Blood dripped from the rafters, heavy beads that swayed back and forth before breaking free. One drop splashed against Seth’s head. It ran down the back of his neck, cold as ice. A chill wind whistled through the gable vent, and the candlelight flickered, casting dark shadows across the two corpses before him.

He needed to leave, but his feet wouldn’t move. It felt like he was watching himself from a distance. Afraid of what he might do next.

This wasn’t Seth’s fault. He repeated that mantra in his head, over and over and over. It didn’t help.

His backpack lay by the side of the hatch. Seth needed to grab it, then he could climb down the ladder. That was the best course of action. If he broke things down into little chunks, maybe he could spur himself into motion. Backpack, ladder, car, escape.

Fog drifted through the gable vent. Thin wisps at first, but they soon stretched into thick tendrils that swirled around the candle. Seth watched them, confused. The fog had been omnipresent since the First Shadow dropped, but this mist felt different. It felt alive, purposeful.

The fog flowed into the father’s mouth. The corpse seemed to drink it in, and soon the mother joined him. Both corpses inhaled the mist, their chests expanding out. Then their eyes snapped open.

Seth’s heart seized. He raised his shotgun, arm trembling.

The corpses slowly climbed to their feet, their movements jerky, as if they were puppets being pulled by invisible strings. The mother looked at Seth and tilted her head. Her eyes were sunken pits, a dull gray with flecks of red.

This wasn’t his fault.

Seth pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. He’d never reloaded.

The corpses lurched for him, arms outstretched. Seth strode forward and kicked the father in the chest. His foot crunched against ribs, and blood sprayed from the shotgun wound. The impact knocked the father through the air, and his head cracked against the rafters.

The mother swung at him. Her nails slashed three lines against his cheek. Seth hissed as he stumbled back, and he swung the shotgun in a quick arc. The heavy metal clobbered the mother’s temple, and she fell to the side.

That wasn’t enough to put the corpses down for good. Already they were climbing to their feet. The father recovered first, and he charged at Seth, teeth biting at the air as he scrambled forward.

Seth reached for the revolver, but a heavy hand clamped around his arm and spun him around. It was another corpse, this one wearing a shredded winter coat. His skin was flayed, exposing the muscle below. In some places, his flesh was stripped to the bone.

It was the man from the porch, the one Seth had thrown a stick of dynamite at. How had he gotten up here?

Seth pulled his arm free and punched the corpse in the face. His fist cracked the man’s skull, but it was clear these undead wouldn’t go down so easily. Perhaps they were like zombies, and Seth needed to destroy their brains.

Either way, he needed to reload the shotgun. He reached for his pocket.

The mother grabbed his shoulder for leverage, then bit into his neck. Seth stumbled to the side, screaming. Flashes of pain burned through his neck and shivered through his nerves like hot fire. He tried to shake the zombie off, but she’d clamped down good.

The father grabbed Seth’s arm and yanked him back. And then the third zombie shoved against him, warding him away from the hatch.

Seth thrashed against the press of bodies. He wrenched to the side, tearing free of the mother’s grasp. He lost a chunk of his neck in the process, and he grunted as the pain flared down his spine. The mother swallowed the bite of flesh, then advanced again, arms outstretched.

Seth ducked low, then dove through a gap in the throng, heading deeper into the attic. The crowd wheeled on him, teeth gnashing and nails scratching at the air. His fingers fumbled for new shotgun shells, but he froze at the sight of a fourth corpse climbing up the ladder.

The boy, from before. Jess’s brother.

The son acted differently than the others. His movements were smooth, methodical, and his eyes seemed to adjust to the low candlelight.

Seth turned his attention back to the shotgun. He wrenched the barrel open, popped the old shells free. Too slow. The mother had reached him, and she was hungry for more of his flesh. Seth kicked at her leg and snapped her knee backward with a wet crunch. She toppled over, her broken leg twitching.

That was the way to handle these things. Break their limbs first.

Seth finished reloading, snapped the shotgun closed, and aimed the barrel at the father’s thigh. His shot blasted through the father’s flesh and splintered the bone. He fell over, his leg barely attached, only a few strings of meat gluing it together.

The son stood by the hatch. He watched, curious, but then something else caught his attention. Seth’s backpack. He shuffled closer, reached down, and pulled the pack onto his shoulder. Satisfied, he descended the ladder.

What the hell? Seth snapped the shotgun open and popped in two new shells. He couldn’t let that corpse steal his bag. It had the clues from Jess, not to mention the rest of the dynamite and the shotgun shells.

Seth ran forward. Something grabbed his ankle, and he fell to his knees. The mother crawled for him, fingers digging furrows in the wood as she dragged herself forward. Seth kicked his way free and scrambled to the hatch.

The man from the porch burst from the shadows. He tackled Seth, trying to bowl him over. Seth stood his ground. He had considerably more strength than the corpse, and he used that strength to grab the man around the waist, lift him in the air, and throw him through the hatch.

The corpse splattered to the floor below, a cacophony of bones crunching against the hardwood. Seth jumped down on top of him, shattering the man’s rib cage beneath his feet. He shot the man in the face for good measure, and the skull exploded. Black gore speared across the floor.

[Warning! Connection weakening!]

Connection? What was that about? The message popped up from the Inkling system, clearly related to the parasites.

Whatever. Seth could figure that out later. For now, he needed to chase after the son and get his backpack. He stepped forward, and nearly fell over. A wave of nausea rolled through him.

Pain bloomed across his body. His shoulder, where the boy had cracked him with the fire poker. His neck, where the mother had bitten a chunk from his flesh. His cheek, where the corpse’s nails had carved into his face.

Even the earlier wounds as well. Dull pain thudded against his arm, where a few gunshots had drilled through him. Another ache in his thigh, where a bullet had lodged against his bone. And his fingers felt numb, starting at the line where the chainsaw had severed them.

Seth had thought those wounds completely healed. What was happening to him?

[The laptop, you idiot! Don’t lose the laptop!]

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

What? Was the parasite talking to him now? It had to be, but what did it want with the laptop? Seth waited a moment, but the parasite had no answers. It lay dormant in his stomach, and when he focused, he could almost visualize it curled within his gut. Limp, as if asleep.

Seth forced his way to his feet. He stumbled out of the master bedroom, and it took all his strength not to fall over again. His limbs weren’t working properly, as if there was a delay between his brain and the rest of his body.

Even so, Seth flowed down the hall and drifted down the stairs. There he stood for a moment, confused. Where had the boy gone? A back door led out of the kitchen, and it was open. It hadn’t been open before, right?

Seth limped for it. A corpse jumped from behind the counter, the woman in rags. The one who had tried to impale him with a broom. The sudden movement scared the shit out of him, and he struggled to raise the shotgun. He fired it point-blank against her head.

Brains splashed across the countertops. Coated the ceiling. Splattered the walls.

The corpse fell back, headless. Even so, its limbs still moved. She patted the floor around her, as if blind.

Seth didn’t care. He strode past her, hands shaking. His ears rang from the shotgun blast. Had it always been that loud? The recoil stung his palm, and he struggled to hold the weight of the gun. It would be easier to drop it, leave it behind.

Seth barreled past the door and stumbled onto the back deck. The boards creaked underfoot, the wood old and wet from the mist. He hurried across the deck and down the steps onto a patch of spongy dirt. Where next? Where was the son?

A path wound its way around a grove of oak trees. With no better options, Seth hobbled down the path. He heard the door creak open behind him. Someone stepped onto the deck. More of the corpses, probably, but Seth didn’t bother to check. He pressed on, lungs burning.

The path curved behind the oak trees, ending at an old barn. The building was two stories, with huge doors down the center. One of those doors drifted closed. Something clanked within, and the building shuttered. A latch, locking the barn doors. The son had to be inside.

Seth stumbled to the door and leaned against it. The wood creaked under his weight. Red paint peeled away, flakes of it sticking to his hoodie. He took a moment to catch his breath, and already, he was starting to feel better. The laptop had to be just inside, close enough to restore his connection. Whatever that meant.

The shotgun barrel flipped down, and Seth quickly reloaded it. That done, he turned around and kicked the doors in. The wooden latch cracked under the force, and the doors swung open.

The inside was empty, a hollow shell with only some hay bales and a packed dirt floor. A loft hung over the back of the barn, and atop it stood the boy’s corpse, the backpack swaying from his hand. A man leaned on the railing beside him. His face was hidden in the darkness, but he wore a denim jacket and his eyes glowed bright yellow. David.

“Looking for this?” David asked. “The source of your power.” He laughed. “Do you even know what it is? That parasite inside you shouldn’t even be alive. It was always the weakest of the three, and yet you came along, carrying exactly what it needed.”

Seth dropped the shotgun and whipped out his revolver in its place. He thrust it at David, pulled the trigger down, and with the other hand, he fanned the hammer. Bullets leaped from the barrel, all six shots ringing out in a burst of firepower.

Wood chips sprayed from the railing. David cursed, and he ducked down, hands over his head. It was over in an instant.

David popped back up, his eyes wide. “Not in the mood to talk, I see. I understand. But you really shouldn’t have blown your load all at once. You haven’t even waited for the main event.”

Seth growled, and he snatched his shotgun back up. He strode forward, reducing the distance. The closer he got to David, the worse his angle was. But that was okay, the shotgun would blast right through the floor and any other cover David tried to hide behind. The shotgun could probably knock the whole loft down, given enough time.

David whistled.

Shadows stirred along the edges of the barn. The barn doors slammed closed. Seth spun around, too late. Corpses shambled toward him. They were covered in straw and their skin was rotting away. More were climbing out of the hay bales, where they had lied in wait.

Damn it! Seth blasted the leg off one, then burst the skull of another. His fingers dug through his pockets, twisted out new shells as Seth backed away. He reloaded faster than ever, the motion now familiar, ingrained in his mind. Two more shots rang out, aimed at the legs of the two closest zombies.

He reloaded again, but this time his arms faltered. A familiar corpse strode up the center. His thick beard swayed through the fog, and bloody welts bubbled from his face. Earl, back from the dead. Riles walked behind him, her skin charred and her head held under her arm.

“I tried to bring them back,” David said. “When the Holy Signal granted me a new wish, that was what I asked for. The gift of eternal life. But it seems my siblings have already left this world. All that remains is an empty husk. Hollow…”

Seth finished reloading just as Earl closed the distance. The burly man pressed close, and without room to maneuver, Seth fired the shotgun directly into his gut. Blood splattered across the crowd of walking corpses, but the blast did little to stop Earl’s charge.

Pressed against the back of the barn, Seth had no choice but to roll to the side, seizing a gap in the crowd. But the zombies surrounded him, their circle growing smaller by the second.

“Don’t worry,” David said. “Soon you’ll be hollow too.”

Seth fired his second shot into the back of Earl’s knee, then he kicked the man over, the force shoving him halfway across the barn. The crowd pressed in, and the ones with missing legs crawled across the floor, arms outstretched and teeth clashing.

Riles grasped her severed head by its hair and swung it like a mace. The head crashed into Seth’s wrist, knocking the shotgun askew. Pain lanced up his arm as Riles bit down. Her teeth sliced through flesh and tendons and nerves. His hand fell limp, and he dropped the shotgun.

“You bitch!” Seth tried to yank his arm away, but Riles held tight, both with her teeth as well as the arm holding the severed head.

More zombies pressed in. An arm slashed across his chest. Another grabbed the tattered sleeve of his hoodie. A third grabbed his ankle. Seth thrashed against the crowd. But every time he broke free of one’s grasp, another latched on.

Blood rushed through Seth’s ears, an everlasting roar that grew louder with every scratch and bite. Now that he was closer to the laptop, his wounds began to heal. But the damage outpaced the healing, if only slightly.

If Seth didn’t do something, he was going to die. A slow, agonizing death as the zombies slowly whittled him down.

The thought sent a bolt of panic down his spine, and Seth tore an arm free, used it to punch straight through a zombie’s chest. The man flew back and rebounded against the corpses behind him. But Seth kept up the assault, punching and kicking and screaming as he desperately thought to widen the noose that surrounded him.

David said something, but the rush of blood droned everything out. All Seth could hear was the constant roar, a raging river, an ocean that boiled with fury. The sound crackled like a wave of static. A Signal that resonated deep within his gut.

That sound. It felt so familiar. And even with the pain and the rage and the panic, this Signal filled Seth with an invigorating warmth. He fed on this energy, drank it in, and he used it to fight with renewed vigor.

Seth kicked against the crowd so hard that a score of corpses fell back, granting him a second of space. He used that time to bury his fingers under Riles’s clenched teeth, then tore her skull apart. He held half her head in one hand, while her lower jaw fell to the ground.

His right arm finally free from Riles, Seth couldn’t help but smile as he tore into the zombies. He used her severed head as a hammer, swinging it wildly against the surge of rotting flesh. But no matter how hard he fought, how many times he knocked the crowd back, they just kept coming. Soon they would drown him entirely.

And through it all, the Signal sang to him. After what seemed like an eternity, the Signal reached its crescendo.

[Integration threshold exceeded. State your desire.]

Seth laughed. So it seemed absorbing these parasites wasn’t the only way to level up. But what did he want?

A zombie grabbed onto his leg. Seth tried to kick it away, but this one was stronger than the others, its arm thick with muscle. Earl. The corpse pulled closer, using Seth’s leg for leverage, and it started to climb up Seth’s back.

The crowd surged closer, and there was nothing Seth could do. Earl leaned back with his considerable weight, and Seth toppled over. Corpses jumped on top of him, a mountain of writhing flesh. Within the jumble, Seth couldn’t move an inch. The zombies pressed into him, nails and teeth worming through the gaps to scratch and bite him.

What did he desire? To be free?

[Wish redundant. Choose another.]

That wasn’t fair. Though Seth supposed the wish was too similar to his ChainBreaker ability. Was that how things worked? Wishes couldn’t overlap?

To test it out, Seth asked for better healing, enough to outpace the zombie’s onslaught.

[Wish redundant. Choose another.]

Damn it! What did he want?

With the pile of bodies pressing against him, Seth felt more alone than ever. It felt like he’d been fighting for an eternity. First the gate, then the house, now this barn. When would it end? Why was no one helping him? Again, he was trapped in that closet. Cramped walls pressing in as his father shouted and drank and passed out in front of the TV.

No, Seth wouldn’t think of that. Instead, he replaced the pit of loneliness with a flood of rage. Where was Alex? The timer had gone off ages ago. All she’d had to do was get the goddamned car working.

“Here’s a wish for you!” Seth screamed into the press of zombies, his voice silent against the rush of blood. “I wish my friends weren’t so fucking useless!”

[Wish granted.]