HuntingtonPost Halloween Party
By Editorial Board - Published 2020-10-31
Happy All Hallows Eve from your friends at the Huntington Post!
To celebrate this time of spooks and skeletons, we held a inter-office halloween party. The interns who hadn't heard in advance that they would have to work on halloween were partially trilled.
We first held a costume party for the staff. The competition was fierce. There was a glowing combination of creativity and ingenuity. The Lead editor was to be judge jury and executioner. All the interns, fueled by a desire to survive, ran to the party store to get the cheapest costumes they could afford(Which wasn't much because we don't pay the sla- unpaid interns). Everyone got the spirit as spirits and specters filled the endless cubicles of the Huntington-Post Editorial-Division.
Everyone prepared for the competition, in last place, was Tim. Because no-one likes tim. He wore something, I can't remember what.
Dr Yamok wore one of his beloved ghillie suits with a victorian-era combat vest. We don't really know what they were going dressed as, but it was still fantastic. He stayed in character as a writer for a satirical news site. He convinced all of us! He also brought generous bribes, which helped catapult him to third place
Gerald Fitz finally left the cocoon of his Hazmat suit that he has been wearing since the start of the pandemic. He was coated, head to toe, in tin foil. He said he was dressed to "avoid the 2020 curse brought by the space ogers". Besides the costume, he brought props. He had a small collection of anti-bacterial flamethrowers and a large collection of "anti-ray ray-guns" to "defend himself when the zombies came". Gerald Fitz made a convincing raving pyromaniac, he had us fooled! While the Huntington Post-Security Department had some objections, they knew they were out-armed.
Dr Heinbrow did not participate in the Halloween Festivities. In spite of this, He still managed to participate in the costume contest. He was dressed as a "Physical representation of the lexiconic usage of the image of a paranormal aberration expressed as a living embodiment of a deceased lifefor, particularly of the hominid branch, particularly if, as the time of it's death, it happened to have objectives it would want to have competed". His costume as the most boring person in the room was very, VERY, convincing. We don't know by what process, but he won first place, something about "The careful and thoughtful application of capital gain to sway opinion of particularly low intelligence individuals".
After the contest, we went trick-or-treating. Our neighborhood is full of those really good houses with those large-candy bars, like, the real good chocolates. We grabbed our pillow cases(for the maximum storage) and left for that age-old attage of trick-or-treating.
It was a colossal decrepit carapace of a dwelling. The cobwebs draped the windows and the glowing beam of the moon couldn't pierce the shadows. We pressed the door bell, but the cascading cacophony of bells and chimes echoed through the night without response. The foreboding entrance seemed to call to the more criminally minded elements of our candy-gathering group. We didn't know what evil lied inside so, as good investigators, we made our intent to march inwards. We threw a brick through the window next to the door, and crawled in. The smashing of the glass revealed a dark atmosphère, devoid of movement and sound except the falling of the dust in the air and the ticking of grandfather clock in the entryway. The spiraling polished dark-brown wood of the grand staircase stood tall above us as we passed into the foyer. A small orange glow illuminated from the cuts in the pumpkin which rested on the first step. We turned to a flickering light which hung over a table. The brief bursts of light presented red solo cups and black disposable plates sitting atop a plastic orange tablecloth. We activated our flashlights, but they had inexplicably low brightness and battery life. Under the staircase, there was a red door which seemed to hint at further discovery. With each step, we heard the creaking of the aged wood. As we touched the handle, we were met with a shock; The door was locked. Noone locks a door unless they have renters or a dark secret, and it simply cannot be the former for obvious reasons. We had to find a key, which probably laid upstairs. Gerald Fitz offered to stay behind, to protect against the ghosts which he insisted were all around him. We setup our climbing harness and began to ascend the to the second floor. The elegant railing of the staircase made for good footholds, allowing us to ascend rapidly. We found ourselves in a loft-like section of the house. There was a set of multi-colour chairs circling a 4k widescreen TV. The chairs pointing at the TV were an obvious clue. We decided to quickly and efficiently dismantle the TV with a brick to find the key inside. To our dismay, it was a false-container designed to throw us off. Luckily, there were other avenues before us, the most obvious of which being a fake-bedroom designed to conceal a vault. There was a large king's bed framed by dressers and a large vanity, but the decor did not fool us. We knew the key must be hidden somewhere around here, but there was a problem. We heard a noise from downstairs. We couldn't deal with that right now, we were hunting for a key. We sent Dr Yamok to investigate. In the closet, there was a small metallic safe with a combination lock. With our resident demolitions expert currently gaurding the door to the basement, we had to unlock the safe. Luckily, Dr Heplar had a solution. He began trying passwords, starting at 0001 and going to 0053, by that point, Dr Heplar remembered his jackhammer which sped up the guessing plan significantly. Inside the safe was a small diamond neckless, which we took as it might be helpful later, and a small rusted skeleton key. We hoped that key would allow us to uncover the secret in the basement. There was one problem: Dr Yamok hadn't returned. We called out for him, but he didn't respond. We heard the shuffling of footsteps downstairs, around where Gerald Fitz was. We peered out the doorway. The foyer was empty and Dr Yamok was nowhere to be seen. We were alone in a dark loft, but the sound of a scream from below us indicated we were not alone in the house. Peering over the railing, we expected to see Gerald Fitz guarding the red door, but he was also missing. Something strange was happening, but we were certain the secrets lied in the basement. We slowly descended the staircase, careful not to let the sounds of old wood reveal our position. We tried the key on the lock: Success! Soon the secrets of the basement would be revealed. We heard the sounds of approaching footsteps, they somehow knew we had opened the door. We rushed down the steps, but we heard the sounds getting closer. We only had a few moments to take in the basement. It was a simple room. On the wall there were a variety of tools. Blunt instruments, regular instruments, a chainsaw, hammers, screwdrivers and a hatchet. These were hung above a desk on which sat some form of dark, mechanical, contraption. There was a station with a refrigerator, stove and knives. We knew a ritual chamber when we see one. We took what photographs we could and escaped out an escape. In the chaos, Dr Helper tripped. We would have to leave him behind. There were many flashing blue and red lights in the distance, possibly the ghosts of former victims. We jumped over a fence, but many singular lights continued their pursuit, their beams cutting through the woodlands. We managed to get away, but we still didn't know what happened to our compatriots. We didn't have the time to care, as we found our way to a nearby safehouse. The next morning we went to work. Gerald Fitz, Dr Yamok and Dr Heplar were there, but they couldn't perfectly remember what transpired. All they remembered was a bright light, and a sharp pain to the head.
Happy Halloween from the Huntington Post!
