Chapter Text
The road seemed to go on forever in an expanse of trees so tall they blocked most of the sun, only allowing speckles of light onto the road. Noelle glances away from the road for a moment to look at Susie before looking back at the road.
"so Susie whens my next turn?" Noelle asks tilting her head in Susies direction
"uhhh…we missed it, five turns ago" Susie said looking at the GPS before rolling down the window and sticking her hand out. Noelle snaps her head over to look at Susie, before she can say anything someone from the backseat yells.
"SUSAN! five turns ago?! five??!! you're tell me not once not even twice but FIVE times you didn't bother to say anything?!" berdly shouts from behind Noelle looking agitated beyond belief
"nah, its a magical thing only funny people understand. its called a joke, kinda figured you get it given you're a walking joke" Susie says smirking watching berdlys feathers stick up. "ok but for real like two miles take a left then a right in another 4." Susie says removing her hand from the outside of the car and pointing at the turn.
"sure is far from campus.. Kris are you sure about this? maybe you put in the wrong address?" Noelle says turning to glace at Kris who's fallen asleep, leaning forward being gagged by their seat belt. "pfffffffft…fahaha..berdly wake them up before they choke"
berdly reaches over to poke kris who promptly bites berdly on his wing finger. "KRISMAS DREAMER! OH SON OF A..! berdly shouts pulling back his hand. kris responds with a scraggly chuckle, they clear their throat before uttering the word "yum".
"dude kris, we've been over this. no eating in my van." susie says turning around to look at kris. she glaces at berdly "y'know… maybe i can make an exception for some chicken. Kris, imma roll down your window and you're gonna shimmy on the side of the van and go grab your air fryer, if you start to fall just yell and I'll get Noelle to punch it so you stabilize."
"even if you were being serious, speeding up wouldn't make kris stabilize. they'd fly off faster due to their high wind resistance" berdly interjects before being cut off by kris who puts their hand over his beak
"i'll have you know im WAY more wind resistance then you are" berdly stares at kris for a moment "im….y'know what fine i give up" he says putting his hands up and turning to his window. Susie give Kris a fist bump before turning back and looking at the GPS.
"gps is bugging out…oh theres the house." susie says looking up seeing the mailbox beside a dirt path before looking down at the phone. "or maybe not.. it says its like way back. nah thats like halfway back. kris its 107 right?" kris nods.
noelle pulls up to the dirt road before stopping the car and unlocking the door allowing berdly out to open the gate. he steps out stretching his legs a minute before shouting in pain and falling to the ground. susie jumps up and runs out the van, ripping the seat belt instead of unbuckling. "four eyes! you alright" she said looking at berdly holding his leg.
"ah…dammit… calf cramp" berdly says between sharp breaths. susie just stares for a second before almost kicking him in the face, she stops before tapping him with her boot and going to open the gate herself. kris looks at berdly through the open van door. "sissy." they simply say before unbuckling the closing the van door.
noelle drives forward on the dirt road for a few seconds until the van is right at the front of the house. she shuts off the car and steps out onto the porch where susie had sat herself to wait for them to get over berdlys "major setback". Kris waits a second longer pressing their head into the headrest until it hurts, they scratch their neck before wiping their lips and shaking their hands. they remove their head from the headrest and get out the van with their left hand on the back of their head, they walk down the dirt road to see berdly still lying there.
"theres no way that still hurts." they say bluntly before picking him up and carrying them. "thats right, i just wanted my..uh.. pretty..no.. handsome.. yeah my handsome gamer-they to come save their wonderful and super amazing boyfriend" its a wonder that kris let him finish before letting him go causing him to start to slip, berdly doesn't go down without a fight taking kris down onto the rocks with him.
"HEY! COME INSIDE SO Y'ALL CAN GET A ROOM" susie shouts from the old porch swing that her and susie are on. berdly quickly stands up before helping kris up and walking to the house. the four of them walk inside taking in the "scenery" to the right is the kitchen, the table right at the wall the door is; to the left the living room with an old CRT TV and a brownish couch with odd floral patterns; up ahead is a stair case leading to the second story.
"…is it just me or does like everything look like its from some other guys idea of a nice piece of decor.. like just the wall papers..didn't know they could make a color look that ugly" susie says breaking the silence.
"yeah.. i mean whens the last time you've seen a popcorn ceiling?" noelle adds "i remember that time kris was over at someone elses house with me for a sleepover they sat on the top bunk and rubbed off all the popcorn off with their shoes until everything was all dusty. then he ate some of it"
"the er had the best chocolate bar i've ever eaten" kris adds. "that was some old guys protein bar you stole" noelle corrects, she looks over and sees berdly is gone. "well i guess we should go look around!" she says walking into the living room, first thing she notices is the missing blade from the ceiling fan; its just snapped off with the rest of it nowhere to be found.
susie is upstairs checking out the bathroom. there's a, weird amount of those mats to stop people from slipping. susie stands on one of them thinking to herself before looking at the bathtub, its pretty big but the shower is just the tube connected to the sprayer, no bar or hook to set it on, and no shower curtain attached to the bar. "weird" she mutters leaving the bathroom. she walks into one of almost empty rooms, all that's in there is a bed and berdly looking out the window. susie walks over and looks at the massive tree blocking most of the view. "that branch is way under developed compared to everything. you think some cut it?" he said pointing at the branch facing the window; if it were longer it would the perfect "bridge" to the massive tree. "nah, probably snew here and made if all heavy" susie says with a disgusting amount of confidence in what she just said. "but there would be more branch at similar stages, its not that young but at least 2 years-" he stops and looks at Susie "snew?". susie looks at berdly smirking "yeah. y'know it's snewing, i hope it snews. uh, i can't think of any other sentences honestly" she said pulling a green apple sucker out her pocket, its dirty and has some of noelle's hair on it. berdly stares in disgust at what susie pulled out and put in her mouth. "hmmm nacho cheese dust" susie says causing berdly to gag. meanwhile kris is looking around in the kitchen looking at what the old homeowner left behind, then yet another oddity. the outlet has tape over it; an absurd amount, at least three different just to keep it unusable. they walk away and try to open the cabinets uptop, they struggle for a second just yanking at it hoping if they do it hard enough it'll just open. they take a closer look after three tries: childlocked. they fiddle around with it until it clicks open, empty. they walk upstairs to one of the bedrooms susie and berdly are in.
"ok but like if im good enough i just need really good attack" susie says to berdly both sitting on the bed.
"susan, evil pipe bomb isn't a real character" berdly says not in his normal correct tone, just genuine tiredness.
"wow i had NO clue. Anyway, i still think they're the best character. modded or not" susie says annoyed crossing her arms and looking away. kris comes to the bed and sits down right beside berdly and leaning on him.
"next week when we bring all our stuff you two can fight it out on dragon blazers 7. modded character n all"
while the three talk noelle is looking around outside. she steps around the backside and sees a wonderful flower garden; it looks like something out a dream, beams on sunlight shining on butterflies and dew covered flowers so many colors. according to the housing info the place has been empty for about a year because so many people complained about weird occurrences, noelle tries to think harder on it but the beauty of the garden is too distracting. she kneels down in front of a deep blue one still dripping from the dew, she reaches out to touch the flower but stops herself opting to just gaze at it.
they spend the rest of the day bringing in their things, setting them up and just making the dingy place feel more like a home for the four of them. the four of them are sitting on the couch much later in the day, the sky turning a deep navy blue in the darkness.
"so berdly. you said you have the time schedule for when we're meant to get everything, right?" noelle asks breaking what felt like an hour of silence. "next week" berdly says simply, staring at the turned off tv.
that night when everyone is sleeping susie is woken up from how cold her room suddenly got. she sets up and looks around, everything looks different. the room has an almost blue tint to it with what looks like tiny bits of ice forming in the corner. she shutters her breath freezing, she stands up holding her blanket over her shoulder dragging it with her to the window. she tries to open it but its frozen over, she wipes the ice forming in the glass. a blizzard rages outside, wind howling so loud she can almost feel it. "what the hell…" she says to herself, it was almost 100 degrees outside in the morning but now its got to be so far in a negatives. she walks through the nearly empty room and tries to leave the room. the doors frozen shut, she tries to take her hand off the knob: her skins frozen to it. she starts to panic.
"HEY! noelle! NOELLE! HEY!..come on… KRIS?! SOMETHINGS WRONG OUTSIDE!"
she says trying to take her hand off without tearing her skin off. she looks around for anything she could use, nothing but the bed with a shelf ontop holding her suitcase of clothes. even if she could use her clothes or even the suitcase its way to far to even attempt to use. she grabs her blanket and sets it on her hand, she puts her head under it and blows hot air onto it. before she can make any progress she hears a noise, she snaps her head up the blanket falling to the floor. a little girl sits on her bed, cherry red skin with ice forming around her hands, glassy eyes staring at susie with nothing behind it, just blank. susie in a panic yanks her hand off causing the skin to be ripped off with it, she hisses in pain grabbing her hand which has started to bleed in some spots that came off thicker. when she opens her eyes, tears pricking in the corner; the girl came closer looking down the top of the red ribbon on her hair shaped almost like eyes, then any light behind reflected off the snow into the room disappears. darkness engulfs the room. susie looks around panicked, she can't see anything. then what looks like two pairs of eyes look down at her, susie doesn't waste anytime and winds up a right hook before using all her force to hit whatevers in the room with her. she holds her bleeding hand again the cold air stabbing her lungs before she kicks down the door. she runs out to noelles room and yanks the door open, she pulls down noelles blanket and takes off her headphones and shakes her awake.
"noelle, something happened. noelle i need your help"
noelle opens her eyes feeling the cold touch of one hand, and the wet warm touch of the other. she looks up at susie, noticing the ice formed in her hair and the chattering of her sharp teeth; then the blood dripping from her hand. she sits up wiping her eyes.
"susie.. susie what happened?" noelle asks quietly grabbing susies hand.
"noelle my room. it was like frozen over- and- and someone was in there." noelle jolts awake at that.
"someone was in your room?!" noelle says getting out the bed and heading to the room. she stops to glance around to make sure the person didn't leave before heading to the room. its empty, no ice no snow no little girl and no four eyed creature.
"i swear something was in there, it was frozen over!" susie exclaims going to the window, nothing. noelle steps over to susie and grabs her hand leading her out the room.
"i dont understand how that happened..but i believe you. but for now we need to fix your hand"
she says reassuringly to susie leading her to the bathroom. she sits susie on the edge of the tub before pulling her first aid kit out from behind the mirror. in silence she pours some disinfectant over susies hand before placing cotton on it and wrapping something around it. she places a kiss on the top of susies now bandaged hand.
"there, now i know it'll be alright."
susie looks at noelle for a moment a rose tint flushing her face. noelle chuckles and stands up before turning to leave.
"i think you should sleep in my room just in case that happens again" she says walking to her room, susie following. she stops at kris's door, they didn't answer her call and she knows they dont sleep with headphones. she goes to open the door but stops and goes to noelles room, she lays down beside noelle wraping her arms around noelle and sticking her nose in her hair.
"you're so cold susie…" noelle comments grabbing onto susies hand with one of hers and using the other to pull up a blanket and throwing it over the two of them.
susie barely gets any sleep, she feels watched. she feels like noelles being watched. she can't tell which one is worse. shes also surprised by how soundly noelle was sleeping, not entirely sure if thats a good or bad thing.
the next morning susie is sitting at the table barely keeping herself awake, just staring at her cereal with an empty feeling in her chest and a burning pain in her eyes.
"so susan what'd you stay up doing?" berdly says before taking a bite of his toast looking foreward instead of at her.
"protecting noelle." susie says. berdly looks over at susie almost choking on his toast.
"from- from what?" he says spraying a few crumbs out trying to not choke.
susie doesn't answer the question at first taking a few gulps from the bowl, the spoon falling out and landing on the floor with a 'clank'. she wipes the milk off her lips and leans to the side to pick up the phone.
"there was like some kind of small disappearing child like a ghost i think in the room while it froze over. i thought it was a dream but uh" susie points at her bandaged hand. berdly stares for a second trying to think of a logical alternative.
"a child.? like a ghost?? maybe it was a dream! you could have been sleep walking and hurt your hand some other way?" he says leaning foreward moving his hands around as he talks.
"yeah… i dont know i mean.. what if there is?? shouldn't we like do something??" susie says a little worried.
berdly interjects "what can we do if it is? susan, ghost aren't real! stop trying to scare me with your jokes".
"why are you getting so mad?!" susie yells standing up. noelle walks away from the sandwich shes making and grabs susies shoulder.
"hey, hey susie its alright. berdlys just, being berdly. you know this, its alright ok?" noelle says desperately trying to stop a fight from breaking out.
susie grabs noelles hand and lets out a huff.
"y'know i heard theres a movie theater around here, movies are cheaper on sunday too. maybe after you finish we can go?" noelle suggests wanting susie to feel better and get her out this house. susie thinks for a second before letting go of noelles hand and gluping down her cereal and throwing the bowl at the sink, she misses and it lands on the unplugged microwave-oven.
"yeah lets go" she says grabbing her shoes. noelle follows susie outside to van and they leave. berdly watches them pull out from the window before getting up, he sets susies bowl in the sink and set noelles sandwich in the fridge before walking outside. he takes kris's scooter off the porch and walks it down to the road, he turns on his phone punching in an address before putting on his headphones and riding.
meanwhile in the garden a particular figure kneels infront of the flowers watering them. he reaches out to move one tilting it to the side so its not longer shadowed by the taller one beside it. he stands up and tends to the rest or the plants. he sets his watering can inside a bush and phases through the wall into the living room, he glances around in the empty room before going downward into the blocked off basement.
"alright then, house is empty so its time to strategize! but first, my biggest question is; who hurt the girl?" flowery said clapping his hands together and looking around at the other six ghosts sitting in the basement.
to be continued in chapter two: depths of fear