Berkley Street Series Books 1 - 9: Haunted House and Ghost Stories Collection

by Ron Ripley

  “Hey,” Keith called out, drawing his pistol. “Hey!”

  When neither shape answered, he approached to within a few steps.

  In the faint amount of moonlight that filtered down through the leaf canopy overhead, Keith saw them. An older man and the deaf girl.

  They were both dead.

  Their eyes were too large as if pressure in their skulls had popped them part way out of their sockets. Each one's tongue protruded from between their lips. Neither had a weapon, but there was a phone on the path between them.

  “What the hell?” Moe asked.

  “Don’t know,” Keith said, not lowering his weapon. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up as he looked at the bodies.

  The One hadn’t killed the two people in front of him. They would have been still alive and listless, slowly drained of their life. Keith had seen the footage and knew what to expect. Throughout his time with the Watchers, he had also seen the bodies of people murdered by ghosts, and more than a few had looked like the older man and the deaf woman.

  Without much hope Keith said, “Check the phone.”

  Moe, with his own pistol at the ready, eased past Keith and dropped down into a crouch to retrieve the phone.

  “Dead,” Moe said after a moment. “Like the two of them.”

  “Definitely not good,” Keith said. “Got your iron?”

  “'Course I do,” Moe snapped.

  Keith stuffed his free hand into his pants pocket, withdrew his iron ring and slipped it over a finger. The metal was warm and reassuring. He reached up and touched the earpiece and spoke into the microphone that hung by his larynx.

  “Keith to base.”

  “Go,” Clair said on the other end.

  “We’ve got a problem,” Keith stated, and he summed up the scene on the trail.

  Her silence was worse than any curses she could have spoken.

  “What do you want me to do?” Keith asked.

  “Take the camera,” she ordered.

  Keith shined his light on the bodies.

  “There is no camera,” he replied.

  She did curse then, and Keith realized he was wrong. Her silence hadn’t been worse.

  "Backtrack towards me," Clair said when she had finished. "See if it was dropped before they were killed."

  “Copy that,” Keith said, and he dropped his hand from the radio. “Did you hear her?”

  Moe nodded. He looked up the trail and said, “This is bad.”

  “Of course it is,” Keith snapped. “If it wasn’t, hell, we wouldn’t be here.”

  Moe shrugged in agreement.

  Keith took his flashlight out, flicked it on, and aimed it at the path ahead. He had no idea what the camera might look like, and he had no desire to waste time in an effort to find it.

  When Moe turned to follow the trail back to Clair, the flashlight went out.

  Neither of the men said anything.

  Keith dropped the flashlight, holstered his weapon, and tried to anticipate the attack.

  Whoever it was, came up through the trail and ended his anticipation.

  Chapter 59: Traveling in Darkness

  Shane moved along a trail through the darkness with only Courtney beside him.

  The other ghosts had fanned out from their street, searching for the Watchers and anyone foolish enough to enter the woods.

  Shane held his .45 and listened as he traveled.

  The forest was silent.

  Neither bird nor beast, as the saying went, could be heard.

  And he knew why.

  The animals had abandoned the forest, given it over to the dead. If Shane had his way, he would have done the same.

  But there was a relative to speak to, and family relationships could be difficult affairs to handle.

  He doubted there would be anything easy about Samson.

  Courtney moved ahead of him on the slim game trail. She returned several minutes later, whispering, “Two women up ahead. Watchers.”

  Shane nodded his thanks and slowed down. His footsteps became silent. He blended in with the darkness. The women were loud, obscenely so. Their feet cracked twigs, legs and arms pushed aside branches, and they spoke in low but clearly audible voices.

  “This is ridiculous,” one said.

  “I know,” the other agreed.

  “Come on, we couldn’t just push him towards the One?” the first asked.

  Before the second could reply, they stepped into a shaft of moonlight.

  Shane let off two quick shots, and the women dropped. He waited a moment for his night vision to return. When it had, he moved forward. Both women were down, the slugs from his .45 having punched through their breastbones. He stepped in, drew one of their 9 mm pistols, and stood up. He put two more rounds in each woman's head, just to make sure.

  Shane wiped his prints off the 9 mm, and dropped it onto the stomach of the closest body.

  “Ready?” Courtney asked.

  “Yes,” Shane replied, and she took off again as he continued down the trail.

  It took her longer to return, and when she did, it was with grim news.

  “Two more teams, three each,” Courtney said. “They’re in a glade ahead of us.”

  “Are they stationary or moving?” Shane asked.

  “Stationary,” she answered.

  "Good," Shane muttered. Within a few minutes, he could see the tree line and the glade beyond. They were speaking, but their voices were muffled, making it impossible to decipher what was being said.

  But it didn’t matter.

  Shane left one round in the chamber, ejected the magazine, and slipped a fresh one in, giving him a full eight. He edged up to the tree line, got into a good firing position and took control of his breathing. The shots would be long for a .45, but not impossible. Not if he followed the old Marine mantra of ‘slow is smooth and smooth is fast.’

  And Shane followed it.

  The pistol barked six times, shell casings ejecting into the darkness.

  When Shane had finished no one remained.

  He walked out to the bodies, mindful of the two rounds he had left. Several of the Watchers were still alive. One, a younger man, was even attempting to draw his weapon.

  Shane did it for him, and like the first two he had put down, he finished off the rest.

  He cleaned the weapon as he had the first, dropped it down, and looked at the bodies. There was no sense of guilt. No feeling of remorse.

  "I've killed better men than you," he whispered to the dead and headed out once more for the home of Samson.

  Chapter 60: Alone

  Clair threw the handset out of the SUV with a snarl. She ignored the way it smashed into Gordon's car, and she stepped out to stand in the night air.

  She had lost contact with all of her teams.

  Whether they were alive or dead, she didn't know, although she was certain most of them had been killed. She had heard gunfire and lots of it. A heavy caliber weapon, possibly a .45, followed by the higher pitched report of a 9 mm.

  Clair felt certain that the .45 belonged to Shane, and she doubted any of her people had managed to shoot him. Especially since the heavier pistol had been fired first. Eight times. And then single shots from the lighter pistols. Those sounded more like people being finished off than the mad rush of fire from a prolonged gunfight.

  Muttering to herself, Clair went to the lead SUV, opened the trunk. She removed a sidearm for herself and a Daewoo shotgun. She slapped a 20-round drum magazine into place, each round loaded with 00 buckshot which consisted of nine small iron balls.

  Clair took out a second magazine, placed it into an ammunition bag, and then slipped the strap over her shoulder.

  She was going to have to go in after Shane.

  He couldn’t be allowed to get to the One.

  The situation, she felt in her heart, was still salvageable. She, if no one else, could still come out on top. The One would see to that.

  He would see her fealty. The One
would know.

  All Clair had to do was stop Shane.

  She could do it.

  She had to do it.

  And she knew she should have done it before.

  Armed and braced with fervent devotion, Clair went into the woods.

  Chapter 61: The Chestnut Tree

  Shane felt an electrical current run out of the woods on the other side of the glade in pulsating waves. He knew the sensation. He had felt it before.

  Standing amongst the dead in Jonathan Engberg’s house.

  Their energy had infused him with a renewed determination to see the job done. It had expelled all doubts.

  And as he drew nearer to his relative’s house, the energy increased.

  He knew it for what it was, the power of the innocents trapped by Samson. The dead boy had fed off it for centuries, and the Watchers wanted him to have more of it. Shane didn’t.

  It was as if the innocents knew Shane was approaching. For every step closer to the opposite tree line gave him increased strength. By the time he left the glade, Shane felt as though he could have leaped the distance to Samson's house if he had only known where it was.

  As he passed along the trail people appeared in the woods on either side.

  Young and old. Male and female. They were from every period of New England's history, and they watched him. In their eyes, he saw a desperate hope, and Shane knew he would either kill Samson or remain with the innocent, although he could not count himself among that number.

  Courtney was beside him, a comforting presence of bitterly cold air. On her delicate features was an expression of grim determination, and Shane knew she would stay with him until the end.

  He wished he could take her hand and hold it.

  Shane holstered his .45 as he drew nearer, the darkness becoming deeper as he crossed under the boughs of a magnificent chestnut tree. Soon he could see only a few feet in front of him.

  He didn’t slow down.

  He knew the path would be clear.

  Samson wouldn’t want there to be any obstacles for his victims to trip over.

  Shane was glad for that.

  When he reached the trunk of the chestnut, a strange, green tinted glow appeared. It illuminated the front of a battered house, and the stones of a small, colonial burial ground.

  The light also revealed bodies. Some sitting upright, others prone upon the ground.

  And Samson sat among them, smiling like a beneficent king.

  “Hello,” Samson said, his voice sweet and pleasant to the ear. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Shane.”

  “Shane,” Samson said, nodding. “What a nice name. I do not believe I have heard it before.”

  Shane didn’t respond to the statement.

  Samson evidently didn’t expect one. “Will you come and sit with me, Shane, and keep me company?”

  Shane nodded and moved forward. Courtney went with him.

  He sat down in front of Samson, and the little boy smiled at him.

  “Isn’t this nice?” the boy asked.

  “Sure,” Shane replied. He twisted the iron rings on his fingers.

  A perplexed expression flitted across Samson’s face.

  “Are you not happy to be with me?” Samson asked, a playful, hurt tone in his voice.

  “I don’t care if you’re happy or not,” Shane replied.

  The pleasant smile vanished from Samson’s face as he demanded, “What did you say to me?”

  “Pretty sure you heard me,” Shane said. “Unless you’ve gone deaf after all these years, Uncle.”

  Samson opened his mouth to reply, and then closed it, a confused look on his face. “What did you say?”

  “You’re my uncle,” Shane said. “Many times removed, but an uncle still.”

  “We are not related,” Samson spat. “All of my relatives are dead. You lie.”

  Rage blossomed on the dead boy’s face and he whispered, “I shall smother your falsehoods and you will choke to death upon them.”

  Samson’s body began to dissipate, the edges of it shifting into a dark mist, a fog that grew around the dead child.

  “I don’t lie, Uncle,” Shane whispered, and he drove an iron-ringed fist into Samson’s face.

  The mist that had built up around the boy snapped back into him, and the child himself didn’t disappear. He tumbled backward, jumped up and snarled, “How dare you? How can you?!”

  “Because, and because,” Shane said, getting to his feet.

  Samson sprang forward, striking Shane in the midsection and sending him tumbling over an emaciated man.

  Shane let out a curse as he got up. Samson stared at him, surprised.

  “Why didn’t I go through you?” Samson asked, looking at his small hands. “I should have plunged them deep into your innards.”

  Shane didn't respond with words. Instead, he moved forward and tried to grab Samson. The boy slipped away, passing through a seated person. Shane watched as the stranger shuddered and collapsed.

  “That’s what should have happened,” Samson hissed. “You should have died. Everyone I pass through, dies. Why are you different?”

  Shane answered with a kick, driving his foot into Samson’s thigh and sending him spinning backward. The dead boy passed through a trio of headstones and shrieked, “Answer me!”

  Shane grinned.

  Samson howled and jumped at Shane, who caught him easily and threw him through the wall of the house.

  The boy reappeared in the doorway a moment later, with several ghosts behind him.

  “Now,” Samson spat. “Kill him!”

  The ghosts rushed at him, and Shane’s hate brought a grin to his face.

  Samson’s dead were why he had worn the iron rings.

  His fists smashed into them, casting them back to their bones.

  In silence, Shane advanced on Samson and wondered what the boy might do next.

  “Save me!” the dead boy screamed, and those who still lived clambered to their feet.

  And that was something Shane had not expected.

  Chapter 62: On the Move

  Clair had come across multiple bodies, the last remnants of the Watchers, stretched out in death. Some had been slain by ghosts, the marks obvious to one who had spent so much time with the dead over the years.

  The rest had been killed by Shane Ryan.

  She found the last of the bodies in the glade, six of them.

  He had murdered them with a cold and brutal efficiency that Clair both admired and despised. Each one he had killed had been dropped by a single shot to the chest, with another to the head to make sure they wouldn’t get back up.

  Clair considered, for a moment, what an asset he would have been for the organization.

  And then she was out of the glade and into the woods. She could hear yelling in the distance, the voice of a child, outraged and furious.

  Shane had reached the One.

  A sense of panic welled up in her, and she sprinted down the narrow, dark path.

  Someone lunged out at her and Clair staggered to a stop as she brought the shotgun up. The weapon roared in her hand, the iron buckshot dissipating the ghost that had sought to stop her.

  Others appeared as well, but the shotgun was up, and she pulled the trigger again. She fired as quickly as she could, shooting anything that was potentially threatening.

  In less than a minute, she had taken down nine ghosts, and there was silence around her.

  Clair waited to see if any more would appear.

  None did.

  With her heart thundering in her chest, she moved on.

  Chapter 63: Out of Options

  Shane backed away from the living who were under Samson’s spell.

  Some walked towards him, others crawled, and a few dragged themselves across the earth. All who could, obeyed, and those who couldn't and were still alive filled the air with moans of anger and sadness.

  Shane knew some of the people who approached him had to be Watchers,
those caught within the snare of Samson’s voice. Others would be innocents, and Shane could not bring himself to draw his weapon and fire at them.

  A woman stumbled into him, her eyes feverish in the dim light, her skin hot to the touch as she grabbed hold of him.

  Shane tried to shake her off, but in spite of her frail appearance, she was strong. Her fingernails dug into his flesh, and she opened her mouth. Fetid breath engulfed him as he peeled back her fingers. Several fingers broke in his hands before he was able to free himself and push her to the side.

  By then the others had reached him.

  They clawed, and bit, and punched at him, and Shane replied in kind, with greater strength and violence. Ghosts came at him as well, their blows more powerful and far colder than that of the living.

  In the doorway Samson stood, watching with a smirk on his face.

  Someone or something struck Shane in the back of his knee, and he dropped down, the joint crashing into the ground. The living defenders of the One tried to swarm over him, and he drew his pistol.

  He reversed the weapon in his grip and used the butt of it. Again and again, he smashed it down on noses and cheeks. He shattered teeth and broke jaws. Some fell to be clambered over by their brethren, others continued to fight on. Shane felt himself losing control, lashing out with greater fury, giving way to his inner rage.

  Skulls cracked, and the living died, shuddering heaps of skin wrapped bones.

  Chapter 64: A Brief and Exuberant Joy

  When Clair reached the house of the One, she felt a wave of joy wash over her. Not from the scene in front of her, which she enjoyed, but from being in the presence of the One. Of knowing that she had done right in coming to Him.

  But the battle she found herself witnessing sent a thrill of excitement through her.

  Shane Ryan was on his knees, being beaten by both the living and the dead.

  His dying would be long, painful, and well deserved.

  Yet as she watched, her belief in his eventual demise faded.

  He was beating them. All of them. Body after body hit the ground, and the dead vanished beneath his blows. They returned within moments, but never long enough to press the attack.