Happy New Year, guys! I always love getting to say that as time moves by. I hope you all had a great Christmas, Hanukkah, New Year's Eve, etc. I did. Moreover, my birthday also happened, so I'm now 27 years old. Not a major milestone, but I now have another year under my belt.
I had a blast writing this chapter, which focuses on Mike and June, as I always loved their dynamic as best (human) friends. Plus, I finally get to tackle a topic I've alluded to for a long time: Twilight. That's right, you better believe it's a major plot point! The whole "vampires and werewolves in Washington" conversation from the Halloween chapter of A Fun Weekend at Freddy's was a riff on the series, if I was being too subtle about it (I don't think so), and there have been several other allusions throughout my series.
I have history with the Twilight franchise, which is why I'm including it so heavily. I had - and still have - some distant family in the Seattle area, so my parents, sister and I visited them several times when I was a kid, so we also vacationed at Olympic National Park while we were already in the state. That included visiting the real-life town of Forks, where the series is set, at the absolute zenith of its popularity. I was 10 years old when the first Twilight movie came out, and I remember what a huge phenomenon it was between 2008 and 2012, and obviously, it was even bigger in Forks; merchandise and tour groups everywhere.
I have read the genderbent AU version of the first book that the author, Stephanie Meyer, wrote in 2015 (yes, that actually happened), but that's my only engagement with the series. I was never one of the people who made fun of it, though. If I haven't been clear, Twilight isn't canon to my stories - but "normal" vampires and werewolves might well exist in them! Anyway, this A/N has gone on too long, so I'll get to the story. Thanks to Silverment5 for reviewing since last time! Hope you all enjoy the chapter.
Sunday, August 6, 2017, 10:45 AM
Forks.
The name rattled around Mike's head, conjuring more images of eating utensils than a place. But it was the name of a real town on the Olympic Peninsula, "only" a five-ish-hour drive from home. Though geographically closer than Salem, Oregon, it was a longer trek because the peninsula was so rural; no interstates, just a smattering of highways connected by backroads, some of which weren't paved. Pretty much the whole interior was off-limits to development because of a huge national park and forest, so the main roads stuck to the coasts.
It was similar to the Cascade region around Whitewater in terms of demographics, geography and weather, but even more disconnected from the rest of the world.
I'm glad I don't live out here, Mike thought as he halted at the first stoplight he'd seen for over an hour. While he loved pastoral life, this was a little too extreme for him. A quick look around told him he was out of the literal woods for the moment, though. Instead, he and June were surrounded by buildings which disappeared into fog. Unlike Whitewater, though, some of these were greater than three stories tall, and he saw at least two more stoplights ahead of him instead of being just the one.
Port Angeles was the largest town on the Olympic Peninsula at around 20,000 people. Forks, on the other hand, was Whitewater's virtual twin in terms of population (and many other things, too). Still another hour to go, so he didn't get too uncomfortable yet. He looked to the right, hearing ocean waves crashing over the hum of the engine even if he couldn't see them.
"How are you holding up?" June asked from the passenger seat as the light turned green. "I know you're having a rough time mentally, but I'm wondering if you want me to drive."
"I - I'm all right, thanks," he answered, throwing her a glance. Felt alert enough to continue. A little hungry, but they decided to eat once they reached their destination. "Maybe on the way back, if that's OK with you."
The trip through town only took a few minutes. After that, the road pulled away from the invisible ocean and deeper inland. The sound of waves diminished, and even the occasional car that passed was relegated to a pair of headlights passing far off in the foggy forest. They may as well have been will-o'-the-wisps or sprites flitting in front of them. Again, Mike wouldn't be surprised if supernatural beings roamed a place like this, safe from humanity's prying eyes.
One did for certain. And if one did, more almost seemed likely.
June had pulled out her phone by this point, using it to look up news stories on Forks and the murder investigations there, just like she did on the first half of their excursion. Much as it pained Mike, every little update helped them. Maybe investigators discovered a clue they made public or something. He wasn't a cop, and he didn't even watch true crime stuff, so he didn't know how this worked! From what June said, though, it sounded like not much changed in the past few hours.
A dead, mutilated child had been found, and her death had been connected to a string of disappearances in Forks that lurked just under the radar for years. It had been over a week since the news broke, and little had been learned beyond that. Which was too bad, because the media circus that descended upon the town was out for blood.
We'll have to do it ourselves, Mike thought, drumming his fingers along the steering wheel.
Not much happened for the final hour of the drive other than seeing some animals along the side of the road that ducked back into the woods as he passed. Things only started to change once he got to the outskirts of Forks. A structure here, a billboard there, more cars going past. It happened slowly. Then, suddenly, they arrived. A population sign, a cemetery and an unsurprising number of vans with the logos of different news networks emblazoned across them.
Nothing was on fire, so Mike didn't know what the journalists here did. Were they waiting in their motel rooms and milling around until something happened?
"I wonder how long these reporters have to be here," June said as she looked out.
"Maybe another, um, week or two," Mike guessed, pulling those numbers out of his ass. "Or until something worse happens anywhere else in the country." Unfortunately, he didn't doubt that'd take long. After looking shocked for a moment, June's expression morphed into a smirk.
"Since we're here and there are barely any tourists, do you want to visit anywhere specific from your favorite book series?" His friend's shit-eating grin said it all; he rolled his eyes. It may have been perverse to joke, but they needed a little levity. "The Swan House or the high school, maybe? Or… I don't know any other locations." Hey, Mike found it impressive that she was able to name a single proper noun location from the series in question. She really didn't care for it after skimming the first Twilight book.
Twilight. While not as big of a deal those days, the vampire/werewolf romance-action extravaganza had been a cultural juggernaut even five years prior, and there was still a booming tourism industry in Forks thanks to the series being set there. Several of the places appearing in the books and movies were real, so they got the most foot traffic. As for specifics, he really didn't know or care. He surely would have been more familiar with the series if he had a younger sister instead of an older one.
He wondered if the town would recover from this; a sudden exodus of tourists understandably fleeing the serial killer picking their kids off might keep people away even after this eventually blew over.
Thankfully, Whitewater avoided becoming a tourist trap when it came to Fazbear's. Though a simple Google search showed an actual restaurant called "Freddy Fazbear's Pizza" to be there, the myth about it being somewhere in Utah caught on enough with the people interested in such things that the real place was dismissed as either a psyop distraction from the "real" Fazbear's or a cash-in on the legend, depending on whether they thought the stories were real or not.
He'd had to call the police on a few people over the years for harassing the animatronics, demanding to know "the truth about them"; Freddy almost had a conniption the first time it happened. Still, they handled it like champs, playing the "humans in costume" acts like a fiddle, and Mike was able to get the cops within minutes - not much else going on for the handful of officers in town. Of course, he wanted them out ASAP, regardless: the restaurant had a policy of not letting in adults without children even in Phil's day.
Mike wished he could have taken credit for people not paying much attention to his business (and he left some messages and comments on different forums calling it all bullshit, for all the good it did), but it really came down to blind luck and the inscrutable way people believed some things but not others. Just had to count himself lucky and hope the hype around the legends died down soon and never heated back up.
"Where do you want to eat?" June asked. Mike's stomach growled before he responded, like it had a mind of its own and desperately wanted food. He laughed at the timing. Guessed he was hungrier than he thought! Looked around for any offerings that appealed to him. His first thought was Burger King or its ilk - not because he liked fast food, but it was fast, and he wanted to finish this.
He hadn't seen any fast food offerings since entering town, though. Mike had heard of cities banning big chains in the name of health, to prevent eyesores, reduce traffic, and so on. He thought it was a great idea when those points were taken together - though Mike admitted he had plenty of incentive to support such bans as a restaurant owner who would lose business if Wendy's opened something nearby. Still, McDonald's wouldn't go bankrupt because they couldn't open a restaurant in a town that even most locals couldn't find on a map.
"Um, what about that place?" he asked as he spotted a firehouse red building between a decommissioned steam locomotive that must have been a public landmark and a motel full of the news vans. It caught his eye because one of the wings was oddly shaped, like a box truck stuck out of the side. The sign announced it as D BBQ. Barbeque sounded good to Mike. Hard to get any on the exact opposite side of the country the food originated in, so he hadn't eaten a lot before - and it wasn't Chica's favorite, despite her being a country girl at heart. Up to try new things, mundane though they may have been.
Mostly, though, it was the first place he saw. That was the main factor. He wanted to get in, eat, and get out.
"I'm down," June responded, so he pulled into the parking lot. Not many people there, so he checked online to see if it was open. Yeah, it opened 15 minutes prior at noon. The flight of so many from the town cut down on the business of places not even related to Twilight. Well, it meant they wouldn't have to wait long on their food.
Though he wanted to finish and go home, lunch stretched out longer than he expected. It wasn't due to anything specific. He and June just talked longer than they expected. Sports, current events, etc. As long as the abomination they caught wasn't involved. Nothing escaped their biting inquiry or notice: they should have been invited onto The View. Mike wondered, Is that a thing anymore?
Plus, the barbeque was really good. Smoky, tender and juicy, though he wiped as much of the sauce as he could off with a napkin. He never understood the point of slathering good meat with goop. It drowned out the flavor, in his opinion. Mike might have considered returning if it wasn't a five-hour drive. Even Chica's cooking wasn't great enough for that.
Still, he eventually found himself back in the car instead of the warm indoors, ready to drive into the thick of something awful. He didn't think it'd be particularly dangerous; the animatronics weren't around, and most of Auric's magic was strongest between midnight and the small hours of morning, so that wasn't a concern. Still, his palms sweated, and he felt the hairs on his arms raise. He closed his eyes and sighed as his friend sat beside him. While he could have done this alone, someone being with him lightened the burden.
According to the news, Alejandra - the girl Auric murdered - had been found in the forest east of Forks. That was where they needed to go. He hoped police hadn't cordoned off the area. Even if it were open, he wouldn't have been shocked if local folks with guns patrolled, looking for their own justice. How embarrassing it'd be to die from getting shot by some hapless dupe who thought him the monster.
He couldn't stand to think about it anymore, so he turned the key in the ignition and lurched into the unknown. His teeth chattered as much in fear as in anticipation of seeing a demon as it was to the frigid veil.
Auric already seemed to mock him as they drove through Forks. Different attractions had signs out front saying they were closed until further notice. A banner on city hall proclaimed a week of mourning for Alejandra and other presumed victims, which ended the next day. It was a place beset by senseless suffering nobody could explain. That was the way Whitewater used to be because of one bad day. His grip on the wheel tightened as he thought back to the breathing techniques Helen taught him in therapy to control his fear. Hadn't needed to break those out in a long time. They were enough to get him through, though, and he soon pulled up to a parking lot on the edge of the national forest. Many hiking opportunities here, of which this was one.
He scanned the area, seeing no one at the trailhead. Though the place didn't seem officially closed, nobody wanted to be in the wilderness with a deranged serial killer. All except them. Mike opened the door and stood before a collection of oaks and pines. They seemed to grow even taller as he stood in their shadows. The idea he was going to do this seemed crazier than ever. There were potentially dozens of square miles to search, and Auric had to be good enough at hiding to avoid multiple search and investigation teams combing the woods for him.
Mike hadn't been able to contact Auric in his dreams, so he didn't know they were coming, and he believed the monster could not magically detect his presence. Neither he nor June were superpowered trackers like Wolverine. They should have been out of luck. But two things nobody else knew about made Mike believe they had an edge finding their quarry.
First, Auric smelled horrible, like a rotting, molding house that was about to be condemned for public health. That was largely because of the golden Freddy costume he inhabited like a supernatural hermit crab, yet Mike believed part of the stench came directly from Auric, like the noxious golden miasma he spewed. Even in a forest ripe with the scent of natural decay, it'd stand out. The second way to track Auric was the cold he emanated. It was powerful enough to freeze an enclosed space in the span of a few hours, though it'd be much less potent outside, where the cold could dissipate, as opposed to a single locked room. A small drop in temperature might still be a clue.
He believed those two factors put together would be enough to let them find him after coming all this way. And persistence. They weren't going back to Whitewater until they found Auric, no matter how many days it took.
Wordlessly, Mike walked onto the trail, June beside him. The green canopy motionlessly hovered overhead, casting dappled emerald shadows on the ground. Gravel and sand crunched under his feet. June's, too. Something beyond the obvious unsettled Mike, though. It took a while for him to realize that was the only noise. It was a windless day, and the normal chattering birds and trilling insects were strangely absent. Maybe the forest here was always this way. More likely, he thought, the presence of incessant searchers or Auric himself quieted them. It made every muscle in his body tense.
That tension gave way to boredom after the first hour of searching. His nose was turned skyward and his skin ready to feel whatever sensation came his way. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. Tried not to lose focus, yet there was only so much anyone could do to feel engaged, no matter the stakes. Just kept his eyes on the trail ahead and tried to think about how much fun he'd have never doing this again.
"Hello, folks." Mike nearly jumped. For the first time in their walk, they weren't alone. Nor was it Auric. Instead, a police officer leading a German Shepherd-type dog came around the corner from the trail ahead. He looked for the same thing they did, even if he didn't know it. June tensed up, causing Mike to step slightly in front of her. Nothing his great charisma couldn't handle.
"Hello, o-officer," Mike said, not as intimidated as he expected. "Can we help you?"
"We aren't getting many visitors coming through here, with all that's happened recently," the officer spoke as he closed the gap, which gave Mike a better look at him. Middle-aged guy, a bit of a gut, and a moustache. Mike thought he looked more like a horseless mountie than an American cop. He stopped right in front of them, and Mike tried not to smile at how relatively short the guy was.
"May I see some ID from you both." While ostensibly a question, it was spoken as a demand. Mike was pretty sure he had a legal right to refuse, but there was no point making him suspicious when they didn't do anything illegal. The two prepared for this, and the officer had a good reason. Though Mike thought the fact he and June didn't immediately flee was good enough proof they were on the level. He surrendered his license, and June followed suit. Mike looked at his friend, who closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
As the cop looked them over, he casually asked, "So, what brings you nice people here? I assume you've heard of the terrible thing that happened last week."
OK, they were potential suspects in his mind. June's concern was warranted. "We, um, heard, and I'm very sorry about that. I - I hope whatever monster did that is brought down soon." And I hope it's because of us. "Anyway, we're, like, good friends and wanted to do some hiking. It's a long way from home, but we've heard that the wilderness a-around Forks is some of the best in the country." It wasn't a lie. They just left a little detail or two out about what they hoped to find in the wilderness.
"You heard right," the officer muttered, flipping over their licenses to read the backs. For a moment, Mike wondered if he'd call dispatch to run their ID numbers. That turned out not to be the case as he tucked the licenses between his meaty fingers like playing cards and handed them back to Mike and June. "Sorry to keep you nice people waiting, I just wanted to make sure everything was in order, which it is," he said. The dog stood there, eyes locked on Mike, but not making a single noise. Just like every other animal in the forest. "Stay safe out here… and stay out of trouble."
He continued his patrol, out to search for the killer - or, barring that, to card anyone else he came across. Hoped everyone brought IDs to spare themselves headaches. Mike watched him walk out of sight before hesitantly looking back to June.
"Are you OK?" Now it was his turn to ask her. To him, a cop was one of the less scary things to see that day.
"I worried that guy would assume I was doing something illegal, even if I'm not a serial killer," she sheepishly admitted, grimly smiling as she looked sideways at him. "I know that sounds dumb, and maybe it is, but it's how I felt." It took Mike a while to understand what she got at.
"I don't think it's dumb." Mike didn't think every cop was racist (especially because not every cop was white), but he was sure some were, whether they realized it or not. Besides, it would have been horribly tone deaf to chide her for something he had no way to know about firsthand. In fact, he was touched that she trusted him enough to confide that in him!
Racist or not, he hoped this was the only time they'd deal with the police. Mike still had that medical skeleton in the trunk… he really should have removed it for safekeeping. Maybe after they got back to work and wrapped this all up.
They had cell signal, being within a fairly inhabited area of an otherwise unpopulated peninsula, which was more than he could say about the spotty coverage at home. That allowed them to navigate while away from the beaten track.
Hours passed. A dozen times during those hours, Mike thought he heard or saw or smelled a hint of the monster. Time slowed, his body trembled, and then everything snapped back to the way it had been when he realized whatever he sensed to be either natural or a figment of his imagination. He tried to shrug these off, yet it became more difficult every time.
The sun pushed through the sky like a stone through water - inevitable, yet sluggish, at least beating on him dimly through the leaves, so sunburn wasn't much of a concern. Some things, like the lack of animal noises or wind, remained uncomfortably homogeneous. He and June paused only to eat a brief lunch of chips and sandwiches and for the occasional bathroom break. His body and mind slowly exhausted. Ticks dug into his flesh, no matter how much bug spray he applied.
He wondered if he should spend the night in discomfort or ask the cringe-inducing question of if June could pick off the ones on his back he couldn't reach… yeah, it'd be better to buy bottles of Vaseline and roll around in it. Eventually, they could go no further.
What could we do differently? he wondered as he tried not to scratch himself furiously. He leaned against a tree and felt a primal urge to rub against it like a bear or deer did to scratch itself.
They might try splitting up tomorrow so they could cover twice as much ground. Starting earlier would allow them to do more hours. Otherwise, he had no ideas.
Mike sighed, looked at his dying phone and realized they wouldn't get back to his car until after dark, unless they wandered to a nearby road and tried their luck hitchhiking. As he was about to suggest they call it for the day, Mike smelled the faintest hint of decay spirited to him on a puff of wind. Not regular rot, but the special kind that lingered and worsened as time passed. He'd only ever smelled one thing like it.
Part of him thought it couldn't be true. This must have been another mistake after so many false alarms and almost jumping at his own shadow for hours. June's nose wrinkling made him think otherwise, along with the fact it persisted more than a heartbeat.
His legs were suddenly concrete as he slogged through the undergrowth towards where he smelled it. Every inch, it became more nauseating, which put to rest the idea that this was a dead deer. He'd smelled those, and they weren't nearly as bad. Part of him wanted to run, but he couldn't. All of this would be for nothing, and they'd damn countless people.
"We can do this," June whispered from behind to psych herself up. He needed that encouragement, too. A wall of cold air slammed into him, and he knew once and for all that this was exactly what they sought. They were on the edge of a cliff.
Quite literally.
Mike kicked through a thick, thorny shrub, only to find his foot and half his body hanging in the air. He looked through the hole he created to find a 20-foot drop.
"Gah!" He screamed and wheeled his arms, feeling himself lurch over the edge. June grabbed his collar and yanked him back, making him land safely in a bed of sticks. Shouldn't have forgotten this place was on a mountain. "Thanks," he told his friend. He didn't want to imagine shattering his legs three feet in front of Auric, who'd take that opportunity to eat him alive.
The monster was down there. Just needed to follow him without falling. They walked a couple hundred yards down the ridge to a place where the drop shortened, hopped off and doubled back to where Mike nearly fell to his doom. It barely registered mere minutes after the fact. He'd had so many close calls that they no longer fazed him. The fear of another near-death experience was far worse for him.
The cliff he'd nearly tumbled from turned out to be the overhang of a rock shelter. Not a proper cave, but an indentation in the base of a rock where animals sometimes sheltered.
Just such an animal heard their approach and waited inside: a bear.
Mike felt his heart stop before it reluctantly kicked back into gear. The monster still wore the body it did for 30 years. Mike had thought he'd have abandoned it for something stronger or at least not smelling of a moldy, flooded basement. 17 years in the wilderness as opposed to 13 in a protected room made this frail form look far worse than before.
Holes, possibly from gunfire, were blasted through the torso, the lower jaw was held on by a few threads, and a shriveled twig was stuck in an eye socket, which Auric couldn't have cared less about. The husk was held together by magic and malice. It should have already fallen apart.
"We meet again, Warden." Auric's static, crackling voice was laced with poison. His jaw almost being detached created no hindrance; he sounded the same as the last time Mike heard him. Must have spoken through mystical means to begin with, since he lacked lungs.
"Mighty Auric, I, uh, nearly fall to my knees at the sight of your glory."
Vomit almost came with the words. It made Mike ill to give this monster fake praise, yet he knew something as proud and haughty as Auric would be swayed by flattery, which was why Mike and June came up with a few lines to use. Hated groveling to this thing, even if it was to advance their own ends. Speaking of which, he glanced at June, who cringed as she put on her own act.
"We didn't know each other well, but my father was the first person you fought in your great game. It only makes sense that I take his place." That part was true, at least. "He's dead, by the way," she added, a hair's breadth away from spitting on him. Mike believed she held back not out of fear of fucking this up, but because he wouldn't notice her contempt. If he ignored a stick in his eye like the parable of Jesus, he'd be unbothered by a little spit.
"An ignoble but fitting end. It will be your turns soon enough." His friend's face turned bright red as she doubtlessly imagined all the ways he'd suffer before they offered the mercy of letting him die. "What brings you miserable creatures groveling back to me, perchance?" Somehow smirked with his mangled mouth. "Whatever the reason, it is appreciated. You have finally learned your place at the feet of one infinitely your superior."
"We were l-looking for you to offer a contest. A game."
An eyebrow was raised. "I have not experienced one of those since I took my leave of you. What sort of competition did you have in mind?" Getting straight to business meant Mike and June no longer needed to suck Auric's dick.
"A fight to, um, the death. You versus all of us at that haunted house in Oregon." Mike was the one to offer it. Auric hated them all, but Mike knew the demon reserved the most antipathy for him. It was more on principle than anything, Mike believed, but he couldn't know the mind of something like Auric. And he didn't want to.
"Fazbear's Fright?" Even Auric had heard of it. Mike didn't know whether that meant the place was even more famous than he thought or if Auric stayed somewhat in the loop with culture and current events.
"We don't want the restaurant to get s-sucked into this, but it'd be nice to end this somewhere thematic." There was a moment of silence as Auric scratched his temple and leaned against the inner wall of the abri. Right then and there, Mike knew the monster would take the bait. The offer was too good to pass up, and there was nobody to make him think about this. "August 21, two weeks from now. Take it or leave it."
Alongside pride, Auric's biggest weakness was solitude. Despite being ancient and knowledgeable (even if most of that knowledge had been lost to the sands of infinite time), he had nobody to bounce ideas off or consult with. If he did, he might have been able to see through their deception. Like, they wanted to fight him somewhere "thematic"? That never mattered to them before. And why on a specific date? Thankfully, those weren't the questions he asked with the prospect of brutally murdering his greatest foes.
"An intriguing proposition. More climactic than smothering you in your beds 50 years hence, when you are weak, defenseless, practically small children again." Mike grit his teeth. Should have figured Auric already plotted that. What really got to him was the mention of children. They were the target of the monster's appetite of late, so they were on his mind. After this, he would never be able to hurt anyone again, let alone those who were too young to even comprehend what happened. "I accept."
His word was the best he could offer, and Mike believed him. As the demon once said, he was many things - but not a liar. What else would he do if not come? However, Mike didn't want to see him again before that day.
"Leaving so soon?" Auric asked as he turned away. It was rather ridiculous, Mike admitted. Driving and walking for 12 hours just to deliver one sentence to someone who couldn't be reached any other way. "Do you not want to hear what I have been up to? The people I've killed, just to spite you?" Mike paused mid-step and slowly turned back, finding the monster grinning at him without a lower jaw. "No, of course you don't. But know this, Warden. Every person I've strangled the life out of in recent years, it has been your face I imagined."
And Mike imagined caving Auric's face in right that second! The only reason he didn't was because they'd get that chance soon enough. He turned away again, resisting that animal urge. As he did, something dawned on him.
While Auric hid it well, Mike noticed the limp in his gait and an occasional wince. He was hurt. What made something like him feel pain? It couldn't have been from damage to the body, because it had always been somewhat messed up, and Auric would have abandoned the shell for another if it were the issue. His best guess was something invisible or spiritual, though he had no idea what. The more important question was if that could be used to their advantage.
He was all right for the moment, he told himself. Didn't know how he'd feel in an hour, a day or a week. Probably worse instead of better, because it'd give Auric's speech about how this was Mike's fault to sink in. Intellectually, he knew it to be untrue, even if the monster didn't see it that way. Auric would have killed these people anyway, because that's all he'd ever done, and Mike had no way to stop him before now. But the question of "what if" now hung in the air, and he wished there were some way to get it out!
Another deep breath. He tried to think about what would definitely happen in the immediate future.
They were going to drive to a motel and spend sleepless hours trying to dig all the ticks out of themselves and worry they'd develop Lyme disease. They'd sleep on uncomfortable beds on opposite sides of the one room like a married couple in a 50s TV show, which was appropriate because they were not, in fact, together. Then they'd leave for home and wonder if everything they'd done would be enough.
First, though, they needed to trek through multiple miles of brambles, honeysuckle and poison ivy to reach that car. And wouldn't that be fun?