The translucent figures are back and the abandoned school's lights are on.
Both happened around the same time last week and both have the town a little on edge. One or the other would be bearable, an issue bite-sized enough for us to handle or investigate. That's what's happened all the times before, always one or the other and never both.
Something must have changed.
When the translucent figures arrive we know to not bother locking our doors at night and to leave a plate of warm offal outside for them to take in our place. We don't know what they do with it but if it means we live another day we don't really mind too much.
The council even have a deal with local butchers to provide every house in the town with enough offal to cover our little fee to whatever these beings are. I'm sure we'd know more about them if we were able to look directly at them without hearing their thoughts screaming into our own.
As far as we know, the school lights are just a warning for the remainder of the year and if we keep our children indoors while they're on then they don't go missing. We know that every missing child for the last hundred years is in the abandoned school - we can see their faces pressed against the windows.
But only when the lights are on.
For the rest of the year it's just an empty shell where teens sneak out to go get drunk with their friends and pretend to be edgy and authoritative. That all changes the second the lights come on and all those poor souls come back with them.
So for both the figure and the lights to appear can only mean we're in for something much, much worse.
Both happened around the same time last week and both have the town a little on edge. One or the other would be bearable, an issue bite-sized enough for us to handle or investigate. That's what's happened all the times before, always one or the other and never both.
Something must have changed.
When the translucent figures arrive we know to not bother locking our doors at night and to leave a plate of warm offal outside for them to take in our place. We don't know what they do with it but if it means we live another day we don't really mind too much.
The council even have a deal with local butchers to provide every house in the town with enough offal to cover our little fee to whatever these beings are. I'm sure we'd know more about them if we were able to look directly at them without hearing their thoughts screaming into our own.
As far as we know, the school lights are just a warning for the remainder of the year and if we keep our children indoors while they're on then they don't go missing. We know that every missing child for the last hundred years is in the abandoned school - we can see their faces pressed against the windows.
But only when the lights are on.
For the rest of the year it's just an empty shell where teens sneak out to go get drunk with their friends and pretend to be edgy and authoritative. That all changes the second the lights come on and all those poor souls come back with them.
So for both the figure and the lights to appear can only mean we're in for something much, much worse.
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