As Lucas opened the door, he could feel all the joy and nervousness for the girl he was supposed to meet quickly turn into a cold, fearful sweat. It was as if he was swimming in the middle of the ocean and felt a cold hand touch his leg. Or waking up and not being able to move while a demonic shadow figure slowly watching over him. The feeling of being in a helpless situation that he knew was not going to end well. This was exactly how Lucas felt when he stared out at the door.
Instead of opening the door to a beautiful nerdy girl wearing green glasses with dirty blonde hair, he found himself looking at a young man nearly his height with light brown skin. He had a smile on his face that seemed friendly but hid something sinister. Lucas's eyes then looked up to meet a much darker-skinned man that stood several feet taller than the first one, with a low formed beard and a visible mustache connecting to it. The man also had a piercing on his bottom lip. Lucas's eyes then moved left towards the last man, almost as tall as the other one, just barely shy a few inches. He was white with slick back hair with a goatee. He also had shades resting on his head.
Lucas never felt this much fear in his life to the point his hand began to shake on the doorknob. He made a gulping sound as he could feel a bad sensation coming off of the trio.
"I have no idea who these guys are, and I have never seen them before in my life. I need to think of something now to keep them from becoming suspicious." He thought to himself as he heard the snapping fingers of the short one.
"Hey, buddy. You there?" The short one said while pulling out his phone. "Are you Lucas Homes?"
"Uhm..... No. I'm sorry, I....uhm...think you...have the wrong address." Lucas said, quickly lying on his feet as he tried to hide his fear.
"Oh? Are you sure? I thought this was 0977 West Gapple Street?" The short one said, raising an eyebrow towards Lucas. He started to read the kid moments to see if he could catch Lucas slipping.
"Sadly no. That's the second turn coming in. We are 0978. We've been meaning to fix that but never got around to do so." Lucas said, letting out a nervous laugh as he realized how dead on this guy was about his address. His mind began to tell him that he needed to close the door immediately and call for help as soon as possible; however, he knew he needed to do so in a way that was not too suspicious.
"I'm sorry, guys. But I have to close the door now. I have food cooking at a very delicate temperature, and it could burn over at any moment. I hope you guys find the place you're looking for." He quickly made up an excuse as he tried to close the door. Lucas then felt a sudden stop on the door and looked down to see a shoe was blocking the path.
The short man then let out a sigh.
"By the Divine Serpents, I didn't think the child of the most infamous hunter would be such a terrible liar. Brando and Alexander, would you do the honors?" Timmy said.
On cue, the door was blown off of its hinges. The sudden force knocked Lucas to the ground while at the same time, pieces of the door flew right over his head just by a few inches.
Lucas watched in horror as he could see what appeared to be steam coming off the men. He then noticed something off about it. It was more fluid-like and had a different shade of color for each of them. Lucas looked down to see part of the door at his feet and the other half nearly in the living room. His body started to feel the pain from the force, but the overwhelming shock and fear consumed him. His hands began to shake as he tried to slide back and think of a way to escape. As much as he tried to move, his body wouldn't move an inch. He was paralyzed with fear.
"Look, Timmy. We scared him stiff." The one known as Alexander stated before letting out a bellowed chuckle.
"Shit. This might be a lot easier than we previously thought." Brando exhaled as smoke came from his mouth.
"And y'all underestimated my plan. I told you two it would work." Timmy said, checking his phone before putting it up.
As he took a step inside of the house, he took a moment to take in everything. His eyes slowly examined every detail of the home, from the walls to the floor, to the ceiling, to even the decorations. While the smell flowed from the kitchen, he could pick up the faint pleasant natural aroma of the hall. He felt like a guest being lead through a tour of an exclusive exhibit cut off from the rest of the world.
"So this is the home of Elizabeth Homes. It's... breath-taking. I love the Victorian style with the modern twist." He spoke, still captivated and noticing the details of the layout. His eyes then landed on a picture on a shelf close to him. He picked it up to examine the photo of Elizabeth, Martha, and Lucas taking the group photo with silly faces. He had to admit it was a lovely family photo and even caught himself chuckling a little. That was before he coldly raised it and slammed the photograph to the ground.
As Lucas sat on the floor, he tried to piece together how they found him and why they were here.
"How did they know who I was? How did they know where I lived, as well? The only person that knew was the Sinder date. But how? Her name was Kim, and this guy's name is…." He thought to himself as the realization set in heavily.
"Son of a bitch," he mumbled to himself as he realized he got catfish.
As they invaded more into the home, the one known as Timmy squatted in front of Lucas and started to snapped his fingers right in his face.
"Hey. Hey. Pay attention. How long did she say she was going to be gone?" He addressed Lucas with a confident yet cautious voice.
"Wha-what?" Lucas said, zoning back in, and could hear his own voice quivering. He was so scared that his body began to shake visibly.
"How. Long. Is. Your. Mother. Going. To. Be. Gone?" he asked, nearly picking Lucas up by his shirt and repeating himself very slowly. Lucas could see the seriousness in his eyes as he wanted the answer right then and there.
"Don't say anything. Don't tell him the answer." Lucas thought to himself.
"She.....won't be back until later tonight." His mouth released the answer against his will.
Timmy thought about it for a second as if he was doing math in his head. He then smiled very deeply, showing Lucas the gap around his two front teeth. He then tilted his head back towards his friends.
"Boys. We gotta lot of time on our hands, so destroy everything," he then looked back at Lucas. A twisted smile formed on his face. "We can kill you and still have time." He then dropped Lucas back down before backhanding him so hard that he slid straight into the kitchen.
Lucas felt the world around him shift as his ear began to ring. His face went numb before pain quickly took over. Using his shaking left hand, he felt his face and brought his hand back down to see his hand covered in blood. He began to breathe in heavily and rapidly as he started to panic. He then turned around to see the one know as Timmy and the rest started to destroy everything they could get their hands on. He began to feel powerless and different thoughts ran through his mind.
"I don't want to die. If I don't do something, I'm going to die. I need to do anything." He told himself while still breathing heavily and with tears in his eyes. He started to look around for anything that could help. He then froze for a moment before looking up to where the knife he had placed on the counter earlier was.
The three men in the hallway began to celebrate while destroying things in their path. They accomplished what no other being could, were willing to, or dreamt of doing in a lifetime. They were in the home of the woman who imprisoned or killed so many of their allies and had enough time to crash and burn it. Then to add icing to the cake, they can kill her weak and defenseless son. This was the best night of their lives and they were going to enjoy every second of it. All three of them began to break furniture, rip books, smash different things, and break things over their own heads. When they went by the kitchen, they saw Lucas standing there with a knife in his hand and blood on the side of his face. All three of them burst with laughter at the sight.
"Yo. I've seen some funny shit in my life, but this shit takes the cake," Brando said taking a step forward and caused the frightened boy to take a step back.
Lucas felt embarrassed and intimidated by the man. His ear was bleeding and his arms were shaking. The weight of the situation began to dawn on him. He stood no chance against them. His breathing and heart rate started to accelerate to the point where he felt light-headed and dizzy.
"Maybe I should give up. I'm not strong enough for this. Maybe I should just die here." His mind began to produce toxic thoughts as tears began to race down his face. He could feel his grip on the knife loosen as he went closer to giving up.
"Man. I kinda feel bad for this kid. He looks like he's about to piss himself." Brando said turning his head to his friends. He then took another step forward. "Tell you what, kid. I'll do you a solid. I'm going to allow you to do your best. And I'm not going to move one inch." Brando said holding both of his hands out.
"Go ahead. Here's your free shot."
"They're making fun of you again. Just like the rest always do. How long are you going to keep allowing them to do this?" Lucas could feel his inner voice talk to him as he felt his legs wanting to give out. He dropped his head hiding his eyes behind his hair. He felt his heart tighten as it continued to pump even faster, and his arms still shook much wilder.
"I'm so tired of feeling this way. I hate feeling useless. I don't want my last moments being a coward." Lucas told himself as his arms stopped shaking. He could feel both his breathing and the beating of his heart slow down to a much calmer state. As his breathing became more controlled, his hair began to flutter and rise slowly. A faint light blue aura began to leak from his body. The three invaders noticed this and could feel this slight change in the scared boy. He was still the same, but something was off about him.
"I refuse to die a coward!" Lucas roared at the men as he raised his head towards them. A light blue spark left his right eye as his grip on the knife tightened. He gritted his teeth as this new feeling consumed his body. His feet caused the floor he was standing on to crack when he took off towards Brando. A deep roar left Lucas as he charged at him.
This was it. At this moment, Lucas got what he wanted. He wasn't scared. It was as if something had snapped in him and pushed him to show his bravery. He felt a warm sensation flow throughout his body as he tried to thrust the knife into his opponent's stomach as hard as he could.
A small amount of blood hit Lucas's face as he let out a deep breath. He felt something warm on his hands and looked down to see blood was covering them. He then felt a sharp pain as he realized that it was his own hands bleeding. Lucas forcefully dropped the knife due to the pain and a mixture of shock. He immediately noticed that nearly half of the blade had broken off, and was in a different spot on the floor. Even the handle was broken. Lucas felt his heart in his stomach as he slowly looked up to see the atrocious smile on the man's, he just tried to stab, face. He took a step back to try and get away but felt a hand around his neck and raised him off the ground. He began to gasp for air as he felt the hand tighten.
"Well damn. That was a pretty good thrust you had there. If I was human, that could have killed me." Brando complimented Lucas while looking him in his eyes. As his grip tightened, he could see the fear in them grow. Brando took a step back and raised Lucas higher in the air, before slamming the boy straight through the kitchen floor.
The impact knocked the wind out of Lucas's lungs as he just laid there for a good second in disbelief until the pain finally kicked in. He couldn't move without pain shooting throughout his body and felt as if the bone in his arm was broken and he was bleeding out. As he laid there, he could feel a warm sensation began to overcome his body.
"Am I dying?" He thought to himself. "Huh. At least I tried to do something," he gave himself credit as he slowly began to look around at what he could.
"Huh. So this was the basement." He thought to himself as he realized this was his first time in it. He remembered his mom always telling him never to go into the basement under any circumstances. Lucas had never seen his mom so serious about anything else, expected when it involved this area. She gave Lucas chills when he saw her face about it or when he brought it up.
As he zoned back into looking around at what he could see, Lucas could hear the invaders above him laughing and going back to destroying things—leaving him for dead.