ماسک روح زده فصل 26

The Haunted Mask - Chapter 26

Carly Beth hesitated. She turned back to stare at the heads bobbing on the shelves.

Fat, dark lips began to move, making wet sucking sounds. Crooked fangs clicked up and down. Ugly, inhuman noses twitched and gasped air noisily.

The heads, two long rows of them, throbbed to life.

And the eyes—the blood-veined, bulging eyes—the green eyes, the sickly yellow eyes, the bright scarlet eyes, the disgusting eyeballs hanging by threads—they were all on her!

“Run! You’ve awakened them!” the store owner screamed, his voice choked with fear. “Run! Get away from here!”

Carly Beth wanted to run. But her legs wouldn’t cooperate. Her knees felt wobbly and weak. She suddenly felt as if she weighed a thousand pounds.

“Run! Run!” The store owner repeated his frantic cry.

But she couldn’t take her eyes off the throbbing, twitching heads.

Carly Beth gaped at the hideous scene, frozen in terror, feeling her legs turn to Jell-O, feeling her breath catch in her throat. And as she watched, the heads rose up and floated into the air.

“Run! Hurry! Run!”

The store owner’s voice seemed far away now.

The heads began to jabber in rumbling, deep voices, drowning out his frantic cries. They murmured excitedly, making only sounds, no words, like a chorus of frogs.

Up, up, they floated, as Carly Beth stared in silent horror.

“Run! Run!”

Yes.

She turned. She forced her legs to move.

And with a burst of energy, she began to run.

She ran through the dimly lit front room of the store. Her hands grabbed for the doorknob, and she pulled open the door.

A second later, she was out on the sidewalk, running through the darkness. Her sneakers thudded loudly on the pavement. She felt a shock of cold air against her hot face.

Her hot, green face.

Her monster face.

The monster face she could not remove.

She crossed the street and kept running.

What was that sound? That deep, gurgling sound? That low murmur that seemed to be following her?

Following her?

“Oh, no!” Carly Beth cried out as she glanced back—and saw the gruesome heads flying after her.

A ghoulish parade.

They flew in single file, one long chain of throbbing, jabbering heads. Their eyes glowed brightly, as bright as car headlights, and they were all trained on Carly Beth.

Choked with fear, Carly Beth stumbled over the curb.

Her arms shot forward as she struggled to regain her balance. Her legs wanted to collapse, but she forced them to move again.

Bent into the wind, she ran, past dark houses and empty lots.

It must be late, she realized. It must be very late.

Too late.

The words flashed into her mind.

Too late for me.

The hideous, glowing heads flew after her. Getting closer. Closer. The rumbling of their animal murmurs grew louder in her ears until the frightening sound seemed to surround her.

The wind roared, gusting hard, as if deliberately pushing her back.

The murmuring heads floated closer.

I’m running through a dark nightmare, she thought.

I may run forever.

Too late. Too late for me.

Or was it?

An idea formed its way through her nightmarish panic. As she ran, her arms thrashing the air in front of her as if reaching for safety, her mind struggled for a solution, an escape.

A symbol of love.

She heard the store owner’s words over the rumble of ugly voices behind her.

A symbol of love.

That’s what it would take to rid her of the monster head that had become her own.

Would it also stop the throbbing, glowing heads that pursued her? Would it send the faces of The Unloved back to where they came from?

Gasping loudly for breath, Carly Beth turned the corner and kept running. Glancing back, she could see her chattering pursuers turn, too.

Where am I? she wondered, turning her eyes to the houses she was passing.

She had been too frightened to care where she ran.

But, now, Carly Beth had an idea. A desperate idea.

And she had to get there before the gruesome parade of heads caught up with her.

She had a symbol of love.

It was her head. The plaster of Paris head her mother had sculpted of her.

Carly Beth remembered asking her mother why she had sculpted it. And her mother had replied, “Because I love you.” Maybe it could save her. Maybe it could help her out of this nightmare.

But where was it?

She had tossed it aside. She had let it fall behind a hedge. She had left it in someone’s yard, and—

And now she was back on the block.

She recognized the street. She recognized the houses.

This was where she had met up with Chuck and Steve. This is where she had sent them running off in terror.

But where was the house? Where was the hedge?

Her eyes darted frantically from yard to yard.

Behind her, she saw, the heads had swarmed together. Like buzzing bees, they had bunched together, grinning now, grinning hideous, wet grins as they prepared to close in on her.

I’ve got to find the head! Carly Beth told herself, struggling to breathe, struggling to keep her aching legs moving.

I’ve got to find my head.

The rumbling, jabbering voices grew louder. The heads swarmed closer.

“Where? Where?” she screamed aloud.

And then she saw the tall hedge. Across the street.

The yard across the street.

The head, the beautiful head—she had let it fall behind that hedge.

Could she get to it before the ugly heads swarmed over her?

Yes!

Sucking in a deep breath of air, her arms reaching out desperately in front of her, she turned and ran across the street.

And dove behind the hedge. Onto her hands and knees. Her chest heaving. Her breath rasping. Her head pounding.

She reached for the head.

It was gone.