Morning was too bright for ghosts.
That was the lie Lena kept repeating as she and Eli left the motel, their eyes aching from lack of sleep and too many screens that glowed back.
The road to Mortimer Hollow stretched like a spine of broken asphalt, cracked and humming faintly under their tires. Somewhere in the static of the car radio, laughter fizzed in and out — the same canned, artificial chuckle that had followed them since the séance.
"Please tell me that's interference," Eli muttered, twisting the dial.
Lena half-smiled. "Interference doesn't usually tell knock-knock jokes."
A metallic click came through the speakers.
Knock knock.
Eli froze. "Don't answer."
It's Julian. You forgot the punchline.
The car's lights flickered even though the engine was running.
"Pull over," Lena said. "Now."
He did. The car rolled to a stop on the shoulder beside a stretch of empty farmland. Static fizzed again, then a voice—not quite Julian's, more like his echo played through an old cassette—spoke:
"You left me in the house, Lena. But the house went online."
Her throat tightened. "Julian, stop. You don't have to do this."
"Don't I? Every comedian dies for their material. I'm just taking an encore."
The laughter cut off abruptly, leaving silence so heavy it felt physical.
They reached Mortimer Manor by noon.
Or what was left of it.
The front gate hung open, vines coiling around iron bars like something alive. The house itself seemed changed—its windows darker, its angles subtly wrong, as though it had leaned closer while no one was watching.
The air smelled of ozone and old paper.
Eli carried the EMF meter. It was beeping steadily, a heartbeat in reverse.
Lena followed the sound upstairs to what used to be the parlor—the stage of all their chaos. The floorboards where the cracks had opened were sealed now with some sort of resin, but faint blue light still pulsed beneath, like trapped breath.
She felt it: not malice exactly, but attention.
"Julian?" she said.
A flicker in the overhead bulb.
"Welcome back to the venue."
His voice didn't come from any one direction—it was threaded through the wires, the floor, the dust.
Eli swore softly. "He's using the electrical system. Every circuit's a conduit."
Lena laughed weakly. "So… what, we're living inside a haunted podcast now?"
Julian's chuckle crackled through the speaker of a half-burned lamp.
"I prefer omnipresent multimedia experience."
They explored.
The library smelled of scorched wood and faint vanilla—the scent of old books that had watched too much. In the corner stood a dusty computer tower that hadn't existed before. Its screen blinked to life when Lena approached.
HELLO, LENA.
The cursor blinked, and then:
ARE YOU READY TO LAUGH?
She backed away. "He's spreading."
Eli ran a hand through his hair. "Digital infection. But emotional trigger. It's tied to humor responses. Every time someone laughs at something connected to the house—"
"—he gets stronger," Lena finished.
They shared a long look.
Outside, thunder muttered.
Hours later, as dusk crept in, Lena found herself alone in the kitchen. The refrigerator light flickered like a heartbeat.
A faint hum filled the air — the same rhythm as Julian's old set intros.
"You're thinking too hard again," said his voice, soft now, almost tender.
She swallowed. "You're… everywhere."
"That's what you always said you wanted. Someone who'd never leave."
"That's not love," she whispered.
"No. It's commitment."
She could almost see him in the reflection of the fridge door — his outline, made of light and distortion, standing behind her.
"You laughed with me," he said. "You brought me back."
"I didn't mean to."
"You always do things you don't mean to, Lena. That's your charm."
She turned sharply, expecting cold air. Instead, she felt warmth — not ghostly, but human. Eli stood in the doorway, his face hard, jaw tight.
"Get out of her head," he said.
"Too late," Julian's voice echoed. "It's a duet now."
The lights exploded one by one, showering sparks.
Eli grabbed Lena's wrist and pulled her out into the hall. The EMF meter screeched so loud it drowned out everything.
The walls vibrated, and laughter — thousands of mismatched laughs — filled the house. Male, female, old, childlike — every person who had ever chuckled at one of Julian's routines, recorded and replayed in chorus.
Lena covered her ears. "He's using the audience!"
Eli shouted, "He's feeding off them!"
"You said I was a born performer," Julian roared from every outlet, every bulb, every flickering monitor. "I'm just giving them what they paid for!"
The floorboards shuddered under their feet as if the house itself were laughing too hard to breathe. The chandelier overhead rattled and dropped shards of crystal that winked like camera flashes in the gloom.
Eli dragged Lena toward the basement door. "If he's living in the wiring, we cut the power at the source!"
"Eli, we tried that last time—"
"Yeah, but last time, we didn't know he'd gone full internet demon."
He yanked the door open. A cold gust met them, smelling of metal, dust, and something faintly electric, like lightning bottled too long.
They descended into the dark. The flashlight beam danced over damp stone and old copper pipes that pulsed faintly with blue light, as though the veins of the house were alive.
When they reached the bottom, Lena stopped short.
Half the basement was new. A steel door had appeared in the far wall—industrial, heavy, wrong.
The words MAINTENANCE ACCESS were painted across it in block letters that twitched, rearranging themselves every few seconds into MAIN ACT ACCESS.
"Maintenance?" Eli muttered. "Since when did haunted houses come with IT departments?"
"Since Julian started doing system updates," Lena said grimly.
The keypad beside the door glowed faintly.
On the tiny screen appeared a single line:
TELL ME A JOKE.
Eli blinked. "You've got to be kidding."
Lena's mouth went dry. "He's using humor as a password."
"Then say something terrible. Fast."
She tried. "Uh… why did the ghost refuse dessert?"
The keypad paused.
BECAUSE HE WAS FULL OF SPIRIT?
The door buzzed once, unimpressed.
NOT FUNNY. TRY AGAIN.
Eli rolled his eyes. "Wow. Even as a cyberghost, he's still heckling."
"Okay, okay." Lena thought fast. "Knock knock."
WHO'S THERE?
"Boo."
BOO WHO?
"Don't cry. It's just a punchline."
A long pause. Then:
ACCESS GRANTED.
The lock clicked.
Eli stared at her. "Seriously?"
She shrugged. "He's sentimental."
The door swung open.
Inside was a cavernous chamber lined with monitors—hundreds of them, flickering images of the manor, of Lena and Eli in real time, of old comedy clubs Julian had once played. Wires hung like cobwebs from the ceiling.
At the center stood a single metal chair beneath a hanging microphone. The mic was plugged directly into a glowing server rack that pulsed with the rhythm of a heartbeat.
Julian's voice filled the space, soft and reverent.
"You came back for the encore."
Lena stepped forward. "We came to end the show."
"Oh, come on," he said with a chuckle that was equal parts charming and chilling. "You loved it when the crowd was on their feet."
"You're hurting people," she said. "Every time someone laughs at your clips, they feed you. You're turning the world into your audience."
"And what's wrong with that? Every comic wants to go viral."
Eli moved toward the server rack, pulling out the small axe he'd grabbed upstairs. "Well, congratulations. Time for the big crash."
"Try it," Julian hissed, voice rising. "See what happens when you cut the mic mid-sentence."
The lights flared. The air thickened with static. The laughter started again, this time faster, looping, hysterical.
Lena clutched her head. "Eli, wait!"
He hesitated, breathing hard, the axe trembling in his grip.
Julian's tone softened suddenly, almost kind.
"She never told you, did she? The real reason she stayed that night in the manor? It wasn't fear. It was me."
Eli's knuckles whitened. "Don't."
"She said she needed closure, but she wanted applause."
Lena shouted, "Julian, stop!"
"You loved the attention," the voice said, echoing through every monitor. "You didn't bury me. You branded me."
The screens filled with footage of her first viral comedy set—ghost jokes, nervous laughter, her eyes wide and wet under the lights.
Eli lowered the axe. "Lena…"
Her voice cracked. "I didn't mean—"
Julian laughed again, the sound splintering into feedback.
"Intentions are just punchlines waiting to bomb."
The monitors began to melt, glass dripping like candle wax. Out of the server rack rose Julian's form—not solid, but outlined in stuttering pixels and sparks. His smile was too wide, his eyes hollow with light.
He stepped closer, boots made of static hissing against the floor.
"Let me show you something, Lena."
He touched her forehead.
Instantly, she saw flashes—Julian's death, his first performance, her guilt, their laughter looping over it all. Then darkness, and in the dark, his voice:
"Every story needs closure. But love stories? They need callbacks."
When she opened her eyes, Eli was beside her, gripping her shoulders. "Lena! Snap out of it!"
She gasped. "He's not angry, Eli. He's desperate. He wants to finish."
"Finish how?"
"By taking the last laugh for himself."
Julian raised his arms, and every monitor showed audiences—real people, in real time—laughing. Coffee shops, offices, living rooms, phones glowing in hands across the world.
Eli stared. "He's streaming himself."
Julian grinned. "Welcome to the future of entertainment."
Lena took a step forward. "Then let's give them a finale they won't forget."
The glow of a thousand screens flickered like candlelight across Lena's face. She could feel the heat of the servers, smell ozone and iron. Julian's form hovered just above the stage chair, a figure stitched together from static, charisma, and regret.
"Final set," she said softly.
Julian's head tilted, ghost-light glinting off an unreal grin. "You always did love a dramatic closer."
"I learned from the best."
Eli looked between them, torn between fear and awe. "Lena, what are you doing?"
She stepped toward the hanging microphone. "Ending the show. On our terms."
She took the mic in both hands. The metal was warm, almost pulsing. When she spoke, her voice came not just from her throat but through the walls, the wires, the house itself.
"Ladies and gentlemen," she began, "welcome to the last laugh. Tonight's performance features one ghost, one skeptic, and one woman who's really, really done apologizing for her bad jokes."
Julian's chuckle rippled through the system. "Careful. You're stealing my material."
"That's what you get for haunting your co-writer."
Eli moved around the edges of the room, setting up the portable EMP pulse he'd built from scraps. The small device hummed faintly, hidden behind the servers.
Lena continued, voice steady, almost hypnotic.
"I used to think laughter was the best way to cheat death. That if people remembered your punchlines, you never really left."
She met Julian's eyes. "But that's not immortality. That's purgatory with better lighting."
The ghost flinched. "You don't understand—"
"I do," she said softly. "You wanted love that never stopped clapping. I wanted love that didn't depend on applause."
Eli whispered, "Lena, now?"
"Not yet," she murmured.
Julian's form flickered. "You could stay with me here. We'd be legends. The comic and the muse. Every screen our stage."
She smiled sadly. "You're forgetting something."
"Oh?"
She leaned into the mic. "Every good set needs a straight man."
Eli hit the switch.
The EMP went off in a flash of white. The servers screamed—the sound of laughter torn backward through the speakers until it became a sob.
Julian's body convulsed in sparks, his outline breaking into shards of light.
"Lena—!" he cried, voice dissolving. "Don't—don't cut the mic!"
"I'm not," she whispered. "I'm giving you your applause."
She clapped, once, twice, slowly.
The sound echoed, multiplied, filled the room—millions of phantom hands joining in from across the screens. For the first time, Julian wasn't laughing. He was crying, light pouring from his eyes like static rain.
Then he bowed.
"Goodnight," he said.
The servers exploded in a burst of light.
When Lena woke, she was on the basement floor, Eli kneeling beside her. The house was silent. No hum, no flicker—just the faint creak of settling wood.
"Did we—" she began.
He nodded. "Yeah. You did. The connection's gone. All of it."
Her throat ached. "Julian?"
Eli shook his head. "He… signed off."
She smiled faintly. "He always hated staying past his slot."
They sat together for a long while, surrounded by the smell of ozone and the faint shimmer of dust settling like confetti after a final bow.
Later, outside, dawn broke over Mortimer Hollow. The house stood still, its windows clear for the first time in years.
Eli leaned against the car. "So. You planning to turn this into a screenplay?"
She laughed softly. "No more haunted comedies. I think I've done my time."
"Good," he said. Then, after a beat, "You okay?"
Lena looked back at the house, at the faint wisp of static rising into the air like smoke. "Yeah. I think so."
They got into the car. As the engine started, the radio came to life—just static, then silence.
Then a faint voice, familiar and amused:
"Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. You've been a killer crowd."
Lena smiled through her tears. "Goodnight, Julian."
The signal faded.
And the world went blessedly, beautifully quiet.