"On these hot summer days at the beginning of the New World, we're all walking with the dead."

A grueling summer of horror is finally winding down and Jeremy is one of the wandering survivors who can't come to grips with the acts of terror that have ripped his nation apart.

Now he's returning to Pier 13, the ocean front amusement park his family visited every summer when he was a child.  The park is still open for business, although it resembles an old west ghost town populated by a strange and broken cast of characters.

Jeremy's destination is the wooden roller coaster called the Screamin' Demon, and his purpose for coming here is simple: he wants to visit the place where his brother died and he wants to try to understand why so much horror has washed across the land this year.

But that might not be the only answer waiting for him on the docks...

Originally published in Shivers edited by Richard Chizmar (Cemetery Dance Publications, August 2002).