The store was set up with little rooms that were about twenty by twenty. Each room connected to another. It was like a giant maze. My brother abandoned me for the game section. It's rare that he finds anything in places like these, but half of the fun for him is trying. He did manage to pick up a 2nd edition Dungeons and Dragons GM guide at a thrift store a couple of moves ago. It's still his pride and joy.

A few rooms later I got turned around and found myself lost somewhere in the middle of the store, which was weird because that was usually Achilles MO. Every room after that started to look dimmer, as if the light couldn't quite reach the corners of the room. The walls began to look wet as if slime or something else were soaking them. The tiles on the floor were cracked and stained. The items in each area began to look decrepit too. Dolls eyes were burned out. Some toys didn't even have heads. Plates had moss growing on them. Even the clothes began to look tattered.

By this time I was seriously freaked the fluck out. I felt like I was in the middle of a horror show. I tried to turn around again and go the other way, but there was no exit. There was a very wicked sounding laugh behind me. I spun around and my heart was screaming in my chest. The room I was standing in had changed. Gone were the broken and worn pieces of junk and in their place were a bunch of couches and chairs. All of the chairs were occupied by creepy guys.

Okay, I know you're thinking, creepy guys? That's the best description you could come up with? Well, yeah. Bite me. These guys were just... creepy. Like living in the basement and never leaving it sort of creepy. And they were all guys. Each one had extra long greasy black hair. Each one had extra large highly arched noses. Each one's eyes glowed a sickly brownish yellow. Yes, I kid you not. They glowed.

One of the creepy guys unfolded himself from a sagging puke green chaise lounge. He was tall and so skinny it distorted him, making his arms and legs look ten times longer than they should be. He wore a faded and grungy ball cap that made his glowing eyes stand out just that much more. His clothes looked odd. You're thinking 'oh come on Athena, the glowing eyes and extra long noses didn't already do that?' Well duh. But his clothes were a different sort of odd. They were like something out of a fairy tale. He wore long stockings with a robin hood type tunic belted over them and long leather (I assumed it was leather) boots. He had bracers on his forearms that had little spikes all over them.

His voice was creaky and made my ears feel like they were going to turn inside out when he spoke. “Look what we have here. A little Sidhe found her way into our home.”

Home? What? No. What was going on?! More of the men – creatures? - stood unwinding themselves from their resting places and all of them started moving closer.

I backed up, stumbling as I went and shaking my head in disbelief. I was not seeing this. This wasn't real. I slammed against something hard where nothing hard should be. I bounced forward again and the only thing that kept me from taking a header onto the nasty tile was an iron band wrapped around my waist. I suddenly had an overwhelming sense of déjà vu.