Betrayal at the House on the Hill Shorts

The Star Sickness

     It's astounding how much trouble a group of young adults can get into by being innocent.  This group went looking for ghosts in the old manor, serious and genuine, but instead found something else.  Months before, a meteor shower graced the sky with their display of beauty and everyone believed it to be nothing more than falling stars.  No one knew what was going to happen, but they could never imagine what was working behind the scenes.

     "We got everything?"  Denise asked, turning to her friends.  The five of them looked normal, despite the rising moonlight.  Each had a flashlight in one hand, but one had another object.  It looked a bit like a phone but the antenna had a small spinning dish on it.  The young man pushed buttons on it, not looking up until a few minutes later.

      "Should we make sure everyone's here?" he asked.  Denise rolled her eyes.  This was the third time he'd asked this, but there was grounds behind it.

      "Fine," Denise conceded.  "Sound off...."  One by one they gave names; Daniel, Susan, Nicoli, Francis.  "Happy now, Francis?  Great, let's go ghost hunting...."  The old door hung from its hinges, not completely off, but enough to be opened with a little force.  In a small, close group centered around Francis and his weird device.  

     Darkness was all that greeted them, the only sounds their breathing, the creaking of the house, and an occasional beep from the device.  Nothing gave any evidence of a ghost being in the immediate area or even on the first floor.

     "Wait a minute," Francis finally said, standing over a book.  The device in his hand was beeping at a faster rate than normal and the green light had turned yellow.  "Something's up with this book...."  Nicoli rushed over to the book and rifled through the pages, using his uncanny ability  to skim the pages and get a decent answer from them.

     "It's a chemist book," he announced, still flipping through the pages.  "Formulas for what looks like tonics, antidotes, serums...and potions."  Seemingly on a whim, he stuffed the little book into his back pocket.  No one told him to do otherwise and seemed to think it was as good an idea as any.  

     "We need to find something else," Susan put in, gesturing upstairs.  "If we're right and there are ghosts in here, there's a chance that we could find something that summoned them in the master bedroom?"  The others looked at each other with determined grins on their faces.  Susan was usually good at finding evidence of paranormal activity, but they didn't know what was really happening to one of them.

      "Anyone got that map?" Daniel inquired.  Nicoli produced a piece of paper with a crude drawing of the house and vaguely where the rooms where.  "What are we waiting for then?  Master bedroom's first room on the right, looks like.  Come on."  He led the way to the grand staircase, up the ancient stares and to the door.  Grapping the door handle, which was cold as ice, and pushed open the door.  All of them recoiled at the sight that rested on the floor.

      A dead body had slid down a spear  to lie on the floor, a bloody note inches from his hand.  Gently, Denise grabbed a clean edge of the note while Francis, putting the device away and putting on a pair of gloves, removed the body from the spear and held it.

      "'Ever since I touched that meteorite, I can feel the change working in me.  I have studied it and looked at it under a microscope, and have found a twisted DNA that never came from this world.  But what is even worse is that I have heard the creatures in my blood, talking to me.  Telling me how much better use they can make of my body than what I have done with it.'"   The silence became even deeper than it already was.   

     "'I have sought an antidote serum, but I am out of time, and soon I will belong to the microbes entirely.  In desperation, I have enlisted the help of my estranged brother Kepler Ingstrom to help find a cure, but I am afraid I may have sealed his fate along with mine as well.  Before that happens, if I can steel myself, I intend to run upon my spear like the ancient Romans and hopefully eradicate the alien spores once and for all.'"   Francis glanced at the bloody weapon in his hand.