Everlost (Skinjacker 1)

Snow felt different than rain or sleet as it passed through Allie. It tickled.

As for the wind, she felt it, and it was indeed cold. But like all other weather conditions, feeling it and being affected by it were two different things. The cold did not, could not, make her shiver. And yet as unpleasant as it seemed for the living people fighting the snowstorm, Allie wished she could be one of them.

But Johnnie-O, like Mary, had no interest in the living. Allie wondered how long until she became like that.

The going was slow, because it seemed every single city block had a Chinese restaurant, and Johnnie-O was making them cross the street, or turning down side streets again and again to avoid them.

“This is ridiculous,” Allie said. “Chow mein does not carry the plague.” The next time, she refused to cross the street, and walked right in front of Wan Foo’s Mandarin Emporium.

“Wow, she’s brave,” said one of the little kids, and so Johnnie-O was forced to do the same, just to prove he was just as brave as Allie.

When they finally reached the Haunter’s place, Allie could tell something was wrong. The steel door that had been so securely sealed now hung wide open and was slightly bent.

Johnnie-O looked to Allie as if she could explain, but she only shrugged.

Maybe, she thought, Nick and Lief fought their way out.

Johnnie-O, for all his swagger and big-fisted boisterousness, wasn’t about to be the first one in, so Allie took the lead and cautiously stepped inside.

The scene inside was not at all what Allie expected. There was no longer food hanging from the ceiling. Instead, half-gnawed carcasses of roast chickens and pieces of meat lay strewn about the floor.

“My God,” said Allie.

“You said it,” said Johnnie-O. “I haven’t seen so much food in fifty years!”

Unable to control himself, he raced forward and the Altar Boys followed, grabbing the carcasses and meat off the floor and shoving them into their mouths. There was no need to fight because there was enough for everybody.

“No!” yelled Allie. “The Haunter! He could be anywhere!”

But they weren’t listening.

Allie braced for the moment the Haunter’s hollow minions would descend on them, slapping them into barrels, but as she looked around she realized the barrels were all gone. All, that is, but one single barrel that sat in the center of the mess.

Allie noticed shredded bits of black cloth mixed in among the scraps of food—and then something else caught her eye. It was a turkey— a big one—a twenty-five pounder, maybe. It was a bird the Haunter had probably ecto-ripped into Everlost right off someone’s Thanksgiving dinner table. One thing though…the turkey had a bite out of it. A huge jagged bite. It was as if a dinosaur had sunk its teeth into it and ripped it apart—you could still see the teeth marks.

What, thought Allie, could leave an awful bite mark like that?

Suddenly her attention was drawn to the single barrel in the center of the room.

Someone was inside it, pounding and screaming. She couldn’t make out the words but she recognized the voice. Just hearing it chilled her far more than the blizzard ever could.

“Johnnie-O! Over here!” she called.

With a chicken in each of his fists and grease dripping down his chin, Johnnie-O looked a bit more comical and less menacing than usual. Reluctantly he handed his chickens to Heimlich with a look that said, You eat them, you ‘re dead.

He came over to the barrel, and both he and Allie knelt down, putting their ears close to the wood.

“Who’s out there?” the voice inside said. “Let me out, let me out and I shall give you whatever you want!”

It was the Haunter.

Johnnie-O looked to Allie for direction. She had, after all, led them to the biggest feast of their afterlives, so she was now held in some sort of reverence.

“Let me out!”yelled the Haunter. “I demand you let me out!”

Allie spoke loudly enough to be heard through the wood and brine. “What happened here? Who did this to you?”

“Let me out!” screeched the Haunter. “Let me out and I shall rip food from the finest restaurants in the living world and lay it at your feet.”