Moose's Spooky Story
| Moose's Spooky Story Worn Unique |
| Moose's spooky story. |
| Used in "Spooky Stories of Solomon Island" |
Used for the mission Spooky Stories of Solomon Island, but given as a reward from the mission The Hiker
Transcript
Andy tells me you're harvesting a crop of urban legends. Fascinating things, living stories. They go from mouth to ear to children's book to internet forums to mouth to ear again. They evolve and mature. They're stories that actually travel, wandering with an almost-purpose. I guess that's why I like them. They're the still-functioning vestigial bits from ages ago, from a time when people carried stories like parcels and passed them out around fires during the uncertain nights. But now I'm woolgathering. On with the story.
--Sandy
Walk into a truck stop at 3am, lend your ear to the right denizen, and you might hear anything. The open road is intriguing and peculiar, and so are those wandering souls swimming through the dead water of late night pavement. It's sort of "limbo of lunary souls," to quote a certain E.A. Poe. Get a trucker gabbing and it's like a nicotine-stained copy of Arabian Nights. Get a trucker talking long enough, and, sure as the sunset, they'll tell you a black dog story or a hitchhiker story. This one's mine.
I came into Kingsmouth just as summer died, just as the warmth began leeching away, but before the rigor mortis of winter. Post witching hour, and I was eating pavement on Solomon Road. Right out of the tunnel, I saw a figure in my headlight.
I braked. It was a girl, early teens. She was dripping with water, from her hair, from her dress. How did she get out here? Where had the water come from?
"Cold," she said.
I gave her my leather jacket. It was the thing to do. Poor thing was like ice. I asked her name, mindful of the signs of hypothermia.
"Chloe," she said.
I said I'd better get her home, and quick. She hoped up on the back of my bike and pointed down Solomon Road, and I didn't hesitate to gun the engine.
It happened somewhere around Langmore Bridge. Just before? On the bridge? Just after? I can't be sure. She was a little thing, light as a sack of feathers, and I didn't feel the moment she left my bike. On the other side of the bridge, I looked back, and she was gone. I was terrified that she'd fallen off. I'd been going fast. So I doubled back. No girl.
That's what brought me to the Sheriff's office. They had no missing Chloe to report. They did find my jacket the next morning. It was neatly folded, laying across a tombstone in the graveyard at the Kingsmouth Congregational Church. I read the writing on that stone. It said:
Chloe Mercer
To die will be an awfully big adventure
I think I would have liked Chloe. I meant to get her flowers. But then...well. You know the rest. It seems that just like the living, it's the quiet and polite who get neglected, while the noisy and belligerent get all of our attention.
I hope you've found peace, Chloe. I don't know what made you restless.
That's my hitchhiker story. Believe or disbelieve at your own peril.
Media
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