When Laughter Dies( A Laughing Jack FanFic)

Chapter Two: Little Ones

     The days following their arrival were anything but notable or exciting, instead the children found themselves wandering throughout the doll-ridden halls in utter boredom simply to pass time. The porcelain figures still sent chills up Chloe's neck and each time she turned her head to see if one of them had moved, she was almost certain she saw their eyes dart to look the other direction, as if they knew they would be caught. Miss Miller had gone to ignoring them almost entirely and the children and their aunt only spoke to each other at meals and even then the conversation was bland and forced. Their cousins had proven to be as closely similar to rats as possible, annoyances that seemed to lurk in the shadows or anywhere around food. 

     It was on the fourth day that Sam and Chloe had been at the end of yet another venture of mindless walking around the home, having stumbled across the attic the previous night they decided to make it their personal hide out and wandered there instead of another corridor. It was a dark place that smelled so strongly of dust that the first time neither Chloe nor her brother were able to breathe, instead coughing and wheezing at the pungent smell. The space had no windows except for one, which was round and about the size of a dinner plate- over looking into the back gardens which had long since begun to wilt and turn brown. Inside, the attic was scattered with lost belongings that Miss Miller no longer wished to keep in her home, gowns and fashion accessories from an earlier time and trinkets upon trinkets of oddities. 

     Chloe had been wandering through the aisles of peculiar junk, stopping at a particular gown that appeared to be a wedding dress. The girl laughed when she saw it, picking it up into her arms and turning around to show her brother how absolutely ridiculous it appeared. Though the smile on her face vanished when she saw the expression of her brother. 

" Sammy?" she called out, lowering the dress in her arms. 

" Chloe you have to move.. They're behind you.." he whispered, his voice trembling with fear. 

     His tone had made her heart skip a beat and she drew in a hesitant breath, unsure whether or not she should rush forward or look behind her. Yet it seems human nature always focuses on looking in the shadows, moving towards that one place you are absolutely petrified of. So the girl turned on her heel and found herself staring into darkness. She squinted, trying to make out people in the nothingness. She found nothing so she laughed, assuming her brother was joking and turned back once again to look at him. 

 " Sam there's no one there," she remarked, a grin beginning to lift the corners of her lips. 

" No Chloe.. They're behind you but you can't see them, they're right behind you," he called out, his voice still quaking. 

" Oh come on, Sammy knock it off. Who's behind me?" she retorted impatiently, putting the dress back into the old wooden trunk that had become its coffin. 

" The boys with the rope necklaces," the younger boy answered, taking a step backwards. 

    She hesitated at his words, unsure of how someone so young could have imagined something so awful. He must have seen it from a television program.. Or heard it from one of their cousins, she did not doubt the second option. The three had proven to take liking into tormenting her younger brother.She stepped forward and put a hand on his shoulder, giving him the warmest smile she could manage. 

" There's no one there, Sam.. The triplets are playing jokes on you again. You ought to stop listening to them, " his sister cooed, shaking her head.

    Though her brother remained unconvinced and begged them to leave the attic, so finally the girl succumbed and they traveled back down the stairs to the corridor below. However as they left, Sam caught a glimpse of a yellowing mirror in the far corner of the room. As Chloe turned in front of him her reflection was followed down the wooden steps by three young boys... All with nooses cutting into their necks, their flesh being torn and bruised by the rope that suffocated them. Their eyes were nothing but black voids and their skin was so pale that the boy shivered just by looking at them.. Yet what scared Sam the most was the smiles they wore, blood staining their teeth.