Chapter Text
Dave couldn’t fathom how the hell Megadeth, the speed metal band that aimed to challenge Metallica, were four grown men in a Halloween store. In fact, he was wondering what had gotten him to this point in his life, where it felt like he was babysitting his bandmates. The beer in the car was probably getting warm, and he just wanted to guzzle some of it down to get some relief, both from the lack of adequate air conditioning and the overabundance of screaming children with their mothers. If Dave said he wasn’t tempted to abandon the other three, he’d be lying. They had been here for twenty minutes, and he literally couldn’t give two shits. It wasn’t a damn costume party they were going to, but Chris had to open his mouth about ‘how cool it would be if we were dressed up’ and now they were skirting around racks of cheap Halloween masks while dodging children with plastic weapons. The scrawny teenager stocking the shelves looked about as interested as Dave felt.
He checked his watch impatiently, realizing they were behind schedule, and considered getting his bandmates leashes in the future so he could keep track of them in situations like these. Before he could seek them out like a bloodhound, though, he was found first.
“Hey Dave,” came from behind him, in that dumb midwestern accent. Groaning inwardly, he turned. “Check it out. I’m a cat.” Junior said, motioning to the rubber mask on his face, a poor rendition of a black cat whose green eyes appeared to be crossing as the result of a bad paint job, one of its ears crooked and folded from being crushed during shipment. Unamused, Dave ripped the mask off his head, and messed up his hair in the process.
“Hey!” Junior protested, making a grab for it, Dave holding it above his head like a mischievous older sibling.
“It’s time to go man, we don’t have time for this! Where are Chris and Gar?”
“BOO!” Someone’s hands slammed down on his shoulders, and he turned to face a snarling werewolf and a leering mummy wrapped in bandages. For a moment, Dave was actually startled, before he punched the werewolf and Chris cried out in pain through the intense laughter of the other two, taking off the mask and rubbing his red cheek.
“ Very funny , dickhead,” Dave hissed. “Now have you decided what you’re buying or what?!”
“Looks like someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” Gar said, putting his mask back on a rack.
“No, it’s just that we’re a fucking metal band, not actors in a Michael Jackson music video,” Dave said. “If you guys want any chance of getting a chick for the night and getting a few beers in before it gets dark, then we’d better get moving. The festival starts in thirty minutes.” He double checked his watch and debated dragging them out before they finally followed him out an agonizing fifteen minutes of ‘just looking’ later. Piling into the car, Dave found that his beer was, indeed, warm now, and that the other three were scheming to weasel candy out of money-hungry children.
Yes, he HAD woken up on the wrong side of the bed today. October 31st had started out for Dave with a wicked hangover and his dog puking on his bed. After cleaning up dog sick, Dave had wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep, when Junior had thought it a good idea to plug in his bass and play in the living room. Who, thought Dave, as he had clutched his aching head, played bass at six forty eight in the morning? And then the guitars had started wailing, and Dave realized that band practice was going on without him. That had set off a chain of events that led to everything Dave had done going wrong.
Trying to cook breakfast? Scalding hot eggs had pelted him, then fallen onto the floor right after.
Playing guitar? His strings broke and cut his playing hand.
Going for a walk? A bird shit on his head, and then LAUGHED at him about it as it flew away.
Going to the store? Every plastic bag he held in his hands broke, spilling his shit all over the filthy parking lot.
The universe seemed to be out to get Dave today, and he was having none of it, no siree . Dave wasn’t superstitious, but something was out to make him suffer today. Maybe it was his payback for using black magic a few years ago, but it never seemed to do anything then, so why would it affect him now?
All he wanted was a beer and chick, and he was set for the halloween festival tonight. Nothing mattered if he just made that happen today…right?
Due to their lateness, there was no parking in the immediate vicinity of the downtown Halloween festival, making Dave grow ever more frustrated by the minute as he walked with his bandmates. Some utterly miserable part of him regretted hiring them as he walked along. He was being tested, and by god was he trying to hold it together when they complained about the parking job he’d done. Dave was walking through a child infested neighborhood with them when he spotted a black cat sitting on a mailbox near him, watching with unblinking eyes like a sentry. He stuck out his tongue at it and it scrambled away, but not before crossing in front of them.
“God, I hate cats…” Dave hissed.
“Black cats, you know what they say. Bad luck,” Chris remarked.
“I’m not superstitious,” Dave snorted without realizing, and the other three exchanged glances…and burst into song.
“OH I AIN’T SUPERSTITIOUS! WHEN A BLACK CAT CROSSES MY PATH!” They each mimicked their instrumental parts before continuing their acapella cover. “AND I AIN’T SUPERSTITIOUS, AS I BREAK THE LOOKING GLASS!” Suddenly they had Dave in their arms, and he found himself crushed between Junior and Gar, hearing them screaming the lyrics to the song right into his unprepared ears. He tried wriggling free, but accepted his fate with an exhausted sigh as they walked to the festival. Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ was playing loudly somewhere, a nearby theater was showing ‘The Rocky Horror Picture Show’ as hordes of costumed people milled around the closed-off streets. There were all sorts of stands, some serving candy apples and others giving out candy to trick-or-treaters. Strung up were lights and bats, witches on broomsticks hung from trees as clusters of jack o’ lanterns burned outside nearby stores. And Dave immediately lost track of his bandmates when they let go of him and melted into the crowd.
“Guys, come on, we should stick together!” His voice was drowned out by the music and the crowd, and Dave sighed, and went to get some apple cider. The least he could do was try to enjoy himself a little before he had to look for them again. He bought some cider and a donut from a very sweet middle-aged woman in a pirate costume. After, he took a seat on a bench to enjoy the pumpkin spice donut and the cider in his hands. When he sat down he must have squeezed the cup, because it broke after, spilling warm liquid all over his crotch. In his shock, he threw his hands up, forgetting about the donut for long enough to accidentally let it go sail into the air, landing in the crowd somewhere. Dave got up with a growl, taking off his jacket and wiping up the mess with it. It still looked like he had pissed himself, and he muttered a few curses about his bad luck, getting very fed up with it.
As he cleaned himself off, a small kid dressed up like a cowboy wandered up to him, staring up at him wordlessly.
“What are you supposed to be? A red poodle?” the boy asked. ‘ He must think he’s dressed like a comedian and not a cowboy,’ Dave thought.
“A rockstar,” Dave said proudly, hoping the kid would scurry off after that.
“Then where’s your guitar, mister?” he squinted.
“Where are your parents, kid?” Dave shot back, stepping around the little boy and trying to find his bandmates, and beer they had brought. Dave skirted around a man dressed like Michael Myers, spotting Junior chatting up a woman at one of the candy booths dressed as a witch. He didn’t have the beer. The sun had set and the night chill was setting in as the area was packed with trick-or-treaters and adults going out to party. Dave made a beeline for Junior.
“Where’s the beer?” he demanded.
“I left it with Chris and Gar, why?” Junior asked, going to continue chatting with the woman.
“Well, where are they?” Dave asked.
“They’re right-,” Junior went to point behind him, but discovered an obvious absence of their bandmates, and also their drinks. “Oh, fuck.” The Megadeth Beer Brotherhood was stronger than the temptation of a woman, even an attractive one serving candy and wearing metallic green paint on her face. His ladylove forgotten, Dave and Junior were soon on the prowl for the beer, knowing for a fact that Chris and Gar might go through the whole thing by the night’s end if their heinous crimes against booze weren't stopped.
Dave’s bad luck caught up to him as he tripped going off a curb, and fell right into a dirty puddle. People ogled around as Dave scrambled to his feet, running with Junior through the chilly night in soaking wet clothes.
“There they are!” Junior cried suddenly, pointing ahead to the two escaping down a less busy road, the cans between them.
“Hey, you fucking thieves! That’s our beer too!” Dave howled, charging after them, still spitting out dirt. They banked right, charging down a side street, and then another, getting all of them very lost.
Eventually, they stopped running, and stood panting in front of a store that looked like it was closing. The street was cold and empty, full of closed off shops, and the festival was nowhere in sight.
“Jesus, I am out of shape,” Chris declared, sitting on the curb. “Those candy corns did a fucking number on me, eh Gar?” His partner in crime nodded, belching loudly, and Dave scowled as he and Junior caught up to them.
“I can’t believe you guys! I paid for that whole thing of beer!” Dave said, catching his breath, noticing Junior had fallen silent and wasn’t yelling at the guys seated on the curb like Dave was. Instead, he seemed entranced by the store they were lingering in front of.
“What do you guys think about seeing a mystic tonight?” he asked suddenly, looking back at them for confirmation. They all had their good look at the small shop. It had purple curtains blocking out the view of the inside, but there was eerie green light spilling from between them. The place seemed to be open, the neon sign on the door said so, and yet the whole place made Dave feel uneasy.
“Madame Lucretia’s Mystic Emporium,” Gar read out from the worn and faded window decal in a monotone voice. “Huh. Weird.”
“Yeah weird. Let’s get back to the party guys. I saw a restaurant over that way, we can get some pizza,” Dave said, trying to get them back to the festival before they got any funny ideas. He’d had enough bad luck today, the last thing he needed was someone telling him he was going to get in a car accident in two weeks or something along those lines. Please just listen to my ideas for once , he prayed.
“A mystic would be fun. It’s obviously gonna be smoke machine bullshit, but…fuck it, live and let live,” Chris agreed with Junior’s initial suggestion. Dave rolled his eyes.
“Oh my god guys, do you seriously want to get scammed tonight? Let’s go get laid! This testosterone ain’t gonna last forever, my friends,” Dave said. This was really his last straw, he was practically begging. “I mean, come on, what is some warty old hag gonna tell you about yourself that you already can’t figure out on your own?”
“This warty old hag can tell you many things,” a woman’s voice said from the open shop door behind him. Dave turned, and turned bright red when he saw the woman that was no more than sixty standing there, hands on her hips, left eyebrow arched and lips curled into a mischievous smirk. She was gorgeous, with silvery hair that was drawn up into a violet bandanna covered with beautifully embroidered stars on it. “I invite you in, esteemed customers.”
The other three exchanged glances, actually considering it now as they whispered to each other. Dave’s exceptionally bad mood was getting worse and worse with his lack of a proper dinner in his belly. Dave didn’t know why he was following them into the shop, but he did. A curtain of beads slapped Dave’s face as she led them into a small room with a crystal ball. It was the source of that same light they had seen earlier.
“It is a full moon tonight,” she remarked as she sat down behind her crystal ball, and as they gathered on the small stools in front of it “The time of mischief is at hand.” Dave scanned their expressions.
Junior looked…excited. Chris looked fascinated, and Gar looked…high? Tired? He was probably a bit of both, Dave decided, wondering how he himself looked watching her light candles and set them on the table around her in a circle. They waited nervously, until she seemed ready, and shapes like cirrus clouds began to swirl around within her crystal ball, the thing shifting colors slowly from blue to eerie green, bathing them all in ominous, hellish light. To his right, Dave spied the black cat from earlier slinking across the floor and vanishing into the darkness of the shop.
“There is a doubter amongst us,” she said. “But I shall continue. What would you like to know that you didn't already know?”
“What will the band become in the future?” Junior asked. “What’ll happen?” Her hands hovered over her crystal ball, the band watching anxiously as she whispered to herself.
“I see a long future. Some of your futures are bright. But for others…I sense them tainted with bitterness over a traumatic event. Some end earlier than they should. I cannot tell you exactly how or why, for it is not the nature of my readings to deal in absolutes and specifics…”
It took Dave a few moments to process her words, and then it clicked. Was that line about bitterness tainting their future about…the Metallica expulsion? Did this old woman have the gall to take a jab at Dave over that? Meanwhile, Junior nodded like a fool, eyes fixed on her. Chris and Gar exchanged glances, curious now. Dave’s eyes rolled to the heavens. The reading had been vague for a reason, to make gullible people believe it.
He was half tempted to tap Junior on the shoulder and tell him that the word ‘gullible’ was written on the ceiling, but given how they were all responding to Dave’s dry, passive-aggressive humor that day, he was sure it would be met with more criticisms from his bandmates than laughter. Chris and Gar asked hesitant questions about dumb shit, but he was only half listening, studying the room for cameras and for other tricks, like the electrical cords for her crystal ball. Maybe, if he could secretly unplug it they could get out of here already before he died of boredom. Maybe Dave was being a bit harsh, but they were in here instead of out there where all the women and beer were. This was one party he didn’t want to miss, after a day of misfortune. His leg was already bouncing up and down from how antsy he was, the hard wood of the stool he sat on was hurting his ass.
“Our doubter, what about you? What do you wish to know?” she asked, finally getting to Dave. He snapped to attention, pondering it for a few seconds
“I want to know why I have been dragged to your cheesy Halloween establishment, and why you continue to give these dumbass readings that are clearly vague enough that people will apply to them to anything they can and then keep coming back to you. I want to go home, I want to stop having bad luck today, I want to drink our beer, and I want to know where the hell the extension cord is for your ‘crystal ball’,” he snapped, standing abruptly from his chair and searching for it. Junior facepalmed and shook his head, Chris looking a little embarrassed, and Gar, again, looked high.
“I think this ‘cheesy Halloween establishment’ is a lot more real than you think, young man,"
"Is that so? What's so real about any of this?" He demanded, now thoroughly angry. He was about ready to walk out of the building then and there, but this woman was egging him on. He wasn’t gonna get violent, but by god did he want to scream in her face. “I bet that mole on your face is real, alright.” he hissed that before he caught himself, and Chris and Junior looked more than embarrassed, completely ashamed of his behavior.
“Dave, just sit the fuck down,” Chris was saying, Junior and Gar agreeing.
“I disagree,” she said simply. “If you do not believe, no one is forcing you to stay.”
“You know, I’m tired of people telling me what to do. I’m tired of today, and I am most certainly tired of this shitty establishment and your dumb ‘ magic’. If it’s real, then fucking prove it!” Dave didn’t know where this burst of aggression was coming from (most likely the beer) but he reveled in how giddy and completely overconfident it made him. Something glinted in her eyes, some kind of twisted mischief.
“Would you fucking sit down, Dave?” Junior demanded, tugging on Dave’s arm.
“Very well. Your anger has decided your fate, just as it had brought you all to me,” Her crystal ball went red, horrible hellish red, and something in her eyes told Dave that she was completely serious, but he was too speechless to say anything as they were blasted with a wave of hot wind that knocked them from their chairs, magic swirling around them. Even Gar looked alert, all of them gazing in awe and terror upon everything unfolding. “On this night of All Hallows Eve, I call the dark immortal forces of the deep, the lost souls of this world, and the residents of the land of the dead to walk the earth once more until the hour of dawn. I curse you four to the forms of monsters, the faces of your Halloween , and if by dawn you cannot break the spell, you will remain cursed for eternity.” Her eyes glowed unnaturally, and the room darkened, her crystal ball going out with a flash and a deafening bang. Madame Lucretia had vanished into thin air, the smell of smoke lingering in the room.
They ran with the sound of her voice still ringing in their ears.