FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

"Oh, for crying out loud. This place could not be any more obviously haunted."

Jill stood with one hand on her hip, the slender black cat pointing her flashlight up towards the creaking ruin of an old manor. It was drooping and decayed with age, long since abandoned but never quite demolished for one reason or another. The nearest streetlights were but a distant shimmer, the city limits long since left behind, leaving only the moon and the flashlights they had brought with them as a guide. An elaborate, rusted gate of black bars stretched all around the property, sitting open to allow them inside. Once they stood before the manor's looming form they couldn't help but pause.

It was like a relic of another time entirely with its elaborately constructed arches and crumbling gothic towers. It might have looked more like a cathedral than a house in its prime, but the years had worn it down to a rickety ruin of its former glory, rusted over the gleam of prestige and left it a blackened skeleton of what it once was, and yet somehow it still stood. Untouched by any but nature, its husk was wrapped in withered vines, the twisted tendrils wrapping in and out of the many shattered windows, half-decayed. There were at least four stories to the structure, though it was hard to tell exactly with the roof partly caved in, leaving the whole thing crooked. Yet it was massive, a sundered titan in the middle of nowhere, wearing the cloudy moonlight like a cloak of gloom. The only road leading there little more than dirt. For all the knew, they were the first ones to have bothered coming up that far in decades.

"Aren't we getting a little old for this kind of thing? I know it was fun back in high school and all, but like, we've got jobs and exams and shit now, man." Barry patted the dalmatian on the back.

Chris was resistant. He turned to look up at the taller stallion, wagging his tail slowly. As much as the sight of their destination made him admittedly nervous, he tried to hide it by just looking excited, his doggish features bright and cheery.

"Come on! We'll all have a good time. It'll be just like before!"

Barry gave him a sideways look before just letting a smile spread over his lips.

"Alright, alright. You know I can never say no to that face."

The dog stood up tall on his toes and gave the horse a big smooch on the cheek. Of course, Barry wasn't letting him leave it at that and just tugged him into an embrace, taking him right off his paws so they could make out. Jill just watched patiently, giving a little chuckle as the kiss went on and on before finally clearing her throat to remind them she was there. When that didn't work, she did it again, louder and more urgently. They popped free from the kiss and just cast some dazed looks her way.

"Oh, um, I mean as much as I love that my two best childhood buddies have totally hooked up and are adorable together - I think something's glowing over there."

Jill pointed with one hand, shining her flashlight in the same direction with the other. Barry almost dropped the dog in his surprise, staring over in the direction she was indicating. He squinted, his own eyes not quite as keen as a cat's, but soon enough he saw it too.

"Holy shit."

"What what?" Chris was all off balance. "What is it?"

There was something shining there in one of the second floor windows. It looked almost like the outline of a person. Glowing might not have been the word. The colour was a ghostly green-blue, cold and dull, barely reflecting three flashlight beams pointed in that direction. Just looking at it made Chris feel cold. It glimmered and shifted, flickering like a flame. From that distance, even Jill couldn't make out a face, but the sight of it all had them in silent awe. They stared for a while, until it vanished. Whoever or whatever it was didn't seem to turn and walk away, they just disappeared as quickly as turning off a lightswitch. None of them said anything for a while. Then they turned to each other.

Chris found himself stammering. Both of his friends were looking at him for some kind of explanation.

"I, uh, well, I mean - there have been rumours of people disappearing lately."

Jill cut in, her tone a bit sharper than usual. "Maybe it's just some idiots pulling a prank."

"Or maybe we're going to get robbed. Or sold on the black market. I hear horse bits go for a pretty good amount." Barry snorted.

"It's probably nothing like that. Maybe it's just some trick of the light? The, uh ... old glass, or something. That could be where the stories come from." Despite the looks his friends were giving him, Chris wasn't backing down. "Come onnnn. One more adventure. This could be really cool. We could be in the paper or something."

"Yeah, because we were murdered," Barry joked, though the way he was nibbling at his lips betrayed just how jittery he was feeling.

"I'm not even going to lie. I'm super freaked out right now and pretty sure getting anywhere near that spooky old house is a terrible idea for reasons both supernatural and totally mundane. It could very well just collapse on top of us, for all we know" Jill paused, and then her eyes lit up with a youthful, impulsive energy. "And despite all this I am totally feeling it."

That put a broad smile on Chris' face. "See! I told you! We'll never be too old for this."

"Some of us won't maybe," Barry muttered, but he couldn't help but follow right along with the eager cat and dog. He guarded the rear. While also checking out his boyfriend's rear. Chris was so cute when that tail got to wagging.

The front door was locked, and incredibly solid. It felt less like a door when Chris tugged the handle and more like a hard stone wall. He glanced around for an open window, or a broken one, but he drew the line at actually breaking anything himself. They were looking for an adventure, not an opportunity for vandalism. When nothing seemed like a way in, he just stopped and planted his hands on his hips, disappointed. Well, at least that probably meant they weren't going to be robbed or something. Then the door would have been open.

Just when he was about to give up, he felt a subtle tap on his shoulder. And when that was too subtle, Jill outright grabbed him and turned his body to look at what she had seen. There was another figure there. Ghostly and glimmering with the haunting hue. It was standing at the entrance to a weathered old hedge maze, one somehow still standing despite the gaps and dying foliage. And it was looking at them.

They remained locked in a frozen chill for a while until the figure departed. This time they saw it move. It was definitely a person of some sort, walking on two feet as it retreated into the maze. Neither cat nor canine hesitated to follow after it, lured along

Without a word, he and Jill went striding off towards the maze, following the hypnotic allure of fear. They left Barry behind briefly, the stallion just snorting as he watched them go, folding his arms and remaining stubborn for just a few seconds.

"Really? Right into the creepy-ass ... yep, okay, they're gone. Well. We're doing this," he muttered to himself, begrudgingly tailing them.

Chris found himself thinking a natural hedge like that ought to have completely decayed to nothing over the years of neglect. It was browned and withered, but still standing somehow. That meant aside from a few glimpses through the gaps in hedges, they couldn't see what was ahead. Chris led the way, winding left, then right, following some sort of unspoken instinct while his friends followed along behind him. They seemed to trust his sense of direction, or maybe his nose, but the truth was he had no idea where he was going. Something just called to him, and he answered the call with every turn down the twisted path.

Whatever was guiding him, it ensured they made progress. None of them were saying together, remaining close to each other to ensure they didn't get separated and lost in that old maze. When they eventually came out in a clear, they knew they were in the middle. It was a round, open space, and the the scent of stagnant water resting motionless, no longer flowing through the old fountain. A statue had once stood there on a platform in the middle of the water, but it had long singe crumbled down to nothing more than a pair of avian feet and shins. There were four ways leading out of that centrepoint, but all of them were blocked. Several of those figures stood there, glimmering their ghostly tone, and finally the three friends could get a better look of them.

At first they looked to be nothing more than walking skeletons. They stood rigid, but not motionless. They appeared to be breathing. Wrapped around those bare, dull bones was that faintly glowing something, like a translucent cloak. A ghostly outline of who they had once been, flickering images of a bobcat, a bull, a doberman, and a doe all clung to those remains, their faces blank, devoid of emotion. They did not blink. They stared at the three intruders for a time, swaying, their ghostly outlines shimmering upon their bones. And then they each raised a hand in unison, and pointed at them. Then came the scream.

It was a shrill, piercing wail, erupting from all four figures at once, blending together into a horrifying sound that hurt their ears just as it froze them in place as sure as if they had been bound. Chris wasn't moving, holding his breath, flattening his ears as he endured the assault. His friends weren't moving either. Even once the ghosts started advancing. There was no other word for it. They might have been partly translucent, nothing more than reanimated bones and a shadow of their former selves, but some part of them was still physical. Chris was gritting his teeth, curling his lips back in a reflexive snarl. But he wasn't going to fight them. Finally tearing himself free of those unseen bonds, he whirled around and grabbed his friends by the shoulders.

"Run!"

And so they ran. The horse and cat alike were faster than him, but he was only shortly behind. When they came to a split in the path, he couldn't stop Jill and Barry from splitting up. She went left and he went right. His mind all but froze up in the momentary panic. He couldn't leave either of them alone. His indecision almost had him plowing into the hedge in front of him. He had to make a choice. One of the other. And finally, he found himself following the distant tail of the stallion. He was big, he could fend for himself - but Chris wasn't going to be able to forgive himself if something happened to him. Jill was a cat, and that meant she could just hide. Hopefully.

Barry wasn't slowing down for him. He reached out for the distant figure of the horse while he huffed and gasped, realizing he wasn't quite in the same kind of shape he had been a few years ago. He was slowing down, but the big fit horse wasn't. Barry didn't look back. And when he went around a corner, Chris could only trail behind, doing his best to follow. Except, he wasn't there when he turned the corner. There was nothing but the solid wall of dead hedge. He was backed into a corner, and the flicker was just behind him, the glow reflecting in the dirt, the creature just around the corner.

Though he was bent double, tongue hanging from his mouth, panting harder than he could ever remember panting, he wasn't going to let something so simple as a few cramps make him fall victim to a ghost. The feline one was striding towards him, not running, and so he did the only thing he could think of. He leapt through the spiky, thorny hedge, wincing and yelping all the way, forcing his way through the old branches and crackling leaves. He felt something grasp at his ankle, but those bony fingers slipped free as he lunged forward, tumbling out on the other side.

Gasping and dusting himself off, he picked himself up. The fall had left him sore and scratched, but he wasn't going to let that stop him. Not when his friends were in danger. And not when he was that afraid He could still see that eerie glow shining through the gaps in the hedge, searching up and down the paths nearby. But he hadn't escaped yet. The maze still stretched before him, towering and dark, and he only had his flashlight to guide him. The moon was gone. Where before it had at least provided some moderate illumination, it had grown entirely dark. He could barely see his hands. Only the short distance lit up in front of him by the shaky beam of his flashlight as he clutched it tightly, trekking forth.

He could hear footsteps. Were those hooves? He thought to call out to Barry, but the constant presence of dull, raspy scraping kept him silent. They were still near too. And they were going to find him. His flashlight in his hands kept flickering, as if something had been knocked loose in his escape. He could hear a faint electric buzz emitting from it. Those moments of darkness were brief, but in the half-seconds he went without its guiding light, he was left bathed entirely in darkness, relying only on his other senses. As keen as his nose usually was, it wasn't telling him much. All was damp and decaying, fresh fall air mixed in with the dying plant life around him. He was lost.

Jill would have been better at such a thing, but he did his best to move silently, keeping low, and holding back his panting as much as he could. He still heard movement nearby. In all directions. It was impossible to tell if he was making any progress towards the exit. Everything was too dark. He felt like he was looping around on himself, choosing an arbitrary direction at each fork in the road. Yet no matter how long he went, he never encountered a dead end. The maze went on and on, dark and cold, until he swore he had to have been going in circles. He turned right. And again. And again. Yet he never found himself back in the same spot. He had nothing to leave behind, no breadcrumbs, and so he could only hope if he wandered for long enough he would be lucky.

All had grown silent. He only noticed it just then. His breath was coming back to him, but he could still feel his heart pumping. And hear it, too. It was the only sound, aside from the quiet falls of his paws on the hooves below. His flashlight was still flickering. And it had grown dimmer. He could barely see where his paws were landing, feeling like he was going to trip over himself at any moment. The night was getting colder, especially with the chill breeze that kept blowing over the back of his neck. Right exactly there, in fact.

He thought he had caught his breath, but he could still the draw of air. So he held it in, stopping on the spot, doing his utmost not to make a sound at all. Something was still breathing, in slow, shaky, ragged huffs through their teeth. And he still felt that chill on his neck. His ears slowly flattened to his head as he realized exactly what that meant. It was right behind him. Standing perfectly still. Maybe if he didn't move, it somehow wouldn't see him. But the scream was so much louder from so near.

It rattled through his skull, piercing, deafening, shaking him down to his very toes. He felt at once naked and so very cold, especially when he felt those bony hands upon him. His flashlight fell to the ground, flickering out to nothing, and he could only kick and cry for help as he was dragged off into the darkness. The stars were gone. The moon was hidden. He couldn't hear his friends, nor could he smell them. There was only the cold of death, chilling him to the bone in that skeletal grip.

He must have blacked out, because he didn't remember arriving in that new, candlelit place. He was just there all of a sudden. It looked like some sort of ancient crypt, dark, dusty stone bathed in the warm light of the candles. The ghosts were there too. They stood at attention, lined up on two sides of the room while the candles flicked, reflecting off their dull green bodies. The four he had seen before were all there, and there was a fifth. Another feline. It was hard to recognize her at first, but the bones of the new figure were coated in a perfect ghostly recreation of Jill's features. His eyes went wide and he reached a hand out to her as if to call, but he was interrupted by a broad door swinging open across the room, sending a gust of air across the candles that left them flickering but not going out.

The figure was cloaked, but even in the light Chris could see a dark black beak. It shimmered, reflecting the multitude of tiny flames in the room. He couldn't see the rest of the bird's face. The ghosts knelt before the figure's presence, all in unison but for Jill who lagged slightly behind. Chris noticed, but his eyes remained fixated on their leader. Two scaly hands lowered the hood of that clock, revealing a raven's face, with two dark, golden eyes gleaming at him. But the bird wasn't done disrobing, unfastening a sash and letting that clock fall open, revealing the bare feathers beneath. His belly was full.

Stretched out to a rounded, stuffed form, those feathers outlined the clear figure of a person beneath, all curled up tight in the raven's gut. Whoever it was, they were still squirming. They had gone in alive. Chris watched on his knees, trying to discern the features he saw bulging in that broad gut. The raven's stomach was only pulling tighter and tighter around the frame, revealing a muscled body, bulky and tall, but still trapped. Chris didn't want to let himself believe it, but he knew who was in there, struggling in vain against the noisy gurgles that clenched and churned all around his powerful form. All the working out had proven useless against ... whatever the raven really was. Normal people couldn't stretch like that.

As soon as Chris opened his mouth to cry out, the ghosts snapped their attention at him all at once. Jill locked eyes with him as he shuddered in horror. Then she raised a bony finger to her shimmering lips, and smiled to him.

"Shhh. It's going to be okay. We will all serve together," she said, and it sounded like her voice, but she had never spoke so flatly, so coldly.

Chris wanted to scream, but the sound caught in his throat. He could only choke as he watched the raven looming over him. Closer and closer, his prey-stuffed belly jiggling with every step. The sloshes were too much to bear. Especially with how much wetter they were getting. Chris remained on his knees, gazing up at those intimidating eyes as he digested his boyfriend. It was all happening so fast. From struggling, Barry was soon just twitching, his body shrinking inwards as that belly tightened up around him, revealing where he was already softening, growing more unrecognizable by the moment. Digesting and absorbing, adding to that lean raven's form but hardly even making for much visible fat. He was simply being used up.

A few last twitches came from the horse's form, but he was balled up so tightly he couldn't have been anything close to whole. The raven's belly was flattening, leaving little more than a paunch where the entire swell of Barry had been. A few last churns, and his stomach grew quieter, mildly gurgling and grumbling about. When Chris looked up with a wide-eyed and tearful expression of horror, the raven simply reached down to cup his chin, tilting his muzzle up towards his beak. His voice was low and smooth, surprisingly comforting in a time of such trauma.

"No need to be upset, canine. He's not gone. Right this very moment, he is becoming something greater, free of his mortal bindings.."

That didn't do much to calm Chris down, but the dalmatian didn't move much. The intimidation was part of it, but he simply felt compelled to be silent, even respectful as the raven stepped back away from him. He watched as that bird rubbed over his belly, producing some messy digestive noises at first, along with a disturbing clatter. The horses bones tumbled about in those acidic juices, bulging here and there, making Chris' heart sink, making his mind go blank at just how horrific it all was. Especially when the raven let a deep, cawing belch rumble forth from within him, first flinging some saliva in Chris' direction. And then a few bones.

He still couldn't move. The horror he was experiencing was such that one more awful thing just contributed to his paralyzed numbness. He was left to kneel there, observing as the raven bent double, rubbing at his middle, parting his beak wide. He was rolling his whole body, arching his spine, flexing, gurgling. And then he was just spitting out every single one of those bones, one after another, letting them bulge their way up his throat and clatter down to the floor below in one big slimy pile. They gathered there until topped off by an empty horse skull, dripping spit and stomach juices but otherwise completely polished to off-white.

The raven didn't seem to be greatly affected by such a thing, and just stood again, making a sharp gesture to those bones.

"Rise," he said, less a command and more a casual direction, as if he were politely addressing a waiter.

The bones stirred. They simply shook at first, but they began to move all on their own, defying gravity as they levitated upwards, aligning themselves with each other, reconnecting joints and arranging ribs. Then rearranging them when they weren't quite right. Bits and pieces swapped around, locking together, and soon the broad skeleton of his equine friend was standing there above him, looking down. His features filled in around it, a muscular ghost all wrapped around those bones, and Chris say Barry's face once more. The horse looked dazed, stunned at first, but he gave his head a shake and finally he was grinning a horsey grin.

"Oh man, this is great! Join us, Chris. It's going to be fine. Joiiiiiin us." He sounded like he was himself as always, being a big tease, except his voice had acquired an echoing, haunting effect.

It wasn't like he had much choice. The raven was already approaching him. He felt a firm grip on both his shoulders, and then he was on his feet. His balance was all shaky, but the bird held him up. Chris looked the raven in the face, but all he got was an open beak. He felt the warmth of the bird's breath, welcome after that cold night in the maze, and then he was slickly sliding along that firm tongue towards the back of a dark gullet. He felt tugging, squeezing, and then the potent muscular force of a gullet tugging at his muzzle, taking him in. All was warm and wet, smoothly enveloping him one swallow at a time as the raven traced his hands and talons down his sides and spine, clutching him by the hips, holding him close to that slightly chubby belly.

He felt his face being tasted, that tongue slathering over every one of his features, but the bird didn't linger for too long. The purpose of eating him wasn't for food, wasn't for sustenance. It was to relieve him of his mortal form. Chris was starting to see that, as he gazed into the black abyss of the raven's throat, felt it tugging and massaging him as he slid into those humid depths. All was wet and slippery, drool pouring down his features, soaking into his fur until he was utterly drenched in it. Surprisingly, it smelled nice in there. Like it had all been prepared for him, a hot aromatic acid bath to slip sweetly into as he descended. He knew he should have been afraid, but the horse's reassurance remained fresh in his mind. It allowed for the fear to start leaving his tense muscles, letting him finally start to relax, to slip into that slimy embrace and forget about his troubles and worries. He was fine. His friends were too. They were all going to be alright in the raven's care.

Chris felt his feet leaving the ground, felt himself sliding back into that open gullet. The raven's grip was powerful, unshaking as he held the dog in place and devoured him while. Though he couldn't help but wiggle a little, startled by just how firm some of those firm compressions were around his form as he was consumed. The noise of gulping, of all that squishing and slurping and sloshing was enough to slightly harm his sensitive ears, making him flatten them, all welled up with bird spit. But he was otherwise relaxed. Accepting his fate. His new purpose. It felt so good to submit, to simply let the predatory bird claim him, to stuff him down into that murky belly. It was churning in greeting of the dog's muzzle as he pushed in. At first he was stricken by the scent of digestion, the sharpness of the acidic air that struck him. But it wasn't so bad, once he got used to it.

His legs kicked up in the air, flicking around some bird drool that was clinging to him, his pants all rolled up to expose some of his bare fur. The raven didn't pay much mind to his crotch on the way in, but the treatment was making Chris' sheath bulge. Not quite full on hard, but he was embracing the pleasure overtaking him as he slid inside. He was in far too deep for anyone to hear him moaning, but muffled down in the bird's warm gut, he let slip a few gasps and groans of pleasure up against the slimy walls closing in on his face, and then was left mmmming all the way down in a long, smooth swallow. The edges of the raven's beak rubbed against him, scraping but never hurting. The bird's throat kneaded him along. And all around him was the sound of gulping, quieted as he settled into that expanding stomach.

He felt that tongue working over his bare paws, but only for a few licks. Then they too were tucked away, the raven's beak closing over them with a clack that sealed him inside. He was warm. He even felt safe. Despite how quickly that belly attacked him, wrapping tightly around his form to create a tight outline of curled up canine in those sleek feathers. Bulging and only squirming a little, Chris settled down and sighed, feeling like he was being rocked to sleep. The churning never hurt, never crushed or cramped him, and though he was forced to roll up into a pretty tight form, he was fine with that.

All was warm and dark. The fluids flowed over his body, getting through his clothes, soaking them down to his skin. He felt the raven kneading at him, pressing inwards on that humid chamber while he stewed within. That, along with the soothing song of low caws that resonated from within the well-fed bird, and Chris was all but ready to submit, to slip into slumber and let whatever happened, happen. But that would have meant ruining that relaxed state. He gave himself over to his fate as the digestion as it simmered over his skin. His fur was first, loose and falling out, raining down to the bottom, fluttering and sodden. Then his skin began to weaken as some sort of potent, but unfelt digestives worked their way through them. He could tell he was falling apart, being destroyed at an alarmingly rapid pace. It should have been scary. But his body wasn't reacting that way.

When another particularly hard compression of that belly came around his form, he felt himself sink inwards, bent in half by the power of that squeeze. He was being broken apart, softened to the point he was barely solid. In those last moments, he felt his own body collapsing upon itself, his head sinking into his chest, his legs parting from the rest of him, and so forth. It surely would have been highly gruesome if he could see in there. But to him, all it felt like was an intense relaxation pouring over his body, so soothed he couldn't feel a thing. Because he had been mostly liquefied by then. All but his bones. The last thing he heard amidst that chorus of glurps and heavy churns was his own skeleton clattering together as the bird absorbed the rest of him as nutrients. Or maybe he was to simply be used as fuel for those unholy powers? Either way, he was still making the raven a little pudgier with his contribution.

It didn't take long of absorbing and metabolizing his essence before the bird was ready to bring him back again. Some part of Chris was still aware in there. Still conscious and thinking, if not exactly feeling or perceiving. He just knew he was part of the bird, like a sentient layer of fat upon his frame. And his sense of touch was starting to come back. He could feel that throat again, kneading him, though fainter than before. Then he felt himself falling. It seemed to last for minute. He would have screamed if he remembered how. Then came the ground, a shocking impact. He couldn't see, couldn't tell where he was, but he could hear his own bones tumbling to the cold stone floor.

His vision came back to him once his canine skeleton was reassembled. He blinked a couple times. Everything felt as before, except better. He no longer had any of his usual muscle cramps or sore joints. He wasn't tired, hungry, or cold. Everything was just right. Raising his arms slowly, he looked down at himself, stroking along his skeletal form a few times. The wisps of his body moved out of the way for his bones, soft as air. When he looked back up, his friends were grinning at him. He returned the look.

The raven stepped close, placing his hand on Chris' skeletal shoulder. It felt warm. He spoke with a fond smile, leaning in to peck against the dalmatian's bony cheek.

"We will have time to talk to each other later. For the moment ... we have more arrivals. They're coming through the gate now." The raven clicked his beak thoughtfully. "The house has called them here, just like you, but it's not ready yet. Soon, it will be the place of great things. But in the meantime - everyone who comes here is mine."

When he stepped away, Chris just found his gaze naturally following the bird. The other ghosts did the same, gazing at him in silent reverence and obedience. He smiled to them.

"I think you all know what to do. Another game begins. Our numbers grow again tonight. How quickly the crypt fills! It is a shame I will only have you until the dawn of the next month. But we will have our fun in the meantime."

Chris joined his friends once more. The fear was gone as the glittered together, clattering their bones together. The only thing to be afraid of anymore was themselves. And they were going to have such fun together. Chasing down the intruders. Bringing them to the master raven. They didn't know his name, but they knew that they would serve him for as long as he held on to their souls. He said he'd let them go, and they had no reason not to trust him. Even after he'd swallow and digested them all whole, absorbed every single part of their flesh and essence alike into his increasingly pudgy body.

Turning to Jill and Barry alike, he gave an excited ghostly rasp, and they responded in kind. And when they saw their prey from a distance, they lurched forth, scraping their freshly cleaned bones through the dirt, preparing for the ambush. He could already feel a wonderful scream welling up in his ghostly chest. It was going to sound terrifying when he let that out, but he was waiting for the right moment. This was all going to be such fun. It really was just like one of their old adventures together.