FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Clomping hooves announced the arrival of the faun lecturer to the unfolding scene of horror by the Pac-Man machine. “We’ve barely got breakfast out of the way, can you save the acting for later at least?” he huffed, crossly, as wails and shrieks reverberated off the walls.

But this was no roleplay.

The shadowy tendrils of doom were not Made In China, purchased from Woolworths; they were moving, snatching, dragging…

Wet slurping slowly drowned out the cries of an ensnared student.

Anar skidded up to the arcade and was given a side-eye stare. The aardvarkian teenager was coated in what looked like egg and milk, his usually immaculate forward-sweep of hair lying flat on his grey head between his gracefully curving, black horns. His robe was equally filthy. He looked as though he’d belly-flopped onto his plate.

“Meredith?!” Anar called, looking around desperately.

The teacher looked at the tendrils and back again at Anar, weighing up the possibility of making the student a very messy scapegoat.

“What happened to Meredith, Mr… errr…”

The faun’s eyes narrowed, “Mr. Hiln!”

“Yeah, yeah, Mr. Hiln, I knew that,” he said quickly, spotting the eldritch horror sinking down into the carpet and vanishing before them.

He pointed, “what was…?”

“Shadow Wite,” the faun snapped. “Don’t move!”

“Ooooh, what’s going on? It’s Mr. E. Ville! Hello Mr. E. Ville,” Rap waved, cheerily.

“Who on Earth is Mr. E. Ville?” the teacher snapped.

“Never mind that,” Anar quickly tried to change the subject from his made-up name for the magic teacher, to the whereabouts of his ex-girlfriend. “Where’s Meredith gone? Did the Wite take her?”

“We thought it was a trap,” Rap chatted, happily, “we thought we’d turn the corner and you’d be clonked round the head and left in a heap.”

“There was a big shadow monster! Right there, by the pinball machine.”

“Ooooh, like that one?’ Rap nodded to the pool table on the opposite side of the room. Black tendrils were sneaking out of one of the ball pockets.

The teacher raised his hand and a sharp blast of yellow light lit up the green felt of the playing surface, shrinking the smoky tentacles back with a gurgling noise and the scent of sulphur.

“What was your suckie doing here, anyway? I thought she was hanging out with Crowley.”

Anar’s ears flickered. He had heard the familiar flittering of tiny wings, “I think she was, yeah. In fact…” he slowly walked across the bright blue carpet covered in red zig zags and yellow circles, to where the largest game cabinet was sat, big and tall and wide. In the dark corner, in the shadow away from the neon light, Alexis was crouched with his back against the wall.

His eyes looked up to see the aardvark standing over him, grinning an evil little grin.

“I knew you were all talk!” Anar gloated.

“Oh no, demon donkey, I wasn’t hiding. I was waiting!”

Before Anar could say anything about having Rap and Rave and a teacher there with them in the arcade, so don’t try any funny business, a black whip-like shape lashed out and grabbed his leg, gripping it tight. “GUYS!”

His leg was roughly pulled under him and he landed on the floor with a thump, dragged along as a chittering voice laughed in his ear. Dainty pixie fingers lifted his knotted silver chain from around his neck.

In a moment, Sharon was gone.

Anar panicked as he felt the carpet suddenly envelop him, a fuzzy smothering sensation that filled his mouth and nostrils as he was sinking down into its fibres, muffling his screams as he called out for his friends.

Mr. Hiln stepped back as Alexis Crowley stood up from the back of the arcade room, his wings opening with a creak, an amber amulet gleaming in his red hands.

“I’ll eat you!” Rave snarled, lunging.

“Ah, but then you won’t know where your demon donkey friend is, will you?”

“Shadow Wites, Crowley?” the faun asked, concerned.

“It’s just Hallowe’en trickery, Mr. Hiln, all in the spirit of the celebrations. The donkey won’t be permanently scarred, more’s the pity, just subjected to horrors beyond his comprehension.”

“And this… Meredith?”

Crowley looked unmoved, “she’ll be wandering around in the outer circle too, of course. Maybe they’ll find each other – they deserve each other,” he added, darkly. “She wouldn’t shut up about him, it was so annoying.”

“I see. The outer circle, you say? Well, they’ll be able to make their own way back then, at least, with the connection between realms open.” He eyed the amulet, “don’t do anything unwise, Crowley,” he instructed, “that magic won’t work for you.”

Alexis feigned innocence, “I’m simply looking after it for him until he gets back, that’s all, Mr. Hiln. I’m not planning on letting anything unfortunate happen to it, whatsoever.”

Rave moved closer, teeth bared.

“You won’t attack me in front of a teacher,” the human scoffed.

“Try me!” Rave blocked his way, his tail swishing menacingly. He raised his green, scaly fists. “We’re only familiars, our punishments are limited. What we gonna do? Spend an extra few hours in our cage?”

There was a sharp ‘squeak’! The pixie tumbled in the air, its wings flapping rapidly.

Mr. Hiln watched it try to prevent a crash landing, and didn’t notice Rap’s quick hand movements while he’d been standing off to Crowley’s side, keeping out of the drama.

“Well, it seems we have no choice but to wait for Anar to get back from the outer circle of Hell, where that smoke monster sent him,” Rap said, loudly. “Come on, Rave, leave the silly monkey alone. We don’t want to get in any trouble, after all.”

Rave’s long face crumpled in confusion for a moment. “What? But I’m gonna give him a thrashing!”

“You don’t want to get in any trouble, do you?” Rap said, again loudly, his bony eye ridges raising.

“I don’t?” Rave watched his partner pat the now empty pockets on his skirt. “I don’t! No siree, no trouble here. Bye-bye Mr. Hiln, see you in class.”

The two lizards coughed, clearing their throats, taking each other’s hands and wandered off in the direction of apple-bobbing.

Once they were out of earshot and along the corridor, Rave asked what that had been all about. “You were being sneaky! I could tell.”

Rap beamed, “being here has given me a few ideas on trickery, too! We just need to find our nice jackal security friends. After we’ve eaten a few toffee apples. We can’t help poor Anar, but we can give him something to smile about when he gets back.”

“Is he really in the outer circle of Hell? Were the shadow monsters made by Crowley?”

“We said it was a trap,” Rap shook his head, sadly. “Anar’s too heroic for this demon stuff; his moral compass ain’t wonky enough, I reckon.”

The air was thick with heat, a shimmering glaze hung above the dust and rock as Anar picked himself up from where he’d landed. It had been a hard fall from a great height, his ribs hurt and there was a smear of blood across his snout. Now more than before, he looked like a curious grey street urchin from Victorian England. His trainers were covered in milk that had dried crusty yellow, and because it was sticky they had just gained red dust, clumped up at the soles. His robes were stained and no longer a shade of black worthy of an underworld minion, it was now just a dirty dark coat with a very high collar. He’d been to the laundry and washed everything ready for today. Now, barely after breakfast, it had all been undone. His black jumper had got baked bean juice all down it. His hair was stiff and crispy.

Sharon Stone had been stolen from him.

He’d been taken away from Rap and Rave.

That bastard Crowley had lured him in like a pro. The Shadow Wites – whatever they were, had brought him here to the wilderness where he would surely perish. Good job he’d actually eaten a meal and had his coffee, today! He wouldn’t die on an empty stomach.

His ears were full of howls, chittering, wails, screams; on the horizon he could see a boundary of some sort, a ledge leading to a drop below. Smoke rose up in the far distance. The sky was a blue colour, but it looked off, too transparent, not quite right. Clouds sat above, not moving, looking like a painting rather than water vapor.

A black flash accompanied by a rumble of thunder split the not-quite-sky and a dark tunnel grew, stretching from the ground far below, up beyond where he could see.

Small shapes drifted, eerie sounds carried along the faintest of breezes as they flapped or soared or whirled through the mysterious corridor.

“That’s the Underworld link.”

Anar spun at hearing Meredith’s voice beside him.

“I know you’re going to be cross with me,” she said.

“Cross?!” Anar barked. “I’m more than that! I should be bobbing for apples right now, not looking at underworld creatures flying through the flipping air on their way to the mortal realm! Look at the state of me! And Crowley robbed my amulet! What did you go and get with him for, anyway? Just to make me jealous? I’m a nobody! So what if we didn’t work out?”

“We only didn’t work out because your lizard said so! I know you like me! I didn’t get with Crowley, not really, I was just flirting so you’d chase after me.”

“Yeah, well, I did, literally. And now look,” he swept a grey hand to the odd sky. “How come you’re here?” he looked puzzled. “That doesn’t make sense. You let the shadow monsters take you?”

Meredith wiped red sand from her pale, beautiful elven face with her black lace glove, “Alexis said he’d trick you into going to the Underworld, said it would be ok because you weren’t dead so you’d get back eventually. It would mean you couldn’t make your offering, or make your dark pledge and therefore you’d lose marks. I wasn’t supposed to be here, Alexis tricked me as well. I was only going to do the whole ‘screaming for help’ thing and hope you showed up. Then I got dragged away.”

“Did you tell Alexis anything about me?” he pulled his cloak collar tight as the sand sprayed his face in sharp drifts. They walked to the edge.

“I didn’t mention Destroyer, if that’s what you mean. I really wanted to, but it seemed a bit… secret.” Her sparkling eyes gazed at the sky. “He can rescue us, right?”

Anar shrugged, “I don’t know. What if he can’t? I won’t be able to transport myself using my amulet, because Arsewipe took it! You said we should be able to get back, but how?”

“The Underworld link,” she replied.

Anar once again took in the black, swirling tunnel that stretched from ground to sky and beyond, “you’ve got to be joking me.”

“We blend in! That’s what Hallowe’en was all about, wasn’t it? The night when spirits and demons walked the mortal plane, so everyday folk disguised themselves for safety? Only we’re occult students dressed in black, trying to not get vaporised in Hell.”

The ground rumbled. Cracks appeared. Pale, sun-bleached bone reached forth, knuckles bent, searching for the warmth of life and the sustenance it brings.

Meredith shrieked as her fishnet tights were ripped at her ankles as hands rose up from the red dust around them, longer arm bones following, the sharp edges catching her thin limbs.

In a cloud of dirt, the remainder of the bodies crawled out from their subterranean resting ground, jaws creaking and feet shambling, reaching out as the two teens stumbled backwards, horrified, Meredith scrambling for her jewelled brooch and the magic therein. “I don’t want to leave you,” she wailed to Anar. “But I don’t know what else to do!”

Anar grabbed at a forearm and yanked it, hard, ripping it from its socket, “sometimes gratuitous violence is the only answer!” he said, gritting his teeth and swinging the detached bones at their assailants. Dozens of undead spirits – the very same that the necromancers raised up for mischief – grabbed at them hungrily, thin papery sheets of flesh still dangling as they creaked and scraped through the dusty ground.

They looked below them. Another level of Hell. Another round of danger.

“Destroyer!” Anar called, pleadingly.

But there were no hoofbeats, no mighty swooping wings, no terrible Nightmare scream.

On the ledge, his trainers teetering, Anar pushed and shoved the rotting corpses away from them, only to watch as they struggled upright again and came back. This was why they were such an asset in the dark arts; you couldn’t kill them, you couldn’t tire them, they didn’t need food or rest or even air. They would drain you of your essence for their master’s purposes and then you would be one of them, taking your turn. All you could hope to do was dismember them enough, reduce them to parts, only that tactic ceased their enchantment. Anar smashed and splintered thick bone, aimed for the fragile ligament connectors, stamped at knees and hips. The sound of soft thuds, cracking and creaking as bits and pieces of deceased persons were flung all over the place, eventually drew other shadows near to them. White, cold mist rolled in. Long, tendril limbs moved.

“Jump?” Meredith asked, not looking happy about it.

“Jump!” Anar ordered, still waving a forearm bone around as he lifted himself off with a hop, bracing for impact as they hit the muddy surface below.

“Ohhhh, YUK!” The gloop sucked at Meredith’s high heels.

Wide, toothy mouths opened, gaping from within the marshland, burbling and gibbering as skittering insects swarmed around them, thin, barbed limbs scratching and probing mouths flicking on their faces. They swatted at the awful bugs, trying to run, their feet squelching as they moved, feeling tiny pinches as the mouths bit down or the insects stabbed. Real, living bodies were a treat! Their scent would carry, the heat from their bodies a beacon drawing forth all the critters within this otherworldly bog. Dead tree limbs lay in their path, rotting vegetation slipped under them, more muck and filth to wash out of their outfits.

The deep bellow of a creature unseen caused them to quicken their pace. They had to make their way to the next level, down, down the ledges until they reached the city of Pandemonium, their final destination; the Capital of Hell itself.

Splashes and groans collected up behind them but they didn’t look back, the zombies were following, or what was left of them, the creatures that the wide mouths belonged to were hopping and croaking, the insects they were swatting still buzzed round their heads.

Meredith struggled, her footwear being a tad less suitable for outdoor adventuring than trainers.

Anar kept her close, his hand on her pretty dress sleeve, ready to lift her as she stumbled down. The next ledge was leapt and it was all mist, just like when the wraith had been wandering, only this time there was no taking it home to rest, no local cemetery a quick ride away, this time it was going to be a mad dash without a Zippo lighter.

“I’ve still got my magic, don’t forget!” Meredith panted, her lovely locks now damp and frizzy from the moisture in the air.

“I know,” Anar snorted, out of breath, “but that’s a last resort, right?”

They couldn’t see the ground in front of them so they had to slow down, the sounds of shambling and creeping pursuers catching them up. Faces appeared in the thick mist, long and haggard and decayed; wraiths far past rescuing, spirits that longed to feel the warmth of the sun and the touch of the living, no matter the awful cost. One brush of their clammy forms would drain the essence from their souls until there was nothing left. Like a succubus, without the pretty lips.

Anar reached into his pockets, there must be something that would keep them away? The lighter drew them in, he knew that, but what would they not like? He had his Walkman, his headphones, his music, not much else. He remembered Rave’s awful singing. That would be enough to drive a phantasm away!

“Meredith, how’s your singing?” he asked, breathlessly.

“I’m – I’m a siren,” she gasped, “why?”

“You might want to plug your ears.”

Anar clicked PLAY and deliberately butchered Michael Jackson’s Thriller. It was a desperate move, from a desperate would-be demon, and he took no pleasure in calling forth his inner Rave as he paid no attention to notes or tune, instead just throwing himself into it, full gusto.

“’Cos this is Thriiiiller! Thriller NIGHT!”

The milky wisps kept their distance as he warbled awfully, and they almost fell forwards down into the next level below them.