Both she and Evan jumped back from the explosive sounds. They watched, speechless as the last of the energy bled out of the Funhouse. The building began to rapidly dim into the surrounding darkness. As it faded the weight of the building settled with a deep groan of its death throes, and its shape disappeared behind a curtain of darkness. The embers of the Funhouse’s last flash of light glowed before their irises.
Just like that, the prison that called itself a Funhouse was gone.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Doorway
The light from their torch held back the night’s oppressive depths once again their sole illumination as they were cast adrift in a sea of darkness weighed down by the heavy silence. In the black emptiness, the sound of their ragged breathing felt like a veritable windstorm, and the thunderous pulse of Erin’s heartbeat pounded in her ears.
She turned away from the direction of the Funhouse and began to walk with Evan in tow. Despite the stillness, there was an external alertness in the air. They could feel eyes staring at them, invisible in the darkness. Evan’s hand trembled within hers. He wasn’t the only one shaking.
“It’s okay, honey. Momma’s here,” she said, trying to sound reassuring.
He glanced up at her, and his eyes constricted as the torch shown in his pupils. He then gazed back into the darkness, trying to look everywhere at once. His voice came back to her in a barely audible whisper. “I know you are, Momma, but they are too.”
Erin stared down at him as they strode. She swallowed a few times before she asked him hoarsely, “Who’s out there, baby?”
He remained silent and merely shrugged while he kept his vigil as they walked. They only walked about a dozen paces when she froze in her tracks. The torchlight fell up on a concrete wall directly in front of them. At its center was a heavy metal door laying wide open.
This wasn’t just any door. It was that door, the one she had barely escaped with her mother’s help. Beyond this doorway was a creature just like the ones in the murk of the waterpark and this endless world, but far more powerful. It was the same one that had reached out and taunted her within the Funhouse itself. She suspected that a being this powerful must be the master of this entire realm.
“How could we already be here?” she wondered. She had traveled miles on end just to reach the Funhouse. How could they already be back to the beginning when she and Evan had just begun their journey?
This place follows rules of its own, her mother had told her.
She looked at the door. There couldn’t be any denying it. This was indeed that very same door, resting wide open like a hungry mouth eager to devour anyone foolish enough to draw too close. The dense smell of decayed leaves wafted past its threshold like a force unto itself. The darkness that lay beyond the door seemed so much darker and sinister than the universe of night that surrounded them. Even the light of their torch had difficulty piercing its depths.
Though she dreaded the thought, the door’s appearance suggested this was their only way out. She had to return to the exact place that she had barely escaped with her life and soul intact. It was the place that captured her little boy and pried his body and soul apart.
Trembling Evan said, “Momma, I don’t want to go in there.”
She squeezed him tightly to her. “I know, honey. I’m scared too.”
“No, Momma, I’ve been in there before. That’s where something caught me when I came here from the slide!”
“I know, honey. But this is where we have to go. I’m sure of it. The only way to leave this evil place is through there. Evan, baby, we have to go through that door to find our way home. Can you feel it?”
Evan’s tiny face registered the intuitive pull that told him the same thing as his mother, but he was overtaken by his terror. “Momma, you don’t understand. There is something bad in there! Very bad! It’s really strong and it knows what you’re thinking! It’ll get us as soon as we step inside!”
“No, it won’t.” she told him calmly.
“It will!” he shrilled.
She stooped down and cupped his face in her hands to look directly into his eyes so filled with dread and tears. “No it won’t, honey. Do you know why it will not harm us?”
He shook his head as he rubbed his eyes with one hand. “No.”
“It can’t harm us, because we have this.” She held up her torch.
“Why?”
“Well, that creature in there is made up darkness like the things that are staring at us from somewhere out in the night,” she nodded to darkness beyond, “Neither of them can stand the light. If the light touches them, it will burn them.”
“It will?” he asked his eyes wide.
“It will,” she confirmed.
“You just hold on tight to my hand, and I’ll hold on tight to yours, while I hold the torch above us, and we will get through this.”
“Okay.”
His grip tightened on hers. She squeezed his hand reassuringly and tried to give him her warmest, most confident smile. “Come on, baby. Let’s go home.”
He didn’t look convinced as he looked back up at her. “Momma?”
“Yes, honey.”
“I want to tell you that I love you.”
She paused. She knelt back down to him again and pulled him into a hug. “I love you too, sweetie.”
“Thanks, Momma. I just wanted to tell you one more time. Just in case…”
Erin fought hard to keep the tears from flushing through her eyes again. “I understand. You just be sure to hold tight onto my hand, okay?”
“Okay,” he told her.
With those less than reassuring words echoing through her head, they both stepped across the threshold of the doorway into the dark den.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Beneath the Leaves
Erin’s foot immediately sank to her knee below the surface of the dark foliage. She stumbled forward and a scream escaped from her lips. Evan's cry echoed hers.
She would have consoled him, but she was concentrating too hard on keeping the torch from falling into the leaves. The countless years of accumulation would have provided enough fuel for a firebomb of tremendous proportions. It was not the kind of thing that she wanted to be in the epicenter of.
She caught herself as she stumbled on her third step. She checked on Evan. His face broke out of the leaves with a gasp. Fat tears fell onto her shoulder as he visibly fought for self-control.
“It’s okay, honey. I have you. I'm right here.” Where did they go from here? She knew that were supposed to enter this place, but she had no idea where she should go from here. Slowly, she carefully climbed down the incline holding on tight onto Evan’s hand.
The metal door behind them produced an explosive thunderclap as it slammed shut. They both jumped and cried out in unison. Evan lost his self-control and was reduced to full-out sobbing.
Erin steadied her footing, then scooped him up with her free arm and slowly began to rock him making shushing sounds. “It’s okay, honey. I have you. I will protect you.”
“I never thought of you as a liar, Erin.” The dark voice's harsh whisper seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at once.
Erin could feel the cold amusement in its voice and she felt nothing short of loathing for it. Evan began to cry again. “Don’t listen to it, honey,” she consoled him. "It won’t come any closer as long as we hold this.” She indicated the torch and glared out into the darkness. “It’s afraid of the light, because it knows that the light will burn it like it burned the others.”
“Is that what you think?” it asked. “What makes you think that your insignificant light can breach the surface of my leaves? The sharp rustling of leaves erupted as the voice’s owner charged them like a hungry shark.
Evan let out an ear-piercing scream as he tried to climb higher up on Erin’s shoulders. Erin tried to wrestle him into a better hold as she turned to shine the light in the direction of the leaves rustling, trying not to fall into the leaves
herself.
“Stop!” she shouted.
Both Evan and the thing in the leaves froze. She eased Evan down into a better position as she spoke out into the darkness. “You can’t do anything to us.”
“Now what would make you think that?” the cold voice inquired.
This time it was Erin whose voice was bitterly cold. “It’s really very simple. If you knock us down into your filthy nest, the torch will fall with us. That would bring light to your world in an awful hurry.”
“That would destroy you and your whelp,” it told her savagely.
It was her turn to smile. “I guess it would, but at least we’d get to take you with us.”
“You will take nothing!” it snarled.
“So let us pass without any problems. We just want to find our way home.”
Cold amusement returned to the dark voice. “The only exit from my den has already closed behind you when you entered here with your whelp. You escaped me once I do not intend to let you do so again. That little light of yours will not last the night, and I can wait for it to burn out. I have waited here for an eternity. What is a little longer? When your flames burn out, that is when I will feed.”
“You’re lying.”
“Am I? I guess we shall see, won’t we?”
Erin briefly contemplated putting the flames into the leaves just to kill the creature and save them from the fate of being a meal or worse.
The voice answered her dark musing. “Oh, I don’t think you will do that, my dear. It will damn your soul to a fate worse than what I have in mind. The gesture itself will be futile. Your flames will never touch me, and I will return to devour your charred flesh.
“Momma,” Evan said a in a small voice, “make him stop.”
The voice said, “Oh sweet, sweet, succulent Evan. Your mother cannot make me stop.”
“Don’t you talk to him!” Erin shouted. “And we will find our way out!”
“Will you?” it said with a hint of a sarcastic chuckle. “This is a big place and you are welcome to look for your imaginary exit. I will see you when it gets dark.”
A chill ran up her spine. She nervously looked at her torch. Was it right? The torch hadn't diminished yet, but would it? It was once again a race against time, and time was not on their side. Without any other options before her, she started to wade forward looking for a way out. She descended the hill that she had so arduously climbed up to escape earlier.
As she travelled further into the dark voice’s lair, the leaves’ level rose on her. She soon found herself waist deep in the foliage. Evan cringed openly as his feet and ankles dragged through the leaves.
“It’s okay, honey. I know you’re scared, but I’ve been in here before too. We’re going to find our way out.”
She continued offering encouragement and affirmation to raise both their spirits and to distract Evan from any noises that the dark voice made around them.
All she could see ahead of them was the sea of dead leaves, swallowed up into the darkness beyond.
Even though it had remained silent through her trek, she had the distinct sense that the shadow dweller was still lurking somewhere nearby. Evan’s expression sobered as he began to look around in an apprehensive vigil. She gave him a smile and kissed him on the forehead. He looked up at her with some surprise and a small smile of his own.
“I still cannot get over how brave you are, honey,” she told him warmly.
“Really?”
“Yes,” she nodded, “Daddy would be so proud of you.”
He beamed. “Really?” His expression became wistful as he said simply, “I miss Daddy.”
“I miss him, too.”
“He will miss you too! For all of eternity!” the dark voice said harshly from directly in front of them.
Erin startled and took a step backwards.
The rustling of leaves in front of them grew louder. “Your husband will be left only with his memories of his missing wife, child and, oh yes, his unborn daughter. The ensuing nightmares will drive him to the brink of his sanity. Who knows, your precious Scott might even contemplate suicide.”
“Stop it!” she snarled.
“You watch your tone, Erin!” The owner of the voice moved forward swiftly. She took another involuntary step back. “You might upset your dear, sweet child.”
A thought occurred to her with divine clarity. It’s herding me away from my path ahead.
The dark thing roared, the cataclysmic howl vibrated through her very marrow. She had heard once that the roar of a lion could be heard from over five miles away. This sound surely would have paled a big cat’s primal cry.
A sudden warmth spread over her hip and abdomen where she held Evan. “Sorry, Momma,” he whimpered. Erin kissed his forehead with a shush, surprised she held her own pregnant bladder. But the indication of her son’s sheer terror now steadied her, charged her with a cold maternal anger. It “brought her momma bear up,” as Scott would have said.
There was a sudden change in the rustling of the leaves, and at the perimeter of the light cast by her torch, Erin could see something moving beneath the surface, rushing towards them.
Erin stood firm with a calmness that belied the grave danger they were in. “Get out of my way,” she said.
To emphasize her words, she thrust the torch out in front of her as a shield.
As if her words were fired from a cannon, the encroaching thing not only stopped dead in its tracks, but rebounded backwards as if struck. Now it was her turn to press her advantage. Erin began to stride purposely towards it. Her enemy continued to shrink back from her reluctantly. As it retreated, it continued to hurl its verbal assault.
“I will flay your flesh and make your brat watch as I suck the marrow out of your bones! You will scream your agonies for an eternity before me!”
It’s afraid! she thought with fascination.
“I will show you the true meaning of fear!”
“Be quiet!”
The dark voice silenced instantly as Erin looked down at the little boy in her arms who had shouted. Evan glared at its position in the darkness.
“Me and Momma wanna go home! Now go away!”
Fiercely proud, she looked up from her son at the darkly-shrouded thing. “I think you should listen to him.” She continued to walk forward. The dark thing did not threaten them any further, but she could feel it still watching, waiting.
After several minutes Erin realized that she was climbing an incline to the top of a small hill. As she reached the top of its crest, she looked down the slope and saw something reflect their light back up at them. She squinted and the object in question came into focus her. She nearly jumped with glee. Less than fifty feet down the slope was the metal handlebar and the cylindrical top of a tube slide poking out of the leaves.
She pointed her finger excitedly. “Evan look!”
Evan twisted around to see. His eyes found it much faster than hers initially did. “That’s . . . that’s a slide. Is it . . .” His worried eyes finished the question, “Is it safe?”
She answered him with a bright smile. “It’s our way home, honey! It has to be!”
“Really?” His face was hopeful but disbelieving.
She nodded, “Really.”
She gave him a fierce hug. When she released him she looked at him, with tear-soaked eyes. “Come on, baby. Let’s go home.”
As she took her first triumphant step towards the final exit, something big and black as the night exploded out of the foliage with an ear-splitting scream of rage and agony as it crashed into her. Her hand flailed out and the torch flew up in the air.
In the spinning shadows Evan shrieked as he was torn from her grip by an enormous force. Erin was yanked off her feet as Evan and her persecutor sped away.
“No!” She burst up with a shriek as she tried to wade after them.
The light above her drew her eyes, and Erin’s fevered mind latched onto the object’s significance as her torch fell toward the
surface of the dry leaves.
She reached out and caught the torch just before it could ignite the leaves.
As she caught it, the dark voice called in her mind with a triumphant hiss, Your son is mine!
“Evan!” she screamed.
She could just see the impossibly huge mound rapidly move out of the range of the light. In its wake Evan’s small hand reached out of the leaves as it too slid into the darkness.
Erin rushed after them awkwardly. She raised her torch for better lighting when something about it caught her eye. She was holding the torch by the flaming end. Its orange flames flickered between her exposed fingertips, but the flames did not hurt her. In fact, it felt warmly pleasant. She grasped the torch with her other hand and check for damage. There wasn’t a single or even ash on her skin, let alone a burn.
In her head she could hear her mother’s voice repeat, “As long as you hold onto this light, a part of me will always be with you. Its flames will help protect you and Evan from the dangers as long as you need it.”
“It was a message,” she breathed.
“Momma!” Evan’s shout came from out in the darkness.
“Evan be brave!” she shouted as she swung the torch down into the leaves like a mallet.
The effect was instantaneous. Fire flashed through the years’ worth of decaying leaves with the speed and power of a bomb. The world of darkness blazed into a world of light. The roar of the flames was mindboggling. Only a shriek of the purest agony screeched louder than the flames themselves.
She rushed through the maelstrom of fire towards the source of the horrifying sound. Burning leaves swirled out of her way as she rushed forward. The bright fire enveloped something made of the pure night. The creature that owned the disembodied voice rolled painfully as the light tore away and vaporized chunks off its amorphous form. A large clawed hand of shadow rose up convulsively above the rest of its burning form before it too became nothing but light.
She ran harder. Suddenly something crashed into her belly, knocking the air out of her. Erin’s eyes fell upon a smaller figure clutching her around her middle. Overcome with emotion, both she and Evan fell backwards laughing and crying.
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