Eerie Indiana Drabble: Borrowed Equipment

[froodle]

The power came on and deep beneath a cracked and dented plastic shell, internal fans began to move.

Marshall could hear the click and whir of demonic wings struggling to take flight. The air grew hot and the smell of sulphur filled the room, the rank odour choking him and making his eyes burn. On the laptop in front of him was a login screen, red text on a black background.

Harley and Simon's usernames showed who had used it most recently, and both "6" keys were worn smooth and blank from constant use.

"Maybe I should get my own..."

Ongoing Verse: Holmes Brothers

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Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Disturbed Sleep

[froodle]

Marshall Teller did not bolt upright when catapulted from sleep. His eyes opened, and he rolled onto his back to stare the dark grey spot above him that the rising sun would eventually resolve into the lumpy, inexpertly-applied paint job on his bedroom ceiling.

Not all dreams were prophetic. Every nightmare didn't come true. And of those he'd had that did hold some warning or hint for the future, most of them were jumbled images of things he'd already known, or suspected, or worked out on his own.

Marshall Teller lay in the pre-dawn darkness, and told himself these things.

Ongoing Verse: The Children

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Sleeping Housemates

[froodle]

The coffee maker bubbled happily atop the scarred Formica breakfast counter, the little green light on it's front a beacon in the otherwise darkened kitchen. Simon moved as quietly as he could, navigating the large, scorpion-tailed cat who sprawled in front of the oven, stepping around the clutch of tiny chicken-legged houses over by the window, and skirting the amorphous black mass which oozed from beneath the kitchen table and which was only sometimes a dog.

"This would be easier if you guys would stay in your own beds," he murmured, opening the refrigerator and finding a chupacabra dozing inside.

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Application

[froodle]

Simon looked at the online registration form open in front of him, then down at the two creatures that sat at his feet and that were, for the most part, dogs.

"Hmm," he said, looking back at the screen.

"What's up?" asked Marshall, navigating the small menagerie while holding two cups of coffee with the ease of long practise. "Pup Patrol Doggy Daycare won't take them?"

"I haven't finished filling out the application forms yet," said Simon, taking one of the mugs with a grateful smile. "Does Sparky count as one or three, do you think?"

"Call them and ask."

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Ineligable

[froodle]

Simon thanked the person on the other end of the line, settling the phone down gently in it's receiver before turning to Marshall.

"Good news and bad news," he said.

"Go on," said Marshall, inwardly bracing himself. Sometimes even Simon's good news could contain a fair amount of bad.

"Sparky only counts as one enrolment- he's got three heads but only one stomach, so feeding and clean-up is about the same as for any large dog."

"But?"

"Since the Wild Hunt's hounds aren't always or even mostly confined to dog shape, Mustard's technically a polymorph so they won't take him."

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Daycare

[froodle]

Marshall stared down at Mustard, still wearing his fluorescent yellow "I'm nervous, don't pet me" jacket. Today, as most days, Mustard resembled a slightly underfed golden retriever, albeit a little more skittish than most of that cheerful and placid breed.

"That's-" he started to say, then paused before continuing in softer tones, "That's not fair. He's not even part of the Wild Hunt anymore." He rubbed at Mustard's velvety-soft ears.

"I know," said Simon, also leaning over to run a hand across the rippling sunshine fur that was the dog's namesake. "Don't worry. We'll find another way to help him."

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Food Standards

[froodle]

The ground beneath the Eerie Municipal Pool had collapsed, sucking two dozen swimmers and thousands of gallons of water down into the echoing chasm below.

Marshall Teller peered out over the raggedy edge of the hole, feeling broken blue-white tile crunch beneath his feet and wishing there was a safety rail to hang onto.

"What's your theory?" asked Dash. "Giant moles? Shoddy workmanship? Human sacrifice to something with an aquatic theme? Do we need to call your ex down at the Sushi Bar?"

Marshall shook his head.

"Smell that chlorine?" he asked. "No way Janet's bosses eat anything that tainted."

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Timing

[froodle]

Marshall rolled over in bed, bleary eyes seeking out the glowing red numbers of his digital alarm clock.

5:17 a.m.

He groaned, softly but with a great deal of feeling, all of it negative.

Far too early on a workday to get up, not if he wanted to be functional at the office. Too late for further sleep to do anything but render him groggy and disorientated when his alarm finally did go off.

The worst of both worlds.

He closed his eyes, willing his brain to shut off. If he didn't remember waking, it didn't count, right?

Right?

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Ongoing Verse: Milkman

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Changing Tastes

[froodle]

"All I'm saying," said the Milkman, who had already said considerably more than that and who, Marshall felt, was in increasing danger of being forcibly fed his own wares until he drowned in them if he didn't shut up this minute, "Is that if your body naturally wakes you up at five, maybe you should consider it a sign."

"A sign," said Marshall flatly. "A sign that I should deliver milk."

"Early mornings are a perk of the job," said the Milkman.

"If you're me," said Marshall, "You must know that I'd never consider that a perk."

"Maybe not yet."

Ongoing Verse: Milkman

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Perspective

[froodle]

ChimpBee stood, thick fur bristling with pollen, and watched as a dozen worker bees, bright and blinding in their yellow hi-vis jackets, manoeuvred the newly cleaned skull into position atop the pile. Empty eyesockets stared blindly out over Chimpbee's domain, and Chimpbee felt a pang of sorrow that the dead human would never see the glory that lay before it.

Most likely the man wouldn't have appreciated it anyway - so few humans did, too busy wailing and crying about bee larvae crawling about under their skin to understand the miracle happening right in front of them, but still.

A shame.

Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Entry Point

[froodle]

The Tatzelwurm had gotten down the chimney, and aside from the obvious inconvenience of suddenly having an eight-foot catsnake underfoot at all times, this raised a few questions.

Chiefly, that the rundown apartment block where Simon lived with his two housemates had been built in the seventies, and had never, so far as city planning and long-time residents and what their landlord laughingly called the maintenance team, had a chimney.

"How did you do that?" Simon asked the Tatzelwurm, raising his voice to be heard above the purring as it would about his leg.

But the Tatzelwurm did not answer.

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Structure

[froodle]

Sheila knew that, as an incorporeal being, what she experienced was not actually tiredness. Not the physical kind, that came from muscles and blood cells and eyelids that wanted to close.

No, most likely what she felt was boredom, and boredom for a ghost was one of the bigger dangers out there. More-so than rogue exorcists and quartets of strange people in boiler suits, getting bored was how you got hurt. Or how you hurt other people.

She stretched, back arched, arms up, pantomiming a yawn. It didn't help.

She needed a distraction. More than that, she needed a routine...

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: First Encounter

[froodle]

She spotted him down by the old well, now just a circle of stone topped with a heavy concrete plug. The council hadn't wanted this place disturbed by the silver-dollar wishes of unwitting townsfolk, and for good reason. There was an ugly history here, one best left sealed away and forgotten by those that could.

He leaned against the crumbling curve of old brick and waterlogged mortar, and the pale blue ghosts of new-born kittens and unwanted puppies milled about his feet. As Sheila watched, he produced a handful of catnip mice from one pocket, scattering them amongst the crowd.

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Double Drabble: Equivalent Exchange

[froodle]

Simon glanced up, aware of a watchful presence that went beyond the playful attention of the animals at his feet. He spotted the faint spectral glow emanating from beneath the trees, waved, then immediately felt a bit silly.

The ghost in the trees seemed to startle, a muscle memory response to an adrenaline rush it no longer had. Then it slapped one luminous hand to it's forehead, apparently feeling a little silly itself, waved back, and stepped forward.

"Hi," said Simon. The ghost wore a plain white t-shirt with acid-washed jeans, old-fashioned but in a way that said "Mrs Teller at home on a Saturday" rather than "character from a Susan Hill story".

"Hi," said the ghost.

"I'm Simon," said Simon, who knew that giving your name to strange entities one meets beside abandoned wells hidden deep in the woods was a bad idea, but who also believed that good manners could coexist with keeping your middle name unknown to absolutely everyone, including your best friend and the tax man.

"Sheila," said the ghost. "I'd offer a handshake, but it would probably pass right through you."

Simon, who had just been about to proffer a shake of his own, laughed.

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Flea Treatment

[froodle]

"Ghost fleas?" asked Sheila, wrinkling the memory of her nose in an expression of disgust. "Seriously?"

Simon nodded, one thermal-gloved hand holding a squirming ghost cat in place against the warded metal table, the other dangling a pipette of yarrow powder and grave dirt suspended in blessed saline over the base of it's neck.

"Seems unfair, doesn't it," he said. "But then, why should the afterlife only exist for humans and a select few pets we decided warranted it?"

"But aren't you about to kill them?" asked Sheila. "Or re-kill them, or something?"

Simon thought about it.

"I guess so."

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Chooseday Challenge

[froodle]

It's Tuesday, so today you get a choice between two prompts. Pick one, combine both, pit them against each other - on Tuesday, you choose!

This week, your options are:

Canine Arrest Team versus Bureau of Lost

Eerie Indiana Drabble: Lockdown

[froodle]

It wasn't that Chisel was adverse to sacrificing the townspeople. If it meant a tax break or a good harvest, heck, even if it brought no material benefit other than the removal of some citizen he found particularly annoying, he was all for it.

It was just that this whole thing was so wasteful. The death toll alone would have stretched Eerie's finite human resources thin, but the effects of the plague left the corpses useless either as spare parts or sacrifice, and that was a bridge too far.

"Seal the borders," he told the Garbage Men. "We're in lockdown."

Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: The Call

[froodle]

There were strange markings carved into the trees. Near the roots, close to the earth, the cuts were neat and precise, scoring the bark without harming the soft wooden flesh beneath. Higher up, the symbols were sloppier, wild slashes that went deep and wept sap.

The undergrowth all around had a crumpled, slightly squashed look, as though someone very small and light had been making huge jumps in order to reach the upper edge of those ragged flourishes.

Simon glanced down at Snooter, whose yellow-brown eyes glistened with wounded innocence.

"Have you been trying to summon your friends?" he asked.

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Vantage Point

[froodle]

One of the chupacabra had climbed to the top of the telephone pole and was refusing to come back down.

"The stupid thing must know there's no goats up there," Sheila muttered. "Where would they even hide?"

"We can ask him when he's safely on the ground with us," Simon said. "Maybe he was trying for a better view of the Petting Zoo's defence systems?"

"Then he should have gone to their front door and read the sign for their Saturday farmer's market," said Sheila. "Chupacabra always do everything the hard way."

"I don't think they can read," Simon offered.

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Acknowledgement

[froodle]

Syndi Teller set a plate of sugar-dusted pastries down on her parent's kitchen table, and took a seat opposite her brother.

"Guess what," she said.

"I'm not speaking to you," said Marshall.

Syndi rolled her eyes.

"Look, I'm sorry I took your spooky Green Ribbon fanfiction about Dad's slightly awkward work friend and made it better by adding some much-needed bodice ripper elements, but I wanted to let you know," she lowered her voice, glancing around the cheerful room nervously, "You were right."

Marshall's eyes widened. "About Mr. Kermode?"

"No, idiot," said Syndi. "About the Future Homemakers of America bakesale."


Ongoing Verse: Teller Family History

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Strategerie

[froodle]

Marshall Teller opened the economy-sized packet of plain black men's dress socks, lifted the lid of the Odd Sock Box, and dumped the contents in. Forty-eight neatly folded, entirely identical socks tumbled into the all-black mass below, and Marshall gave the contents a quick stir for good luck before setting the lid down.

There was, he thought, a certain satisfaction in knowing that a concept like the Odd Sock Box actually made it harder for the Bureau of Lost to mess with his stuff. If he couldn't easily identify a matching pair, then Al and Lodgepoole hadn't got a chance.


Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Dialect

[froodle]

Melanie Monroe had not grown up in Eerie, and she tried not to think about the possibility that her haunted heart meant that she might never be able to leave, or, at the very least, might not be able to take Devon with her when she did so.

That was why, when she pushed open the cheery red-painted double doors that lead into the Eerie Baitshop and Sushi Bar and saw the skinless corpse sat at the counter, she didn't say "Holy Corn!" or "by my ever-lasting husk!" or any one of a dozen colourful local sayings.

"Jesus fucking Christ!"

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Eerie Indiana Triple Drabble: Culinary Dramatics

[froodle]

The raw and weeping thing at the bar jumped a little at her outburst, as did Janet, though she controlled hers in time to stop the neatly-plated nigiri from sliding off her serving tray.

"There you go, sir," she said to the skinless corpse, setting the dish down in front of it. "Wasabi, soy sauce and ginger are on your left. Let me know if you need anything else."

She smiled, bright and breezy, then turned to Melanie.

"Mel," she said carefully. "Are you doing okay?"

Melanie took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. This was not the time to go all Marshall Teller on her best friend just because...

Just because...

Because there was a revenant sitting at her place of work, carefully separating a set of disposable chopsticks with bloody fingers that left red-brown smears over the cheap alder wood.

Janet's expression became one of concern.

"Do you need to sit down? We're kind of crowded today because of the King Tide, but there's room at the counter."

Melanie swallowed hard, shook her head, and forced her expression back to something that, if not cheerfully unconcerned, was least pleasantly neutral.

"No," she said. "I'm good. Just stopped by to say hi and pick up some takeout is all."

"It'll be a bit of a wait," said Janet. "Fred's compulsively impersonating a high-strung perfectionist right now, so there's a lot of drama going on in the kitchen. I'm actually hanging out with the customers for some peace and quiet, if you can believe that."

Melanie Monroe looked from her friend, to the heavy steel door that lead to the kitchen, to the bloodied tatterdemalion peaceably eating sushi dipped in way too much soy sauce, and raised an eyebrow.

"Seriously?" she asked.

"Trust me," said Janet. "It's that dire."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Great

[froodle]

Marshall stood on the curb opposite Haunted Structure #189, a penlight in one hand as he scanned his way down the neatly-typed list of names he held in the other.

"I don't get it," he said. "According to this, the place has been dormant for over a decade."

Blindingly white torchlight played over the front of the screaming, shaking house, stopping at the front door which swung wide to reveal inky blackness beyond.

"Looks like somebody broke in," said Dash. "Woke it up, gave it back it's appetite."

Marshall watched as blood ran down the insides of unwashed windows.

"Great."


Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Pockets

[froodle]

The robe was thick and soft, the sheer bulk of it packed so tightly into the glitzy gift-wrap prison that it started to ooze out the moment she tore away that first strip of tape. She pulled, and as the tidal wave of the fabric spilled out and down and pooled about her feet in a glorious tide of pinks and blues, Sara Sue squealed in delight.

"It has pockets!"

She lifted it, feeling the velvety plush against her paint-stained fingertips, noticing the slight strain required to lift all that wonderful, snuggly weight, and slipped it on.

"Pockets, you guys!"


Ongoing Verse: Pay Attention

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Off Season

[froodle]

On the sunniest shore of Lake Eerie, twelve small whitewashed cottages stood in neat rows of four, each row running parallel to it's neighbour and the first running parallel to the lake.

In the summer, smoke would rise from a dozen barbeques as tourists and locals alike made use of rented kitchenettes and fold-out sofas and reasonably-priced canoe rentals. But now, in the dead of winter, the pale blue rooms looked cold and empty, and the large picture windows with their drapes all taken up and put away stared at the grey water like unfocussed eyes.

Janet loved them then.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Patience

[froodle]

The sun was high and hot, and around the lake the air smelled of salt and had a thick, cloying texture that coated the inside of her mouth with every breath, leaving her throat dry and her tongue tingling.

Janet Donner stood at the end of the boardwalk, wooden planks warm against her bare feet, feeling every minute shift of the water around her as it worked with slow and endless patience to erode the rotten pilings that sank deeper into the muddy lake bed with each day that passed.

It would get her eventually, she knew. But not yet.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Low Effort

[froodle]

"It's a secret," giggled the thing in the grating. "I like secrets. I'd like to share some secrets with you, if you'd let me."

It beckoned with a thing that was not a hand, that had never been a hand, that only a thing without hands, having only the dimmest most uncomprehending idea of what a hand even was, could have thought would pass for a hand.

The man from the Eerie Water Board sighed. It looked like this whole section of pipe would need to be flushed with holy water to clear these bastards.

And they were so lazy...


Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: After Work Drinks

[froodle]

"It's the principle of the thing," said the man from the Eerie Water Board. "Plenty of stuff out there that will kill you and eat you, maybe even take your face and wear it around for a bit. That's fine. That's nature."

He took a hard look at his beer before raising it to his lips, then continued:

"But this? It's so low effort. No style. No originality. Just headed straight for the easiest prey, the dumbest people."

The woman from the Eerie Nursery and Garden Centre nodded.

"It cheapens the whole thing," she said. "There's no challenge to it."


Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Victorious

[froodle]

The things that were not ducks but instead the duck-shaped fingertips of some vast and lurking thing that made it's home in the muck at the bottom of the reflecting pool in Deadwood Park were ragged and bleeding, leaving pink trails in the white-crested water as they sank beneath the surface, desperate to escape their attackers.

Their attackers, who actually were ducks, bobbed and dived and bit at their retreating enemies, but finding themselves unable to follow once the false fowls vanished below ground, contented themselves with a victory lap of their reconquered territory, accompanied by some very derisive quacking.


Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Naturally Occurring

[froodle]

"Should there be swamps in Indiana?" asked Marshall, already knee-deep in said swamp and already regretting not having borrowed his father's waders for this trip. Goofy-looking but dry and unbothered by leeches would definitely be the way to go, should he find himself out this way again.

Simon gave him a strange look.

"Of course," he said. "Where would the swamp witches live, if we didn't have swamps?"

That was a fair point, Marshall supposed, though it wasn't quite what he meant.

"I just thought there had to be wetlands or something."

"Nah," said Simon. "A swamp witch is enough."


Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: No

[froodle]

"Close your eyes," said the voice from the woods. "Close your eyes and reach."

Marshall Teller, pale blue eyes now full of green and growing things, shook his head. For a moment, it seemed like the trees were shaking with him.

"No," he said, forcing the words out with difficulty, as though his mouth was stuffed with peat and loam. "No, I don't think I will."

Now the trees did shake, though it was the anger of some ancient, hungry thing being thwarted, rather than a motion carried by the sympathetic magic of the Harvest King.

"Coward," the forest hissed.

Ongoing Verse: Harvest

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Eerie Indiana Drabble: Call of the Sea

[froodle]

The ghost of the drowned man stood amidst a growing puddle of phantom seawater. His eyes were clouded, jelly-grey and unseeing, and his blanched white skin bubbled and bulged. Marshall raised the clunky Instamatic camera to his face, his hands shaking so badly that his eyes could barely find the viewfinder, and managed to hit the shutter button on his third try.

The flash was blinding on the dark shore, and the drowned man turned. His jaw hung slack and black water poured out of his gaping mouth. He screamed like waves thundering on bare rock, and finally, Marshall ran.


Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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Ongoing Verse: Janet

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