The Spooky Bloodspread

Chapter 8: Drawn Away

It was November 5th. It had been a month and 3 days since the Bloodspread reached Skid and Pump's families.

The Wonder family had taken shelter at the hotel for quite a while, and surprisingly, nothing threatened their new home... yet.

Susie was teaching Skid and Pump how to draw better, since out of the 3, she was the most talented. Skid seemed to understand some of the basics, but Pump... not really. He drew people just fine, but getting their proportions right was a struggle.

He started to get frustrated with having to erase so much of the work, even if it was actually drawn right.

"Pump, you okay?" Susie asked.

Pump slammed the pencil down, looked at his crudely drawn human and started to cry angrily.

"I CAN'T DRAW!!!" he yelled.

Skid and Susie were shocked at Pump's sudden outburst.

"Pump, shhhh, it's okay," Susie said in a soothing but panicked tone. "I can get you a new piece of paper if y-"

"NO!!!" Pump cried. "I don't want a new piece of paper!!!"

Skid attempted to hug Pump, but the latter slapped the former's hand away.

"Pump, don't hit your brother like that," Susie said. "He's trying to give you a hug to make you feel better."

"But I don't want a stupid hug! In fact, I don't wanna do this anymore! I mess everything up, and nothing I make is perfect and... ugh, I just ruin everything!"

Skid took a peek at Pump's drawing.

"I think that looks pretty good," he said.

Pump immediately got pissed off.

"ARE YOU SERIOUSLY OUT OF YOUR MIND?!?! IT DOES NOT LOOK GOOD!!!!!!" he screamed. "I HATE IT SO MUCH!!! HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY THINK THIS LOOKS GOOD, HUH?!?! TELL ME!!! TELL ME!!!!!!"

"Do you... wanna do something else for a bit?" Susie asked.

Pump gave no response. Instead, he crumpled up his drawing, threw it to the ground, and stormed off into another room, slamming the door behind him, and cried.

Susie had never seen her first little brother this angry before, but Skid's experienced it a few times. It hurt them both to see Pump so mad either way.

"D-do you think we should talk to him, or...?" Skid asked nervously.

"We should give him a moment to calm down," Susie responded. "If we go in there right now, we might end up making him uncomfortable."

Skid understood. "Good point. We'll wait."

After about 25 minutes, Pump went back into Skid and Susie's room and apologized for his breakdown.

"It's okay Pump," Skid said, comforting his little brother. "It wasn't your fault at all. It's okay to get angry."

"Yeah, we forgive you," added Susie. "Accidents happen, and that's okay. Sometimes I lose my temper too, and sometimes I act before I think, but afterwards, I learn from my mistakes."

But just then, the fire alarms in the hotel went off. The loud beeping scared Skid and Pump, causing them to cup their hands over their ears.

A small, human-like figure smashed the window with its bare hands and climbed through with a box of matches, and threw the lit one right at their supplies. Immediately, the whole room was up in flames.

The hotel was no longer safe.

Susie grabbed Skid and Pump and ran out of their room with them and ran down the stairs, trying to avoid all the little humanoids and the fire. More of them were throwing matches everywhere. In fact, some had knives.

As Susie turned a corner down the hall, one of them suddenly dropped right on her head and attempted to stab her, causing her to accidentally drop her little brothers. As she tried to pull the small person off, she felt something slimy and crumbly... and plastic.

This wasn't a person. This was a Happy Fella doll that had gained humanlike features, thanks to the burn marks looking flesh-like and the eyes being bloodshot. And the others were the same as that one.

Skid found a crowbar in a nearby closet which had the door open, and stabbed the Happy Fella with the hook end, pulling it off Susie's head. The preteen girl then stepped on the Happy Fella's head, killing it and spilling out a gruesome mess.

Susie picked Skid and Pump up again and bolted down the emergency stairs and out the door as the hotel crumbled to the ground in a flaming pile of debris, presumably killing the Happy Fellas.

"Wh-where are we gonna live now?" Skid whimpered. "We're not gonna have to go around to different places constantly... right? I... I just..."

"Skid... I think that might be our only option," Pump said.