# # #
They didn’t have much. Amber found a few things in the truck—a stake and a couple of their flashlights that he must have lifted from George. Mary and George snapped a couple of the handles of tools they found in the garage. The only thing that Alan carried was the bag of seeds. He scattered them around as they assembled at the door that led from the garage to the shed.
Amber pushed the door open.
The hallway was black.
Tucker began to growl.
Amber crouched to point one flashlight upwards.
Ricky held his light high and pointed it down.
Alan pitched a handful of seeds down the hall.
“That’s supposed to do something?” Mary asked.
“Just don’t look, Mom,” Ricky said. “Don’t look at the eyes.”
“Heard you the first time,” she said.
Ricky started to move forward and Amber reached out and put a hand on his shin. She pointed her light straight up and Ricky understood.
Holding his position, Ricky waved his brother forward with a gesture. George slid between Ricky and Amber and thrust the shovel handle up—driving it into the ceiling several times before he backed away, slinging something from his hand.
Amber leaned forward to reassess and then nodded at what she saw. They all moved into the mouth of the hallway.
Mary closed the door behind them and they began to work their way down the length. Just before they reached the first window, Amber’s light picked up a shadow that moved. To get his light high enough, Ricky had to put his foot on a low shelf that was built into the wall. He rose up and they all saw it. For a brief moment, the two lights converged on a shape that hadn’t been there before. Then, an instant later, it was gone.
Alan tossed seeds down the hall.
Ricky didn’t see the point—so far the monsters had been clinging to the ceiling. He underestimated the draw of the loose seeds. Amber’s light picked up the movement as the creature worked its way down the wall so it could gather the strewn seeds.
He and Amber moved together. Ricky drew the thing’s attention. It focused its swirling eyes on him and he slowed as Amber kept going. Ricky knew what it was like to peer into those haunting eyes, but this creature seemed different. There was no confidence in its glare. Ricky believed that if he really tried, he might be able to look away. It didn’t matter. A moment later, the eyes were extinguished as Amber thrust her spear into one and then the other. It was dead before it could blink.
Moving as a team, they cleared the hallway of one more monster and reached the door to Romeo’s kitchen.
“Everyone turn away or shield your eyes,” Alan said. “The light is bright.”
He stood firm, looking directly at the door.
“What about you?” Ricky asked.
“In case there is no light,” Alan said.
He pushed open the door and flinched back as more of the bright purple light flooded the hall. The puddle of the dead monster began to vaporize on the floor. The group moved forward into Romeo’s kitchen.
Amber found the light switch and one of the bulbs buzzed as it warmed up. Over the sink, a clock ticked off the seconds.
The house was dead silent until Alan called, “Romeo Libby? Come on out.”
There was no answer.
Ricky grabbed Tucker’s collar as the dog tried to move forward to investigate the smells of the new place.
“Stay with me,” Ricky whispered to the dog.
“Romeo?” Mary yelled. “You have company.”
There was still no answer.
Ricky looked to his mom and then pointed to Tucker. “Keep him here. I’ll check the place out.”
“I’m coming too,” Amber said.
George tilted his chin up—silently declaring that he would be on the team.
“Watch out for traps,” Ricky said. “Tripwires, pressure plates, any floorboards that don’t look right, or cameras. He wired up the door and he’s pretty paranoid. There’s no telling what he has rigged up.”
Amber and George nodded.
“You kids stay together,” Mary said. “No stragglers. Alan, you stay and keep me company.”
They all agreed.
Ricky took the lead.
# # #
Ricky moved to the doorway that led to a sitting room. His parents would have called it a TV room, but Ricky didn’t see a TV.
He still had his flashlight on and he pointed it towards the corners of the room without thinking even though the lights were on. Over near a recliner, he saw the empty dog bed where Albert had left a depression and more than a few hairs. There was an overturned glass laying on its side on the table.
Ricky’s eyes roved around the room and he stepped carefully. The carpet was worn enough that he could see the path that Romeo and Albert usually took towards the stairs. Ricky was careful to stay on that path.
The front room had a dining table that clearly wasn’t used for its designed purpose. The table was stacked high with columns of books and there were more piles in front of the bookshelves along the wall. Ricky crouched to check under the table with his light. Amber circled left and scanned down some of the titles.
“Fiction,” she said. “French and Russian authors.”
“Depression and self-loathing,” George said. “Hey—what’s this?”
Ricky turned his light towards George and his brother squinted at the beam. Lowering his light, he saw that George was pointing towards the switch on the wall.
“Light switches,” Amber said. “What do you mean?”
“There are three,” George said. “There’s one overhead light, and maybe this one controls the lights in the next room, but what’s this third one for, and why is it separate from the other two.”
Ricky was about to tell his brother to stop worrying about switches and start paying attention to what they were doing. Before he could, George flipped the switch and Amber reached out like she might be able to stop him before he did.
The switch flipped up and George flinched back from the sound that erupted from the other room. It was a low static sound, like a radio tuned to
