Monday, 12 October 2026

GOX 12: Charlotte's Den (part 3)

Pete rolled up with the ladder and clocked the thing down by the ledge of Greg's window.
  Greg climbed out and climbed down.
  Finally free of his room it was time to get to work.
  'Are you going to school today?' said Greg to his mate.
  'No way son!' Pete returned hotly.  'Sod that!  School is a waste of time.  Anyway a wise man once said you learn more from life by playing video games!  And that wise man, if you were wondering, is me fifty years in the future!'
  'I hear you,' said Greg.  'Are you ready to carry on with the mission?'
  Pete said he was ready...  but he actually sounded quite nervous.  He actually looked quite agitated like he would rather be somewhere else doing something very different.
  Greg detected his friends anxious frame but he didn't care.  'Do you remember where the place is?' he continued.  
  'I think so,' Pete replied.  'It is up the road here, not far to walk not really.  I don't know about you, mate, but I seriously think I am going to need to be drunk before we start doing anything serious.'
  'No.  Not this time,' Greg returned in a serious voice.  'We have got to be sober in all of this business.  We have to have crystal clear minds if we hope to get things done.  If we try to speak to this Charlotte full drunk she is going to think we are two filthy wasters.  But if we keep sober and clean she will just think we are two wasters and we might stand a better chance of getting a word in.  We just need to know if anybody is camping in the GOX house, or if she has heard word of a murderer or anything weird.  That's all.  And when we get the information we can go back home and plan for the next stage - entering the GOX House itself!'
  'Well she can certainly talk about seeing weird things especially after she has finished talking to us,' said Pete with a chuckle.
  'Stop trying to be funny,' Greg slapped back at his friend.  'What's wrong with you?  I worry about you sometimes mate!  There could be a damn dead body inside that GOX house and Charlotte is the key to unlocking the secret to this mystery.  Right?  Do you get get it?  Idiot?  Now grow up and start acting your age!'
  Pete apologised.
  'How did you get that cut to your face?  It's bleeding you know?' said Pete.  'There is a good flow of blood on your face right now.'
  'O that?  It's nothing, really.  Just a little showdown with a very nice person called Liz...  Can you hear the sarcasm in my voice?' said Greg.
  'O her?  Damn!  She is the worst,' Pete returned.  A cold shiver ran down his spine the moment Greg spoke her name...  Nasty memories started kindling in his brain.  'She beat me blue the other day.  Vile creature.  A true vulture!'
  'She is more like a reptile than a vulture I think,' said Greg.
  'O yeah!  I suppose you are right,' said Pete thoughtfully.  'A reptile!  Sure! Do you know what she did to me the other day at school?  She was waiting for me behind the wall, you know the wall behind the canteen?  She was hiding there with her mate and when I came along they ambushed me!  Liz tore up my shirt and scratched my back.  And her friend stepped up and punched me clean in my face.  Have you ever seen her friend?  What a beast she is!  Damn!  Very frightening...'
  'O!  You mean Jen don't you?  She looks like a Sasquatch right?'
  'That's the one,' said Pete.  'A truly frightening creature!  What's it all about, hey Greg?  Why do things have to be so damn horrible?  Why is school the way it is - full to the brim with reptiles, vultures and Sasquatch?  Why can't there just be normal people in the classrooms?  Why is it all beasts and bumpkins?'
  'Life is an evil game my friend,' Greg returned calmly.  'There are only three ways to play it:  Face it and die...  Run from it and die...  Drink from it and die...  It is ALL one vicious circle, mate.  Life for the common man is like being strapped to a wagon wheel and being tossed around forever and ever in the mud.  Your skin and your limbs eventually start to rot with the wear and start all breaking up.  Then when the wheel is done the rope is finally cut away and you roll into a dirty damn ditch all dead and done.  Even when I was a kid I knew what life was all about.  But ah well!  Men like us need a strategy to deal with it - and my strategy is to drink!  But not now.  We need our wits about us, Pete.  Now let us go and find this Charlotte person before it gets late...'

* * *

Finally they were standing outside Charlotte's house.
  They had made it at last.  
  'Okay so this is the plan,' said Greg.  'This woman is not a ghost.  She is a human being - that means she is going to have to leave her house at sometime or other.  She needs to eat, right?  Presumably she has got a job to go to as well?  So this is what we are going to do.  We are going to hide and we are going to wait.  When she finally leaves that door we rush her, collar her, get her into a corner and get her talking!'  
  'You know we might get arrested for doing this,' said Pete.  'I really don't want to go back to prison, Greg, and DC Maddox has already got us marked...'
  'It will be fine,' said Greg.  'Come on Pete!  Stop shaking like that!  Look at the bigger picture here!  We are on a mission - a mission of life and death...'
  Pete was beyond reluctant.  'I am sorry Greg but I am going to need a drink...  I really am!'
  But Greg told him no, reminding him of the importance of maintaining clarity for the sake of the mission.
  'We are going to get into trouble for this I know we are,' Pete dribbled on.  'I mean what we are doing now is stalking.  It could get us years of prison time!  Honestly I don't think I can do it after all.  No.  I want out!  Greg, listen.  If you honestly and sincerely believe that there is a dead body in the GOX House then do what I suggested earlier and phone the police about it.  That is all you have got to do!  This mission of yours is getting to be mad and stupid.  I regret giving you that game now.  You are letting the game get to you.  You sound like a crazy person when you talk about the GOX House!  We have travelled ALL around the country looking for this damn house and now we are harassing a totally innocent person...  This is a bad business Greg and I don't like it.  I have got a real bad feeling stirring in my guts.  I don't want this.  I don't want to waste my day off of school getting into trouble - I just want to chill and play video games.'
  'You do what I tell you or I will punch you!' Greg growled in return.  'Do you hear me?  You are in on this mission with me to the end.  Yeah.  We could get into trouble, of course could.  But we have to do this for the better good of the community.  And listen!  If I get arrested I will tell them that you were my accomplice in all that I did.  I will drag you down with me you hear me Pete?  You already have a criminal record - if Maddox reels you in for a second round in the station you will be toast.  So you do as I tell you, right?  There is NO way out of this not for you not for me!  We have got to get this done!'
  Pete hung his head in defeat.
  He had no choice but to go along with Greg's plans.
  'Right!  Less of the negative talk!  Let's get back to business.  We are going to need cover,' said Greg.  He looked about.  There was nothing...
  ...Apart from this tent obviously belonging to some homeless person...
  Just then the zip of the tent came down and the flap went up and too everyone's surprise Vance King stepped out onto the scene.
  He was holding a bottle and had vomit on his shirt - he was looking wobbly, mad and sick.
  He looked like Vance King basically.
  'Watcha lads,' said King as he wobbled about, leaning on the nearby wall for support.  'Fancy a drink with a stray?'
  'Watcha got?' Greg replied.
  'Double G,' Vance replied with his voice shaking.  'Two doses of G-Juice in one.  Good stuff.  The best stuff.  Takes five seconds for it to hit the brain and the gut.'  He offered them a bottle.  'Drink it!' he said.  'And when you do all of those inhibitions forged in the fires of youth will melt away like birds in a dream.  You will become eagles...  Eagles with the eyes of a child ready to hunt with the wiles of a hyena...'
  'No thanks,' said Greg pushing the bottle away.  'Pete and I need to keep our braincells intact - just for today anyway.  We are on a mission.'
  'That's good to hear!  Still trying to break into that GOX house hey?'
  'That's right,' said Greg.  'Do you know anything else about this Charlotte person?  It is just we are trying to talk to her, see if we can get some information out of her.  But she is so mysterious.  I don't think I have ever seen her out and about before not in my whole life.  She seems to be quite badly housebound.  Am I right?  Do you think she is sick?'
  'She is a strange twig that one - more like a ghost than a human being,' Vance replied.  'If you can get her to talk to you Greg you will be the first of a kind!  You will be a very talented man indeed to pull off such a deed.'
  'I am worried somebody has been murdered and Charlotte might know something about it,' said Greg.  'There could be a dead body inside the GOX House.  I have been playing this weird video game for days now and it hints at such a thing!  If it is not a dead body it could be a prisoner or someone who is trapped!  I think Charlotte knows something about what is going on and that is why she is hiding away like she does.  What do you think Vance?  Do you think I sound like a crazy person?'
  'Well I am knew to the area,' Vance replied, 'but I do know that and things go on in the streets...  And yeah - that GOX House, it really does look like the kind of building where a murder might have taken place...  where murders might still go on!  For sure!  It is a sad lonely old building, the perfect place to hide a stiff.  Now I am being freely and fully honest with you lads, I really do think that there could be a dead body in that building.  If not today then one day.  You might actually find me dead in there especially if I keep on drinking the Double G...'
  'You seriously think that?' said Pete, who was now starting to grow very afraid.  'Do you think the GOX House is the kind of place where murders would really go on?'
  'Absolutely!  It is the perfect place to slay a man and release a soul,' said Vance speaking in a relaxed voice like death and killing was just a typical casual topic for people to talk about.  The lads couldn't tell if the man was being serious or if he was just very drunk.  'Quite a few famous killers haunt Fenwick's history,' Vance rambled on.  'They killed in back alleys - they killed in old houses.  Frightening stuff!' and then Vance digressed into one of his uncomfortable intoxicated drivel talks:  'You can tell if a man is a killer by looking at his eyes...' he rambled.  'If a man has the eyes of a dog he ain't no killer.  Dog's eyes look left and right - they look lost.  When a man has dogs eyes then that is a lost man you are looking at.  But when the man has the eyes of a cat then well that is when you need to start being careful and watching yourself...  when a man has the eyes of a cat he is a hunter and there you might have a possible killer in your midsts.  But it is the man with the eyes of a whale you need to be careful of the most - for that is the man who wears the eyes of a killer and he will kill you there and then clean in the street.  Beware the eyes of a man with the eyes of a whale.  You can tell a lot about a man or a beast by the look in their eyes.  Now listen to this:  the eyes of the eagle are as pure as snow.  Did I ever tell you about the time I was attacked as a child in my pram but a great golden Fenwick eagle?'
  'Yes yes!  You told us that story,' said Greg.  'You really don't have to tell us it again!  Really!  Please!  Don't do that!'
  'Okay lads.  Have it your way.  But let me tell you one last thing!  Eagles are the purest killers on earth.  When they kill they have the eyes of a wide eyed babe freshly born...'
  'Alright.  Let's stop talking about eagles and focus on the task at hand,' said Greg.  Greg desperately needed to stop Vance from setting out on another one of his mad alcohol induced tangents.  'Do you think that this Charlotte person might actually be dead?'
  Suddenly there was a sound.
  It was the clicking of a door handle!
  'O wait lads you might just be in luck!' said Vance.  'I think our girl Charlotte is about to poise...'
  And Vance was right.
  Charlotte was actually leaving her home!
  'There she is!  Let's get her Pete!' said Greg and the two lads gave chase.
  As soon as Charlotte saw the two lads charging towards her she let out a terrible high pitched scream and ran right back inside her house!
  She was so fast - one might think her a willow the wisp!  She really did appear to be quite spectral in her white dress and armed with her strange speed - maybe she was a ghost after all?
  Well whatever, her door was closed and locked against the lads.
  But she didn't have time to lock the gates guarding the outer walls so Greg stalked right up to her front door and started thumping on it like a frantic and desperate man.  He started shouting through the letterbox as well.  These were his words:
  'We just want to talk to you about the GOX house!  The old house next to yours!  What can you tell us about it?  Please talk to us!  We need your help!  We only want a minute of your time!'
   Just then five police cars wheeled into view.
  Pete had already ran away leaving Greg alone and surrounded.
  DC Maddox stepped up out of his car:
  'We need to have a word you and I,' he said grimly. 'Let's head back to the station son.'
  And before Greg knew it he was being cuffed up and bowed down into the backseat of a police car.

* * *

Back at the police station Greg was put on full blast by both the police and DC Maddox.   They had him sat down and cuffed to a chair.  Maddox sat at the desk directly in front of Greg a vast and frightening form - a giant built out of bricks of pure darkness.
  Maddox started:
  'You are growing up to be quite the rascal aren't you Greg,' he said menacingly.  'Harassing a young lady outside of her own home, hey?  You know I am going to have to book you for that.  It is going to be bad for you, Greg, just giving you a heads up.  Prison cells are not what they used to be.  Time was two men shared a cell.  But things have gotten tight here in Fenwick over the last few years - so much crime and so little space to keep the bad guys penned up.  These days we are looking at ten men per cell.  Do you fancy sharing a cell with ten men, Greg?  That is what your fate is shaping up to be right now if you keep going on with things as you are.'
  Greg did the only thing that he could do and that was grovel and beg for mercy.
  And grovel he did - for a whole minute grovelling like the defeated dog that he was...
  'Please give me a second chance!' he said finally.
  'You burned your second chance the last time I had to lock you up,' said Maddox.  'There are no chances left, lad.  Seeing how things are I don't think I have any choice.  I am going to have to book you...'
  'Wait!' Greg snapped - he had a plan to save himself and it was a good one.  This is what he said next:
  'I can help you find a very dangerous criminal!'
  'So you want to add bribing an officer of the law to your list of crimes now, eh Greg?' Maddox replied slyly.  'That will fetch you another couple of years.'
  'No wait listen!  I know someone you want.'
  'Name him.'
  'Vance King.'
  'You know where to find King?'
  'Let me go and I can lead you right to him,' said Greg.
  Maddox rolled his pen around in his hand right hand and eyed the other officers in the room.
  Finally he nodded his huge bulldog shaped head.  
  'So you want to make a deal?' he said.
  'Vance King is yours - just let me go,' Greg replied.
  'Fine.  Then we have a deal,' Maddox returned calmly.  'But this is your third and final chance, Greg.  Anymore nonsense and I will be forced to lock you up in a small sized cell with ten giant sized killers.  Do you hear?'
  Greg nodded.
  He heard.
  He understood.

Vance King was arrested later that day.
  Greg, finally free, gradually wandered back home.  It was finally evening when he climbed the ladder back up to his bedroom.
  Greg was angry...
  He was angry with the police he was angry with Charlotte and most of all he was angry with Pete for having abandoned him clean in his hour of need.
  Greg snapped open his computer and stamped out this angry message to his friend:

Pete!  Damn you!  You fed me to the pigs!  You are supposed to be my mate!  Well whatever!  I know your true colours now!  Our friendship is done.  I will solve this mystery of GOX without you.  But I WILL solve it I WILL!  And then I will be the hero - and you will be what you have always been...  a drunken nobody with nothing.  I will win this game.  I WILL WIN.  O yeah and by the way you are blocked so don't bother responding...TRAITOR!

 With those angry words having been fired out Greg settled down in front of his keyboard and snatching hold of his mouse he started to play some more GOX...




To Read GOX part 11 click here.

For more adventures set in the town of Fenwick check out:
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Tuesday, 6 October 2026

Mirror In The Sky

 The wings in the sky they fly so high!

Mirror in the sky!
Mirror in the sky?
Mirror in the sky...

Introduction:  My Last Night.  My first Night...

I see thee!
IN the very stones of thee...
IN thy stones I see thee - where thou has always been for me...
IN the stones
IN the stones
IN the stones!

So there YOU be!  Where you have always seem to be - like a dream to me - hidden in the stones.
Stones...
Stone.
  
Then I see a flash of light, and then I see the stars so bright and then I hear it and then I hear its wings...

And then I hear its wings...

O mirror!  I just want to be free from thee!
I just don't want to have to see thee...
But I see you being drawn to me...
O those stars are so bright I can hear those wings in flight...
IN flight
IN FLIGHT!
O such a frightening sight!
I beg thee hold thy flight!
O mirror I never wish to behold my sight - 
Show not my secrets to me...

Part 1:  He sees everything and is broken like glass...


The mirror...

O no...

I seek piece among the stones...

But I feel it in my bones - my peace is lost!

The voice it speaks:

'I see thee!  Now you will be with me!'


And there it was!  The mirror High!
And there it was the mirror high!
A mirror right beneath the sky!
A mirror that came out of the sky,
It came out of the sky.
Mirror in the sky!
Mirror in the sky!


'Take thee away from me!  I cry!'
  'O dearest mirror in the sky!  O please I cry go back to the sky.  Return to the sky!  Please don't pry, we need you in the sky - please just go back to the sky!'

I see you and you see me,
I shall never be free,
From thy eye,
Mirror in the sky,
Mirror in the sky!

I try to go to sleep...
  I try to go to sleep...
  But you seek me in my dreams...
  My dreams that are mine to keep - but that is where you seek, my dreams that are also asleep, yet you seek me while I sleep!

'My dreams scatter and fly like birds!'
  'O mirror what have you done to me?'
  'Why would you not let me be free?'
  'My skin is like glass...'
  'The waters of my life are in the grass - and my dreams are stones in a shade by a mountain where the sun does not ever shine - O pretty and deceitful sadness.  How you are the envy of apathy!  But I did not go after thee, I did not wish for people to laugh at me but yet you came after me...

But yet you came after me!

Sadness is the treasure of the weary - please do not go near me - I seek NOT sadness to cheer me, I am not like many of those who live near me...
  But yet you shattered my dreams like glass - and my vapours turn to water in the grass by a stone in the shade where the sun does not ever shine.

Part 2:  What Colour is CLay?

My feet!  What hast become of thee?
  O no my feet!  O no my feet do not betray me!
  Can thou walk?  Can thou walk for me still - walk upon the fringes of the world?  Can thou still carry me?
  Will thou still have me?
  Let us walk thou and I - and write about the colours of the land...

I forge my rhythms with such ditherns...
The frog hops over and he always likes to play, 
His harp you should see him sway, as he stops to sing of clay...
O sway dear frog O say!
Sway and sing of clay.
All things have colour...
Even such things as clay,
O play me a tune and play it fair!
Play thy harp for me!
And when thou have done all that thy can,
and said all that thou can for me,
whip up thy fiddle fair,
and carry on playing, playing, fiddling for all
eternity.

Fiddle now, foul fair and fine,
Fiddle now my fine friend of mine,
Fiddle thy fiddle and fiddle it right,
Fiddle now all day and night.
Play thy song and play it right,
Light the night,
And the night the day,
as thou play...
Thou fiddle fair thou fiddle foul,
Play thou fiddle for play.

Friends are we frog and I,
We dance and frolic fair, 
And fair and far we frolic,
Hyperbolic,
He wrote of our frolic,
our frolic,
our frolic, in the dreamy woods so fair!
O breathe in the air!
SO fair!
The sweet scented woodland air -
We shall be there...
Skipping like squirrels skipping,
Ignorant with the zest of life,
in song we shall set a life, 
without strife,
the life of the summer air!

  
I smiled in sadness and in sadness I smiled...
But my skin was made of glass,
and at last the mirror came back to me,
and I was told I would soon be dew among the grass.

Dew among the grass.

So please while we last, ply thy fiddle and play for me...
  the song that lasts eternity, of the colour of clay, and all things that lay, in the present past of time.
  


Part 3:  Final Glance...

O no O no O no!
  I see you and you see me,
I shall never be free,
From thy eye,
Mirror in the sky,
Mirror in the sky!

I try to go to sleep...
  I try to go to sleep...
  But you seek in my dreams...
  My dreams that are mine to keep - but that is where you seek, my dreams that are also asleep - you seek me while I sleep!

The owl flies down to me,
and gripped in its claws in harmony,
the mirror fair the mirror foul.
O play thy harp and play it well,
As my face does look sad and swell - 
In that glass that reflects my... 

...well...

Other than farewell

so well

so well

I tried O well!

And there it was!  The mirror High!
And there it was the mirror high!
A mirror right beneath the sky!
A mirror that came out of the sky,
It came out of the sky.
Mirror in the sky!
Mirror in the sky!



THE END

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Friday, 2 October 2026

GOX 11: Charlotte's Den (part 2)

So you are wondering about my demise?

So perhaps maybe you should start looking at me with your eyes...

Look at my eyes.  

👁+👁

My eyes and your eyes.

Can you see me?

No!

Come and find me then...

Can't you see me can't you feel me?

Come and find me then.

Want to know me want to find me?

Come and find me then.

Come and find me then...


***********************************************************
It was time to go home.  Greg was dreading it beyond belief.
  He just did NOT want to go home.
  But he had to do it.
  There was nowhere else for him to sleep.
  Nowhere else for him to eat.
  And nowhere for him to beg...
  Even Pete's folks wouldn't let him stay over...
  So it was homeward bound for our boy Greg.  And so he walked with dread, down the road back home.
  He might have to spend the night in the shed...
  Like Vance King...
  But no point shedding tears about it.
  Life does as it does.  It glazes a few, and dazes the rest!

The first thing Greg met when he opened the front door was his mothers fist.
  Well truth is his face met the fist first.
  Greg almost fell over.  Part of it was the booze, of course, but the rest was the hate behind the force that had just cracked into his skin and into his bone.
  His mother cursed him as he stood at the door, a shaking sweating rat of a lad.
  She cursed his name.  'I curse YOU Greg!'
  She cursed his life.  'I curse your LIFE Greg!'
  She spat on him before she hit him again and when she had finished doing that she said this:
  'I hate you,' and she repeated it again, 'I hate you.  You are an embarrassment to me.  You are an embarrassment to all of us.  You are going to put me and your father in an early grave!  Why are you so selfish?  We gave you a good life when you were growing up, didn't we?  We fed and watered and clothed you, bought you all of those stupid video games?  And here you are skipping school, and getting arrested by the police.  O yes!  I got a visit from Mr Maddox thank you for that, Greg.  Do you know how humiliating that was for me, when the police knocked on my door to tell me what an idiot you have been lately?  Why can't you just be a good boy?  Look at Harry across the road for example.  Harry is so well behaved and he dresses nice and he gets on with his homework.  He wants to be  solicitor don't you know?  What do you want to be, Greg?  An inmate in a prison cell?  Because that is the way you are going!  I wish I could disown you, boy.  But all I can do is beat you, and punish you and now I am done!  Go to your room at ONCE!  You are GROUNDED you hear me?  Grounded for five weeks!  My lord!  If your father was half the man...  Damn!  He would have dragged you off to the army!  O yes!  Like it was with your grandfather.  They put you straight in the army.  It is what you deserve, boy!  O yes!  Some army time for  you son.  That would learn you.  Life is all about hard work, Greg.  It is about suffering.  I didn't give birth to you for you to spend your life messing about playing games and getting arrested for being a drunk.  NO!  I birthed you so that you could contribute to the long list of contributors in this family.  My father your grandfather suffered in the coal mines.  Your Great Grandfather was in the war for Gods sake!'  She gave Greg a another full smack to the face.  'You know something, Greg?' she went on, 'when you were cooking in my belly my brother told me, seventeen year old girl that I was, he told me I should have you aborted.  He told me I should have you wiped out.  But I said NO I will do my lady duty, like my mother before me, and play my role as the good little wife to your Dad who was already sleeping with other women at the time.  I kept you.  I let you live.  Do  you know how much I sacrificed for you, Greg?  I could have been a singer don't you know?  Before the stretch marks I was a good looking women - look at these photographs!'  She grabbed the photographs - she always kept them at hand so she could fantasy about the past.  She thrust them in Greg's bruised face.  'That was me, fifteen years ago.  Look at me!  This was how I looked before YOU ravaged my body.  YOU destroyed me, Greg.  When you were born you destroyed my body full and whole.  And today right now you are destroying my soul.  I could have been someone, if it wasn't for you.  I could have been a singer married to a rich and kind man.  But no.  I birthed you.  I let you abuse my torso and I stayed with your waster of a Dad and we have lived in this forsake garbage dump of a hovel for fifteen years.  And all I ask of you Greg in return, for all that I have given to YOU, all that I ask is that you go to school and work and learn and do something with your life and not mess everything up...  Nobody in our family has EVER gotten into trouble with the police before.  YOU are the first one to bring this shame on our family and I am disgusted with you, boy.  Wretched boy.  You will go to your room and you will NOT leave it until I say so.  You will have food delivered to you but you will get nothing else.  Speak to me not for WE ARE DONE.  Now go away!'
  After one final smack to the face Greg was despatched to his bedroom.
  It wasn't all that bad.
  Greg still had access to his computer.
  And so long as Greg had his computer he could message Pete, and he could also play a little bit more GOX.
  And that is what Greg did.
  Things were going good until Greg started to feel ill.  He was sobering up...
  O the horror of it!
  He needed to go to the bathroom.
  He needed to leave his bedroom.
  Hopefully the rules didn't block him from using the toilet...
  So Greg decided to set out on a great adventure down the hallway.
  Hangin and sick and barely able to move he set out.
  Stumbling and falling he made his way over to the door.  He turned the handle.  That was part one of the mission done.
  Now the door was open Greg had access to the landing, and the within a few steps the bathroom...
  It was all good so far.  He had made it.
  With a wobble or two Greg did what he had to do.  He felt weezy.  It wasn't going to be easy getting back to his bedroom again...
  He slid on his side against the wall as he made his way back down the hallway.
  Things seemed to be going well until he was within reach of his bedroom door - and that was when the phantom appeared...
  It was Liz...
  Liz was another one of his sisters girly friends and she was sleeping over.  She was also an awful human being.
  'What are you doing, boy?' said Liz.  'You look sick.  Nothing new there then.'
  Liz hissed at Greg like a snake.
  Most women looked like vultures to Greg, but Liz looked more like a lizard.
  Liz flashed her talons at Greg.  She had sharped her claws recently, sharpened them like a cat or a wild animal.
  She meant to hurt him...
  'I will cut you with my fingernails,' she said to Greg.  'I do not need anything else but these, see, if you please, see!  Look at my nails they are all nice and sharp!  So if you don't mind please hail!  These nails!  Before I assail, thy flesh!'
  She dived in and cut Greg across the skin of his cheek with her claws.  Blood flowed freely from out of the one side of his face where he had been attacked.
  Greg didn't know what to say let alone what to do.
  No one was going to save him from this situation so he just stood there, a hangin shaking wreck.
  But Liz hadn't finished with him yet:
  'Don't you ever get in my way again,' she said.  'Don't you ever look at me!  Do you hear me?  Do you hear me boy?'  And then she started to sing:

You will never again ,
Never again,
Look at me,
Do you hear me?
Do you hear me boy?
You will never again see me,
Do you hear me?
Do you hear me, boy?
You think you are somewhat near me,
So you can speak to me,
So you think you can speak to me?
Eh boy?
 You will never go near me, do you hear me?
Do you hear me?
Boy?
I know that you can hear me,
Hear me,
Boy.
So don't you think you can ever get near me?
Do you hear me?
Boy.
I swear that I will kill thee,
Kill thee,
Boy.
If you ever come near me,
Come near me,
I will kill thee,
Do you hear me?
Boy?

  Greg finally managed to get back into his bedroom.
  He had survived his confrontation with the lizard.
  Okay.  Time to get on with things.
  It was time for some more GOX.
  Greg played and played...
  And then finally, after...  six hours?  Something exciting actually happened.
  Gox was a silent game.
  No music - nothing at all like that.  NO other sounds either.
  Now after a few hours of gameplay GOX started playing music!
  But the music sounded weird, I don't know... out of place, maybe even slightly unpleasant...
  And then a message popped up on the screen:
  
Hear the music?  like it?  good!  record it!

Greg did as he was told and recorded the music.
  After that he did the only thing that he could do.
  And that was to just keep on playing the game.
  And playing...
  And...
  And well you get it, and finally Greg got it as well because another piece of music started to play.
  Now this slice of music was a slightly more pleasant for the ear to receive.  Greg decided that he liked it.  Yes.  He leaned back in his chair listening to it.  He drank it in.
  And then another message appeared.  And this is what it read:

Hear the music?  like it?  good!  record it! 

Okay so it was the same message, but Greg got on with it and recorded the music.
  Fine.
  Job done.
  Time to carry on playing...
  And playing...
  And for about another hour there was no change - no more music - no more messages.  
  Greg was growing tired.  It was six in the morning just about the right time for him to pop into bed and snatch an hour or two.  He was just about to flick off the computer when a new message clicked into view:

play the two pieces of music together side by side.

Greg was ready for bed but he still had enough juice left in him to do what he needed to do.
  He played the two pieces of music together side by side and O MY WORD!
  O if only there was a WORD!  A single word to describe the agonising beauty of that music when it was joined as one.
  So beautiful...
  It was as if Rachmaninoff and Chopin had joined forces...
  Seriously.  
  Beethoven would have been in envy of that music (deaf though he was), and Mozart would have drank himself to death in a frustrated fury if he had taken in just five seconds of that refined melody.
  It was the kind of music played on a piano by a man with six digits on each hand, for such gorgeousness in sound could never flow from a soul in flesh that lacked twelve fingers.
  Greg heard it and burst into tears.
  And that was when the next message appeared.
  
i am in the house.  the house.  come and find me...

Greg knew then that his lives quest was to get into the GOX house by ALL means necessary.
  Greg immediately messaged Pete:

I am stuck in my room.  I cannot get out!  Bring a ladder.  I will exit via my bedroom window.  We need to speak to this Charlotte girl.  I do not knot know how we are going to do it legally but we must find a way.  Call me.  The next stage of our quest awaits!

And so the next stage of the quest was put into motion.  
  


To Read GOX part 10 click here.

For more adventures set in the town of Fenwick check out:
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Say NO to Mobile Phones!

 Honestly just throw them away!



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Monday, 28 September 2026

GOX 10: Charlotte's Den

So there it was.
  There was no doubt about it.
  It look exactly like the house in the picture...
  So they had found it...  The quest was over...
  It WAS The GOX House!
  But the mission had only just started...
  I mean...
  The lads were going to have to try and get into the place and it was all boarded down and locked up.
  'It is a strange old place,' said Harry as the three of them were standing outside of the building.  'It has always been there, one of the oldest buildings in town and yet I don't know anybody who knows anything about the place!  It is all really quite strange.  Me and my friends used to get together in the garden outside the building and do these mad little seances!  It was great.  Real spooky.  We even managed to talk to a spirit once...  We thought were we engaging my late great Sally!  But the next day when we were sober again I think what we really actually heard was a rabbit being strangled by a fox.  But there you go.  That is the house you are looking for!'
  Damn!  What a place!  All rickety look and spooky and all bolted up.  A great big box of mystery!
  'We are going to struggle getting into that place,' said Greg to Pete.
  'You actually mean to go in?' said Pete who sounded very surprised about that idea of such a thing.
  'Of course I damn well do!  What's wrong with you, Pete?  What do you think we trekked halfway across the damn country for?' Greg replied bitterly.  'Do you think we were just going to look at the place and take nice pictures of it?  Idiot!  This isn't Times Square in New York!  We are not sight seeing here!  We need to uncover the mystery of GOX.  There could be a person dead inside that building, and we have to help them...  Well...  help them like - report what happened to the police of you get my meaning?'
  'Well we could just do that without going inside the building,' said Pete with a shrug.  
  It sounded like a good idea.  But not to Greg.
  'Don't be such a wimp!' Greg shouted.
  'Actually I think I am being sensible,'  Pete replied.
  'You Peter?  Sensible?  Really?  I have seen cows in the field with more sense than you!  Now stop being silly and help me to think of a way of getting into that house!'
  'Honestly I would stay away from the place if I were you,' said Harry.  'It could be dangerous!'  As he said that he started shivering.  The young man looked very afraid.  It was like some bad memory of the place had kindled in his memory...
  'Maybe it is.  Maybe it isn't.  Luckily I don't care for your opinion,' said Greg.
  'I was just being a mate that is all,' said Harry.
  'We ain't mates,' Greg returned.  'So snap that idea out of your head now or I will knock it out of you!'  Greg was fine with being a bully to Harry because Harry was smaller than him and wiry and built like a spiders web.  Harry also had low self esteem and was well known at school for just sinking insults into his soul and saying nothing about it.
  There was a common saying at school:  When you are feeling lairy then just beat up Harry.
  Just then a weird looking man came waddling up the road towards them.
  It was Harry's Dad, Cecil.
  O flipping heck Cecil!
  What a sight he was!
  As weird people go Cecil was really out there that was for sure.
  Cecil owned the nearly every day empty mini mart across the road.  Physically he looked like he had been run through a combine harvester but somehow managed to survive the insanity of the entire experience.  He had warped and knobbly knees as well as a bent back.  He was wearing an old dress and an apron, like a kitchen maid from 1916, and to cover his boldness he donned a long yellow wig of curly locks.  He was a truly terrifying sight!  Made the lads jump as he approached, seeming to leap up out of nowhere like a phantom fiend!  
  'Harry!  Where have you been you beggar?' said said Cecil as he stepped into view.  He had a gruff voice that matched the ugliness of his bizzare unpleasant visage.  'WE were expecting you home hours ago!' he growled on.
  WE?  Cecil didn't have a wife (Surprise surprise there), and Harry had been adopted?  SO who was this WE then?
  Interesting...
  'What are you doing hanging out with these lads?' said Cecil and he started to eye up Pete and Greg looking at them with pure contempt.
  'These are my mates,' said Harry.  'I found them while shopping in Iguana Country.  You remember you sent me out shopping?  We were just going for a walk.  Here, Dad, look!  I have these fresh crabs and some of your favourite noodles!'
  Cecil clipped Harry round the earhole and then grabbed at him, 'You are a beggar and a bother Harry!  You are coming home now, boy!'  Then Cecil reared on Pete and Greg, and waving a fierce accusatory finger at them he growled:
  'You two are to stay away from my boy do you hear?'
  'That won't be a problem,' said Greg.  'We don't like him anyway.'
  'Good!  I have had a difficult time raising Harry,' Cecil ranted on.  'It is not easy being a mother and a father all at the same time.  And Don't look at me like that you two pieces of mega filth!  Why do you think I am wearing this dress?  It's because I am a Mummadadda!  It is all the rage in 2026.  Well it is in Fenwick anyway.  Now get lost before I punch you both in the face.'  And with that Cecil stalked away with his son in tow, walking the young man up the street like he was some kind of beast of burden.
  Now that Harry was gone the lads were allowed to concentrate on the task at hand.  
  Breaking into GOX.
  'I mean we can't just break into the place,' said Pete.  'There could be someone living inside there.'
  'Harry said the building was abandoned...  It looks abandoned,' Greg returned.
  'Yeah.  And are you going to listen to what Harry says, seriously?' Pete came back.  'Just because the place is abandoned doesn't mean its empty.  There could be someone dossing inside...  A dangerous soul...  You actually think someone was murdered in the building, right?  So maybe there is a murderer camping inside the place.  There could be a killer hiding under the floorboards or in a cupboard waiting for victims to enter his domain!  What would you do then?'
  Greg didn't want to admit it but Pete had made a good point.
  There could be a killer waiting inside the building - waiting to get them!
  What if the killer had programmed GOX intentionally as a way to lure victims into his dungeon?
  It could be a thing.
  NO.
  They couldn't just walk in.
  They needed a plan and a good one.
  The first thing the lads decided to do was to get drunk.
  'I am going to have to go home soon but I cannot face my mother sober,' said Greg.  'She is going to kill me for going away like that.  Likely I will be grounded for a couple of days.  We still have a bottle of the spiced wine.  Let's find a quiet corner and glug the thing clean.'
  So that is what they decided to do.
  There was well known alleyway off the side of the main road with an old shed at the back of it.  It was the place where dossers and drunks and homeless souls hung out to get wasted and forget about the horrors of adult life.  It was typically free of souls during the daylight hours and so it looked like a nice place for Greg and Pete to settle down and drink and not be disturbed.
  They could plan what they were going to do about GOX in private.
  The two lads had only just started to glug when a man stepped out of the shed and stood in front of them...
  Good Lord NO!
  It couldn't be...
  Of all the souls it could have been on Gods green earth it was Vance King!
  'Good to see you again lads,' said the man.  'I can't believe we have met up like this!  It really is a small world, hey?'
  'You following us?' said Greg who was partially drunk at the time.
  'No son.  Not at all.  Our meeting like this is pure coincidence!  Now take a look at something special I have in store for you,' said Mr King.  
  King was holding a rather smart looking briefcase that was cuffed to his right wrist. 
  He snapped the case open.  It was full up with loo roll.
  'The best quality paper is this,' said King.  'You wont find loo roll better than this not in all the country.  Now can I tempt any of you fine lads to this fine paper of mine?'
  Yeah.  Paper pilfered from restaurant restrooms, thought Greg.  What a fine deal indeed.
  'Tempt us to what exactly?' said Pete, who looked confusedly at the loo roll, and he had a right to feel that way, it was just a bunch of old loo roll after all.  So why the cuffs and all of the secrecy?  Madness!  Indeed.  Of all of the mad things to emerge out of the wastes Vance King had to be the the best example of the nastiest of the entire mad old lot.
  'Can I encourage any of you two fellows to separate yourselves with a little cash for one of my fine pieces of loo roll.  A  pound for a single sheet - but a full roll, well that will fetch you...  shall we say 30?'
  'You have got to be joking?' said Greg.
  It was a joke, right?
  'I never joke about business,' said Vance King, speaking in a very serious voice.  Vance meant his words and he meant them well and true.
  'What are you doing living in a shed?' said Pete.
  It seemed a silly thing to ask, but the shed was definitely an upgrade from the outhouse he used to sleep in back out in the waste, if a little less discreet.
  'Because you are my mates I will be honest with you and tell you the truth - I am on the run...' said Vance King.  
  'How does that not surprise me?' Greg replied.  'Whose after you this time?'
  'Take a look at this,' and Vance brought up a piece of paper.  There was a foot drawn on it.  The toenail on the foot was painted in all black.  'DO you see that?' said Vance.  'That is the black toenail.'
  'That is a black toenail alright,' said Pete.
  'Do you know what it means?' said Vance.
  The lads admitted that they did not.
  'It's the mafia,' Mr King replied.  'They send this out when they want you dead in the ground.  The send the black toenail when they mean serious business.  The black toenail means they want to kick you to death and bury you inside a ditch.  I am in trouble boys.  I don't suppose I could live with any of you guys until the trouble goes away?'
  Pete and Greg said universally:  NO.
  'Don't worry lads I get it,' said Vance.
  'We aren't worried,' said Greg.
  'If you bought some of my loo roll right now you would be helping me out,' said Vance King.  'I just need some fare for the train to help get me out of this country.  If I can get into the UK they might not follow me there.'
  'Why not go the other way and head to Italy that would be the last place they would try to find you,' said Greg, sarcastically.  'They wouldn't think you would be mad enough to hide in their homeland.  Even better get a boat to Sicily, the birthplace of the organisation.'
  'You are not helping me much lads,' said Vance.  'But it is alright.  I get it.  These are hard times.  Don't suppose I can have sup of that wine you are keeping?'  
  The lads felt sorry enough for Vance to share the wine with him...
  ...But only on ONE condition!
  'Tell us what you know about the GOX house,' said Greg.  'Tell us and you can keep the whole bottle and get proper wasted and forget about your black toe problem...  for a bit anyway.'
  'That rickety old house across the road you mean?  I don't know anything about it.  BUT I do know someone who will definitely know something about the place,' said Vance.  'Seek out a strange girl named Charlotte.  She lives in the house next door.  She doesn't leave her home much, seems rather housebound.  BUT if you can find her, catch her off guard if you get my meaning, she is bound to know something about the GOX house.  Now how about that wine?'
  Greg handed Vance the bottle.  
  Well what about that?  Vance had actually managed to help them for once!
  Miracles do happen!
  The lads left Vance to his drink and to his shed and sought out Charlotte.
  There was another building built rather close to the GOX house.  That is where she lived.
  It was a bizarre looking building.  It had a wall...  And another wall.  There was a letter box built about eight feet OFF OF THE GROUND!?  SO how was the postman supposed to reach it...  Was he supposed to bring a ladder with him?
  And that wasn't all!  I kid you not there was a security camera positioned right above the front door - and it was aimed right then at Greg and Pete, primed ready for them to enter the scene.
  DAMN.
  Someone was peering at them through the curtains of one of the high windows...
  'This Charlotte really doesn't want to talk to people does she?' said Pete.  'She is definitely watching us from up there!  I think I saw her looking at us in the window a second ago....  How are we going to get past all of that security?'
  'I don't know,' said Greg.  Greg was just standing there, hunched broken, looking up with his hands tucked right down to the greasy corners of his pockets - he looked utterly baffled.  'Let's try the gate first.  It might be open.  We don't know this Charlotte yet.  She might be friendly in her heart and be up for visitors?  Who knows, right?  What I will do is get through the gates and knock on the front door.  What is the worst that can happen?'
  THE POLICE.
  Yes.  Charlotte had called the police on them for loitering.
  'Run for it Pete!' Greg cried and the lads split and ran!
  DAMN.
  It was time for Greg to home...  in defeat.
  But this business was not over...
  YET.


To Read GOX part 9 click here.

For more adventures set in the town of Fenwick check out:
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