The Hunt

"Damn this place - why is it so big!"

He turned the corner and found another dead-end - one he was certain hadn't been there 5 minutes earlier.

He cursed again and raced back down the hallway.

"I'll find it," he promised himself. "I swear I'll find the way out of this place. You can't keep me here forever!" He added loudly, pausing in the middle of the upstairs landing.

He waited and listened, straining his ears for even the smallest sound of the entity's presence. Sometimes it was a single word, sweeping through the halls like the wind. Sometimes it was a full sentence, asking nonsensical questions. Other times it was a series of loud knocks, the pattern always suddenly stopping as if waiting for a reply.

But most of the time, like tonight, it was the sound of a bell echoing throughout the hallways of the mansion...

Those were the nights he was most desperate for his escape.

'I have to hurry' he thought again, descending the grand spiraling staircase.

'I have to get to them!'

The last he heard of his Deborah she was terribly sick - their baby he was less sure of, though it was now earthbound. He needed to get to them. He needed to make sure they were okay.

He sprinted back through through the foyer, leaping over a section of the floors as wooden planks collapsed in on themselves. He found himself again in the only familiar hallway of the mansion, every door firmly shut - again.

"You've got to be kidding me!" he groaned before charging ahead. He wasn't even thinking as he angrily forced each door open, following the strategy he'd discovered a few days earlier.

Whatever this entity was, there were certain rooms it didn't venture into. Some seemed safe from the strange touch of time that this being seemed to possess: dusty furniture remained untouched and the brick-a-brack was familiar enough. Other rooms, however, were left completely topsy-turvy: heavy furniture shoved to one side of the room, as strange symbols appared then disappeared from the walls, while obnoxious smells from something burning hung heavily in the room.

As he searched the rooms again - finding all the windows sealed and immovable (again!) - his thoughts turned back to the last thing he remembered before he became captive of this labyrinth. He'd received the message from his sister-in-law - "come quickly!" - he'd thrown together a bag, raced out the door and into the night...

It was raining then...

No- it was storming - gale-winds whipped him furiously as if urging him to go back...

He'd turned right at the fork in the road and...

He'd made a mistake. He'd meant to turn right, but instead he turned left and...

He stopped dead in his tracks at the end of the hallway. Voices whispered from within the second door on the left. He crept backward slowly, hoping to avoid the thing's notice.

Suddenly the voices grew louder.

Then the ringing filled the room.

"Oh no... not again..."

The ringing grew louder, and louder, until it was deafening. He slapped his hands over his ears as the ringing bounced round the inside of his head, making the world spin.

Then he felt the dull tugging in the middle of his chest.

It was too late.

He turned to run anyway, hoping this time, just maybe, to escape the Entity's pull.

"No! Stop! Not again!" he cried as the tugging grew stronger, forcing him to a stop. The Bell rang sharply in the air - a yank pulled him backwards and he tumbled to the floor with a 'THUD!'

He scrambled around, still fighting against the pull of the ghostly force as he grabbed at anything and everything he could see.

"Stop it, please!" he yelled launching himself at an end table. It skidded across the floor with him as he was dragged to the second door on the left.

"I have to get to them! My family! I have to help them!" he screamed louder the table breaking away from his grip.

He slid faster and faster as the door opened wide for him."You can't keep me here! You can't!! It isn't right, it isn't fair, it-!"

The door slammed shut behind him...

***

"Well - that was a total bust!" Shayla exclaimed, throwing her hands dramatically in the air.

"It was not a total bust!" Riley chastised, locking the apartment door behind them. "You can't tell me those cold spots weren't something spooky."

"So someone left a window open in a big drafty house - big whoop!" Shayla replied.

Riley scoffed and began quickly unpacking their equipment on the table.

"You're not seriously gonna go through that footage tonight, are you?" Shayla asked.

"Not all of it," Riley explained, queuing up her tape recorder. "I've just got a really good feeling about the spirit-box session, that's all." Shayla opened her mouth to say something snarky, but was immediately silenced when she noticed the pictures on the living room wall shaking.

Riley, meanwhile remained oblivious as she jammed her headphones in the audio-jack and played the tape. She furrowed her brow and rewound the track, and carefully listened to the recording - seemingly confused.

"Hey, Shay- check this out," she said as she yanked the headphones off. Shayla took them and pressed the left earphone to her good ear, listening intently as the voice in the track cried out.

"Uh," she muttered. "That's super weird. Did someone sneak into the room while we were recording?"

"I don't see how," said Riley. "The owners were still outside by the car." Shayla quirked her eyebrow.

"I'm positive!" Riley insisted. "I saw them myself! From the window!"

Shayla only rewound the track and listened again, very carefully and very confused to the sudden ramblings of a seemingly unhinged man:

"No!Stop!Not again!Stop itplease!I havetoget-them!Myfamily!havetohelp them..."

Riley then screamed and Shayla jumped backward as the voice screamed into her ear, shaking the entire apartment around them.

"YOU CAN'T KEEP ME HERE FOREVER!"