text: [Themes: Horror, Lovecraftian, city, Lovecraft, self-mutilation, horror, body horror, female protagonist, strong NPCs, changing environment]
  
  > Go down
  As quickly as you are able, you scramble down the rough stone walls. Ten feet from the bottom, you slip, landing with a clatter amidst the dusty bones.
  
  The sky is a dim circle of light far above you. The stone walls press in on you from all sides, and the air is clammy and frigid. A faint odor of decay drifts up from the floor; the smell of a trapped animal decomposing under the back porch.
  
  You are standing knee deep in a rattling jumble of children's bones.
  
  The ground trembles slightly with the thing's thunderous footsteps as it tromps up the path. It's right outside the slaughterhouse!
  
  > hide under the bones
  You burrow down into the bones, piling more bones on top of you for cover while trying to make as little noise as possible.
  
  You hear it pause inside the building, its hide slithering loudly against the brick walls as it moves about. There is a horrible, wet snorting sound, as if it were trying to pick up a scent, then an unspeakable, inhuman grunt of anger.
  
  > wait awhile
  Time passes.
  
  Scarcely daring to breathe, you lie as still as possible beneath your cover of bones as the thing, whatever it is, moves closer. A shadow falls across the mouth of the well, and then the circle of light above you is blotted out by a shape so utterly, blasphemously hideous that it is all you can do to remain conscious. Two grotesquely blue and childlike eyes blink down into the darkness of the well, searching...
  
  And then it is gone.
  
  You must have lost consciousness after all, judging from the stiffness in your limbs and the difference in the light. You have no idea how long you were out, but the creature must have passed you by. The forest is still again; the breathing and footsteps, gone.
  
  Involuntarily, you let out a long, shuddering breath.
  
  > Ascend
  The bones fall away, clattering loudly as you stand up.
  
  > Go upwards
  You painstakingly climb out of the old well.
  
  Beyond the south wall of the old slaughterhouse, there is nothing but a tangled thicket so dense as to be impenetrable in every direction except to the north, where you can slip back into the ruined slaughterhouse through a hole in the wall.
  
  Rising from the midst of the underbrush is a squat circle of stone: the top of an ancient well.
  
  A rotting circle of plywood leans against the side of the well.
  
  > go to the east
  The decayed remains of an old slaughterhouse stand here, now little more than a shell of crumbling brick and gaping holes, surrounded by a clearing of yellow, sickly grass. A path leads northeast, back toward the road; to the west, a gaping hole that might once have been a doorway leads into the rotting building.
  
  A flurry of dead leaves goes skittering along the ground, swirling past you in the wind.
  
  > go to the north-east
  The tangled undergrowth has been beaten down in a path leading roughly from the east to the southwest. Shrubs and grass have been flattened and pushed aside, vines torn down, and small trees bent or even snapped in half, as though something heavy with huge, flat feet had simply trampled its way through.
  
  > Go east
  The forest grows denser as you go, crowding thickly up to either side of the road. The groping, tangled branches block out what little sunlight there is left. Your footsteps are muffled; whispering leaves and the slow drip of water are the only sounds you can hear. Beyond the watching trees, the shadows are impenetrably thick. The road stretches interminably, north to south.
  
  At the edge of the forest, on the west side of the road, stand the rotted stump and twisted sapling from your dream.
  
  > Go north
  The gently winding lane makes its way through the birch woods south of town. New England foliage is famous for its splendid colors in the fall, but the oppressive weather and pervading murk have leached these trees of most of their tint. The road continues south into the increasingly dense forest, and in the other direction heads back to town. A paved walk also leads east through the trees.
  
  A small group of townsfolk has gathered up at the north end of the road. As you approach, still breathless from your encounter with the thing at the slaughterhouse, they turn toward you -- and that's when you notice that the one in the lead has an axe in his hand. And the one behind him has a pair of garden shears.
  
  A couple of men move over to your left, and several more step out of the forest behind you. All of them carry weapons or nasty farm implements of some kind, and all of them look as though they're just about ready to put an end to a certain over-curious, outsider woman who doesn't know enough to keep her nose out of things better left undisturbed.
  
  > give the bear to men
  They don't seem impressed.
  
  The townsfolk shuffle a bit closer, raising their weapons in anticipation of the kill.
  
  > Ialdabaoloth
  One of the men turns on you with a withering gaze; another makes a fork-fingered gesture in your direction. The syllables die unspoken behind your lips.
  
  The townsfolk shuffle a bit closer, raising their weapons in anticipation of the kill.
  
  > Go east
  You dart past the men on your right, making a break for the church. The townsfolk hover around the entrance to the churchyard but do not follow you, confident that there is no way you can escape.
  
  A low, wrought-iron fence, its spike-tipped bars bent or leaning at crazy angles, surrounds the overgrown yard of this dark, abandoned church. A gap in the fence leads back west, while a bare path beaten through the groping weeds leads around the church to the southeast.
  
  > break padlock with the hook
  You raise the meat hook high over your head and bring it squarely down onto the padlock. The rusted metal casing splits open, the hasp falls loose, and the padlock, now nothing but a broken shell, slides to the ground.
  
  > examine padlock
  It's little more than a twisted hunk of torn metal. You'd hardly even guess it was ever used as a padlock.
  
  > take it
  (slipping the meat hook into the pocket of your trenchcoat to get a hand free)
  Taken.