Gamebooks (Choose Your Own Adventure Style)

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Part 1


Escape From the Haunted Warehouse, unlike other Chooseco books, is labeled #185 as if it were part of the original series.  According to gamebook legend, it was meant to be released in the 1990s, but didn't for some reason.  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse the Star Fox 2 of CYOAs.  As a further reference to the legend, the map on the back of the book says "From the Lost Archives".  The map itself is conventional:  no time loops or Second Chance Endings here.


The one way to tell whether the legend is true is if cell phones are awkwardly inserted into a 1990s plot.  That happens to many reprints of children's books. . .


Unlike most other CYOAs, Escape From the Haunted Warehouse has a map of the setting in the front.  The only other one in the thread that does this is the half-forgotten El Misterio de la Casa Abandonada.  Parking is to the west, with a road connecting to it from the south.  In the southwest corner is the creatively named "Underground Complex" with no rooms. 


In the northwest corner lies Winchester Complex, probably named after the Winchester Mystery House.  It has a "Forbidden Room" in the right corner, which probably has the sort of Latin occult books that would drive you mad.  In the southeast is the Dahmer Complex.  How did Anson Montgomery get away with a serial killer named building in a children's book?  It has a LaLaurie building in the south, which might be a reference that eludes me.  There's a White Room, Green Room, and Red Room in there, which implies the architect of Ultimate Ending's Aurora Hotel designed another CYOA.  Red Room may or may not be a reference to the place that frightened Jane Eyre.


Outside to the north of Dahmer Complex and east of Winchester Complex is Big Gulch.  In the farthest northeast is Crystal Lake, where Jason Vorhees must be preparing to kill the next bus of insufferable teens.


A picture of a fake newspaper clip to the left of the first page says this:


GENERAL

***SUPER SUMMER***
***JOB OPENINGS***

Are you exceptional?  A self-starter?  Able to work on your own?  Open to working the 'graveyard' shift?  Not bothered or scared by working in the darkness of deep night?  If the answer to all of the above is 'YES!', then apply for our new Warehouse Intern position!  Tired of the cut-throat, rat-race real world?  Spend your summer preparing for magical, mystical and mysterious productions!  Competitive wages!  Frequent light and occasional heavy lifting required.  Apply in person at our facility at 999 Kiln Road (2 blocks past the old crematory).  No calls.  Mon-Weds. 11 PM-3:30 AM EEOE.  All beings welcome to apply!  No background check!  POSITION MUST BE FILLED!!!  APPLY TONIGHT!


In spite of the finger quotes around 'graveyard', I've seen more dubious job advertisements in my inbox.  There are also other job advertisements to the left and right that are cut off.  For some reason all the other classified ads are in Pakistan:  one is for an executive in the "Lahore region", another is for a Sales position in Islamabad, and another involves "accounts for leather" in Karachi.  Since neither the writer nor the illustrator seems to be Pakistani, I'm wondering whether they took a picture of a real newspaper and inserted the Haunted Warehouse classified ad in the middle.  Am I the only reader who pays attention to this stuff for the sake of a cheap joke?


There's enough story to deal with that the plot should begin in the next part. . .

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Part 2


Desperation is what motivates my character to take the Haunted Warehouse job.  I could probably write a dissertation about the connections between horror and the economy.  In Gothic literature like The Mysteries of Udolpho, the buildings are decaying because their current owners can't afford to maintain them, unlike their feudal ancestors.  Many stories involve buying or "winning" a haunted house for a suspiciously cheap price.  Luigi knows that plot.  Zombies prowl shopping malls in movies (Dawn of the Dead) and video games (Dead Rising) alike.  And there's the "unemployment forces protagonist to take a spooky job" genre, such as this book and the Five Nights at Freddy's games.


Mr. Del Grady is the manager, and informs me that I'm late at 12:01 AM, "after the witching hour".  Our hero wonders why we're only moving cargo within the warehouse, instead of shipping some of it.  Del Grady claims that the warehouse is for movie props and scenery.  My uniform is in a locker room labeled "Employees Only!".  I thought it was trendier to call them "associates".  Wages will go towards "tuition. . .books, school supplies, gas, and food".  This book may well be set in Pakistan:  there's no way to pay for an American college with a summer job!


I push around tons of "boxes and crates" with the help of a Model B-200 Powered Hand Truck, labeled "B-WARE1 for Warehouse #1".  B-WARE might become a major supporting character, since it gets its own illustration and my character talks to it.  The summer must be like the ones I'm used to in real life, since my character says "Hot tonight, B-WARE!"


When I first started pushing B-WARE1, "you would bang into the walls and go side to side like a bowling ball with kiddie bumpers in the gutters".  So more like a pinball, Anson Montgomery?  Mr. Grady says his door is always open, but it's really always shut.  Nobody else works with me, but sometimes I hear "BOOM-chunk-CRACK" from a machine, or right now a scream to the left of B-WARE!  B-WARE slams into the wall and breaks a pallet, and I'm not sure whether I just hit a person or animal. 


CHOICE #1 is whether to bust a flimsy door with B-WARE on Page 20, or try to find Mr. Grady so he can use a key on Page 30.  Would you rather trust a shifty manager, or a handtruck?  


B-WARE destroys the door, but it takes a couple of minutes to pull it back.  "Taking out your phone and putting it into flashlight mode, you look around".  Did I have a flashlight in the nonexistent original book?  A utility sink is spilling onto the floor inside, and I'm expecting a "trapped rat or raccoon".  The "scream" is water going down the drain, so I turn off the faucet.  The screaming stops, but the laundry moves!  But that's because a "huge rat with glowing red eyes" climbs into a hole close to the ceiling.


Mr. Grady asks me "What are you doing" as he sneaks up from behind.  Grady tells me he knew about the "Haunted Sink", and now he proposes CHOICE #2:  get a replacement door from the Dahmer Annex on Page 102, or a heavy poison bucket to kill the rats on Page 46.  He says the door is light "not like a dead body".  If you're following along, I'm on the right side of the CHOICE map following the vertical orientation.


I go to get the replacement door, and Mr. Grady shows me the map and hands me a green key.  According to the narration here, I've been working 2 months without any incident before the Haunted Sink.  He orders me to leave a note for maintenance so they'll know nobody stole the door.  I ask why there are no security guards to protect the cargo, and Mr. Grady says "Most people seem to avoid this place naturally".


By the time I reach Dahmer Annex, my phone has only 22% charge from using the flashlight so much.  I see paint supplies, workbenches, and "a series of scythes from handheld to enormous" for the inevitable Grim Reaper scene.  A door marked BUILDING SUPPLIES leads to a "shuffling noise in the blackness" which comes from a 9-10 year old girl named Mary hiding in the shelves.  She's wearing "jeans and a red sweater" in the text.  In the illustration, she seems to be wearing black clothes, and is a pale girl with dark hair.  Mary tells me her parents are dead, and doesn't want me to "tell on" her.  She wants to find her mom's ring, but I try to tell her to talk to Mr. Grady since it's 2:37 AM and she should be at home.


The story flips to Page 91, and the narrator is already questioning Mary's story:  "The door to the shop was locked when you got here".  Maybe Chooseco is truthful about Escape From the Haunted Warehouse being a 1990s book, given the reason you can't use your cell phone to get out of danger:  "You would use your cell, but the whole area is a big dead zone and you have to use the landline in Grady's office".  It's one of the more plausible ways of dodging the problem of cell phones in thriller fiction.


CHOICE #3 is whether to help Mary look for King Solomon's her mom's ring on Page 38, or to call for help on Page 120 and assure her I won't snitch.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Part 3


Mary implies that her "mama" is more of an adoptive mother.  There are other kids "as well as those who are no longer children" living in the warehouse.  Mary tells me the ring is in a box of sandalwood and cedar.  She doesn't bother to look herself, but instead tells me to move objects.  She pleads for me to open the locked drawer, which my character initially refuses to do because "It's locked for a reason".  The combination is 9696 because it can be read upside down.


"A peaceful smell pours into you" as our hero opens a box, which has a jade ring resting on purple velvet.  Mary says she can rest now that she has the ring, and she glows with green light before fading out.  My CANONICAL ENDING begins when Mr. Grady shouts and asks what Mary and I had done.


"You can barely see it, but Mary smiles wider, sticks out her tongue at Mr. Grady and fully disappears.  'You!' Mr. Grady yells, pointing at you.  'You are in very big trouble!  Mary is irreplaceable!'  He is so angry, you have never seen him like this and it is scary.  He looks like he could murder you right now.  His hands clench and unclench.  He steps toward you, growling a little.


And then he begins to fade away, just as Mary did.  Mr. Grady stops and looks at his fading hand.  The look on his face changes from anger to terror.  'No!!!' he moans.  You hear the faint laughter of a young girl as Mr. Grady dissolves.  Then the shop slowly dissolves around you.  In just a couple of minutes you are in a normal, well-lit parking lot by a small, very ordinary warehouse building.  The whole complex is about a tenth the size of the warehouse that you entered earlier tonight.  Completely by itself, your car is the only one in the parking lot.  You get in and drive home.


The next day a package arrives.  Inside it is a small white box, and inside the box, on a cushion of white satin, is a crystal ring.  The ring is perfectly smooth, and you feel protected when you wear it.  When you took it to a jeweler, she offered you $10,000 for the ring, even though she did not know what it was made of.  You politely declined.  THE END".


Eventually our hero called the Ring "my precious" and lost it after a midget solved their riddle.


This is about as close to an Ultimate Ending as this book will likely get.  My character banishes the cursed warehouse and puts the inhabitants to rest, and gets a possibly magical ring that's worth $10,000 even if it does nothing.  Like Journey Under the Sea, I stumble into a Good Ending without really trying.  Except unlike Journey Under the Sea, I wasn't attempting to get my character killed in a funny way.


The illustration shows Mr. Grady standing in the doorway, arms stiff in a position that makes him look like he's trying to lean away.  He wears a light suit with stripes and has dark hair.  Mary is fading up to about the waist and has two pigtails on the back of her hair.  The protagonist is in the shadows so you can't see their face, but the head looks long and they have thick light hair.  (All drawings are in black and white.)


Results So Far


1 Good Endings

0 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 1


Mary is contrary when I refuse to help her look for the ring in CHOICE #3.


"I'm sorry, Mary, but I need to make sure someone responsible comes to get you', you say as gently as you can, reaching out with your hand to take hers.  'Mr. Grady won't hurt you.  You'll see.'  'Fool!'  Mary spits out, her face turning ugly.


Before you can react, she lunges forward and bites you in the fleshy area between the thumb and forefinger.  You can feel her teeth tearing into your hand, and the pain is overwhelming.  Snatching your bleeding hand away from her mouth and stumbling backwards, you watch as Mary runs to the door.  She stops and turns to face you.  Your blood is all over her chin.


'You should have helped me!' she screeches.  'Now you'll never forget Bloody Mary!'  After four surgeries on your hand, you get most of the functionality back.  Each time you see the scar you think of that night and how your world changed in one instant.  There are no mirrors in your house and you avoid looking at windows as much as possible.  Any time you look into something reflective, a scowling, bloody-faced image of Mary peeks at you from the edges.  No one else can see her, but you do.  Are you insane?  You don't think so. . .but still.  THE END".


Our hero avoids becoming a page in Foxe's Book of Martyrs, at the cost of their sanity.  Now they'll get a Sega Saturn with Sonic R and then play the music backwards at the mirror to summon another urban legend to fight Bloody Mary.


The illustration shows a mirror with the face of a pale girl with pigtails in her hair, and dark patches around blank eyes.  The wall around the mirror seems to be cracked stone.


One version of the Bloody Mary story calls her "Mary Worth".  Do they have the meddlesome comic strip character in mind?



Results So Far


1 Good Endings

0 Deaths

1 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings



If you're following along in your own copy who am I kidding no one is, go Right then Left on the blank map to get to CHOICE #3.  Left again leads to this ending, and Right takes you to the CANONICAL ENDING where all the ghosts disappear.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 2


Mr. Grady tells me to get the master key "with a strange intensity" when I agree to take the poison bucket in CHOICE #2.  I'm to place a scoop of poison in every room except for the Forbidden Room:  "It is clearly marked, and there are things that could be. . .unhealthy for you if you open that door".  He elaborates that there are "delicate experiments" inside.  Whether these experiments are consistent from CHOICE to CHOICE, or alter the plot entirely will determine whether Anson Montgomery writes like his dad R.A.


A room that smells of chemicals and has "scales, beakers, test tubes, and bags" looks like a mad scientist lair and makes my character tell B-WARE that this should have been the Forbidden Room.  The poison bucket has five gallons, and has RAT POISON and a skull and crossbones drawing written on it with a red marker. 


"Scooting down the hallway with the B-WARE cart and a bucket of poison is more fun than you thought it would be".  My character was mad long before meeting Bloody Mary if this is entertainment.  A drawing shows a white fair-haired teen boy holding the RAT POISON bucket close to his face.  The RAT POISON is pellets instead of liquid.


While passing through the rooms, we get some idea of the Haunted Warehouse's inventory:  "Castle Financials 1592-1648" or "Artifacts from Mary Celeste:  Captain's Log incl".  Is the 1648 date meant to be a reference to Charles I one year before the beheading?


One room has masks everywhere, from animals to the undead to aliens.  My character wants to leave as quickly as they can due to fright, but wasn't Mr. Grady's cover story that it was a movie prop warehouse?  The narrator insists I was scrupulous enough to avoid the Forbidden Room, but now I have to deal with "Animal Control:  AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY!!".


Animal Control's inmate is a giant wolfhound with blood on its muzzle, along with animals in cages like "cats, birds, and screaming monkeys" and a similar wolfhound.  (Which one of these is Jacob Black?)  The free wolfhound tips over the RAT POISON bucket and escapes as B-WARE fails to stop it.  The dog is now rushing at me, and CHOICE #4 is whether to enter the Forbidden Room on Page 74, or climb the ladder to the ceiling on Page 85.  You all want to see the Forbidden Room, but there has to be some suspense in these book reports!


(SPOILER ALERT:  The Forbidden Room does not immediately kill me judging by the blank map on the back, since there are more CHOICES no matter where I go from here.)


I bang my head against the metal ladder, yet manage to avoid a concussion or any other serious energy.  The wolfhound wants to climb the ladder itself, but opposable thumbs beat paws in this case.  Too bad I dropped the keys while climbing.  I'm now in a "cramped access area" and turn on my cell phone flashlight while carrying it in my teeth.  That's got to crack the screen.


A second ladder leads down at the far side of the corridor, and the dog's barking is now faint.  In the storage room are coiled ropes of various types, some of which are for mountain climbing.  (There's got to be a coiled snake in there, but the book doesn't use that jump scare here.)  Two doors are here, though neither is a CHOICE.  The metal door is locked with a combination, while the other says ALARM WILL SOUND. 


The Haunted Warehouse has the safety standards of a Pokemon Gym:  the emergency exit dumps me into the air!  Even my character has something to say about that:  "This is STUPID!  Who makes an emergency exit that opens up five feet above the ground?"  It's gotten much colder and drier outside since the beginning of the shift.


Now I'm in a gully that leads to a forest, probably Big Gulch from the map at the beginning.  I have to climb over fallen trees and sharp rocks with only an 8% phone charge remaining for the flashlight.  The weather is gelid and I can see my breath and "feel the cold deep in your lungs".


Backstory for the player character:  they have matches in their pocket since their mom likes candlelight at dinner.  When the phone's at 7%, I turn off the flashlight.  My night vision hasn't adjusted yet.  CHOICE #5 is whether to do the sensible thing and start a campfire on Page 52, or run through the woods in the dark like a found footage movie on Page 108.


I conk my head on a branch and twist my ankle, and when I use the 2% remaining battery from my phone to turn on the flashlight, I see a skeleton staring at me that gets its own illustration for a second.  My character snaps and shouts "I'll come back!  And I'll get my PAY THAT IS DUE!" 


There is sunlight now, but it's dim.  I'm not at the Haunted Warehouse anymore, as a nearby sign is in Japanese.  On the back is an English quote from Thoreau, in an illustration rather than plain font:


"I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, to  front only the essential facts of life and see if I could not learn what it had to teach and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived".


Two Japanese park rangers or police approach me and take me in their car to eat noodles and read a pamphlet.  One side is in "a rough English translation" that's Capitalized like an 18th century Book:


"Aokigahara Forest:  Please Consult the Police before you Decide to Die!  Lives are precious!  Do not end yours!  You will hurt the loved ones left behind.  Please enjoy the forest and the caves, but do not end your life here!  If you find the remains of someone dead, report to station".


More coherent than 1980s video game translations, at least.


"There is a picture of a happy couple exploring a cave amidst the green, moss-covered forest.  All you can think about is the skull staring at you.  You have heard of this place and know where you are:  you are in Japan, at the base of Mount Fuji, in the middle of the Suicide Forest.  A place where people come to die.  The people who rescued you think you came here on a mission to end your life-how could you possibly explain to them that you were actually just trying to complete your shift at your summer job, back in the United States?  They would think you are crazy. . .maybe your are?  You laugh and drink more of your soup.  THE END".


How many of the corpses are Persona 3 characters?


I had heard of Aokigahara Forest before writing these posts, so that's one piece of knowledge I share with the protagonist.  Guess this counts as a minor Good Ending, since the hero escapes the Haunted Warehouse, goes to Japan, and is fed.


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

0 Deaths

1 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings



Based on the map of the back of the book, I'm probably on Right-Right-Left-Left judging by the arrows indicating pages.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 3


Turns out lighting a fire is as good an idea as it is in the Hunger Games:


"It is hard to make out anything with the smoke and the night blindness caused by the fire, but something, or someone, is moving out in the forest.  Just the wind, you tell yourself, but you know that the wind has died.  Adding more fuel, you make a blazing hot fire that leaps high into the dark sky.  Still, things move around in the dark.  It is getting uncomfortably hot.  You keep your jacket on even as you start to sweat.  The sweat is from heat and nervousness combined into one hot, bad feeling.


A figure appears at the edge of visibility, between a jagged break in the rocks.  It comes to you slowly, and you can tell it is human, or was.  Its head lolls to the side at a deathly angle, and a slack noose with a rope ascending into the sky circles its neck.  Slowly, it moves toward you.  You back away, then turn to run.  All you can hear is the fire and your heart as you spin.  Coming from the other side of the fire are more figures with roped necks leading into the sky.


'No, no, no, no, NO!  STOP!  PLEASE!'  It does no good.  Some dead do not want to be disturbed.   THE END".


We have to assume this is still Aokigahara Forest, right?  The ghosts all have ropes around their necks, implying suicide.  No illustration here.  Making the stupid decision in CHOICE #5 gives you a Good Ending, and the more sensible option kills you.


The next few posts will feature the Forbidden Room when the time comes.


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

1 Deaths

1 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 4


The wolfhound is too slow to follow me into the Forbidden Room after CHOICE #4, and I slam the door shut.  The Forbidden Room doesn't immediately greet me with danger (or put an eye out in Arabian Nights style), only religious and fairy tale symbolism.  The decor looks like a "formal Victorian sitting room", and paintings of Eve, Pandora, Icarus, and Bluebeard hang on the walls.


My character sings "One of these things is not like the other" and tries to open the door again to see if the dog is gone.  It doesn't move, but the narration tries to reassure itself that the master key will still work.  I'm locked inside, and even shouting for Mr. Grady fails.  There's another door that the portraits are looking at, which could only be a good omen.  "Hopefully I'll be like Bluebeard's wife and someone will charge in to rescue me!" our hero says.


This new room has "scalloped wall sconces" with "flickering incandescent bulbs", a wood floor, and a corridor.  The wallpaper is yellow, which surely isn't a reference to a Charlotte Perkins Gilman story.  Doors along the corridor usually lead to empty rooms, but some have antique furniture, or a brick wall blocking the entrance, "and a set of stairs lead to a deadly fall down a dark chute".  Wait, my character looked before descending unknown staircases?  Their Intelligence score is clearly higher than most CYOA protagonists.


I can't come back the way I came even after hours of trying.  Time still passes, as my character is hungry.  One room does have other people:  "a blond man in a suit and a red-haired woman wearing a suit and a tight bun in her hair".  Blond and Redhead point guns at me and make gestures telling me to go away.  Eventually I retreat to a room with a "quilted queen bed" and "plush chairs".  Redhead asks "Who are you"?  My character refuses to make an introduction, saying "I'm just a kid!  I'm trying to get out of here!  Who are you two?"


Redhead knows about Mr. Grady because she's excited that I have his key.  She says "We're like the FBI" (i.e. not actually the FBI).  Redhead doesn't seem to have a name, but Blond is a foreign man named Agent Johnson.  She demands the key, and thinks Agent Johnson knows the way out.  Apparently part of the Haunted Warehouse is the Winchester Mystery House combined with the "Chicago World's Fair Murder House".  This last detail makes me think Escape From the Haunted Warehouse was written after the 1990s, as the Chicago reference was made popular in a 2003 book called Devil in the White City.


Redhead reassures me that "if we wanted to be jerks, we'd just take the key and leave you here, but we're on a mission".  She indicates she will "spare Johnson" after he leads everyone out.  CHOICE #6 is whether to give the master key to Redhead and Agent Johnson on Page 29, or keep it on Page 16.  Keeping the key results in this conclusion.  It begins with Redhead saying that they won't take the key now, but Agent Johnson shoots me in the head.




"CRACK!  A blazing pain spreads from the back of your skull.


You fall to the floor, twitching.  'Listen, Andre!  No need to hurt the kid!' the woman hisses.  'Not hurt.  Sleeping,' Johnson says.  CRACK!  You pass out from the pain.  You wake to someone gently shaking your shoulder.  The pain in your head is still monstrous, but better than it was.  You gingerly feel your head and your hand touches your still-sticky, blood-matted hair.


'You okay, kid?' the gray-haired woman asks you.  She wears a badge that says 'Winchester Mystery House, San Jose, CA:  My name is Agatha.'  She looks nice, but worried.  'How'd you get in here?  What happened to your head?  Are you all right?' she asks.  'Not really', you manage.  Your voice is hoarse and dry.  You notice that you are in the room with the bed and two chairs.  Bright daylight streams in through a window that wasn't there last night.


'Are we really in California?' you asks.  'Of course!' Agatha says.  'Why wouldn't it be California?'  I thought I was a long way from California.  I've never been there.'  Your head throbs.  'I think I need to see a doctor.'  THE END".


Now we know that the protagonist does NOT live in California, which makes the cover story of a Hollywood prop warehouse all the more suspicious.  It's a Bad Non-Death Ending even with the rescue because of the head injury.  Mr. Grady being inhuman continues in this timeline, but I'm not sure if he's a ghost in every scenario yet.


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

1 Deaths

2 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 5


Redhead takes the key after CHOICE #6 and says she'll wait for Agent Johnson in the White Room for 30 minutes as he takes me outside.  When we leave the room through the way I came, I see an "empty indoor swimming pool and into a dusty and unused kitchen" with ancient appliances.  Johnson explains that they're ghost hunters who specialize in evil spirits, "not the harmless ones that move ashtrays".  The narration has our hero wondering whether ghosts exist, which they should probably have figured out after working in a Haunted Warehouse for months.


Johnson falls into a trapdoor and attempts to extract himself from it after dropping his gun.  The party of ghost hunters should have brought a Thief with Find Traps.  Johnson screams "No, NO!  NOT YOU!" as he descends into the void.  "All you hear are scrabbly, skittery sounds, and then silence".  Is it a giant spider?  The narration won't say.  There is an illustration of Johnson about to fall into the pit.  In the picture, our hero is a dark-haired white boy covering his face with his right hand and wearing a shirt with a dark top half and a lighter bottom half.


I try to find Redhead to get the key back, and reach a place with audible "shouts, yells and gunshots".  It's Redhead in the ballroom confronting a "swirling mass of darkness that has the contorted face of an angry man".  It seems to be a fire-breathing ghost, and the gun does nothing.  Redhead must know cold iron works against magic, since she tosses a steel tomahawk at the "mass of darkness" to dispel it.


Redhead falls to the floor as smoke fills the ballroom.  She asks about Johnson and I tell her he's "gone".  The "mass of darkness" is actually the "spirit of the chief".  No American horror story would be complete without a "Indian burial ground" that seeks revenge against colonists.  Redhead had stolen the tomahawk named Night Breaker.  I offer to rescue her, but Redhead orders me to find the tomahawk because it can destroy the master key to exorcise the Haunted Warehouse.  She claims she's already dying.


CHOICE #7 is whether to rescue Redhead and flee the flaming Haunted Warehouse on Page 61, or get the tomahawk to destroy the master key on Page 94.


I grab Redhead by the arm and drag her through the ballroom, and she isn't heavy.  I open a lock with the master key and land in the garden.  Although I'm coughing from the smoke, I'm fine.  Redhead isn't breathing, and CPR doesn't work.  An EMT suddenly appears since I didn't notice them coming, and gives me an oxygen mask.  The firefighters successfully put out the fire.


"The unnamed woman you met with Agent Johnson doesn't survive, even with CPR from you and the EMT.  The official cause was listed as 'cardiac arrest caused by hypothermia'.  She had no identification on her and no one came to claim the body.  They called her 'Jane Doe' and put her in a municipal cemetery lot.


The police hold you as a juvenile suspect for the arson, but you know they think you either killed the woman or somehow caused her death.  'Who was the woman you were here with?  Did you have an altercation?  Did you set the mansion on fire?  How did you set the fire?  Do you know how much damage you caused?  Did you kill 'Jane Doe'?  How did you kill her?  Why did you run away?  How did you get to California from your home?'


Your parents fly out to get you, and they have questions of their own, but theirs are asked out of love and concern.  Everything you tell them is the truth as far as you know it.  No one is satisfied with your answers, including you.  Eventually the police let you go.  Your parents confront the owners of the warehouse, but there is no record that Mr. Grady worked there.


However, a final paycheck reaches you just a few weeks after you return home-and it's more money than you would have made over many years in Mr. Grady's employ.  Your parents suspect it's a settlement to hush up any bad publicity, but you all decide to keep it anyway.  It doesn't keep your bad memories of your days at the warehouse at bay, but it does help you to keep your gas tank full.  THE END".


This ending defies my categories.  Normally receiving a sack of money counts as a Good Ending, but it's more like a Monkey's Paw wish where it comes at the cost of mental trauma and the loss of the companion that I tried to rescue.  Redhead never reveals her name even in death.  (Unless it really is Jane Doe!)  I'll mark it as a Bad Non-Death Ending.


If my character is legally a juvenile, what is the "tuition" money for at the beginning?  I guess it's to save for college years in advance.  But will the settlement last while gas prices are at Deus Ex levels?


Results So Far


2 Good Endings

1 Deaths

3 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 6


For the last ending on the right side of the blank map, let's get that tomahawk in CHOICE #7.  I dodge broken glass and flames to reach Night Breaker, which is soaked in "foul-smelling green goo".  I strike the master key with Night Breaker, "and a flash of intense cold knocks you back".  The fire is gone, and everything is frozen, including the people.  The window shows only a "nothingness. . .Not gray, not black, not white, just nothing".


Redhead tells me her name at last:  Amanda Smith.  She suggests walking backwards and smashing all mirrors with Night Breaker.  Although Bloody Mary isn't in this ending, I wonder if that's what Amanda has in mind.  She says ghosts are "straightforward" and not "original thinkers".  Shattering the largest mirror leads to the entrance of the mansion.


"The door in the room with the cot is still dead-bolted, but it smashes open with one swing from Night Breaker.  Everything in the warehouse is silent and a thick layer of dust covers everything.  You hold the tomahawk up in case you run into Mr. Grady, a ghost, or something even more terrible.  Moving silently down the dusty hallways, you rush to the nearest exit.


Outside, it is night, and it is cold.  Your breath comes out in white puffs.  There are no lights on in the building and the parking lot is empty.  Half of the windows in the warehouse are broken and the remainder are boarded up.  The trees have lost their leaves and they are spread in uneven clumps around the parking lot.  Everything looks abandoned.  'Let's get out of here', you say.  'Town's this way'.


Seven years passed while you spent your last night in the warehouse.  Your family is both overjoyed and frightened by your return.  They have all aged.  Your little brother is now older than you.  Agent Smith is gone the next day, and she takes Night Breaker with her.  You never see her again.  The warehouse remains abandoned.  Rumors of noise and lights coming from it in the middle of the night are frequent, but you don't go to look.  THE END".


Isn't there an ending like this in The Cave of Time?  You return to what is roughly the present, but you realize everyone you know is now older.  It's a Good Ending since the combination Winchester Mystery House + Chicago World's Fair Murder House has been cleansed, and Amanda Smith survives.  And Ganon doesn't take over the world during the seven year absence.


We might get to know Mr. Grady better on the left side of the map, when I ask him for help with the Haunted Sink room in CHOICE #1. . .



Results So Far


3 Good Endings

1 Deaths

3 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

Choose Your Own Adventure:  Escape From the Haunted Warehouse Alternate Endings Part 7


In this alternate world, I abandon B-WARE after CHOICE #1 and rush to Mr. Grady's office.  No response after a knock, but I open the door anyway.  Mr. Grady is startled when I rouse him, since he's been lying on the floor.  When I tell him about screaming in a locked room, he asks "Huh?  What room?  What kind of scream?"  When I tell him "someone, or something, is in pain", he replies "Well, we don't want that!" and a laugh.  He claims his foot fell asleep.


Mr. Grady gives me the master key and I have to go without him.  The source of the noise is "A redheaded doll holding a knife in its left hand while screaming".  If you haven't guessed which character the doll is imitating, his name is Charlie, and he's a movie prop.  Mr. Grady turns off the doll and tells me the knife is fake.  There's an illustration of Charlie in case you want to give nightmares to your kids.


Charlie's room is really the office of Ottis Toole, the Chief Financial Officer, and Mr. Grady claims the doll was a practical joke on him.  I tell Mr. Grady I want to lie down in the break room, but he offers me a "homeopathic remedy" pill that is probably poison.  CHOICE #8 is whether to lie down on Page 32 and try to go home later, or take the pill on Page 63.


Mr. Grady's idea of a rest involves locking me in a room that has a cot.  He says "this is just a maintenance shift", and that the warehouse is much busier during the day.  I dream about rats biting my hands, and wake up to see a "youngish, in his thirties, and almost skeletally thin" man named James Hepburn, and a woman that's "old, with a grumpy face and squinting eyes" named Muma Padurii.  Both work for Human Resources:  James Hepburn's probably English, and Muma Padurii might be Romanian.


Ms. Padurii tells me that I will "reconsider your decision" about quitting the Haunted Warehouse job after talking to her and Mr. Hepburn.  My response?  "It's just a summer job.  I'm just a kid.  Mr. Grady locked me in here!  That's illegal!  I quit and I want a lawyer!"  Ms. Padurii threatens to put a note on my file and says I don't want another note. 


Mr. Hepburn gives me my next assignment:  "Anyway, due to your attitude, we're going to do his team-building exercises.  This will help you bond with your co-workers, as well as provide tools for problem-solving".  He then asks whether I'm management or labor.  Ms. Padurii scowls at Mr. Hepburn and says "He married into royalty, he has a hard time sympathizing with the common folk".  That doesn't make any sense even for this book's plot.  He talks like a corporate manager trying to follow the latest trends, not an aristocrat or prince.


Ms. Padurii says she loves children and licks her lips in a wolfish way.  CHOICE #9 is management on Page 42 with greater rewards and penalties for failure, and being a worker is Page 116 with the chance of an incompetent boss.


The "teammates" are named Malik and Sarah, and both are the same age as our hero.  Sarah doesn't think much of Malik's leadership.  We're in a cabin in the woods to check off another horror movie plot.  While they were dragging me there in a Jeep, Ms. Padurii's hand seemed to have talons, while Mr. Hepburn's hand felt "like frostbite".  Let me guess:  Ms. Padurii is a werewolf and Mr. Hepburn is a vampire.  They don't call me a Vampire Hunter for nothing.


Malik and Sarah aren't Haunted Warehouse employees, but they took equally dangerous jobs.  Sarah was a housekeeper at the Lizzie Borden House B&B, and Malik worked at the Stanley Hotel:  "you know, like the Shining"?  All three of us eat fruit from a bowl and "fall into a stupor halfway between consciousness and sleep" until an envelope appears under the door.  In spite of the place being named Crystal Lake, we're not supposed to sit there and wait for a hockey mask man to kill us:


You have been selected to join in the 'Wild Hunt' (aka 'The Most Dangerous Game')
Location:  Crystal Lake
Dress:  Casual/Tactical
Time:  Midnight til Dawn
Objective:  Get Away!
Survivors will be rewarded!
Listen to your leader!
(No RSVP required)


Sarah channels her inner Tina Warrior Princess with her own distinctive form of swearing:  "Rabbits!  This is going to be awful!"  Malik orders us to split up when we see red, blue, and green lights above the forest.  My character is smart enough to know this is fatal:  "Are you kidding me?  That is stupid move number one in any horror movie!".  Malik disregards the warning and runs away.


All three colors of light rush to Malik's road, descend to the ground, and fade out.  Odin must be ready to attack:  "You can see the black steam coming from the nostrils of the light-horses and one of the ghost riders lifts its arm back to throw a spear."  Tossing a rock is ineffective, but a deus ex machina ending works better.


"You are afraid, but you don't move.  You cannot run any longer, as you are too tired to continue.  The flying host gallops down at you.  The rider launches its spear, but at that moment, the first ray of dawn strikes from the far horizon.  With no noise or any other indication that the murderous host was just there, they disappear. 


You are alone on top  of your boulder, and the sunrise is the most beautiful of your whole life.  From that moment on, you gain a confidence in yourself that allows you to achieve great things.  There is no sign of Malik, Sarah, or the cabin, but you know you did not dream what happened.  THE END".


The narration never mentions Odin here:  that was just my limited knowledge of the Wild Hunt myth.  Surviving an attack from the Aesir by dawn's light assures our hero would never convert to Asatru.  Maybe they'll take up Akhenaten's sun worship?  The "confidence" part suggests the protagonist will succeed in life, so that counts as a Good Ending.


Results So Far


4 Good Endings

1 Deaths

3 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings