Zaelia shivered, wrapping her arms around herself as she glanced around the Cemetary, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. A breeze slithered around the tired looking headstones, stirring dead leaves into a whispering chorus. Her eyes betrayed a flicker of unease, as she asked her friend... "Wasn’t there another way we could pass instead of here?"

Casey didn’t slow down. "Girl no. What are you afraid of? This is the safest place you could be. The dead tell no tales."

Zaelia stumbles running to catch up with Casey, not wanting to be left alone among cracked angels and moss-covered headstones. She might lose her marbles, her mind was already replaying every horror story she’d ever heard about cemeteries. "But what is it you want me to see?"

"It's a surprise."

Zeala groaned softly. Casey’s “surprises” usually didn't involve anything good.

They weaved between headstones until Casey finally slowed near the far end of the cemetery, where the graves grew older and the air felt heavier. "Ta-da, here it is!" She said dramatically, flinging her arms out.

Zeala blinked, and blinked again. Moonlight pooled across a small clearing. What was she suppose to be seeing? There was nothing but an ancient marble cross.

"Uh. I don't see anything."

"It's there, the flower!" Casey jabs her finger at A pale, almost silvery blossom with long, delicate petals curled inward like it was shy about existing, a little before the base of the cross.

"You dragged me out. Ten o'clock, at night, to see a flower in a Cemetary. Girl, you've got to be kidding." She said flatly. “I thought you were about to show me your great, great, great, great, great granny's grave, or Dracula's tomb. Not a plant, Casey!”

"But it's blooming."

"Wow, that's groundbreaking. Casey, flowers freaking bloom. What's the big deal? Next you’ll tell me the grass is growing. Did you like, smoke something? Look, let's go."

"No wait, Zaelia." She grabbed her arm. "You need to see this, look at the flower."

She turned slowly, just as the petals began to unfurl further, stretching toward the moonlight. "What's going on? Why is it doing that?"

“Every four years. For exactly one hour, it blooms.” Casey’s voice dropped to a near whisper. “And when it does… a portal opens.”

The ground beneath the flower shimmered faintly, like heat was rising from the ground. The moonlight seemed to bend around it, pooling too brightly in one small circle.

Zaelia held onto Casey's arm, eyes wide in disbelief. "Casey I don't like this. You mustn't believe everything you hear." The night had gone unnaturally cold their flash lights flickered a bit.

Casey’s eyes gleamed. "It's true. You see what's happening. A portal to another realm is opening."

The flower started trembling, and a low hum vibrated through the ground beneath their feet, causing Zaelia, to whimper and back away, trying to drag Casey with her. A thin, glowing circle carved itself into the ground around the flower—precise, deliberate, like something had drawn it there. And then a tear opened in the space just above the flower. Not in the ground.

In the air. It began as a glowing white slit suspended a few inches above the bloom, widening slowly, peeling apart like invisible hands were pulling reality open from both sides. Threads of light stretched between the two halves before snapping one by one.

Zaelia's heart slammed against her ribs as a vertical oval hovered directly above the circular pattern on the ground widening into a portal. The glow from it, cast a long distorted shadow.

“Casey…” Her voice wavered.

"Zaelia, isn't  this incredible?" Her eyes sparkled. "What do you think is going to happen next?"

"I don't think we should stick around to find out." The oval had expanded, and stabilized into a suspended doorway of swirling light. A wind rushed outward in a sudden burst, sending leaves spiraling and tugging at their clothes. A pebble near Zaelia’s shoe wobbled… then rolled forward.

“Casey!” she snapped, panic rising. “Let’s leave!”

It was only when, the wind no longer rushed outward, but dragged inward, that some common sense returned to Casey and she actually saw fear flash across her face.The wind intensified, sucking in dust and loose pebbles into the portal.

"This is the part in every story where people die. Run Casey!"

They were only able to take two steps before being sucked into the portal, leaving their frantic screams echoing after them.

They hit solid ground. Hard. Zaelia groaned, pushing herself up on trembling hands. The air smelled different—cool and crisp, with a hint of sweetness underneath.

“Wow, this is not the cemetery,” Casey breathed, straightening up next to Zaelia.

The sky above them was a swirling canvas of pastel colours, with no sun, and the ground beneath their feet looked like a mosaic carpet of plants that they had never seen before. The place was strange, beautiful yet wrong.

"Casey, see why you should have listened to me.” Zeala muttered weakly, scanning their surroundings. “I told you we should’ve left sooner. Now where are we?”

A strange sound came from ahead of them, and Zaelia inched closer to Casey. "What's that?"

"I don't know." Casey shrugged, as if they weren't in some strange world that could have things that could harm them. "Let me see.."

"Are you crazy." Zaelia yanked her back just as a tall luminous figure emerged, with long flowing garments. Their eyes almost bulged out, when they saw the pale wings extending from its back and the impossibly beautiful face.

"Casey is the portal still there? We need to go back. I don't trust that thing."

Casey tried to wring her hands out of Zaelia's. "Wait. No. It's friendly, I can tell. It looks like an angel. Maybe we're in heaven. Hi there… where are we? Is this another realm? Are you the ones who opened the portal? Does it only open every four years because of a lunar alignment or—”

Zaelia's legs were shaking and her mind just couldn't comprehend how Casey could be so calm and want to carry on a normal conversation in a time like this.

While Casey babbled on the creature had approached with slow steps and stopped a few feet away.

“Casey,” Zeala whispered, unease crawling up her spine. “It's not smiling.”

"Of course it's not smiling. It's probably curious about us." Casey continued, undeterred. “We didn’t mean to intrude. We were just watching the flower and then—”

The glow in it's eyes fixed on them dimmed, and it's beautiful angelic form changed instantly into the most hideous thing they had ever see. Even Casey who knew no fear jumped.

"Casey’s smile faltered. “Okay… that’s new.” She stepped back, pulling Zaelia with her.

What was once beautiful was now a skeletonized, withered, black and decayed, vampire looking thing with blacked claws. A low, distorted sound vibrated from its throat and then it let out a shriek that split the air and lunged.

When the creature shrieked and lunged, Casey screamed, "Okay, that's aggressive-" and took off running behind Zaelia who was a good way ahead of her.The second those porcelain cracks split across that angel's face,and it started changing into something hedious, Zeala's survival instincts had clocked in and she was gone. If Casey wanted to talk, okay, she could stay there and talk with it. Zaelia was ten feet away and accelerating. Her feet pounding on the ground.

"Zaelia don't leave me! Shit!" Casey yelped, trying to catch up.

Zaelia, wasn't playing. Ent no way she was going to be monster food tonight. She didn't know where the hell she was running to, but wherever her legs chose to carry her, she was going, with Casey screaming behind her.

She ducked and stopped low behind a tree and Casey scampered down right next to her."YOU COULD HAVE WARNED ME, YOU WERE LEAVING." Casey whispered breathing hard, her eyes wild.

"I DID, WITH MY LEGS! Casey, it's gonna hear us!" Zaelia was figeting, looking all around in a panic.

"YOU LEFT ME!" Casey peeped around the tree.

"You SAW THE FACE PEELING!" Zeala whispered back fiercely."THAT WAS YOUR CUE!"

"SHIT!" Casey's head ducked back behind the tree and she scrambled back on her hands.

"WHAT...WHAT IS IT." Zaelia scrambled back too, Casey's fear feeding hers ever more. "And she took off running with her again.

"IT CAN FUCKING FLY!!"

"WHAT! OMG. WE'RE GONNA DIE!"

A shadow swooped overhead and the thing landed right in front of them in all its horrific glory, causing Zaelia to crashed into Casey and they went down in a tangle of limbs.

The creature was fast. Just as Zaelia was scrambling up and away it slashed its claw across her upper arm, slicing clean through fabric and skin. The force spun her sideways, and she hit the mosiac grass hard, skidding.

"ZAELIA!" Casey 's voice cracked into something raw and panicked. "Oh MY GOD! YOU'RE BLEEDING, YOU'RE BLEEDING!!"

"No kidding!" Zeala winced, trying to steady herself.

She rushed to Zaelia, who was struggling to stand clutching her arm. Dark blood spilling between her fingers, dripping onto the mosiac surface where it sizzled faintly on contact.

The creature sniffed the air and released a shrilled scream. Zaelia swore it was the blood doing something to it because it rushed for her again but Casey was in the way. She tried to blocked it, but it grabbed her by the neck and threw her aside, all its focus on Zaelia, who was qivering in fear.

"NO!!" Casey screamed, just as it grabbed Zaelia, dragging her toward it, skeletal fingers tightening around her neck. Its hollow eye sockets burned with a faint, sickly light. Its jaw stretched open, unhinging impossibly wide as it let out a piercing shriek inches from her face. The sound felt like knives in her ear.

The creature leaned closer. Its breath rancid, like decay and something metallic. Then its long, dark tongue slid out-

Cold. Wet, and dragged slowly across the side of her neck.

Zeala gagged, a hysterical sob bubbling up as she accepted the fact she was going to die.