Spine Chillers

"Cheers, everyone! A toast to your health! Cheers" I raised the beer to all at the party.

All of us were participants of a joint military exercise, and had spent the past few months cooped up in a remote place in the deep jungles. It was our " Rest & Recreation" night, a night where we could get away from the monotony of camp life, after being cooped up for so long, and get back into the hustle and bustle of city-living. We were having a great celebration at the local pub.

"Guys, why don't we visit a haunted house? Scared or not?" Deng, a local soldier, asked us suddenly.

"We are brave men! Right everyone?" Ming said to growing laughter and cheers.

"So, we go to the haunted house tonight, okay? I know the place!"

"On!" Everyone else chorused. High on alcohol, four of us hopped into Deng's car and drove off immediately, singing drunken bawdy songs to the dead of the night.

*   *   *   

Lamp-posts lined both sides of the narrow and bumpy road. Looking around, I can see the farming countryside, bather in the wan moon's glow. It occurred to me that most of the houses were dark. Glancing at my watch, it was already eleven fifteen pm. Looking down the road, I saw a jungle coming up.

We would have missed the track completely, if not for John spotting the tiny road sign as we came up to the dense forest. Looking in, the track was totally dark; we could see nothing as there were no lamp-posts. The dense tree-tops also prevented moonlight from reaching the ground. Turning up the car's headlights, we braced ourselves and entered.

As we drove in, a chill passed through me. The trees had suddenly came alive around us, the leaves rustling in the otherwise breezeless night. The giant branches loomed over us.

Darkness stretched out far beyond the ground illuminated by the car's headlights. All of us had stopped singing, we were beginning to get sober. We had only begun to realise what we were doing.

After driving like this for ten minutes, we reached the house at around ten minutes to midnight. A blanket of thick clouds covered the sky above. The moon, which was shining earlier, had mysteriously disappeared together with the stars.

We parked the car near the house, and then walked up the gate of the house. Looking at the whole house, there was something inside me warning me to leave. I took a deep breath and brushed the thought away.

*   *   *   

Rusty from disuse, the gate was flanked by two pillars. Two statues of lions were perched on top, starring at us with accusing eyes. There was also a large sign hanging at the gate stating that trespassers would be prosecuted.

We stood there looking at each other. The gauntlet had already been thrown. None of us could back down now.

"So, are we going in?" Or are we chickens?" John looked at the rest of us, as he pushed open the rusty gate, to reveal a large house within.

If any of us had any reservations then, all hid it well. Ignoring the warning sign, the others stepped in.

As I was about to follow, I felt the lions' on me, and looked up. What I saw were two pairs of angry red eyes and the lions' mouths were opened in silent snare. Ming shouted something to me then, distracting me. When I looked back again, the snaring lions were back to their original position.

A dreaded sense of foreboding came upon me.

"Guys" Err, guys?"

"What? Why are you still standing there? Scared, is it?" Ming said.

"No, the lions' eyes were red a while ago."

"Waah, he sees red so easily. You got a good imagination man! You drank too much earlier!" John replied, and everyone laughed. I had a good laugh too, for I had wanted to believe that what I saw earlier was just a fragment of my imagination.

The surroundings within the boundaries of the gate were desolate. The cracked walls of the main house were covered by overgrown weeds and peeling paints. An aura of neglect surrounded the house that was abandoned to years of disuse. On our left were the side houses, and tall grass surrounded us on every side.

"This must be the ancestral hall. Look a hall thoe tablets!" Ming remarked to himself. As I gazed around me, I was a loss for words.

Suddenly, a gush of wind swept past us. Afraid to disturb the dead any further, my friends and I quickly scampered out.

Then I suggested that we proceed on to the big house, which I had been eager to explore. Built in a distinctive oriental style, the house had two porcelain lions at the front door. A red banner hung on top of the door, with two tattered lanterns hanging at th sides. Above it, there was a wooden plaque with Chinese inscriptions, probably the previous occupants' family surname.

What reservations we had earlier from the ancestral hall were forgotten as curiosity came over all of us. Cobwebs hung from every corner of the hallway and all the rosewood furniture looked grey under a thick layer of dust.

The wall by the stairway was lined with faded, yellowish portaits, as we walked up the wooden creaky steps. There were five bedrooms on that storey, and we stuck together, exploring one room at a time. In every room, Deng and John ransacked the furniture, hoping to find something valuable, but to no avail.

Looking out one of the bedroom's window, I realised that it had started to drizzle. It was puzzling because I remembered that it was a clear and starry night when we set out. However, the rain probably explained the cold and chilli inside the house. After looking and exploring the five bed-rooms, we then went down to the ground floor.

The ground floor was equally vast, with two big halls and a backyard at the rear of the House. John and Deng both gave a cry of delights as they came upon the antiques. The rest of us were just too engrossed with our environment, studying the antiques and the old furnitures.

*   *   *   

Deng had ventured to the backyard alone.

Suddenly, we heard shrill screams coming from the backyard.

Then we saw Deng running toward us. With a terrified look on his face, he told us about the living skeleton he spotted at the back of the house. Thinking that he was trying to frighten us, the others just laughed at his tale.

However, our laughter was soon drowned by a loud and sinister laughter coming from the backyard. Dumbfounded, we just stood there, starring at each other. Fear struck deep in our hearts, as the sound of the laughter seemed to be getting nearer and nearer.

It had started to pour heavily outside, with the angry thunder roaring. I knew that we were in trouble at that moment. I felt someone tapping on my shoulder.

With dread, I turned around only to find a red-eyed skeleton standing right in front of my very face. Without much think, my friends pulled me right out of the house, knocking over some furniture in our way. To our dismay, the laughter followed us.

When we passed the cookhouse, we saw something moving. In the heavy rain, we can only see a blurry image. The thing had seen us, and was moving in our direction.

Slowly, we could make out the outline of another skeleton as it came near. Screaming with terror, we scampered out of the big gate and rushed for Deng's car. The rain came down in torrents on us, but we were only too aware of the thing catching up with us from behind.

Upon reaching the car, we drove off. «»

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