Dark Tarot Teaser

Kelly headed out across campus toward the library. The building was one of the older on campus, built shortly after Stinson Hall. That meant it was designed in the same vein as Stinson Hall. The proper architectural reference was ‘Early American Scary’. The air was oddly quite. No one seemed to be around. Not a peep from Greek Row. No bug sounds. No nothing. Even the buildings seemed more menacing then normal. Something was not right.
As the sun dipped below the horizon, Kelly reached the main doors of the library. She paused for just moment to take in her surroundings. She shook her head to wave of the unsettling feeling and entered the building.
The interior of the library was much like the outside, almost mean. It was dark even with lights on. It loomed over anyone that entered and gave off an oppressive vibe. Other then electricity, there were a few modern amenities. The library had computers. That was about the extent of it. Other then the 3 computers for searching books and the lights overhead, the library was lost in the dark ages.
For the past several years, the school had been trying to change over to the computers. A rumor circulated that a new library was in the works. It was to be state of the art when it was finished.
Knowing this, Kelly skipped the computers altogether and walked straight to the counter.
As she approached, the young man looked up from his sketch pad.
“Can I help you?”
Kelly threw her bag on the counter and asked “Can you point me in the direction of the Psych catalogues?”
The kid smiled and replied “Sure. If you head just down that hall, you will see them just to your left.”
“Great. Thanks a lot.”
And with that, the hunt was on. Kelly turned and headed off in the direction of the catalogues. As she headed down the hall, she rummaged through her bag for the book list.
Lost in thought, Kelly rounded corner only to walk headlong into one of her classmates.
“Oh God. I’m so sorry about that.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Her classmate responded.
Kelly stooped to pick up some papers. With some embarrassment, she shoved them into her notebook.
“So, you here for the psych paper?”
Kelly looked up at the girl. “Yeah. I figured I would get a jump on some of this, you know. I always seem to leave everything to the last minute.
“Me too.” The girl giggled. “Hey, just to let you know, I am checking out a couple of the books. There are still several up stairs though.”
“Oh cool. Hey, can I get a look at those when you are done?”
“Ya, no problem. I’ll bring them into class next week.”
Kelly smiled. “That would be a huge help and sorry once again about knocking into you like that.”
The girl just smiled and waved.
And with that, Kelly turned her attention to the massive row of drawers that loomed before her.
A daunting task to say the least, Kelly spent the next several minutes flipping through the various drawers of the catalogue and writing down numbers.
After getting all the numbers that she needed, she checked out the map on the wall next to the catalogues. The map showed that the books she needed were on the 5th floor. The very top floor. Rolling her eyes at the thought, Kelly headed to the elevators only to be confronted with one more disturbing revelation. The doors to all the elevators were roped off with yellow caution tape. A small little sign hung precariously from one of the doors, mocking her. It stated that the elevators were ‘Down for maintenance’.
“Oh for Christ Sake.”
Kelly begrudgingly trudged towards to the stairs and started the journey to the top of the world. Or in this case, the top of the Library.
Climbing to the 5th floor was kind of like climbing Everest. The floors were big. It felt like there were about 20,000 stairs between each floor. Each floor seemed like it needed a base camp for the weary. All they needed were some oxygen tanks for the climbers.

After what seemed liked days of hiking, Kelly was delighted to be finally making the last push to the summit of the 5th floor. There were a few other people milling around here and there, but other then that, the floor was hers. Kelly checked her numbers then began to navigate through the stacks of books. Finally, after about a dozen rows, she located the correct area and began to pull books. Kelly eventually headed to a small group of tables near the wall and settled in.
As any normal college attendee can attest, libraries have this magical ability to send a student into an instantaneous state of unconsciousness. Kelly was no exception. After about four nanoseconds, her mind began to drift. Her eyelids got heavy. The chain reaction had started and there was no way to recover. Kelly fought the good fight, but it was a futile task.

Kelly snapped awake with quite a start. There wasn’t a single sound in the building. The air was still. Something was definitely wrong. Kelly was in panic mode. All of her senses were heightened. All of a sudden, there was soft echo that drifted in. The echo enveloped Kelly. She wasn’t able to tell where it can from. She looked to and fro, listening intently.
There it was again.
This time it sounded like a book being closed and set on a table. And it was a whole lot closer.
Kelly had progressed from panicked to petrified. She jumped up from the table and began to search the stacks for the source her mounting fear.
As Kelly rounded a corner of one of the stacks, there was a flash of movement. Kelly only saw the blur out of the corner of her eye. It was way too fast to be a human. Instinctively, she looked in the direction of the shadow, only to find a whole lot of nothing.
After a brief moment, a bit of relief showed on Kelly’s face. As she released a short sigh of relief, she paused against the shelf next to her to let her heart catch up.
Kid, you need to lighten up.
Kelly turned to head back to her things at the table.
Just sit down, relax, and get some work down.
Turning the corner to her table, she ran head long into the chest of the shadowy figure.
Kelly looked slowly up the length of the figure’s chest and straight into the eyes and teeth of a vampire.
Kelly opened her mouth to scream, but much to her dismay, nothing rolled out.
A split second later, the brain kicked in. Kelly turned on her heels and ran like hell towards the stacks.
The chase was on.
Kelly darted in and out of the stacks, skidding around corners like a D1 drifter.
Every few corners and rows, she thought she shook the attacker only to hit that next corner and have him standing there. He was way too fast. He seemed to know her every move before she did. It dawned on Kelly that he was simply be toying with her.
Kelly flashed on an emergency exit that she saw on the way up. Hoping to escape, she tore around a wall and clipped the copier. It sent her reeling into her perceived escape route, but she found only a barred security door instead. Cornered, Kelly had nowhere to run now. She turned slowly, trying to catch her breath. The only thing that filled her field of vision was a mouthful of teeth. The vampire sneered and slowly moved in. With jaws wide open and teeth at the ready, he took the final lunge at her throat.

Kelly sat straight up, fully awake. In doing so, she knocked the stack books off of her table. They toppled off and hit the floor with a colossal thud.
The normal sounds of life had returned throughout the building. As she looked around, trying to focus in, she noticed that a small study group had taken up residence at the table across from her. The chatter stopped at the table with the thud. The group looked at her in a quizzical way, turning to each other and snickering amongst themselves.
Kelly shot a glance at the table. She quickly shoved all of her things into her bag and made a dash for the stairs.
Kelly was embarrassed, visibly shaken, and scared to death about the experience.
She burst through the doors to the library like a horse out of the gate, nearly breaking one of them in the process.
Glancing over her shoulder several times as she went, Kelly quickly moved away from the library. All the shadows seem to follow her as she went. They reached out trying to impede her efforts to reach the safe harbor of the dorm. Kelly tried to stay in the light of the overhead lamps as best she could. Tear streamed down her face.
As she passed the quad, she finally broke into a full run. Her fears had finally gotten the best of her.

• Favorite
• Report Concern
• Share This
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Add your comment

You need to login or signup to add your comment to this work.

Tags:

dark, goth, gothic, horror, noir, novel, vampire and vampires