Caroling has been a tradition for years, so it’s really no surprise when you hear a soft chorus from outside. What is a surprise is the fact that it’s three in the morning, and the moment they start singing you feel a chill in the air. It’s a song you’ve heard a hundred times before, but something about this version makes you go cold. If you move to the window, you will find no carolers, but the song is loud enough that you know you should be able to see them. They sing one song, and then there is silence. An eerie chill lingers, and your dreams are haunted by strange voices. You’ll probably never be able to hear that song again without feeling a chill.
Drew had finally slept peacefully for the first time in days, when he was awakened by an eerie sound that chilled his blood. He lay there in the dark, trying to figure out what this blood chilling sound was. Was it, could it be, people singing? Was someone actually singing out there in the dark, cold, and snowy night? Well, yes, it was near Christmas, so he did suppose that they were caroling, and yes it did seem to be a Christmas Carol that they were singing. But for Pete’s Sake, what time was it? It had to be really late. He looked at the lit up clock. Oh hell, it was three in the morning, what the heck were they doing caroling at this time in the morning?
And now that he was awake and he was thinking about the singing he realized that its eerie sound of the caroling gave him a chill unlike any other. The hairs on the back on his neck stood up rigidly and goosebumps rose in an instant, on his arms and legs. He felt like someone had trod on his grave, or a ghost reached through him, or what ever people say when they get that creepy feeling, and there is a chill in the air.
And why did this Christmas Carol scare him so? He mused. He’d heard and sang it himself a million times before? The carolers were loud and clear enough to be outside and below his frosted bedroom window, so he got up to check them out. However, when he got to the frosted window and looked out, there was not a person there. He looked in every single direction he possibly could but there were simply no carolers. Yet the impossible eerie chorus continued.
Finally, the Christmas Carol came to an end. Drew held his bated breath waiting for the next creepy one, wondering what damage it would do. If the last one was creepy then it was surely the forerunner for this one, that would do some damage and he would have to just into action. But it never came and he never had to. There was only silence – an eerie, chilling silence. Drew must have waited another hour, before he found his way back to bed and it seemed like more hours had passed before he got to sleep.
He never did figure what exactly happened that night, though he discussed with other powered people he knew and would continue to meet, friends, allies, neutral and even enemies. No one ever admitted to having an experience quite like that.
For the rest of that night, and many nights to come, his dreams were filled with the sound of that haunting Christmas Carol with no carolers. Indeed, for years to come, whenever that Christmas Carol was played or sung, the hairs on the back of Drew’s neck still rose, and goosebumps still popped up on his arms and legs. He refused to sing that Christmas Carol for the rest of his days and some of his later reincarnations would hate that Christmas Carol, once they remembered it.