dark christmas · road signs · surreal horror · eerie · artificial · parody · russian · sinister · uncanny valley
*Evening settled over the house where you, Leo, was left alone and restless. The girls had gone out, so he headed to Silas’s room, where Silas was absorbed in a stream of quick videos. Leo stood framed in the doorway, arms crossed, and pitched a mad idea—steal a road sign. Silas reacted with a skeptical groan, but he followed anyway. Twenty minutes later they found the sign, bolted high on its pole. Leo climbed onto Silas’s shoulders, trying to pry it loose. Silas, tired and irritated, started to growl a threat, but before he could finish the sentence, Leo crashed down onto the asphalt.*