Aidan and Elza pressed themselves firmly against the door, both of their hearts pounding in their ears. The shuffling sounds on the other side were unmistakable, and their mutual anticipation felt unbearable.

"Alright, kids! Come on out!"

Elza slowly looked up at him with glee, bearing an ear-to-ear smile with her missing front tooth. She tugged on Aidan's pajama shirt, barely able to contain herself.

"Aidan! Santa came!"

"Too bad I'm gonna open all of your presents!" Aidan said with a mischievous grin as he pushed Elza away and ripped the door open, recklessly dashing down the hallway. He breathlessly made it to the living room, the sunlight barely glowing in the windows. His parents were seated in their usual recliners. Mom greeted him with a warm expectant smile, while Dad nursed a mug of coffee, and snuffed out a cigarette in his ashtray on the nearby coffee table.

"Why'd you do that, butthead?!" Elza cried as she stormed up beside him. Her annoyance was instantly quelled as the Walker children eyed the numerous wrapped presents left for them by Santa Claus the night before.

"It looks like you two must have been very good this year!" Aidan curiously turned to his mother. Her voice sounded different, harsh and gravelly. He was terrified when he saw the rotting corpse rising from the recliner. Once blue eyes were masked behind a glazed white film. Her gaunt face was pale and slathered with blood, and a shredded mass of flesh was hanging from her gaping mouth. Dad sat limply in his chair, his throat savagely torn away. He managed a feeble twitch, as blood poured down the front of his plaid robe.

"Mom?!" Aidan panicked as his mother clumsily teetered towards him, hands outstretched. He held on to Elza, closed his eyes, and screamed.

Aidan's scream escaped his lungs and resounded from his subconscious in the empty classroom. Panting heavily, it took him a moment to get his bearings, and realize his surroundings. "God, not even my precious fucking memories are sacred in this hellhole." He sighed and wiped the beads of sweat from his forehead, and the tears from his eyes.

Somehow, the stench from the skinless abomination on the table had seemingly worsened tenfold. The permeating odor quickly left his immediate attention when he heard a knock at the door. A familiar voice from behind it filled his heart with hope.

"Aidan? Aidan, it's us!"

Clutching at the still tender wound on his back, Aidan made his way to the door as quickly as possible and flipped the lock. Immediately, Elza stormed through the open door and pulled him into a frantic hug, and he squeezed her in tightly. "I'm so glad you're alright." He could see Roy and Treadwell standing on guard closely behind her. "I don't know how to thank you two. Given everything else that's happened today, I can't imagine adding 'losing my sister' to the list."

"More than happy to help, bud," Roy smiled as they entered the classroom. "We're also happy to report that Günther won't be a problem anymore."

"Finally, some good news. Sorry, but I'm a whore for details. How did you guys dispatch the sadistic piece of shit?" Aidan asked eagerly.

His question was left unanswered, interrupted by Treadwell tapping the whiteboard with his rifle. "Well, well…what's this now?"

All eyes turned to the whiteboard, which was filled end to end by a hand-drawn map of Raccoon City. Aidan shrugged, "Oh, well I thought I could help out while you guys were gone. In a town like this, most people would rather frequent bars over bookstores. I've always had a ton of downtime at Auretta's; I can't tell you how many times I've resorted to reading maps of the city to combat the boredom. I figured this might be of use."

Elza was beaming with pride, and Roy had a sheepish smile on his face as he patted Aidan on the shoulder. Treadwell appeared to be in awe. "This is perfect. You pretty much covered anything. Stellar work, Aidan."

Aidan shrugged once more. "Hey, if I can't go play rescue mission with the big boys, I might as well make myself productive." Elza lightly slugged his arm with a smile. He responded with a chuckle and a slight shoulder bump.

"I'm quite serious. Thanks to you, we can plan ourselves a route," Treadwell said. "My team was given a specific extraction point at a construction site in the Cedar District. That should be about here." Blake pointed at the spot on Aidan's whiteboard map.

Elza jumped in, and began to trace a path with her finger from the school to the construction site. "Look! We've got a pretty clear path! Guys, we can do this!"

"Shall we then?" added Roy. He gestured one hand towards the classroom door, then looked at Aidan. "I'm sure you'll be pleased to be free of this heinous smell."

Aidan couldn't help but chuckle. "Fuck yeah."

By a rare stroke of luck, the trek to the gymnasium was an uncommonly quiet one. While traversing the halls of the now desecrated school, the group only spotted the occasional bloodthirsty undead slamming against the doors of closed classrooms, trapped, and posing no threat. Once they gained access to the gym, they were surprised to find that, it too, was eeriely silent. Corpses of students and staff alike littered the gymnasium floor, but each and every one of them lay entirely still. Roy noticed that the bodies were hardly intact, in fact, they were practically ripped limb from limb, shredded resemblances of their former selves, scattered across the bloodied basketball court. They made their way towards the exit doors on the far end of the building.

"Helllll…..llllpppp…"

The tiny plea reached Aidan's ears and caught his attention. He turned to the rest of the group, who apparently did not hear the small, raspy cry. He lightly murmured, "Hey guys, hang on…" as he walked hesitantly towards the bleachers. Once he made it to the corner of the gym, it took a second for his eyes to adjust to the low light. He saw someone's face lying helplessly on the ground, the rest of their body lying under the bleachers.

"Helllllllpppp meeeee…"

He hesitantly took a few steps forward. Without warning, the face darted directly towards him, connecting with his chest and knocking the wind out of him. His fall towards the hardwood floor was an unfinished one, as he felt a thick, constricting force wrap across his chest. It pulled him upwards, and he found himself facing upright again, his feet dangling inches above the ground. Before he could emit a scream, its grip tightened, and he could hear the gut-wrenching sound of his own ribs snapping. He hung there, helpless, as the tentacle reeled him in. With all of the effort he could muster, he let out a breathless gasp.

Treadwell arrived at the door, but stopped dead in his tracks before opening it. "Where's Aidan? He was just with us."

Elza whipped around immediately, seeing that he was nowhere to be found. "Oh God. Aidan!" She turned on her heels and ran across the gym, scanning for any sign of her missing brother. Roy and Treadwell darted after her, following closely behind with their firearms at the ready.

"Elza…"

His voice was raspy and faint, but Elza was able to pinpoint its location. She bolted towards the end of the bleachers, and stopped dead in her tracks when she saw Aidan suspended in the air, his mouth and nose wet with blood. A thick, grey tentacle was constricted around his chest, but the tentacle's owner was unable to be seen, shrouded in darkness.

"Aidan!" Elza raised her rifle at the unseen monstrosity. At the end of the tentacle were three finger-like appendages surrounding what appeared to be a human face. The fingers opened and closed like a plant in bloom, revealing and hiding the grim visage every few seconds. Aidan weakly raised his hand, reaching out to Elza. His eyes were filled with a sadness that Elza had never seen before, and with his other hand, he weakly wiped the blood away from his mouth.

"I'm…so sorry…" Tears fell from his forlorn eyes. "I love you. R-run."

A second tentacle emerged from the shadows beneath the bleachers. The fingers clamped down on the top of Aidan's head. He closed his eyes one final time as the tentacle effortlessly tore his head away from his shoulders. His arms went limp, and the tentacles dropped both his lifeless body and severed head to the ground.

Elza felt like she had been stabbed directly in the heart. She fell to her knees, her rifle clattering to the floor. She could not feel the tears streak down her cheeks, nor could she hear her own screams of anguish, only a muffled, deafened howl. Roy picked her up from the ground, and Treadwell grabbed her rifle as they all began to run as fast as they possibly could.

She knew she had to run, but all she wanted to do was stay. She wished that she had done something, anything, to save her brother. As they sprinted to the exit, her arm firmly held by Roy, she looked back. She wished she hadn't. The abomination that murdered her brother was utterly nightmarish beyond comparison, and was already bounding after them.

Author's Note: Happy holidays, everybody! Funny enough, this author's note is going to be pretty similar to the last, since the previous chapter was posted a little over a year ago. I sincerely apologize for the sporadic and few-and-far between updates on this story. As most can attest, life happens, plus this chapter was kind of a hard one for me to finally bust out and publish given its outcome. I truly appreciate all of the viewership and support from you beautiful people, and I wish you all the happiest of holiday seasons. Catch y'all in 2016!