Bill inputs a series of required numeric codes into the sophisticated trap’s keypad then pairs it to an app on his phone. The four-by-two foot wire trap is heavy, but he manages to carry it one-handed while climbing the attic ladder. Better this ladder than the taller one his son-in-law is climbing outside to search for entry points. Squirrels, by the noises his daughter reported. Reaching the attic, Bill scans the unfinished space. It’s mostly dark up here, but a skylight provides just enough light. Shame the builder never finished the space. And strange how the rural home’s dozen different owners over twenty years had all vanished just days after moving in, never to be heard from again. The new generation, Bill thinks. Just as he’s placing the technologically advanced, humane trap near where the noises were heard from, he hears chattering and scratching. Squirrels, indeed. Suddenly, his son-in-law’s voice comes from outside, and through the attic vent: “Found a hole. They’re definitely getting in through here.”

Movement in the darkness, then. Bill steps closer, his eyes widening as he sees the biggest squirrel he’s ever seen creep toward him—two feet long from nose to tail, with glowing red eyes and fangs an inch long. Three more appear, then dozens, from every direction and all advancing. They’ve blocked his path to the ladder, too. There are a hundred of them now, converging on him and causing him to fall to the floor where they begin tearing bits of flesh from his arms and face. He screams… 

* * *

Sean has just stepped onto the roof to check for other possible entry points when he hears his father-in-law’s gargled screams rise through the attic vents. Reaching the skylight, he looks through it and he sees a writhing gray mound on the attic floor. Then—a hand extending from within the mound, and then a face—Bill’s. He’s reaching up, fingers bloody, with desperate eyes fixed on Sean’s. Help! they plead, as dozens of ravenous squirrel-things rip out chunks of flesh from his face, neck, and body. Sean stumbles backward, turning toward the ladder when he freezes. Hundreds of trees surrounding the property are all alive it seems, their branches covered by an undulating gray mass. It’s not the trees themselves, but what’s in them. More squirrel-things. Hundreds. Thousands. And now they’re jumping from the trees and heading toward the ladder—a chattering, murderous gray column twenty feet wide. Sean takes one step toward the ladder, then freezes again. He’ll never make it down in time. They’re climbing the ladder now, he can hear their claws clacking against the aluminum, and there’s no use jumping because he’ll break both legs, and then what. All he can do is remove his phone to call his wife. Don’t come home! He’ll say. Ever!

Before he can call, he reads a new incoming text from her: Just walked in with the baby, where are you two…?