby, framed me for it..."

Claudette grimaced. Well, he'll get plenty of belief here, she thought grimly. They'd all seen too much NOT to believe in spirits.

Nicolas shook his head, feeling sorry for this woman. As Helen talked, though, Nicolas noticed a mirror. It was wildly out of place, and a part of his mind was screaming at him not to look. But he couldn't help it, a powerful force drawing him towards the mirror, staring into its depths.

"I… He said he wanted to bring me into his legend…" Helen said, crying. "Have us both burn to death in a pyre, like his body was burned after he died… I… I saved the baby he kidnapped from the pyre, but I died! I know I did!" She looked into Claudette's eyes. "Am… am I dead? Is this Hell?"

"No," Claudette said sadly. "But it might as well be." And she began to explain the Trials.

"Candyman…" Nicolas whispered, influenced by the mirror.

Helen stared in horror. "We're… we're trapped here? In these endless games?" she said.

Claudette hugged the frightened woman. "So long as we're alive, there's hope," she said. "None of us have given up on finding a way out. But we need to keep surviving the trials as much as possible."

"Candyman…" Nicolas whispered, eyes wide and staring.

Helen shook her head. "But… But if we keep dying, like you said-"

"Giving up means the Entity wins," Bill said, not looking up from his work. "And I refuse to let that spider bitch win."

"Candyman…" Nicolas whispered.

"...Nick, what are you doing?" Claudette said, noticing Nicolas standing before the mirror for the first time.

Helen realized. "He's…. He's summoning him! Summoning the Candyman!"

"Candyman…" Nicolas wanted to pull away. But he couldn't. It was as if the Entity itself was holding him in place.

Bill kept working frantically. "It's the mirror… It's controlling him! Get him away from the mirror!"

Claudette and Helen both grabbed Nicolas and pulled him away from the mirror, but not before he said the final 'Candyman.'

Their hearts pounded as the red light of a killer's gaze appeared from the mirror. In a swirl of bees, he appeared. A tall, short-haired black man in a fur-lined black longcoat, one hand missing, replaced by a vicious looking meathook not unlike the ones hanging around the building. He would be handsome, if not for the scowl on his face, and the bees swarming around him. And when he spoke, it was in a voice like the grave itself.

"I am the writing on the wall," he intoned, "the whisper in the classroom. I have been called, so now I must shed your innocent blood."

Oh, good, a talker, Bill muttered inwardly. He hated the talky ones. "RUN!" he commanded, everyone bolting in different directions. Nicolas, cursing himself for letting himself get trapped by a mirror, ran for the stairs, while Helen and Claudette ran for the inner courtyard, Bill quickly dashing out of the Candyman's eyeshot and looking back to see if he could sneak back and finish the generator.

Candyman chuckled a little, turning to look at the generator. He gestured, and some of the bees swarming him began to swarm the generator as well, the generator sparking as they usually did when struck by the killers. Bill cursed inwardly.

Candyman looked around, not noticing as Bill ducked back. He eventually decided to chase after Nicolas, heading for the stairs, when he staggered. A sharp, agonizing pain, like claws in his brain, tore through him, and he nodded. "ALL RIGHT! All right… I won't wait for one of the mirrors next time… Surely you of all creatures can appreciate theatrics, though…" Another spike of pain, and Candyman grunted. "Fine. Too much of a good thing. You're right." Shaking his head in irritation, he wandered off, wanting to hurt the survivors even more now.

Bill watched him go, feeling his heart slow down. Huh, he thought. Well, that explains the wait. Bastard wanted to make an entrance… That worked out for his side, though. He had almost been finished with the generator. So long as he didn't look at a mirror, and indeed just glancing at it made him feel the pull towards it, he'd be fine.

The problem was the bees still swarming around the generator.

Deciding to risk it, he reached for the gears of the generator again, only for the bees to swarm him. "ACK! Fucking bugs!" he snarled, wincing as he was stung over and over again. He backed off from the generator, flailing as he swatted as many of the bees as he could. Finally, the stinging died down.

Bill felt ill. Like he'd taken a hit from the killer. Fuck, he thought. Okay, so he can boobytrap and damage generators with his bees. Great. The swarm apparently had died out after triggering it, though, and the damage wasn't as bad as a blow from the killers usually did. "I can work with this," Bill said, going back to work.

Elsewhere in the trial, Claudette was leading a terrified Helen on. "We… We have to get out of here!" Helen said, in tears. "I can't face him again! Not after what he's done!"

"We can get out of here, Helen," Claudette said, feigning calmness. "But we have to work on the generators, power up the exit door."

"Door?" Helen said, eyes blossoming with recognition. "There's… There's this giant metal door outside… next to…" She gulped hard. "Next to where the bonfire was… Attached to a giant wall separating one side of the complex from the other."

Claudette nodded. That's good, they had discovered the exit. "Okay. Okay, Helen, I'm going to need you to focus," she said. She looked into one of the apartments, grimacing at the bloodstains, and spotted a generator. "...Of course they're in enclosed spaces," she muttered. "All right. We need to fix these to power up the door and get out of here."

Helen gulped, visibly forcing herself to calm down. "R-Right," she said. "Okay. How do I do this?" They stepped into the room… and Helen whimpered again, seeing the skeletal, headless corpse of a dog there, laying in a pool of dried blood. "It would be this apartment, wouldn't it?"

Claudette knew there was a danger. But she couldn't help but stare. "What… What happened here?"

"When the Candyman took me for the first time," Helen said, clutching herself to Claudette as she struggled to calm down again, "he took me to this apartment. He kidnapped the baby that lived here, and decapitated the rottweiler. He… He made it look like I did it… He wanted to bring me into his myth…"

"Fuck…" Claudette said. She felt nauseous. She loved dogs, and the idea of killing one… She shook her head. "C'mon. We still need to do generators."

Helen, still shaking, nodded. "O-Okay… Okay," she said. At Claudette's instruction, she began to fix the generator, pushing misaligned gears into place, tweaking wires together, and cleaning grease and ash off of pistons, some of which needed to be realigned. Of course, unfamiliar as she was with the machines, she touched a wire to the wrong thing and...

"AH!" Claudette screamed, the generator sparking.

"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!" Helen stammered.

"It's okay! Let's just get out of here for a bit!" Claudette said. "A gen going off let's the killer know where we are for a few seconds!"

"WHAT?!" Helen said.

"We'll stay away from it for a bit. If he doesn't come check on it," Claudette said, "We'll come back."

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2nd Floor…

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And indeed, the generator exploding did let Candyman know where two of his prey were hiding. But he decided against going after him, as he was almost able to catch Nicolas. The killer snarled as Nicolas put a pallet down in his way, and bashed his hook into it a couple times to crush it. The Entity has definitely increased my physical form's strength, he thought following through the large room as Nicolas tried to loop around, catching him with a slash from his hook.

"FUCK!" Nicolas screamed, staggering and clutching at the wound to his gut.

Candyman grinned. "You cannot escape, Mr. Cage," he said.

Nicolas winced, quickly making his way back down the hall, the Candyman following him. He looked down the hall, and saw a mirror there. He quickly glanced down, not wanting to get influenced into looking at it.

Unfortunately, the Entity had gifted Candyman with a particular ability – specifically, the ability to teleport to any mirror he could see.

Vanishing in a swirl of bees, he reappeared directly in front of Nicolas and backhanded him with his hook, sending him to the floor.

"Fuck… Ow…" Nicolas said, slowly crawling away, still clutching at his gut wound. He looked up at Candyman, at the bees swirling around him… and began to laugh.

Candyman scowled. "...You face death. You face one who would gut you from groin to gullet were he allowed, and you laugh."

"Nononono, it's just…" Nicolas giggled nervously. "I'm just… I'm just remembering this one movie I was in… I was supposed to be 'tortured' by bees in one scene… I thought I did pretty good showing how scared I was but everyone laughed… Looking back, I really was hamming it up a bit much… Seeing your bees just reminded me of that."

Candyman quirked an eyebrow. He glanced up, noticing a nearby hook, and hefted the actor onto his shoulder, slamming Nicolas down on the hook. After taking a moment to enjoy the man's screaming, he stepped back to move on… only for a naughty idea to take hold of him. He turned around slowly… and Nicolas suddenly KNEW what was about to happen.

"Oh, come on!" Nicolas almost whimpered.

Candyman opened his mouth wide, a swarm of bees coming out and stinging Nicolas over and over. He thrashed about on the hook, flailing to try and swat them away. "AH! FUCK! NOT THE BEES! OH GOD, ITS EVEN WORSE THAN THE FILM SHOWED! NOT THE BEES! FUCK! AAAH!"

Candyman snickered. "He's right. It is quite amusing," he said, moving on to continue the hunt.

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Elsewhere…

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Claudette and Helen made their way outside. The plaza of the housing development had more patches of maze-like hedges and piles of garbage. The smell was rancid, of rot. As if the tenement itself had died and was withering. The exit door was clearly visible in the middle of the lot, but there were several obstacles and a few generators in between them. And to Helen's dismay, the pyre where she died was right near the door.

"Oh god…" Helen said, looking at the pyre.

Claudette grimaced, realizing that pile of wooden junk was where Helen died. "The Entity just put it there to remind you of trauma. Ignore it, and let's focus on the generators," she said. "I'm sorry for what you've gone through, but we need to focus on escape."

"R-Right," Helen said. "Generators." She gulped hard.

Claudette smiled and hugged her gently. "Attagirl. Now let's go," she said. The two of them started on another generator. But as they were working on it, Candyman appeared behind them, heralded by a swarm of bees. He yanked Claudette off of the generator with his hook hand, smirking as he hefted her onto his shoulder.

"JUST RUN!" Claudette said.

"But what about-" Helen started.

"GO!" Claudette insisted.

Terrified, not sure what else to do, Helen ran for it, tears streaming down her face as she heard Claudette scream in agony. She eventually came to an apartment and hid underneath a table, hands over her head. This was somehow worse than the first time she'd come up against Candyman. Everything felt wrong and foul.

A hand touched her shoulder, and she screamed. She looked up, and sighed in relief, seeing Bill and Nicolas there.

"Where's Claudette?" Nicolas asked.

"I… Candyman grabbed her while we were trying to fix one of those generator things…" Helen said. "I ran…"

Nicolas glared at her. "You just left her?! You didn't go back for her?!"

"I didn't know I could!" Helen protested.

"Calm down," Bill snapped. "She's new, she doesn't know all the rules yet." There was a thunderous boom in the distance, and the old veteran shook his head. "Its too late now anyway. She's been sacrificed."

"S-Sacrificed?" Helen said. "Oh no… Oh no no no…"

"We have to keep going," Bill said. "C'mon. The less kills he gets, the less he gets rewarded."

Helen gulped, and steeled her resolve. "R-Right," she said. "I'm sorry…"

Nicolas shook his head. "Don't worry about it," he muttered. "Just… I forget that I was new too sometimes."

"Let's go," Bill said. "Keep an eye out for Candyman. You can tell he's coming when you see the red aura from his eyes…"

And indeed, they led the aforementioned ghost on a merry chase around the ruins of the apartment complex. The trio managed to get some more generators done, only for Candyman to corner them in one of the apartments. They scattered, but Candyman turned his attention to Helen, slashing at her with his hook hand.

Helen screamed as the hook tore through her, and tried to run. She had been told about the pallets, but didn't think to use them as Candyman chased after her, too frightened to think properly. She would kick herself later for panicking like this. But right now she didn't know there was a later. So she ran. She tried to get away, but Candyman teleported to another mirror, emerging with a slash of his hook and striking her across the chest, knocking her down. Helen, groaning in agony from the slash marks on her chest, tried to crawl away, clutching at the heavily bleeding wounds. But Candyman stopped her by putting a boot on her ankle.

"Such a shame I cannot play with you properly," Candyman said, hoisting Helen onto his shoulder. "But our current 'employer' has specific needs." He carried the staggering, bleeding woman over to a hook and slammed her shoulder-first down onto it.

Helen practically howled in agony as she felt the hook pierce her shoulder, the blonde clutching at it reflexively. "Oh god… oh god…"

Candyman stared at her, debating on whether to leave a trap of bees surrounding her, before shaking his head. No, he still cared for her too much, in his way. He turned to continue his hunt.

"Daniel…" Helen said, her voice strained with agony.

The Candyman froze as he heard his real name.

"Daniel…" Helen said. "Why do this? If what the others said is true, then we're both trapped here… The legend of the Candyman is over…"

Candyman shivered softly. He'd taken the creature's deal in a moment of desperation, desperation to have Helen stay with him after a fashion. The man with the bear traps had explained his new situation to him, Candyman realizing his foolishness far too late. "...The legend of Daniel Robitaille will fade, yes," he conceded, turning to Helen and grinning cruelly. "But there will always be a Candyman. The Hive will survive the loss of one."

Helen just stared in shock. What… what did that mean?! Were there others who died badly, as he did!? She called out to him again, but he tuned her out, striding off, leaving her to suffer on the hook.

Nicolas popped out from behind some trash cans, coming up to her. "I remember my first hooking," he said casually. "Hurt like hell."

"I'm stuck…" Helen groaned. The hook tearing through her shoulder felt like fire through her veins, pain shooting through her with the slightest motion.

"They're tricky to get off of without help," Nicolas said. "I've never managed it yet." He grabbed her legs. "Brace yourself, this is gonna suck just as much as the hooking." He hefted her upwards, Helen screaming in agony as she was lifted off the hook.

"Fuck! Fuck… fuck…" Helen groaned, staggering to her knees.

"I gotcha, don't worry," Nicolas said. He pulled out some cloth and pressed them to the hook wound, gently rubbing them over it.

To Helen's surprise, she felt the wound starting to close. "What…" she stammered.

"The Entity lets us have a little magic," Nicolas said. "Just enough to keep us going and draw out our pain and suffering more."

Helen shivered. "Why not just end it?"

"Tried it," Nicolas said softly. "Just woke up a few hours later. Death is not an escape. Not here…"

Helen grimaced, finally remembering what she'd be told at the beginning of this mess. "How can you keep going?" she said softly.

Nicolas shook his head. "Better than getting tossed into the void," he said. "Plus? Every time we win is the Entity going hungry. Every time all four of us get away is the Entity having to take her food from the Killers instead."

Helen didn't notice the choice of gender words for the Entity yet. "I let it get Claudette, though…" As Nicolas finished, she looked at her shoulder, seeing a wicked-looking scar from the hook there.

"You're new," Nicolas said, pulling aside his shirt to show her his hook scars. "Mistakes happen when you're new."

"Such as standing around talking when you should be running," said the Candyman, appearing from a mirror behind them.

"Shit! GO!" Nicolas said, he and Helen running off. But Nicolas couldn't react fast enough, getting hit with a slash from the Candyman's hook hand. Smirking, the Candyman shook the blood off of his hook, chasing after the injured Nicolas and frightened Helen. He followed the trail of his scratchmarks, Nicolas also leaving droplets of blood as the two of them ran.

Finally, they made a mistake, Candyman catching Nicolas with a blow to the head that sent him sprawling to the floor.

Nicolas landed roughly, wincing at the pain from his earlier slash injury. He looked up, seeing Helen hesitate. "JUST GO!" he screamed. "It'll be okay! RUN!"

Reluctantly, Helen fled, abandoning Nicolas to his feet. The injured actor turned, looking up at the looming, well-dressed figure of the Candyman. "Just no more bees, please," Nicolas asked.

Candyman smirked down at him, grabbing him and yanking him to his feet. "No more bees. But thanks to a little ivory trinket the fat oaf with the bottles loaned me-"

Fuck you, Clown, Nicolas thought.

"-I can put an end to you another way," Candyman said. He then shoved his hook into Nicolas's crotch, just above his penis. Nicolas screamed in agony, thrashing about in Candyman's grip as the murderous spirit yanked upwards, the actor's screams turning into a choked gurgle as his guts spilled out in a bloody splash, the ghost tearing Nicolas open from just above his crotch to his chin. "Besides. If a joke is overused, it stops being funny." Candyman shook his hook off, scowling a little at the bloodstain on his sleeve, and shrugged, pushing his body down. "Groin to gullet, Mr. Cage."

Nicolas had nothing to say on the matter, as he was dead. Candyman smirked, and went hunting once more.

Helen, meanwhile, heard the sound of another generator going off. She met up with Bill as she got near the door. "Where's Nick?" he demanded.

"He… Candyman, he…" Helen stammered, tears in her eyes.

Bill cursed. "All right. I need you to do something for me," he said. "First, tell me a little bit about any backstory you may know for this guy. Then, I need you to lift the door opening switch right here. Okay? That'll let us get out of here. You'll need to hold it until the door opens."

"But what about-" Helen started.

"I'll handle him, don't worry," Bill said. "C'mon!" He showed her the switch to pull, Helen quickly telling Bill about Candyman's real name and what she knew of his backstory. The gate made a loud noise, and indeed, not long after, the Candyman showed up, surrounded by a swarm of bees.

"Helen… My dear, my love…" Candyman almost purred. "I have such wonders to show you."

"I've seen those wonders before," Bill taunted, slowly moving away from Helen. "They aren't anything special."

Candyman's eyes narrowed, but he didn't lose the smile he had on his face. "I'll deal with you in a minute, Mr. Overbeck. Helen and I have much to discuss…"

"She never would have gone for you, you know," Bill said. When Candyman's face darted to him, Bill clarified. "The original girl you were interested in, I mean."

Candyman made a sound like a tiger growling. "And what would you know about it?" he snarled.

"Only that a pretty young thing like that would never go for an artsy fartsy type," Bill said. He really hoped he wouldn't have to say something racist. He always felt dirty afterwards.

"You… You know nothing of love," Candyman snarled, starting to stalk after him.

"More than you, Danny boy" Bill said. "At least the people I love didn't stand back and let me die like cowards." Granted, I didn't give them much of a choice, running into the zombie horde the way I did, but that's none of this fuck's business.

"You… You dare slander her…" Candyman snarled, sending a wave of bees after Bill, who laughed mockingly. Candyman, hook hand at the ready, chased after him, not realizing that Bill was leading him into a loop around some crates.

Helen, meanwhile, returned her attention to the door, silently begging it to open the fuck faster. When it did, though, she laughed in relief. "Bill! Bill, come on!" Helen said.

"Op, that's my cue," Bill said, slamming a palette down just as Candyman entered the passage. It staggered him, Bill grinning and running for the exit as Candyman smashed the palette in fury. "Pleasure meetin' you, Danny boy!"

Bill and Helen dashed through the exit, a barrier coming up to block Candyman as he tried to follow. The ghostly killer scowled… and then chuckled. "Another time, perhaps… After all, we have all the time in the world now, Helen my dear…" He felt mild approval from the Entity, along with an admonishment to do better next time.

Bill and Helen walked on through the fog. "So… So now what?" Helen asked.

"Keep walking until you see the campfire," Bill said. "That'll take us to the camp we all live at in-between trials. Used to be just tents we scavenged and whatever comfortable place we could until our numbers got up to the forties. Then the Entity provided a full campground with cabins for us."

"There's over forty people trapped here?" Helen said softly.

Bill nodded, scowling. "Started out with just four. Then the Entity started building a collection," he said. "Different worlds, different walks of life…" He shook his head. "It ain't much of a life here, but we stick by each other." He looked at her. "Just keep winning. Every time you escape means that the Entity gets less to eat."

Helen frowned. She… wasn't happy about that. But what could she do about it? "...What about Claudette and Nicolas?"

"They'll reappear in a few hours out of the graveyard," Bill said. "It'll be fine, don't worry."

Helen just nodded, taking his word for it. And sure enough, they arrived back at a campground. A man with a mechanical hand greeted them. Helen thought it was Bruce Campbell from the Evil Dead movies, but it turned out to be Ash Williams himself. Then she saw Laurie Strode, from the Halloween movies, and another young man said that she was a movie character too, that she had been played by someone named Virginia Madsen.

It was all a lot to take in. She ended up sitting at the edge of the water near the campground lake, staring out at the moonlit water. Everyone else, understanding perfectly, left her alone so she could process everything.

After several minutes, Claudette came down, sitting beside her. Helen hugged her tightly, glad to see her again. "I'm so sorry! I shouldn't have left you…" Helen said.

Claudette shook her head. "No, it's okay," she said. "We've all made that mistake sometimes. Even me." She smiled. "And sometimes, its honestly not worth it to go back to save someone. Sometimes the killers like to watch to see if someone comes back."

"This whole thing is a nightmare…" Helen said. "And now I find out I'm a movie character to some people?" Claudette bit her lip, looking away. Helen sighed. "...And I'm one in your world too, aren't I?"

Claudette grinned. "If it helps any, I enjoyed it," she said.

Helen laughed. It was a humorless laugh of someone who'd just given up and decided to roll with it. "...So how'd it end? Last thing I remember is dying in the bonfire…"

Claudette fidgeted. "Well… It switches back to your cheating boyfriend and his new girlfriend…"

Helen scowled. "His new younger girlfriend…" she muttered.

"The apartment is a lot less vibrant than it was when you were there… and your boyfriend's feeling guilty about it. He says your name five times in front of a mirror, turning the lights off on the last time, and… well…"

Helen blinked, realizing. "...I'd turned into a Candyman?" she said softly.

Claudette nodded. "You pretty much eviscerated him," she said. "Left the body so that the girlfriend would probably be blamed for it."

Helen facepalmed. "Oh shit…" she said. "Well… Is it bad that I don't feel bad about that?"

Claudette giggled. "Considering how he treated you? No," she said. The two women hugged again. "I'm sorry about all this…"

"Did you bring me here? Then don't apologize for what you didn't do," Helen said softly. "I'm the goof who stuck her nose in where it didn't belong…" She sighed. "Legends like Bloody Mary and the Candyman… I just had to go and study them."

"Never be ashamed of curiosity," Claudette said firmly. She chuckled, and added, "Just be aware of what it did to the cat…"

"Nrraoo," mewled a voice.

Helen blinked. Claudette smiled. "Well, not that cat," she said as Jonesy the cat trundled up to Helen and nuzzled against her. "That's Jonesy. He came in with Ripley."

"Hey sweetie!" Helen said softly, picking up the orange cat. She gently stroked it, Jonesy purring. "Please tell me he doesn't go into the trials."

"No, thankfully," Claudette said. "Plus about a third of the killers are cat lovers and will gang up on any that threaten it."

Helen smiled, gently scritching Jonesy's ears. "Well… maybe this won't be all bad, then…" she said. "Definitely BAD, I'm not looking forward to being hooked again. But…"

"Not awful all the time?" Claudette said, Helen nodding. "The trials are what you make of them. The most important thing to remember is this – you aren't alone." She hugged Helen again, the two women staring out into the night, just savoring each other's presence. Helen sighed softly. There was a lot to take in. Candyman mentioning a Hive, the Trials, the other killers… But maybe things won't be as bad, since she's not in this by herself...

TO BE CONTINUED…

Clue for next time…

Ba-dum… ba-dum… badum badum badumbadumbadum…