JIMMY FACED thedoor, his pudgy knuckles white as they hovered inches from it.

"Are you gonnaknock, dude?"

"I'll knock, Ijust..."

"Yeah?"

Jimmy put his handdown, and he and Steve turned to Rich, who was standing just behindthem.

"It's just thatwe've got to tell him what to expect."

"What to expect?Dude, it's just Ian."

"Yeah, it's Ian."

There was a longpause, then...

"Yeah, you'reright. Dude, let us do all the talking."

"Only saysomething if he talks directly to you."

"And don'tmention Jenny."

Steve looked atJimmy, a bit puzzled.

"Why not, dude?"

Jimmy's voicelowered to a whisper.

"He doesn'tknow."

Steve looked evenmore perplexed.

"Know what?"

Jimmy turned backto Rich and raised his hands, pleading.

"Just please, letus do all the talking."

Without waiting fora response, Jimmy turned on his heel back toward the door, raised hisfist to knock, lowered his head to steel himself, and then took theplunge and knocked shave-and-a-haircut into the door.

There was whatseemed to be a really long pause, then, from the other side...

KNOCK KNOCK.

Steve and Jimmylooked at each other.

"Is that somekind of secret knock?" Rich asked.

"Just come in,Jimmy," came a booming bass voice from the other side.

They entered theroom to see Ian as he walked away from the door, slouching into achair at his desk, spinning toward them, and crossing his right ankleacross his left knee.

"What can I dofor you gentlemen? Oh, hey..." Here he uncrossed his legs andleaned forward, extending a hand to Rich.

"You must be RichArmstrong."

Before Rich couldanswer, Jimmy interrupted, beaming.

"How did you knowit was me?"

Ian withdrew hishand and looked at Jimmy, frowning.

"Shave and aHaircut? Really, Jimbo? You tell me. How did I know?"

Before Jimmy couldanswer, Ian scooted his chair toward Rich and extended his handagain.

"Ian McDermott.What brings you?"

Rich looked towardJimmy, whose already normally squished-together features seemed to becollapsing even further into the gravity well of his nose.

"I didn't askhim," Ian growled. Rich snapped back to look at him, shot a glanceto Steve, then handed the bag he had been clutching to his chest overwithout a word. Ian took it, never taking his eyes away from Rich's.

"You know. Youdon't have to fear me. I'm here to help."

"I'm... I'msorry. You're just... kind of intense."

"I'll take thatas a compliment."

He looked at thenote.

"Who's J?"

"Jenny."

"Jenny Who?"

"Jenny Sobek."

"Sobek? Does shehave the head of a crocodile?"

"What?"

"Sobek was theEgyptian god of the Nile. He had a crocodile head, and governedfertility."

"Oh. Right."Rich had no idea what to say at this point as he listened to Ianspeak. The Man in Black, still dressed in his customary attire in hisown room right before lights out, began to open the package.

"Should I askwhat I'm going to find in here?"

"Jenny and I werein the chapel, and..."

"Alone?"

"Yes, alone."

"Hm."

"Umm, ok. We werein the chapel..."

"You saidthat..."

"...and it gotdark, and Jenny turned around and she just had this stuff on her."

"Ian pulled theshirt out of the bag, and held it open in front of him, turning itover to inspect both sides fully.

"'Stuff?'"

The 'stuff' inquestion was gone. There was a stain on the shirt that looked greasyor waxy, but the substance was no longer present.

"It... honestly,it looked like... semen."

"Well, that'swhat happens when you go into the chapel alone with a girl."

"No! It wasn'tlike that!"

"Then what was itlike?"

"We were justtalking!"

"You weren'tdoing anything else? At all?"

Rich was sweating."N-no. I mean, we kissed a bit, but..."

Jimmy gasped. Stevesaid "My man!"

"No!" Richblurted again, but Ian waved him down.

"Cool it, kid.Looks like you've got a case of a phantom smee."

"What?"

"A phantom smee.You got smee'd on."

"What?"

"You say that alot."

"He does, dude,"Jimmy added. Steve looked at him, his own frequently-used wordstolen.

"Stop it. Anyway,smee... it means exactly what you think it means. You've beenejaculated upon by an Incubus."

Rich felt the roomgo quiet. He thought at first Steve and Jimmy would be just asbackhanded by the mention that some sort of sex demon might be real,and active on this campus. However, both of them were just looking athim solemnly.

"So, a demon?"

"A demon," Ianresponded bluntly. "A masculine spirit that feeds on sexual energy.Yes."

"And so, you'rejust saying that's real?"

Ian frowned, thenlooked around the room.

"Where are you?"

"The dorm?"

"In a broadersense. Where are the dorms?"

"At the school."

"Which is a...?"

"Seminary?"

"Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding.Are you telling me you're at seminary and you don't believe indemons?"

"I mean, Ibelieve in them, but, I never heard of them doing things, like...physically in the real world."

"Oh, then youaren't looking hard enough."

Rich stopped again,once more at a loss.

"Are we gonnahave to take the drive?"

"What drive?"

Jimmy leapt up.

"Ian, he's notready for that!"

"How do you know?You haven't done it yet yourself."

Jimmy was silentfor a second, biting his lip.

"Nobody's readyfor that," he sighed.

"Can I come withhim?" Steve asked. Looking at Jimmy, he added, "I've done mine."

Jimmy looked hurt,but this wasn't hard to accomplish.

"Well, wenormally don't do it that way. But he could probably use someemotional support for this. I'll go get Phil."

Ian led them to theroom Rich had seen him enter the other night. He motioned for them tostay put, then he knocked on the door.

"Come on. We'vegot a ride to take."

It sounded likethere was about to be some complaining, but Ian came back just as itstarted.

"It'll just be asecond."

After a moment,there was a knock on the door, and Ian held it open as a man a coupleyears older than them with glasses, short black hair, and a smallmustache rolled out of the room in a wheelchair.

"Rich Armstrong,this is Phil Gregory. Phil, Rich."

The man in thewheelchair grunted and nodded.

"Let's get thisover with then."

As Ian pushed Philout to the parking lot with Jimmy close in tow, Rich fell back withSteve.

"Is that whatJimmy meant by 'he doesn't know?' He doesn't know Jenny? At all?"

"He's been a bitof a hermit since stuff really started going down, dude."

"Then why did shehave a crush on him?"

"Have you seenthat dude?"

Rich wouldn'tconsider Ian handsome, per se. The first word that came intohis head was 'scary.'

But he did havequite an aura about him.

"And who's Phil?Why haven't I seen him?"

"He's a student,but he listens to the class on tape. You only see him in class whenthere's a test. He... well, let's just say he doesn't like...anything. Or anyone. And they give him a pass because of the chair."

"They seem to getalong." Rich nodded toward where Ian was pushing Phil.

"They both haveseen some crazy stuff. And done some crazy stuff. You know why he'sin the wheelchair?"

"No?"

"No, no one butIan does. But we do know one thing... if you ever see him in theshowers, it looks like his entire back has been mauled by a bear."

"What?"

"Dude, stop. Youdo say that a lot."

"Well, I mean...was he?'

"He's alsoterrified of red lights. And both he and Ian have to close the shadesin a room when it's dark out and the window is solid black."

"What does thateven mean?"

Steve grew solemnagain, and for a second time in the week he'd been here, Rich heardthe most ominous two words...

"You'll see."

- - -

The ride had beenan hour of almost complete silence, with Marty Robbins music playinggently in the background. Ian drove a 1986 Plymouth reliant stationwagon, bright yellow, which had been dubbed "The Yellow Submarine"by most of the students but which Ian and his inner circle referredto as "Betsy." In happier times it had been the car of choice formost students seeking a fun night out. Tonight, Rich kept wanting totalk, but there was a generally sullen mood about Betsy's occupants.

"Here we are,"said Ian.

Just as he did, thestreet light above the car flickered out.

"And there's thesign that things are about to get funky," Phil added.

"Don't worry,dude," Steve leaned in toward Rich. "That always happens."

"And it's alwaysfunky," said Ian. Phil remained quiet.

Ian turned left andpulled off the main road and onto a smaller, densely tree-coveredsmaller lane bearing the sign "Old Mill Road."

Rich read the signaloud.

"'Snake Road,'most people call it," Ian said, "and there's a reason why, eventhough most people who call it that don't know what it is."

"What is it?"Rich asked.

"In 1963,"began Phil, turning toward Rich as best he could, grimacing a bit ashe tried to conceal the pain this caused, "a cult to the Egyptianserpent god Set moved into the eponymous 'old mill.'"

"They werekidnapping children from surrounding neighborhoods for sacrifice,"Ian continued. "In 1996 I followed a group of them here from RhodeIsland. The Temple of the Black Serpent, one of the biggestnon-mainstream Setian cults in the world. Most public ones don't holdto ritual sacrifice, but this one was absolutely unconstrained by thelaw. No police officer would touch a member.

"The one in RhodeIsland learned their lesson from the incident here," he said,pointing out the window. Across a small river, Rich could see theburned-out ruins of an old stone mill.

"They couldn'tjust steal kids," Phil added, "because people caught on andshowed up with torches."

"So," said Ian,his eyes still straight down the road, his hands at ten and two,"they got smart. They lured kids in with promises to teach themreal magick. The ones that showed an aptitude, they allowed to join,and had them do gradually worse and worse things. It started withstealing from their parents... burning the family dog..."

Phil squeezed asmuch of a turn toward Rich as his body would allow, and locked eyeson him. "...and progressed to them becoming full fledged members ofthe cult by sacrificing the ones that didn't show potential."

Rich stared blanklyback for a second, until he was able to muster up something to say.

"You just told medemons were real... okay, I already kinda believed that, I justdidn't know how far it wernt. But magick?"

"The Bible saysnot to be a wizard," said Phil. "How can you be a wizard withoutmagick?"

"But, that's justa different type of religious belief. It's just like prayer. The onlyreason the Bible says it's bad is because it's prayer to other gods.Beside God."

Ian and Phil seemedto sigh heavily in perfect synchronization. Then, Ian's voice becameeven more dark and gravelly than usual.

"You hear insermons all the time about the milk and the meat of God's Word. Youand the people teaching you all think you know what the meat is. Inthe story of David and Goliath, you get all smug because you candecode that it's talking about overcoming adversity. Let me tell youboy... you are in fourth grade. You're sucking down the bottle andmissing the steak."

Ian stopped thecar. At this exact moment, Rich realized how dark it was. He had beenlooking at the talking pair in the front so intently that he didn'tnotice it was now so dark outside, despite the light of a nearly fullwaxing moon, and he certainly hadn't noticed that there was some kindof a black dog snarling in the seat next to him where Steve had been.

He gasped, jumpingaway from it, but when he turned to face it, there was nothing therebut shadow.

Ian turned to facehim, slowly, seriously... and then, Rich heard the words that changedhis life forever...

"Everythingis real."