Once the door swung open the group slowly walked in. The interior was just as 
intimidating as the outside. Dust had settled everywhere and to make things worse it was 
just as cold as inside as it was outside. Brock set his backpack down on the floor and 
looked around. Right in front of the door they were met with a giant and elegant set of 
stairs from which he could tell when in its prime was a very welcoming sight. To his side 
there was a wall with two doors, each about seven feet apart and two portraits in between.
To his other side he saw the same thing: two doors and two portraits in between the two. 
At the top of the stairs there was a huge painting of a man dressed in a fine brown suit. 
The details were faint due to the filth accumulated on its surface.
Their admiration for the manor was suddenly disrupted as Max slammed the front door 
accidentally and winced when he saw everyone jump and turn to look at him with 
annoyance dwelling in their faces.
“Sorry…” Max said in a low whisper as he retrieved his hands from the door and walked 
next to his sister. Max did not want to admit it but the place scared him. He was not the 
only one feeling that way for as the more Ash looked around the less he felt safe. Ash 
looked about curiously. At his feet lay an old beaten red rug that led up the stairs. Ash 
looked back at the others and saw they were headed to one of the doors to their left but 
Ash was more intrigued by the contents on the upper level; whatever they may be.
Ash walked up the stairs and as he placed his hand on the sidebar he saw as dust lifted 
from it freely letting him know it had been a very long time since the last person to walk 
up these stairs was there. “Maybe I should wait for the others…” Ash thought to himself 
as he looked up at the majestic painting before him. In some way it frightened him. There 
was no explanation for it but he seemed rather disturbed by the entire manor.
“Ash!” Brock called. Ash turned around and saw his three friends standing close in a 
huddle as they stood in front of one of the old doors. “I think it’d be a good idea if we 
searched the place in a group.”
“Hmm, yeah.” Ash backed his eyes from the portrait and turned around to head towards 
his friends.
As soon as Ash joined the group Pikachu jumped up on Ash’s shoulder and held on 
tightly for it too was frightened. Even though it was clearly the middle of the day the 
curtains were covering the windows making it impossible to see so Brock had taken one 
of their flashlights and lead the group into the room behind the door.
Slowly his hand reached for the doorknob and as he slowly turned it the door easily 
opened. To their surprise the door opened to reveal the kitchen. Relieved to have only 
found an old dinning room the group of kids walked around looking at some of the old 
chairs and the huge table in the middle of the room.
The room was very spacious; it was big enough for at least fifty people. All decorations, 
paintings and other details in the room were decayed severely. The only item which 
looked to have been spared from much of the decay was the once beautiful oak table 
lazily sitting in the middle of the room. Brock, May and Max circled around the room in 
a curious manner, the one thing in their minds was an all too common question they were 
sure everyone who walked into the manor asked.
“I wonder how many people have passed by here.” Max asked this while pulling back on 
of the chair and looking at the table.
“Lots, I’m sure many travelers go by here all the time.” Brock was in part fascinated with 
the dinning room and the mystery it emitted. Brock found the entire manor a chest of 
secrets waiting to be unveiled, he was rather anxious to settle down and start exploring 
the manor. Brock gleefully stared at the old kitchen once more and walked out followed 
by May and Max never realizing Ash was nowhere in sight.
The portraits on the wall seemed rather hostile and angry, the painter never used soft 
toned colors nor were the stars of the portraits bothered with a smile or as much as even a 
grin. One portrait in particular grabbed Ash’s full attention. Hidden at the end of the 
hallway like some dirty old secret was the portrait of a young boy, this portrait defied the 
pattern they all had. This boy in particular was smiling, the smile was not powerful and it 
seemed almost forced and fake. It was as if he were trying to cover a secret he feared 
would get out into the world. Ash gazed into it, deeply analyzing the smile; it was almost 
as captive as Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. The boy’s clothing was of the old days but 
high class. His brown tie and black suit were well ironed, his shoes sparkling with the 
room’s light.
Ash kept looking at the portrait loosing touch with reality, it felt as though he just had to 
uncover the secret behind his smile. Ash’s vision began to blur except for his one 
focusing point which was of course the portrait. He kept staring without blinking, his 
breathing almost as faint as the color of the walls.
Suddenly a heavy hand fell on Ash’s shoulder causing him to turn around quickly and 
come face to face with Brock. In that split second he felt his friend’s hand fall heavily on 
his shoulder Ash could swear his heart had stopped and felt an extreme rush flow 
throughout his entire body.
Wide eyes stared back at Brock, eyes with a hint of shock searched his face, and he knew 
he had almost given Ash a heart attack. “Sorry. Hey, we’re heading upstairs to put our 
sleeping bags in. You coming as well?”
Still shaky from the startle Ash collected himself and nodded. Brock watched as Ash 
feebly walked past him, Brock knew the place scared Ash. Brock had little brothers and 
sisters and he was confident that Ash’s behavior was that of a frightened or at the least 
uncomfortable person. With a confident, big-brotherly smile he turned around and 
walked behind Ash and both walked upstairs.
The wooden floor creaked as May’s feet lodged into the surface and the full weight of her 
body rested on the wood. The wood’s decay was noticeable and being in the second floor 
made May worry about the fact that she might set foot on the wrong plank of wood and 
cause her plummet to the first floor. She softly shook her head to try and think straight; 
after all, she did not want to show off the fact that the house scared her. May looked 
around the empty hallway and even though it was covered in thick dust she was able to 
appreciate the fine details of the indentations on the border of the wall. The magnificent 
woodwork was more than enough to give an empty hallway a sense of style and elegance. 
The perfectly carved leaves and vines intertwined with one another in perfect harmony.
At the sight of a door May opened it and found it to be a bedroom. The accuracy that it 
looked like it had been a little girl’s room amused May to the point where she giggled to 
herself. The room was quite clean, or as clean as they had seen so far. The wallpaper was 
cracked and was peeling in some of the corners especially at the upper right hand corner. 
The bed was a canopy made of oak and it had a transparent veil made of silk. At the foot 
of the bed was a very weathered and very old toy chest, the top had a hole in it and it 
looked beaten down.
May looked around and found no other furniture; it was just the bed and chest. The bed 
itself was abundant in dust so May figured it to be a good idea to place her sleeping bag 
over the mattress. The idea was brilliant and it proved to be for as soon as she placed her 
sleeping bag on the mattress the impact lifted a huge and thick cloud of dust. All in the 
area began to cough and wave their hands in front of their faces to clear the dust.
“Well, I for one will be using my sleeping bag as well.” Max coughed out the words as 
some of the dust had been inhaled. The rest of the group nodded in agreement.
Right in that same hall all the rooms were where the guests would stay. Fortunately for 
all of them they all had a bed, they were dusty and some had a few stains but using May’s 
idea of placing their sleeping bags over the mattress proved useful to avoid direct contact 
with the mattress. After they had all picked a room Brock had gone into the kitchen and 
started to prepare dinner. Of course, Brock never used any of the pots and pans from the 
house he merely used the stove which by the oddest coincidence still worked.
Meanwhile, the rest of the group was out exploring the rest of the house, there were 
plenty of rooms they had not seen and other hallways they just had to look into. The size 
of the manor was bigger than they had anticipated but at least exploring the manor would 
cease the boredom of having to sit around and waiting for the snowstorm to cease. On the 
third floor Ash, Pikachu and Max were captivated by the rooms and its contents. It 
seemed that one of the people who used to live there was a painter. There was one room 
Ash and Pikachu had walked into that was full of canvases and portraits and half finished 
paintings of gardens and beautiful sceneries.
The room was completely painted in white but the floor was of oak wood that was 
deteriorating, the windows although far too filthy to look out of were made of an Italian 
style that was popular back in the early 80s. Ash and Pikachu looked around but there 
were only wooden stands and canvases, nothing much to look at. Pikachu jumped off of 
Ash’s shoulder and ran into the hallway to see the other rooms it so badly wanted to 
explore.
Ash smiled at the curiosity his Pokemon showed, he took one step forward but stopped as 
soon as he heard a creaking sound coming from inside the room he was in. The sound 
was that of an old door desperately needing some oil for the hinges. Ash turned around to 
look at the room and noticed there was a door at the very back of the room. The door 
slightly open, Ash kind of twisted his head; he wondered just how the door opened up by 
itself since all the windows were closed. He figured it must have been the rusty metal 
hinges that would move from time to time from all the rust they had gathered through out 
the years. Never really giving much thought to the matter Ash walked towards the door to 
see what was behind the door.
As he passed through several paintings he had not noticed several wires on the ground 
which to his misfortune had gotten tangled in his feet causing him to fall. The impact 
lifted some of the dust from the floor causing him to cough. Ash drew his fist in front of 
his mouth and coughed several times to clear his lungs. Slowly he got back up on his own 
two feet and looked at the door that was only a few feet in front of him. As he looked he 
saw something that he was absolutely sure had not been there before. Right behind the 
door he saw a shoulder; the skin had an almost blue tone to it, like that of a frozen body. 
Ash blinked twice and still saw the shoulder there, something was wrong, they were sure 
they were the only ones in the manor but now with this he wanted to make sure they were 
not intruding.
“Um…hello?”
No answer. No responses, or greetings, not even a gesture of some sort. The person 
hiding behind the door must have been shy so Ash tried to talk to the person again. 
“Excuse me but why are you hiding behind that door?”
Again silence, now Ash was starting to grow worried. He took one step forward and as 
soon as his foot met with the floor the door opened just about an inch and slowly a hand 
crept out from behind the door. The hand had the same tone of color as the shoulder that 
was already out but the hand was different. There were deep lacerations on the surface; 
the nails were uncontrollably long and jagged. Suddenly Ash saw something he only 
thought he would see in nightmares or in the movies. As the hand moved he could it 
completely and noticed that the thumb was not there. From the hole in the hand some 
blood spattered on the floor.
In a quick reflection Ash ran out of the room and shut the door loudly. He leaned on the 
door as he tried to catch his breath from both the running and the scare. His eyes were 
wide with fear, his breathing was uneven and deep and his heart seemed to be racing. Ash 
had no idea what could have been what he just saw or even if he really saw it, all he knew 
was that he had never felt this much fear before in his life.
As his breathing slowed down he exhaled and leaned his head on the door and slowly 
closed his eyes. The image was still fresh in his mind but he kept telling himself that he 
was only imagining it. As he tried to deny one reality he faced another that perhaps he 
really did see the shoulder and mutilated hand. A thought then kicked his mind, what if 
it’s someone who was hurt and needed help? What if that someone needed desperate 
medical attention? This would have made Ash rush back into the room but he recalled the 
color of the skin and his first thought was that whoever that person was could have been 
dead. He wasn’t oblivious to all facts of life; he knew what a cadaver looked like and 
knew that human flesh was prone to change its color once blood stopped flowing through 
the heart.
“Hey, Ash!” Max’s voice hollered from the second floor, “dinner’s ready come on 
down!” The announcement broke his chain of thoughts but he was glad, he was not about 
to give in to the fact that he might have just seen a corpse up and walking about. He 
sighed deeply and walked quickly downstairs, trying his best to forget whatever it was 
that he saw.
May and Brock released their Pokemon who at the sight of plates full of food next to the 
table ran over to eat especially May’s Gnobe. The Pokemon enjoyed their meal and so 
did May and Max, as they ate they could not help but notice how Ash was not face first 
into the bowl as usual. They also noticed how he was unusually quiet and the look of 
concern that was so blatantly displayed upon his face. Max looked at Brock who said, 
“Ash, are you all right?”
Ash cleared his throat and said as he moved the soup with the spoon, “Yeah, I’m fine. 
Just not that hungry.”
As soon as Max heard that last sentence he chocked on the soup and spit it back into the 
bowl as he looked at Ash in shock, up to that very date, he had never heard Ash say that 
before. Max was not the only one to have been shaken up by the words Ash so blatantly 
spurred from his mouth. May, who was still holding the soup full spoon in her hand that 
had just about the same distance between her mouth and the bowl, looked at Ash in 
shock. She blinked several times as she kept staring at him. Brock was not far behind; he 
looked at Ash with concern along with a hint of shock. Ash saw their reactions and 
wondered why it was such a big deal for him to say that he was not hungry.
“It’s not like I just confessed to a murder, you know.”
“But…you’re always hungry…” Brock said in a half serious and half joking tone. Max 
laughed as he said, “Guess this old manor has had an effect on ya, right Ash?”
The shoulder and the hand were still clear in his mind; all along he had been debating 
with himself if what he saw was real or some kind of trick of the mind. He even 
considered the fact that he might have been under stress. Ash looked at the Pokemon as 
they ate happily and dismissed that thought quickly. As he stared into the bowl of soup he 
sighed deeply and rose up from the chair quickly and ran upstairs. Brock and the others 
remained seated as they watched Ash run upstairs, they looked at each other curiously 
and followed suit.
Ash was determined to end the confusion, he knew if he would face the very room he saw 
the shoulder in he might be able to sleep that night. Ash stomped through the hallway and 
headed straight for the room while Brock, May and Max tagged along behind him. Once 
he found the room he was in he walked straight to the closet, which to his surprise was 
closed. He opened the door and as it swung open it made a horrible creaking sound from 
lack of oil.
There was nothing inside. Part of him was relieved and part of him was concerned. The 
very image of the shoulder was disturbing, not to mention the fact that they were in a 
very old manor that could have been haunted. Ash shook his head and looked again but 
there was still nothing inside.
“Ash, what are you looking at?” May said as she took a step forward.
With his eyes fixed on the closet and his mind still debating Ash simply sighed and said, 
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
After dinner everyone agreed to get a good night’s sleep since they were going to need it 
for the day just in case the storm would pass as they slept. To their surprise the storm had 
not even begun as of yet but they assumed it would go on as they slept.
Ash had picked the room that was all the way at the bottom of the hallway. Something 
had drawn him to it, he could not explain it but he was drawn to it in a weird way. Snug 
inside his sleeping bag Ash was not able to sleep at all. His mind was running at top 
speeds and nothing he did was able to quell its thirst for an explanation of what he saw 
earlier that night. Ash looked around and saw Pikachu asleep at the bottom of the bed, for 
a minute he envied the small mouse’s peaceful rest. He turned around and faced the door 
which was closed and placed both hands under his head for comfort.
His eyes searched the darkness of the room and as he did he noticed the storm had 
started. He could hear the wind howling viciously and several objects that were outside 
that were being moved about by the strong winds. The tree branches that were close to 
the windows scratched them as they were moved by the fierce wind. Finally his eyes 
were beginning to close, he was much too tired and if the storm subdued over night they 
had a long way to go in order to get to the next town so this rest was much needed.
Right between sleep and awake Ash felt a tug at his feet. Thinking it was Pikachu Ash 
uncovered half of his body and swung his arm to the electric lantern that was on the night 
stand beside him. He turned it on and saw Pikachu asleep where he last saw it. Never 
giving much thought to it Ash looked at his Pokemon one last time and reached for the 
lantern. He switched it off and as soon as his head hit the pillow his eyes widened with 
horror.
With his back facing the window Ash was not able to see who or what was standing on 
the terrace behind him. The light from the outside poured through and into the room but 
Ash saw more than the light. A dark silhouette stood at the window, frozen, it merely 
stood there not making a move or sound. Ash felt as if his heart had skipped several 
beats, he was frozen stiff as he tried to see if the shape of the silhouette was familiar in 
any way. It was futile, the strange silhouette was not recognizable and that just made it 
worse for Ash.
He watched as it stood there, he did not move nor did the silhouette. Both were frozen 
like trees in midwinter as ice wrapped itself around them. Fear was swallowing Ash, he 
felt as his heart beat faster and faster, his breath accelerated and deepened with the very 
fear that engulfed him. Slowly he turned around to face whoever it was standing behind 
him.
In a swift action he faced the window but there was nothing behind him. Ash got up from 
the bed and waked towards the window but there was no one in the terrace. The 
confusion was irritating Ash but he was glad there was nothing else in the room besides 
him and Pikachu. Ash placed his hand on the glass and watched as the snow fell from the 
Heavens towards the Earth. For the first time in the last twenty four hours he was at 
peace.
Ash let out an exasperated sigh and closed his eyes for a few seconds. The need for some 
cold water suddenly overwhelmed him and so he decided to head downstairs to get a 
glass of water. He quietly walked across the room to avoid waking up Pikachu, at the 
door he slowly opened it and closed it just as slowly.
Once out in the hall he was struck with a powerful cold shiver, he felt as if the snow 
storm was actually inside the manor. Ash placed both arms around his body in order to 
warm up but it was futile. As he exhaled his breath had been frigid and he felt his skin 
freeze up. As he kept walking he heard a creaking sound behind him, Ash froze as his 
eyes widened, once again that same fear engulfed him but this time it felt worse. He 
began to slowly turn around to look behind him and see who or what was now behind 
him. Afraid of what he might see he braced himself but he was also sure that he would 
not be fully ready to face it. His eyes slowly walked across the hall and were soon placed 
upon what his back was facing.
Brock awoke at the first light of dawn. After getting cleaned up, which was a bit of a 
challenge seeing as how the manor was filthy, he quickly headed downstairs to start 
making breakfast before anyone else would wake up. As Brock walked down the stairs he 
had a smile plastered upon his face, a good night’s sleep would have that effect on him 
the next day, his cheery disposition and the humming gave it away. Brock opened the 
kitchen door but was startled to find Ash sitting at the table.
Brock figured Ash just woke up early but as he walked near him he heard Ash breathing 
heavily and just staring into the table. Brock placed his right hand on Ash’s shoulder but 
as his hand landed on his shoulder Ash gasped and looked at Brock. Brock saw Ash’s 
tired eyes; he could tell he barely got any sleep, if any even. Brock pulled back a chair 
and sat down as he looked at his friend and said in a soft tone.
“What’s wrong Ash?”
Ash simply looked at the table, his breathing had become heavier and faster. Brock was 
beginning to worry so he asked once more, “Ash, seriously, what is it?” Ash finally 
looked at Brock, he knew he was worried but he did not want to cause any trouble so he 
simply said, “Nothing, I just barely got any sleep last night, that’s all.”
Brock did not fully believe the excuse Ash gave him but he did look like he had not slept 
so it must have been that. Brock smiled as he told him he was going to make breakfast so 
Ash just remained sitting on the chair. The kitchen door had been left open and as soon as 
Brock walked past the open door Ash saw the silhouette standing on the doorway staring 
right at him.