Lost in Darkness Read online

  Lost in Darkness

  Jeffrey Thomas

  Anaheim, California

  Digital Edition published by

  Evil Jester Press

  New York

  Lost in Darkness

  © 2011 by Jeffrey Thomas

  Cover Artwork © 2011 by GAK

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copy Editing by Steve Souza

  Bad Moon Books Logo Created by Matthew JLD Rice

  ISBN-10: 0-9837799-6-1

  ISBN-13: 978-0-9837799-6-4

  www.badmoonbooks.com

  BAD MOON BOOKS

  1854 W. Chateau Ave.

  Anaheim, CA 92804

  USA

  www.eviljesterpress.com

  EVIL JESTER PRESS

  Ridge, New York

  For Jade

  1

  An angel, a vampire and a zombie walked together down the middle of the gloomy, lonely side street.

  Autumn leaves scuttled like eerie crab-things across the dark pavement ahead of the trio, and when the chilly breeze gusted it whipped the leaves into the air, turning them into rustling bat-creatures. The icy bursts of air also caused the vampire’s black cloak to swirl, and the angel’s wings to flap behind her. The angel had to hold onto her wreath of flowers to prevent it from flying out of her thick golden mane of curls.

  Dana, the angel, squealed as she walked in the face of the gust. It plastered her long, gauzy white gown to her legs. “That’s it—next year I’m going as an Eskimo!” she yelled.

  “What are you wearing under that?” asked Mike, the zombie.

  “None of your business!” Dana laughed.

  Sophie, the vampire, snicked her tongue. “She’s wearing warm clothes under those angelic robes, don’t let her fool you.”

  “Nice sneakers for an angel, Dane,” Mike noted, looking down at her feet as they scuffed through the tide of leaves. Mike’s green makeup was a flaky thick coat on his face, and his eyes were ringed in black. He was carrying his snaggly plastic teeth in his hand, at the moment, so he could talk. A bloody rubber hand poked up out of the fluorescent orange pumpkin container he carried.

  “Let’s hit that house up there!” Dana cried out, pointing excitedly with one hand and grabbing Sophie’s sleeve with the other. The house, near the end of the street, was old and ominous—seeming to have no lights on except for a row of four jack-o’-lanterns, ranging from large to small, set out on the porch. From this distance their flickering eyes and jagged grins were both friendly and spooky.

  Sophie snatched her arm free. “Man, will you two grow up? I can’t believe we’ve actually been trick-or-treating. I haven’t trick-or-treated since I was a kid!” Sophie, the oldest of the three, was fifteen.

  “That’s the fun of it,” Dana insisted. “Doesn’t it remind you of how fun Halloween was when you were little?”

  “Too cool to have a little fun?” Mike chimed in. He popped in his fangs and grinned at Sophie.

  The vampire sneered at him. Sophie was tall, thin, and pale—a perfect vampire. Her short hair was draped over one eye and dyed a shade of red that was almost maroon. Her mother had flipped out when her older sister, home from college for the summer, had colored it for her. “Drop dead, Mike.”

  He bugged his raccoon-like eyes at her, and moaned in a ghostly voice, “I already did.”

  “Hey, fine,” Dana told her friend. “You don’t have to share any of our candy, then.”

  “Candy,” Sophie scoffed. “Yech.”

  They reached the shabby little old house, and Dana and Mike thumped up onto the creaking boards of the porch, giggling with child-like excitement. Dana knocked, turned to Mike and smiled while they waited.

  Mike smiled back, suddenly feeling bashful. Dana’s smiles had that effect on him, and he wasn’t the only one. Dana was tall for fourteen, and had an attractive figure that she seemed to have woken up with one morning. It made her feel awkward and self-conscious at times, but her mother had assured her that there was nothing wrong with being shapely...not all girls were meant to be skinny model-types, or should try to be. Beauty came in many forms, and her mother had promised her that she wasn’t going to have any trouble finding boys who appreciated her particular brand of beauty. Dana’s mother encouraged her to eat healthy foods...but never allowed her to diet.

  The breeze stirred Dana’s long blond curls again, and she brushed them away from her face. Her eyes were far-set and hazel colored, her mouth small and full-lipped. When she smiled like now, with her lips pressed together, they tipped up at one corner in a way that Mike found mischievous or mysterious. With her wreath of silk flowers and her wings of sparkly fabric formed over a wire framework, she almost made the zombie sigh out loud. To Mike, Dana was even more the perfect angel than Sophie was the perfect bloodsucker.

  “Come on,” Sophie groaned in disgust, “nobody’s home! They’re at a Halloween party...like we’re supposed to be!”

  “Yeah,” Mike mumbled, his dreamy trance broken. “We’re gonna be late.” He clomped down the warped porch steps.

  Dana was about to follow Mike down the porch steps when she heard the storm door behind her squeak open loudly on rusty hinges. She turned toward the sound, startled.

  There was no light on in the hall of the house, so the figure in the doorway was concealed in darkness. It was tall, a looming shadow. And, as Dana stared at it, the shadow chuckled.

  “Well, well, little angel,” it croaked, “what brings you down to earth tonight?”

  Dana thought she caught a glimmer of large eyes in the darkness...too large to be human eyes. Eyes glowing like fire. She let out an involuntary cry of fear, and backed away from the dark apparition...

  ...and then she was falling, falling.

  Dana fell backwards off the porch, onto her back in the grass beside the porch steps. The wind knocked out of her, she gaped in horror at the giant figure flowing down the stairs after her. A large hand reached out for her.

  A car passed by the front of the house, and before Dana could scream she saw the figure illuminated briefly in the headlights. It was only an average looking man, not even as tall as he had appeared in the shadows. The strange gleam of his eyes had only been his thick glasses reflecting the glow of the jack-o’-lanterns on his porch.

  “I’m sorry!” he told her, distressed. He gave her his hand and hoisted her up. “I didn’t mean to scare you. Are you all right, hon?”

  Dana giggled in embarrassment, patting at her bottom and pulling a few clinging leaves out of the gown’s gauzy fabric. “I’m okay. You just scared me a little, for a second there.” She glanced over her shoulder at her wings and frowned. The left one was badly bent.

  Sophie snicked her tongue again. “Such a graceful angel,” she muttered.

  “Um, do you kids want some candy?” the man asked, just as embarrassed.

  “She does,” Mike said, pointing to Sophie.

  Sophie turned away and started walking briskly down the sidewalk with her cape billowing behind her. “Come on, guys, we’re going to be late!”

  Dana and Mike jogged after her to catch up. Both were laughing. “Ease up, Soph!” Dana told her.

  “You ease up. You’re the one who almost had the heart attack back there.”

  Dana swung her brown paper candy sack into Sophie’s rear. “You’re terminally hip, Soph, that’s your problem.”

  Angry, the vampire spun around and swatted the candy sack out of Dana’s hands with surprising force. “Go to hell!” she shouted.

  For a moment, Dana just stared at
her friend in shock. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Mike go into the street to gather up the contents of her spilled bag.

  Sophie fished in her robe and produced a pack of cigarettes, tapping one from the package with nervous fingers. Dana slapped it out of her hands and now it was Sophie’s turn to look shocked. Dana snapped, “You think candy’s bad for your teeth but you smoke those things, huh Soph? That’s real smart, y’know?”

  “I thought I told you to go to hell.”

  “I can’t believe you, sometimes, Sophie...I really can’t. Why are you so angry all the time? Have you ever wondered how come me and Mike are like your only friends?”

  Sophie smiled without humor. Her pale face was even whiter than usual with its thick layer of makeup, and her lips were blood red. “You’re so perfect, Dana, you know that? Everything is so easy for you. Boys like you, your parents aren’t divorced...life is just so, so easy.”

  Dana shook her head sadly. “Sophie...I’m sorry. I know it’s hard for you, about your parents. But—”

  “Don’t feel sorry for me, Dane. I don’t want your pity.” Then Sophie’s eyes flicked past Dana as something caught her attention. “Mike!” she called. “Get out of the road!”

  Dana whirled around to look, and saw Mike crouched in the center of the narrow side street, still gathering the colorful scattered candy. He seemed caught in a bright spotlight, growing brighter, like a deer dazzled by the headlights of a...

  “Car!” Dana yelled, and suddenly she was running at Mike as fast as her legs could take her. “Mike, a car!”

  Dana’s gauzy angel robes whipped behind her, and as she ran it was as if her wings carried her, glittering in the bright lights. But one wing was crippled, and it was as if it held her back.

  Her wreath of flowers blew off her head.

  She slammed into Mike with both hands just as he got to his feet. Mike went stumbling out of the road, dropping all the candy he had gathered. The force of Dana’s charge sent him out of the glare of the headlights.

  But Dana was left in his place, and she turned to stare into the oncoming blaze. It was like staring into the sun.

  She was like a winged moth drawn to flame. And then the white-hot flame was on top of her.

  The glancing impact sent her spinning. Somehow, she was able to remain on her feet, but it was as if the blow made her run back out of the road the same way she had come.

  She saw a telephone pole loom up in front of her. It looked like a tree that had been cut down and was falling toward her to crush her. And that was the last thing she saw before her forehead smacked against the pole’s hard surface.

  The car had already been swerving to avoid her and squealing to a stop at the same moment it struck Dana the glancing blow. Two young men leaped out, babbling in horror at what had happened, the passenger blaming the driver and the driver yelling that it wasn’t his fault.

  Mike raced across the street and crouched by Dana’s side. Sophie was already there. She was holding Dana’s hand, and her tears looked black as her mascara streaked her white face. “I’m sorry, Dane,” she moaned. “I’m so sorry!”

  “Dana!” Mike exclaimed, trying to scoop her up into a sitting position. Sophie shoved him back.

  “Don’t touch her! Call 911! Go! Hurry!”

  “Oh, man,” groaned the driver of the car, leaning over them. He saw a trickle of red seeping out from the hair across Dana’s forehead. “I think...I think it’s already too late.”

  A dark figure came running up the road, like a skeletal ghost carrying a lantern. Looking up through the tears in his eyes, Mike saw that it was the man with the glasses from the house with the jack-o’-lanterns. He had a flashlight in his fist.

  “What happened?” he panted.

  “Call 911!” Sophie begged him, sobbing helplessly. “Please!”

  The man shined his flashlight down into the face of the young girl who lay crumpled at his feet like a fallen angel.

  2

  A bright light shone in Dana’s face.

  She squinted against the light and raised her hand to shield her eyes. The glare was so bright it made her head hurt badly.

  As her eyes adjusted a bit and she was able to lower her hand, Dana saw that she stood in a long hall or corridor. The walls were white, smooth, completely featureless. There were a few doorways branching off from it, other corridors she guessed, but that was it. And at the end of the hall was that blazing white light.

  For a crazy moment she almost panicked, because she imagined the light came from car headlights bearing down on her. She wagged her head. Why would she imagine such a thing?

  Slowly, disoriented, she started down the hall, her sneakers scuffing across the glossy polished floor. She felt light, airy. Her gown dragged behind her, hanging off one shoulder. Absentmindedly, Dana shrugged the gauzy robe off her and let it fall behind, wings and all. Underneath she wore a bulky white sweater and worn, comfortable jeans. Under the sweater she wore a white long-sleeved shirt over a T-shirt, and she vaguely remembered that she had dressed warmly because it was going to be cold outside. But she wasn’t outside, she was here, and it wasn’t cold but very comfortable. The light was warm. Its warmth seemed to draw her.

  The hall appeared to elongate the more she walked, so she never seemed to get any closer to the light. It almost seemed like the light was getting farther away. Dana began to walk faster. She wanted to jog toward it but her head hurt too much, and made her dizzy.

  Where was that light coming from? she wondered. Was that a door leading outside, to the bright day? Somehow she thought it was supposed to be night-time.

  This place appeared to be a hospital. Yes, of course, that was it. No wonder the walls and floor were so antiseptically white. That light must be coming from an operating room. And she had to go in there, for some reason. It was very important for her to go into that light.

  A figure appeared in the light, now. It was hard to make it out, because it was a silhouette surrounded in dazzling rays, but the figure seemed to be gesturing for her to come closer. Waving for her to keep coming. Dana wanted to call out to the figure but she couldn’t raise the words to her throat, she was so weak and weary. She just kept trudging along toward that light. Maybe she was getting closer, after all. She was beginning to make out the figure a little better. At first she thought it was Mike. She seemed to recall that she had been with her friend Mike a little while ago. It was a guy standing in that light, after all. But as she drew closer, Dana saw that this young man was a stranger to her. He looked about sixteen. His dark blond hair was swept back, but a few loose strands had fallen across his forehead. He had a serious forehead, like a young Beethoven, she thought with a smile. His eyes were just as intense. But his mouth was pressed into a small, reassuring smile. The handsome youth was dressed in clean white clothing, like a doctor perhaps, though he was obviously too young for that. And yet, Dana had the impression that he wanted to heal her.

  The blond youth kept waving for her to come. Waving as if in slow motion. Keep coming, he seemed to be saying to her without moving his lips. Thatta girl...

  Dana suddenly stopped. Where was it he wanted her to come to? What was in the light beyond that boy? There seemed to be others there in the light behind him, watching her, though she couldn’t see them. They were all waiting for her to join them.

  But Dana wasn’t so sure she wanted to join them. She wasn’t sure she was ready for that, yet. For some reason, even though the youth was so handsome and looked so friendly, Dana began to feel fear creeping over her.

  She turned away, started walking back down the hall the way she had come.

  “No!” a voice shouted in her mind.

  Startled, Dana glanced over her shoulder. It was the boy. His mouth was still shut, but no longer smiling. He had spoken without moving his lips.

  “Dana, please come!” his eyes seemed to speak directly to her brain.

  Terrified now, Dana tore her eyes away from him and began to trot down the ha
llway. She had seen the boy reaching his arm out as if to grab onto her. She was afraid he would begin to chase after her.

  “Dana! Please...”

  Was he following close behind her? Dana was taking no chances. She took a sharp right turn into one of the doorways that branched off from the main corridor.

  “No, Dana!” she heard the boy yell after her. At least, she heard his mind yell into her own. “No! Don’t go that way!”

  She ignored him, and ran down the new corridor.

  After the brightness of the main hallway, this one was very murky. She could just barely see ahead of her, but at least there weren’t any obstacles to block her path. The dimly lit hall just seemed to keep on going.

  “Dana! No!”

  The boy’s voice was getting distant now. Good, thought Dana. But she still felt a little guilty.

  The last thing she heard him yell before his thought-voice vanished was, “Dangerous! It’s dan—”

  There were doors on either side of the gloomy hall now. They were shut, but they had little windows in them. Were patients asleep in those rooms? Dana slowed down, panting, and moved to one of the doors. Standing on her toes, she peeked in through the dark glass.

  There was nothing beyond but blackness. It was like staring out into the cold emptiness of outer space. Like another dimension.

  Suddenly, a face appeared in the window on the other side, thumping against the glass. It was too dark to see it clearly, but the face looked terribly distorted, inhuman. The eyes were feline and seemed to glow purple with ultraviolet light.

  Dana screamed. She backed away from the door and bolted down the hall. She didn’t care to look into the windows of the other doors on her left and right. She just hoped the doors were locked.

  At the end of the murky corridor there was a staircase leading down, apparently into a basement judging from the darkness below. Dana hated to go down there, but behind her that strange boy might be following, and there was that...that thing...behind the door, too. What if the door was unlocked? What if even now it was stalking her? She couldn’t go back. Holding in her tears, Dana drew a deep, ragged breath and began to descend the dark staircase.