The Haunting of Shining Cliff 2 continues....

We came across the most awful sight that will stick in my memory forever. A man was hanging from a tree by a noose, blue in the face and struggling for his life. The gentleman ran towards him and heaved him down, only then did we notice a woman nearby - she had been the one screaming. She was like a wild manic, and before anybody could stop her she attacked the gasping man and slit his throat as he lay on the ground. We stood shocked and silent for what seemed like minutes and tried to comprehend what had happened. The wild woman curled up on the floor, rocking back and forth.

Uri and Dr. Stone insisted we take her back to the house to try and find out what this was all about. Lady Cananagh kept her distance but said she didn't recognise her even though it seemed she had been living in the woods for some time - her hair was matted and her skin was badly scratched and bruised. The mad girl would only mutter "Snow is gone", which was plainly wrong as it had only snowed a few hours before. After a time, Tarqiun with his calming voice managed to persuade her to say a little more. Apparently she had killed before and this was the last.

Strangely, the event didn't put us off our meal, and we settled down to a beautiful spread of the finest food and I found I had worked up quite an appetite with all the excitement. When the meal had ended, dear old Lizzie, I notice, had moved closer to Lady Cavanagh, and suddenly she started shouting out "It's you!" at her. I don't know what she did as I never saw her touch her, but Cavanagh just dropped dead! And to make matters worse, a heart appeared from nowhere, all bloody and very real! It was quite a shock to say the least, more so because no one was missing an organ, not even the late lady. I was glad things happened after the meal, but as it was it put me off my pudding. Her body was dragged away quite unceremoniously, might I add.

While we were getting over the shock of how events were turning (I was wishing I caught that train, I can tell you), two men in white coats turned up. Apparently working for Dr Stone, they were here to pick up Evans, who turned out to be a lunatic who had escaped from the local sanatorium. Fancy that, a madman in a midst! I had an idea there was, but my money was on Mr Bender, who at this point seemed to have forgotten his accent.

But I digress. The nurses swiftly went to work, strapping a straight jacket on Evans in seconds after beating him a little to ‘take the fight out of him’. Then they joined us in a cup of tea and a slice of cake, discussing the finer points of mental heath care (which, according to Dr Stone, involved giving the patient an enema. He assured me it worked in curing the mind). When they had finished, the nurses dragged the madman off to their van, giving him a kick on the way. It was good to see such professionals at work.

As we started to settle down again and I was thinking things could not get any stranger, chaos broke out. Evans reappeared, swiftly followed by one of the nurses. I thought Evans had managed to elude his guards but the man swiftly told of how they were attacked on the path by no other than Lady Cavanagh! I was inclined not to believe him, what with the man being a mental patient and Miss Cavanagh being quite dead and all, but the nurse backed up his story, saying of how his friend was ripped apart by her! He appeared quite terrified and he carried a number of wounds he insisted was caused by the undead woman. I didn't know what to do, but apparently Henry Stephens did, and he proceeded to shoot the nurse dead, which was most uncalled for and extremely messy. I don't know why he did it, but all Henry had to say was "It was for his own good".

I was really beginning to wish I caught that train now.

While everyone was deciding what to do (with Evans, with Henry, with the body of the nurse), there was a tap at the window. There stood Lady Cavanagh and the other nurse: very pale, very bloody, and very dead, yet very much moving. Chaos erupted again, with a number of people drawing weapons from nowhere and blasting at the windows, which seemed to scare off the - if I may use the word - zombies. Just as we were beginning to count our blessings (and work out the fastest route to the cars) the nurse that Henry shot began to stir and groan. No one wanted to take the chance that he simply might still be alive, and so we threw him outside to face the mercy of the zombies. It was for the best, I think you'll find.

The attacks continued, yet we managed to fight them off with cunning, guile and a strange mirror that someone found with an odd marking on it. During the quiet moments, a number of people examined the pieces we had been left in the will and found clues hidden within them as to what was happening. Professor Todd translated some Egyptian writing, which led us to find out one thing:

We were in deep do-do.

Someone, I don't remember who, said something about a charm, an item that may help. We found out that Lizzie knew where the charm was, and after much pleading by us (she had slipped into a semi-catatonic state at the news of the zombies, her last words being, "Not bloody more of them") she agreed to let a small number of us go with her to retrieve it, myself included. I think it was lucky she agreed when she did because I spied Dr Stone readying his enema kit.

It was pitch black outside, and I immediately regretted joining Jack, John and Uri on their trip with Lizzie. As soon as we started moving away from the house we were attacked by the scum bag undead. Guns did little but annoy them, and it was only by passing the mirror around ourselves we managed to reach the place where Lizzie had hidden the charm. Our fight back to the house was harder, with zombies, apparently maddened with our success, leaping off cliff-tops in their attempts to reach us. But, due to luck or divine help, we managed to reach the house without losing a single member of our group.

It was only afterwards that we found out that the charm did - and please excuse my less than unladylike language here - bugger all.

The zombies attacked the house again soon after we made it inside, but this time we were too slow on the offence. With the moans of a thousand forgotten souls, the undead swarmed in through the back door and grabbed the nearest person - Evans. With his shouts of fear and rage joining in with the groans of the zombies, Buffy was dragged away into the night, and there was little we could do (although I noticed no one actually tried to do anything).

The attacks were wearing down our rapidly diminishing party, with madness infecting the group like some sort of wild plague. At one time Jack Shannon stood up and announced that the hammering at the door was his friends trying to get in, even though we could see through the window that it was the vile undead. He was quietly led into a corner and sat down.

Then the attacks stopped, which worried me greatly. My anxiety was proven right when, seemingly through the wall, stepped the most evil creature I have ever seen (though I heard one person say ‘It looks like we've managed to piss off Peter Pan’). I ran, as did everyone else, but many of our party were killed by the monster, torn limb from limb. We scattered into the forest, and for a while I thought I was the only one to survive. Then, slowly, we began to gather together again, our numbers severely depleted. The creature was no where to be seen.

We used the lull to our advantage and launched into a frenzied attempt to translate as much as we could and understand what we could do to defeat this evil. We had a lot of help from Jenrick and Taylor, who, much to my and everyone else's surprise, knew an astonishing amount about the occult, even being able to translate words in the blink of an eye. Finally, we had a plan (and a ritual). It wasn't a moment too soon: the evil struck the house again just as we were putting the finishing touches to the ritual. But something went wrong; our plans didn't work. I saw Jack go down with a zombie Uri. I saw the dead attack in greater numbers. Then they came for me....