Trick or Treat - The Annual Teen Massacre

Chapter Five : 2AM - 3AM

Chapter Five

 Once again, David was running for his life. He had a minute left to find a partner so he could live. But before he started running, he looked behind him and saw three men dressed as Frankenstein and two as zombies arming a huge wooden crossbow on wheels. A ballista! David recognized it from a drawing he once received at school. It was a very rare weapon to be used, but not unheard of. It was tremendously hard to handle though, and even harder to aim with. Still, the harpoon that pierced Vanessa right through her chest must have been fired from that thing. David had heard of rumors that there were people this night who would wield strange weaponry. But he thought they were only rumors to scare them. Just to make sure they were more eager to learn more about this night. 

"If you misbehave without getting any punishment, the fanatics may find you on Halloween night. They will hunt you down on the street and knock on your door when you think you are safe. And they'll shoot at you with crossbows and throw torches at you, until you confess what you did," his father would start one of his many bedtime stories.

He remembered the tales of vampires using huge injection needles to steal all the blood from your body. And a story of pyromaniacs covering you in oil before setting you on fire. They'd cackle in the shadows the flames on your body would produce, and if you were trying to run to your friends for help, they would catch on fire too. David ran almost in panic away. He ran further into the street and in a different one  to the right and he saw more children being brutally slaughtered. Knives, Throwing stars, axes, halberds all wielded by masked figures. The masks were scary white, all the fanatics looked about the same. He never knew if any of it was based on true history. Maybe they didn't even care about it and it was just to show they were teaming up. They didn't spot him though. The children in the street were surrounded by the five men in a pentagonal formation, closing in on them, taking out every child that tried to escape. One by one they fell on the floor, the pool of blood getting bigger and bigger, reflecting faintly in the moon. 

David always thought the ballista was a fairy tale. "Why would they bring a ballista.  A huge crossbow on wheels outside, father?" he would ask when his father finished a story about it. "Isn't a normal crossbow more trustworthy?"

     "Well, son, the thing about fanatics is that they get joy from Halloween night. It's a sport to them. Every year it has to be bigger, more expensive, more flashy. They have a reputation to uphold with the other fanatics. It's just how they relate to each other. Just another way to enjoy the night...Can you imagine, son, how much happiness you can get from actually hitting someone with an horrific weapon like that? The look in the victim's eyes...It would feed their fantasies for a whole year," his father used to say, smiling. "But that's not something you should worry about for now." 

Things are different now, David thought. How could such nightmares be real? He heard wooden wheels turning the corner he just left. Any second and they'd attempt to shoot their ballista again, David thought. He had to be ready to dodge. But his ankle was making it more difficult to dodge. Even though the painkillers set in, he still manoeuvred less well than before. And he had to find someone to bond with first, or he might as well just give up and surrender to the zombies.He stumbled further and further away from Vanessa's lifeless corpse, looking back one last time before turning to the left in the opposite way of the white masked men. There were people on this side as well, but at least he was safe from a ballista shot. He had trouble making out what exactly was happening, but there was panic. There was a lot of screaming. It smelled like the kitchen at home when his mother made her famous pork surprise. The surprise was when there was actually something edible about the piece of meat, which was usually burned down to a black lump of charcoal.

He walked a few more paces into the street. anything was better than that ballista, he thought. But there was a blinding light coming from here. He was so used to the dark ever since he stopped using his flashlight that this weird yellowish light startled him. Children were running all over the street. He could make out the colours a little now. There were bonfires. Small ones, big ones. Children running away, trying to avoid them. He blinked a few times. It was so bright!  He looked at his watch. A minute had passed. And he was still alive? What was happening?