Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

Daryl thought he'd buried her.

He remembered the weight of the soil, the sound of the last shovel of dirt landing on her chest, and the silence that followed. It wasn't mercy. It was survival. Elise had been bitten. She begged him to end it, and when he couldn't, she ended it for him—pressing the barrel of her pistol to her heart.

But now… she stood in front of him.

Soaking wet.

Eyes wide.

And whispering his name.

"Elise?" he choked out, stepping back, the flashlight in his grip trembling.

The underground metro station had long since gone cold. The tiles were cracked, cables hung like veins from the ceiling, and old advertisements fluttered in the stale wind. Daryl had come here looking for a safe place to rest. Instead, he found the impossible.

Or rather, she found him.

"Elise… you're dead," he said.

Her lips quivered. "I was."

And that's when the truth hit him. Her voice didn't echo like the others. Her body didn't carry the rot. Her shadow didn't match her shape—it twisted, longer than it should be, like something else was standing with her.

"I buried you," he whispered.

"You buried my body," she replied. "But not what was inside."

She stepped forward and with each movement, flickers of her death flashed across her face—bullet wound, pale skin, eyes rolled back, blood. Then gone. Normal again.

Daryl raised the flashlight like a weapon. "What are you?"

"I'm Elise. I remember the song we used to hum in the tunnels. I remember your hands shaking when we split the last can of food. I remember how you couldn't look at me when the fever came."

He hesitated.

"I also remember what came after," she added.

Behind her, the shadows pulsed—alive, breathing.

"Something crawled into me. Something that wasn't death. It waited. It's been… listening. Learning. Growing."

"Elise, I'm sorry," he said, tears forming. "I didn't know what else to do."

"You made the right choice," she said, with a sad smile. "But the infection didn't die with me. It adapted."

He backed away toward the tracks. "So why are you here?"

"To warn you," she said. "They're learning how to be like us. How to remember. How to feel."

Suddenly, the flashlight cut out. In the pitch dark, he heard dozens of breaths—not growls, not gurgles, but synchronized breaths.

When the light flicked back on, Elise was gone.

But on the far wall of the station, someone—or something—had written in dried blood:

"DEAD DOESN'T MEAN GONE."

And underneath, drawn in fingernail-deep scratches:

"WE REMEMBER."

Daryl ran.

Not because he feared the dead.

But because he feared what they might become.