The three young witches were quite serious  about their craft. Here, one is seen through a peep hole in the middle of a blood sacrifice.

The Darkness Hunters are no strangers to weird enemies and uncommon perils. They are
your neighborhood demon hunters. 

Here, we read about Vanessa, one of the Hunters, and her encounter with a trio of 
playful, but dangerous teen witches. These passages were extracted from an episode of 
the e-series, to be shown online soon. Sorry, I couldn't download any drawings yet. But 
I can tell you it's another big girl vs. small girl match-up: the 'big' girl being the 5 foot 8, 
120-lb. Vanessa, versus the 5 foot 2, 140-lb. teens, judging from the way they were drawn. 
Although Vanessa had the advantage in reach, the teen had the advantage in numbers! 
Here, Vanessa finds out how her long time friend and fellow witch hunter was murdered 
at the hands of the three teens. She tried to confront them alone--but with painful failure. 
The teens had made themselves welcomed into her New England summer cottage, where 
she was finishing a book. Wearing shorts and a tank top was hardly enough clothing to 
protect her from belly torture! 
 

My surprise quickly became anger, as I grabbed to two nearest to me. I had them
 both in either  hand, by their collars, as I was determined to hurl them through the front door. As I
 stood with  my back against the door molding, with both arms stretched out at my sides, there
 came a hard  little jab, almost as if a knitting needle had jabbed my into my stomach! The first was
 merely a  jab, but the second seemed to have gone right through my navel and straight into my
 colon. As the  two held one arm in a full-nelson and the other in a hammerlock, my glazed-over
 eyes could see  Marie sucking on that lollipop.  Slowly, as I now stood helpless before her, she
 approached me. 
    "You've been working too hard, Mrs. Turner," she said. "That awful ache in your stomach 
 won't go away until you get some rest. We have no argument with you. We-" 
     "What have you done with her??" I grunted. "What --" But Marie silenced me by  jabbing the  stick-end of that lollipop hard into my exposed navel. This snuffed all the anger from my now  limp body. 

Now bound and stuffed away in the attic, Vanessa contemplates
her next move...

 Eventually, the rope had came free of my wrists, as I crawled to the phone.  Immediately, 
 I dialed emergency for the sheriff. There came the voice of a woman on the other
 end,  asking if I needed help. 
     "Yes--connect me with Sheriff Hodges," I said, breathlessly. "I'm locked up in my
 attic--  three intruders came into my--"
      "Hold, please, I'll see if he's in," she said. About a minute had passed until she
 returned.  "I'm sorry, madame, but Sheriff Hodges is busy now." 
       "Busy?! Isn't the deputy--one of the deputies in the office??" 
       "They are, madame," the operator said. "Please be patient. He should return
 momentarily." 
       "Momentarily? What the hell is he doing??" 
       "Nothing at the moment," she said. "I'm just sitting on his face." And then there
 came the  sound of flatulence, a real one, from the sound, and the familiar little teeny cackling
 laughter.  Immediately, I pulled the phone's wire from its plug so as not to hear them. 
         Despite this, the beating, the raiding of my personal belongings, I knew I could
 not let  myself become demoralized--which was what they were aiming for. 
 

\ After being overpowered by the three teens, Vanessa is bounded and helpless as she awaits their next fateful decision.

The leader of the trio seems to be an expert in administering pain and humiliation.

        The hours, days passed ever so slowly. I was only half conscious through it all,
 as they  drugs began to overtake my body and mind. I thought I was left to starve to death up
 there,  but I knew they would come for me sooner or later. A rotting corpse would definitely
 leave  glaring evidence of wrong doing, and I knew those creatures were aware of this. But
 my  worry about their evil was last in my thoughts, as my body grew weak and feeble,
 seemingly  with each long, passing second. I managed to take in water from a dripping faucet on
 the  attic sink, but that was all the sustenance I had. My bounded arms grew numb, as did
 my  bounded legs, as I was made to crawl about like a wounded worm. 
       Whether it was by the drugs or my own diminishing capacity for thought, I began
 to  hallucinate, talking to the images that appeared before me. My stomach was drawn
 against  my spine, as my ribs began to show against my skin. Worse, I could still feel that
 horrid  little devil jabbing that stick into my body, giggling as as did. Each and every bruise
 and  scratch resounded in pain as I languished in my semi-conciousness. In all, I could
 find   a dark humor in it all--me, a powerful player in the clothing world, spending all those
 years,  making one sacrifice after another, denying myself the simplest pleasures, holding
 the   fate of all whom served me--brought to the mercy of a simple-minded, giggly country
 girl with a taste for what she think is witchcraft. On the face of it, it had the makings of
 a bad  Homeric epic. 
 
 

       The silence loomed like a fog. She walked to a nearby window, keeping her
 eyes on  me as she did. 
       There was little doubt about what she was after. Her huge dark eyes conveyed a
 hunger, an  unnatural, murky, consuming hunger which would not be satisfied until it has
devoured both flesh and soul. In her staring, she set aside the glass of wine and slowly lifted the  little camisole  with her thumb and index finger. The fullness of her stout belly was unveiled as her unfastened  jeans hung lose upon her hips. Her sky-blue thong 
was now showing, as she massaged her stomach  with her fingers. Between her fingers was a hint of the cavernous navel that seemed  more like a stem dimple upon a rounded fruit. I was sitting far too close to her for comfort, as  I could smell the rawness of her exposed skin and even her thong. 
     Taking offense, but at the same time, queerly flattered, I stood and walked to a
 nearby window. A sudden dizziness came to my head, as I thought I was hyper-
ventilating. I could feel   her elbow brushing against the base of my spine as she slowly walked behind me. She made certain to rub her well-rounded well-pronounced rump against the side of my leg. I leaned  against the desk, holding my head, trying to keep my balance. Then, I felt her hand stroking across my stomach, rubbing, then scratching lightly into the skin. But in my hallucinogenic stupor, I took her hand to be that of Greg's.
I could even feel his body against mine, as he  kissed my ear. As I slowly opened my eyes, I had even seen his reflection in the window. Startled, I jerked away, as my head cleared. I saw her standing beside me, smiling as if  she knew what I had seen. 
      "YooHoo!" came Marie's voice, as she approached the room. "Dinner's ready." 
 Nina   then fastened her jeans. As Marie entered the room, Nina then smiled at me,
 stroking her  hand upon my right cheek. I pulled away, touching the area where her hand had touched. 
       "Am I interrupting something??" Marie asked in a sneaky smile. 
       "I'm a bit tired," I said in a breathless whisper. "I think I'll take my supper to my
 bedroom."  As I walked through the door, I paused a bit to gather my senses, as it seemed as if my legs  were made of jello. 
       "Oh, and not too much salt this time," I said turning to catch them silently
 giggling to one  another. Marie held her hand over her mouth, as Nina kept that eerie frozen smile, staring  up at me. "I think my blood pressure's up again." 
      "Yes, Ms. Anderson," came Marie's muffled voice. 

       Whatever sickness that was overtaking me lingered even as I slept that night.
 But this time,  it malady led to a most bizarre nightmare.  Upon awakening, I felt a
small hand resting on the center of my stomach. The  blanket had  folded and curled around my legs and left arm as if it were trying to entangle me. Then I felt my 
 right arm growing numb from the weight of someone's head lying upon it. 
       It was Nina. 
       I looked down into her large eyes as her body curled into my outstretched
 body. She  stared up into my eyes in that eerie, unblinking stare of hers, her lips still bearing that half- smile. I pushed myself away, sitting on the edge of the bed. At that moment, I could not  feel more violated and cheated. Even as I held myself, I could still feel her fingers greedily intruding, clawing into the most guarded portions of my body, even going under my very  skin. 
       "How..how dare you??" where the cries, weak and whispering from the bottom
 of my  throat. "...how..dare you?? What have I done to you?" Her souring perfumes and raw scents  were firmly immersed into my skin and sheets. She, in response to my agony, stroked the  back of my neck with her finger and kissed me lightly upon the cheek. Completely apathetic  to my misery, she took up the remnants of her clothing and left for the dining room. 
      As if checking for any signs of her touching, I examined myself before the mirror.
 Then,  and there, I knew this mischievous, queer little cousin could no longer be welcomed in  my home. This could not be tolerated, less she does it again. 
     I wanted to ease the news to Marie of Nina's impending dismissal without, of
 course,  going into the horrid details of the cause. I seemed to have caught the girl in one of her  more jovial moments, as she was busy fitting herself into her costume for the party their school was giving. 
     "Too bad you're tied up with your work," she said, as she emerged from her
 closet  with some of the costume draped over one arm, as she was half-dressed in the
 other  portion. "I had the perfect outfit for you. A real belly dancer's costume. You're 
way too  tall for any of my others. I think my stomach's too fat for that one. All those
 McDonalds,  Burger Kings, and White Castles for lunch did that." 
      "Perhaps," I said, half listening. "I'm not at all partial to that genre of cuisine." 
      "Me neither," she smiled, twirling before the large mirror, examining the short
 black  skirt she wore. "The first two, okay; but the White Castles--like eating balloons. They  turn my ass into a leaf blower. You don't mind me saying, but it doesn't seem you
 eat  too much of anything." This, she said as she dropped herself onto the couch,,
 pulling  the black stockings up her legs to fasten them to the garter straps she wore.
She  folded  one thick, shapely leg over the other, smoothing the black stockings up each one. Then,  I just happened to notice that familiar-looking stocking on her left leg with the even more  familiar run near the top seam. Also, the thong she wore underneath that skirt was of the  the same shade of purple as those that were missing from my underwear drawer. 
         "There is the matter of Nina," I said, not wishing to make my stare noticeable to
 her. "I--" 
      "I know," she smiled. "She's bothering you." I came to silence, figuring she
 knew what   had happened the night before. 
      "Please--I have nothing against her," I said. "But I cannot let her get away which
 such  audacious behavior. I have nothing against her or her preferences. I know these
 things are started at childhood." 
      "I don't honestly know what she does to the people we worked for, but they
 usually end  up feeling the same way," she said, "confessing" her ignorance. "Don't worry. I'll tell her. But  you won't get rid of her that easily. She really likes you--like a kid sister likes an older sister. 
 She talks about you all the time." 
     "So...she does speak," I said. 
     "Only to girls she trust," she said, examining the remaining pieces of her
 costume, which  included a whip of metal thorns. "Her dad is a neural surgeon and her mom is a real estate  agent, and she's basically alone most of the time. I guess she figures you're good for a substitute guardian or something. She'll never let you go. She knows you're lonesome, too. She thinks  she could fill your emptiness and you could fill hers. She's queer like that. But, that's Nina's little  world. I'm afraid you're part of it now. You're hers for good." As she uncurled that formidable  whip, she came toward me. 
      "You even got her smell," she smiled, sniffing my chest. "She knows every mark
 one your  body. She knows where you're strongest, and where you're weakest and most vulnerable." This, she said, as she drilled her index finger deep into my navel, which was involuntarily exposed between my T-shirt and shorts. It felt as if my body suddenly diverged into a thousand pieces.  In another unwelcomed gesture, she lifted my T-shirt at the lower side, bending to see a marking  in my skin. When she touched it, I could feel the sting. "You're hers, all right. She may not have  much to say, but she makes sure  to mark her territory." 
       I never took the pain in my side to be anything more than a scratch I caught from
 an exposed  bed spring. When Marie left the room, I looked at my lower side from the mirror. The scratch  was a human bite mark, of all things! 
 
New Cities Studios is also the company leader in producing horror shorts, 
such as The Bedeviled, a short story about a dead teen wanna-be witch 
haunting a farm house. This may be available at the Payloadz store. Image1
or the sister press CEN is probably carrying it in one of their stores.