A/N: It's another WP78 Halloween Spooktacular(!)

I've been so damn slow at writing, but I figured I'd at least attempt this.

We're going into AU territory again! Something I do not do often, at all(I can count on one hand my AU/alt timeline material), but this one sort of cried out for it. I was trying to figure out a way I could get this working otherwise, but my creative side wanted to branch out into so many 80s and 90s horror slashers that AU won out. Which, hey, it's fine by me. Maybe some AU is what my creativity needs right now.

With City of the Wolves on the way, I remembered how much fun I had at writing one of my favorite 'horror movie monsters', Freeman, in my other AU-story, Twisted Justice. While he was not the focus of the story(appearing, if I recall, only in two chapters, and then only parts of them, as that was focused on a what-if Jhun Hoon went insane story-btw-if you like horror tributes and gore, it's over in my collection!), he was fun.

I got an itch, after watching some of my fall horror picks(lots and lots of 80s stuff with a bit of 90s and maybe dipping into the 2000s, but not much, it's 85% 80s), and being saturated with Garou talk, to maybe try to create something in this vein again. I'm trying to capture a 'movie feel' with this one.

So, here we go. It's an AU, it takes place in the Northeast, in a fictional Massachusetts town. It's easier to get the requisite cool fall weather of the setting there, and it's a little tribute to Stephen King, who loves writing up there as well. Taking place late in the year 1999, there's a few little changes I made to this little horror-movie AU(Freeman originally being from the 80s coming over, not only liking death and thrash metal but being in a band, and so on), but I will make sure to be dropping in some shout-outs. I decided to make it 1999 as that was the year the OG Garou came out; I know that the *actual* game takes place in the mid 2000s, but, again, it's an AU so I'm kinda fudging the timelines here. To give the story a bit of an older feel, I moved it back to '99.

As a side note, being an AU horror movie tribute, there will be heavy use of OCs in this. So just a head's up. There is very little 'South Town' here(though some!) and not a whole lot of canon characters(again, there's some!) Of course, our 'movie monster' is going to have some unexplained abilities that puts him on a movie-monster level; I really have no idea what Freeman is or isn't capable of in the game itself-I know he has a fighting style that involves him ripping people apart with his bare hands and that he's kind of scarily resilient, but this story I am pretty sure will have him doing Jason-level antics that may be a little more than one might expect from the game. Just mutter the MST3K mantra.

I'll probably list the influences at the end, if you don't pick them up, but brace yourself for lots and lots of influences, pokes, and tributes in this one(and possibly a few straight rip-offs.) It's a shameless 80s Horror Man Does Murder In Lots of Creative and Nasty Ways movie-fic, featuring one of my favorite SNK bad guys.

So yeah. Without further ado here, I do hope you all enjoy it!

Magistrate Hotel, Hollisfield, MA, October 30, 1986

–

"How long has he been in there?"

"Don't know. Not long. Why the hell aren't the cops busting in there!?"

"Afraid it's a hostage situation." The reporter, Vincent Burton of the Hollisfield Daily, rubbed his chin. "Don't want to risk anything more, I guess."

"He's killing people in there! " The blood-spattered hotel concierge rubbed his hands together, wishing he could get said blood off of himself. He had thrown up everything in his stomach already as he tore out of that cursed hotel. First, when his workmate met a grisly end at the hands of the madman. He could've really gone without seeing his eyes gouged out and his guts spilling all over the floor as the killer chuckled, his voice going between a harsh whisper and a terrifying shriek. The second heave was due to the doorman who, upon tripping and falling, had gotten his head crudely kicked open as the man walked slowly past him, a sadistic grin on his face as he did so. Somehow, the blood-soaked, orange-haired killer had missed the concierge hiding near the coats; the minute he heard another scream as the killer reached the top of the stairs-he thought he saw someone's arm get pulled off as if the killer was tearing apart a ragdoll-he simply ran out the door, managing to finally find it in him to move. He threw up once more outside, though at this point, it was nothing but dry heaves.

Sirens blasted in the background as two more cars pulled up; two officers were already on the scene, guns drawn at the door. Three more officers got out, one of them with a long rifle. He nodded at the other two, taking a position over at the side, hoping to get a clean shot when the man walked by one of the windows.

Vincent hurriedly scribbled down some notes, his tape recorder out. He did not get in the way of the officers, as he was just there to cover the night's insanity for the next day's paper.

One of the officers actually came up to the man, though, nodding.

"What do you have?" he asked, knowing that Burton was a perceptive fellow. He tried not to let the chaos going on around them distract him.

"The guy came here after the incident at the concert hall. I caught up after I heard about the drummer's death. He simply went right inside, killed one of the fellows at the front desk, and according to the concierge, two more. At least." He looked over, more and more confused and terrified hotel patrons running outside. "He's got to be on some insane levels of drugs," the reporter said, somehow managing to stay level-headed through this insanity. "He's pulling people apart. That...shouldn't be possible."

"Yes. And there's still too many in there to open fire, still. We are placing a sharpshooter, at least." The cop nodded, and walked over to the front, trying to lead as many to safety as possible so they could hopefully get to storm the place.

After what seemed to be forever, but was only a couple more minutes, the sharpshooter stood. He took out his binoculars, nonplussed.

"I think he just…killed himself!?"

"What?"

"I thought saw him by the window. Hard to tell if he had someone with him or not, so I couldn't take the shot. But then I think I saw him...tear out his own goddamn throat!"

"What the hell? Vincent, are you getting this?"

"Yeah. Yeah I am."

Magistrate Hotel, Outside, Hollisfield, MA, October 1999

–

"Oh! You never heard the story?"

"I'm not from around here, remember?"

"Ahh yeah. West coast." The young man rubbed his hair. "This place used to be some old hotel. I think it was made into a hotel before the turn of the century? Before that , it was some creepy Victorian place, I guess for some rich folks who passed it down for a long time. And before that, wouldn't you know it…"

"Yeah. Bunch of witches and warlocks killed." A young woman snorted.

"Ahh. Of course there were." The fellow being told the story chuckled. "So what happened?"

"Well, it was one of those things. The place had a buncha bad luck attached to it, they said. Coincidence, probably, but some occult experts swore it's because of the place's bad vibes."

"They were probably right," the other young woman replied.

"I dunno if they were or not, but a lot of bad stuff happened over the years. I think one time there was a fire in one of the other smaller side houses that ain't there anymore. An accident. Way back. Before it became a hotel? Would have to go look that up. I think someone hung themselves in the barn at some point, too? All legends, but who knows if they were true. The fire probably was, since some old pictures show a side house and it's definitely not there anymore. But the last straw was one night near Halloween back about a decade ago. Maybe a little more?"

"1985 or 86 I think? I kinda remember hearing about it on the news, but I was young. Four or five? I used to hear the TV in the other room."

"I don't think I heard about it, but my parents made me go to bed early upstairs back then."

"So...around that time, some dude in a death metal band holed himself up here after killing a bunch of people. Took himself out when they had the place surrounded. Apparently shoved his own hands through his guts or tore out his own throat or some wild shit."

"How the fuck did he do that?"

"I heard he was the bass player. Strong hands, I guess."

"Or...maybe it's just an urban legend."

"I dunno, man. Death metal bass is hard on the hands. They hit those things hard."

"Okay, okay, whatever. How the hell did all of this come about?"

"I like reading stuff like this," the quieter young woman said. The smallest of the group, she was also into similar music and aesthetics, as well as her share of true crime, and loved reading up on haunted histories. "Now that I think back…there was a band from South Town. Or was it Second Southtown? I read about it on a website during computer class when I was sneaking online."

"Yeah! Florida death metal was big then, I think I heard? Well, in the circles, anyway. Florida versus New York, was it?"

"Yeah. That was it." The tallest young man nodded. He was familiar with some of the music. "Different sounds. I'm partial to Florida's, myself, from what I've heard."

"Well, the band on tour. Was going to be a Halloween tour...at least that was the plan. It started early October, and I think ran up and down the East Coast? I didn't go too far into it, but apparently there was an argument between the band and their manager. About pay or something."

"Sleazy manager maybe?"

"Could be. Well it escalated…and the bass player…I forget his name, they called him by some stage name? He had moved to South Town from England a few years before, something about street fighting. But they had gotten him in after their old bass player quit."

"Right. South Town's got stories about that. They love that shit there. Attracts fighters from all over the world, even. I think I even remember a dude's brother-one of the mallrats from a few years ago-might have gone to try his luck there."

"I think I remember who you're talking about. But I guess because of that, the band had the idea to use him to scare the manager. Threaten to rough him up a bit, since he could back up the words." She took a drag on a fresh smoke. "I think they may have used him as security or something, but I don't remember it all. Would have to find the site again."

"Then what?"

"He roughed him up alright. No one knows what happened in that room, but some said they heard screams, and the bassist comes out, covered in blood and little...bits of stuff. Not a damn weapon on him, either. The manager was in there and from what they say, he didn't have a face anymore. Or half his head. Or a neck. I think I heard he even had half an arm missing." She snorted. "Been looking for the crime photos. They sound too gnarly to be believed."

"Of course you'd look for them."

"Holy fuck. Is that true?"

The other young man took out his own smoke; the girl next to him lit it as he dug in his jeans for a lighter. "I remember hearing some crazy shit on the news. Not exact details. But yeah. I think there's truth to all of this."

"All I know is after that, the drummer ended up dead that night as well, along with two cops, and a couple of hotel workers. It was indeed still a hotel then. Not sure why he went at the drummer...I guess he tried to stop him? Corpses were in some horrible states, the old articles said. Didn't get too far into details indeed, though. If the one reception guy was any indication, those others were gory messes."

"How the fuck does a dude do that?"

"I heard there's drugs that can make people super strong?" the tall fellow said. "Sometimes they need like, a bunch of grown dudes to hold a guy down on one of those trips."

"Could be? Would at least sort of explain some of it."

"Anyway…they found him dead, too?"

"Yeah. Up in one of those rooms. Dunno which one, but from what the reports said, they had the place surrounded, but then someone yells that took himself out. They planted him in a nameless grave in the mausoleum. Closed this place for good. No one wanted to come here after all of that. From the stories, they probably couldn't get all the blood out."

"Why didn't they tear it down?"

"Protected landmark."

"Gotcha. Leave it be, but shut it up." He looked at it. "Place really does look wrong, don't it?"

"Always wanted to see inside."

The other girl blinked, shaking her head. "You two aren't…"

"You know we are."

The other fellow shook his head. "Oh, godamnit." He looked up. "Well at least we got an hour of daylight left." Shoving his free hand in his pocket, he checked out the grounds. "Where did they bury the guy anyway?"

"Morning Star Cemetery."

"...Wasn't that the place…"

"That they buried all the people they killed here way back? Yes."

He sighed.

"Of course it was."