Hollow

It began with a cough.

In the quiet mountain town of Black Hollow, nestled deep within the pines of the Pacific Northwest, the first signs of illness were subtle. A few missed school days, a drop in Sunday church attendance, whispers in the grocery store aisles. At first, the town doctor believed it was a flu strain. Nothing more than a seasonal nuisance.

But then came the bleeding.

First from the gums. Then the eyes. And then something else—something far more terrifying. Those who got sick didn’t just suffer—they transformed. Their skin became pale and translucent, their pupils dilated until no iris remained. Their hunger for raw flesh overwhelmed any trace of humanity.

Sheriff Marianne Blake had lived in Black Hollow her entire life. She’d seen forest fires, flash floods, even a meth lab explosion that took out half a barn. But she had never seen anything like this. Her best friend, her former high school biology teacher, and even her ex-husband had all fallen ill. They didn’t die. They changed.

With the roads blocked by downed trees and landslides—suspiciously convenient natural disasters—and the internet reduced to a sputtering, unreliable whisper, the town was cut off. The government had sent no help. No CDC. No National Guard. Just silence.

Marianne took refuge in the town’s old library, a stone building once known for its cozy reading rooms and friendly book clubs. Now, it served as a makeshift fortress. She wasn’t alone. A group of twelve had survived the initial wave. Among them was Ben, a former ER nurse with unsteady hands but a sharp mind; Iris, a sixteen-year-old girl who hadn’t spoken since her parents turned; and Father Jonah, whose faith was being tested with each passing night.

The infected—called “Hollowed” by the survivors—only came out after sunset. Their shrieks echoed through the woods like hunting calls. They were organized. Coordinated. Intelligent in ways they shouldn’t be.

Ben believed the illness wasn’t natural. He’d found strange puncture wounds on the necks of the first victims—too clean, too consistent. Iris had drawn a symbol she saw in a dream, a circle surrounded by six jagged marks. Marianne recognized it. It was carved into an old stone at the edge of town. Local legend said it marked the burial place of something ancient, something never meant to awaken.

As the nights grew colder and the Hollowed more aggressive, the survivors devised a plan. They would journey to the stone. Burn it. Bury it. Destroy whatever tether bound the town to this nightmare.

What they found beneath the stone wasn’t just a relic. It was a gate—sealed for centuries, now cracked open. Something pulsed on the other side, something hungry and vast. A sickness of thought. Of flesh. Of soul.

They didn’t destroy it. They couldn’t. But they sealed it again—at a cost. Father Jonah never came back. Ben lost a hand. And Marianne? She heard a voice in the dark whisper her name—and she whispered back.

Today, Black Hollow is quiet again. The trees sway gently. The library’s windows are intact. But those who visit say the town feels hollow, like a painting of itself. And sometimes, at night, a strange light flickers near the woods, where a circle of jagged marks waits patiently beneath the soil.

Thank you for reading. In the shadows of every quiet town, a story waits—and I’m grateful you chose to walk through this one.