The porch light was flickering in the night as Cletus and Jenbola made their way up the steps. They creaked, but it didn’t matter. The people who were home weren’t going anywhere. Cletus had come here last night to prepare everything. The bodies were tied up, facing each other. Mother, father, and children. Opening the door he gestured the woman inside, “Ladies first,” he told her before letting out a chilling giggle. There was a zap as a moth flew into the bug lantern and Cletus looked at it and licked his lips. “Interesting.” He said, filing that idea away for a later date. Today he was going to see what she could do. 

Jenbola moved through the house, hands slightly outstretched as the lights weren’t on. “Where are they?” she asked as she stopped in front of the stairs. She glanced up and then looked at Cletus who was stood there rubbing his hands together and smiling. Raising her eyebrows she nodded before ascending the stairs, her footsteps muffled on the carpet. As they got closer they could hear the whimpers of fear and the sound of a slight struggle. They knew they were here and they were trying to break free.

As she got closer and closer,  in a soft voice Jenbola began to sing. "Ring around the rosie, pocket full of posies. Ashes, ashes, they all fall down. She pushed open the door and looked at the family gathered here for her. “For me?” she asked, her eyes wide as she looked at Cletus. 

“Yes, show me what you can do.” He told her before tilting his head to the side and nodding. “But maybe let me finish off one. Yes.” With his creepy chuckle, Jenbola smiled and skipped around the room. “Einey, Meany, Miney, moe…” and with each word she tapped the captives on the head. 

With each tap, a new symptom would appear. The mother’s hair started falling out and her face turned a lovely shade of blue. The Father’s face was quickly turning gaunt and his body turned red as he was taken by a sudden fever. And the children, oh the beautiful children. She stopped and stared at them. “I always hated little shits like you.” She said before holding one hand to the middle child’s forehead and laughing with glee as their skin started sprouting sores that then seeped pus and infection. She moved on to the other two, one with a hand on the chest started coughing until blood was appearing, and the second started throwing up so hard that Cleetus wondered if he’d free himself from his bonds. 

“Beautiful.” He said as he watched her, “but now I want to play.” He pulled a knife out and moved to the children. “They’re the future, you know.” He said before laughing and pulling the steel blade across their throats. He carried on working, making sure each child was dead, and when the last one started to bleed out Jenbola once again started to sing. 

“Ring around the rosie, pocket full of posies, ashes, ashes,….”

She then put one hand on both the husband and wife’s shoulder and squeezed, pulling the little strings inside them that fought infection and disease. She watched, as lesions appeared on their skin, as their flesh melted away. Watched until they were practically skeletons and finally, when they opened and closed their mouths like a fish out of water, desperate to get some air into their dried shriveled lungs. Jenbola smiled, still humming,"

“They all fall down.” 

Stopped and listened to the last fleeting beats of their hearts until silence filled the room. She cautiously looked up at Cletus and gave him a slow sick smile, “Well that was fun.” She told him just as the man started to clap his hands together softly. 

He looked down at her with pride and had to admit he was rather impressed with her tactics. Sure, draining the blood from your victims and making them slowly suffer from bullet wounds was one thing – but taking away their very health and vitality? Why that was something extraordinary to watch. 

“Well, its decided,” he said as he wiped his blade clean on his shirt before pointing the tip of the blade at her. “I think it is time to see what you can do when given a bit of freedom here in New York.” He tucked the blade away as she hesitantly stepped closer. 

“What?” she said looking around, “You mean… go around infecting people?” she asked her eyes lit up at the thought of murder. 
Cleetus chuckled and shook his head. “No… Well yes, but also no.” he handed her a set of keys to a building not far from his. “I think its time we spread our special kind of madness a bit further, don’t you?” he asked her. 

She started giggling softly as she clutched the keys in her hand. “Because who doesn’t love a bit of mental instability, eh?” she told him just as he flicked the lights off and they headed down the stairs and out of the house together, leaving the bodies to rot.