As night falls on the grove of trees across from Jack Trice Stadium, a haunted fantasy world comes to life to celebrate the chills and thrills of Halloween.

Even with Alicia Keys’ music blaring from the speakers and hot cocoa on sale nearby, the ominous aura hangs in the air outside the Haunted Forest – at least to the anxious 8-year-olds waiting in line.

“We’re going to die in here,” said one of the 8-year-olds solemnly to his friends.

Kristine Hornish spends her days as an ISU student – but when the sun sets, she doubles as a pop-up corpse as an actor in the Haunted Forest.

It’s her goal to scare.

“The best is when you cause them to trip – it’s so hard not to laugh,” said Hornish, junior in French. “Any time when I cause their eyes to bug out, I feel proud of myself.”

The college-age customers who arrive later in the night are usually less na‹ve, but the terror is often genuine, she said.

Lee Ballard of Ankeny, one of the owners for the Haunted Forest, likes to brag about the time he ambushed an adult couple with a chain saw.

“The guy just shot off into the woods and left the girl just standing there, and I was like, `Get back here you sissy!'” he said laughing.

Ballard doesn’t hesitate to claim that the Haunted Forest is the best haunted attraction in Iowa.

Kurt Claxton, Haunted Forest general manager, is proud of his annual terror among the trees.

“With Disney money, I couldn’t have built anything better,” Claxton said, while he admired the dense, leafless woods eerily highlighted against the night with a 500-watt lamp.

People drive from as far as Iowa City to visit the forest, Ballard said, which is stocked with a host of set pieces, including a maze and “black hole.”

A walk through the Haunted Forest holds about 25 actors, some of whom are part of the Ankeny Community Theater. Most actors, however, are ISU students like Hornish looking for a part-time job.

“I wasn’t really sure what to expect,” she said. “When I asked [Ballard] what I was supposed to do, he said whatever I wanted to do.”

The job of scaring children and adults alike was easier than she expected, although popping out of a coffin “feels like doing situps for six hours straight,” she said.

But even the most skilled actors can’t hide the B-horror flick quality of the Haunted Forest.

“After 10 p.m., depending on their intoxication level, they don’t react to anything,” Hornish said. “It kind of makes you feel like an idiot when they just stand there.”

Even though most customers know the plastic-ax wielding maniac doesn’t actually kill anyone and that the blood on the wall is paint, they still happily play their role as real-life “Blair Witch” victims.

“One of the reasons we went was to watch Maggie get scared,” said Morgan Gaffney, freshman in biology, referring to one of her friends who couldn’t make it through the movie, “The Exorcist.”

Once in a while, an intoxicated customer decides to become the victimizer rather than the victim in the Haunted Forest, Hornish said.

When the night is done, she said, the actors discuss their woes over pizza.

“They actually hit back,” Hornish said. “Someone slammed a fist on the coffin, and it hit me on the head.”

But these reverse roles are far and few between, as most Haunted Forest patrons visit the forest for a spine-tingling scare-fest, Claxton said.

“My personal philosophy is that if you keep people entertained,” he said, “they won’t have time to make trouble.”