The vegetation on Poveglia was not just overgrown; it was hostile. Thorns tore at my jeans and low hanging branches slapped my face. I didn't look back. I didn't want to know if the three shapes from the church were following me.
"Okay. Okay. Cut the feed."
I fumbled with the camera, turning off the front facing light. Total darkness swallowed me. If I couldn't see them, maybe they couldn't see me. That is how ghosts work, right?
I crouched behind a thicket of bushes, trying to control my breathing. The air here was heavy, smelling of wet rot and salt.
"Ghost Gang," I whispered, shielding the microphone with my hand. "We are currently... tactical. The church was a bust. We need a new location. Ideally one with a roof and a lock."
I peeked over the bush.
The asylum loomed ahead, a massive skeletal structure against the night sky. It was the only place left to go. But between me and the front door was a stretch of uneven, lumpy ground.
I took a step forward. The ground felt spongy.
Crack.
It wasn't a stick. It sounded dry and hollow.
I took another step. The earth shifted beneath my weight. It wasn't soil. It was a crust, brittle and thin, covering something much softer below.
"Whoa," I muttered, trying to balance. "Ground stability is zero percent."
Suddenly, the earth gave way.
There was no time to scream. I dropped five feet, sliding down a slope of loose dirt and debris. I landed hard on my side, the heavy black case digging into my ribs.
"Ouch. Okay. Everyone good?"
I sat up and clicked my flashlight on.
I wasn't in a hole. I was in a trench. A long, eroded gash in the earth where the rain had washed away the topsoil.
I aimed the beam at the walls of the trench.
They weren't made of dirt.
They were made of ribs.
Hundreds of them. Thousands. Femurs, skulls, pelvises. They were packed so tightly together that they formed a solid wall of calcium. This wasn't a grave. It was a layer of the island's geology.
"Oh no," I gagged, covering my mouth with my sleeve. "Oh, this is bad. This is the Plague Pit. I fell into the Plague Pit."
I scrambled to my feet, my boots slipping on loose vertebrae. I needed to climb out. Now.
I reached for a root sticking out of the wall to pull myself up.
The root moved.
It wasn't a root. It was a hand. A skeletal hand, still attached to an arm buried deep in the wall. Its fingers clamped around my wrist with a grip like iron.
"Hey! Let go!" I yelled, yanking my arm back.
The wall shifted. Dust and ash poured down as something pulled itself free from the mass of bones.
It didn't have legs. It was just a torso, a spine trailing behind it like a tail. Its jaw hung open, disconnected on one side. It crawled toward me using its arms, dragging its broken body over the remains of the others.
Then another one pulled itself free. And another.
"Crawlers," I whimpered, backing up. "Why does it have to be Crawlers?"
The first one let out a hiss. It lunged, clawing at my boot.
I kicked it in the face. The skull shattered, but the spirit didn't stop. It grabbed my ankle, its grip freezing cold through the leather.
"Get off me!"
I swung the heavy black case, using it like a club. It connected with the spirit's head with a sickening crunch. The entity shrieked and recoiled into the shadows.
I didn't wait to see if it was coming back.
I threw the case up over the lip of the trench and scrambled after it, digging my fingers into the dirt. I kicked wildly as more cold hands grabbed at my legs. I felt a fingernail tear through my jeans, scratching my calf.
"Nope! Nope! Nope!"
I hauled myself over the edge, rolling onto the grass. I grabbed the case and sprinted.
The asylum doors were fifty yards away. I could hear the sound of dragging behind me. The wet, scraping sound of bone on dirt. They were fast.
"Open! Please be open!"
I hit the double wooden doors with my shoulder. They were rotten, but heavy. They groaned and gave way, spilling me into the lobby.
I spun around and kicked the doors shut, jamming a piece of broken timber through the rusted handles.
Thud. Thud.
Something slammed against the wood from the outside. Then a scratching sound.
I backed away, aiming my flashlight at the door. The scratching continued for a minute, then stopped.
Silence returned.
"Okay," I wheezed, checking the camera to make sure it was still recording. "We are inside. We are alive. And I am never, ever going outside again."
I turned around to look at the lobby.
It was massive. Peeling paint hung in strips from the ceiling. An old wheelchair sat in the center of the room, facing the reception desk.
And it was freezing.
"So," I whispered, my breath visible in the beam of light. "Out of the frying pan, into the asylum. Let's see what lives here."