Halloween IV: The Ultimate Edition Read online

Rachel was indeed right; they do look more elegant out the door. “You’re going to be late. You don’t want to blow your promotion.”

  “Don’t make fun,” Darlene said back. “Tonight is the difference between vacations in Bermuda and another two weeks visiting your grandmother in Cleveland.”

  “So hurry up,” said Rachel.

  And that is what her parents did. Rachel then closed the front door and automatically went for the livingroom telephone.

  Upstairs, Jamie busily brushed her teeth as she always had done every evening after dinner. Within her bedroom, down the hall past the master bedroom, Sunday moved cautiously toward the shadows beyond the opened window. Suddenly he sensed something, and he backed up towards the open door. There was something there. A presence. A low growl swelled within his throat.

  Something was in Jamie’s room.

  But when Jamie entered and flicked on the light switch, the light flooded over dozens of dolls and nothing else. Jamie thought the clown costume looked great on her; that it looked fantastic just like she knew it would. She gazed at it admiringly in the full-length mirror.

  Downstairs, Rachel’s voice echoed through the livingroom as she sat on the couch cross—legged, preoccupied with the extremely urgent business she needed to take care of over the telephone.

  “Is Brady there?” she spoke casually but hopefully. “Has he come home from work yet? Okay. Well, when he does, tell him to drop by about eight. I’ll be home by then. Okay? This is Rachel. Okay, bye.”

  Then, upon setting the receiver down upon its cradle, Rachel called out, “Come on, Jamie. Let’s go. You’re going to miss all the good candy!”

  Jamie heard her calls. She set the mask over her face, gazed at it for a moment, smiling, realizing that she even looked way better than those stupid kids who made fun of her.

  Something distracted her. She turned towards the closet.

  Didn’t she hear the door creak? Was that coming from her room? Where was Sunday?

  “Come on, kiddo,” the call echoed from downstairs.

  Nevermind.

  She darted happily towards the voice of her foster sister.

  But the shape had been watching, even as she admired her costume, and, in a way, he admired it too. From within the shadowy depths of the closet, he gazed down upon the opened box of memories. He lifted up pictures, photographs of days gone by, memories he shared unknowingly with the little girl, and memories only he alone could summon. He saw the woman Laurie Strode. A teenager. He saw the little girl with her father, posing with a barbecue in the background. And he saw himself, in the ever familiar clown costume, the one the little girl even now wore proudly, and he was standing next to his sister on that night so long ago yet so recent.

  That night was here again.

  Downstairs, Rachel was checking the stove burners in the kitchen. She grabbed her jacket on the rack near the front door and checked her pockets for the house keys. Finally satisfied, she turned to Jamie, who was just then coming down the stairway.

  “I thought you were ready,” Jamie said, observing Rachel slipping into her jacket and returning to the kitchen to turn off the lights.

  “I’m ready,” she replied. “I’m ready. Okay, let’s go.

  The shape at the top of the stairs watched silently, silent with the exception of the ragged breathing which seemed to reverberate through the darkness surrounding him, as the two girls disappeared out the door.

  Back within the depths of the closet, the dog’s low growls were forever stifled; it now lay in a bloody heap, its neck broken and its head hanging loosely over blood-stained rag dolls silent, unmoving, its unseeing eyes gazing out into the horror it last beheld.

  Forever gazing.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jack Sayer brought Sam Loomis all the way into Haddonfield, right up to the parking lot of the police station.

  Throughout wilderness and farmland and miles of empty highway, the old vagabond reverend grew all the more curious of what was behind the doctor’s desperation. It was the face of the Apocalypse, yes, that was what Loomis was searching for, and Sayer had paused many times from his sing-along anthems of old time religion to toss out a few questions.

  There was much to talk about, or much not to, out on the endless open road.

  The doctor’s answers were generally evasive, despite the near-empty corn whiskey bottle which remained in his hand. A sign of a good pilgrim was being a good drinker. Loomis was a good pilgrim.

  Sayer had plucked a new bottle from behind his seat after having discarded the other he’d been working on, and Loomis often wondered if he would make it to Haddonfield in one piece after all.

  Still, Loomis was grateful for the ride. His manners clearly revealed it. He had no intention of drinking as much as he did, but his mind remained clear and focused, and his desperation was even more heightened to reach the town in time. His mannerisms revealed that, too.

  By the time they arrived in Haddonfield, Sayer had already made up his mind about a few things. He was searching for the same demon, the face of the Apocalypse, just as fervently as Loomis was, and he could tell it was the doctor’s destiny to find it.

  He could see it in his eyes.

  Sayer turned his pickup from the main road and pulled into the police station parking lot, swerving into rocky asphalt and u-turning to face the driveway exit.

  Loomis got out, turned to face him, placed the whiskey bottle upon the seat. “I can’t thank you enough for your kindness,” he said. “Good luck with yourself, my friend.”

  “Send the unrighteous devil-spawn to hell,” the reverend told him.

  “If only I could accomplish that,” Loomis replied, and shut the door.

  Sayer looked up and into his rearview mirror, watched as the doctor hurried away past a couple of parked sheriff’s vehicles and towards the station.

  “Godspeed, pilgrim,” he said to the reflection. Then he gazed about, studying his surroundings.

  A library shared the police station’s parking lot beyond rows of hibiscus bushes. Down the street and in the direction he’d come from was a series of houses and a small storage building. Up the street were more houses. Directly across from him was a homey little Presbyterian church, its steeple piercing the darkening sky like a lance.

  Sayer took another swig of whiskey, capped it, set it down at his side. He pulled his pickup onto the street and crossed over onto the vacant side lot of the church. He maneuvered the vehicle around to the church building’s rear, his tires kicking up pebbles and dust. He looked around for signs of life; no one was around.

  Praise the Lord, he mouthed, and found a nice spot on the other side of a garbage dumpster with a perfectly hidden view of the police station’s front door. He parked, switched off his engine.

  And he waited.

  Perhaps it would be a long wait, but to face the Apocalypse, challenge it, defeat it, the wait would be worth it. Loomis would lead him to it.

  And besides, there was plenty of whiskey to tide him over until then.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Haddonfield Sheriff’s Department wasn’t as large as it appeared to be on the outside. It was housed in a one-story beige building with a medium sized parking lot accented with dozens of rows of junipers and a flower bed shared in part by the Haddonfield Public Library next door.

  There was no such thing as sophistication when it came to a small town like Haddonfield, and small towns have small police forces. Of course, if anything unusual occurred, other departments would be notified, firstly the state police. But nothing unusual ever happened. For the most part.

  The inside of the building was as bland as the outside, displaying such average sights as a copy machine (which was out of order for the time being, the employees having to go to the library next door for copies), bulletin boards, a gun rack situated near the back wall, a water cooler expecting a refill, desks and phones and a dart board near the back between the time clock and the single restroom. To complete the
atmosphere, there was a threesome of deputies behind the desks, one of which was conversing with his wife over the telephone---something about a hamster and a liquid cleanser and how a girl named Marsha should be spanked.

  At the front desk, the deputy was occupying his own time by reading his favorite section from Reader’s Digest, chuckling at the humorous anecdotes.

  Suddenly, his attentions were distracted by a man who stormed into the building through the front glass double doors. The fellow appeared to be quite flustered, serious determined, and immediately the deputy knew that this was definitely going to be one of those nights. The balding man, wearing a dark overcoat and a dusty outfit beneath, marched directly up to his desk.

  “I need to see Sheriff Bracket,” Doctor Loomis demanded.

  The deputy set the open magazine face down on the green blotter before him, leaned back casually in his seat, and gave a hearty laugh. Of course, this guy couldn’t be serious.

  He told the man, “Then you need to travel ‘bout three thousand miles south’a here.”

  Loomis was suddenly confused. “What?”

  “Brackett retired in ‘81,” the deputy informed him. “Up and moves to St. Petersburg. We get a postcard every Christmas.”

  “Well, who the hell is the new sheriff?”

  “I am,” spoke another voice. “Ben Meeker.”

  The doctor’s gaze shot beyond the deputy and saw a husky, solid two-hundred-pound sheriff standing to the man’s left. He had inquisitive yet hardened brown eyes and a brown crew cut, and by the look of his heightened stature he appeared to be over six feet tall. If people were cartoon animals, this man would have been a grizzly bear.

  The doctor wasted no time. “Sheriff Meeker, My name’s…..”

  “Loomis,” Meeker finished for him. His voice was deep and commanding. “Folks around here aren’t likely to forget your face. At least, not cops. What the hell brings you back here after ten years?”

  He sounded resentful, but there was something within his tone that the doctor detected as weariness. “Michael Myers,” he told him. “He’s escaped Ridgemont. He’s here in Haddonfield.”

  “That’s impossible,” Meeker said. “He’s supposed to be an invalid.”

  But there was this seriousness in his eyes. “He’s here, Sheriff.”

  Meeker was the kind of sheriff who was known for possessing a very deep sense of humor. Deep, meaning that in order to be able to find it, you would have to dig deep into his personality. He took his job seriously, and even when the situation seemed too absurd to be true, he faithfully investigated; or he would send some deputy to do it for him, and the deputy would curse to himself for finding a dead gopher in the middle of the road instead of a dead baby, or an old man who insisted he saw The Buddah staring at him from outside his bedroom window, like two weeks ago.

  “Why would he be here?” he questioned.

  Loomis told him sternly, “The car crash that killed Laurie Strode and her husband left an orphan in Haddonfield.”

  The Sheriff was plainly surprised. “Jamie Lloyd?”

  “Yes. Wherever that child is, she’s in danger.”

  Meeker was still inquisitive, his interests up. “Myers’ been locked up since before she was born. He’s never laid eyes on her.”

  “Seven bodies, Sheriff,” Loomis declared. “That’s what I’ve seen between here and

  Ridgemont…..a filling station in flames. Michael Myers is here in this town right now! He’s come to kill that child and whoever else stands in his way!”

  Meeker’s lips drew thin. His eyes were hardened and pensive. He was contemplating.

  Then, he turned to the deputy with the Reader’s Digest. “Call the State troopers and check this story.” He turned to Loomis, “All right, let’s assume for a minute that what you say is true ”

  “It is true, Sheriff!” he insisted as the deputy obeyed and began to dial.

  The sheriff continued, “Fine. If it’s true, then I want to know what the hell we can do to avoid a repeat often years ago.”

  “We have to find the little girl,” Loomis instructed. “Get her someplace safe. Call the local television. Tell them to get everyone off the streets and behind locked doors.”

  The deputy turned from the phone. “I can’t get long distance, Sheriff. Operator says the phone lines are down.”

  This was cause enough for the sheriff to move. His tremendous build swerved around the convocation of desks until he came to the shotgun rack. He went immediately for a twelve gauge Ithaca pump, and pulled it down. He knew his profession well; everything was automatic, flowing like clockwork as he loaded shells and pocketed anything remaining. Then he turned to Doctor Loomis, striding back toward the front desk.

  “Coming?”

  “Not until I see your man make that call.”

  The deputy began to dial at the sheriff’s command, and, satisfied, Loomis turned back to Meeker.

  “All right,” the sheriff told him, “let’s go check on the girl.”

  As they started for the front double doors, they could hear the first few sentences of the deputy as he spoke into the receiver: “Yeah, Sheriff’s office calling for Bill Miller Bill, Deputy Pierce We got an emergency situation here. We need everybody off the streets pronto…..”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Rachel swore to herself that she never had been as thoroughly excited about Halloween and trick-ortreating as Jamie was this night. Nearly every single time she would visit the doorstep of some cheerful neighbor who would smile and say something sweet and dropped a few pieces of candy into her plastic bag, she would politely but hurryingly blurt out a ‘thank you’ and be well on her way to the next house, half- running. To Rachel, Halloween was fun, not in a strict sense but in a sort of sense that this night wasn’t dull and ordinary. And, of course, she enjoyed the fact that Jamie was truly happy; overjoyed, even.

  “Wait for me,” Rachel called out, refusing to run. “Jamie, wait....”

  But the little girl was too involved with the splendor of it all; her little clown outfit, sparkling dimly under the street lights, more and more small packages of chocolate and lemon drops and bubble gum waiting to fill her bag. “This is great, Rachel!”

  The next door revealed an overweight, t— shirted fellow who held a can of beer in one hand and a handful of candy in the other. Alcohol undoubtedly blending his thoughts into a jelly of drowsiness, he nearly plopped the half-empty can into her sack before catching his actions and withdrawing, chuckling to himself. Jamie joined in the laughter and frolicked merrily away.

  “Cute kid,” the man remarked to no one, and he closed the screen door.

  The next house; this time it was a grey haired elderly woman who greeted her, an orange robe covering a pink nightgown. She appeared to be delighted before the little girl, and perhaps this was the reason her handful of candy was the most generous thus far.

  “Trick or treat!” Jamie said, at the same time the lady held out the candy.

  “My,” the woman said, “what a cheery little clown. Look what I’ve got for you.”

  Jamie’s eyes immediately lit up into a felicitous resplendence. “Thank you.”

  “You’re very welcome, honey.”

  Jamie walked toward her foster sister, who was waiting on the sidewalk listening to the meager sizzling of the electric cables of the telephone poles above, her mind on the pleasantries of the remainder of the evening, back at home, Jamie asleep and Brady downstairs with her.

  Jamie halted beside her for a moment, her fingers sifting through the bulk of her plastic jack-olantern/ghost bag.

  Rachel looked down at her. “Had enough?”

  “No way,” Jamie said. She turned, and Rachel followed her past a series of hedges enroute to the next house. “Halloween is great. Can we stay out all night?”

  “Forget it, kiddo. We’re home by eight o’clock.”

  As they came upon the next house, the last house on the corner past the hedges, they saw that the porch l
ight was off. Rachel told her to ignore the house, and that the family living there was either sick or out somewhere on vacation or at a party. In Haddonfield, most everyone participated in one way or another in this particular holiday, unlike other cities Rachel had heard about where churches had condemned the celebrations as being paganistic and therefore sinful to practice. All Rachel knew was that tonight, in the world of the contemporary, all of the parties and bobbing for apples and putting on costumes and going door—to—door was as innocent as a newborn baby. She had many fond memories of the custom from her childhood, and Jamie and every other little girl or boy would not be the least bit harmed with the same fond memories.

  Besides, wasn’t Christmas’ origins paganistic, too?

  Anyway, aside from what other people did or did not do on this night, Rachel knew that it was also a night for little, quiet get-togethers get-togethers in livingrooms, dark livngrooms, maybe even dark bedrooms while certain parents were having a good time with their friends somewhere, too.

  Rachel directed Jamie across the street to start on another block, and when Rachel looked down at her glow-in—the-dark Timex, she knew that this block would be the last. As they arrived at the other side, they came across a small group of children who appeared to be around Jamie’s age, wearing brightly colored clown suits with awkward-looking shoes and ghost white sheets and there was even a kid with a huge, plastic buffalo head which forced him to hang his bag of candy by a string around his neck in better effort to hold up the monstrosity. They looked like refugees from a Saturday morning cartoon nobody wanted to view. The one with the stupid floppy shoes, the clown with the stripes as if posing as an escaped convict from the circus, went up to Jamie.

  “Wow!” Kyle said to her. “That clown costume’s really cool.”

  Jamie didn’t know what to say. She was fearful the first instant, but the fear soon evolved into a certain delightful surprise. “Thanks.”

  “I’m sorry about today,” the boy said sincerely. “I didn’t mean it.”

  She was stunned. “Really?”