Emergency Exit

By Khushi Verma

Some memories are meant to fade.

Some doors are meant to stay closed.

And some exits… were never meant to be opened.

Years after graduation, five childhood friends finally agree to a long-awaited reunion. What should have been a night of laughter, nostalgia, and shared memories quickly becomes a silent battlefield of fear. Beneath their smiles lies a secret they have spent years trying to bury,a horrifying incident connected to a place they swore never to speak about again.

The of Emergency Exit their school.

A forgotten passage.

A forbidden door.

A nightmare that never truly ended.

As the evening unfolds, old wounds begin to reopen and fragments of the past start creeping back into their minds. The friends desperately avoid discussing the incident, convincing themselves that time has erased the horror. But some truths refuse to remain hidden.

Then, an ordinary accident changes everything.

{Kuru \= a girl for whom family and friends matters more.

Selena \= girl with a Bold nature and high dreams.

Prerna \= girl who’s kind and caring.

Rohan\= boy with a kind nature and outstanding personality and good in psychology.

Adam\= sports person with a keen sightedness.}

Everyone was having a good time and then after some time Kuru went to the restroom , returning from where she stepped on something on the floor.. A Board , Kuru took up the board & read the writtings. After which she just got out of her balance .Everything wat recalling in front of eyes!!! she screemed out of her frightedness. "Save Me!! Everyone Run!

Because on the board there were ..

Two simple words.

EMERGENCY EXIT.

The moment Kuru reads them, terror consumes her. The memories she fought so hard to suppress come rushing back with brutal clarity. Panic spreads through the group as they realize the past is no longer content to remain buried.

After hearing her voice, everyone ran towards her and saw that she was breathing heavily in the corner with her hands covering her face !! All the other four asked her about what happened !? but she only pointed towards the board. The other four also witnessed The writing on the board and understood why this happened !!?

What really happened on that dreadful night years ago?

Why does the mere mention of the Emergency Exit fill them with unimaginable fear?

And most importantly—

Did they truly leave that place behind… or did something leave with them?

Emergency Exit is a gripping psychological horror novel filled with suspense, buried secrets, friendship, trauma, and a chilling mystery that blurs the line between memory and reality. As the friends uncover the truth they have spent years avoiding, they are forced to confront a terrifying question:

Some exits help you escape. But what if the Emergency Exit was the beginning of the nightmare?

It was certainly a nightmare for them. Silently, they all gathered outside the restaurant in the near garden. Their faces were all down now because unfortunately, they all again recalled what they didn’t want to!!

The laughter had vanished.

The warmth of reunion had been replaced by a suffocating silence.

Outside the restaurant, beneath the dim glow of the garden lights, the five friends stood motionless. Fifteen years had passed, yet the same fear still gripped their hearts. The sight of those two words—Emergency Exit—had ripped open wounds they thought time had healed.

For a moment, no one spoke.

Then Rohan broke the silence.

“Fifteen years…” he murmured, staring into the darkness. “And even after all this time, the nightmares haven’t stopped.”

Prerna let out a bitter laugh.

“We’ve spent years trying to forget what happened that night. But no matter how hard we try, it still follows us.”

Selena lowered her eyes.

“Our lives would’ve been completely different if we had never gone back to that school.”

Adam clenched his fists.

“We should’ve listened to Aunt Maria’s warning.”

The name alone was enough to make everyone look up.

Aunt Maria.( the sister of the school )

Kuru took a deep breath.

“Regretting the past won’t change anything. But maybe Aunt Maria can help us understand what really happened. We should visit her and tell her everything.”

This time, nobody argued.

Because deep down, they all knew the same thing.

The nightmare wasn’t over.

And they desperately needed answers.

⸻

The following morning, the group set out to find Aunt Maria.

Fifteen years had changed many things.

Roads had been rebuilt.

Buildings had disappeared.

Entire neighborhoods looked unfamiliar.

But when they finally arrived at Aunt Maria’s old house, a chill ran down their spines.

The place looked abandoned.

The windows were covered in dust.

It felt as if nobody had lived there for years.

Selena hesitated before pressing the doorbell.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Nothing.

Only silence answered.

Adam shook his head.

“Looks like we’re too late. It’s just an empty house now.”

Disappointment washed over the group.

One by one, they turned away.

Then—

A voice echoed from behind them.

“It’s not just an empty house, kids.”

Every heart stopped.

Slowly, they turned around.

And there she stood.

Older.

Weaker.

But unmistakably the same.

Aunt Maria.

Relief flooded through them.

For the first time since the reunion, they felt a small spark of hope.

⸻

Aunt Maria smiled warmly as she looked at them.

“You’ve all grown up,” she said softly. “I never thought I’d see you together again.”

For a brief moment, everything felt normal.

Then Aunt Maria asked the question they had been dreading.

“What brings you here after all these years?”

The room fell silent.

No one wanted to be the first to speak.

Finally, Prerna gathered her courage.

“Fifteen years ago, you warned us not to return to the school.”

Aunt Maria’s smile faded.

“Yes,” she whispered.

Rohan leaned forward.

“Everyone knew something terrible happened there. Something connected to the student who died near the Emergency Exit.”

The room suddenly felt colder.

Aunt Maria’s eyes darkened.

“So…” she said quietly. “You finally decided to uncover the truth.”

Kuru nodded.

“Because whatever we witnessed that night is still haunting us.”

A heavy silence filled the room.

Aunt Maria looked at each of them carefully.

Almost as if she was deciding whether they were ready.

Then she spoke words that made their blood run cold.

“Tell me exactly what you saw that night.”

The friends exchanged nervous glances.

For fifteen years, they had avoided discussing it.

For fifteen years, they had buried the memory.

But now there was no escaping it.

One by one, they prepared to revisit the darkest night of their lives.

The night that changed everything.

The night of the Emergency Exit.

That Night the School Changed Forever

Aunt Maria listened in silence as the five friends struggled to relive a memory they had spent fifteen years trying to bury.

The room felt colder with every passing second.

Finally, Selena took a deep breath and began.

⸻

“It all started at your farewell gathering, Aunt Maria,” she said quietly.

“We were laughing, eating, and having a wonderful time when Rohan suddenly realized he had lost his cellphone somewhere near the school “

“He insisted on going back to get it. You warned us not to return to the school under any circumstances. You told us that if we did, we’d regret it for the rest of our lives.”

Aunt Maria lowered her eyes.

She remembered.

Every word.

Prerna continued.

“At first, we agreed with you.”

She paused.

Then sighed.

“But I thought you were exaggerating. It was just a cellphone, after all. I convinced everyone that we could quickly retrieve it and come back before anything happened.”

The others nodded.

A simple decision.

One they would spend the next fifteen years regretting.

⸻

The following morning, the five friends returned to their abandoned school.

Even before they entered the grounds, something felt wrong.

Kuru’s voice trembled as she remembered.

“The moment we arrived, everything felt different.”

“It was our school… yet somehow it didn’t feel familiar anymore.”

The towering building stood silently beneath a grey sky.

The air itself felt heavier.

As if the school was holding its breath.

⸻

Rohan swallowed hard before continuing.

“We tried calling my phone from another mobile.”

“To our surprise, the ringing sound came from inside the school.”

Following the sound, they walked around the building until they reached the rear side.

And what they saw made them freeze.

The back of the school looked far more terrifying than the front.

Broken windows.

Cracked walls.

And standing among it all—

The Emergency Exit.

The very door students had been forbidden to use.

⸻

Adam let out a nervous laugh.

“We started joking about who was brave enough to go inside first.”

The joke didn’t last long.

The only entrance still accessible was the Emergency Exit.

To settle the argument, they drew lots.

Fate made its choice.

Kuru.

⸻

“I didn’t want to go,” Kuru admitted.

“But everyone kept insisting.”

Reluctantly, she stepped toward the rusted door.

A cold gust of wind rushed past her.

The others waited outside.

Watching.

Praying.

Kuru slowly entered.

To everyone’s surprise, nothing happened.

After walking a short distance, she signaled for the others to follow.

Feeling relieved, the group stepped inside.

And that was when everything changed.

⸻

A heavy silence filled Aunt Maria’s house.

Nobody spoke.

The memory was becoming clearer.

Kuru closed her eyes and continued.

“The moment the last person entered…”

“The Emergency Exit slammed shut behind us.”

The loud bang echoed through the empty school.

And suddenly—

The atmosphere transformed

Dark clouds covered the sky.

Violent winds howled through the corridors.

The temperature dropped.

The school no longer felt abandoned.

It felt alive.

⸻

“At first, I thought I heard a woman laughing,” Kuru whispered.

“But it wasn’t normal laughter.”

The sound echoed from every corner.

Like someone celebrating after winning a long-awaited battle.

Fear began creeping into their hearts.

Kuru rushed to switch on the lights.

Nothing happened.

The electrical system was dead.

So she used her phone’s flashlight.

The weak beam of light cut through the darkness.

And landed on a wooden board.

The same board hanging near the Emergency Exit.

⸻

Then the impossible happened.

The board wasn’t where it should have been.

It appeared directly in front of her.

As though it had moved.

Or worse—

As though something had brought it closer.

The flashlight flickered.

Dimmed.

And then dimmed again.

A dark shape slowly emerged beside the board.

The outline of a women .

⸻

Before Kuru could scream, the shadow suddenly rose into the air.

Her heart pounded violently.

And with the last strength she had, she shouted:

“HELP ME!”

“EVERYONE RUN!”

Then everything went black.

Kuru collapsed.

But this was justt the beginning of the nightmare .