Straight Dope Horror Movie Game

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

“Kat & El Elvis Rojo, or my ether?”

js_africanus took the high road. Stuffing the hankerchief into the neck of the ether bottle and with lighter in hand, the ghost of Molotov smiled on the assembled friends as js hurled the flaming bottle into the mouth of the tomb. The fireball scorched his skin, but Kat & El Elvis Rojo were freed. Whatever it was retreated, screaming in anger and pain.

In the woods outside the graveyard wall there was a howl.

“That ain’t no dog,” someone said.

It was joined by another, then another, then another! Soon a whole pack howled, raising the hackles on everybodies’ necks. The Ibezan hound cowered in fear.

“Ain’t no wolves around here, neither. No natural wolves, that is…”

22

“Come here you little mongrel bastard!” shouted El Elvis Rojo as he grabbed the dog by the collar. “And you, get this blasted thing offa me!”

Tristan slashed with his blade, but simingly to no effect. With every cut, the darkness swirling around the tentacle covered whatever wound he managed to inflict, making it impossible to hack properly.

Elfkin rushed over to Kat and pulled her to a safe distance from the fumbling group. The dog yelp as Elvis began to throttle the thing. The beast jumped around violently, trying desparately to get away, making it harder for the group to get a good grip on Elvis as he was continually pulled into the darkness of the tomb. Holding the tentacle in place with his foot, Tristan plunged the blade straight down with all his might. A blood curdling sound rose up from the tomb, like the sound of a hundred cats trapped in a bag and beaten with a shovel. The tentacle whipped up, lashed out one last time at Elvis, and slipped away back into the cavern, taking Tristan’s blade with it.
That last strike snapped the dog’s collar, and the thing weasled out of Elvis’s grasp. “Don’t let it get away!” he shouted, but it was too late. The dog took off like a flash, and vanished into the fog.

23

SHIT!!! Should have hit preview. Ignor my last post.

24

Kat opened her eyes and stared blankly at Elfkin, who was not sure whether she had actually just lived through two contradictary events or whether she was hallucinating.

“Urma dooleth, Urma dooleth horoban. Amareh, amareh.” Kat whispered urgently, then shrieked. “And don’t let it get away!”

25

“What? You piss off those friends as well?” El Elvis Rojo asked the dog as he delivered a swift boot to its ass.

“What’s your problem?” shouted Elfkin.

"Don’t kick the dog!** reprimanded JS_Africanus.

“Give it another one for me,” requested Kat. The dog let out another yelp as Elvis obliged her. Hurridly, the dog took off into the darkness with its tail between its legs and was quickly swallowed up by the fog.

“I said ‘DON’T’ let it get away!” cried Kat

“You mind telling us what your fucking deal with that dog is, Elvis,” asked Tristan.

“Why don’t you ask Mr. Calm and collected here,” replied Elvis as he picked up his guitar and approached Derleth. “Thanks for your help back there, by the way. Really appreciate that.” The two stood there staring at one another face to face.

“Look, we’ve all got enough to deal with without putting up with you two matching egos, so if you don’t mind, could somebody please tell me what we’re doing here?” interjected Elfkin.

26

On the hill, Grelby dropped his Untrusty .38[sup]TM[/sup] as the huge form slammed into him, knocking the wind out of him and throwing him to the ground. He struggled frantically to keep the creature’s mouth away from his throat as he reached for his fighting knife. At last, he managed to draw it, and plunged it into the beast’s side. Or he would he would have, except that body of the beast might as well have been made of steel or hard plastic, for all the good the knife did.

“What the…?” A thought suddenly struck him. With some effort, Grelby dug the knife tip into the rubbery skin of the creature’s belly and cut open a long gash. Reaching inside, he felt around until he found the battery compartment and ripped them out. The creature went dead.

“Bloody animatronics” he muttered as he shoved the now lifeless lump of plastic, steel and rubber off of himself. Picking up his knife and Perhaps Not-So Untrustworthy After All .38[sup]TM[/sup], he high-tailed it over to the group standing by the tomb before he could encounter any other unpleasant surprises.

He arrived just in time to hear Elfkin demanding to know what was going on. “I should very much,” he said, panting, “like to know that as well.”

27

Derleth regarded the scene with mild amusement: Those damned robots didn’t feel right from the start, but they smelled of ozone, not eternal decay and malaise. Soon, these hearty, eager warriors would learn the difference. If they made it that long.

He drew his hands out of his pockets, revealing a single ring with a green stone on his right ring finger. The stone seemed to glow dully, casting a light that cut through the fog without reflecting off of it.

“I have been waiting for this night. Forces are aligned against us all, madmen and demons allied to clear the path for the Dead Dreamer. Those robots were created by one faction, a technological cult that believes it can `perfect’ humanity by replacing it with androids. That faction is one of the saner of the group.” The last sentence drew out a brief chuckle. The ring hadn’t changed its intensity, and seemed to shine through Derleth’s handkerchief as he gently polished the stone.

“You smug SOB, we could have been killed by those hellhounds, robotic or not.” Elvis said, letting the guitar hang free around his neck. Derleth gave him a long stare.

“I save my energy for worthy opponents. When Mind Wraiths make you see your hands turn into twisted skeletal masses, who do you think will be chanting plainsong to snap you back to reality? I haven’t risked my sanity to play knife games with eight-bit Japanese toys.” Derleth fairly spit the words, his eyes forcing Elvis back a few feet.

“Risked his sanity? The beggar’s risked and lost!” Grelby muttered, looking sidelong at Derleth’s darkened form.

Derleth didn’t hear that. He had focused his energies into gently swaying like a dowsing wand, clasping his ring in his hands, his knife a bare outline against his pocket.

``Come and get me. I know you’re out there.’’ Derleth thought, a moment before his eyes snapped open in abject terror.

“RUN!” Derleth screamed, leading the terrified crew further into the cemetary with his ring brilliant against the blackness.

28

BraheSilver remembered to pick up his shovel as Derleth streaked away, taking the light from his ring with him. Now in the darkness around the tomb, Derleth could still be seen by the emerald flashes when his hand happened to turn towards the group.

“Well, do we follow him or not?” asked Elfkin.

“My vote’s for ‘not’.” Tristan said.

“I am quite interested in what’s going on, but I’d rather not hang around with that loon.” said Grelby, gesturing towards Derleth.

“He seems to have some explanation, which is more than I can say for anyone else around here.” Kat replied. “C’mon, you guys. We can still catch him.”

Kat, Elfkin, and Elvis took off at a run to follow Derleth, while Grelby, js, and Tristan compared weapons and headed off in a different direction.

BraheSilver swayed on his feet for a moment in the darkness before tottering off alone, where he tripped over the thread that was wrapped around TTT’s throat and knocked himself out against a tombstone. TTT flailed madly at the shovel, just out of his reach, to try to cut his captor.

29

They ran for a good minute before Elvis noticed the diminished size of their group. “Where’d everybody go?” he asked Kat. “And why are we following this choad?”

“Well, he seems to know a little more about what’s going on than anyone else. And, he does have that ring,” she replied.
“Pheh! That thing! I got three of them.” Elvis reached into one of his jacket pockets and revealed three rings, each with their own odd luminescent glow. “Red, yellow, and green. You can get them out of one of those machines for seventyfive cents at the local A&P,” he said with a smirk.

“And how do you explain his scaring the crap out of you back there?” remarked Elfkin snidely.

“I wasn’t scared! I was just thrown off by his…halitocis…yeah.” replied Elvis sheepishly. Suddenly, he was knocked to the ground as he ran into Derleth’s still frame standing in the middle of the crossroad. Derleth hardly budged. “What the fu…you couldn’t have just slowed down first?”

“Shh.” said Derleth curtly. “Maybe if you weren’t so busy flapping your gums, you’d be able to hear it.”

The group stood around, looking in every direction. The fog was filled with the sound of chittering and maniacle laughter from small, hungry mouths.

Kat’s body went rigid again as she stared off into the distance. Softly, she began chanting again. “Urma dooleth, Urma doo”

SMACK!

“You, stop that,” ordered Elvis, and turning to Derleth “You, what is that?”

“Gremlins.”

“Oh, great.”

SMACK

“Oww, what the hell?” cried Elvis turning to Kat and holding the sore spot on the back of his head.

“Don’t ever slap me unless I ask you to,” she said sternly.

“Okay, fine sorry…wait, wha?”

“Will you two shut up and listen!” yelled Elfkin. “Where are they?” The group listened intently for a while as the chittering continued. The sound didn’t seem to be getting any louder, but it seemed to surround the small group. Derleth’s ring began to glow brighter and emmit a small stream of smoke.

SMACK! “Hey! Would you stop hitting me!” Elvis said, turning his attention back to Kat.

“Asshole.”

“Shh! Listen!” Elfin commanded.

“Listen? Listen for what? We’ve been listening too long as it is. I say we pick a direction and get moving. Beats waiting around here for something to happen.”

With that, a gremlin came cannon balling out of the fog and landed sqare on Elfkin’s back, knocking her to the ground.

Elsewhere, the dog slowly walked up besides the standing figure of robertliguori, and sat patiently at the dangling feet of Gaijin. A small crowd of vacant eyed bodies had gathered around the spot. The wind blew gust of wind containing a cold no weather could produce, and the leaves skittered away in fear. Slowly, the tree before them bent down and lowerd Gaijin’s feet to the pavement. The tree conitnued to bend until the rope slid off of its branches, and then slowly rightened itself, leaving him standing there stiff and rigid.

His eyes snapped open, and a faint blue glow could be seen looking out. He looked around himself slowly at the crowd gathered before him. The dog came up and licked his hand tenderly. He parted the crowd, and walked through them and entered the graveyard. Clumsily, the congregation followed him on shuffling feet, back into the fog.

Back, towards the tomb.

30

“Goddamnit! Stop that Gremlin!” Screamed CRorex.

But it was too late, even as the words left his mouth the Gremlin had regained its footing and ran off into the darkness. Between the sudden appearence of the Gremlin and CRorex in a torn, blood and chemical stained lab coat everyone was too shocked to try to grab the wayward Gremlin.

“Err, did anyone see if the it was wearing a collar with an ID number on it?” CRorex slowly became aware that everyone was staring at him and straightened up and began to fidget with his lab coat. “What?”

“Don’t say what like that!” began Kat with a gleam in her eye indicating that more smacking was in the future. “You suddenly run in here screaming to stop that Gremlin, a Gremlin with an ID collar on it, then act as if nothing happened! What was that thing, and why do you want it stopped!”

Carried on the breeze everyone could just make out the sounds of a car being opened followed rapidly by the sounds of an engine starting and squeeling rubber as a car peeled out.

His shoulders sagging CRorex looked like all hope had left. “None of you understand! We’re trapped now! There isn’t any way we can out run them on foot! We can’t out fight them, the last group of people who tried died.”

Grabbing his shoulders Derleth started shaking CRorex. “Make some sense! Tell us what’s going on!”

CRorex backed away until he ended up with his back against a tree then sank slowly to the ground. Closing his eyes he started his story:

"I don’t know much more than what the rest of you know. A few days ago I was transfered to a different department, redundancies and all that stuff. Some strange looking feral creatures were found outside of San Antonio, THEY needed scientists to run some tests.

Apparently some hunters had captured a few of those Gremlins the weekend before, right out of the blue huh? So we tagged 'em and stuck 'em in cages and started to run blood work to see what we can find out. They are an entirely NEW creature. God knows where they came from, but the hunters said they found them near that old graveyard up in the Hill Country…

Look, we ALL thought it was a joke! Strange creatures nobody has ever seen, unless you count all of those old legends, living in an old graveyard. It all seemed like some drunk redneck trying to make a fast buck with a wild story. But you

31

** Cut Cut Cut**
Everyone knows you can’t spell * horror movie * without *gratuitous-teenager-sex-scene *. I want one girl on top of one guy *now *or else this movie is going nowhere.

32

CRorex was cut off as Elfkin gratuitously lunged on top of him. The torn back of her shirt revealed a beautifully sculpted back, and the loose garment hung low in front exposing her black laced bra. She wrapped her legs around his waist, and pulled him close. It was the most passionate embrass CRorex had ever been in.

Or at least, would have been, if it weren’t for the fists pounding into his forehead.

“YOU ASSHOLE!!! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW MUCH THIS SHIRT COST ME?!?!?!”

33

The three arcane bodies - “The Dog,” robertliguori, and Gaijin - shuffled forth through the graveyard, ever closer to the tomb. Their eyes emitting a soft blue light, they chanted the pre-ancient phonemes with perfect articulation. Except for “The Dog”, of course. That would be crazy.

The congregation followed reverently behind them. Some appeared as though they were barely able to contain their excitement, while others possessed the discipline to remain stone-faced and grave. They had waited generations for this. Decade after decade the stagnant families of the disparate fishing village observed their unholy rites, awaiting the boons promised them. And tonight those promises would be filled.

Meanwhile, up ahead, Grasshopper was making out with his super-hot cheerleader/prom queen girlfriend. He’d been planning to get down and dirty in the graveyard for weeks - he was kinky like that. Of course, SHC/PQ was having second thoughts.

“I don’t know, Billy. It just doesn’t seem right,” she whined.

“Aw, come on, baby! You know you want to. And why do you keep calling me Billy?” Grasshopper adjusted his letterman jacket, and dusted off the bold, capital “V”.

“Oh, alright.” SHC/PQ and Grasshopper proceed to have hot monkey sex, with much visibility of SHC/PQ’s ample bosom.

Suddenly, SHC/PQ gasps with fear. “I think I heard something!”

Grasshopper remained undeterred. “Yeah, I heard it too. It was the sound of hot monkey sex coming to an abrupt halt. Quit worrying.”

“Ok, Billy. I trust you.” Hot monkey sex proceeds.

But SHC/PQ was right after all. She screamed as she watched the necromantically enchanted bodies of robertliguori and Gaijin shamble by, escorted by a haunting hound.

Grasshopper stands up and notices a crowd of villagers donning strange robes covered in mystifying runes and symbols. “Sweet Christ!” He screams. He shoves SHC/PQ to the ground in the typical jerk spasm of self-preservation and sprints off into the night, totally ass-naked.

One of the villagers, gripping a crooked knife, grasps one arm of SHC/PQ, who is also totally ass-naked. “The sacrifice… has been provided for.”

The priest’s aide grips her other arm. “Yes… as prophesied.”

The troupe marches on. They reach the tomb. Gaijin and robertliguori slowly carve circles into the air with their cold, dead hands, and the passage begins to glow. “The Dog” enters first, followed by the twin zombie puppets, and finally by the cultists, their bloodlust eager for the sacrifice to come, and the glorious events to follow.

SHC/PQ manages to release one terrified scream, which echoes through the graveyard, before she is muffled by her captors and carried into the cavernous depths beneath.

34

“Dixieland,” says Tristan.

“Huh?”

“Dixieland. I hear it. Coming from the cemetary chapel.”

Indeed, Derleth and js_africanus heard it now as well. The chapel doors were open and an odd greenish-red light dissapated into the night. The stained glass glowed softly from within.

“What do you think?”

“Well, any monsters have probably been lured away by the sounds of slapping and hot monkey sex going on over there.”

“Yep.”

“Let’s check it out.”

They approach–cautiously. The chapel is ringed by a gravel driveway. Their feet crunch in time to the beat. Standing in front of the doors, looking into the chapel, they can see shadows of forms, but not the forms themselves.

“Sort of a reverse ‘cave.’”

“Aristotle would be so proud of you right now.”

“Aw, shucks.”

“C’mon.”

They climb the steps and enter the chapel. Five men occupy the raised stage area were the pulpit would normally be. They were playing instruments. The pews were about a quarter full of people. The room smelled of…something musty and dry smelling, like fifty year old firewood and newspaper. The three walked up the center aisle. The audience did not look well. They all wore suits and dresses–church clothes–of varying styles. There was a man in a '70s leisure suit. There was a woman in a polyester pantsuit. There was a man dressed like Mark Twain. There was a woman with an authentic 18th century wig.

The only thing every member of the audience had in common was the look of the dead. Every member closed eyes and tightly pursed lips. Some hummed. Some nodded to the beat. None seemed to notice the three new visitors.

Tristan gestured the other two to come close. “They look like zombies.”

“Why are all their eyes closed?”

“Glue,” wispered js_africanus. “They have to glue the eyes shut and wire the mouths closed for presentation at the funeral.”

“They’re all blind and mute?”

“Not by choice”

The music stopped. Applause rose from the crowd. Some whistled through clenched teeth–a weak, raspy noise. Some stomped thier feet.

The band leader rose. He began to speak, “Mmph mmph, gfftm mmph plssck. Mmph, trgt, vrbbt!”

With that, the band took up another tune. “Amazing,” wispered Grelby, how can they play with their teeth wired together?"

“Practice I guess”

“AAAH!”

They turned at Tristan’s shout of alarm. A zombie woman, dressed like Laura Engles, took Tristan by the elbow and led him blindly to a pew. She indicated that he should sit. He complied. The other two followed suit. She took a seat across the aisle. And the band played on.

35

Blackeyes finally woke up from his state of unconciousness. When he was climbing over the graveyard fence his foot snagged on a gargoyle and he fell onto the ground. What a klutz. He was the pretty cool type that never seemed able to catch a break; his role in life was to be the loyal retainer and comic relief. When he picked himself up he looked around. He couldn’t make heads or tails of the scene before him. Not that it mattered. He’d be dead soon anyways and he knew it. He walked on.

36

BraheSilver came to suddenly, and felt a warm wetness on his forehead. His fingers came away bloody after touching it, and there was a small red stain on the tombstone as well. At first he wondered how long he’d been unconcious, and if he’d need a cat-scan. Then he wondered where everyone else was. Lastly, he wondered why ** TTT **, the only other living thing around, was turning an unattractive shade of blue.

Lurching forward quickly enough to make his injured head throb, BraheSilver snatched up the shovel that was still eluding ** TTT**'s reach. He slashed at the post, and it quickly fell away and slunk off into the night; apparently it had been an unpopular ‘why don’t women like nice guys’ debate.

After a few moments of gasping like a man recovering from drowning, ** TTT **, looked up at his rescuer and spewed out a few syllables of jibberish. BraheSilver took a wary step backwards. ** TTT ** flapped his hands and tried again. " You saved my life. Thanks."

As the other man clambered to his feet, BraheSilver gave him a grave look. " Maybe, maybe not. There’s still a lot of night left."

TTT nodded tiredly; the man had a point. He listened carefully, because he was almost sure he heard a voice. " Do you hear someone screaming…about a shirt?"

37

Seeing how Elfkin & CRoex wanted to be alone Kat returned to the cabin.

She went into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water. All that chanting had left her throat dry. She suddenly had that strange feeling that she was being watched. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up so she grabbed the chef’s knife and spun around. ** Zebra** grabbed her wrist and stopped her from slashing him just in time.

'Oh it’s you. Where have you been Zebra you’re late."
‘I was delayed.’

Then **Kat noticed something about Zebra that seemed strange. His voice was a little deeper than usual and then she realized that his eyes, normally a very seductive dark brown, were completly black. She let out little gasp and dropped the knife. He reached up and grabbed her by the throat and lifted her off the ground choking her. Kat struggled but what ever was inside Zebra was very stong. He pushed her back up against the cabinet and Kat say the fondue set that was on top of the fridge. She frantically reached for one of the forks. She could’t quite reach them as her face turned bright red. Then on her third attempt she grabbed a fork and plunged it into Zebra’s arm. He dropped and as he screamed in rage and agony she ran out of the kitchen and into the main room. To her right was the front door and the rest of her friends. To the left were the stairs that lead to the second floor.

She went up the stairs.

Zebra was right behind her and he caught one of her feet as she ran up. Kat stumbled and her short skirt flipped up and flashed her white panties at the Beast inside Zebra When she reached the top she flung down a chair that sat at the top of the stairs to slow him down. He growled and made his was past it. She ran into the bathroom and after locking the door, she slipped on the rug and fell into the filled tub. The water was cold and it made her white blouse transparent but Kat didn’t have time to think about that. Zebra broke down the door but Kat had slipped through the side to the masterbedroom. She stood with her back to the door and was starteld by her reflection in a full length mirror. She stod there panting then she noticed something strange about her reflection. She looked down at her heaving breasts, her white lacy bra plainly visible through the soaked shirt and between her breasts was the point of a knife. She gasped as she watched the blood follow the pattern of the lace in her bra and then with a simple ‘Damn it’ her eyes rolled back and she died. Zebra came into the bedroom through the main door and looked at Kat hanging on the door. He lifted her limp body over his shoulder and took it to the basement to prepare it for his master.

38

As he reached the base of the stairs, Zebra noticed the doorway to the basement was blocked. El Elvis Rojo stood there, casually smoking a cigarette and cleaning the gunk from under his nails with his folding knife. He glanced up at Zebra and the limp body of Kat resting on his shoulders.

“Man, and I was hoping to sleep with her tonight in some ‘world’s gonna end, might as well, remember-that-time-I-bought-you-flowers’ kinda moment,” he said regretfully.

Zebra flung Kat’s body aside and roared. Elvis flung his knife to the side and struck a pose. A quick strum on his guitar let loose a wail of feedback and riff unknown to anything the music industry had ever heard. Zebra roared even louder and covered his ears to help drown out the noise, and that’s when Elvis struck. A quick kick to the gut doubled over his adversary, and an upward swing with the guitar laid him on his back. Quickly, Elvis strattled his opponent and burried the tip of his cigarette into his forehead.

Zebra let out a new scream, one of the agony of two beings writhing in pain. His body convulsed and flung Elvis aside. Zebra’s body convulsed horribly as he flailed around the room knocking over lamps and breaking bookshelves. Finally, he fell to his knees and spewed forth a putrid river of black ooze. The ooze slinked away, but niether man was in the shape to notice where it went. After some time, Elvis walked over to the panting Zebra and helped him to his feet.

“H…h…how’d you…do that?” Zebra asked, still stunned and feeling incredibly wiped out physically.

“It’s amazing what cloves do to certain demons,” replied Elvis.

“No…no, I mean…how’d you make your guitar do that? You’ve got no amp.”

“Oh, that. Well, uh…you see…” But before he could finish, Kat’s body stood up suddenly, eyes black as night. She let out a bone chilling cry and lept at the two confused men, flung them aside like a pair of rag dolls, and tore through the door and made off into the night.

“What the hell?” said the bewildered Zebra. The two lay there, staring at the hole in the door, nursing their soar bodies. Elvis spoke up as the realization hit him.

“Hmmm…maybe I will get to sleep with her later on afterall.”

39

In the foggy darkness it was hard to make out the environment. TTT trotted after BraheSilver, who seemed to have an uncanny ability to find his way around the graveyard. His mind was working overtime to catch up with the strange occurences behind him. A sudden insight came to him.

“You know (pant, pant) what whe have to do?”

BraheSilver suddenly halted. With a grumpy look he eyed TTT. “What?”

“We must find out what kind of movie we’re in, so we can use the rules to get out alive.”

Never had TTT been exposed to a look that so full of deeply felt derision. “Fuckin’ wise-ass”, muttered BraheSilver, while turning and resuming his heavy stride. “Saved his life once, not doing it again.”

TTT could take a hint, at least this one. Still he didn’t quit thinking. “Can’t prohibit that, can they? So how did I get here? There I was, peacefully surfin’ and making some silly jokes and generally happily wasting time, and suddenly here I am, out of breath with grumpy Mister Know-it-all. It’s like that movie, what-was-that, wait, I’ll check the SDMB, o no, can’t do that now, WHAT THE HECK IS THAT.” Falling down over something that felt remarkably like a human corpse but not wanting to check to make sure, he swiftly got up and tried to catch up with BraheSilver, who was not holding back. Weren’t that sounds of raw naked gratuitous passion he could hear far away, or were those grunts coming out of the throats of creatures that should not roam the face of the earth? He sure hoped the former.

It seemed as if he could spot the fleeting pale figure of a naked man running. Or was it a giant Grashopprer? He seemed to have Black Eyes. Then it was gone.

“Scream. That’s it, I must be in Scream-meets-Night of the Living Dead or whatever”, he thought. “What were the rules? Don’t be a virgin, check, don’t go out alone, che…”

“Uh… Hello, where are you guys? Guys?”

In the church Tristan saw fit not to protest too much, and Grelby and js_africanus followed his lead. They should have been afraid, were they lesser men. But now they found the spectacle to which they were unwilling participators to hold a strange and seductive beauty, despite or even because of the gruesome horror of it all.

“Frankly, I think the tenor sax is a bit off key”, whispered js_africanus.

The band leader turned his head as if to fix his eyes on js_africanus. A sudden movement of his arms silenced the band. The hapless tenor player was taken away by two helpful members of the audience. Then they turned to js_africanus. Despite his protests he was dragged to the stage.

Grelby and Tristan looked on, horror-stricken, one thought spinning through their minds. “Not by choice”

The unbendable rules of horror were played out to perfection. The once formidable unity of the original party was gone; the band of brethren lay in shambles. Unholy lust had spelled the demise of poor Kat and set up Zebra and Elvis. Inexplicable rage had filled the hearts of the usually so calm and controlled Elfkin and CRorex.

Thereby the yard lay open to the enemies of all that is good and beautiful. The Three, the arcane bodies of “The Dog,” robertliguori, and Gaijin, lead the way to their blackhearted followers, who drag their naked victim along.

And what happened to Derleth, and his One Ring? The quips of Elvis had amused him, for they lulled the others in a false sense of security. At this very moment, when all were distracted he could carry out what he had waited for all these ages.

40

“This double-reed can not be sanitary.”

Just then, Kat entered the chapel.

Quoth Kat, “Let’s hear some music, boys.”