Three years ago, my cousin, my brother, and I tried one of those "something" we just looked upon vastness of the internet. Those were our "adventure" days, where we freely do or mimic random and stupid things we just found out in any social media platform, website, and even old books that my grandpa stored away at our house's attic.
See, we were young and foolish — and naive, and just plain idiots. Basically, every kid that goes in his or her teenage years. But specifically, if there was an institution meant for kids like us, the people — or should I say, patients — inside that institution are just the three of us.
So we were in our grandparent's "vacation" house, on my cousin's side of the family, just outside the metropolitan. It's a run-down, crumby, old, medium-sized, brownish shack that smells like the soil it stands. It's not that particularly located at the center of the rainforest where it stood, just a few miles away from the main road connected to its own murky, muddy, narrow, leafy path.
It was an evening, if I can recall; my memories' getting rusty these days. Cousin Johanna called us, me and Gordon, to play a game.
"In the middle of the fucking night?" My little brother bursted out. Johanna almost slapped his mouth.
"Watch your language, young man!" I said to him, eyes all widen. "Do you want mom to hear you?" He was wearing his cute jacket with a cat knitted design on the middle. He shook his head, barely kept his laughter.
"Oh my, Carrie, what have you been teaching this boy?" Johanna asked, holding a huge ass book that looked like it was unearthed below the Pyramids of Giza.
"Don't look at me, internet geek, he must've picked them up from those videos you've been sending to us." I said, laughing out loud.
"Well damn, girl, sorry if it's my fault." She laughed out loud, too. Gordon couldn't stop laughing, either.
"Well, we better shut up before we 'alert' them." I said, pertaining to my parents. I love them both, but they're just in my neck sometimes. Johanna sat down on the side of our bed while me and brother are at the window in front of her.
I think.
Or, we're at the side of the bed and Johanna's at the window. I guess it doesn't really matter.
"What you got there?" I said, pointing to her book.
"Ew!" Gordon exclaimed, "a children's book?" And then he laughed hysterically.
"Well, for your information, bud, this book is what both your sister and I had been looking for in the web." Johanna said closely to my brother.
"Shut. Up!" I said. I felt my mouth painted a huge smile on my face.
Web?" My inexperienced brother asked. "You mean like, the spiders?" And then both Johanna and I laughed.
Quarter to two o'clock in the morning, the three of us snuck out of the seemingly dilapidated house. We tip-toed our way out and ran silently into the woods.
After a half-hour walk, leaving marks as we want farther, we arrive in what used to be a prominent campsite. Johanna, having forcibly enrolled to one of those girl scouts thingy in her middle school, lighted a small campfire in the middle. Or was it a survival camp in the summer?
I excitedly walked towards her, with my little brother gnawing on a piece of caffeine-filled dark chocolate bar beside me, and touched the majestic book.
"You sure this is it?" I asked.
"Of course! You don't know what troubles I had just to have this." She boasted. I pouted my lip a little and mocked her with it. "Well, have you learned the incantations?" She continued.
"Of course! Well, actually, I learned, but I haven't mastered it yet." I hesitantly said, slowly opening the book, unveiling its deep signs and scriptures.
"I guess it's okay?" She said, shrugging it off. "By the way, just a few reminder:" She turned its glossy, new-like pages and stood in front of me, holding up the book. "Remember that what we're going to summon to day is a demon from another realm, all right?"
"Yeah, yeah, I got it!" I said.
"Demon?" Gordon said while there are still chocolates in his mouth.
"Hold up, this one's a little fiesty. Treat it like it's a royalty. It's not that dangerous..." she dropped the book slowly to the ground and began drawing a special, distorted pentagram, "but we all still have to play it safe." She smilingly said while I nodded throughout the conversation. I sat down Gordon on one of the soggy, mossy logs around the campfire and gave him more dark chocolates. I walked in the middle of the pentagram, draw more insignias and emblems, and sat down in front of the campfire.
"Ready?" I asked Johanna. She nodded at me.
Slowly, I chanted the language written in the book. This language doesn't exist within our world. The grammar, the rules, the spelling — all are different and, you could say, exotic. How the hell did I learn them? From a demon, too, of course. We summoned him from another book and with another special pentagram. Each demon has its own pentagram, and one wrong stroke could cause problems.
As I continue the chant, the campfire became a bonfire. The markings on the floor are glimmering red, slowly etching like tattoo being printed on the surface of the skin. My feet lifted off the floor as I my voice grew louder and louder. I couldn't look anywhere but through the burning flame, as it transcend, drown, and then transform into a portal leadiglng to their realm.
I could see Johanna through my peripheral vision smiling as Gordon holds tightly onto her, covering his eyes. I'd forgotten that that was his first time seeing us doing the dark arts.
Though my song grew louder, I could hear him whimper from the corner. He stood out of Johanna's lap a ran to me, all crying out loud.
"Carrie, Carrie!" He kept shouting. Johanna panicked and ran to get my brother, until he accidentally slipped from a chocolate bar wrapper and bumped the book, turning its pages. I was three words done with my incantation when it happened.
The pentagram's color turned, and the signs and emblems distorted even more on its own. The portal closed, but it opened again.
And something else got outside.
The next thing we knew, we were running away from the old lumber mill — Johanna and I. Gordon... we couldn't save him. We got back in the morning, past seven. My parents were outside our grandparents' mansion waiting for us, looking all worried. They hugged us when we returned and asked where my little sister was. I couldn't answer them. And then Ben, my cousin, and I panicked and forced my parents to go inside and lock all the doors.
"What's wrong, Martin?" My mom asked.
"We have to get out of here, now!" They got surprised when I shouted.
"Ben, what's the matter?" My mom asked again.
"Please, Mrs. Tann, listen to us, we need to get out of here." He horrifyingly said.
Just before I could climb upstairs, we all heard loud knocks, followed by a small, feminine voice — my little sister's voice.
"Mom, dad, Ben, may I come in?" She said.
"Is that Fiona?" My mom asked. "Why is she outside?"
"Mom, wait!" I said.
"Why, what's wrong?" She asked. I couldn't answer her. I was too silenced from what was going on.
"Come in, honey! We're going to have some breakfast." She said.
Both Martin and I were petrified. We could have sworn that she's already gone. We saw how the demon mutilated her body right in front of our eyes.
Martin snapped out of it and rummaged through the pages of the book, looking for the page it turned when the accident happened.
"Oh, no." He said. But it was all too late.
As the door slowly opened, the demon slipped through silently. And then the horror began. One-after-one of my loved ones were massacred, until I was the only one remaining.
It stood in front of me. I could see its mangled face and smell the fresh blood and flesh all over its body.
And then everything went black.
I couldn't breathe. I was trying to, but lesser and lesser air are getting through. Though I fought until I took a huge breath and finally have the power to open my eyes.
I woke up all sweaty and cold, arms numb, gasping loudly for air. It was a terrible, terrible dream.
"Carrie." I heard a voice coming outside of whatever place I am in now. It was a child's voice. A familiar one.
"Carrie?" He repeated. "Is everything all right?" He asked mumbly.
"Ye-yeah, yeah!" I said. "Just had a nightmare."
I observed my room. It's filled with papers and books and school supplies and the only pieces of furniture were a long table and small, handy couch. The room has one window, an air-conditioner, and a lamp to which I opened.
"Are you sure? You want me to come in? I brought some snacks." He said.
I was half asleep, still gasping for air. It all felt real, the nightmare. I looked at the time and it's almost two o'clock in the morning. I looked at my cell and I got bunch of missed calls from Johanna, dad, mom, Gordon...
Gordon.
"Sure," I said as if my lips moved on its own, "come in."
Some things just crossed my mind. This room is my room, and it's a dormitory near the university I am currently enrolled.
My parents live on the other side on the country.
And I'm an only child.
The door opened slowly.