Black Hollow

The forest pressed in on either side of the road, thick and suffocating, its gnarled branches clawing toward the sky like the fingers of dead men. Fog curled across the cracked asphalt, swallowing the weak glow of the headlights as the car moved deeper into the unknown. The man behind the wheel—his name was Ethan—gripped the steering wheel with white-knuckled fingers. He had been driving for what felt like hours, the gas gauge inching closer to empty, the GPS long since reduced to static.

Beside him, the woman—Tessa—sat curled against the door, her breath fogging the window. They didn’t know each other well, not really. She had run into the road, wild-eyed and frantic, and he had done the only thing that made sense at the time—he had let her in. That was before he saw the thing chasing her.

It had come out of the trees like something from a fever dream—too tall, too thin, its glowing eyes locked onto them as it ran with inhuman speed. Ethan had floored it, the tires screeching against gravel, the engine groaning as he pushed it harder than it was ever meant to go. He had lost it. He was sure he had lost it.

But Tessa sat there trembling, arms wrapped around herself, and in the silence between breaths, Ethan could hear something—a wet, rasping exhale from the darkness beyond the trees.

Something was still out there.

The road ahead split—one path leading toward the flickering lights of what might have been salvation, the other winding deeper into the woods. He made his choice without thinking, yanking the wheel toward the lights. Civilization. Safety.

Or so he thought.

The gas station crouched in a sea of cracked asphalt, its flickering OPEN sign humming with sickly red light. The pumps stood unused, skeletal beneath the buzzing fluorescence. Beyond them, the night loomed, heavy and watchful, pressing in with the weight of something unseen.

Ethan pulled in hard, tires shrieking, the car fishtailing slightly before jerking to a stop. The engine ticked as it died, the sound swallowed almost immediately by the vast, pulsing silence that followed. A silence that was too thick, too expectant.

Tessa barely breathed beside him. Her voice came out small. “I don’t think it’s gone.”

Neither did Ethan.

His pulse pounded in his ears, his hands still shaking on the wheel. His mind screamed drive—but something in the air, something primal and wrong, held him there, frozen in place.

Then—a sound.

Not from the road. Not from the trees.

From above.

A slow, deliberate tap.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The blood in his veins turned to ice.

The sound wasn’t casual. It wasn’t a branch shifting or an animal scrambling for footing. It was slow, measured. A presence announcing itself.

Ethan exhaled carefully, as if any sudden movement would send the thing above them plunging through the windshield. His hand crept toward the trunk release. A click. The latch popped.

He forced himself to move. Opened the door. Stepped out.

The night swallowed him whole.

The air was thick, clinging to his skin, carrying the scent of pine, gasoline… and something else. Something damp. Something rotting.

He reached the trunk, his fingers fumbling until they found the handle of the machete. The blade was rusted, dull along the edges, but it had weight. It was real.

Then—a growl.

Low. Wet. Close.

Not from the roof anymore.

Behind him.

He turned—too late.

Something dropped from above, the air shattering with its descent.

It had been waiting.

And now, it had him.

Ethan swung blind, his instincts moving faster than thought, the machete hissing through the air before his mind had fully caught up to the horror in front of him.

The blade bit deep into flesh—if it could even be called that. It was pale, rubbery, wrong, as if something had tried to be human and failed. The thing let out a sound that should have been impossible—a shriek that carried too many voices, layered over each other in a chorus of agony. The noise curdled the air, as if the night itself was rejecting it.

It lurched backward, long, jagged fingers clawing at the sky, at him, at nothing. Ethan didn’t hesitate. He wrenched the machete free, a wet, sucking sound following the motion, and swung again.

This time—the neck.

The blade met resistance, but Ethan pushed through, bone giving way with a sickening, wet snap. The thing crumpled, its milky, dead eyes locking onto the sky, staring past him, past the world, into something Ethan couldn’t see and didn’t want to.

For half a second, the world was silent.

Then, from the trees—

Rustling.

Breathing.

More of them.

Tessa was screaming, but the words didn’t reach him, lost beneath the roar of his own pulse. He didn’t think. He just ran.

The driver’s seat. The ignition. His hands shaking so badly he almost missed the keyhole.

The engine turned over.

The night moved.

From the tree line, figures began to step forward.

Not one.

Many.

Ethan saw the grins first—too wide, too eager.

Then he slammed his foot down.

The car screeched away, the tires burning against the pavement, and in the mirror—

The things in the woods broke into a sprint.

The road slithered into the forest like a dying thing, narrowing, twisting, as if it had no interest in letting them pass. The trees closed in on either side, their crooked arms stretching toward the car, their tangled roots pushing through the cracked asphalt like knuckles through rotting skin.

Then—a sign emerged from the darkness, swallowed in fog.

The headlights caught the battered wood, the letters barely legible beneath decades of grime and decay.

BLACK HOLLOW – 2 MILES.

Tessa’s voice came small, strangled. “That town’s been abandoned for years.”

But the road had already decided for them.

The temperature plunged. The windshield fogged at the edges, breath and frost kissing the glass in delicate, skeletal patterns. Ethan gripped the wheel tighter, his knuckles bone-white.

The trees no longer looked like trees.

Their bark twisted into grotesque, screaming faces, their mouths stretched wide in eternal, silent agony. The branches swayed even though there was no wind.

Then—something in the road.

A shape. Tall. Motionless. Waiting.

Ethan honked. The figure didn’t move.

Then, with an awful, wet pop, its head snapped toward them.

Too fast. Too far. Too wrong.

The bones cracked like wet twigs, twisting, twisting, twisting, until its black, empty eyes met his.

Ethan’s breath stopped.

And then—it was gone.

Not gone as in it had run, or faded, or turned away. Just… gone. Like it had never been there.

But up ahead, something else had changed.

The rusted gate marking the entrance to Black Hollow had been closed for decades.

Now—it stood open.

Waiting.

Welcoming.

Something inside had let them in.

The town should have been empty.

But it wasn’t.

The buildings leaned under the weight of time, their facades warped and peeling, windows smeared with the greasy fingerprints of a past that refused to die. Faded neon signs hummed weakly, casting sickly patches of light onto the cracked pavement. A convenience store stood at the center of it all, its glass doors hanging open, breathing a slow, mechanical wheeze as they rocked in the still air.

Ethan felt it before he saw it—the way the night thickened, the way the silence listened.

Then—the car died.

The radio clicked on. A voice crawled from the speakers, thick and distorted, as if whispered from the bottom of a long, wet throat.

"Welcome home."

A new sound joined it. Footsteps.

From the alleys. From the hollowed-out shells of forgotten buildings. From the shadows that had always been there, waiting.

Figures stepped forward.

Their movements were wrong—puppets with their strings tangled. Their smiles were carved too deep, their black, empty eyes drinking in the world without blinking.

Tessa’s fingers dug into Ethan’s arm.

“They see us.” Her voice was barely a breath.

Ethan didn’t think. Thinking meant fear, and fear meant hesitation.

His hand closed around the key. Twisted.

The engine roared to life.

The figures moved.

Not walked. Not ran.

They surged.

Ethan slammed the gas.

The bridge rose from the mist like the bones of something ancient, its rusted steel ribs arching over the black water below. The wooden planks, warped with age and rot, sagged beneath the weight of years, whispering secrets to the river that churned hungrily beneath them. A sign stood at the entrance, its letters faded but unmistakable in their finality:

🚧 BRIDGE CLOSED – UNSAFE CROSSING 🚧

Beyond it, the road vanished into the abyss.

Behind them, the things that had once been men were coming.

Ethan didn’t think. Thinking was a luxury for people who had time, and time had just run out.

He slammed his foot down.

The tires screamed. The car lurched forward, barreling toward the bridge, toward the unknown, toward the only way out. The moment the front wheels hit the wood, the entire structure groaned, as if waking from a deep and terrible sleep. Nails shrieked, beams trembled, splinters cracked like gunfire.

Tessa clutched the dashboard, her breath ragged. "Ethan—"

Snap.

A plank beneath them gave way, vanishing into the void. The river, far below, opened its jaws. The bridge swayed, the car fishtailing as Ethan fought the wheel, sweat slicking his palms.

And behind them—

The figures had reached the edge.

They did not stop.

They did not hesitate.

They ran onto the bridge, their movements wrong, jagged, their too-wide grins locked onto the fleeing car. The headlights caught glimpses of twisting limbs, blank eyes, teeth. The bridge screamed beneath them all.

Then, with a final, shuddering crack—

It gave way.

The rotten wood collapsed, beams snapping like brittle ribs, and the figures plunged into the darkness below.

They did not scream.

They did not flail.

They simply fell, their empty eyes never leaving Ethan’s as the blackness swallowed them whole.

The car hit solid ground.

The bridge was gone.

The town was gone.

Ethan didn’t stop. Didn’t look back. Didn’t speak. His hands locked on the wheel, knuckles white, as the road stretched on before them, winding through an endless corridor of trees.

For a long time, the only sound was the engine’s ragged growl.

Then Tessa whispered, "We made it."

Ethan said nothing.

Because far ahead, somewhere deep in the forest, something breathed.

A slow, wet, rattling exhale.

And Ethan understood.

They hadn’t made it out.

Not really.

Not yet.

The End