Johnny Renfro made one last check over his shoulder, making certain no eyes were upon him, then slipped into the underbrush and disappeared from view. He wasn’t supposed to get out of eyesight from the house and he certainly wasn’t supposed to go into the woods, but he was nine years old now and he was going to do what he wanted.
He had wandered onto an old, overgrown path a few years ago while playing. His father had tanned his hide good and grounded him for a week when he finally found him. He was determined to find that old path again though. Last time it had led him to a broken down old barn, hidden back in the recesses of the woods, buried beneath a growth of vines and twisting branches. His father had scared a year’s growth out of him when he had suddenly grabbed him by the arm just as he was about to slip inside the decrepit building.
His father had practically dragged him the entire way home, berating him every step of the way. He heard about the dangers of the old barn, it being rotten wood, rusty nails, and something more. Something dark and sinister that his father merely hinted at.

Having managed to sneak away unnoticed, Johnny pushed his way through low hanging branches and thick shrubbery, stumbling over large, heavy roots which seemed to jump up out the ground everywhere he stepped. A thin branch whipped at his face as he passed, leaving a stinging red line across his cheek. The trees seemed larger and closer together the deeper he went, their canopy blocking out much of the sunlight making their forms seem much gloomier.
He still hadn't found the old path and he was beginning to worry that he wouldn't come across it before his mother or father noticed he was gone. Yet just as he was losing hope of finding it, he saw the faintest trace winding through the trees ahead. He burst forward with renewed vigor and began following it into the depths of the woods.
It had been two years since his last walk on the path, and he had to admit that his memories of it were somewhat hazy, but it seemed a much longer journey than he remembered the last time. As the minutes and footfalls passed, he began to feel uneasy. Perhaps he had stumbled onto a different path. Perhaps this one wasn't going to take him to the old barn. Perhaps this one didn't lead anywhere but into the deepest depths of the woods.
He gulped at the thought. Off to his left he heard the rustling of bushes and started suddenly, nearly tripping over an old root that he could have sworn had not been there only seconds before. His eyes scanned the bushes at his left for a good number of seconds, but there was no other sound or sign of movement.
He let out a breath of air as he realized he had been holding it the whole time.
Dummy, he told himself. It was just a bird is all. Just a bird.
He looked up the path ahead. It seemed even less a path the further along it went, almost like it was being swallowed by the woods.
For the briefest of moments, he considered turning back. He had an uneasy feeling about these woods and this path.
But then his resolved strengthed. He was Johnny the brave after all. No woods were gonna scare him. He would find that old barn and prove his father was wrong. It didn't hold any danger to him. He could go there and play anytime he wanted. He was Johnny the brave and he didn't fear anything.

Even with his new found courage, Johnny didn't hurry along at a breakneck pace. Though he didn't exactly care to admit it, he wouldn't have been disappointed if his father found him before he got much further along. He had come this far though, so there was certainly no turning back. The trees seemed to press all around him as he continued along the path. The canopy was thicker in this part of the woods, providing even less sunlight.
He wasn't sure how long he had been walking before he realized there was no more trail. He stopped nervously, wondering how he wandered off the path. Turning around, Johnny's eyes widened as he could see no trace of the trail in that direction. The light was too dim to try and trace footprints, if he had left any at all. He began to walk back in the direction from which he thought he had come, hoping to stumble across the trail again, but after a few minutes it became evident to him that he was only getting himself more lost.
Johnny couldn't remember ever being more nervous in his entire life. He had never been lost before .... well, except for that time at the supermarket when he was five, but that was an altogether different situation. He was about to yell for his father when he noticed something out of the corner of his eye. Turning in that direction, he was able to make out the top of an old barn through the trees.
How had he missed that before, he wondered to himself.
He started walking toward it, his nervousness receeding. He had found the old place again. That meant the path was there as well. He wasn't lost after all. He was Johnny the brave once more.

The old place loomed up before him like some great, majestic cathedral. The boards were rotted and crumbling, vines and twisted branches curled around the outside like some giant net, and there were fibrous strands of web scattered among them. It was probably one of the coolest places he had ever seen in his entire life. It was a dream playhouse.
He ran forward and stopped before the great barn doors. One hung from a single rusted hinge, the other seemed, for the most part, completely intact. His hand closed over the edge of the broken door and pulled. His fingers squished into a patch of webbing as the door creaked open.
"Yuck," he muttered as he wiped his hand on his pant leg.
The opening was just large enough for him to squeeze through. Johnny turned sideways and force his way through. Once inside, he stood in awe. It was even better from this view. Streaks of sunlight shone through the broken places in the roof and walls, creating a criss-cross of beams through the entire expanse. There was a ladder that led up to another level that was half the width of the barn. The perfect place for a base of operations. In fact, the whole place was perfect in every way except one --- there were spider webs everywhere.
It wasn't that he didn't like spiders. Anything that crawled and scared girls earned high marks in his book. It wasn't the spiders that he didn't like, it was just the fact there were so many webs you could hardly take a step without running into them.
Johnny started looking around for a stick that he could use to pull them down. It was a barn, so he figured there would probably at least be a pitchfork or something. He walked forward, tearing at the webs directly in front of him with his hands and arms, as he moved toward one of the far corners. It was dark in that corner, but he could see there was something propped against the boards.
Something cracked beneath his foot as he stepped in something brittle but squishy.
"Aw man," Johnny said aloud, thinking he had just stepped in a pile of manure.
He lifted his foot away and glanced down for a look. It wasn't manure. It was something entirely encased in a cocoon of webbing. He tore away part of the webbing with a brush of his hand, then jumped back when he saw it was the skull of some small animal.
"Johnny, you dummy," he said with a small laugh at himself for having allowed himself to be scared for that split second.
He kicked the skull away and then started back for the corner. He noticed a lot more small, web covered objects on the dirt floor and he stepped along. In fact, there seemed to be an awful lot of the web cocoons scattered all over the floor. He slowed his pace slightly, glancing warily at the small patches of webbing, but continued on to the corner.
He still couldn't quite make out the object propped against the boards there. He reached out hesitantly and touched it. The object, its precarious balance disturbed, fell forward.
"Ya!" Johnny yelped as he jumped to the side, narrowly avoiding the object.
It struck the ground with a clattering sound. The webbing which had encased it split in several places, pulling away just enough to allow him to see the bones inside. Only .... it wasn't really bones ..... it was taunt, decayed skin stretched over bones. It was a body.
The smell hit him a few seconds later. The cocoon of webbing had been so thick it held in the smell of rot and decay, but now that the webbing was broken in many places, the nauseating odor spread. Johnny stumbled back a step with a choking cough.
What an awful smell it was.
He was about to make a break for the door when his knees suddenly began to tremble. Were his eyes deceiving him? The body was ..... moving. The skin covering the torso seemed to ripple ..... almost as if there was something moving beneath.
Johnny screamed as the realization struck. Yet before he could move, the torso seemed to erupt. Hundreds of black, wriggling things flew from the devoured heart and covered Johnny like a blanket. He stumbled forward, his pitched shriek echoing in the old barn. He brushed at the creatures crawling upon his face and head in absolute terror. He could feel the bites of little mandibles on every part of his body. He ran forward through the beams of sunlight, clawing at the frenzied spiders.
They came out of the woodwork, dropping from the roof and walls, a wave of black moving across the floor to the flailing figure in the middle. They were everywhere on him at once, a sheet of poison death tearing into his flesh. They crawled into his ears, nose, and mouth as mixed screams of pain and terror continued from his throat.
He made it halfway to across the floor before his legs gave way beneath him. As suddenly as his face struck the ground, he could no longer move other than to twitch. He could still feel the thousands of tiny legs parading across his skin and through his insides. He could no longer breath or scream, his throat was so clogged with spiders. Every part of him burned cold.
Through the opening in the doors, he could make out something standing some distance outside. His vision was hazy and spiders continually walked across his eyes, but it looked like a person standing there.
Dad .... he wanted to say. But he had no breath or muscle control.
Please ..... help .... me ..... his mind screamed.
He couldn't feel the spiders anymore. It was still cold, but not burning. Just cold .... so cold. His eyes glazed over as to him the criss-crossing beams of sunlight were no more.

The weather-beaten man stood at the edge of the path looking upon the old barn. Other than the creeping carpet of black on the dirt floor, nothing moved inside.
His jaw was hard and set, but water brimmed at the bottom of his eyes.
He had warned him. Damn that boy.
This place was evil.
He wanted nothing more than to burn it, leaving only scorched earth behind.
Thousands of tiny, red eyes stared maelevolently at him from within the barn. He could feel them individually.
They were in the trees as well he knew, you just didn't see those. But they were there, and they knew when anyone or anything passed nearby.
This place was evil and he wanted to burn it and the spiders with it, but he would never get close enough.
The spiders would be upon him before he got within fifty yards of the place.
No one would ever burn this place.
So it had always been, and so it would always be.

End