 Welcome to Microterrorz, scary stories for kids, where it's always the spooky season, full of chills, thrills, and spine-tingling spooks. Microterrorz are family-friendly frights for those ages 8 and up, and while our stories are for younger years, we are still talking about things that go bump in the night, and some children may not be able to handle what others can. Parental consent is recommended. Now for tonight's Microterror. Halloween Night of the Living Dead It began like any other Halloween day. The weather was brisk, the sun was out, although not providing much heat. It was basically there as a reminder that it was still daytime. And if the quaint little village of Holman, Ohio had any clue at all as to the terror that was about to rain down on them, they would have prayed the sun had never set that fateful Halloween. Holman could barely be categorized as a village. It was more of a small stretch of road with very few houses and a couple of small shops to keep their population of only 30 afloat. Holman was located far out in the countryside, away from big cities, any form of entertainment, and well, civilization in general. Holman was literally put on the map by a small congregation of workers back in the early 1900s as just a basic camp while they installed the Holman West Cemetery, a graveyard whose entire aura was a thing of nightmares. The most violent and wicked of criminals were buried there. No one else wanted them in their grounds so an isolated cemetery out in the country, one that became known as Holman West Cemetery, was constructed and the vicious criminals were laid to rest beneath an old maple orchard. Across from the gated iron-fenced resting grounds was the camp. With only a few small dwellings to begin it grew into the small stretch of road it is today. Descendants of the workers and constructors who put Holman on the map are the ones who live there today, their lineage feeling drawn to the land they helped build and decided to call it home. And today in one of those homes across from the Holman West Cemetery lives a boy named Peter Dixon and his parents George and Barbara. George and Barbara are sitting in the living room with the dull lights on their end tables giving the living room a soft luster after the sun had set and the moon rose. An old black and white horror film flickered on the television supplying more light in the room than either of the two lamps. Peter crossed through the living room after grabbing a cold piece of pizza left over from their dinner and recognized the movie on the television immediately, Attack of the Crab Monsters, one of his favorites. While most kids his age were obsessed over modern horror films like A Quiet Place, Trained to Busan and The Black Phone, Peter was more of an admirer of the B-movie classics, Crab Monsters, Plan 9 from Outer Space, The Tingler, these were his entertainment compulsions. In fact, he had posters for all of these movies and more hanging in his room. Peter sat down on the couch between his parents as his favorite part of the movie played out. A team of scientists enter a mysterious cave and the giant mutant crab emerges from the darkness for the first time. Gunfire and terror ensued along with some of the all-time cheesiest monster effects. It was glorious. The movie abruptly cut out bringing up the graphics of a breaking news segment in its place. A man behind a news desk shuffled papers in front of him, cleared his throat and looked directly into the eyes of Peter, George, and Barbara. Jeffrey Trent with an urgent bulletin from Ohio State officials in conjunction with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The anomaly tracked only days ago entering our galaxy. What officials are referring to as a cosmic pulse may in fact make contact with our planet within the hour. A NASA spokesman says the cosmic pulse or rapidly moving radio wave currently poses no threat to civilians but warrants of electronic disturbances and rolling blackouts. An Ohio State official says the most likely places affected are those on the outskirts of larger cities or isolated areas with older forms of technological capabilities. We will keep you updated as more information is available. For now we return you to your regular programming. Attack of the crab monsters burst back onto the screen, and George, complete with an ornery smirk, began to hum, r-e-m-s, It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it, funny. Peter said, taking a giant bite of the cold pizza from Fazzini's, I heard that pulse came from a planet called Quasar, Barbara said. Peter laughed mockingly at his mom, Quasar's not a planet, mom. It's the origin of the radio wave from deep space. Barbara crossed her arms and stared at the television. Well, it sounds like bad news to me. Peter's phone rang in his pocket. Looking at the screen he saw the face of his friend, Sean Rhodes, sticking his tongue out with his eyelids rolled inside out. The photo always made him laugh, as disgusting as Sean's patented trick was. But that was the nonsensical life of a 12-year-old wrapped up in one frozen instant. Peter scarfed the rest of his pizza as he hopped up from the couch and rushed up the stairs to answer Sean's call. He entered his room and shut the door. Surrounded on all four sides by the vintage artwork of 50s and 60s science fiction and horror, he answered the phone. Talk to me eyeballs, Peter said. Huh? Eyeballs? Sean said on the other line. Then he remembered. Oh, that stupid picture is still my incoming call image. Peter laughed. Hey, it's a brilliant photo, he said. Sure to impress someone someday. Seems to have impressed you, Sean laughed. Just wanted to let you know crab monsters is on. I know what's your favorite. Yeah, I saw that. Thanks. Did you see that breaking news or urgent bulletin, as the news guy called it? About the cosmic pulse thing? Yeah. Sean said. Kinda crazy. My mom thinks it's bad news. The only bad thing would be if it interrupts crab monsters. Sean said. Peter laughed. Yeah, well, good thing I've seen it a thousand times. Where Peter expected a laugh or even just a chuckle from his friend was nothing. Silence was now on the other end of the call. Sean, you there, buddy? Nothing. Peter pulled the phone away and saw the black screen. He tapped it and pressed the buttons on the side. Still, nothing. The phone had died. It made no sense. Peter smirked and so struck the devastating, the horrible blood curdling cosmic pulse. He joked to himself, trying to sound like an old school horror host. Then something outside his window caught his attention. There were bright blue flashes synced with quick, thrumping sounds and rapid succession. They were blinding like the brightest bolts of lightning Peter had ever seen. He put his hand over his eyes to shield them from the flashes as he made his way to his bedroom window. Pulling the curtains apart, he looked outside just as the mysterious flashes stopped. He scanned the street, the neighbor's house, and then the sky, which was clear of any clouds and only contained the full bright Halloween moon. Cosmic pulse, he said to himself, not completely writing enough this time. Suddenly the power went out, filling his house with silence. The rest of Holman also fell into darkness. Stillness. Peter, are you okay? George called from downstairs. Yeah, Peter responded. His eyes still glued to the dark, eerie landscape outside. He looked across the street to where the Holman West Cemetery sat behind its protective iron gates, tombstones rolling up and down within its hills. For the first time, the cemetery gave Peter the creeps. A slow chill made its way down his spine, eventually branching off in a sea of goose bumps on his arms and neck. Another sudden flash came from the sky, lightning cracked through it and struck the cemetery. A flushing glow of blue mist covered the sacred grounds before sinking into the earth. Peter was stunned. He'd never witnessed such an event, such a bizarre occurrence. The last trickle of lightning receded into the sky, and all fell silent and still again. The moonlight reflected off a soft white layer of fog that rose in the cemetery. Whispy and elegant, it swayed in place between the gravestones, monuments, and mausoleum in the distance. Peter's bedroom door opened in a hurry, his father and mother rushing in. What on earth was that? Barbara exclaimed, gripping her husband's sleeve. Peter turned to his parents. The cosmic pulse, he said. It had to be. What else could that have been? George raced to the bedroom window and looked out. He scanned the street. People had emerged from their homes. Confusion was kicking in. Panic would be next. We should go check on the neighbors, Jim, Selena, Sean, and his dad. George said, someone might need help. George glanced at Holman West Cemetery next. He saw the fog, and then he saw movement within it. They began as shadows lumbering through the mist, but the more George watched, he could tell they were people. There's a bunch of people in the cemetery, he said. Something's happening. He pulled away from Barbara and went for the door. George, wait, she said. He stopped in the door frame, only lit by the moonlight from outside. I'm going to see what's happening, then I'll come back to get you, Barbara. You and Peter. I'll be right back. George was gone. Barbara and Peter remained in the bedroom. George ignited a flashlight and left his house. Outside, he was met by the neighbors, Jim and Selena. What's going on? George asked them. They joined his side, both of them just as confused as he was. Not sure, Jim said. He pointed across the street, lightened and struck the cemetery. There's a weird glow and then this strange fog. George followed Jim's direction, still seeing the slow-moving figures staggering around beyond the gates. Looks like some people already went in to investigate, then. No, Jim said. We were out on the porch enjoying the weather when it happened. We didn't see anyone go in there. They just appeared. George gawked at these shadowy figures again. Who are they? He asked. Neither Jim nor Selena had an answer. It was like the mysterious figures appeared out of thin air, or possibly even the fog itself. You want to come with me? George asked. Jim puffed up his chest and took a step toward George. But Selena was quick to stop him. You're not going anywhere, she commanded. It's Halloween night and you're wanting to go stomping around a foggy graveyard to investigate shadows? I have seen enough scary movies too. It's fine, George said, putting his hand up to stop her. As much as her interruption annoyed him, George didn't need anyone to go with him anyways. I'll be back in a minute, he said, before jogging across the street and up to the gates of Holman West Cemetery. What started off as a normal Halloween evening, winding down after trick-or-treating, having a few slices of pizza from Fazinis and watching bad movies on television, had now taken a more bizarre turn. As George peered between the iron bars of the cemetery, he suddenly felt like he was in one of those bad movies. Strangeness abound, confusion among the peasants, he thought, as he was hit with the notion that maybe these mysterious figures wandering through the cemetery should be handled by the authorities. Deputy Eros was only a quarter of a mile away on the other side of Holman. Surely he was wise to what was going on, surely he'd be arriving momentarily. Just then a hand shot through the fog and through the gates, grabbing George by the neck and cutting off his ability to scream. His eyes went wide as he saw the face of his mysterious attacker slowly materialized through the wispy haze, covered with rotting brown flesh hanging from its exposed skull. Its eye sockets were vacant, their deep cavities only filled by shadows. It opened its mouth, moaning mournfully as the last of its teeth fell out and pittered on the tips of George's shoes. George struggled, trying to pull away from the crazed thing, but as weak and frail as it appeared, it held a strong grip on him. George couldn't believe what was happening, this was like an old movie, it was like the ones where the dead rise from the ground. Zombies! George wheezed within the creature's ever clamping grasp, and if George knew zombies like he thought he did, he knew what they were capable of. They bite, they infect, they recruited that way, that's how they grew in numbers. In the movies, a single zombie was one thing, but a horde of the undead was an entirely different beast, one that always kicked started the end of the world. And just as George thought all of this, dozens more of the undead took shape behind the iron gates of Holman West Cemetery. He was frozen in fear, too distracted by the sickening sight to notice his right arm being pulled through the gates and bitten by one of them. George wanted to scream, he wanted to warn his family, his neighbors, but he couldn't. The pain surfaced in his arm, it stung at first, then went numb. His entire body throbbed after that as the infection spread. His vision went black, his body shut down and smacked the earth. George was dead, then he opened his eyes. Peter had tried his phone several more times, all to no avail. Whatever had lit up the sky, and most concerningly the cemetery, had clearly killed their electronic devices, cut their power, and sent Holman Ohio back into the Stone Age. I don't see your father, Barbara said, squinting out her son's bedroom window. She only saw Jim and Selena standing in the yard, as well as a few others, congregating in the street a couple of houses down. He crossed the road to the cemetery, but now I don't see him. Peter could tell his mom was becoming more anxious by the second. Peter leaned over her shoulder and saw exactly what she did. He took note, however, of the misty fog that seemed to grow out of the cemetery. It had become thicker and was slowly drifting its way down to the street. He could barely see the iron bars anymore, not to mention the people who his dad saw wandering around behind them. As Barbara continued to try and see through the darkness and ever-expanding foggy landscape, Peter left his room, using the moon's glow beaming through the windows of his house to make his way to the back bedroom, a spare room that the Dixons rarely used. On the far wall was another window. Peter pulled the dusty curtains apart and looked out at his friend Sean's house. Sean sat on the window sill of his upstairs bedroom, with his legs dangling down the side of the house, a vivid LED camping lantern beside him. Took you long enough! Sean, a boy of Peter's same age, yelled across the yards. Are you and your dad okay over there? Peter called back. Yeah, my dad went down the street to try and get some answers from Sheriff Arrows, Sean said. Why do dads feel the need to launch their own investigations so quickly? Peter laughed. Mine went to the cemetery. The cemetery? Sean seemed surprised. Why would he go there? He saw some people walking around in there after that lightning strike. He thought they might have been trying to see what happened. People walking around the cemetery after a mysterious lightning strike? On Halloween? Sean questioned, your dad better pray they aren't zombies. Peter knew his friend was clearly joking. Zombies were a thing of fiction. There was no way on earth that the dad could rise. Sure, it was common in the grainy black and white movies they watched, but not in real life. However, even still with that mindset, Peter couldn't help but shake the familiar formula. Mysterious power from space. A power outage. Strange figures lurking behind the gates of an old cemetery where the most violent criminals had been buried. Sure seemed like a convenient and convoluted setup for a zombie invasion story. And just then, almost on cue, a woman's blood curdling scream ripped through the silence of the night. The scream was sharp enough to chill both Peter and Sean. They could just look at each other. Each of them praying Sean's joke hadn't turned out to be real. Below them, between the yards, a woman ran for her life. It was Selena. He's dead. Jim's dead. Somebody help me. She screamed. Hey, Mrs. Selena. Peter yelled down to her. She came to a quick stop between the yards and looked up, seeing Peter in one window and Sean in another behind her. What happened? Peter asked. Jim's dead. Your dad killed him. She screamed. My dad. Peter must have heard that wrong. His dad wouldn't have. No, he couldn't have done something so horrible. What are you talking about? Peter aggressively questioned her, ready to defend his dad at any cost. Your dad came back from the cemetery. Selena sobbed. Jim went to see if he was okay. Then your dad bit him on the arm and the neck. It was overkill. Jim died right there, and now your dad is coming after me. Peter and Sean immediately looked at each other. No, they both thought individually. This can't be real. This has to be a prank. A painful groan off to Peter's left made him turn his attention to a shadowy someone staggering between the yards. Selena gasped at the sight of the man. Peter squinted and saw it was his dad, but he looked sick. He was walking like he didn't know how to walk. There was some kind of red liquid smeared on his face and clothing, one of his arms too. Dad, Peter called out. His dad stopped moving, buying Selena enough time to run away. Hearing Peter's voice, George stopped where he was, jerking his head back and forth like a confused bird, looking for where the voice had come from. Up here! George finally snapped his head in the right direction, staring at his son in an upstairs window of their home. He opened his mouth groaning loudly until something in his throat gurgled. In the vivid light of Sean's lantern, Peter noticed his dad's eyes didn't look right. They were yellow with red in the center. His skin had lost most of its color, now making it look gray or dead. George hissed. His brow dipped in his nose, twitched like a snarling dog. He's a zombie! Sean yelled. Peter couldn't deny it now. All signs were pointing to it. The cosmic storm that struck Holman West Cemetery had reanimated the dead, and now it was spreading. Peter urged his mom downstairs, explaining what he thought was happening. She laughed at first, but her panic in the situation generally made it difficult to keep up her own denial. He grabbed the extra flashlight from the junk drawer and told his mom to stay put. Barbara had succumbed to her fear and sat down at the kitchen table in a mostly catatonic state. Her lips trembled, her teeth chattered. I'm just going to get Sean and bring him over here until his dad gets back with the sheriff, Peter said, boldly rising to the occasion. Barbara nodded, although she was still lost in her own mind. Be careful, she barely got out. Peter rushed to the back door and peered through its small glass window. He didn't see his dad out there anymore, but did see the light of Sean's lantern at his back door. Peter unlocked the door and slowly opened it. He felt the brisk temperatures of the night rush in against his face and body. The air had a strange scent on it, musty, cold. It didn't smell right to him, not like it had earlier in the day when burning cedar, dry leaves and pumpkin spice were more prominent. Peter crept outside and closed the door behind him. The wind blew between the yards. The dead trees scraped against the houses, a feeling of uneasiness crept into the back of Peter's mind. He looked both ways, like he was crossing a busy street and determined the coast was clear. He jogged across the grass and to Sean's back door. Sean opened it and the two friends finally stood before each other. Still in shock, neither of them knew exactly what to say first. Zombies, Sean simply stated. In his head, Peter agreed, but also that zombie happened to be his own dad, which meant his dad was no longer alive. Peter tried to push past thoughts of grief and deal with the problem at hand. There would be time to grieve, but he needed to make sure he stayed alive long enough to do so. How widespread do you think it is? Sean asked. Peter didn't know how to respond. He assumed, though, that if the corpses in Holman West had risen, that meant there would be dozens, and if the infection had already spread to his dad and with the potential of Jim as well, then it was going to continue to spread like wildfire. I don't know, Peter said, but if this is like any movie we've seen, it's going to get much worse. Sean felt a knot in his stomach. What if this is the start of the zombie apocalypse? The thought had already crossed Peter's mind. The closest city or town to Holman was at least 25 miles away, so there was always the possibility of somehow getting the situation contained or under control. But that's only if the citizens of Holman banded together and quickly came up with a plan of action, but it had all just begun. We need your dad to come back with Sheriff Eros, Peter said. We have to figure out a way to stop this from getting a sudden snarl discharged behind Peter, and he was grabbed by two cold, dead hands. He screamed, wriggling himself away from his attacker. Zombie! Sean screamed. Peter stumbled into Sean's house and turned around to see Jim, Selena's husband, lumbering in the doorway with his arms outstretched. His skin was grey, his eyes were yellow and red, and he moaned dreadfully. Give me that, Peter said, tearing a lantern from his friend's hand and smashing it over the zombie's head. With a single loud grunt, the monster crumbled to the ground. The fog rolled in, snaking its way between the two homes. Within it, Peter and Sean saw more shadowy figures. They were all slow moving and moaning in sync with one another, a harmonic song of the dead. One of them sprung from the fog and directly at the boys. They both screamed. Peter tried to shut the door, but the zombie had crammed its body inside just enough to prevent it from shutting. Sean joined his friend, both of them trying to force the monster back. Two more zombies pounded against the outside of the door, making Pete and Sean's job even harder. The decomposing corpses were stronger than they looked. Peter swung the lantern again, blasting one of the monsters in the side of the head. A second swing struck it directly in the face, and that was enough for it to cower. Peter and Sean forced the door shut and locked the deadbolt. I need a weapon too! Sean shouted. He scanned the kitchen, immediately spotting a pizza cutter sitting next to the empty Fazzini's box. He snatched it off the counter and held it up like he was accepting an Oscar. The lantern light reflected off its stainless steel circular blade, giving it the appearance of an epic legendary weapon instead of just an average kitchen utensil. Peter nodded, agreeing to Sean's weapon of choice somehow seemed right. Lanterns and pizza cutters were going to have to do the trick. Through the house, the boys heard the front door open, although rather loudly. Dead! Sean called out, running from the kitchen to the adjoining living room, but he stopped dead in his tracks when he saw what had really entered the house, and it shouldn't have been that much of a surprise. Zombies, four of them, flooded in, their ghastly wails and harrowing groans chilling the boys to their bones. Peter wasted no time. He lunged at the closest zombie, smacking it against one side of its head, and then the other. He finished it off by coming straight down on the top of its head. The zombie collapsed, but the problem was far from over. There were still three more. Sean stiffened up in fear, unable to bring himself to assist in the undead onslaught. His pizza cutter remained idly raised over his head. Peter smashed another one until it was incapacitated on the floor, and then went straight for a third. Peter was filled with berserker style aggression, smashing zombies left and right with the lantern, and as soon as the fourth and final one was down, Peter dashed out the front door to make sure the coast was clear, if only for a few minutes to regroup. What happened next in Holmen happened fast. Beneath the reanimated walking corpses and screams of the citizens, the sky erupted in a blue glow, giving the illusion of daytime for only a brief moment. But within that moment, spiraling lights shot down all around the outskirts of Holmen, like squiggling bolts of lightning and connected like a chain. Then, like magic, a blanket of translucent light flooded back up into the sky to the original point of origin and created what could only be described as a force field. Holmen had been cut off, quarantined. It wasn't for a few more surreal moments that Peter saw something else. Something in the sky, within the mystical enclosure, was suspended silently in the air directly above Holmen, and it didn't take a genius to recognize what it was. A zombie invasion was already an unbelievable event on its own, so why not add a flying saucer from outer space to the mix? Barbara sat in the kitchen of her home, shaking. Through the windows only moments earlier, she had seen the latest light show, the insane bursts of blue that almost blinded her before subsiding back into darkness. She didn't want to know what was going on outside, and now she regretted letting Peter rush out of the house like he did. What kind of mother am I, Barbara thought, disgusted by her decision. She needed to rise to the occasion like her son had, whatever the occasion was. She did believe what her son told her, something about zombies coming from the graveyard across the street, but at the same time, she didn't. Sure, something was wrong, that much was certain, the power going out all over town, the blue lightning and flashes from the sky. That darn cosmic pulse, Barbara thought, it's making everyone crazy. There had to be a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of this. Barbara stood up from the kitchen table and walked through the house until she was at her front door. She grabbed a light jacket from the coat rack, tossed it on, and opened the door. George startled her at the doorstep. He looked sick. He looked wrong. Barbara cocked her head and gawked at her husband. She wanted to say something, but she couldn't find the words. His skin was dead and peeling. He had peculiar red smears all over himself. His eyes were unnatural shades of yellow and red, and there was nothing behind them. No emotion, no feeling, no life. George was dead, but yet there he was, standing before her. Before she could utter his name, he attacked Barbara with a snarling force. Her screams echoed throughout Holman, blending in with all the others. Peter couldn't remove his eyes from the thing in the sky. Not even the countless screams of men, women, and children across Holman were enough to deter his focus. He'd seen this kind of thing before, however it was always in the movies. War of the Worlds, The Man from Planet X, Planet Nine from outer space. Peter didn't even want to think of the implications of what he was seeing now. And on top of a zombie apocalypse? This wasn't going to go well. Sean rushed out of his house, joining Peter on the porch. He looked briefly at the shimmering blue wall that surrounded Holman, but then turned his attention to the sky, just like his friend. Just like everyone else was doing. Is that ahhh? Sean began, but couldn't bring himself to finish the question he never thought he'd have to ask. A flying saucer, Peter confirmed, still taken aback by the sight. The flying saucer that had entered the airspace over Holman was also the responsible source of the shimmering dome that now covered it. Peter's brain worked over time trying to make sense of it all. If the saucer was responsible for the dome, it was a safe assumption that it was also responsible for the mysterious cosmic pulse that was tracked through space, as well as the strange bolts of lightning that reanimated the dead. Was this some sort of sick game? Peter thought. Raise the dead? Let them wreak havoc and just watch all the carnage from above? Was this a form of alien entertainment? Then out of nowhere, the ship silently lowered itself, landing and disappearing behind the fog-ridden cemetery. We're being invaded by aliens and zombies! Sean said, his pizza cutter rattling in his grip. Before Peter could respond, a deep voice called out from the street. Sean, Peter, get down! The tall, brooding, mustachioed sheriff Eros was rushing towards them, his gun drawn. Peter and Sean didn't think twice. They both ducked to the ground as Holman's beefed-up sheriff opened fire. Two heavy thuds hit the ground behind the boys. Peter rolled over to see who Sheriff Eros had dropped. He saw two individuals on the ground, a man and woman, both dead. Well, deader. Mom, dad? Peter mumbled. He stood to his feet and looked down at his zombified parents. His mind went blank. He didn't know how to feel. He knew grief was there, but something was keeping it from surfacing. You boys have to come with me now! Sheriff Eros said, trying to hurry them along. But my parents, Peter said, shakily. They weren't your parents, Sheriff Eros expressed. They had been changed by the dead. Those things are everywhere. They're multiplying faster than I can eliminate them. Where's my dad? Sean asked the sheriff. I eliminated him, he matter-of-factly said. Sean's jaw dropped, but he came to get you. Eros laughed starkly. Oh yeah, he came to get me all right, get me with his teeth. He came at me looking for a meal, a Halloween night snack. I wasn't going to let my brain become that snack. Peter turned to the sheriff. We have a new problem, he said, motioning to the cemetery. Eros knew exactly what Peter was talking about. The aliens, he said. Yeah, that's definitely a problem. We'll just add it to the list of other nonsense. The screams around Holman continued, almost overshadowed by the snarling groans from the ever-growing number of undead ghouls. There's an old mineshaft off the main stretch about a quarter of a mile south of here, Eros said. They used it back in the day to transport materials when Holman was established. Without force field up all around us, I think the mineshaft is our only shot at getting out of here and getting help. Sean froze. That mineshaft is haunted. Eros scoffed. It's not haunted. I personally spread that rumor to keep the kids of Holman away from it. It's dangerous, but it's also possibly our only way out of here. What about Edgar, the miner? Sean asked. I made him up too. Edgar was my grandfather, Eros said. He was definitely a spook but not a ghost. A cold breeze blew against the back of Peter's neck. He felt something was wrong. He felt another impending danger. Turning around he saw the fog thickening before him, and within the fog he saw shadows, shadows that belonged to the dead. They lurched from the fog and revealed themselves, ghoulish, dead and hissing with malice. Peter turned and tried to run but slipped on a pile of wet leaves in the grass. He smacked the ground, clunking his head against it. As he shook off the days, he heard several muffled gunshots around him. Sheriff Eros was eliminating more zombies as he had so casually put it. But then the gunshots ceased to exist. He heard a scream in place of them. A manly, yet devastating and defeated scream. Peter struggled to get to his feet swaying from one side to the other. In his foggy days he saw a blurry and distorted event play out before him. Several figures, several zombies, attacked Sheriff Eros from behind. His weapon was dry and had no way of fighting back. Peter's vision began to clear up. The zombies overpowered Holman's sheriff, taking him down to the ground and smothering him until his screams were abruptly cancelled. Sean lunged at the pile of zombies on top of the sheriff, slicing and dicing his pizza cutter at them like he was serving up an extra large pepperoni and sausage. But then the circular blade got wedged between one of the zombies' shoulder blades and neck. Sean couldn't get it to come back out. He struggled, he pulled, he yanked, but it was all to no avail. He had to abandon his weaponized utensil. Sean stepped back, bumping into Peter who was now fully recovered. The boys stood side by side, slowly backing away from the zombies. As all of the undead monsters rose to their feet and staggered in their direction, Sheriff Eros also rose up, dead and gray with glowing eyes. He snarled at the boys, joining in the morbid chorus of the dead. Wet snarls and inhuman screeches erupted behind the boys. They spun around to see another horde of zombies closing in on them. They were trapped, sandwiched between two different hordes who wanted nothing more than to eat them and turn them into their doulish clothes. It was nice knowing you, Sean cried out. Peter was overwhelmed. He heard Sean but couldn't bring himself to respond. In just a moment, once the first bite happened, it wouldn't matter anyway. Peter decided to just close his eyes and wish for a quick death. Maybe it won't be so bad, he thought. They all seem to work together pretty well. That's something that even living humans can't do. Seeing nothing but the darkness under his eyelids, Peter made peace with his horrific fate. He squeezed his eyes shut even tighter. But then something happened. There was a loud sound, a blast. It reminded him of a laser gun blast from the hundreds of science fiction movies he'd seen and video games he'd played. The blast was followed up by a sizzling sound and then a pop. Oh my god! Peter heard Sean say in complete disbelief. Peter opened his eyes just as the blasts continued. They were lasers. Piercing electric green blasts hit the zombies. They sizzled from the legs up until they were charred like the burnt drippings at the bottom of an oven. Then pop. They burst into a cloud of ashes. Blast after blast, each zombie that surrounded Peter and Sean met the same exact fate until there were none left. Within the wet leaves and grass around them, now lay a fine layer of black ash. There were still screams and gunshots echoing in the distance, but within their space, Peter and Sean were met with unnerving silence. They breathed heavily, their hearts pounding with the ferocity of a thousand tribal drums. Then, through the fog, another figure appeared. This one was much taller than the zombies. It walked upright like a human and was more brooding and wider in the shoulders, like it wore enormous shoulder pads. Its head was rounded like a dome, and in one of its hands was a weapon. The laser gun, perhaps? Still, on the side of caution, Peter and Sean slowly backed up as this new entity split the fog in half, finally revealing itself in full to them. It was nearly seven feet tall and wore some kind of armor-plated suit with strange markings all over it. The suit shined unlike any material the boys had ever seen before. The weapon in its grip was cannon-like. Colors swirled around the barrel as it hummed with life. The armor suit it wore was larger near the shoulders, and on top of it was a helmet, a glass dome. But it was what was beneath the helmet. That was terrifying. The being inside the suit looked human enough, but its face was all wrong. Its features were sharp, angled strangely, and in some areas seemed to droop, while in others seemed more pronounced. It looked like it was made from clay. Even its mouth was just a long slit that looked like it didn't belong like it was an afterthought. Its eyes were small and beady, and its head was bald, but with grooves reaching from the front to the sides where ears should have been. Peter had come to a well-educated conclusion that this being, this heavily armored alien life form, was the reason Holman had fallen under such a horrible spell. He and Sean froze. They'd been able to somehow fend off the zombies, but now seeing this hulking beast from another world standing before them and wielding an out-of-this-world weapon that proved capable of vaporizing someone in an instant, their hope to elude death quickly faded. This is it, Sean said, accepting their impending fate. As Peter and Sean braced themselves for imminent vaporization, something happened, a sharp, crackle-like feedback from a microphone, and then a short burst of static emitted from a speaker system somewhere on the alien's suit. When the fuzzy static cleared, the being spoke, but it was in a language the boys had never heard before, a very alien language. As they tried to communicate with them, Peter and Sean shot each other a quick glance. The alien grunted in frustration and then reached up to a small speaker box centered on its chest plate. It pressed a button and then spoke again. Its voice sounded like it was being strained through a radio, but it was now at least in a language the boys understood. The alien said. The fear that Peter and Sean had felt began to melt away. The alien continued. It said, It was official. Holman, Ohio had become ground zero for events that should have only existed in the bad science fiction and horror films of the 1950s and 60s, the ones that Peter Dixon and Sean Rhodes, two 12-year-olds, watched devotedly. Space lightning had reanimated the dead from the Holman West Cemetery. Then a force field had cut Holman off from the rest of the world, and as the unexpected cherry on top of this nightmarish cobbler, a UFO landed, bringing with it a large, hulking entity from another world. Peter and Sean trembled in the presence of the armor-suited alien. That was until it vaporized a horde of zombies who were about to secure their grim fates as hollow shells of their former selves to help pad the numbers of the walking dead. All one giant misunderstanding, the alien had said. I am going to be in so much trouble. Peter and Sean gawked at the interstellar visitor. Any fear they once had for it was now gone. Honestly to them, the alien sounded like a teenager who had screwed up royally. And as it turned out, that's exactly what happened. Aphros Isar, the alien said next. I am from the Orlet Quadrant, a far away region in one of the darkest corners of space. Peter was the first to speak back, although cautiously. I'm Peter. This is Sean. What is going on here? Aphros Isar exhaled, defeatedly, through his speaker. Peter and Sean wanted to smile. They wanted to laugh in relief. After all of the horror they had been through, the cause of it all was an adolescent alien from a distant world who had just simply not listened to his parents? Who hadn't been in that situation? There was one question though that was on the boy's minds, and Sean was the one who spoke up for the both of them. What's a CEU? Aphros Isar responded promptly. An extraction unit. What's that? Peter asked. Dead bodies give off a toxin called cadaverine. Our species extracts cadaverine from across the universe to help with cell regeneration procedures. Aphros said. He looked around and scratched his head. Well, scratched the glass dome over his head and said, I guess there was a glitch or something. This has never happened before. I'd certainly say so, Aphros. Peter shouted. Now just annoyed rather than scared. Our families are dead, man. They've become walking corpses craving skin and brains. Aphros said, nervously looking around. Zombies lurked in the night around them, beginning to close in again. Peter and Sean weren't so sure that he could fix this. How could he? People had died, then died again. Aphros said again, but this time much more confidently. It actually seemed like he had a plan. He grabbed a small device off his armor and tossed it down in front of the boys. A transparent force field shot up around them, encasing them in what was basically a shimmering bubble, a much smaller scale version of what unnaturally sheltered Holman. Hey, Peter screamed. Let us out, now! Aphros placed a hand on the shimmering encasement. I will fix this, he said one more time. Something about it seemed genuine. Peter nodded, slightly hesitant. But what other choice did they have? He relaxed his body and stepped back, sliding up against Sean. Aphros lifted his laser cannon, the swirling colors around the barrel, picking up speed and becoming a hueful blur. He turned and rushed off into the night. In the street, he was stopped by a half-dozen snarling, rotting corpses. He lifted his cannon and fired three quick, thumping shots. All six of the undead blew up in puffs of ashes. The action caught the attention of several other zombies from a nearby yard. They staggered out into the street where Aphros aimed and he took them out one by one. Three more sizzled and popped into ash. Something latched onto Aphros' leg. He looked down and saw a zombie crawling around him, trying to grip and grasp his leg. Aphros aimed his weapon down and fired. The crawling ghoul exploded. All around him, Aphros could hear the groans of the dead. But the night made it difficult to see. He extracted another device from his armor and tossed it straight up into the air. Acting like a flare, the device exploded nearly 30 feet up, creating a blue glow across Holman. Now the dead were visible. There were dozens in all directions moving in. Aphros was a one-alien killing machine and acting such a surreal decimation of the dead that both Peter and Sean assumed they'd wake up from a severe candy-infused nightmare at any moment. Lasers blasted throughout the night and the walking dead became nothing but smoldering dust. Holman was covered in a fine ashen powder by the time morning came. Once Aphros made his rounds to be sure the town was secure of the zombie menace, he came back to the shimmering bubble the boys were in and retracted it. Peter and Sean couldn't believe their eyes. Holman was a wasteland. Smoke billowed up from every corner. Houses were charred, some still burning, and bones and dust decorated the landscape like a macabre filter had been placed over it. It was certainly the clean-up job of a child. The threat is gone, Aphros proudly stated. Yeah, but Peter began, so is everyone else, and everything is destroyed. Aphros stood with his hands on his hips, scanning the devastating landscape around them. Sean buried his face in the palms of his hands. The government's gonna come for us now, aren't they? He was right, Peter thought. Surely the encasement Holman was put in would catch the eye of someone, some satellite or radar system. Over the summer, Peter had heard on the news that the government had secret programs that dealt with this kind of phenomena. It was only a matter of time before they showed up. There would be questions, investigations. You need to fix this, Peter said to Aphros. Aphros clammed up. He'd made a mistake and then acted in the moment to try and remedy it. He wasn't thinking about the aftermath, or what it would mean to the unassuming occupants of planet Earth. The gathering, Aphros said, as if a bulb sprung to life in his mind. That's what this whole thing was all about means, he said, looking around at the billowing land. Peter and Sean were obviously skeptical. Not because of what Aphros claimed their technology could do with the cadaverine, but because Aphros had already proven himself to be a major screw-up. The boys turned away from the teenage alien and conversed quietly between themselves. If we leave it all like this, everyone is dead and everything is gone permanently, Peter said. If we put a little bit of trust into Aphros, there's a chance they could all be brought back. Certainty or chance. That's what the fates of Holman's residents came down to. And Sean quickly agreed with his friend. Okay, he said with a surrendering sigh. Aphros was thrilled that the boys trusted him to make everything right. He rushed to his ship in the cemetery and brought back with him a device that acted as a vacuum. Over the next hour, Aphros sucked up all the dust, bones, and remains of the zombies and their former selves. The vacuum device was stored on the ship in a cooling chamber, and a few flips of switches on a control panel lifted the shimmering blue encasement that had cupped over Holman. If you are people, Aphros promised. Sean looked at the devastation that surrounded them. What are we supposed to do? Where are we supposed to go? In the distance, an air raid siren began to work. A radar, a satellite, something, had detected the anomalous event. They're going to take us away! Sean cried out, his wide eyes filled with panic. Peter looked around, waiting to see helicopters and drones flooding the airspace. The boys' uncertain fate was clear to Aphros as well. Come with me, Aphros said. Peter and Sean were stunned. My ship's not big, but it's cozy. Our species, our worlds. Worlds? Peter emphasized the pluralness of Aphros' word. Aphros grinned beneath his helmet. Deep space is filled with wonders and places you cannot imagine. Time means nothing. Plains of different existences can crisscross. There are sites that need to be seen, experienced to even believe. Come with me. The boys thought about it. They listened to the blaring sirens. The cavalry would arrive soon enough. And rather than be subjected to whatever the secret government factions would ultimately put forth, they thought, what would Aphros do? He'd make a snap decision. He'd disobey authority. He'd get on the ship and go to places and worlds unknown to him for the pure thrill of it. And that's exactly what Peter and Sean did. They followed Aphros up the ramp and in through the underbelly of the saucer-shaped ship. All three of them settled into the cockpit area where Aphros brought to life millions of tiny glowing lights on all sides of them. A small oval-shaped screen off to Sean's right caught his eye. There was a green line that kept shooting across a grid accompanied by a sharp pinging sound. What's that? Sean asked, pointing to the screen. Aphros leaned in and took a closer look as the ship's engine activated. It's foggy. Was Aphros' response. What? The boys both asked in unison. Like I said, we should all run parallel to where we are. What kind of signal? Peter asked. Passive some kind. Aphros smirked and looked at the boys. Anyone for a side quest? Zombies? Aliens? The imminent arrival of secret government officials with unknown intentions? Peter and Sean had nothing to lose. They were in so over their heads that their adolescent minds insisted, keep going. What would Aphros do? They agreed, and Aphros tapped the screen to let the source of the distress call know that they were on their way. The ship lifted up off the cemetery grounds, sliced through the clouds, and propelled itself to the stars. The end. Thank you for listening to Microterrorz. Join us each Saturday for another scary story. For more fun visit our website at microterrorz.com where we will also have spooky games you can print out and play like wicked word searches, mysterious mazes, and more. Microterrorz.com is also where you can find us on your favorite social media and even send in your own scary story for us to tell. Plus, you'll learn more about our author Scott Donnelly who has other horrors for both young and old. I hope you'll join me again soon from Microterrorz, scary stories for kids. 7 days a week And while you're at it, spread the darkness by sharing this video with someone you know who loves all things strange and macabre. If you want to listen to the podcast, you can find it at weirddarkness.com.