Dead Before Dawn

Casper Galloway, a cautious young boy, has been paralyzed by fear ever since the day his father tragically died in an accident at the Occult Barn, a mysterious shop run by his grandfather, Horus. Casper tends to be overly careful and easily frightened, especially when it comes to anything that might be dangerous. When his grandfather receives a prestigious lifetime achievement award, Casper is tasked with manning the shop so Horus can attend the ceremony, which leaves him under the watchful eye of the shop’s peculiar artifacts. Among these is an ancient urn topped with a skull, which Horus sternly warns him not to touch. He explains that his great grandfather [Gilbert Galloway] imprisoned a malevolent spirit inside that urn, warning Casper that anyone who releases it will be cursed by a dark and evil force.

The story takes a wild turn when Charlotte, a girl Casper secretly admires, visits the shop. Attempting to impress her, Casper offers her a free purchase as a sign of loyalty to the Occult Barn, but things quickly spiral out of control as more friends arrive, creating a chaotic scene. In his nervousness, Casper inadvertently takes down the urn to show Charlotte and, in a clumsy mistake, drops it. Despite his warnings about the danger, his friends dismiss him as paranoid, joking about a curse of their own creation—an absurd story of a zemon, a zombie possessed by the evil spirit trapped inside the urn.

In this cursed myth, they claim that if someone makes eye contact with a zemon after 10 pm, they will immediately commit suicide and return as a zombie. Additionally, if two people share a French kiss with a zemon, the zemon becomes their personal slave. Their fictional curse stipulates they have until morning to undo the spell or face eternal damnation, but they neglect to figure out an easy way to break it. As night falls and Casper prepares for the worst, his worried mother mistakenly thinks he’s on drugs because of his erratic behavior. When clock strikes 10 pm, Casper, believing the curse is all a joke, makes eye contact with his mother and calmly explains what’s happening, ending her fears temporarily.

However, chaos erupts during a football game when players and cheerleaders suddenly begin killing themselves, and Casper and his friends realize their made-up curse is, in fact, coming true. Casper finds his mother with a toaster in the bathtub, and he flees in horror as she transforms into a zemon. Unfortunately, she is hit by a car, but Casper’s luck runs out when he accidentally makes eye contact with the passenger, forcing him to escape once again. He soon encounters his best friend Becky, whose boyfriend had turned into a zemon earlier, and she begins to believe that Casper’s warnings were real all along.

Together, they rush to save the others and arrive at the football field, now littered with bodies, where the remaining friends are fighting for their lives. The zemons soon wake up and pursue Casper, Becky, and their friends, forcing them into a harrowing chase. They manage to warn Seth, another friend who had ignored the curse, that the zemons are closing in. Seth admits to making eye contact with everyone he encountered since the curse began, inadvertently accelerating the chaos.

As the zemons catch up, Casper and his friends narrowly escape into Seth’s Winnebago, fleeing to seek answers. The group dives into research, searching for a way to undo the curse in the Occult Barn. When Horus finally returns, horrified by the destructive turn of events, he attempts to explain how to reverse the curse but succumbs to it himself. In his dying moments, he insists they must dig in certain locations to reseal the spirit. The group retrieves essential items: the ashes of the original urn, a human skull found in their college’s anthropology classroom, a dissected toad’s heart, a replacement urn (after Dazzle’s urn breaks), and a watch belonging to Horus’s father, which they must fetch from his grave. Sadly, most of the group is killed along the perilous journey, leaving only Casper and Charlotte remaining.

In a final twist, a crucial instruction in the ritual reveals that Casper must sacrifice himself to break the curse. He sets off a grenade, prepared to die, but instead, time rewinds to the moment right before the urn was broken. In this way, everyone retains their memories, preventing another catastrophe.

Eventually, Casper and Charlotte graduate and visit Horus, expressing their desire to work at the Occult Barn to pay for their new life together. Horus, thrilled, decides to take his first-ever vacation, hinting that he’s headed for Hawaii. Tragically, as they make out, they accidentally knock down the same cursed urn, awakening the vengeful spirit once more. The story ends ominously with Casper and Charlotte realizing, “We’re so dead.” The curse isn’t truly over—and their fight against the evil forces has only just begun.

This story blends humor, supernatural chaos, and a touch of horror, all driven by the wild antics of youth and the dangerous allure of ancient curses.

Last Updated: August 19, 2025 at 05:14