The ones that follow me for some time know I wouldn't let Halloween go 
through without releasing a special caption. So many options to choose 
from, so many concepts I'd love to work with... But I think I made the 
right choice with this one. Hope you guys enjoy it!
Image source: https://www.pixiv.net/en/artworks/61477790
        Although Halloween’s origins are certainly a matter of discussion, 
denying the importance of this holiday across the entire globe would be 
foolish. Traditions may vary from country to country, but it’s always an
 expression of the cheerful interpretations that people give to what 
they can’t understand. For whatever reason, humans forgot that they 
don’t own their fate; they act as if there’s no reason to fear darkness,
 no reason to avoid visiting and playing with the uncanny. Halloween 
reflects that: it’s a sacred date, in which the veil between realities 
sways. But Richard never understood that, not until he walked inside of 
Old Crow’s Bog.
        Old Crow’s Bog was not its official name, but almost no one cared 
enough to memorize the name of the colonel who named the bog after 
himself. While during day it was considerably peaceful and even 
attractive to truffle hunters, it was by night time that it’s grim aura 
was revealed; maybe it was the mist, maybe it was the weird whistling of
 the wind (a bizarre sound after which came the swamp’s nickname), maybe
 it were the stories about people going missing.
        None of that, however, was able to prevent Dick from going to the 
ominous marsh on that night, taken by a suspicious cabby. The ominous 
aura of the place could be felt on its surroundings, so the bald driver 
barely noticed when his customer opened the door, taking his backpack 
from the back seat. “Tomorrow at noon, okay?” Dick asked the driver, 
adjusting the GoPro on his head. The driver nodded, taking the money and
 getting away from there as fast as he could.
        The blonde man could feel his knees trembling, not able to 
completely avoid the urge to run away. Accepting the challenge of 
spending an entire night camping inside of Old Crow’s was already 
challenging enough, but going on a Halloween night felt much worse. 
Nevertheless, his legs moved and, slowly, he found his place inside the 
marsh. He knew it was worth it, his real prize not being popularity; no,
 the real reason why he accepted it was who made the challenge itself: 
Aiko. She was much more than a pretty face, she was what made Dick 
believe in love at the first sight. For three years he has been trying 
to get her to notice him and for three years he has been failing. She 
actually had never seemed to really give him attention, in that party, a
 drunk Aiko promised to do whatever Dick wanted, the only requirement 
being to be the first man in this decade to spend an entire night in Old
 Crow’s.
        ‘Aiko, I want you to dine with me…’ He thought, trying to find the 
right words to use during his return. An hour had passed and the tent 
was almost ready when he stopped to adjust the GoPro again. If his 
calculations were right, Dick should be approximately two or three 
kilometers inside of the swamp by now, the proof being how hard it was 
getting to find a nice place to camp. And the GoPro was there to show 
everyone he did it. “So, when you assholes are watching,” he spoke out 
loud, hoping the camera would capture his voice over the insects’ 
buzzing. “You should learn to never doubt Richard Collins ever again! 
And, if you are there Aiko, would you...”
        But Dick was interrupted before he could finally say it out loud, as
 his attention was dragged to something else: a flashlight. It was only 
there for a moment, before it turned off, disappearing in the woods. 
“Yo, is anyone there?” He yelled, feeling his knees weak once again. As a
 response, the flashlight was turned on once again, now a bit further 
amidst the trees. “Fuck, Tom, is that you?” He screamed once again, 
slowly walking towards the light. But when it noticed his movement, the 
light moved at an incredible speed, turning on and off periodically, as 
if its owner was running from Dick. Without thinking twice, slightly 
carried away by his emotions, he ran after it, certain that his 
colleagues were, as usual, trying to play a prank on him.
        After ten minutes chasing the light (which speed seemed to increase 
at every second), it finally stopped moving. “Alright now, who the fuck 
are you?” He puffed, walking closer to it. Although Dick had his own 
flashlight on, he didn’t manage to get a glimpse of the carrier during 
the chase; but now. as he stopped meters away from the light, he was 
sure that he found the owner bizarrely laying on the ground, exactly 
under the focus of light Dick had been chasing. But before he could ask 
anything else, the young man froze in place, finally noticing the empty 
cavities in which eyes should be. Hovering a meter of two from the 
corpse under it, the ominous sphere of light kept shining for a second 
before disappearing. And when it did, a dozen more lit up.
        Dick couldn’t hear his own screams as he dashed through the woods, 
unaware of the direction he was going to in his panic. Whistles and 
whispers were now audible as more lights seemed to appear all around. 
Blind in his fear Dick only understood where his running took him, he 
had already lost sight of the ground beneath his feet; before he could 
even pray or scream, Dick was free falling from the cliff towards unseen
 ground. And for seconds he fell, until, with a gulping sound and 
excruciating pain, everything went pitch black.
                                                                                                ***
        “Gettap,” screeched a voice inside of Dick’s mind. He startled 
awake, uncertain as to for how long he was unconscious. Looking at his 
surroundings, everything seemed brighter now, although no sign of 
sunlight could be seen. As he looked down to better understand what was 
going on, Dick once again screamed, jumping away from the corpse on top 
of which he had fallen.
        “Found yourself just now, kiddo?” The scratchy voice manifested 
itself once again, echoing on the trees from somewhere Dick couldn’t 
see. “Who the fuck are you?” He sobbed, but felt no tears rolling down 
his cheeks. “I’m right in front of you,” the voice replied, causing the 
blonde man to, in shock, look at the crow perched on a branch. It glowed
 with an unnatural light, partially translucent. “What kind of prank is 
this, you sick bastards?” Dick looked at his sides once again, 
desperately trying to find a camera. “If you still think this is a 
prank, just look at yourself.”
        As he automatically looked at his hands, all blurred out for a 
second. He finally realized why everything didn’t seem as dark as 
before: he was the source of light. In his daze, no sound could be heard
 coming from the woods; at least not until he found the final clue to 
his current situation in the form of the corpse sinking in the mud in 
front of him, wearing the same clothes Dick remembered putting on that 
morning. “No,” he shouted, clumsy dashing in the air, just now realizing
 he was hovering over his own dead body. But he couldn’t be dead, not 
permanently, right? There should be a way to pull his body out! His 
attempts, however, were useless, as Dick found his hands going through 
it as if they weren’t real. Even more disturbingly, though, now that his
 eyes were getting used to the new source of light he had become, he 
could see that the shape of his ethereal hands wasn’t quite exactly what
 they should be: in fact, looking closer, they seemed to be… 
Disintegrating.
        “What is going on? I can’t vanish here!” He sobbed, looking at the 
ominous crow in desperation. “There’s nothing I can do. They lurred you 
here. You died,” Dick heard, still uselessly trying to push his body out
 of the mud. “It can’t be!” He screamed, watching his now petite hands 
moving without making any progress. “Oh, but fear not. If you were a 
weak soul, like those will-o’-wisps, you would already be a glowing orb 
at this point. Taking corporeal form after dying in this bog means you 
have potential. Tell me… What lurred you here?” The crow asked, its 
horrible voice taking a grim tone.
        “What do you mean? Those fucking ghosts did,” Dick asked, not 
realizing how the timbre of his echoed voice sounded slightly off. “No, 
you idiot, what brought you here, inside of these woods? For example, I 
came here to hunt crows… Stuff them inside my cabin. I lost account of 
how many years ago it was when I fell from the same cliff you did, 
running from the same fucking spirits. Before I knew... I was eating 
corpses,” the bird laughed bizarrely, watching as Dick’s hair wavered, 
growing slightly.
        ‘What brought me here?’ Dick asked himself for a second. He finally 
solved the cursed puzzle when he once again stared at the palm of his 
hand, where a small scar could be seen. The exact same scar Aiko had in 
her hand. “Wait, what?” He screamed, inadvertently floating back, moving
 his hands to his hair; it was a funny sensation: so far, he couldn’t 
feel the ground, his corpse, nor even the air. But when he touched his 
own head, he felt completely corporeal for a second, as the strands of 
hair went through his fingers.
        “I’m going to be turned into Aiko?” He asked, now finally noticing 
his own high pitched voice, a consequence of the shrinking of his Adam’s
 apple. “You came here for a girl?” The crow laughed sadistically. “No, 
you are not becoming the girl herself. Most probably your interpretation
 of her… Flawless, I suppose. The bog apparently sees this as the best 
way for its ghosts to lure more people inside it,” the crow explained to
 the desperate man, who was too busy staring at his own arms. If the 
idea of turning into Aiko wasn’t disturbing enough, watching his own 
body fading, getting rid of the extra mass, was overwhelming. His thin 
arms bore no sign of the fat it once possessed, his shoulders feeling 
disturbingly smaller than they should. But his attention was soon drawn 
to his own thoughts. As the changes spreaded and he watched his waist 
getting slimmer, weird and repetitive thoughts invaded his head.
        ‘What do I like the most about Aiko? I like that she is attentive, 
almost maternal. Yes, I’m attentive and maternal. No, I am yes I am, no 
I-’ Dick pressed his head strongly with his head, crying out loud. 
“What’s going on?” Once again, the crow laughed. “You are feeling your 
perception of her thoughts, kid. I feel the urge to eat corpses ever 
since I died, so I don’t think you are in any position to complain,” the
 bird mocked, amused by Dick’s suffering. Unaware of the provocations, 
the young man kept shaking his head, too focused on separating what was 
his personality from the personality the marsh was giving him. ‘She is 
provocative and sexy, like I am; I’m not, though, I’m like her, I know I
 have curves and I know how to use them to please the boys I care about 
and get them to do what I want,’ the thoughts kept rushing, to the point
 that he no longer could focus on the reshaping of his bone structure, 
on how his eyelashes felt longer, on how docile and girly his voice came
 out from his plump and provocative lips.
        But nothing could prevent him from completely ignoring his changes 
and, at the unnatural laugh of the crow, the man watched for the first 
time as his body received mass instead of losing it. Materializing in 
impossible ways, he watched in utter panic as his legs elongated and his
 thighs got plumper, the fat he once lost finding his way back in the 
lewdest ways possible. Once his butt followed it and started to expand, 
Dick was once again lost in his own thoughts, so he couldn’t hear the 
dirty jokes coming from the disgusting crow. ‘They will like to see 
this, I like to see my ass when we are in college, I look so hot I want 
them to follow me inside-’ Was everything that filled his mind before 
screaming a desperate “I don’t want to forget myself!”
        The crow’s voice raised over the thoughts and finally Dick could 
hear him again. “Oh kid, you won’t, don’t worry! You will remember 
everything, from your childhood to your drowning corpse… Whatever 
cynical god or demon created this unholy place, all it wants is for you 
to have the perfect personality to bring more perverts like you inside. 
And if my eyes are not lying to me, you must have been a huge pervert, 
indeed,” the bird playfully mocked, staring right onto Dick’s chest. 
Looking down, the man watched it growing, two orbs of ethereal flesh 
forming under his glowing skin, and, disgusted, saw his own penis 
getting hard inside of his pants. ‘Seeing how hot I am gets me horny and
 when they see I’m horny they fall for me,’ she thought, screaming out 
loud as her breasts finally sprouted free from a disintegrating 
immaterial shirt. Her penis now stood out, the only remarkable trace 
of who she was, now a mere shadow of its living form.
    It shrunk at every second and, no matter how much Aiko tried to hold it,
 her mind was dazed, dragged by her new vision of herself. She was 
attentive and maternal, but also sexy and provocative. She was aware of 
her body, and got horny just by thinking of what she can make out of it.
 She can’t help but drag boys where she goes and she is the queen of 
stares. She likes to control those that like her, it just makes her 
horny. As she reflected about who she was, she for a second forgot about
 everything else, floating in the air, just felt her own fingers pushing
 inside of her. On the branch, the crow opened its wings. “I think you 
are done. We will meet again, countless times, kid. For now, enjoy 
temporary oblivion,” he said, knowing the girl wasn’t listening, flying 
away from Aiko.
                                                                                                ***
        “They disappeared because they were alone,” said Hugo, as he laid 
inside the tent. “We are pretty much together, babe,” he whispered, 
lying closer to Naomi. “I know, it’s just… Pamela told me a man from our
 college disappeared here three years ago. They never found his body 
and… I don’t know, it’s Halloween, I suppose everything feels grimmer,” 
she explained, trying to tell herself everything was going to be fine, 
feeling her naked body shake in fear. “You were the one who suggested 
it, babe. We have been telling how much we wanted to bang, how hard it 
was with your boyfriend being suspicious all the time… Now it’s 
something new, it’s wild, and we can finally make it,” Hugo spoke, 
sitting close to the tent’s opening.
        Naomi was going to reply, but something seemed to have grabbed 
Hugo’s attention. Chills went down her spine as he slowly spoke. 
“There’s someone outside.” Disturbingly, though, Hugo’s erection didn’t 
seem to be affected by it. “What? You are scaring me...” She whispered, 
covering her body, not daring to look outside. “It’s just a girl 
wearing… A sweater? Hey, you, wait,” he yelled, getting up. “She saw us,
 damn it. Wait right here, I’ll be right back!” He said, putting on his 
pants and dashing towards the woods. Ten minutes went by when Naomi’s 
fear got too strong and she peeked outside the tent, hoping to see her 
lover; instead, she saw, in horror, the pale girl, who giggled and ran 
away. Before long, Naomi was after her in the woods. Ignoring her 
natural and protective fear of what she couldn’t comprehend.
                                    

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