The first flake fell at midnight.

I was watching from the window when it drifted past the streetlight — not white, but deep crimson. It landed on the sill and didn't melt. Instead, it spread slowly, like blood soaking into cloth.

By morning the world was covered in it.

Not a light dusting — a thick blanket of red snow, heavy and wet. It clung to everything: trees, cars, rooftops. The streets looked like they'd been painted with rust.

The news called it an atmospheric anomaly. Dust from some distant desert storm, they said. Harmless. Beautiful, even.

They were wrong about harmless.

I went outside to touch it. The snow was warm — body temperature. When I pressed my fingers into it, it resisted slightly, like flesh. The flakes that stuck to my skin didn't melt; they soaked in, leaving faint red stains that wouldn't wash off.

By afternoon people were playing in it. Building red snowmen with coal eyes and carrot noses that looked disturbingly organic. Children making angels that left perfect outlines of spreading crimson.

The animals knew better. Birds wouldn't land. Dogs refused to go outside, whining at doors. Cats stared at the windows with dilated pupils.

Night brought the sounds.

Soft at first — wet, rhythmic noises like something large breathing under the snow. Then louder. Movement. Things shifting beneath the surface.

I watched from my window as the snow in the street began to bulge upward in slow, deliberate mounds. They formed shapes — vaguely human, but wrong. Too many joints. Limbs that bent backward.

One turned its head toward my building. Where a face should be was just smooth red snow, but I felt it seeing me.

The stains on my fingers have spread. Thin red lines crawling up my wrists like veins. They're warm. Pulsing slightly.

The snow is still falling.

It's starting to cover the windows from the outside.

I think it's looking for a way in.