The look of panic on Dylan's face didn't waver, however. His blankets had been strewn on the floor, and he stood still as a statue, seemingly incapable of drawing a full breath. He looked intensely worried, like he'd just seen something traumatizing. To Kenji's eyes, Dylan looked just like a wounded animal, tail between his legs.
“I'm fine, man,” said Kenji, sitting on the edge of the bed. Cracking a smile, he mimicked Dylan's frightened expression. “Are you OK?”
Dylan pointed to the television and gave him a yank. “Look,” he said under his breath, his fist trembling as it locked around Kenji's shirt.
Kenji turned to the TV. In his frightened awakening, he hadn't hardly glanced at it, but now that he'd had a few seconds to regain his cognizance he could tell that something was wrong. When he'd drifted off they'd been watching Planes, Trains and Automobiles, but that wasn't what filled the screen now.
The screen was frozen, the image on it flickering unsteadily. The movie hadn't been paused by the looks of it; more likely the playback had locked up of its own accord. Maybe the campus internet was lagging. Looking at the image on the screen, Kenji narrowed his gaze and tried to make sense of it. Then, it hit him.
Kenji sat bolt upright.
He knew the face that looked back at him.
Agnes Pasztor was staring at them through the television screen.
Her visage was roughly-cast, pixellated somewhat, but that it was her there was no doubt. The background was an off-white color, and behind her there loomed something amorphous and dark. It might have been her shadow, except that it moved, shifted, in a strange way even as Agnes remained stationary at the screen's center.
“I shut off the TV,” explained Dylan, shaking. “I turned it off. And then it turned back on.”
The image of Agnes on the screen flickered, her pixellated face changing ever so slightly. The television speakers crackled as her voice began to come through. She spoke in hushed whispers, the words too muddled and low to understand. If he listened closely, Kenji thought he could make out not one, but two voices speaking in unison. One of them a low growl, the other breathy and feminine. The combination reminded him of the terrible voice that'd come through on the radio so many nights ago during their makeshift séance in the shack.
Then Agnes, and the pitch-colored shadow behind her, lurched forward.
The image, though still scattered and marred by pixels, had become unfrozen, and the two figures were coming forth, becoming clearer and clearer to the viewer. They approached jerkily, shambled as though they intended to walk straight out of the screen and into the dorm room. Very soon the entirety of the screen was filled with their distorted, pixel-laden forms.
Kenji backed onto his bed till his shoulders bumped the wall, while Dylan remained cemented before the screen, trembling.
Then the television powered down.
The dorm room was thrust into total darkness. Even the alarm clock on Kenji's desk was turned off, the bright, red numbers dying out as if on command.
“W-what's happening?” came Dylan's voice through the darkness, as softly as a mouse's.
Kenji was about to reply. His words were cut off by a sudden burst of brightness, however. Both of their laptops fired up in tandem, the screens coming to life with a deep blue color. The alarm clock came back on, and as the display blinked 12:00, static from the radio began to blare at an ear-shattering volume. The small radio scanned through the channels rapidly, the swell of frequencies amounting to something like a chorus of wails. Kenji's cell phone lit up soon thereafter, rattling on the desk, its screen showcasing what appeared to be an unknown number. The television had come on, too, but there was nothing on the screen, save for that same off-white background and a hint of shadow in the corners.
Above the ruckus, Kenji took hold of Dylan's arm. “It's... it's just a power surge!” he shouted. His voice joined the swell of electronic chatter like a plea, a wish, but he didn't even remotely believe the words coming out of his mouth.
And neither did Dylan for that matter. The tears running down his face as he turned and looked to Kenji in the low technological glow were rendered in ghostly blue light. “She's here,” he managed, almost choking on the words.
Suddenly, there was a savage pounding at their door. Hinges rattled as the blows of numerous hands met the wood. The band of hall light beneath the door was punctuated by two sets of feet.
No, thought Kenji, his heart twisting in his chest. They're both here.
End
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Transmission: A Supernatural Thriller Page 18