Going to the Chapel

Night has descend on the great estate of Collinwood bringing with it old treacheries and new alliances. While for one young woman the night will only brings yet again the return of strange voices in her head, of thoughts that no longer seem her own. In the refuge of an old abandoned chapel of the Collins Estate she seeks solitude. But as many a Collins can attest the only solitude come from the grave – and from one, perhaps Samantha Brook may soon find an ally

Opening: [www.youtube.com]

The light of the gibbous moon casts an eerie phantasmagoria. Cold moonlight filters down through the half bare limbs of the trees so that the ancient woods are lit in an eerie simmering sheen of silvery light and rising mists. It is almost another world. There is a certain dream like quality very reminiscent of a scene from some low budget Italian horror film that she vaguely remembers.

The sound of the soles of her soft wedge boots crunching upon the fallen leaves obscures the chorus of insects and gently stirring foliage.

A stab of light cuts through the thickening mist as the bright halo of illumination from her flashlight skims across the earth before her. The dark wedge boots step cautiously among the fallen twigs and larger broken branches as Rachel Shrewsbury moves slowly upwards along the uneven pathway as she navigates The Cut, a worn, pedestrian path which winds it’s way through the woods to connect the original estate with that of the Great House of Collinwood.

At one time all of this land had been one great swath of earth belonging to the Collins Family – well, the Maine branch of the family – before the division, before a cousin, Barnabas Collins, who had left Collinsport sometime in the 70’s to return to London, shortly after he received legal ownership of the property, and all of its structures, outbuildings, barns, ruins, and any and all environs commonly known as the Old Estate, in a codicil executed by the matriarch of the Collins Family, Elizabeth Collins Stoddard. And so this land now belonged to Barnabas Collins’ daughter, Nichole Collins, who had had to take the current head of the family, David Collins, to court in order to establish ownership, seeing as he finally decided to contest the will, but only after becoming aware that Miss Collins was planning to travel to Collinsport from London to finally take possession. Which was certainly a very odd time to contest the will, one would have thought but then again so much of what Rachel had begun to learn of the Collins Family was eccentric to say the least.

Her attention was suddenly diverted by the sound of what appeared to be something rather large and heavy crashing somewhere ahead, in the distance, through the mist and the trees, somewhere off toward the west, in accompanied now by a low rumbling which shook the earth beneath her feet.

Earthquake?

Rachel Shrewsbury continues to cautiously made her way to the top of the hill, and then began her descent, by way of a winding path, which led sharply up and then curved once more acutely down into a small valley complete with a clear little brook from which the ghostly mists arose. Off from the foot of the path there stood an old gated cemetery, and to the left, through the trees the ruins of an old chapel long left deserted to the encroachment of underbrush and forest. All but forgotten here in the infamous and neglected “Cut”.

She felt somehow that she was now near the epicenter of the loud, crashing sound.

Rather inside the dark, mist dampened walls of the abandoned sanctuary, it was Samantha Brook, who had been lying curled up within the frail protection of some old corrugated boxes she had discreetly scavenged and converted into a shelter, much like many a shelter she had built in alleys in so many cities, in so many states, she had lost count, as she had furtively departed the luxurious comfort of the mansion she had come to know as the Pierce Estate, who had been at the epicenter of the earth’s disturbance.

Samantha had slipped away from the Pierce Estate to get away from the woman who had given her sanctuary. Not that she had done anything in particular to warrant Samantha Brook’s hasty departure. But there was something in the mistress of the house’s eyes – the way she looked at her . . . as if she were aware . . . as if she knew . . .could read her thoughts . . . hear the voices in her head . . . even as Samantha became more suspicious of her benefactor’s late night phone calls in which she spoke in hushed tones.

On a landline. . . always, always on a landline.

And so, earlier as Rachel Shrewsbury had reached the summit of the hill, Samantha Brook had snuggled into the warmth of her coat, against the chill of the night, when the sudden tremor began in the earth beneath her the ground had begun to vibrate, to rumble, quake, just before there was this god-awful sound of something renting through the trees. The sound of tall limbs and overhanding branches being broken, snapped, and torn away as if the thick, ancient and solid oak trunks were being splintered, a crashing that felt as if the east wall of the old chapel itself would fall.

Samantha Brook clenched herself into a tight fetal ball and closed her eyes expecting at any moment to hear the sound of trumpets just like at Jericho when all the walls came tumbling down.

Only there was suddenly an eerie stillness.

A vast silence.

The accustomed sounds of the night having completely disappeared—everything placed on mute.

It was a lack of silence she at once recognized. Yes, something Evil was coming. She had heard this lack of sound before it; she had felt it coming, far too many times. Evil. As if it seemed to always have a very special appointment with her. She opened her eyes and glanced up through a rent in the vaunted ceiling to see the swaying tops of trees beyond with the soft glow of the moon behind. Clouds racing high in the heavens.

What the hell?

Cautiously now she slowly begins to crawl out of the safety of her cardboard niche and carefully moves down the grass carpet of the chapel toward a broken window.

The mist seems to have grown heavier now just beyond the broken panes of the grime covered glass of the shattered window, in a thick rise of trees; and within its swirl there was now some structure. It was large, round with what appear to be some statuary.

It had not been there earlier, in fact it had never been there, Samantha Brook was sure as she pushes open a side door, the hinges screaming in protest as she slowly steps out of the threshold and took a tentative step forward. The structure was obscured by the broken trees, the white mist, but as she peered at it she could see that atop what was surely an altar there was a figure standing there, a lone figure looking out toward the rise of land that lead to the Great House of Collinwood and the cliffs beyond.

A branch under foot snaps and the figure turns abruptly to look down at her. Samantha freezes and becomes aware that the figure is that of a woman dressed in black. Dressed in what appeared to be an old mourning dress – Victorian? Edwardian? Samantha was uncertain just what she was certain of concerning this sudden apparition – but there was one thing she was most certain of at the moment, and that was the woman, having heard her awkward step, was now moving towards her. And in moving it was not as if she were walking but rather as if she were gliding across the top of the altar. Samantha took another quick look now and saw that at the four corners of the altar stood these huge robed and hooded statues, which were human like – but their faces were far more reptilian . . .

She did not hesitate as she turned and suddenly began racing back toward the front of the old chapel, aware that the woman was coming now in her direction. A glance over her shoulder saw the woman floating down from the altar to the darkness of the ground below and then began to skim over the uneven earth after her.

Boots slapping the stone steps, Samantha pulled the old iron gates of the chapel open and whipping inside pulled them shut behind her with a loud clang, quickly locking them now with the rusted drop bar. Her fingers hurriedly tugging her belt free in order to wrap it about the bars as she tied the gates together.

Only the gates did little to stop the woman’s advance as she easily seem to slip through the crack in the foundation of the old church.

Samantha Brook backs away, panicking now. “WHO ARE YOU!?”

“The question you should ask not of me but of yourself. Who are you?” The voice is soft, almost a whisper lost in the sound of the night.

“I . . . I . . . I’m . . .” Samantha stammered.

The spectral figure within the chapel looks up through the broken beams of the ceiling, “Can you not see them?”

Samantha Brook hangs her head defeated. “All the time.” She replies quietly.

“The Stars!” The soft voice barely whispers.

“The Stars?” Samantha asks looking up.

“They are almost right.” The figure tells her and turns with a wicked smile, “They are never far away. They are COMING back. You, you of all should know—they trap you with their beautiful eyes.”

“Y-yes.”

“Only the Dead are living still . . . even now their Altar has arrived.”

“Yes, well, they have been prevented so many times.” Samantha replies, suddenly doubling over and clutching her head as she once again hears the whispers, “Oh, my dear you shall soon see the lake . . . in all it’s darken glory . . . all for you . . . all for you . . . there shall be no more rags . . . you shall dance . . . you shall dance at. . . the masquerade . . . you shall be . . . . and they shall be . . . and all shall be unmasked.”

“The dead and the living.”

“What? Samantha grimaces trying to push the voices back further out of her mind.

“How long has it been? How long has it been since you saw the Pallid Mask? The Yellow Sign? How long has it been since you lost yourself? So long ago, long before you came to these unhallowed grounds of the accursed Collins.” The ghostly woman looks at her and smiles. “It’s all seven and nines, now, seven and nines.” She says in that odd whisper of a voice, a whisper than Samantha has to listen hard to hear above the den of the other voices. It seems almost as if the woman is speaking now lost in her own far away thoughts – as she was asking herself a similar question. Just how long had it been? How long had it been since she had been walking along ”the Cut,”heading back to Collinwood. It was here in this Chapel that Daniel had secretly murdered her as he had suspected the truth – she could hear their whispers, calling to her out of the dark shadows; and then in the chill, misty night he than taken her body to Widows Hill, where he cast her into the sea.

Dashed upon the rocks and carried out with the tide, sinking fathoms until they found her and taken her into forbidden realms. And now, here she was in the year was 2013!

It all seemed so impossible – and yet, she knew . . . information had been directly imparted to her, even as she was able to resist their influence.

She had one chance to warn them.

Her voice had spoken to her through the centuries. Directing her. Telling her this was the one who is connected also to the Old Ones.

“Yeah and who the F**k are you? The Ghost of Christmas Past?”

“My name is Harriet Collins and I have not walked these grounds since before my death in 1837.”

“1837? Well you look particularly well for someone well over a hundred-and-seventy-five years old.”

Of course Samantha was more than well aware that this woman, if not merely a hallucination, was not flesh and bone but something far more spectral. The woman continued to seemed to hover before her, her feet not touching the ground as the fine mist swirling about her, “You are lost and hearing voices? Only, they are not their voices.”

“Whose voices?”

“Those of the Altar.”

“And who are they?”

“You must find the evil doctor to free your jaundiced mind.”

“W-what?” Samantha hears the voices louder telling her not to listen.

“Then beware!”

“I don’t understand a f**king word you’re saying.”

“Fear the Box! Do not look inside.”

Samantha quick glances at the shelter of her boxes. “The Box?”

Harriet Collins adds as she continues to examine her surroundings. “The old chapel it is in even worse repair. They will seek to make you one of their own. Make you tell them your secrets.”

“Just what the hell are you talking about?”

“Beware The Naga Box!.”

Samantha holds her head, “The what?”

“Only she can stop them.” Harriet Collins nods as if remembering. “Yes, only she.”

“Only who can stop them?” The voices now growing louder, whispering, insidiously suggesting, explaining that she needed to get away, needed to stop listening . . .

The look is one of incredulity, “Petofi’s daughter, of course.”

“Nikki’s mother?”

Harriet Collins shakes her head and frowns, “I must go.”

The mists coalesce to swirl about Harriet Collins as she fades into the thickening fog, which, when it begins to dissipate, reveals her to have vanished.

“WHAT THE HELL!” Samantha punches the wall.

Rachel Shrewsbury, having crested the rise, looks down the path to see the darken ruins of the old chapel. From what she understood, the chapel had been built back in the late 1700’s for Abigail Collins, who, though a religious woman, was just as crazy as any other members of the Collins family. A fanatic! A zealot! It had been Abigail Collins, pious suspicious that had started the witch hysteria in Collinsport back in 1796. After the death of the Collins governess, they had shut down the chapel. There were rumors of odd lights and sounds emanating from the structure at night. There had been talk of tearing it down, and yet, it till stood.

Rachel begins to make her way down the path toward the abandoned sanctuary. Off to the right, she took note of the mist shrouded stone fence and iron works of a small garden like burial ground , and for a moment her curiosity wanted to pull her from the path to investigate the tombstones. Who was buried out here, away from the family burial ground, from the Eagle Hill cemetery? And why? It had be a Collins or someone associated with a Collins.

This land was almost exclusively reserved for the Collins Family, being the wooded boundary between to two estates: the old and the new. Yes, she was more than certain she would be back out here soon as Jose was going to want to know precisely who was lying in the ground behind the stone and iron garden facade, the overgrown brush.

Only tonight she was on another mission.

The Collinwood caretaker, Ted Norris, had indicated that someone was sneaking about the old chapel at night. And if her suspicions were correct.

Inside the chapel, Samantha Brook, standing with her forehead pressed to the rough surface of the chill stonewall, suddenly snaps her head up. She hears someone walking along the path, crossing in front of the old graveyard, and stepping now off the path which could only mean one thing . . . they were heading to the chapel. She looks about in the darkness, and then silently moves over to a breach in the wall.

Rachel Shrewsbury stands for a moment inspecting the gloomy sanctuary. How long has it been left to the forces of God she wonders. She walks up the grassy hillock and heads toward the old chapel before her, the chill and the fog seeming to reach out in order to greet her. The flashlight beam cuts a shimmering light in the mists as she approaches the broken stone steps leading up to the iron gates that once stood before a pair of massive wooden doors, which have long since gone missing.

She places a foot on the step and tests it, then another as she ascends to the iron gates: “Samantha Brook, are you, are you in there?” She asks looking through the ironwork into the gloom of the interior of the chapel.

“No,” Samantha Brook replies as she stands in the shadows preparing to slip through a crack in the chapel wall.

“Oh, then I guess I will just go away.” Rachel says with a wry smile.

“I’m behind you.” And Samantha Brook added as she had quickly made her way out of the chapel in order to rush the steps and slam the woman up against the ironwork of the locked gate.

Rachel goes limp from the sudden force of being hurled roughly up against the damp iron, but she holds tightly to her flashlight, “I know. I know you are hiding from the authorities, but . . . I can assure you I am not with them. There are no police involved! I am only here because I want to help you.”

“Why would you want to help me?” Samantha demands.

“My name is Rachel. Rachel Shrewsbury and I am assisting an author. Jose Chung. He’s rather famous. And he is very interested about Collinsport and he wants to talk to you.” Rachel says, pressed against the ironwork.

“Why me?”

“Why not you? You were once an investigator, no?”

“That was . . . a long time ago.” Samantha recalls now Detroit. Blackjack Investigations. She had friends there before they all disappeared!

“Not so long ago, actually.” Rachel slips free of Samantha’s grip and cautiously moves down the steps to stand looking up at her, ready to draw the Walther if necessary.

“What do you know about it? About anything?”

“Look, I know you must be cold and hungry.” She can see that there is so much confusion in Samantha Brook’s eyes, and something else, a flash of something slightly amber hued. “If you will let me take you to him, you can get warm and having something to eat and if after you want to leave. I will assure you no one will try and stop you.”

“Jose Chung?”

“Yes. A rather famous author. He wrote The Caligarian Candidate. A Lap Full of Tongues. From Outer Space.”

Samantha Brook cocks her head as if she is trying to remember, “He’s published by Warden White, Incorporated . . . a subsidiary of MacDougall-Tessier, and they’re connected to . . . “

“Miss Brook, Mr. Chung believes that you have some crucial knowledge regarding the events that took place here in Collinsport, in the Eagle Hill Cemetery, to be precise, last year; he thinks that you saw something—something which has caused all your recent difficulties with the CPD.”

“How does he know what happened? We kept that all under wraps.”

“Mr. Chung is an extraordinary investigative journalist, one of the best. . . “

“Godda**ed journalist!” She snapped angrily.

Rachel Shrewsbury grows even more concerned as the woman before her seems far more confused and disoriented than she had anticipated: ” Are you alright?”

“I haven’t been alright for years . . . “

“I see,” Rachel slowly become more and more to believe that she is not going to be able to coax Miss Brook away from the chapel, “Are you aware that they arrested Officer O’Malley? The officer who arrested you.”

Samantha Brook looks up, “On what charges?”

“Seems he pulled a car over, two tourists, and he opened fire on them. Killed one and the other is in critical condition.”

“And if they had let me keep his gun,” Samantha mutters to herself.

“They have him on murder and attempted murder charges.”

Samantha Brook eyes her suspiciously, “If you’re lying.”

“I assure you I am not.”

“Okay, well, lead the way.”

“Ok, good.” Rachel moves quickly before she can change her mind, “So, if you will just follow me. My car is parked way back down the path, over this way. We will have to go down the hill, but I am sure you know this terrain much better than I, this place has so many roads.” Rachel says as she turns to lead the way, “It’s like a maze.” And she’s careful to look back and see if Samantha is following, which she is, slowly, almost reluctantly.

“Oh, did you heard some kind of loud crashing sound earlier?”

“Yes.”

‘What the hell was that?”

Samantha Brook glances back at the altar which lies hidden in the shadowy concealment of the trees, “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Cue Music End of Episode