“Trick or treat!” three children said in unison, holding out their candy buckets. Standing in front of them was a woman named Debbie, who was holding a bowl full of candy.

“Well, aren’t you three adorable! Here you go!” She transferred three pieces of candy from her bowl to each of the kids’ buckets.

“Thank you!” They exclaimed before happily walking away. Debbie smiled as well as she watched them leave. But her smile switched to a frown when she saw the next group coming up her driveway. It was four older teens, none of which was wearing a costume. Upon reaching her porch, they all simply held out a pillow case each without a word. One of them, named Candace, wasn’t even looking at her as she text on her phone.

Debbie sighed. “You’re not even going to say anything?”

George broke the silence of the teens. “Ugh, fine. Trick or treat.” He said unenthusiastically.

Debbie rolled her eyes. “Sorry, but you’re not getting any candy from me. You’re too old to be trick or treating. I wouldn’t care if you were polite and had a good costume, but it’s clear to me that you don’t deserve my treats.”

The other girl in the group, Becky, got angry. “What?! You can’t do that! Isn’t it, like, against the law to not give candy to trick or treaters.”

“Becky, calm down,” Trent told her. He turned back to Debbie. “Listen, lady, I suggest you just give us some treats unless you want the trick instead.”

“I’m not giving you anything,” Debbie repeated. “And if you try anything funny you’ll seriously regret it.”

“Fine, but don’t say we didn’t warn you.”

“Same here.”

“Come on guys, let’s go to the next house.” Trent led the other three away from Debbie’s house as she glared at them.

An hour passed as Debbie continued to hand out candy to other trick or treaters. Lights around the neighborhood began to turn off as people finished giving out their candy. Debbie was about to head inside herself when she noticed four figures approaching. They walked into the light and, as she expected, it was the teens from earlier. Only this time they were holding eggs instead of candy bags.

“I told you we’d be back,” Trent affirmed.

“This is your final warning. If a single one of those eggs hits my house you will regret it.”

Trent ignored her and shouted, “Fire!” A dozen eggs flew through the air and landed on Debbie’s house. Egg oozed down the walls as the teens laughed.

“Alright, you asked for it.” Debbie flicked both of her hands at the teens and in an instant they were gone. When they reappeared, they were in a completely different location. The four were laying down disoriented on an uneven terrain. Once their vision came back fully, they noticed that they were laying on dozens of giant pieces of candy piled inside of a huge bowl.

“What the hell?!” Trent shouted.

“Is this actual giant candy?” George asked in surprise.

“It’s a dream come true!” Candace exclaimed.

“Not exactly,” a voice boomed overhead. Suddenly the candy below began to move upward as the bowl was picked up. The teens tumbled around as the ground shook. When they stabilized they were greeted by Debbie’s enormous face appearing over the bowl.

All four of them screamed in horror. “What’s going on?!” Becky shrieked.

“Well, in case you can’t tell, I shrunk you and now you’re inside my candy bowl. Long story short, I’m secretly a witch. I told you you’d regret throwing those eggs.”

“Wh- what are you gonna do with us?” George asked, afraid.

“Please don’t hand us out to trick or treaters!” Candace pleaded. “I don’t want to be eaten by some little kid.”

“As tempting as that is, I had something else in mind. Let’s go inside.” Once again the four teens were tossed around as Debbie walked inside and placed the bowl on her kitchen counter.

“Are you going to eat us?” Becky asked.

“Another excellent idea, but no. I have a daughter named Amy. She’s the same age as you all but much more respectful. Right now she’s out taking my younger daughter Kylie trick or treating. She’ll be home soon and I just know she’s going to be craving some candy.”

“You’re going to feed us to your daughter?! You’re insane!” George shouted.

“Maybe I am, but I don’t care. The only problem with the plan is that Amy would never eat you on purpose. So I’ll have to pull off a little trick of my own.” Debbie snapped her fingers and the teens transformed. At first they couldn’t tell what happened. But one look at each other was enough to make them all scream again. They had all turned into gummy bears!

“You turned us into gummy bears?!” Trent yelled.

“Yep! Amy LOVES gummy bears. You four won’t last an hour.” Debbie laughed maniacally.

“Mom! We’re back!” Came a voice from the front door.

“Ooh! There she is!” Debbie quickly snapped her fingers again and the four gummy teens were inside of a small package alongside several other normal gummy bears. Also, they could no longer move or speak out loud. They could only communicate telepathically with each other. To everyone but themselves they were normal gummy bears.

Debbie greeted her daughters in the living room. “There’s my little girl,” she said before giving Kylie a kiss. “Did you have fun?”

“I sure did, Mommy!” Kylie replied. “I got lots of candy! Can I eat it now?”

“Alright, but only a few pieces. I don’t want you to get sick.”

“Yay! Thank you!” Kylie ran to her room with her candy bucket in hand.

“So I guess it went well,” Debbie asked Amy.

“Yeah, she’s not kidding about a lot of candy. I won’t even feel bad about stealing some this year. Ha ha.”

“Well, you might not need to steal anyway. There’s still a lot of my candy left for you to eat.”

“Awesome!” Amy grabbed the bowl from the kitchen and noticed the bag on top. “Gummy bears? Sweet!” Amy rushed upstairs. On the way she stopped to say, “Oh, right. Sam is coming over to hang out in a bit. Just send her up to my room when she gets here.”

“Will do.”

Amy entered her bedroom and tossed the bowl on her bed so she could turn on her space heater and warm the room up. The bowl tipped over and the candy spilled out. Amy quickly ruffled through the candy to see what there was. The teens were shoved all around through this ordeal. “Looks like Mom got the good stuff this year. But nothing beats gummy bears.” Amy picked up the package and tore off the top. The teens screamed for her to help them, but she couldn’t hear a thing.

Something the teens didn’t know, however, was the real reason why Amy loved gummy bears so much. Not even Debbie knew actually. It was because she liked to pretend she was a monster, brutally eating tiny helpless creatures. It was all in good fun, though. Until this time.

“Well, hello there little gummies. Are you ready to enter my belly?” Amy said, pretending the gummy bears were alive. The four which actually were alive screamed in terror for her to stop. “How about we start with you?” She said as she picked up Becky, a red bear.

“No! Stop! Let me go!” She shrieked.

“You look like a big strong bear. You might even be dangerous in my tummy. I guess I’ll need to ‘disarm’ you.” Amy used her front teeth to quickly tear off the bear’s right arm. Becky screamed in pain as she felt her arm get ripped off. Another bite took her left arm clean off as well. “And just to be safe, let’s get your legs too.” Two more chomps left Becky limbless and in excruciating pain. “Hmm, on second thought, maybe this is too cruel. Maybe I should put you out of your misery.” Amy placed the bear so that its neck was laying on her bottom front teeth. Her mouth was wide open.

Becky stared at the upper teeth looming above. “Please! Don’t do it! I’m begging you!” But Amy ignored her and guillotined the poor teenage girl with her upper teeth. Becky now ceased her screaming. Amy chewed up her head and then tossed in her leftover body. Throughout this ordeal, the other teens heard every word and scream. They would have cried in sorrow and fear, but they were physically unable to. They could only sit and wait for their own demise.

“Alright who’s next?” Amy grabbed a yellow bear which happened to be Candace. “Don’t worry, your death will be much faster than your friend’s.” Amy placed Candace carefully on her back molars facing upward. Candace had a similar final view as Becky looking at Amy’s upper teeth. Then the teeth chomped down. However, they didn’t completely smash her. They lightly pressed down on her at first. But then the pressure increased as Amy slowly bit down. Candace screamed as she was crushed between the molars. Her gummy body spread out from the pressure until it couldn’t handle any more and burst. She was completely dead before Amy finished chewing her up and swallowing.

Amy ate a few more gummies in unique ways while the two boys waited in fear. Soon George the green bear was picked up. He didn’t even bother yelling for help as he approached his inevitable death. As he was approaching Amy’s mouth, he heard a ringtone from her phone. Amy was startled and accidentally dropped George. He fell down some distance until he he hit Amy’s boobs and bounced off. Then he flew through the air until he landed face down on the hard wood floor. He felt victorious for his unintentional escape until he felt extreme heat on his back. He had landed right next to Amy’s space heater and felt himself beginning to melt. He cried out for help, but no one could save him.

“Dang it! Where’d he go?” Amy looked around the room. “Oh, well. Who texted me anyway?” She looked at her phone to see a text from Sam stating that she had arrived. Amy smiled and grabbed another bear, which was Trent this time. She looked at him and frowned. “Eh, I don’t like the orange ones. I guess you’re going in the trash little fella.” Trent was slightly happy. He didn’t want to rot away in the garbage, but at least it was less humiliating than being eating by a teenage girl.

“Happy Halloween, girl!” Sam exclaimed as she entered the bedroom.

“Sam! I just read your text. I’m glad you made it.”

“Yeah, I drove over as soon as I finished trick or treating with my little brother. Wait are those gummy bears?! I love gummy candy!”

“Well paws off ‘cause I love ‘em too. Unless you want this orange one, that is.”

“Fine by me. I’m not picky.” Amy tossed the bear to her friend. Trent was launched into the air and landed in Sam’s hand. “I love to suck on these things for a bit before I eat ‘em.” Sam tossed Trent into her mouth and he landed on her tongue. Inside it smelled like various other kinds of candy, which Sam ate on the way over. The tongue slammed him onto the roof of the mouth and he was squeezed as Sam sucked on his body. It was the same as Candace’s predicament, except that he didn’t burst. The pressure was relieved after a few seconds and he was then tossed around Sam’s mouth. His whole body became slimy as the saliva lightly eroded his outer layer.

This experience was only temporary, though. Soon he would be crushed to death like the others. Or so he thought. Right before Sam would have done so, Amy made her laugh and she accidentally swallowed her gummy bear. Trent slid down her throat and landed in a vat of stomach acid. The acid quickly ate away at his body and he screamed in turmoil until there was nothing left of him.

Sam coughed from the unexpected swallow. She walked over to Amy’s dresser to grab an open bottle of water and fix her throat. She got her drink, but on the way she stepped on something. “Ew, what did I just step on?” She lifted her foot and held it up for both of them to see. “Is that another gummy bear?”

“Oh, that must be the one I dropped.”

“I see.” Sam paused. “I’ll give you five bucks to eat it.”

“Honestly I’d do it for free. You misunderstand how much I love the green ones.”

George was on the brink of death. He was half melted when he was stepped on and the pressure of the bare foot only flattened him even more. Now he was staring up at two giant girl’s faces, one of which still wanted to eat him. He didn’t even have the energy to scream as Amy’s tongue swooped in and pried him off of Sam’s foot. He was promptly chewed up and everything went dark.

Sam was disgusted, but laughed. “I can’t believe you just did that. You’re so gross.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment. Now help yourself to some other candy and watch me finish off these gummy bears.”

*******

The four teens were now dead and digesting in two girls stomachs. ...Or at least that’s what they thought. The next thing they knew, each of them appeared on a large wooden surface. Glaring down at them was Debbie. They had somehow become undead and were standing on her home office desk. They were also back to being humans, albeit still shrunk.

“What?! How are we alive?” George asked.

“Because I just cast a spell to bring you all back. I watched each of you get eaten using my crystal ball. I could hear you too. It was quite entertaining, although I may need to talk to Amy about eating food off of the floor.”

“But why?” Candace asked.

“Because I never actually wanted to kill you all. I just wanted you to think that and get some revenge. I still don’t like you, but a dumb prank is nothing to murder you over.”

“We may not have died, but that was a horrific way to almost die.” Becky complained. “I’ve never suffered that much in my entire life.”

“Well, you should’ve heeded my warnings. I told you you would regret your actions.”

“Whatever, we learned our lesson, I guess. Can you unshrink us now.”

“Oh, yeah, I’ll unshrink you. But not yet. See, I wouldn’t want to play favorites with my daughters and Kylie loves M&M’s so...”

*SNAP*

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!