Just as soon as Morecroft Manor comes into focus, the camera chasing Sev veers back even further, and shows that it’s not just a boy running. It’s a boy being chased.

  “Zombies can’t run,” Isaac protests.

  “I don’t think they know that,” Winter responds. “Feel free to go out and explain it to them.”

  The creatures have mottled skin that shows on the black and white screen like patches of grays. Wide, rictus mouths are open and gnashing though there is nothing yet to chew. Unlike Sev, whose own speed waxes and wanes with effort, the pace of the creatures is eerily consistent, like they don’t get fatigued or winded in the slightest.

  The path through the woods leads out with a view of the Manor, but it still sits a good distance away. The Morecroft estate is lined with heavy, old iron fencing that acts as a blockade against intruders. Despite living here all my life I’ve never seen anything scale the fence or even thrive against it. When weeds or plants try to grow along its length, they inevitably wither and die within a season.

  “That’s your house, right?” Nico continues. “Sev’s running here?” He moves to the window and looks outside. Though on the television the area looks well lit and easy to see, out the windows is just a blank, black slate except for the faint shine of a distant street light.

  “It’s probably just a coincidence. Where did you hear about this show again?” Winter asks, though she moves to the window at Nico’s side. Even in the middle of… whatever this is, she’s incredibly glamorous, looking more like a model finding her light than a girl at a mediocre zombie apocalypse.

  Unlike the other two, Isaac is cowering down into his seat, pointedly not meeting anyone’s eye line.

  I glance over my shoulder at Wrath, who looks equally confused - or at least I think he does, with demons its hard to tell - and he shrugs his shoulders.

  “Do you see anything?” It’s entirely possible that this is some kind of recording, but deep in my chest I know that’s not the case. I remember the blood rain after all.

  “I can’t see anything,” Nico says in frustration as he cups his hands around his eyes.

  That’s not going to do any good. I begin to head for the front door, but Isaac grabs my arm desperately and yanks me back with ferocious strength. “You can’t go out there!”

  “I’m just going to look,” I respond, trying and failing to shake him off. Isaac is a tiny boy, and I end up yanking him out of his seat entirely. He continues to resist, but now that he’s on his feet it’s surprisingly easy to begin to pull him along with me.

  “I hate to agree with the scaredy cat,” Wrath says from his chair, “but something’s wrong with all of this. You can’t go outside.”

  “I’m not going outside,” I repeat. “I’m just going to look.”

  “You never met a hot stove you didn’t want to lick, or whatever,” Wrath says with mock severity.

  “It’s a metal pole you lick,” I point out, not realizing I’m responding to him where other people can hear. “Not a hot stove. You touch a hot stove.”

  “You’re not supposed to do either,” Isaac says, sounding horrified.

  “I’m not going to. Now leggo!” But the redheaded boy is impossible to shake off.

  “I think I see something!” Nico hollers.

  I drag the two of us to the front door and throw it open.

  There, on the other side of the property fence, where the path to the woods leads up to the sidewalk, runs a boy chased by two creatures. And before I can do anything more than blink, the creatures tackle him to the ground as he begins to scream.

  Screams that choke off into a wet, horrific gurgle only moments later. But while the screams stop, the whimpering sounds coming from the boy continue on.

  “Look,” Winter says, glancing back at the television.

  The camera now zooms in close, and from my vantage point between the television and the street I can see it happen in real time the same as it’s captured on the television screen. But where there should be a cameraman, there is nothing. No camera. No man.

  Just creatures, noisily chewing on their prey. Though we heard gasps and breaths at the start of the program, now there is only a faintly playing melody in the background as the title card slowly begins to appear.

  Nec-Romance. A Dreadflix Exclusive.

  Color began to literally bleed from the screen as the black and white is covered with a dripping red. It’s only after a few minutes, and Winter’s “Uhm, guys?” that I turn back to see that the television is literally dripping with blood. Out of the screen, onto the floor, and staining the edges of the Tibetan death rug that covers the floor.

  I look away for only a second, but as soon as I turn back to the view outside, there’s no trace of Sev, or the zombies that dragged him down.

  While I looked between the TV and the view outside, Isaac was frozen in the doorway. “What did you see?” I ask him with a shake, but he shrugs me off and hurries back into the living room.

  I start to follow him, leaving the front door open. The gate is locked, so even if something wanted to break in it couldn’t. The television doesn’t drip blood for long. With a sudden PAF the picture vanishes and a smell like burned equipment begins to rise in the air as smoke bellows forth from the television.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Isaac has huddled himself up into a little ball on the loveseat, feet tucked underneath him. Winter looks down at the blood, then carefully reaches out and presses a finger against it. “It’s warm,” she says, looking back at me.

  Nico comes over towards the door, putting a hand on my shoulder as he passes.

  “There are…” I shake my head. Unsettled by what has just happened, I’m not even sure what to do.

  “Paper towels in the kitchen,” Wrath supplies helpfully.

  “Thank you,” Winter says, getting up and vanishing into the house.

  I don’t even notice the slip. “What was that?” I ask the demon.

  He shrugs again. “Blood rain?”

  Oh right. I forgot about the blood rain that had started my week. A portent of some kind of disaster that was on the way. Better than any horrorscope.

  “Theo?” Nico calls. “Better come see this.”

  I hurry back to the front of the house, where Nico is standing guard at the door. I don’t have time to ask what he’s worried about - I see them at the end of the front walk.

  The zombies.

  They rattle the fence gate as they press up against it, trying to force their way through. Still nearly five hundred feet away from us, it’s close enough to see the detail that the television left out. Their skin is indeed a mottling of grays, with hints of green, like infections that have had time to really settle in and make themselves home. Where the skin is rent or torn, black liquid has nearly calcified into something like onyx. The corners of their mouths are split open, as though the jaws have grown too long for the bodies underneath.

  They look less like humans than they do of someone’s approximation of a human being. Distended upper arms with short, stubby forearms. Shorter calves and long, bony thighs. Knees that don’t bend the right way. Arms that seem like they were attached from the wrong direction. Ragged, chunky fingernails and toenails, blackened and carved with gristle.

  The bars of the gate are shoved forward, clanging against the latch but never allowing them forward. That doesn’t stop the zombies from trying, but as a result of their disproportionate limbs - which look like makes them fast runners - they seem to have trouble staying upright as they stand still. As they lunge forward, it seems like only the weight of the fence is managing to keep them upright. Even as we watch, one of them begins to tumble to one side, falling to the ground.

  “Zombies are real?” Nico asks quietly from my side.

  “Do I have to answer that? Or can I just gesture quietly at the front gate?”

  Nico shoots me a look. “Listen here, there’s a time and a place for sarcasm —“

  “And it’s when there’s a zombie apocalypse showing up at my door like some wacky welcome wagon?”

  He sighs, but doesn’t push the conversation any further.

  “I just wanted…” A normal night. Friends that weren’t scared off by hijinks and danger. Someone who —

  “This is the coolest thing that’s ever happened to me,” Winter says, eyes alight despite the nearly deadpan tone.

  “He turned black and white before he disappeared,” Isaac whispers from his perch. “He disappeared into static like he was on television.”

  “He kind of was,” Winter points out, returning with the paper towels. She begins sopping up the blood on the floor before she tries wiping the blood from the television.

  The zombies continue to awkwardly fumble against the gate, but make no headway in getting closer to the house. And it’s clear that the house is their ultimate goal.

  “What should we do?” Nico asks, but I close the front door dismissively.

  “I’m not worried. This isn’t the first time the undead have tried breaking onto the property. The gates will hold them back.”

  Wrath moves into the drawing room and stares flintily out the front bay window. “I’m as ecologically conscious as the next demon, but I find zombies a disgusting attempt at recycling.”

  I chuckle lightly and then head back into the living room, where Winter has almost finished soaking up all the blood.

  “This a normal Friday night for you?”

  “Not usually so much blood,” I suggest, nodding to the number of paper towels she had to use to clean it up.

  “Oh please,” Wrath said from the other room. “You’d never leave your room if there was this much blood. You’re just acting tough for your friends.”

  Winter tucks her face away for a moment, but I don’t have a chance to react because Nico follows me in and crosses his arms next to me.

  “So what do you think we should do?”

  I don’t spend very long considering it. “I—“

  Isaac doesn’t give me a chance to speak. “I’m not going out there. You can’t make me leave.”

  I take a deep breath and continue with what I was going to say. “I think you guys should all stay here tonight. I don’t think any of the other bedrooms are fit for company, but I know I can find some sleeping bags and blankets, and we can do the slumber party thing.”

  It was secretly exciting. I’ve never actually been to a slumber party before. The kids in town never wanted to talk to me growing up, let alone invite me over.

  “Besides,” I add, because I never can help but make things worse, “zombies are only active at night.” As though that’s a fact that just everyone knows.

  I hear Wrath slap his face in dismay only to realize that I’ve messed up.

  “Is this because of the blood rain?” Nico asks from my side. I think he intends to do it quietly, but his voice carries across the room.

  Winter looks up absently, forehead knitted together. “Rain?”

  “The blood rain that happened on the first day of school,” Nico explains.

  She and Isaac both look blankly at the two of us. I tried to tell him - the people in Hollow Hills ignore whatever they can. When things get weird, they go inside and watch more Dreadflix until it goes away.

  I shake my head in Nico’s direction, trying to convey they’re not going to remember when Isaac suddenly chimes in with, “Oh yeah. How did I forget about that?”

  A moment later, the clarity spreads to Winter, too. “Yeah, that was spooky. I tried to go out and dance in it, but by the time I finished my makeup, it had already stopped.” She pouts for a moment. “I really wanted some shots with my makeup streaking down my face. That would have been excellent.”

  This is… unusual. People in town never remember when strange things happen. They just endure it and then sweep it under the rug once it’s gone. Wrath doesn’t seem phased, though, barely paying attention to any of us. But the embarrassment of sharing my knowledge of zombie active hours has seemed to been overlooked in the new developments, so I feel a rising anxiety begin to wither.

  I converge with Wrath in the upstairs hallway when I sneak away to grab the blankets and sleeping bags. Surprisingly, they’re exactly where I remember leaving them, which never happens in Morecroft Manor. I don’t know if the house itself moves them, or if Wrath’s minions like hiding things, but things go missing all the time.

  “You have any idea what’s going on?”

  Wrath gives me a blank look. “What, like I’m tapped into the mystical underworld and can just listen in to the pipeline to find out what’s up?”

  “Yeah, pretty much.”

  He nods. “Touche. I’ll put my ear to the ground tonight and let you know.”

  Which is nice and all, but he doesn’t even help me carry everything back downstairs.

  An hour later, everyone in settled in the drawing room, since no one wanted to sleep in a row where a television recently started vomiting blood. Nico helps me get a fire going in the giant fireplace that dominates one wall. “The house gets chilly at night,” I offer, blaming it on the fall weather and not on the fake that sometimes the house opens a portal to some kind of arctic Broken Hell demesne when it feels particularly nervous.

  We spread out in a semi-circle around the fireplace, already feeling a draft coming in from the rest of the house. Every so often, between the crackle of wood and the faint whistle of air making a circuit through the first floor, there’s a low moan from outside, and a faint scratching of nails against metal.

  I don’t know about everyone else, but I sleep like a baby.