Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare — Adaptation Excerpts

Adapted by Bob Italia
Transcribed by Rob Nimmo
Order

FOUR

Spencer, Carlos, and Tracy huddled around a pay phone. Spencer was fishing in his pockets for change while Tracy looked over the strange fair. Pies were rotting on a stand, crawling with buzzing flies. A lonely old man rode around and around in a bumper car ride, no one to bump. A clown leaned against a game booth, smoking a cigarette—no kids to entertain. Spencer frowned as he held out the phone. “This phone’s out of order.” “So’s this town,” Tracy said. Just then, they were startled by the sudden, desperate appearance of an odd middle-aged woman. She was jumpy, sweaty, and wore too much makeup. The woman cornered them by the phone. “What lovely children,” she said, constantly glancing over her shoulder. “What perfectly lovely, darling children. Would you like to come home with me? It’s been so long since we had children in the house. So long. But this time it’ll be different, my perfectly adorable little babies. This time I’ll hide you and he won’t find you and he won’t find you.” “Ethel!” a man shouted. The woman jumped up, the man’s shout effectively cutting off her insane rambling. She turned and ran toward a stern-looking man. He grabbed her by the arm and dragged her off. “I want my children back!” she cried. “You know they bring him!” the man growled. Suddenly, alarm bells rang at the nearby high school started ringing. The man and the woman reacted fearfully. “See what you did!” the man roared at the teens.

—

Maggie and John returned to the van while the alarm bells continued ringing. The rest of the adults at the fair scrambled to close the stands. Carlos, Tracy and Spencer approached the van as the man dragged the odd woman past. Then the man stopped and pointed at John. “You said you were getting out!” he shouted. “But you brought back more!” John just stared at him as he dragged the woman away. “Okay, c’mon,” Maggie said to the teens. “Back in the van.” Carlos, Tracy and Spencer climbed in. “Hey!” John said. “Watch the air here. It’s heavy. Makes you sleepy. Don’t give in.” “Go ahead,” Maggie said. With Tracy driving, the van sped away. “I hope they make it,” John said. Maggie turned to the school. “Somebody rang those bells.” “Lucky us,” John said with a weak smile. They started walking up the street toward the school. Suddenly, Maggie was distracted by something in the sky over a row of houses. It was a water tower. Then Maggie stopped and looked down. “Why’d you stop?” John asked. Maggie pointed down. “Look.” Maggie and John were standing on top of a huge chalk drawing. It was a child’s rendering of a horrible looking figure with steel claws and a fedora. There were words scrawled under the illustration: ONE, TWO, FREDDY’S COMING FOR YOU.

Maggie and John stepped back and stared at it. “Freddy…” John said, scratching his chin. “Have you seen this before?” Maggie asked. “I don’t know, but I know who posed for this. It’s Freddy Krueger.” Maggie frowned. “That’s not even human. Traumatized and abused children often draw what they can’t talk about. This drawing simply represents something else.” A middle-aged woman carrying a bucket of water and a large hand brush suddenly appeared at Maggie’s side. She knelt down and began scrubbing the drawing. Then she looked up at them. “It won’t wash away, not even when it rains.” The woman resumed the scrubbing. But the brush had no effect on the drawing. “What does she represent?” John said to Maggie. Maggie remained silent. They continued on, walking through a rusty schoolyard. The playing fields were overgrown with weeds and grass. John spotted some graffiti on a wall. It was a heart with two names drawn in. It read: GLEN LOVES NANCY. John stared at it, waiting for the words to trigger his memory. But nothing happened.

Maggie approached the front doors of the school. A weathered sign proclaimed SPRINGWOOD HIGH SCHOOL. The sign had been spray-painted with the words: THREE, FOUR, BETTER LOCK YOUR DOOR. Maggie stared at the strange rhyme. John joined her. “I guess they didn’t teach much poetry around here,” he said. They cracked the door and entered. Immediately, they heard a murmuring coming from a nearby classroom. Maggie and John peered into the empty room and saw an old man with thick glasses writing furiously at the chipped blackboard. A huge pencil holder weighed down the pocket of his stained shirt. “You’ll all be expected to pass both written and oral exams,” the man muttered. Maggie and John looked at each other. “Don’t disturb him,” Maggie whispered. A thick book lay on a desk. Maggie quietly approached it and flipped through it. Suddenly, the old teacher pulled down a weird map of Springwood, complete with a dream border and murder sites marked with an X. “Well, you were here,” Maggie said to John as she fitted the clipped article in the book. “This is where you got the clipping.” Just then, the teacher spun around and stared at the empty classroom. “Welcome to Freddy 101!” he proclaimed loudly.

—

Tracy drove the van down a Springwood residential street while Spencer sat in the passenger seat. Carlos was in the back. “Hey,” Carlos said, “there’s a map back here.” “Did I say I needed a map?” Tracy said irritably. “I can’t get over the way those people looked at us,” Spencer said, yawning. “Quit yawning,” Tracy said. “You’re making me tired.” Tracy drove down the street, past a statue of a Boy Scout in the town’s center. An engraving on the statue read: THE CHILDREN SHALL ENDURE. Tracy drove around for a while until she saw the statue again. Now she realized that she had been driving around in circles. “Give me the map,” she snapped at Carlos. Carlos started unfolding the map. But it didn’t stop unfolding. It kept getting bigger and bigger. Tracy and Spencer watched as Carlos struggled to unfold the endless road map. Then all three of them unfolded it. It filled the van. Suddenly, they unfolded a message on part of the map. GUESS WHO? it read. Carlos snapped awake from his nightmare.

“Carlos!” Tracy yelled. “I asked you for the map!” “It says ‘Guess Who?’ ” Carlos replied. “Okay,” Spencer said to Tracy, “you’ve had your chance to get us out of here. Now it’s my turn.” Tracy and Spencer switched sides. Spencer drove around, looking for a way out of town. But he too ended up at the statue. Finally, he had enough. He pulled the van up to the statue and all three teens piled out, yawning and exhausted. “There’s no way out!” Spencer said. “Not with you driving,” Tracy said. “Look,” Spencer said, “we’re just too fried to see straight. Let’s find Maggie.” Tracy grew angry. “I’m not turning myself over for any adult supervision. This girl’s gonna get some rest and get out of here in the morning.” She started walking away from them. “In fact, I think I see my kind of neighborhood up ahead—empty!” She trudged off. Spencer and Carlos reluctantly followed.

They crossed right under the Elm Street sign and walked down the deserted avenue, passing burned out houses with crooked FOR SALE signs planted on their rotting lawns. Tracy stopped them in front of a rundown, plain-looking house. “This is the one. We’ll have it all to ourselves.” Tracy headed inside, Carlos behind her. Spencer hesitated, then followed them inside. But as soon as they entered, the house began creaking loudly as it transformed its outer shell into the hideous Elm Street house. Unaware of the deadly trap they had just entered, the teens began exploring the house. It was mostly empty of furniture and decoration, and looked harmless. “I need to find a bed,” Carlos said, yawning. “I need to find a bathroom,” Spencer said. Tracy looked around. “This place makes the shelter look like the Ritz.” Carlos began climbing the stairs to the second floor. He walked down the hallway and into a plain, stripped room with a rusty box-spring shoved into a corner. Carlos picked up a dusty sheet and threw it over the springs. Then he stretched out. “Beats the street.” Meanwhile, Tracy and Spencer continued exploring. “Why do you think John said not to fall asleep?” Spencer asked. “Because he’s a lame-o freak,” Tracy replied. “He’s Miss Maggie’s pet psycho.” Then she looked upward. “Carlos!”

—

The old teacher began his lesson. He pulled up the map and drew a time-line on the chalkboard, detailing Freddy’s history. The line started from the original crimes to his return as a dream demon. “In fourteen hundred and ninety-three,” he babbled, “Freddy sailed across the sea…” Meanwhile, Maggie continued flipping through the book. “I can’t find anything on you,” she said to John. “At least I’m not up there,” John said. Maggie looked up and saw John staring at a display that lined the back wall. It read IN MEMORIAM and displayed every deceased student’s picture. “The dates,” she said in shock, “they’re all within a ten year period. What happened here?” “Freddy happened here,” John said. “That’s impossible. He was dead by the time these started.” The teacher suddenly smacked his pointer onto a particular event on his time-line. Maggie and John swung around and moved forward. “Here’s a crucial point,” the teacher said, gazing around at the empty classroom. “Anyone know what I’m talking about? Hmmm?” He waited for someone to raise their hand and answer. When no one responded, he let out an exasperated sigh. “We covered this, people! Here’s where they took his child away.” John’s eyes brightened. “What child?” “It was taken from him and put into the town orphanage,” the teacher said, “adding a critical variable to an already unstable status quo.” “He had a kid,” John said in astonishment to Maggie. The old teacher cleared his throat. “In fourteen hundred and ninety-four, Freddy came back to look for more…” Maggie and John left the room.

—

Carlos sat up in bed when he heard his name called out. But it wasn’t Tracy’s voice. It was the voice of an older woman with a heavy Spanish accent. “Carlos!” the woman shouted sternly. Shakened, Carlos headed for the door. “Tracy?” he called out warily. He entered the empty hallway. “Why don’t you listen to me?” the woman’s voice said. “Carlos, you never listen!” Carlos turned a corner. Suddenly, he found himself in a cramped, inner city tenement hallway. It was dark and smoky. “Tracy, where are you?” “Behind you,” the woman said chillingly. Carlos spun around, sweat pouring from his face. A meaty hand flew forward and smacked his ear. Then he saw his mother, a large and powerful woman, glaring at him. “Maybe you don’t hear so good,” she said. “Maybe I clean out your ears for you!” “Mama, no,” Carlos cried. “Don’t do this! I was good. I was a good boy!” He turned to run, but a hand grabbed him. “I’m not!” Freddy said. Hanging onto Carlos, Freddy used one fingerblade to pop out Carlos’ hearing aid. “Carlos, lend me your ear!” Laughing maniacally, he raised his claw to strike. Screaming in terror, Carlos pushed himself away. He crashed through a wall and tumbled down an old rickety fire escape. Carlos came to rest on a catwalk. He jumped to his feet and gazed around in panic at a boiler room, its pipes spewing steam. Freddy stepped out of the shadows and approached Carlos from behind, laughing as he swung Carlos’ hearing aid in sinister delight. Carlos couldn’t hear him. “Give me my hearing back!” Freddy snuck up on Carlos and jammed the hearing aid into his ear. His hearing returned—but something was wrong. Carlos whirled around and saw Freddy grinning as he held one blade to his lips. “Shhh!” Freddy said. Then he produced a pin and dropped it. Carlos winced in pain. He could hear the pin whistle loudly as it fell. Realizing his hearing aid was super-sensitive, he dove and caught the pin before it struck the ground. Relieved, Carlos tried to remove the hearing aid. But it wouldn’t budge. Then he looked up at Freddy. Freddy was grinning, holding in the palm of his hand hundreds of pins. He laughed—and dropped the pins to the floor. When they landed, they made ear-splitting booming sounds. Carlos clutched his head and writhed in pain. It felt like his head was about to explode. “Make it stop!” he cried. Freddy produced a small blackboard out of thin air. All sound stopped. He raised his glove and positioned the blades against the blackboard. Then he scraped one blade against its surface. It emitted a terrible short screech. Carlos shook his head, pleading with Freddy. But Freddy smiled horribly and nodded. He scraped his glove against the blackboard with enormous joy and ferocity. Carlos screamed as the noise boomed in his head. The painful pressure built and built… until his head finally exploded in a flash of blue light. The blue light streaked into Freddy’s heaving chest. Freddy seemed to grow stronger. “Nice hearing from ya, Carlos,” he said, laughing. “Ear today, gone tomorrow!”

Chapter 3 | Chapter 5