Hounds Backrooms Novels & Stories

An unknown number. I opened the message, and the coffee in my stomach turned to lead. It was a high-resolution photo of the front entrance of Building 4B. The yellowing Scotch tape on the glass, the dented mailboxes, the pile of trash on the curb—it was all there, clear and unmistakable. Then, the text followed. [Unknown]: The Hollows. So this is where the Hippo hides. I have to say, Zosia, the smell of poverty suits you better than that latex did.

Each step sent a jolt of pain through my calves, like my muscles were stretching beyond what they were meant to hold. I stopped when the scent hit me. Wet earth. Pine. And something sharp and animal that made my mouth water and my stomach turn. A growl rippled through the darkness. I spun, heart slamming against my ribs. “Hello?” Stupid. Human. Weak. The growl came again, closer. Yellow eyes flickered between the trees. Then another pair. And another. Wolves. Too big. Too many. Their bodies moved wrong too fluid, too aware. I backed up slowly, my heel catching on a root. The moment I stumbled, they lunged.

The pale morning light crept through the letterbox sized windows of the den slowly, casting a stark glow over the rows of beds before crawling up the back wall. The scent of blood mingled with the musty scent of damp and cheap perfume as the girls silently let the night pass them by.

"Mom, I meant what I said earlier, I—" I cut him off. "Talking's easy. I ran that house for fifty years. Think you can?" Anton froze, then nodded. Said he'd spend the rest of his life proving it. So we let him stay. But the next morning—first day of the new year—I got word Steven was dead. He'd been home when Fiona, mid-episode, knocked over a candle. The place went up. They both didn't make it. I blinked once. Then got to work—handled the forms, inherited his estate.

I arrived at Ohio at past seven and headed straight to the location Don gave me. I looked at her instructions and all I needed to do was to set the beautiful master piece on fire but I had to get something from an underground room. I parked my car at a safe distance from the mansion. Somewhere dark and unnoticeable precisely. Once I was a hundred percent confident with my choice of stationing I got changed into a pair of leather pants and a black hoodie. I laced up my boots and got down from the car with a gun tucked behind my pockets.

"Those jerks! The players here are horrible. They stitched my mouth shut! "They even tried to pull out my stuffing to start a fire. I wanna go home. Waaahh!" I touched my burnt, brittle hair. I wanted to go home, too. We clung to each other and cried, completely unaware that everything we did was being watched through the live feed. [This is hilarious. How does an SSS dungeon end up with monsters this weak?] [The strong ones probably already got wiped out by Big V and his team. Only these little leftovers are still alive.]

"Shawn, I'm heading out to pick up some inventory. Keep an eye on the shop for a bit. "And Ms. Hartley from next door should be stopping by to settle her tab. The ledger's in the cabinet beside the counter. Just double-check it when she gets here." I vaguely heard my mother talking near my ear. I mumbled a few sleepy replies before drifting off again. I had been pulling all-nighters for the past few days, finishing my thesis, and I was completely wiped out. I hadn't even made it home. I just stopped by my mother's shop, found a bed in the storage room at the back, and collapsed.

Aldric's voice came through it with the same calibrated quality it had in the hotel lobby, undimmed by the fact that he was talking through a dismantled machine in a limestone ravine while standing in the mist several hundred meters away. "I want to be transparent with you," he said. "As a professional courtesy." Nobody said anything. There wasn't anything obviously useful to say. "The Hounds weren't designed for capture," Aldric said. "They're a herding mechanism. They apply directional pressure — subjects who encounter them move away from them, which is entirely predictable. The directional pressure has been applied across your current position for the last forty minutes." A brief pause. "

His eyes narrowed. "What the hell are you?" he asked. Hilda didn't answer. He stepped into the room cautiously. Two more wolves appeared behind him in the hallway, both armed. The scar gestured for them to stay back, keep their weapons aimed. "You're not pack," he said, circling Hilda carefully. "Not completely. I can smell it on you. Something... off." He inhaled deeply. "Old blood. Modified genetics." His eyes widened slightly. "You're one of them. One of those experiments from down south. The Hunters, they've been trying to bring back."

I glanced out of the window every once in a while, watching the buildings going by and people going about their business, completely unaware of the creatures that threatened their very existence. We headed out of the city and drove deep into the Rocky Mountains until we were at the gates of the werewolf compound. The guards quickly opened the gate to let us in and we drove for another half an hour down the road, passing houses and businesses until we got to the pack house. Crimson Fangs Pack was one of the largest packs in North America, and one of the most feared. Their bloodline was old, dating back to when wolves were first created. We pulled up outside of a large mansion, guards armed wi