A Trio of Spooky Halloween Stories

Necrophonic

The sky was bruised, a deep purple-black, heavy like it had swallowed the sun whole. Dylan took a sharp breath and looked down at his phone, fingers jittering over the cracked screen as he reopened the Necrophonic app. He felt like a fool — this was supposed to be a Halloween dare, not some pilgrimage to the lost and the damned. But he couldn’t shake the feeling, heavy and insistent, that tonight was different.

He’d heard stories about this app, Necrophonic. Supposedly, it opened channels to the beyond, let ghosts speak through distorted voices and static. Dylan was a sceptic by nature, but ever since *that night*, he’d felt a need gnawing at him. The silence of his flat had become unbearable, thick with shadows, and no matter how loud he turned up the television, he couldn’t drown out the feeling that he wasn’t alone.

Tonight, the app’s sinister black-red glow was the only light in the room, casting shadows that twitched with the slightest movement. He swallowed hard, his breath quickening as the app loaded, a thrum of static creeping through his speakers. His girlfriend had dared him to turn it on tonight — she called it a laugh, but something in her voice told him she wanted to hear it, too. “If there’s anything still lurking around,” she’d teased, “maybe it’ll want to talk to you.” She’d laughed, but her eyes hadn’t.