October 31st 1999 Halloween night

“Trick or treat smell my feet give me something good to eat, I don’t know, I don’t care, I’ll pull down your underwear, is that how it goes?” Chris laughed as he was bouncing up and down the sidewalk with the other guys, JC, Justin, Lance, and Joey. They were all out for the night; heading to a Halloween party across town, and Chris was looking forward to it.

“Chris, you are completely nuts.” JC said shaking his head.

“Well JC, I did dress up as the Planter’s guy for this night, as you may have noticed, and what are you supposed to be anyway?” Chris frowned looking at JC’s costume.

“I told you already, I’m a warlock.” JC said proudly.

“Whatever, and what about you Lance, were you supposed to be some kind of fairy?” Chris smirked.

Lance had something sparkly all over him that made him look like a fairy. “My mom was the one that picked it out, not me. She said that I was supposed to be some exotic looking bug or an angel or something.”

Chris just shrugged, and looked at Joey and Justin; they were dressed as their favorite superheroes, Joey, of course was dressed as Superman, and Justin as Batman.

“At least your costumes look reasonable.” Chris muttered.

“I think this is the place.” Joey said looking at the address that was written on the paper he was holding.

They all stared up at the house; well it looked like a mansion more than anything. Justin let out a whistle. “Wow, this is something.” He gazed at the house in amazement.

It’s a good place to throw eggs on it, and T’P’d it.” Chris smirked.

“Chris, the deal was we were only gonna throw eggs and scatter toilet paper all over it, if the house didn’t look like this.” Justin said to his older friend.

“I’m still gonna throw stuff anyway, that’s the point of Halloween you know, it’s a night where you do something absolutely crazy.” Chris laughed.

“Chris, you always do something crazy.” JC chuckled.

“Ok then, well crazier.” Chris said with an eye roll.

The five of them walked up to the mansion, there were people everywhere, with all sorts of costumes, some of them looked to real for their liking, but hey it was Halloween. They entered the mansion, and were greeted right away, by a charming young woman who was dressed as a witch.

“Hi.” She hissed.

They all said hello in unison.

“I’m Margaret, and I’ll be your host tonight, there’s a punch bowl there, so help yourselves.”

“Thank you Margaret, I like your costume.” JC said giving her a warm smile.

“Thanks, I like yours too.” She hissed

JC let out a nervous laughter, and walked quickly to where the punch was, the guys were all there helping themselves. Joey was flirting to a girl who was dressed as a queen, and Chris was indulging himself with candy. JC stared at the punch bowl, it was a deep red color, it didn’t look like any punch that he seen, but he decided to drink it. After all, he saw other people drink it, so that’s what he did.

Justin was on the dance floor showing off his moves, and Lance was in the corner talking to a girl that was dressed as Tinker bell. The party was okay, there were people here and there, some good Halloween themed music.

“Ok guys and ghouls, we are gonna play a little game.” Margaret spoke up, but first I don’t think I haven’t introduced to my two sisters. A blonde young woman and another young woman with jet black hair, and a blue streak walked up next to her. These are my sisters Ashley and Wanda, and yes they are dressed as witches too.

“Great costumes.” Chris spoke up from the crowd; they all turned and looked at him, which was surprising to him, because all the partygoers became quiet.

“Wow this party died.” He joked. And with that all the lights went out, and flashed back on in less than a minute, when the lights did turn on however, all of the people were gone, and I mean ALL. The only people that were there were Chris, JC, Justin, Joey, and Lance.

“What the f-? Justin gasped looking around.

“Where are the people? Is this a Halloween joke?” Lance said checking behind the curtains.

“It must be a joke, because how can a whole crowd of people just disappear like that?” JC said snapping his fingers.

Joey went to check the doors and windows, he looked outside, there was no one outside, nothing, looking at the time, it was only a quarter to ten. “That’s funny, he said pulling the door, but to his horror, it wouldn’t open.

“Uh..hey guys?” Joey said his voice shaking. “This door is not opening.”

“What are you talking about Joe, maybe you’re not pulling hard enough?” Chris said walking up to him. The door was unlocked, but it wouldn’t open.

“Ok then, how bout the windows?” Chris pulled his sleeves up and tried to open the window, nothing, checked the other one, the other guys did the same, no luck.

“Are we trapped in here?” JC said, he was on the verge of hyperventilating.

“No of course not JC, maybe we’ll just check-Justin was cut off by three voices.

“You guys are not going anywhere.” They all spun around to where the voices were coming from. It was Margaret, Ashley, and Wanda all wearing mischievous grins on their faces.

“What-what are you talking about?” Lance said, his voice coming out a whisper.

“You must be thinking what happened to ALL these people that were here just minutes ago.” Margaret smiled.

The guys just stared at three young women blankly.

“Wha-What do you mean?” Chris stuttered.

They just laughed a creepy cackle laugh. “You boys are so naïve, it was a trap, a setup to bring you guys over here, we are gonna suck the life out of all of you, just like what we did with them.”

“You mean, all those people? You drained the life out of them, and they were all dead, ghosts?” Chris asked in shock.

“Yep, why do you think we look so young and beautiful.” Wanda said gushing.

“We ONLY do this on Halloween night, we’ve been doing this for years, one by one, group by group, we invite them from the neighborhood, give them a little fruit punch, appetizers, all the happy servings that come at a party.” Margaret replied grinning.

“The punch?” JC asked wide eyed.

“Yes the punch, the punch is poisoned; it makes you fall asleep, only you never wake up.” The three witches uttered a cackle, and at that moment JC fell to the floor.

“JC!” Justin quickly ran to his side before he collapsed on the floor, “JC?” Don’t fall asleep man, don’t-Justin lightly slapped his face to keep him from sleeping. The guys were all huddled around him and soon after JC quickly dozed off.

Justin had JC limp in his arms, he was unconscious, and then Justin realized that he remembered taking a sip of that punch, and Justin’s eyes quickly felt heavy.

“Justin! Don’t tell me that you drank the punch too, tell me you didn’t!” Chris pleaded.

Seconds later, Justin dozed off, JC was still limp in his arms, and Chris, Joey, and Lance moved Justin and JC to the end of the wall. Chris took a look back to where the witches were, they were still there, and this time they were flying over them.

“You three didn’t drink the punch?” Margaret frowned angrily.

“No! We didn’t.” Chris said, putting a foot forward.

“Well, looks like we have to do this the hard way, don’t we sisters?” She cackled, and the three of them threw sparks from their hands and aimed directly at Lance and Joey.

Ashley had control of Chris in case he tried to save his friends, he didn’t have control of his body, he couldn’t move, he couldn’t speak, he took a glance at Lance and Joey who were up on the wall, they looked like they were in pain, Chris weakly searched for something to hit the witches with, he saw a hackey sack, he realized that it was the hackey sack that they practiced with before every show, with all of his strength he picked it up, and tossed it at Ashley. Chris knew that the hackey sack wasn’t strong enough, but it was something. To his surprise, it threw Ashley off course. The other two stopped what they were doing and Lance and Joey landed on the floor with a loud thump.

Chris stood up and walked over to them, they were both unconscious, every muscle in his body was in pain, like needles were piercing through his skin. He looked back at the witches and frowned.

“So you wanna play hard ball huh?” Margaret replied, “Look at you, you’re so weak, you can’t even stand up. She cackled, which made the other sisters cackle as well, and with that all three of them flashed their sparks and aimed it at him. Chris let out of a yell, and fell to the floor, but he was determined, there was no way that the power of witchcraft can be stronger than the power of peace, love, and harmony. He had to fight them, he slowly started to get up from the floor, and walked grudgingly to the witches, he was doing this for the guys, he loved them, and he cared for them more than anything. To his surprise, the closer he walked to them, the weaker they became.

The witches gazed at him in shock and Chris heard one of them say, “That’s impossible! no one can’t withstand our power!”

When he reached them, their powers weren’t working and Chris saw the look on their faces, and they were quickly deteriorating.

“NOOO!” They yelled, and they burst into colorful dust and sparks, and all was quiet. Chris was on the floor at this moment, all of this left him without energy, he slowly rose to his feet from where he was and heard a groan.

“Ow my head.” Joey winced and put a hand on his head and frowned. “What happened?

“The witches are gone Joe,” Chris replied, his voice shaking.

“How?” Joey asked.

“I confronted them.” Chris said, “Their magic was painful but that didn’t stop me from rescuing you guys.” He gave Joey a warm smile.

“Thank you, I love you man.” Joey said his voice breaking a bit and pulled Chris into a tight hug. “I would, well we would do the same for you, you know that, you were always the bravest one out of all of us.”

“I know Joey, I know, you weren’t expecting that, in fact none of us were, it just happened.” Chris said, pulling back from the hug and he realized that Lance was awake, who had a bewildered look on his face.

“What happened?” He asked.

“Joey would explain that to you.” Chris said patting his hand on Lance’s shoulder. Chris walked up to Justin and JC, they haven’t moved from the spot where he placed them earlier, he was having second thoughts when he saw Justin move and he slowly opened his eyes.

“Chris?” He replied

Chris just smiled at him and he saw that JC was coming through too, he let out a chuckle cause JC was talking to himself in his slumber.

“Aww come on mom, ten more minutes.” And with that JC woke up with a goofy sleep grin.

“It’s so good to see you again Jace, I thought we lost you dude.” Chris said giving JC and then giving Justin a hug.

Joey and Lance walked up to them and they gave each other hugs.

“But what happened to the-JC said, but was quickly cut off by Chris.

“We’ll talk in the house okay?” Not here, the walls have ears.” They all nodded in agreement

Chris pulled the door open, he was so happy that it was unlocked. “Let’s go guys, he looked back at the house, and walked down the street with the guys.

Chris felt something or someone shake him.

“Chris, Chris, wake up.” JC said.

“Huh?” Where am I? Chris looked around, he was in the living room in his house, surrounded by his four other best friends, he frowned and saw that the TV was on, playing some scary movie.

“Are you alright man?” Justin asked. “That was some dream or nightmare for that matter you were having there dude.”

“Nightmare?” It was a dream?” Chris asked confused. “What’s today?”

“October 31st 1999,” they all replied in unison.

Chris scratched his head and frowned and stared blankly at the screen. “What happened? Weren’t we supposed to go out tonight, to a Halloween party?”

“Uh no? We agreed that this year, we were staying in eating candy and popcorn and watching scary movies.” Joey asked.

“And yeah we were watching a movie, and then we saw that you fell asleep, so we just left you alone, what kind of dream was it?” Lance said.

“It felt so real guys, I dreamt that we went to this party, and there were these witches that sucked the lives of people, and they cast spells on you guys, and they poisoned you with some fruit punch and it was just so frightening. I did save you guys though, then we walked back home.” Chris rambled.

“It was only a dream Chris.” JC said giving a pat on Chris’s shoulder.

“More like a nightmare.” Chris muttered.

“How much candy did you have anyway?” Justin frowned and looked at the empty bowl.

“I-I don’t know.” He said.

“I think if you have too much candy you tend to doze off and have nightmares.” Justin chuckled.

“Yeah, I guess that was it, but one thing is for sure guys, I have your backs and you have mine, no matter what happens.

“Of course Chris, we love you; we won’t let anything happen to you.” Justin said giving him a warm smile.

“That’s right, all for one, and one for all.” They all replied in unison and gave hugs to one another.

“I’ll be right back, I’m gonna head to the kitchen to refill the popcorn bowl.” Joey asked the guys and he quickly rose up from the sofa and headed to the kitchen. Minutes later, he returned with freshly popped popcorn, he carried the bowl and placed it on the table.

“So what movie there giving next?” Lance asked placing his hand in the bowl of popcorn and tossing them in his mouth.

“Um I think its “Halloween”. Justin said, checking the guide on the TV with the remote.

“That is a great classic movie.” JC said and sat next to Chris, who still had that look of worry on his face, JC noticed the look and said, “Look Chris, it’s okay, it was only a dream, witches don’t exist, people only have costumes on this day, you know, it’s all good fun, so don’t worry, do you want me to pinch your arm or something?” JC chuckled.

Chris shook his head no. “I already did, and I’m awake I guess.”

“Well loosen up man, I don’t like seeing you like this, you are worrying me.” JC said, and he looked at Chris and smiled, which in return he smiled back.

“Shh the movie’s starting guys.” Joey said and scooted in next to Justin.

All five of them huddled on the sofa and had their eyes glued to the TV, they were munching on popcorn and candy. About ten minutes later, the doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it!” Chris said and rose up from the sofa. “It must be trick or treaters that are still out there looking for some late night candy.” He stared at the clock that was on the wall. It was still early; it was only eight-thirty. So that is what Chris assumed; taking the remaining candy that was in the bowl he opened the door just a crack, in case it was some crazy kids that wanted to throw him eggs or something. His front door didn’t have a peephole, so he just opened it halfway, he heard someone say “Trick or Treat.”

“Here you go,” he reached a handful of candy bars and placed them in the bag, he didn’t look up at the person he was giving it to, and when he did, he froze dead in his tracks, he didn’t know if his eyes were playing tricks on him or what. But what he saw was someone that was in his dream, but here he was staring at a young woman with a mischievous grin on her face, it was Margaret.