Nancy Ayers was dealt with an excellent set of cards by life. She was born into an exponentially wealthy family, but her desire for more wealth grew. She wheeled, dealed, swindled, and even killed if it meant she'd gain money.

Nancy's decapitated head was found in her mansion's kitchen, boiled in a pot full of oil.

Taylor Finley hated being average. She didn't enjoy always blending into the crowd and having no friends. She wanted to be known. She wanted what that girl had: popularity, beauty, and charisma.

But she could never be like her. So she resorted to drastic measures. Those "drastic measures" included splashing the poor girl with battery acid at their school prom. The girl was hospitalized, and her appearance was ruined.

Taylor was found at the bottom of a public pool, with a weight tied to her leg and her wrists bound.

Joshua Rios was a powder keg ready to explode. The torment and abuse he received from his peers didn't help, and none of the teachers listened.

Then Joshua found something he could let it all out on. That being the cat that belonged to one of his worst enemies. He even left the poor thing's body on the boy's doorstep.

Joshua was found in his bedroom, bathroom, living room, kitchen, and backyard.

Brooke Lyons was a single parent who yearned for a lover. Yet none of the men she dated were more interested. She started spending more time at clubs instead of caring for her five-year-old son. Who was left constantly starving.

Her burnt-up body was found in a dumpster outside of a club, with lipstick placed on her chest.

Douglas Weiss was never grateful for his wife. He always had her do everything in the house and yelled at her to make food for him. He even went out of his way to steal some of the money she made so he could order food deliveries.

Worse yet, if his wife messed up in any way, shape, or form, he'd let his fists do the talking.

Douglas's horrified wife found him dead with a large bottle of rat poison shoved in his mouth.

*

KEITH RILEY, CEO OF KELLA CORP, FOUND SLICED IN HALF IN A JUNKYARD.

I read the article page explaining Keith's life before his death and how he viewed those beneath him and his workers. When I was done reading, I checked my gun. Fully loaded, but the safety's on. The windows are all boarded up, and the locks are in place. Everything was prepared to make sure no one got in.

I eyed my old badge, a constant reminder of my past.

I know that I'm the next victim. If I hadn't just brushed off her pleas for help and done something, she would still be alive. An innocent person spent their last hours in hell because I chose to ignore her suffering.

And any day now, I'm going to pay the price.

Alice sat on the edge of her son's bed.

"Do you want to talk about what happened at school today?"

He frowned and turned away from her.

"You gave Robbie a bloody nose, Liam. You know you shouldn't be hitting anybo—"

"I didn't hit him."

She raised an eyebrow. "Oh? Did he get a bloody nose and start crying for no reason?"

Liam picked at his bedsheet.

"…I just, wanted somebody to remember," he said.

"Remember what, Liam?"

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper.

She closed her eyes and rubbed her temple.

"I can't keep leaving work early every time you choose to act up in class. I need you to be honest with me."

He unfolded the paper and stared at it.

"What are you looking at?" she asked.

"Nothing."

She sighed. "Honey. Show me."

He wiped his eyes and handed it to her. It was a photograph of Liam, Robbie, and another boy at a birthday party. It'd been folded and unfolded so many times that it was starting to tear along the crease.

"Where is this from? Robbie's birthday party?"

"No…"

"Then where?"

Liam grabbed his blanket and pressed his face into it while mumbling something.

"No, not good enough." She pulled the blanket from him; his eyes were red. "Try again."

He refused to look her in the eyes.

"They were best friends, mom. I thought maybe he could remember too," he said.

"Remember what?"

"…Danny."

"Liam." She leaned forward and hugged him. "Did Danny move away? Is that why you're upset?"

"No."

"Then what, sweetie?"

Tears began streaming down his cheeks and he pushed his face against her chest, whimpering softly.

"Shhh, it's okay, baby. It's okay to miss your friend."

"He's not my friend! Nobody remembers him! Nobody! I'm the only one! I keep trying but people always forget!"

She sighed as he cried into her shirt. She ran her fingers through his hair, rocking him back and forth. The photo sat on the bed beside them. It had slipped from her hand and landed on it's face revealing text on the other side. "Danny's 10th Birthday Party" was written on the back, in her handwriting.

Her temples throbbed and she grabbed her head. She groaned and blood started to drip from her nose.

He looked up at her, his lip quivered as he did.

"What happened to Danny, Liam?" she asked.

"They came. They took him."

"Who came?"

He closed his eyes.

"I c-can't remember what they look like. It hurt to look at them." His nose started to bleed. "I tried to stop them, mom. I t-tried to save Danny but I couldn't."

"Who is Danny?"

He choked back a sob. "He's my little brother, mom."

Blood poured from her nose now.

"You don't have a little brother."

"I do, mommy. I do. Don't you remember? You took the picture."

Standing in front of my mirror, I make myself pretty.

Lipstick. Eyeliner. Foundation.

I'm not used to makeup, at least not this type of makeup.

The kind that feels and looks like paint, like colors splattering a porcelain doll.

I used to wear light eyeshadow, maybe some blush and balm.

I feel like a child discovering beauty.

I brush and straighten my hair, crowning myself with a headband.

I ignore the empty spot in my bed.

I ignore the absence heavy on my heart and continue painting my face.

Mom says I must remove my engagement ring.

I pull it off and drop it onto my desk, wincing at the light clang.

“Annie?”

Mom stands in my doorway.

In her hands is my dress, a formal white monstrosity I know will hang off me.

I put it on with no objections.

I try not to shiver when Mom’s ice-cold fingers dance up my spine, buttoning me up. She lets me step into glass slippers, then turns me to face her. Mom is crying.

She wears black instead of white, like she's mourning me— and she is.

Her smile is strained.

She takes a photo with a disposable camera.

“You look beautiful, Annabelle.”

“I know.”

I try to smile when she cuffs my hands. The silver is cold and cruel, a reminder my engagement ring means nothing.

“It's just a precaution,” she murmurs.

Mom links arms with mine and smiles wide as we exit my home.

She greets others.

I’m forced to smile at young men and women with their parents.

The neighborhood they built for us is clinical and symmetrical.

One girl has a bag over her head.

Her father won’t look at her as he pushes her into a Range Rover.

Mom accompanies me to the high school, now a matchmaking facility.

She squeezes my hand and mouths smile, and I do.

I wear a grin that hurts my jaw as a guard takes my shoulders, dragging me to a table.

A suited guy is forced in front of me, slumping into the chair opposite.

He doesn’t look at me, muttering his name: Ace.

I tell him mine, then I say I have–had– a fiancée.

Ace whips his head around, scanning the guards, then turns back to me.

“I was married,” he whispers, voice breaking. “We were going to have a child. We were happy.”

A girl behind me is ripped from her seat and dragged away.

Then a guy, as his match is forced to her feet and taken to another table.

I don’t realize I’m shaking until Ace leans forward, cups my cheek, and kisses me.

It’s fleeting. It doesn’t mean anything, and he’s crying. But it’s enough.

“Lie with me,” he whispers, as thudding footsteps approach.

“We have a match!” a guard yells. I hear my mother breaking down in relief.

The guard pulls us apart, smiling, and plucks off the pink triangle sticker from my dress, then Ace’s suit.

“We have the perfect match!”

“Natures Rorschach Test” is what Ellie would call them. The phenomenon that many young couples experience- those picturesque dates where you lay back, gaze at the sky, and debate over what each cloud shape could mean. Ellie and I were no different. During our sophomore year of high school we spent nearly every day of summer at the beach, and without fail, Ellie would always kick off a cloud watching session.

One day, near the beginning of August, we decided to go to the beach for what would be the last time before school began. That morning however, I noticed Ellie seemed a little off, which at the time I chalked it up to first day-of-school jitters. I decided this time it was my turn to kick off our little cloud ritual, describing the first thing that came to sight.

“I- oh babe I swear to God Mr. Clean is in a fist fight with a dinosaur up there, you gotta look!”

I managed to get a little smirk out of her as she raised her eyes to the sky narrowing in a cloud of her choice. Her smirk slowly faded, giving way to an expression of discomfort. She broke the silence a few seconds later-

“The clouds paint death.”

"What, Ell-?" I started to question, but she sighed and turned her gaze back on me.

"What time are you picking me up tomorrow for school?" she asked, shifting the subject.

“Uh probably 7:20… everything alright?”

She gave a small nod and a smile, reassuring me that everything was fine, but those words, "The clouds paint death" still lingered in my mind. They lingered with me that night as I watched lightning dance through the clouds. They lingered a couple weeks later when Ellie was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. They lingered two months later, when her body was lowered into the earth.

It took a few years, but eventually, I started to see exactly what Ellie saw in the clouds that day. As I was walking to my university classes, my eye was caught by a peculiar shape in the sky. I saw what looked like a bus… with its front tire crushing the head of a figure beneath it.

I brushed it off and kept walking to my first class, only to stop abruptly when a biker zoomed past me. He sped down the street, but the next pedestrian wasn’t as quick, sending the biker crashing onto the road. He probably didn’t have a second to process before an oncoming university bus painted the asphalt with his brains.

I don’t know how many more deaths it took but eventually I became permanently glued to the ground. My therapist suggested I combat my paranoia through writing, hoping that I might come to realize that the clouds aren’t prophetic.

But as I look up in the clouds, I can almost see it again, "the clouds paint death". I just hope it’s not a sign for you.

On the 1st day, the sky bled.

On the 2nd day, the seas boiled.

On the 3rd day, all the wasps and flies and bees had human faces and wouldn’t stop screaming.

On the 4th day, none of the doors in our houses led to the right room.

On the 5th day, all the food rotted in our mouths when we tried to eat.

On the 6th day, we couldn’t remember the faces of our loved ones, and our hearts ached because we still missed them and knew they were still there.

On the 7th day, our nails grew at a rapid pace, but backwards.

On the 8th day, even the dimmest lights hurt our eyes.

On the 9th day, our pets turned against us and with tears in our eyes, we had to fight back and put them down.

On the 10th day, no matter how deep our breaths were, we never felt like we were getting enough oxygen.

On the 11th day, the TV only showed terrible things, our favorite characters being horribly killed in unbelievable ways, and none of the TVs would turn off.

On the 12th day, everything was on fire, but nothing would burn.

On the 13th day, it hurt to think of the things that once made us happy.

On the 14th day, nothing bad happened, but we were too afraid of what might happen to realize it until the day was over.

On the 15th day, our teeth exploded in our mouths.

On the 16th day, the roads flowed like rivers.

On the 17th day, all our carpets were replaced with a field of thorns.

On the 18th day, our bones broke with every motion.

On the 19th day, we were finally allowed to die.

This happened when I was 10, and honestly, it still creeps me out sometimes.

So my parents had gone to work, and they told me on the phone that they might be late and could come back in the morning. I was alone at home with my dog. It was one of those nights where you're just kinda vibing, so I ended up watching a horror movie for fun. After that, I played some random horror game that was about summoning spirits or something. Probably not the smartest move looking back.

Anyway, it's around 3 AM, and I suddenly hear this loud, blood-curdling scream outside. Not a movie scream, not a "someone's joking" scream—like, a real, horrifying scream. I swear my heart stopped. I was already spooked because of the horror stuff, and hearing that just pushed me over the edge. I thought it was a ghost or demon or something coming to get me.

I panicked and locked myself in the closet, sitting there in the dark, hugging my knees, waiting for something—anything—to happen. My dog? He was dead asleep the whole time like nothing was wrong, which somehow made it worse. Like, how was he not reacting?

I stayed in that closet until the morning when my parents came home. They didn’t know anything had happened. Everything seemed fine the next day, so I just kinda tried to forget about it. But I was so scared after that night that I started sleeping with the lights on, no joke.

Years later, my dad randomly told me something that chilled me to the core. That same night, our neighbor had murdered his wife and ran away. The scream I heard? It was her, when she was being killed.

I had thought it was a ghost.

Turns out it was something much worse.

“Bailey’s not like the other boys. They all think him rather queer.”

The Provost, Lionel Beambridge, stood up from his desk to poke at the dwindling fire. He rested his hands on the ornate mantel.

“What makes him so, Lafferty?” The elderly leader asked. “All the boys here have quirks, despite our best efforts at rigorous, Christian guidance.”

“Well,” Lafferty began, puffing on his pipe. “He makes a most peculiar cacophony when he sleeps. Keeps the others awake.”

“Does he say anything?”

“No. He produces a most torrid tune.”

Beambridge frowned, his bushy monobrow ducking behind his glasses.

“What tune?”

Lafferty shrugged. “One that none of the other students recognise. I heard it myself the other evening. It sounds like something that howls from some morbid domain. It's very unsettling.”

A suggestion came to the Provost and feeling very pleased with himself, tapped the mantle quite harshly.

“I will ask Dr. Lee to mesmerise the boy. See if we can't stop it.”

Lafferty stood up and poured himself another port from a Ship’s decanter. “I concur.”

The next evening, after a supper of game and a dessert of gypsy tart, Bailey was summoned to a small room off the library. Inside stood the three gentlemen: Lee, Lafferty and Beambridge. The Provost explained the proceedings.

“You may leave if you wish, Bailey, but I will once again reinforce that your nocturnal habit is proving very troublous.”

The child nodded, too afraid to disagree with his superiors.

“Good man,” Lafferty exclaimed. “I knew you were a regular brick.”

Lee commanded Bailey to sit on a chair. The Doctor then brought his own chair opposite the boy until their knees touched. Pressing Bailey’s thumbs into his hands, Lee stared into the child’s eyes. Lafferty stood aside, taking notes.

After a short while, Bailey relaxed into an absent calmness and farted twice. Beambridge huffed in disgust. Lafferty smirked.

Lee placed his fingers on the child’s hypochondrium, in an area underneath the diaphragm. Almost immediately, the boy produced an aeolian melody. Beambridge covered his ears.

“Dear Lord,” he muttered. “That is unnatural.”

Lafferty moved away. “This is it. The sound. It is as though he carries a song from the very bowels of Hell.”

Beambridge recommended that the boy be stirred but Lee was unable to remove his fingers. The Doctor began to panic but Lafferty pulled Lee away. The singing continued.

“Halt this! Right now!” The Provost commanded. The noise emitted by Bailey was increasing in volume.

Lafferty slapped the boy hard and the howling strain ceased. Beambridge and Lee shook Bailey until he regained consciousness.

“Are you okay, boy?” Lafferty enquired.

Confused but feeling better, Bailey nodded. The boy was given a hot totty and sent back to his room.

“I think it best if we never speak of this evening’s events ever again,” Lee said afterwards. Beambridge agreed.

“And if that sound truly was from the underworld,” The Provost remarked. “Let us from this day lead lives free from sin or temptation.”

I’ve always loved my soon to be wife, but I begin suspecting she been seeing someone else. It all started when she began coming home later than usual, smelling of alcohol and cheap cologne. So I went through her Phone and saw that whore was see her co-worker. I can not describe the repulsion I felt towards the co-worker, clearing abusing the fact her “best friend” recently died. I just knew I had to save my love form that monster, so I killed him, just as I killed my fiancé’s “best friend”. Some may say I’m a monster, just I had to protect my future bride, I love her so much. God I can’t wait to finally to finally ask her out.

It started with the mirror.

Mom caught me staring into it a little too long and said, “Don’t do that. It’s not polite to study someone else’s face.”

“Mine,” I corrected.

She didn’t say anything.

I was thirteen, old enough to feel unsettled but too young to know what to do with the feeling.

I started noticing it more after that. She’d avoid taking photos of me. Would flinch if I walked into the room too quietly. Once, I sneezed while she was in the kitchen and she dropped a glass.

“You scared me,” she said. “You sounded like—” She never finished the sentence.

One night, I brought it up.

“Who do you think I am?” I asked her.

She laughed. But it was the kind of laugh that comes too late. Like she’d practiced it.

“You’re my son.”

Then she added, “That’s what matters.”

That’s what matters.

I started digging.

Family photos stopped around the time I turned seven. No birthday parties. No school pics. Just a long, silent gap.

One night, I looked through her closet and found a shoebox with an old USB drive taped inside the lid. The files were dated. The earliest one read: JULIAN_01.

My name isn’t Julian.

There were videos.

The first showed a toddler playing in a backyard I didn’t recognize.

The next few were older. A boy about nine years old. Same eyes as mine. Same voice.

And then one labeled JULIAN_FINAL.

It was taken in a hospital room. No audio.

The boy—Julian—was asleep. Tubes taped to his arms. Mom was holding his hand.

At one point, she looked into the camera. And smiled.

But it didn’t reach her eyes.

That night, I confronted her.

“Who’s Julian?”

She froze.

Then said, very quietly, “You are.”

I shook my head. “That’s not my name.”

She stepped forward.

“You were gone. Gone. For weeks. I begged them to bring you back. I begged them.”

I didn’t understand.

Until she added:

“They said they could return your soul. They didn’t say it’d come back… in someone else.”

She looked at me like she was searching for something behind my eyes.

“I know it’s you. I see glimpses. I hear it in your laugh.”

I backed away. “You’re insane.”

She didn’t stop smiling. Just whispered:

“They said sometimes the body fights back. That the boy you’re in might try to regain control.”

She started crying.

“I won’t let that happen. I won’t lose you again.”

“D-Dad?” 

Robert rubbed his bleary eyes as the bedroom door creaked open. Oh, God. Oh, please. Not again.

The past few months had taught him to loathe Bobby’s nightmares and midnight questions–-his last decent night’s sleep was a distant memory. His own father would’ve beaten him bloody for even being awake at this hour. I shouldn’t be spoiling Bobby like this.

“Come in.”

A pale wedge of moonlight illuminated Bobby as he softly, slowly, timidly entered. 

“What’s wrong, Bobby?”

Bobby spoke. His voice was a frail, hoarse whisper.

“I had a n-nightmare that…that Edith was trying to hurt me.”

Robert sighed. 

“Bobby, not this again. Edith’s your sister. She’d never try to hurt you.”

“Dad, I don’t want to be alone with her!”

“Well, I don’t want to wake up at 2 AM every morning. I’ve got work in four hours. This has to stop, Bobby.”

Bobby stared at his feet, still shaking, obviously terrified. Robert felt a sharp stab of regret. 

“Look, I’ll walk you back to bed, okay? Nightmares can be rough.”

Bobby smiled, then froze. A hulking shadow stood in the doorway, extinguishing every trace of the moonlight. A shapeless mouth opened to speak.

I TOO HAD THE BAD DREAMS, FATHER.

“Oh, Edith. You too? Okay, back to bed, everyone. I promise we’ll have bacon in the morning. Isn’t that something to look forward to?”

As Robert trudged back down the hallway, rubbing his temples, the bedroom door clicked shut, leaving Bobby and Edith in silence and shadows. Bobby desperately buried himself in his blankets. Silence reigned. 

Then Bobby heard the footfalls of a giant. Thud. Thud, thud thud THUD–

A massive hand tore the sheets away. The mouth gaped wide, wider, widest. 

It smiled. It spoke.

MORE BACON FOR ME.

After many months passing dwelling in depression I was fed up with being alive. Like any mother mine could notice the certain change in my demeanour. “Austin are you alright?”, she asks,”what does it look like ?” I bluntly responded. Dad came in rushing into my room where all havoc was taking place.

I stared tensely into his eyes, as he was about to utter a word I left the room without hesitation. Took the car Keys that were laid on the newly crafted side-table and went about my night. Voices in my head ringed like a sounding alarm, whispering unholy words along the lines of : kill yourself, you’re worthless, you’re the reason Mica died .

My hands stiffly held onto the driving wheel I was feeling noxious, not to mention I was driving 80mph. Tears gushing down my raspy cheeks. I knew I had to come to a halt. Passing the high school where both Mica and I were in I was bombarded by the memories we shared. Not one of her friends knew she would take her life. I still blame myself time to time for what had happened. I just wish I could’ve been there during her darkest hours.

I decided to continue my drive to the local McDonalds that was open in the early hours of the morning for some coffee and a McMuffin. As I was waiting for my food my phone buzzed thinking it was my parents I reluctantly opened my phone, to my surprise it was a text from Mica.

The boy’s fingers were still sticky with jam when he climbed the old fence. Past the chapel, behind the collapsed greenhouse, the black fig tree stood tall—unpruned, wild, and whispering.

“Don’t touch that fruit,” the caretaker had warned. “It grows fat on envy.”

But Noah didn’t believe in old men with limp mouths and milky eyes. He believed in hunger. Real hunger, the kind that crunched your insides like dry leaves. He’d been eating stale bread for days while his father drank his wages into vinegar.

So he took one.

It bled on his teeth, dark and warm like something alive.

The first change was small. His neighbor’s new bicycle vanished overnight, and Noah found it in his shed, gleaming under a tarp he didn’t remember laying down. The second change—more obvious. His father, broke for months, came home with wads of cash, reeking of smoke and guilt. Said a man at the bar had “slipped” playing cards. Noah didn’t ask questions.

The more fruit he ate, the more came to him.

Shoes that fit. Teachers who overlooked his silence. Friends whose parents worked overtime while Noah played in their rooms, belly full.

He told himself he deserved it. He’d suffered. He wasn’t greedy—he was correcting a wrong. Taking his share.

But the tree wanted more.

One morning, he found claw marks gouged into the wallpaper. His mother stared at the sink for hours, blinking like a broken metronome. At school, kids whispered in half-sentences when he passed, forgetting his name mid-sentence, forgetting he’d ever existed.

Noah checked his hands, stained now—not with jam, not with soil. Black and pulpy, like rotten fruit.

He returned to the tree.

Its branches were bare. Every fig gone. The bark peeled back like skin, revealing a hollow trunk—and inside, something that moved. It looked like him. Smiled like him.

And spoke.

“You envied them, Noah. So I took their place. You fed me their names.”

“I didn’t—”

“You wanted what they had. And now you have it. Alone.”

Noah ran. Through the chapel ruins. Past the greenhouse bones. Into a world where no one knew him.

Not even his mother.

In shadows long and eons deep
It warps the haunted realm of sleep
Before the measured hand of time
Its wordless voice sang twisted rhymes.

It lurks beyond the veil of thought
A monstrous soul that no god wrought
Its mind is full of evil spite
Its bloody soul defies the light

Its whispers reach the strongest mind
It twists the great and kills the kind
The mad it takes to make its own
To fight and die and endless roam

Its body dwarfs the highest peak
Its skin is woven night
Its blazing eyes scythe down the meek
Its hunger strips the light.

Its mind is far beyond a beast
With eager thoughts of coming feasts
Words are its tools, as much as its claws.
As well as the souls it twists for its cause.

But what is this monster? This creature of yore?
It comes from the place that was here long before.
A haunted survivor of a plane that’s long dead
What once was its world is now ours instead.

I was quite charmed by the oil lamp I found on my porch steps. I grew up in a Disney world, like everyone else.

It looked old. Genuine. Not some knockoff. Valuable, maybe.

So of course I brought it in. Finders keepers.

So of course I rubbed it. Just for the laugh.

And...of course...I recognized the genie as it billowed out of the thin spout of the tarnished old can. Not so cartoonish as the Robin Williams version, a fair bit more sinister. More the blue of hostile ocean rather than of pleasant sky.

It certainly didn’t tell me my wish was its command. But everyone knows the rules. I knew it would have to obey me – it's my house, my rules, after all – so I blurted my wishes out before it could say anything.

“I wish that my son forgives me, admits I was right, and comes home to run the business! That’s three! Do it!"

The genie did not react, only staring at me in mute appraisal.

I’ve never been the best at handling my temper. Or being told no. I leapt to my feet “I gave you my wishes, you piece of shit! Obey!” My voice was thunder, echoing off the walls. I’ve always been able to throw my weight around, like any good salesman and leader. I get my way, even if there are a few tears.

This finally elicited a muted reaction from the genie. A smirk.

Before I could speak, it waved its hand, and a swirling mote of vivid viridian light pirouetted in spirals around the room before dissipating.

I sat back down and mirrored its smirk. “That’s more like it. Rules are rules.” I began to smile in anticipation of my son groveling for forgiveness at my feet. No more diatribes about evil dad the tyrant, ignorant dad, hateful dad. What could be more irritating than an ungrateful child?

My amused enjoyment was cut short by the violent, pulling pain in my chest. I stared at the genie, mouth agape in terror. Its smirk had not faded, but it did finally speak.

“You daughter does not forgive you.

You were not right.

Your business will be sold for pocket change in a few months as part of your estate.

As you now see, the wishes I was here to grant were not yours.”

I collapsed to the floor as the world turned to static.

It’s judgement day.

No one’s told you this, but you know - in the tremble of your bones and the buckling of your knees. You can barely stand upright.

The sky is bright now, too bright. They've pulled the blinds open while you shut yours in a panic, pacing your apartment floor.

Front door – locked. Windows – locked. Gun – by your side.

They can't hurt you, you tell yourself.

You take your meds. Maybe this is just an episode.

Maybe the burning gaze on your back you can’t seem to shake off is just a figment of your imagination. A manifestation of your guilt, after you-

No. Shut up.

You swallow some more pills.

The bottle’s empty now.

The room is uncharacteristically bright, fluorescent bulbs stabbing right at your eyes.

You can hear a bell tolling in the distance, each rusted clanging skewering your flesh as you desperately try to claw the feeling off your skin.

You lose count after sixteen.

Bright.

You rock yourself – knees to chest, back against the wall – listening to the sole sound reverberating around the room.

It’s so bright.

You can hear them now.

Open your eyes.

They know what you've done.

Your fingers twitch towards your gun. Can you reach it in time? Can you press it to your temple before they rip your arm off your torso?

It doesn't matter. You can't move, anyway. You’re too tired.

Your eyes are open.

I booked a solo vacation to a luxury hotel in Oymyakon, Russia one of the coldest inhabited places on the planet. The place was called Hotel Solstice. Super exclusive. No social media presence. Just a private invite link, glowing reviews, and this eerie tagline: “Come experience eternal stillness.”

I should’ve known that was a red flag.

The hotel was gorgeous. All glass and black steel, half-buried in snow, lit by auroras at night. Staff were oddly formal, like they stepped out of a Kubrick film. They never blinked. Literally. I thought it was just… Russian intensity or something.

First night, I met a guy in the sauna. Mid-40s, quiet. He leaned over and whispered, "If they offer you the Night Suite, say no. No matter what.”

Then he just walked out, leaving his towel behind.

I never saw him again. When I asked the concierge, they said no one by that name had ever checked in. They even showed me the guest list. His name wasn’t there.

Day three, things got weird. My phone wouldn't charge. My door unlocked from the outside. At breakfast, they served my favorite dish… which I never ordered. Then came the offer:

“You’ve been selected for an upgrade. The Night Suite. Very few guests receive this honor.”

I remembered the sauna guy. I told them I preferred to stay where I was. The concierge’s smile faded for the first time. “That’s not how it works.”

That night, I ran. In a panic. Through the snow. I didn’t even have boots on. I made it to the frozen lake nearby—figured I could cross and flag down help from the road. But as I stepped onto the ice, it cracked beneath me.

I fell in.

The cold hit like a sledgehammer. As I sank, I saw faces under the ice. Frozen. Screaming. Some were recent. Some looked decades old. Eyes open. Trapped. Watching.

Next thing I know, I’m waking up in bed. Warm. Dry. My favorite robe folded neatly. No sign of my escape attempt.

Then came the knock.

“The Night Suite is ready.”

I didn’t say yes. I didn’t say no. I just smiled.

Because I think… once the ice has you, part of you never leaves.

If you see an ad for Hotel Solstice—don’t click it.
And if you already did… I’m sorry.

It is always a sombre day when a person has to read the eulogy of a loved one. That day is today for me. 25 feels too young to lose your mother. She was 50 years old. But, she had lived a good life.

I stepped up to the podium. I faced the sea of white. Sniffling, quiet sobbing, faces full of pain faced me. As her eldest child and son, I was given the task. I made all arrangements, prepared our childhood home, organized for the cremation and wrote a eulogy. My mother was an English teacher, so I had to make sure it was perfect.

I spoke of her life - of her time as a little girl from stories I learned. I talked about the tragedy of her own mother going missing when my mother was only 15 years old. My grandmother being only 30 years of age. I spoke of her attempt to overcome it; continuing on in school, earning her degree, becoming a teacher and meeting my father. I reflected on how she raised myself and my siblings. I spoke of all her achievements, the children she taught, the trips they took us on. I told all those who had gathered that my mother's only regret in life is never knowing what happened her mother - who took her, why, when she may have died and how. I ended the eulogy speaking about how much we all loved her and would miss her and that my hope was she would find her mother in the afterlife.

~

All around me is darkness, before a bright light engulfes me. I feel young, strong, limber; like I did when I was a child. I look at my hands and still see the wrinkles that had began to form before my life was cut short by cancer.

I am standing in a stark white room that feels warm and comforting. A voice speaks to me.

"Hello."

I turn and face a young man. He's smiling at me. He tells me I've died and that I'm in the afterlife. He tells me I will go to a different place than here, that I will now be at peace and not feel anymore suffering. He asks me if I had any questions.

I tell him I have two. The first is, if our loved ones who have passed would be there? He answers yes and joy fills me. I am going to see my mother again and I will finally be at peace knowing what happened to her.

I was going to ask him about her when the man, who must have known what I am thinking, says, "I'm sorry. You won't be able to talk to your mother." I ask him why not.

"Your mother is not dead. She is still alive with the man who took her."

It started with a missed Uber.

Cal and Jonah, slightly drunk and very lost after a failed attempt to find an underground jazz club, stumbled onto a bus at 1:13 AM. The door creaked open like it was annoyed, and they laughed as they climbed aboard, tossing jokes about getting murdered in the suburbs.

"This is what we get for not downloading Waze," Cal muttered.

Inside, the bus was spotless. Too spotless. The kind of clean that screamed "nothing has ever lived here." And then they noticed: every single passenger wore the exact same tuxedo.

Not just any tux—shiny black, red bowtie, polished shoes, and hair slicked back like they were off to a haunted prom. No one looked up. No phones. Just silent, rigid stares forward.

"Uh... themed party?" Jonah whispered.

"Or a cult. Definitely cult vibes."

They slid into a seat near the back, trying not to laugh. The bus gave a sudden jolt and began moving—not forward, but backward.

"Okay, what in the Benjamin Button..." Cal said.

They exchanged wide-eyed glances. Outside, the world looked warped—buildings stretched like melting wax, streetlights flickered green instead of yellow, and there was no one else out there. Just fog.

The driver wore a tux too. He didn’t blink. Just grinned into the mirror like he knew a joke they'd never hear.

Then the chanting started.

Low at first. Rhythmic. Like a Gregorian choir trying to beatbox.

Jonah squinted ahead. "Why are they all humming the same note?"

One of the passengers turned slowly to look at them. His face was blank, but his eyes were jet black—no whites. Just pits.

Another turned. Then another. Until every single tuxedoed figure was staring at Cal and Jonah.

"We should get off," Cal whispered.

"Stop request button is right there. Press it. Press it. Press it!"

Jonah smacked it. The light blinked. Nothing happened.

The driver laughed. Not a ha-ha laugh. More like a thousand spiders coughing.

Suddenly, the bus screeched to a stop. The doors opened with a hiss. They didn’t wait—they ran out into the fog, hearts pounding.

But the street was gone.

They were in a long tunnel. The ground beneath was carpeted in red velvet. Above them, chandeliers swung gently despite no breeze. The bus drove off behind them.

"Where the hell are we now?"

"I think we got off one nightmare bus and landed in a worse sequel."

Then, footsteps. Tuxedos. They were coming out of the fog.

Hundreds of them.

"Run," Cal said, already sprinting.

They ran. For what felt like hours. The tunnel twisted. The velvet floor turned to marble, then to dirt, then to something sticky.

Eventually, they found a door. Wooden. Marked with a gold plaque: "The Last Stop."

Jonah didn’t hesitate. He kicked it open.

Inside was the bus.

Same driver. Same passengers. Same two empty seats near the back.

And this time, the tuxedos were waiting for them.

A perfect fit.

The radio crackles on at 3:33 a.m.—a dead hour. Static whines like a throat filling with blood, then: music.

A song I’ve never heard. But I know the words. I know them because it’s my voice. Not similar. Not close. Mine.

I’m seated, knife in hand, blood drying under my fingernails, the smell of her still dancing on the air—jasmine, piss, copper. 

The song lilts, a slow, humming waltz. My voice glides through the speaker, gentle as a lullaby:

“You took the cat apart first,
Slick fur in your little red fist…”

I freeze.

Verse by verse, it goes on—every sin, every splatter, every moment I thought the world wasn’t watching. It remembers better than I do. It sings the way my hands shake after, the way I cried the first time I split someone open and found it beautiful.

Then it starts telling the future.

“You’ll carve out her eyes at 4:07,
She won’t scream until the second one’s gone…”

The clock ticks.

3:46.

I laugh. My laugh sounds like rust. No one else is in the house. Not yet.

But the song says she’s coming. The song says her intestines will uncoil like rope. The song says I’ll cry when I bite into her cheek—not from guilt, but because the softness will remind me of my mother.

That bitch.

I don’t remember eating her, but the song does.

3:52.

I start pacing. My reflection in the TV flickers. The static shifts—just for a moment—I see something behind the screen, in it. A shape. Smiling.

“You think you’re the singer,” the song coos. “But you’re just the echo.”

3:59.

Footsteps upstairs. Bare. Wet. I never let her in. The knife feels smaller now, like it shrank in my grip. Or I did.

4:03.

She enters the room.

No eyes.

Just black sockets, still weeping thick trails down her cheeks like melting mascara. But she sees me. Smiles. It’s my smile.

I open my mouth to scream, but she raises a finger—and suddenly, the song is in my throat. Not a scream. A chorus.

“You’ll taste the salt of her dying breath,
Teeth sunk deep in holy flesh…”

She walks forward, dragging something behind her. My body.

Not moving. Not breathing. But me. Torn apart like roadkill. Teeth scattered. Jaw slack.

I look down at the knife in my hand.

Gone.

The air smells like jasmine. She leans close and kisses my lips. They taste like rot and sugar.

Then she sinks into me, face first—wet, tender, endless.

I scream, but it’s the final verse:

“Now he’s quiet, tucked away,
We wear his skin. We go outside today.”

Static.
Then another voice begins.

“The song starts again at 3:33.”

Matilda stood on the edge of her apartment balcony, the cold wind biting against her skin as she looked down at the street below.

The city lights flickered like distant stars, indifferent to the turmoil raging inside her. The weight of everything—the failures, the loneliness, the overwhelming emptiness—pressed down on her shoulders. She took a deep breath, her fingers tightening around the railing, ready to let go.

Then she saw him.

Across from her building, in a window directly opposite, stood a man. He was dressed in a tattered bathrobe, his face obscured by the dim light behind him. But his posture was unsettling—rigid, expectant. He wasn't just looking at her; he was watching her.

Not even an audience can stop what she is about to do now, she thought to herself. Then before she could even tighten her muscles for the leap, the man raised a hand in an eerily slow wave, his fingers bending at odd angles, as if he had too many joints.

Shiver ran down her spine. She stepped back slightly, her heart pounding.

Something about him felt wrong. His mouth moved, forming silent words she couldn't hear, but she didn't need to. The way his lips curled, the way his expression stretched too wide—it was as if he was whispering her name.

She turned to run back inside, but the moment she stepped away from the railing, the man moved too—only he didn't walk. He simply... shifted, as if the space between them had collapsed for a split second. Now he was closer to the glass, his face partially illuminated.

Matilda's stomach dropped.

His skin was gray, sagging, his eyes sunken black pits. And yet, she could feel them burrowing into her. His smile stretched across his face, but his jaw had dropped open too, as if happiness had pried it apart.

Her breath hitched. She stumbled backward into her apartment, slamming the balcony door shut. But when she looked back at the window across, the man was gone.

Silence filled the room, almost suffocating.

Then, a whisper echoed throughout the room—soft, teasing, crawling into her ears.

"Ma...til...da... you were so close."

The balcony door was open again.

I woke up on a train.

Paralyzed.

“Hello, Mabel.” A mechanical voice murmured in my head.

“Due to your current cognitive state, you must remain still.”

“Where am I?”

“You’re part of the Fix Me program. You are at 3% cognitive recovery. You have been in the Fix Me program for exactly 3,650 days. As part of your sentence delivered on 08/12/25, the judiciary accepted your plea of insanity. The Fix Me program is part of your rehabilitation—”

“I’m insane?!”

“Correct. You pled guilty for the annihilation of 80% of the human race. The Fix Me program revisits memories linked to your cognitive decline, and with your consent, we begin what we call System Restore. Do you want to begin?”

Closing my eyes, I enter my memories.

“Yes.”

I'm 17 again, standing in front of my best friend.

Millie.

She’s crying.

“Don’t do it,” she whispers. “If you do the play, bad things will happen.”

“Like what?” Memory-me demands.

Noah, another friend, stands with me, rolling his eyes.

“Can't you just be happy for me?”

“Ignore her,” he mutters, dragging me away. “She's jealous she didn't make the cut.”

This is why I’m insane?

“Incorrect.” The program stated.

My memories skip forward.

Now I’m on stage, smiling. Laughing. In front of me: glistening red innards too warm, soft, slithery to be fake.

Still, I play my character, letting her hunger fill me.

Around me, the others feast.

I’m halfway through fake intestine when I see blonde curls.

Her vacant eyes stare up at the curtain yet to fall.

Millie.

Something violently snaps inside me, and I scream.

Noah chokes up one of her fingers.

We’re eating Millie.

But she tastes… good.

Like… chicken.

Applause slams into me. I stand, grab Noah’s hand, and bow to an audience of screams, wiping her blood all over me.

Mr Carter, our theater teacher, gets to his feet.

“Bravo!”

I jerk back to the train.

My arm stings, but I'm grinning.

I’ve bitten into it, feasting on my own flesh that tastes like—

“Mabel, I’m having trouble connecting to your… DO NOT exit the program without prior—you are NOT in a fit state to re-enter–”

“How's my favorite girl doin?”

I feel his breath on my cheek, fingers pulling the plug inserted into my head, blood seeping down the back of my neck.

The train melts around me into nothing, and the real world is cold.

“Damn, I really thought I'd lost my best acolyte to fucking… therapy..”

My eyes flicker open.

Mr. Carter, our theater teacher.

Our King.

Who let us live as humans were meant to!

With a hunt.

“Welcome back! Man, they really had you kids under lock and key, huh!”

He's got a body over his shoulder.

I recognize Noah’s blonde hair, even ten years older.

The Fix Me program is still connected to him through a plug in his skull, a bright green light flashing.

“Now, let's free your brother from therapy."

“Hoarder” is such an ugly word.

I prefer “saver”. Because that’s what I do. I save things.

Glass baby bottles with lead paint, a beautiful antique accordion, the manual to a Honda CRV, though I don’t have a driver’s license. All are useful, none should rot in a landfill. If I don’t need them, someone might. Someday.

The things I save are my everyday companions. Stacked up to the ceiling, always leaving a delicate little path just for me to sidle through. They are thoughtful like that.

The windows vanished a few years back, but I don’t mind. I never really needed them.

The door, on the other hand, was quite an asset. It’s been missing for some time now.

My things must not want me to leave, the little scoundrels. I’d come back for them, they must know that.

Every day I pick through my things, searching for the door. I rejoice when I find a jar of pickled beets. I grieve when I discover Mittens, my sweet little Mittens, scrawny and lifeless.

I mustn’t be deterred. The door is around here somewhere, waiting to be found.

I just hope it crops up soon, because the hunger pangs are growing stronger.

Still, Mittens will be useful. I am a saver, after all.

“May I come in?”

It was past ten in the evening, rain was pouring outside.

“Go away,” she said firmly. She stepped back and attempted to close to door. He put his foot in.

“I just want to talk. Please, Nell. I’ve made up my mind.”

He looks so pathetic, she thought. Like a helpless little puppy, all wet and shabby.

She invited him in with a silent gesture, never losing sight of him. They now stood in the living room, next to the main entrance.

“What is it, then? Keep the door open.”

“I want to let you know that… I forgive you.” It had been three months since he’d found out the truth and disappeared from her sight. He looked so different from the man she once shared a life with, a gloomy shadow now visible under his eyes. “I’ve thought about it a lot. It’s not too late. We can start again, if only…”

She instinctively put her hand over her womb.

 “Listen, we can leave this behind,” he insisted. “I don’t care that it’s not mine, no one needs to know. It’s just… we can’t have it. Then everybody would notice. It wouldn’t be right.”

“Forget it, Greg,” she exclaimed. “You have no word in this. And stop calling him ‘it’.”

“We can have a normal life and pretend this never happened. I still don’t know how… you could have done this to me.” He sobbed and pressed his hands over his ears. “But I love you, and I want to be with you. We can try…”

“We are done. Please leave, and stay away.”

Greg walked towards the exit, but stopped right before the door and closed it. He turned around and faced Nell. His stare was empty.

“I can’t let this happen. I’m sorry,” he muttered in a trembling voice as he drew a large kitchen knife from the inside pocket of his jacket.

Before Nell could react, he lunged at her and managed to knock her down. Nell tried to scream, but he’d grabbed her throat with one hand and turned her cries into dry rattles.

“How did this even happen, you dumb bitch? What did he promise you? Was it money?"

Nell kept punching and pulling, all to no avail.

As Greg raised his weapon, he began to feel something burning. He looked at his jacket, a dark flame engulfing it. He jumped on his feet and tried to take it off, then realised it was his skin that was being devoured by the fire. The man shrieked and ran outside, but not even the rain could put it out. In a blink, his flesh and bones were reduced to mere ashes, carried by the wind. Soon, there was no sign of his presence ever in this world.

Nell stood up and smirked, satisfied. This was but a small demonstration of the power He’d promised, all in exchange of her womb bearing His seed.

The string that connected them was pale red, like the first flush of ripeness on an apple in spring. He leaned in to nuzzle her ear. She laughed and rested her head on his shoulder.

I watched my friend's parents, envy twisting my gut as I learned: red like an apple, for love.

For as long as I can remember, I've seen strings between people, colored to reflect their relationships.

The strings between me and most of the other kids at the orphanage were pure white. Neutral. The string between me and my best friend, Joel, was brilliant gold, like the sun.

The day that I was adopted, Joel hugged me too tight and whispered in my ear, “I hate you for leaving me.” As I recoiled from him, I watched black spots bloom like mold along our gold string.

So I learned: gold like the sun, for friendship. Black like mold, for hatred.

Going to public school exposed me to many more colors than I'd seen at the orphanage. Green like poison, for rivalry. Blue as the ocean, between a pair of twins.

But the only people I ever saw connected by a red string were the parents of my new school friend, Emma. Whenever I visited their house, I had to force myself not to stare. How could I not? The string hung in the air, close enough to touch: incontrovertible proof that true love exists.

As I grew older, that knowledge corroded my own relationships. How could I stay with a boyfriend with whom I merely shared friendship and trust, when I knew there was something better out there? Every time I saw Emma's parents, their string was a deeper, truer shade of red. I began to despair of ever finding the same for myself.

Then I met him again at a bar.

“Christine?” a voice said.

I turned around to see an unfamiliar young man with a dimpled smile and curly brown hair. I recognized the string between us, faded yellow with spots of black.

“Joel?” I said incredulously.

Joel and I spent hours catching up. As we chatted, the dull string between us began to glow again. This time, ruby red.

When the bar kicked us out at 2am, I didn't hesitate to invite him up to my apartment. As I pulled out a pair of wine glasses, my phone buzzed. It was a message from Emma.

Are you awake? I really need to talk to someone.

“Sorry, I have to make a call,” I told Joel, stepping into the bedroom and closing the door.

Emma picked up on the first ring.

“Dad killed Mom, then himself,” she said hoarsely. “I should’ve told someone. I knew the abuse was getting worse.”

I sat heavily on the bed, the world spinning around me. I’d gotten it all wrong.

Their string was red, red like blood, for violence.

The door clicked open. Joel stood in the frame, a lopsided smile hanging from his lips.

I’m Peeps. My real name is actually Peter, but nobody calls me that anymore. Peeps, they think, suits me better. I was always feeble, weak, insignificant, completely unsuited for the nightmare that is everyday life now. I barely remember how it all was before the zombie virus decimated civilization, the freedom to eat whenever, to sleep as long as you wanted, the small things everyone took for granted, now a rare gift.

The settlement I am living in is the only one that still remains in this region, somewhere where the town of Wichita once stood. As one might think, life during a zombie apocalypse isn’t easy. Rations are scarce, water is limited, tension is constant. Were it not for the strict rules that kept us alive until now, everyone would be at each other’s throats. But me? I have it even worse. Being the one with the least worth-not strong enough to fight, not clever enough to provide-all I’m good for is being used for the others to blow off some steam. Want to punch somebody for the fun of it? Call Peeps. Want to feel better about yourself by humiliating someone? Peeps it is. I am just a source of entertainment to them. I guess that is the only reason they didn’t throw me to the brain eaters yet, and maybe because I somehow always return from the suicide scavenger missions they send me on. I’m fast. Nimble. Barely noticeable. Something they don’t even acknowledge. If hell would be a place, I pretty much think this would be it.

But not for long, oh no. Today, my ribs are aching worse than ever. Earlier, I coughed up blood. I know I’m already a goner, that they overdid their fun this time. Still, as I stand there on a deserted street outside our walls, I’m smiling. Fort he first time in who knows how long, I could laugh hard, loud, free. Yeah, were it not for my punctured lungs, that is. I pull myself together, wipe the blood from my lips, and walk back to the gates, swinging my backpack to the guards to sign I have found supplies. They let me in, strip me right there in the cold, searching for signs of bites, but they don’t find any. Of course they don’t. I get dressed as they tear away my backpack, taking anything they want. I don’t care, not anymore. I walk into the packed canteen with a smirk, ignoring how they mock me for it. However, when their looks turn confused, suspicious as I lock the doors with a flick of a switch, my smirk turns into a grin. Wicked, free. Being bitten isn’t the only way to become infected. If you eat the rotten flesh of zombies, you’ll turn into one too. I can still feel the disgusting taste on my tongue, but it isn’t as bad as before. And now, my time has come. And all of them smell so good…