Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

The moon hung low over the black forest as Mira Caldwell trudged through the pine-choked path, guided only by a map scorched into human skin. Behind her, the remaining survivors—Zara, Elias, and the Forsaken Girl—moved in uneasy silence. In the distance, a cabin with flickering red lights pulsed like a dying heartbeat.

"This is where it all started," Elias muttered, staring at the building through cracked glasses. "Where the first rituals were written. The Book… it was born here."

Crows circled overhead, silent for once, as if the air itself had been robbed of sound.

Inside the cabin, time was wrong. The furniture was frozen mid-splinter. Shadows on the wall moved in reverse. A woman in chains sobbed in the corner—only she wasn't alive. She was memory given flesh. The Forsaken Girl walked past her with recognition in her eyes.

"I was here," she whispered. "I watched them tear the world apart with ink and blood."

Elias knelt beside an old bar counter. Vials glowed green, bubbling without heat. "This was Father Alistair's first lab," he said. "Before the war. Before the Hollow Man came."

Suddenly, something crawled from the vents—a long-limbed thing with porcelain skin and hollow eyes. It moved like smoke and bone.

Zara reacted first, hurling a knife into its chest, but it didn't flinch.

"It's a Keeper," Mira said grimly. "A memory guardian. It wants to erase us."

They ran. Through twisted hallways of broken time, mirrors reflecting futures they'd never live. The Keeper hunted them, crawling upside down across ceilings, whispering in voices that weren't its own.

Elias finally reached a hidden door behind the fireplace. It opened to a room filled with candles and a circle of salt. In the center: a burning page, hovering mid-air.

"The Final Verse," he gasped. "The one that can rewrite the end."

But the Forsaken Girl stopped him.

"It's not meant for you," she said softly. "It's meant for me."

She stepped into the circle, and the flames swallowed her. The room shook. Screams echoed through dimensions.

Outside, the earth split open.

The Ghoul Trainmaster's shriek pierced the woods as spectral tracks rose from the soil, stretching into the sky. A train, midnight-black and crowned in bone, thundered across it.

"The Final Train," Elias whispered. "It only arrives when the world has one last chance."

As the survivors watched, the Forsaken Girl walked from the cabin, her eyes glowing like suns.

"It's time to ride," she said.

Zara hesitated. "Ride where?"

"To where endings are rewritten."

The Keeper wailed behind them as the train screeched to a halt. One by one, they boarded.

And from deep within the pages of the flaming book, a voice whispered:

"The end was never the end. Just a question waiting for the right answer."

The train doors slammed shut.

And the world held its breath.