Chapter 6

This was insane!

Everything was insane!

I wanted off!

I needed to escape this bus!

I shoved past the other passengers, desperately hammering on the back door.

“Open up! I need to get off! Open the door!”

“I’m getting off!”

“Let me out!”

I screamed like a madwoman.

The bus speakers announced, “Westside Lane Two, now arriving. Please exit through the rear door.”

With a hiss, the door opened.

Through a gap in the crowd, I saw Mr. Thorne turn to look at me. His eyes were a mix of pain, sadness, helplessness, and desperate pleading.

I couldn’t take it anymore. I plunged off the bus without a second thought.

The moment my feet hit the asphalt, a wave of relief washed over me.

I looked back. The bus full of passengers watched me with innocent eyes.

As the door closed and the bus began to move again, I saw chilling, knowing smiles spread across each of their faces through the window.

At that moment, I didn’t understand why they were smiling.

Not until a sharp pain shot through my ankle. I looked down. A skeletal hand, bits of decaying flesh clinging to it, crawling with maggots and glistening with green slime, was clamped tightly around my ankle.

The asphalt beneath me began to crack and crumble, transforming into a churning sea of blood. Darkness enveloped everything.

Thousands upon thousands of ghostly hands reached for me.

They dragged my ankle, pulling me down into the bloody abyss.

The only light in the darkness was the bus’s tail lights.

In that moment, something clicked. I thrashed wildly, stretching my hand out, trying to claw my way back onto the bus.

But more and more ghostly hands grabbed me. The bus slowly drove out of sight, and I was dragged down into hell.