Title: Fighting Fire With Fire

Author: Queen Serenity

Fandom: A Nightmare On Elm Street

Chapter: Seven

Sere couldn't believe it. They had won. They had really won.

She turned to Freddy, her head hanging forward so that her hair obscured her face. Her voice, when she spoke, was a dull whisper.

"I guess… I guess I belong to you now." When Freddy didn't reply, she looked up to see that he was looking at her in an odd way, almost as though he was measuring her up.

When he spoke, his voice, if possible, was even rougher than normal. "Tell the truth. When you killed that boy, what did it feel like? You know the one I mean."

When she answered, she found that she couldn't lie. Maybe it was because he basically owned her now. That fear that had haunted her for so was gone now. She felt calm, and free. Even if she died, she would be free. "The first thing I felt was a bit of guilt. It did seem like, after all, I had killed someone. The guilt was automatic. A reflex, you might say."

He waved a claw at her. "But what else did you feel?"

She didn't answer, and stared at her feet. She couldn't lie, but she could keep quiet. She didn't want to admit what it had felt like.

When she did not reply, she heard footsteps as Freddy came towards her. The next thing she knew, a single razor-tipped finger was placed under her chin, just barely touching her throat, forcing her to lift her head. When she did, she found his face only inches from her own.

Staring at his icy cold blue-gray eyes, a thought occurred to Sere. As evil as Freddy was, as inhuman, it was still obvious by his eyes that he had been human years ago. They were the most human-looking thing about him. His breath, when he spoke, was fetid.

"Answer the question, Sere. What else did you feel?" His voice was low, guttural.

She knew she had to answer. She had to, she did. She felt compelled to answer, and knew she couldn't lie. When she spoke, her voice was dull, as though she had went back into that mode of emotional detachment of hers once more, and her blue-green eyes never left his.

"It felt… good. No, it felt better than good. It was like there'd been something hungry inside me that I hadn't known about, some sort of darkness, and I had fed it for the first time. In the act of doing it, the thrill it sent through my veins during and after made me feel more alive than anything has in a long time. Even more than pain. Even with the guilt, it was the best thing I've ever felt."

Freddy didn't say anything to that. He simply continued staring at her.

"How are you going to kill me?"

His voice, when he answered her, was triumphant. "And who said I was going to kill you?"

Her eyes widened in shock.

Two weeks later…

"Don't forget, class, those papers will be due after the weekend," the teacher said as the students left the classroom. The woman sighed and rolled her eyes as it seemed the students didn't hear her. She knew that at least a quarter of them would have feeble excuses on Monday as to why their papers wouldn't be with them.

"Molly! Hey, Molly, wait up!"

At the sound of her name, Molly slowed down so that she separated from the hoard of students and waited.

Angel hurried up to her and grabbed Molly's shirt, pulling her into the nearby ladies' room.

"What's up?" Molly asked.

Angela looked her up and down slowly, and a weird smile slowly crossed her face as her gaze ended up at Molly's neck.

Molly shot her an odd look. "What?"

Angel smirked. "Alright, who is he?"

"What?" Molly looked confused.

Angela sighed. "You've been very withdrawn for a long time now, Molly. Don't think I hadn't noticed. I just couldn't figure out how to get you back to your old self. You were getting worse and worse, and you've been really unhealthy-looking, too. And now, look at you. For the past couple of weeks, you've been, well… you've been pretty normal. And you've been happy, and it's like you're all the way here like you haven't been in years. I mean, look at yourself." She turned Molly towards the mirror. "You look healthy, and you look like I said, happy. You're practically glowing nowadays."

Molly looked at her reflection. She did, indeed, look happy. Her eyes sparkled with a life that hadn't been there before, her skin was a healthy pinkish, etc. She blinked. "I don't know what you're talking about. I just stopped one day, and looked at the way I was, and decided I needed to get my act together."

Angela rolled her eyes. "Uh huh. And what's that, a gift from yourself?" She pointed at Molly's neck, where she'd been staring before. She didn't notice as Molly went pale for a sec as she glanced at her reflection, where Angel had been pointing. Resting there was a silver choker about an inch thick. Set into the center of the choker was a small dark gemstone, the color of which was indeterminable. Unseen by Angel, since the back of the choker was located under Molly's hair, was a keyhole on the back, located at where the choker would open.

Truthfully, the piece of jewelry looked more like a silver collar than a silver choker.

Molly offered her friend a weak smile. "You could say that. It's a type of reward for waking myself up, if you know what I mean. I don't have a boyfriend."

Angela rolled her eyes. "Whatever. You know you'll have to tell me sometime, you know."

Molly shook her head. "Whatever, Angela. Think what you want."

Later, outside, Molly walked around, her eyes moving over assorted students. Spotting someone on the steps, she smiled and moved down to sit behind the boy.

The boy; Michael Merrill. A nerdy kid who always thought he knew everything, but he actually had no common sense whatever. He always acted like a jerk, jumping to get anyone he could into trouble, stuff like that.

When Molly spoke, Michael jumped, startled. "Hey, Merrill, you know a lot of stuff, right?"

He looked at her like he would a piece of crap on his shoe. "Of course. You know that."

Molly looked troubled. "Well, there's something I found out about not long ago. And so, I was curious if you knew about it."

"Yeah?'

"There was this killer a couple of states away a couple of decades ago. The Springwood Slasher. Heard of him?"

Michael answered, obviously lying. "Yeah. But tell me what you know about him."

Molly bit her lip. "This story is pretty scary, I gotta warn you. First of all, he went around, killing kids. Young ones. No one could figure out who it was doing it. When they finally did catch him, though, everyone was surprised to find that he was who appeared to be a normal, everyday guy. Married, with a job, and even a little daughter of his own. How he'd been killing the kids was with this workman's glove he fashioned, a glove with a razor on each finger but not the thumb. His name… was Freddy Krueger."

"Yeah? What happened then? Not that I don't know, of course, I just wanna see if you have your facts straight."

"Alright. The thing was, when he got taken to court, he was able to get off scott-free because of some little technicality. The parents of other children in the neighborhood were outraged, so they tracked him down and cornered him in this old building, which they lit on fire after they trapped him inside. They burned him alive." She paused here, wringing her hands, looking spooked by the story she was telling.

"This is where it gets really creepy. They say that after he died, Freddy came back. Not in our world, but in the dreams of the children of his killers, who were now teenagers. He would stalk and then kill the teenagers in their dreams in the most horrific ways possible. He didn't stop there, though. He was stopped, a couple of times, but he kept coming back, and he kept killing more kids, always going after teenagers. The thing is, when Freddy kills you in your dreams, you die for real. They say that not only does he kill you, but he also takes in your soul, so that you become one of his children, so to speak. The thing is…" She dropped her voice to a whisper here, resisting the urge to smile at how white and creeped-out Michael looked at the story.

"They say that Freddy is still around, and that he's always on the look-out for more victims to add to his children."

Michael swallowed. "Yep. Looks like you got your facts straight. Look… I gotta go now."

As Michael wandered off, Molly let the smile she'd been holding back slip onto her face. It wasn't like that bright smile from before, though. This smile was… cruel.

She knew Michael. She knew that whenever he learned something knew, he loved to show off his knowledge, and go around telling many about what he knew. So she knew he would tell many about Freddy.

She reached up and fingered the jewelry piece at her throat, looking thoughtful as she headed home.

Brittany ran, scared. Her bare feet pounded against the metal grates as she ran.

Where was she? This was one weird nightmare. Earlier that day, that weirdo Michael Merrill had found her and completely crept her out with this story that he'd told her about some killer. Then her boyfriend and his buddies had come up and saved her from that god-awful nerd. Like she'd wanted to talk to him in the first place. Tch! Like, seriously, he was so below her.

And then after she'd gone to sleep later, she'd started dreaming about this place. Her dreams weren't usually this vivid, and it was really weird. And then these five weird wolf-like things had found her. Four of them were led by a slightly smaller reddish one with a silver collar on. They'd been chasing her for a few minutes now, and she'd been trying to lose them.

Suddenly, steam shot out a pipe ahead of her and she shrieked and covered her eyes as she dodged it to keep running;. Suddenly she ran into someone, and fell to the floor.

Opening her eyes, Brittany opened her eyes to see who she had run into, and made a face. "Molly? Why the hell would I be dreaming of a freak like you?"

Something flickered briefly in Sere's eyes, unnoticed to Brittany. She shrugged. "What I wanna know is why I'd be dreaming of you."

Brittany really took in the sight of Molly, then. The girl was dressed in a long white skirt that rode low on her hips, slits going all the way up on both sides. For a top, she wore a sleeveless white tube-top that showed off her belly, across which were four diagonal long thin pale scars that looked like they'd only healed recently. Like Brittany, she wore no shoes. For jewelry, she wore a silver anklet on each ankle and a silver bracelet on each wrist. Lastly, there rested on her throat this silver choker she'd noticed her wearing recently, one with a dark stone set into it.

Brittany shot Molly an odd look. "Why are you dressed so weird?"

Again, Sere shrugged. She swallowed. "Merrill told you about the Springwood Slasher, didn't he? Maybe it's true… maybe he's here, somewhere."

Brittany shook her head. "I'm not afraid of some crispy old dude. I'm more worried about those wolfy things I saw earlier." Her eyes widened as she remembered them. "Oh no! I forgot that they were after me when I ran into you!"

Just then, a growl sounded out a few feet behind her. Brittany turned to see four of the wolf things there, looking ready to attack. Their leader wasn't there, though, it seemed. She shrieked and ran past Molly, and was horrified to see that the walkway ended in a dead end.

Sobbing, she pointed at Molly. "Eat her! Eat her, she'll taste better!"

And she watched the things came up to Molly, who she was surprised to see didn't look afraid. They stood on either side of Molly, two on each side. Just then, Molly grinned at Brittany, showing strangely sharp teeth. "You shouldn't have always acted the way you did, Brittany. Something my friends here and I have found… popular bitches taste best."

And then her formed seemed to shift. A moment later, the leader wolf was before her, along with the pack, advancing slowly on her. Horrified, Brittany backed up, knowing she'd run into the railing at the end of the walkway any moment.

But she didn't. She ran into something else that was solid. She whirled to find… oh God! It was that killer that Merrill had told her about!

He leered at her. Then he looked past her. "What was it she said again, Sere?"

Sere stood there again in her human form. "She said she wasn't afraid of some crispy old dude."

Brittany gulped, her eyes tearing up. She was going to die.

The next morning, Molly woke up feeling better than she had in a long time. The night before, she'd been surprised that Freddy had had her deliver the final blow, not knowing why. She'd hesitated, at first, but hadn't wanted to make Freddy mad. When she'd killed Brittany, though… Oh, Goddess, that feeling. It was like nothing else, it was like immense amounts of chocolate and great sex rolled into one.

And then Freddy had given her something. It wasn't exactly her soul… it was kind of… kind of her essence. Something that would enhance stuff about Molly, in the areas of things that Brittany was good at.

It was very cool.

She and Freddy… that night, they had come to an arrangement. Actually, it was Freddy that had decided everything.

He'd had to work to get her, he wasn't going to just kill her. He would allow her to live a normal daytime life… but in the dream world, she was his. Since victims from his hometown had been scarce anymore, it was her job to bring in fresh meat for him, usually by letting people know about him.

The choker… the collar she wore, he'd put it on her. It was a mark of her enslavement to him, even in the physical world. Only he could unlock it and set her free, if he so chose.

She was… it was like she was his bitch, literally. His pet. Her pack members were still with her, for they were loyal to her. It was all very useful for Freddy.

And there were also some benefits. She gained certain… attributes from victims. For example, if he killed someone really smart, and gave her their essence, she would become more intelligent. That kind of thing. Sometimes she might even gain actual knowledge from an essence.

And then there was the protection. He'd agreed that so long as she kept bringing him fresh meat, then he would leave alone those that she asked him to. Such as her friend, Angela.

All in all, as hard as it could be to believe, she didn't mind the situation.

As hard as it was to admit to herself, she outright enjoyed it.

And, somewhere deep inside her, she shuddered at what she was becoming, hearing the words echoing in her mind what Jareh had once told her…

"I may have a solution for you, then… but… it could be the greater of two evils, I'm not sure."

On this path, what was she to become?

FIN

QS: I can't believe that it's over. I hope this wasn't a disappointing ending for you guys. My goal when I was writing this story was to make one of the best NOES stories out there. Not the absolute best, but just one of the best. Did I succeed?

I'm proud of this story. Very proud. But I tell you now, I WILL NOT MAKE A SEQUEL. This is where I intend it to be finished. However, if any of you out there wish to make a story with Sere in it, then I wouldn't mind, so long as you seek my permission first and give me credit. K? K.