The Chalet

TW: Violence, Gore, Fear, Language

“I’m approaching the residence now,” Detective Lance Brewster said through his radio. “There’s so much fuckin’ fog, how the hell am I gonna get back home in this?” 

The radio static hummed some more, the operator on the other end of the radio rendered inaudible and scrambled. Detective Brewster tossed the radio to the side, let out a deep sigh, and sped up along the mountain road to this night’s assignment. Towering evergreens lined the road’s edges and filled the vast forest surrounding Detective Brewster, the distance between him and civilization growing with each minute he traversed deeper into the fog. 

“Not much longer,” he said to himself, when, suddenly, the radio crackled. Brewster flinched and shot a look towards the radio, grabbing it with startled haste. 

“Hello? This is Brewster, I’m almost at the residence,” he said to the operator.

Kshhhh…Kshhhhh…Kssh-Lan-shhhh…Lance! Are you there?

“Yeah, yeah…I’m here. ‘Bout time I got through to somebody, the weather up here is messin’ with the radio.”

Ksshhhh…Sorry Lance…Kshhhh…What’s the reason they got you-kshhh-out there anyway?

“I don’t know much, but somebody called us about their friends going missing in this cabin a few days ago. A group of four. Local police came up to her to look, no one’s heard from them since they got there Sunday.”

Kshhhh…Yikes...Hopefully everything’s alright. At least the drive’s almost over - Ksh.

“No kidding, I’ll see you and the Sheriff tomorrow for some coffee, we’ll catch up then.”

Kshhh…Sounds good, Lance - Kshhhh - Please be sa-kshhhhhh.

Detective Brewster’s signal gave out, the layer of fog that enveloped the valley cutting him off from anyone below. He drove, cautiously, up the gravel driveway to a large Chalet home fit for the hordes of skiers that visit every year. Detective Brewster’s headlights lit up the front porch, and he put his car in park. Reaching for his glove compartment, he noticed a soft glare out of the corner of his eye. He looked up. The Chalet’s only window on the top floor, dimly lit from the inside. He stared at it for a moment. “Maybe the kids are alright after all,” he remarked to himself. He looked back down to grab his gloves, flashlight and firearm.

He stepped out of his car, glancing back up towards the glow coming from the window. Detective Brewster shut the door, echoing across the chasms and valleys below. He glanced to his right, looking out into the rolling Green Mountains, the homes dotting the mountainside like the stars that now emerged in the twilight sky. The fog below, only briefly revealing the faintly-lit town centers and main streets miles off in the distance. A gentle wind rolled up the mountainside, brushing along Detective Brewster’s cheeks. He closed his eyes, and for a moment, embraced the invigorating, crisp mountain air. He breathed deeply, opened his eyes, and turned. The window at the top of the Chalet, no longer lit from the inside.

He approached the house, scanning the front door and front steps. The windows on this level blocked by something on the inside. Detective Brewster knocked on the door of the house which seemed to course through the structure, settling the surrounding woods in silence. Not even the wind could break it as the trees above stalled in their rhythmic swing. He knocked again. No response.

Detective Brewster peered around the windows some more, noticing a small space between the window and the object behind it. He knocked once more.

“Hello!? This is Detective Brewster with the Warren Police.”

Hello, this is Detective Brewster with the Warren Police…

This is Detective Brewster with the Warren Police…

This is Detective Brewster with the Warren Police…

Nothing but silence. The Twilight sky melted away, revealing a canvas of twinkling stars and the November new moon. Detective Brewster moved to the side of the door and pulled his flashlight out of his coat pocket. As he scanned the front of the Chalet, he noticed a small path of stone steps, leading to the side of the house. Detective Brewster crept up the path, investigating the side of the house with his flashlight, each window blocked from the inside. He walked some more, looking for any sign of a way into this place. He gazed towards the second floor, each window, like all the others, covered. 

Except one.

Detective Brewster shined his light on the window towards the back of the house. The bottom half of the window was shattered. Detective Brewster stepped forward, the pace of his breathing picking up, a light sweat broke out in his lower back. He analyzed the window, and his eyes widened. The light from his flashlight shined directly through to the house’s interior. Whatever blocked the windows inside had been punctured. As he walked closer, transfixed and terrified at his discovery, a sharp crack broke from beneath his feet. He looked down, pointing his flashlight to find tiny glass shards glistening underneath his boot. Detective Brewster stepped back, revealing the rest of the glass shards and the dried blood that clung on to the pieces.

He darted his eyes back up towards the window, the flashlight piercing through the puncture in the window board, dried blood streaked down the bottom edges. A sharp shiver shot down the Detective’s Back, he swallowed, and let out another deep breath. He cupped his left hand over his eyes, rubbing them, dragging his hand down. A soft clang of rustling glass interrupted the silence once more, though not from the Detective’s own boot. He raised the flashlight, the spotlight shaking by his trembling hand as he looked up. The puncture no longer streaked through to the house’s interior, but reflected off a blood-red human eye, peering through the puncture hole.

whhhoooOOOOOSHHH - BANG

A swell of wind blasted up the mountainside, a loud, slamming noise ringing out from the front of the house. The evergreens above in a pure frenzy, the gust knocking the Detective off of his feet. Detective Brewster gathered himself, shooting a look towards the broken window. He reached for his flashlight, stumbling over himself, reaching in every direction but finding nothing. He blindly searched in the silence some more, picked up the flashlight with both his hands, and shot it towards the window. The flashlight once again illuminates the wall behind it, reflecting its own light back towards the Detective. Brewster ran back towards the driveway, the front porch no longer lit up by his cruiser lights. He ran to the car in sheer panic, panting and grunting as he made his final sprint. The car, however, was already dead. He failed to start the car time and time again, turning the headlights on and off with each attempt. He broke out in a heavy sweat, his whole body trembling from cold and from fear.

“C’MON PLEASE!” He begged with the car.

When finally the engine roared, the headlights now unveiling the horror that unfolded in the house.

The front door swung open, and a gray, lifeless human body lay face down on the front porch. One arm splayed out in front, the other at their side, their bottom half still inside the house. Detective Brewster went still, locked in a trance, scanning the body for any sign of movement. The engine hummed in the mountainside stillness, as Detective Brewster confronted mortality in its rawest form, each attempt to process this new trauma frozen in shock. He snapped out of his terrified trance, turned his car around, and headed back down the mountainside. The fog thickened around him once more. He gripped the steering wheel with his left hand, and his radio with his right, pushing his knuckles against his taut skin, eyes wide, seeing but not observing, as he would formulate his explanation on the inexplicable. He thought of the body at the front door, and how their hand had been reaching for salvation. He drove home in complete, stunned silence. 

Nothing but silence.

The Next Day

“Jesus, this place is fuckin’ creepy,” Deputy Mark Wilkinson astutely noted. “UGH, that thing reeks how long were these kids here for?”

Sheriff Brent Castille, swung open the passenger car door on his Deputy’s black police cruiser. He briefly scanned the morbid scene in front of him, just to find it as Detective Brewster reported last night. “Brewster said like four days,” he replied, now slowly walking towards the front of the Chalet. “Friend of theirs rang in a call sayin’ they were vacationing in the area.”

The gravel crunched underneath the boots of the officers, they briefly scanned the front of the house, then both fixed themselves on the frozen corpse at the foot of the door. They slowly approached, wincing as each new detail on the body revealed itself. It appeared to be a young man with short brown hair, his outstretched arm as pale as the fog that enveloped the mountaintop, his veins a soft purple contrasting his porcelain complexion. Sheriff Castille crouched down by the young man’s side, looking towards his other arm, tucked underneath his stomach. Dried blood encrusted the man’s arm, and a rust-brown and red halo covered the man’s shirt underneath.

The Sheriff stood back upright, a light grimace peeled the corners of his lips. He scanned the doorframe and looked towards the inside of the house to find a mirror at the opposite end of the Chalet’s first level. A streak of dust-speckled light beamed from the right side of the house. The small puncture hole was jagged, glistening as the Sheriff illuminated the area of the house. There was something back there, dimly lit from the cloud-diffused sunlight. He turned back to his Deputy, searching the young man for any identifying information. “We’ll do that later,” said Sheriff Castille, “there’s someone else in here.”

Deputy Wilkinson looked back up at his Sheriff, solemnly nodded, and rose to his feet. The soft white light from the cloudy Vermont skies could barely light the entrance of the house, the pair stepped inside the house, leaving the door open behind them. Their footsteps rang inside the room, echoing off the walls. 

“You know, I’m startin’ to agree with you,” said the Sheriff, “this place is creepy as he-”

“Brent.” Interrupted the Deputy.

The Sheriff shot a look towards his partner, his shoulders tense and hunched, holding a flashlight out at his hip. The beam illuminating the wall across from them and the body of another young man hunched over against the wall. The Sheriff ran over, the Deputy rooted to his spot. The Sheriff approached the young man’s body, seeing now the dried, black blood that coated his neck, he placed his thumb on his forehead, and slowly lifted. The young man’s detached jaw dropped into a scream. The blood welled around his face, coming from his empty eye sockets, flowing down the front of his face. His right hand was bloodied and scratched, shards of glass piercing through his wrist and forearm.

“Jesus, fu-” gagged the Sheriff, dropping the man’s head back down, his corpse falling to its side. The Sheriff collected himself, and looked at the dimly lit reflection of the room, his Deputy still frozen in utter terror. The Sheriff looked back towards the wall, reflecting the room behind them, and the silhouette of the young man, now standing upright in the doorway. The Sheriff gasped, whipping his head around, embracing the terror before him. The Deputy turned with him to see the man standing in front of him, his eyes gouged just like the other. His mouth slowly gaping wider and wider. A gust of wind swelled in the valleys below, slamming the door shut, shrouding the Deputy and Sheriff in perfect darkness.

A chandelier flickered on from above, illuminating the interior of the Chalet. Mirrors lined the walls, covering the windows and every inch of empty space. The two could only look around and see their own terrified faces at every corner they looked. The bodies of the two young men disappeared, with no trace of blood left behind anywhere. The mirrors were spotless, assorted in a variety of shapes and sizes, rectangular and circular, to cover the walls. The only noise to break the silence are the officers’ shallow breaths.

“What the fuck is happening, Brent,” mumbled the deputy, “What is going on?”

Deputy Wilkinson frantically looked around the room, grabbing the mirrors and trying to pull them off the wall, he grabbed each one, pulling as hard as he could to no avail. Meanwhile, Sheriff Castille, catching his breath, looked at the room around him, the chandelier continued to get brighter and brighter, extending the dimensions of the room, creating a lattice of panic. Infinite rooms in infinite directions. The Deputy collapsed to the floor, his breathing heavier, tighter, constricted. He grasped his chest, beads of sweat dripping onto the infinite expanse below him, meeting his own frenzied gaze across each reflection.

He stood up, panting, and locked eyes with the Sheriff, “What are we going to do?!” He said, his eyes bloodshot and streaming with tears. “I’m freaking out Brent! what the fuck are we going to-” The chandelier went out, the Deputy’s cries echoing across the void of terror that enveloped Sheriff, growing unbearably loud with each passing second. Then, silence, the Sheriff’s heart pounding in his chest, reverberating off every bone in his body. The light came back on, and there was Deputy Wilkinson, frozen in front of the Sheriff, his tears turning to rivers of blood. Deputy Wilkinson collapsed, falling into the Sheriff, knocking him down off his feet. The Sheriff hastily threw the Deputy’s body to the side, and made a beeline for the front door. 

He swung the door open, into the exact same room. His eyes darted around, his heart still pounded and pounded like a great war drum. He ran forward again, opening the door to the next room, only to find the same horror awaiting him. The same room, covered in mirrors, reflecting his nightmare in every direction, impossible to ignore. The Sheriff ran through the door again, and again, and again. Who knows how much time had passed before he finally fell to his knees. He broke down, and began to cry, wailing in every room across this maze of infinite terror. The sound of his cries echoed, and amplified, seeming to increase with each realm of suffering that surrounded him.

Then, the lights went out, the wailing faded to a whisper. A soft breeze pushed its way up the mountainside and silence fell within the Chalet once more.

Nothing but silence.