Everything around her is too loud, too fast, overwhelming, and somehow also delayed, as if her brain is a half-second behind everything that matters. Ella’s voice merges together, words twisting and slipping away before Kari can catch them fully. Nora’s grip is firm and real, yet feels distant, like she’s touching something through glass. They’re speaking to her. Waiting for her to respond. Her chest tightens. She knows she’s supposed to have the answer. But she just—her thoughts get caught. 'Observer.' That word doesn’t help; it only adds pressure. Ella is hurt, with a head injury, blood loss, and at least a concussion. She’s moving, but unsteady. Nora is shaking, overwhelmed, still able to function but barely. Lynn is talking strategy; calm, detached, with too much input and too many variables, at a rapid pace. Kari’s breathing becomes irregular and strained.
"...Stop talking just—just—"
Her voice falters halfway through. She quickly closes her eyes, hoping to somehow align her thoughts. But it doesn’t happen. Something shifts, and her eyes snap open. The monster is no longer fixated on them; it has already moved. Her gaze follows it—not smoothly, but with jagged, frame-skipping corrections, as if she’s struggling to keep up. It passes through its previous position and appears where it is now, causing Kari a moment of nausea as she tries to make sense of it. Then realization hits. It’s not about them anymore. It’s about Valor. Kari’s head jerks toward the knight just as he steps forward, loud and purposeful, drawing the creature’s focus like a flare. A small, temporary, but real window opens. Her breath catches. There. That’s—Her body moves instinctively, before she even finishes the thought.
"It’s not on us-" she blurts, voice sharp, urgent, almost panicked. “It’s focused on him-it’s-just_"
Kari grips Ella by the arm with more force than intended, attempting to lift her upright. The movement is awkward and unsteady—Ella’s weight shifts unpredictably, and her body fails to stabilize, causing Kari to nearly lose her hold.
"We’re leaving. Now. Come on-"
Her eyes shift back to the creature—no, not just the creature, but through it, following its movements to anticipate what it will do next. She can't quite predict everything yet, but she has enough understanding. Currently, it’s not paying attention to them, and that's the only thing that matters.
“Nora, help me. Get her up. This might be our only chance..”
Her voice has grown thinner and frayed, still attempting to sound in control but failing. Because deep down she knows this isn’t a plan; it’s a window that’s already closing.
The Creature
Interactions: Valor (@Drag), & Lexi (@FernStone) The Warehouse Party.
The incoming debris initially seemed harmless, scattered, and inconsistent. The creature didn’t fully turn to face it; parts of its body responded independently. When chunks of concrete and metal struck, the surface shifted slightly to lessen the impact, softening in some areas and hardening in others.
As similar debris continued to strike, the creature adapted, forming ridges on its surface, not armor, but angled structures. Subsequent impacts deflected, redirected into tissue, or lost force, rendering them insignificant. It no longer focused on Lexi; her movements were processed, unstable, and her attacks broad and inefficient.
The real threat was Valor.
The creature’s body responded to him, shifting not directly towards him but in reaction to what he symbolized. Inside, the groove from the spear flexed, and tendrils twitched—not from damage, but recognition, as the weapon’s pattern became familiar. Bones began to form again, not as a cage but as segmented structures beneath the surface, aligned with probable entry points, meant to guide rather than stop the weapon. The interior channel thickened; some areas were intentionally soft, others hardened into dense nodes slightly offset from previous strikes, preparing for the next attack.
The white fire wasn’t remembered as pain, but as behavior; the creature changed its composition where the fire burned most effectively, forming resistant patches amidst softer tissue, which could shift to carry the burn elsewhere. It wasn’t trying to stop the fire but move it. The creature subtly adjusted its balance, lowering its center by compressing its mass and widening its internal channel, preparing itself.
It paused before attacking, making precise, small adjustments—limbs shifting, movement slowing, reducing waste. It was no longer reacting impulsively; it was focusing, filtering. Valor’s weapons ignited again—this was the constant, what truly mattered. The creature remained still, not out of hesitation, but because it had completed its preparation.
When the weapon next entered, it wouldn’t be leaving. It would be ready, controlling what comes next.
???
Interactions: None. ???
The blade was already in his hand when the opening appeared.
It came suddenly, without warning. One moment, there was nothing; then, a clean break in space formed like a doorway. He hesitated briefly, not out of doubt but to check. Too soon. The thought passed silently; he knew it would align in time. He adjusted his grip once and smoothly slid the katana into its sheath.
Then the opening sealed immediately behind him, leaving no sound or trace. The air beyond felt strange, heavy but familiar, as if something large had already occurred nearby, leaving a residual pressure. He moved forward steadily, confidently, navigating turns instinctively as if he knew the layout.
The sounds from inside echoed—metal breaking, concrete shifting, impacts replaying. Continuing, he slightly adjusted his direction, confirming his sheath was secure. A faint, out-of-place sensation flickered at the edge of his perception but vanished quickly. Ignoring it, he approached the damaged building, its interior exposed through broken sections.
Ella was cooperative with Kari, but it wasn’t very helpful when she was so unsteady on her feet. She stumbled, leaning heavily on Kari while her other hand shot out to use the wall to stop herself from falling properly and hitting her head again. At least there was still a wall there… Just not a whole wall. Where had that massive gap come from?
"Who is him?" She asked, words a bit garbled. She saw the flaming weapons in the corner of her eye. Was it the same person who said some weird stuff that was the total opposite of everything she believed in? Or was there another stranger in the room just there to act judgmental?
She couldn’t really keep up. Kari said they were leaving. That was what was important. Concentrate on her friends!
She suddenly grasped Nora’s arm, using her grip on both her friends to pull herself upright. Her legs ached and threatened to buckle under her own weight, but she fought through it, leaning on Kari and Nora for support.
"Leaving, I’m up… I’m good, I can walk, just need the support." She said, managing a smile that was meant to be comforting but it all it came across as was pained. Her whole body protested her movement, her probably broken ribs stabbing sharply into already bruising skin. Now upright, she felt much dizzier, the pink drink she’d had not long ago threatening to come back up.
But she could fight through it. She couldn’t fall down yet… Not until they were safe. It was just a little bit of pain!
It was a testament to her mental fortitude that she was able to force herself to stand, even trying to move them towards the big hole in the wall, albeit weakly.
"I won’t fall again till we’re out."
Warehouse -> Forest
Tuyen crouched only a few steps away from the shattered window. She knew it wasn’t safe here, but she couldn’t make herself move further. Maybe it was just she didn’t care. She’d used up the tiny amount of survival instinct she had, burning it out until only cold depression was left.
The Shadow slunk around her, not even feeling the need to torment her further. She was already doing a good enough job at tormenting herself. It was all her fault that Vicky had died. If she hadn’t left her alone, then she’d still be here. Tuyen would’ve been able to get her out of the place… Or at least she would’ve been the one to die protecting her. But she’d abandoned her, and now she was dead.
Even the boom of a wall being destroyed didn’t snap her out of it. It felt like she was underwater, everything around her muffled. Her mind spiralled, her cold hands clutching her head as she curled into herself. Tears dripped down her face, slowly plopping onto her knees. Harsh, sharp breaths ripped through her chest, getting faster and faster.
Someone grabbed her shoulder, and shook her. “Hey, hey! Get up! We gotta run further–”
Tuyen flinched back like she’d be burnt, finally dragging herself back to the present. She looked up, breath catching in her throat as the person- if they could be called that- leaned closer to her. Their face was blurred and sinister, like they’d stolen a human’s but hadn’t put it on right. Sharp teeth grinned down at her, and clawed hands reached for her.
She didn’t make a sound, backing away in panic and looking sharply to the side in the hope there were other people still around.
There weren’t. Just more of these things wearing human flesh, and shadows pretending to be humans. They were all disjointed, like they didn’t belong in this world. Their glowing eyes and unnatural smiles turned on Tuyen.
”Why aren’t you running?” The ‘person’ asked, reaching for her shoulder. ”It's more fun that way.”
Tuyen pushed their hand away, scrambling back and managing to get to her feet. She turned and ran without any more hesitation. She had to get out of here. She had to get home. It wasn’t even about surviving she just didn’t want to- she couldn’t stay around those things. She wanted it to be quick.
She pushed into the dark forest, but didn’t go deep into it. Instead she kept the road in view as she ran- close enough she could follow it, but not so close that she could be seen from it. Laughter followed her, and her lungs burned.
Even as she got further away, the screams didn’t stop.
She didn’t stop either. She wouldn’t until she was home. Until she was alone.
Relief, Vicky imagined, was what she should’ve felt when Lexi’s head wasn’t popped from her shoulders by the monster. All she felt was horror. This wasn’t just more mean girl shit. Perhaps there was a part of Vicky that felt the world would be better off without another dumb bitch like Lexi, and perhaps that part of Vicky was damn near all of her, but this really stopped being about Lexi the moment Vicky witnessed Tyler hurl that piece of concrete. Earlier, Vicky had drunkenly bragged to Tuyen about being omniscient, and while that wasn’t the case, Vicky was observant—even while drunk. So when that piece of concrete swapped into a speaker, it was less like the first domino in a chain falling and more like the entire domino run had been flattened by a sonic boom all at once.
“Oh, fuck!” cried Vicky in realization at the same time Tyler said, “We can fucking RUN.”
She had been saved by Tyler Fox, swapped like that speaker, and now she was being dragged to safety by Tyler Fox. He was never going to let Vicky live this down. This was horrible, horrible, horrible! She would rather die than be saved by Mister This Fucking Guy. Yet instead of letting go of his hand, rushing back into the warehouse, and prostrating herself down before the monster to put her out of her misery, Vicky held on. She was simply too important of a person to throw her life away, and honestly, there was a fear that if she gave herself over to the monster’s clutches then the rest of the school would follow as if she had jumped from a bridge. She simply couldn’t bear to be blamed for the death of an entire class, like, it wasn’t her fault that she was a trendsetter!
Plus, okay, she didn’t actually want to die, and even if she did, what had happened to Chef and the others looked so painful. Hard pass. Besides, there had to be a way she could turn this around and make Tyler look like a total chump here instead it was just kind of hard to think right now because she was panicking and it was mostly about the monster crashing the party but also a little bit about Tyler and, seriously, thought Vicky as her feet dragged on the ground and made Tyler put in all the effort on their escape, this little fucker was a quarterback and this was really the fastest he could run? Come on!
It was only when they made it to the tree line that Vicky released her death grip on Tyler and dropped to her hands and knees. For a split second her mind cleared itself of all her worries and insecurities and the tears that dropped to the ground were not from fear nor anger nor sorrow but of gratitude, a rare moment of peace where Vicky was simply happy to be alive instead of constantly worrying about how her life could be better. Then that hum returned to her head, the endless, electric buzz of an overloaded circuit that at any second could blow, and she remembered, even as her body still shook in fear, that the Game was still on, she had to play it, and she must win.
When she launched herself at Tyler, wrapped her arms around him, and gave him a tight hug it was a play, a stalling tactic. Likewise, it was just a move to make Tyler lower his guard when she cried, “I. Wan. Na. Go. Home!” And as she broke down into a complete, incoherent blubbering mess as she smeared her face into his chest and continued to wail, it was totally part of an absolute brilliant ploy to inevitably own Tyler and make him her little bitch. Otherwise, then it would just mean that Vicky was some boyfriendless loser whose only “real” friend had confidently abandoned her to her doom the second things got spooky and therefore forced her to be forever grateful to the biggest piece of shit she knew.
Yeah, not happening.
So as a threat, Vicky hugged Tyler harder: she'd drag him under if he tried burying her. Until then, hurry up and get her the fuck out of here.
Interactions: Everyone I guess. The Warehouse Party.
Valor advanced first, the warehouse floor cracking beneath its weight as it surged forward, flames trailing from its weapons through the dust in the air. Heat emanated from the sword and axe, briefly illuminating the debris-stained walls with flashes of orange as the knight closed in with deliberate power. The creature didn’t retreat; instead, its body tensed. Its torso’s groove slightly flexed open as internal parts shifted beneath the surface, dense nodes rotating into impact paths while softer tissue receded deeper into its mass. It lowered its stance further, limbs spreading minimally to brace against the incoming force. Weapon trajectories had already been anticipated. Valor’s right side dipped first, following established preference patterns for the spear. The sword’s angle shifted, but its goal remained the same: penetration followed by sustained heat damage. Some variance existed, but within expected ranges. The creature was prepared to endure the strike.
Then, something entered the room.
Not force but presence.
The air exploded violently, distorting as if reality itself had briefly slipped out of focus. Thin strands of orange light shot through the warehouse in tangled fibers, spreading outward like fractures in glass. The wave moved too fast to track; it simply arrived. Debris rattled, dust lifted, and temperature shifted abruptly. Then, people began falling. Anyone without an Emotional Field dropped instantly, bodies limp before they fully understood what happened. Some bounced on impact, others folded in place as if their strings had been cut.
The Paranormals stayed conscious but just barely. The pressure hit them like deep water collapsing inward. Not exactly pain, but something heavier was pressing against their minds’ edges. Their Emotional Fields flared under the strain as the wave assaulted them. Breathing grew labored, thoughts blurred, and instinctive warnings overtook logic. Not because of the creature, but because of something else. Something worse. Something so powerful its mere presence distorted the room.
The creature responded immediately—not out of fear, but recognition. Its body convulsed as internal structures shifted abruptly. Ridges flattened, bone dissolved into softer matter, and its defensive channels collapsed as it reorganized away from combat readiness. The fight no longer mattered. The orange strands moved differently across its flesh, destabilizing parts of its adaptable tissue and causing it to reform out of sequence. Movements that were once precise and calculated suddenly lost efficiency.
Without hesitation, the creature moved, ignoring Valor entirely, not to attack but to escape. Its body compressed sharply and then exploded outward, rushing across the warehouse at terrifying speed. Concrete shattered beneath its limbs, steel supports bent and snapped as it tore through the collapsing structure outside. The building groaned, supports collapsing as debris was forced aside, but it kept moving, undeterred, until it reached the edge of the place from which it emerged.
The rupture June created.
Beyond the shattered warehouse walls, the rupture swirled violently in space, never forming a stable doorway—just a chaotic red mass twisting inward, like reality folding into a wound that refuses to close. Flickers of-strangely-Cornell appeared within it in broken flashes: distorted corridors, collapsing structures, impossible angles that appeared and vanished too quickly to comprehend. Shapes moved within the distortion, never fully becoming clear. Beneath all this, the voices persisted: screaming, whispering, layered so densely they ceased sounding human.
The creature entered. For a moment, its flesh lost cohesion—stretched and blurred as the seam simultaneously rejected and accepted it. Parts appeared ahead of others as if caught between states. Then, the distortion swallowed it whole. The rupture trembled violently after the creature’s passage. The warped glimpse of Cornell flickered once or twice before collapsing inward, as if reality itself sought to close the wound.
The air was deathly quiet in the warehouse.
???
Interactions: None. ???
The silence that followed was unnatural; it bore an intense pressure, as if the warehouse had been emptied, leaving only the residual moment. The last traces of orange distortion lingered as faint afterimages across surfaces before fading. Nothing moved where it had fallen. Those still aware of their surroundings didn’t speak, and no one acknowledged what had just occurred.
A blade clicked softly as it slid into its sheath, a small but definitive sound in the hollow space. The figure stayed still a moment longer, head slightly inclined as if listening beyond the ruins. Whatever had entered had already retreated, leaving only consequences. Without urgency or ceremony, he began to move.
He crossed the broken floor with calm precision, stepping over collapsed beams and fractured concrete, ignoring the scattered individuals. His gaze was fixed beyond them, past the torn edge of the warehouse where reality had been torn open. The outside rupture pulsed with instability, less a doorway and more an unresolved flaw in existence. Red-black currents swirling, refusing to settle, revealing fleeting fragments of worlds that did not belong to any single realm. Its edges hinted at familiarity, but in a way that defied immediate understanding.
He stopped several meters away. The pause felt deliberate. "... Oh, this isn't good,” he said quietly, not with surprise, but with recognition—like confirming something long known rather than discovering anew. After a moment, he added, "... She'll be here soon.”
This wasn’t a prediction, it was a certainty. His hand moved to the hilt of his blade, but did not draw it; instead, he acknowledged its presence. The air around the katana subtly tightened, as if space itself recognized his intent. With controlled precision, he partially unsheathed the blade—not to strike, but to cut. The act targeted continuity itself, not matter. The air split with a clean, silent cut, forming a narrow seam beside him—structured absence shaped into a passage.
He hesitated, watching the rupture as if confirming its behavior once more. Then he stepped into the seam and vanished.
Current day Interactions: Tommy, Vicky, Corey, Dead Guy Outfit: Normal
Tyler was disgusted.
It wasn’t the fact that Vicky was still holding his hand like some pathetic kid who needed to be comforted. Why else would that freak still be doing this? It wasn’t like there was a way for Vicky to spin this to make herself look good. She was covered in blood, blood, gallons of the stuff. If anyone got a photo of her, they would have all the fucking ammunition they needed to shut her down in every last circle she dreamed of being the queen bee of. Not just because red was totally not her color or anything like that. Still, they would need to survive the night to bring that ammunition to bear. While she was doing a lot of the work to drag them from the raging death cult fuckery behind them, let’s be honest, it is the least she could do. Tyler may be the actual impressive physical specimen between the two of them, but he could not risk damaging the product to save someone as delicate and needy as Vicky. There was nothing else to be read from him following behind Vicky and letting her take charge. He was just the star athlete, letting the lemming lead the way through the potential danger outside the factory.
Finally.
Tyler sighed in relief as it finally happened. His eyes rested on the treeline that the duo had finally reached. Was it the safety that the treeline offered that caused him to feel at ease? Was it the thought that once he got home, he had access to his family's gun safe, and he wondered how bulletproof that monster was? Or was it because it meant that the other losers who refused to flee would learn their lesson the hard way? No. It was because Vicky finally released her death grip on his hand. That freak would begin to think too far into what it meant when a guy and a girl held hands for more than five seconds, if that carried on too much longer, and Tyler did not want to be the asshole. That was a lie. He really wanted to crush that hope and dream. Of course, that dittzy hair for brains would want to leech off his success, and this was her attempt to do so. What a..
“I. Wan. Na. Go. Home!”
Fuck. Tyler looked down as she turned into a crying teenager, completely detached from the cool, collected, and in control visage she adopted at all times. She truly looked even more pathetic than she did every time her fuck ass boyfriend tried to do anything cute or lovey dovey. Couldn’t she fucking take the hint that Chet loved her? Tyler’s eyebrows shot up just a hair. It finally made sense. All of this, the handholding, her face in his chest, and even the sobbing, was because she knew that her man loved her, and was still dealing with the fact that he had been brutally murdered in front of her. This was not her confessing any sort of actual feelings for him, but rather asking the only man who had the stomach to have been around her since they were kids for help. Did this make them friends? Tyler hopped not. All he wanted to do right in this moment was sneak his phone out, take several photos and maybe a video, toss something, and teleport away so she could wallow in her pity. Yet this was not the time nor the place anymore. If Tyler wanted to be the hero that he knew he was, and that his strange ancestor ghost expected him to be, he needed to step up to the plate and lead by example.
“Okay,” Tyler paused as he gently placed a hand on each of Vicky’s shoulders, and with a gentle push, got her off his chest. He offered the sniffling, sniveling, and straight-up crying girl a warm smile. “Okay,” Tyler leaned down and picked up two rocks with his one hand and showed them to Vicky, expecting her to at least have the bare minimum brain processing power to understand what his intent was. But just in case. “Let’s go home. I will toss these ahead and swap our positions with them,” Tyler paused as he threw the stones and turned off all senses. He quickly found the position of the two stones and locked on with his magic, and then locked on to himself. Before he could do the same for Vicky, he swapped and was suddenly several feet in the air and traveling at a high speed towards a fleeing guy.
“WHAT THE FU-,” Tyler’s voice cut out as he collided with the man, tumbling with him through the forest before coming to a rest. Tyler lay where he fell for just a second before he pushed himself off the ground, straddling the person beneath him as he tried to see who he had fallen on. A scowl crossed his face as his hands balled into fists, and proverbial steam exited his nose.
Interactions: Lynn & Daniel Outside Warehouse - Woods
Lynn knew she needed out. While the monster was busy fighting what Party Boy turned into, Lynn watched as the jock and what she assumed was his girlfriend left together, a few others got out, and the girl squad left as well. But Daniel was still in this warehouse; he had lost every bout with the devil, and he needed to get shaken from that trance he was in. Lynn tossed a panicked eye back at the monster and saw that it, too, had begun to panic. Someone, maybe something else, had arrived, and whatever or whomever it was had scared the beast into admitting defeat before the first blow was traded. Lynn’s breath was caught in her chest as she watched it scamper away like a weak and pathetic little monster. That scared the shit out of her. If that monster, that creature that caused all this death and destruction, was scared, Lynn paused the thought as her eyes shifted to the new arrival, then how powerful was this thing? It did not stick around to display what that power was. Her chest let loose the breath, and she gasped. She could not tell why, but for some reason, the air around the warehouse had lost a lot of weight to it, even as the warehouse itself was a scene of horror with blood, viscera, and damaged concrete strewn about.
Valor had watched the monster prepare itself, understood how it fought and the way it divided punishment into some evolutionary defense. The knight felt no concern of this understanding, it would simply resolve to administer punishment greater than the beast could bear.
But no such resolution came. Valor’s weapons struck at nothing as the creature burst into gore and fled using its base elements. The tear in reality, where the beast had spawned from, showed glimpses of the town in its maw, but Valor paid it no heed. More concerned with finding and estimating whatever had caused the creature to make such a retreat. It found nothing, the new presence leaving as soon as it had arrived and the dimensional wound closing over, leaving behind an empty building full of dead things. The knight weighed these events in its impassive face, far from ideal.
“HM.” Valor grunted, mild annoyance in its normally indifferent reverberation. Like the other paranormal guests of the night, Valor suddenly relinquished control and seemed to disappear - albeit remaining closer than the rest of the evening’s uninvited guests. Daniel Mars returned to the world, collapsing forward and smacking his face on the ground, eyes closed and wheezing for air, like a drowning victim who’d been unexpectedly fired out the sea and back onto land.
Lynn quickly shot her eyes back towards Daniel and saw that whatever had possessed him had let the boy go. He was unconscious, on the ground, but he was breathing, and he was distinctly himself. Lynn smirked. A small blessing. She had only just made him an acquaintance; she could very well not lose him before she learned more about this town and the school. *thud* Lynn’s head lurched downward as a small piece of concrete fell from above and hit her on the crown of her head. It was not very big, nor did it hurt much, but it still pulled her attention upward, revealing the damage the fight between Daniel and the Monster wrought on the building in this part of the warehouse. She was no engineer, nor did she know what exactly to look for to determine if a roof was about to fall, but she did know that seeing the stars through the roof, spiderweb cracks, and pieces and parts falling at a steady rate were not good signs. She looked towards Daniel, and back to the ceiling, and back to Daniel. He was in danger. Lynn’s eyes went wide as she gasped. Daniel was in danger, and so was she.
The next thing Lynn knew, she was moving. Her legs had gained a strength that she had never felt before, and she had found a drive that her spirit had always lacked. She moved with speed, avoiding debris and bodies, as she made her way towards Daniel's unconscious form. Within a few moments, she had slid beside him with both knees on the ground, one hand on his shoulder, and another on his chest. She shook him hard once, twice, and a third time more. “Daniel,” Lynn said as she continued to shake, her head turning and watching as more concrete fell around them, “it’s time to wake up, Party Boy. We don’t have to go home, but we can’t stay here. Wake up, please,” Lynn pleaded as she rose from her feet. She grabbed him by the hand and began to pull. To say Lynn was weak would be a disservice to weak people. She had never lifted a day in her life, and while Daniel was not heavy, it was still difficult. Lynn began to tug and pull, leaning back with all her might, giving it some slack, before returning to pulling again. More and more debris fell around them as she did, and some seemed to almost curve towards Lynn’s head.
Groggy and uncoordinated - a drunkard after last call - Daniel ambled to his feet, able to vaguely move even if it were acutely obvious he’d fall in a heap without Lynn’s support. It felt like the lucid dream of someone concussed, the rational part of him could recognise danger in some vague acknowledgement but the rest of him lagged behind. Not helping was the echo of pain in his torso from when Valor had been knocked aside by the monster, something that didn’t ache as much as it felt akin to the pain of a phantom limb, an acknowledgement of pain but not the sensation. Even in this state, Daniel tried to mumble to Lynn, a thanks or a warning or something completely nonsensical in his addled mind, lost to the noise and chaos of the collapsing building.
Eventually, Lynn was outside, Daniel was halfway there, and the roof was holding on by a prayer. A large chunk wiggled loose and began to fall towards Daniel. With one last heave, Lynn pulled Daniel completely free of the warehouse and away from danger. “YE-,” Lynn was interrupted as a small chunk of concrete exploded outwards from the impact sight. While it initially moved away from the two, something grabbed hold of the chunk and directed it right towards Lynn’s forehead. “Fuc-,” Lynn stammered out right before the concrete impacted right on her cheek and the side of her head, a taste of metal filled her mouth, and the world spun around before she fell backwards and felt the cold ground greet her back. While she was not out, she was down and groaning in pain. Her thoughts felt like a mile away, and her vision felt a touch out of reach down a long tunnel.
“Uff!” Face smacking the dirt, Daniel would never quite know how narrowly he came to a much more mundane death or disfigurement after the nightmare that was this party.
The impact’s effect was twofold, one was caking Daniel’s face in muck and fully bloodying his nose after the impact of his last fall, the other was fully pulling him out of his post-possession stupor, a system reboot after smacking a machine. He scrambled like frozen water had been dumped down his back, everything flooding into his mind yet again, the deaths, the black knight, the end of the world. God, how many were dead? His head turned, a mask of frantic terror carved on his face, just in time to witness Lynn fall to the floor with a squirt of blood erupting from the side of her face.
“Lynn!” Daniel yelled, his manic fear suddenly focusing into a singular direction. As he stumbled back up, a thought emerged that would’ve ordinarily been chilling in its simplicity: he thought Lynn was dead.
It was welcome, if strange, relief when he reached her side to find her groaning and still moving. Even then, the sight was distressing, scraped flesh from where the concrete had struck her face and the slight glimpse of her teeth stained crimson from the blood welling in her mouth. Shots rang from behind the metal and concrete, more aimed debris striking the walls and the doorframe, they were being directed away, not that they needed additional reason.
“It’s alright, it’s ok!” Daniel sputtered, his rushed tone making clear he didn’t believe it himself. He coiled one of Lynn’s arms around his neck and began lifting her off the dirt, her willowy frame and Daniel’s comparative strength giving him an easier time than she did - suddenly his father’s homophobia-laden demands that Daniel get into sports was now mildly appreciated in retrospect.
“LEAVE HER. THERE IS ANOTHER BEING IN THESE WOODS. WE MUST TRACK IT..” A voice echoed somewhere in Daniel’s mind, a thought forced into his head and making his brain feel like it was swelling beyond the contour of his skull as it spoke.
“It’s all going to be ok.” Daniel weakly repeated, the voice was fiction, all of this was fiction, everything would be ok when the sun came up. He felt tears stinging beneath his eyes and blinked them away, gritting his teeth and breathing loudly through his nose while he half-guided half-dragged Lynn down the dirt path to freedom. “We’re just- it’s-” His mind swelled again, something protesting, a defeated grimace rested on Daniel’s face. “Let’s show you around town; starting with the hospital.”
Lynn tried to respond, but her words were caught in her chest. Seeing the town sounded nice. It would be the perfect thing to distract her from just how bad her face and head hurt. They could see so many fun things, and they would start with the place called the hospital. Especially after whatever bad stuff had just happened, she knew she could go for some fun. Lynn grimaced as Daniel dragged her along as pressure built behind her eyes. It felt like her skull was filled with an ever-expanding foam. She felt every heartbeat in her temple, and each pulse arrived with a spike of pain. Daniel’s voice stretched and warped, and for some reason, it sounded like he was both right next to her and a million miles away.
Something warm crept down along her neck from her hairline, sticky against her skin. When she tried to swallow, her jaw hitched, and fresh crimson iron washed against her tongue. She realized, dimly, that she couldn’t quite tell if she was walking forward or being dragged. The spaces between moments kept disappearing on her, blinking out like skipped frames in a damaged film reel. Eventually, the skips turned into brief seizures like trips to the Garden. Daniel would watch as Lynn’s eyes would flash green for a brief moment, her body going stiff with it, before they returned to normal.
“M’fine…” Lynn slurred, though the word came out with an almost wet undertone. The attempt to speak only made her stomach lurch, and her ears ring. Lynn thought back to what Daniel had said earlier. Hospital. Ok. Safe. Maybe. Everyone she loved never made it to the hospital; maybe she truly needed it. She blinked slowly and immediately regretted it. For one terrible second, she couldn’t remember why they were running. Then it all slammed back into place at once. The carnage, a monster, collapsing concrete, and more loss. Her breathing hitched again. She dug shaky fingers into Daniel’s sleeve hard enough to wrinkle the fabric. She took a deep breath in and then exhaled deeply. The world focused around her ever so gently. The tunnel collapsed quickly, though her vision still felt further away than it should be. She was able to think again. And save was able to feel the pain she was in fully. Tears welled, fell, and burned as they crossed her wounded face, and a gentle sob quickly filled the air. Her free arm reached up and touched her lip, and her face winced sharply as daggers shot across her face. That was not good.
“Thank you Mars, Daniel Mars,” Lynn muttered, barely above a whisper.
The preacher’s boy never did quite make out what Lynn said, only hearing her sporadic, gentle weeps that reminded him to keep his own tears at bay. Only seeing the dripping blood and flashes of colour blink in and out of her eyes, reminding him that, however hard he may deny, tonight’s events were real. A reckoning had happened, children that Daniel had grown alongside - knowing their individual eccentricities, hopes and beliefs - were dead and left behind as the two continued down the dirt path.
Selfishly, Daniel felt some measure of gladness that Lynn was injured. Escaping alongside her was a goal, something to override the existential terror that would have rendered him catatonic in any other circumstance. In fact, he realised he didn’t feel much of anything right now. Numbed by so much change in such a short amount of time. Would there even be a hospital to reach? More likely all those worthy had been raptured far away from this town, the sinners left with a dreadful respite before the hells opened up in earnest.
Instead of divine light, it was a duet of cherry red and stark white that greeted them when they reached the treeline. Ambulances, squad cars, even a firetruck was turning the corner and making its way down the street from afar. Adults could only react in confusion and work off conjecture while scores of dirtied, bloodied teenagers babbled in hysteria, wrapped tightly in blankets and tears. A weary exhale, Daniel held Lynn closer against him - perhaps realising that with civilisation evidently not quite over yet, he would need her support more than she needed his.
“H-hey! Help! There’s been an- she’s hurt!” He said as he waved down one of the EMTs for help. A middle-aged woman took one glance at Lynn and widened her eyes before quickly jogging towards the duo. Daniel sardonically wondered how that same doctor would react when she saw inside of the warehouse.
Another attempt to bury it down before the police inevitably asked him for a statement. Tonight was a prank, some mundane explanation for however horrific the situation was. It only took another glimpse at Lynn to dispel that notion, a girl Daniel only just met hours ago now left mumbling imperceptibly after saving his life multiple times, blood beginning to drip down from her chin and into a discoloured pattern on her shirt. But really, what forced Daniel Mars to confront this new, warped reality, was the ever-present pressure on his skull as a voice demanded he return to the woods and deliver retribution, coldly repeating the order again and again.
The sounds of hell letting loose seemed to be growing distant. Tommy used the flashlight of his phone to keep going forward, while the golden creature circled him overhead. The adrenaline in his body was at a midway point between “On” and “Dump,” where he felt like stopping meant not getting back up. His thoughts were held together by sticks and glue, the sticks being the knowledge those ghosts had imparted onto him, and the glue being his survival.
”Magic is real. Magic… Is real.” He whispered the words out loud, between the light thunks of his improvised walking stick.
”What the hell else is r-“
Thud.
Something crashed onto Tommy with the force of a braindead jock hitting a two hundred pound wall on legs. Before he had the chance to react, he was face-down in the dirt and feeling the complaint of his injuries. He felt blood soak into his jacket as he landed on his wounded hand. The adrenaline came back to full blast.
”What in the good goddamn fucking shit is-“ He rolled and nearly ran for his life again, expecting something dangerous. But it was just Tyler Fox, out of nowhere.
”Where the fuck did you come from?”
Tyler gritted his teeth as his hand quickly grabbed the collar of Tommy’s shirt. “Talk,” Tyler balked as his free hand balled into a fist, “did you somehow cause this?”
”Cause what? Get your damn hands off me, Fox,“ He growled. ”I don’t know what the fuck’s going on. How did-“
The golden bird screeched. Then Tommy saw it swooping down.
”Hey- Hey hey!” Tommy lunged forward around Tyler and grabbed the damn thing midair. His hand was barely big enough to grab it by the beak. ”Stop!”
Tyler was stunned. Did this bitch try to deflect from his line of questions by grabbing a bird? The nerve. He was the nerd who probably played Dungeons and Dragons. He was the asshole who was most likely to be a believer in Satan. Answering a simple question with a question was low-key a soy boy beta male maneuver, and that pissed Tyler off. Tyler grabbed a rock and flicked it past Tommy while still facing the opposite direction. Tyler swapped, instantly appearing back in front of Tommy. He grinned for a second as he found this magic shit fun. He took a step forward and pushed his arm towards Tommy’s chest. “You show up, a fucking monster appears, and you’re fucking running away. That’s suss as, bro.”
”I’m not your bro. You’re here too, and I know damn well no one’s inviting you either,” He remarked, pushing himself up and letting the magic bird go.
”Leave him alone, he didn’t cause whatever happened in there.”
It ruffled its scarlet feathers and perched on the ground. Tommy grabbed his stick and leaned against it. ”Did you follow me out here? Because whatever the hell’s going on, it wasn’t me. Why would that be me?”
“Everyone invited me, bro. I am the star fucking quarterback in a rustbelt town,” Tyler grinned. He was so impressive. “You don’t know how much those fucking plebs wanted me there. But now,” a dead nerd flashed across his mind, the one he had condemned to death, and he had forgotten his name already, “you got that monster trying to attack me, and you expect me to think you did not summon that giant wolf thing? Admit it, freak.”
”That bird thing just came out of me five minutes ago.” Tommy raised up a bloodied hand, and more of that golden smoke started to come off his fingers. ”I saw people that weren’t really there, they told me magic’s real, next thing I know, I made that.”
The weird bird fixed an odd stare at Tyler. Its eyes were just two red orbs against half-real feathers.
”And now people are getting murdered, and you wanna bitch at me about it?”
This was going nowhere fast. Tyler knew he needed to pivot the questions to ensure that he could still blame Tommy without it going overboard. “Yeah, people are getting murdered up there,” Tyler paused as he pointed back to the warehouse, “and because you ran, because all of you ran, we couldn’t stop it. You fucking coward.”
”Stop it? Stop it?! Do you even know what it is?!” He balked. ”I just watched people get cut in half, like they were paper, what is wrong with you?”
He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Mister Star Athlete wanted to fight whatever that was instead of going home. ”One minute, I’m talking to you, and then it’s like someone drugged me. Everything stopped, now I’m throwing magic around because that’s a thing, apparently.”
Good. Tyler’s lightning quick style of attack has finally caught Tommy off guard. Now, he just needs to lull him in up close with the rushing attack only to throw it deep to put him out of his misery. That’s what he’ll do. He’ll be the hero at last. All he has to do is… Tyler craned his head. There was something fantasy about that last sentence. One minute he was stuck in the crowd, and the next he was feeling drugged, and to escape the high he had to use magic, that was a thing apparently. Did everyone who had magic go through the same experience? Tyler knew he needed to learn and understand the rules of this game before he truly formulated a gameplan. You can’t expect to run an efficient offense if you’re drawing a penalty on every play after all. Thus, as he loosened his muscles, he decided to spare Tommy for this moment.
“I met an old Prussian soldier. Said he was my ancestor, and he taught me as much as he could. Did you have the same thing happen?” Tyler paused as he reached down and grabbed several loose stones.
”…Kind of. Some old guy, and there was this woman with a snake around her neck. They-“ Tommy inched down and grabbed his phone where it had been knocked over. He moved it and pointed the light straight up. ”They said magic was real, and something happened before they’d tell me.” He reached into his blood-soaked jacket. ”Their faces were blurred, then I heard something. Then they looked normal… They showed me where to go to get out of there, they didn’t give me much to go off.” He withdrew his deck of cards that the bird was made from, and then knelt down.
”I don’t get why, but they sounded like they were in a hurry.” Tommy sat the deck down with his phone and snapped the branch he’d been using to stay upright in half. Then into quarters. ”The old man said to reach for these, then- Then I’d just know. I made that bird from- From fucking magic, and blood,” He finished, pulling out another card; The Nine of Spades.
“Have you tested your magic much, yet?” Tyler paused as he began to toss a stone in his left hand up into the air and catch it once more.
”Got it five minutes ago, so no.” He held the branches over the card, and it started to glow gold. And then the branches began to glow as well, held in place above the ground by some force.
”Okay… And I just- I don’t know. Fill in the gaps, I think.” What was he going to make this time? Tommy looked around, thinking. He didn’t understand how this was supposed to work, if blood was a necessity every time, or-
He saw something in the distance that caught his eye. The moonlight caught on something metal between two trees. Tommy stood up and hobbled over, about thirty feet away. It was large and covered in rust, and it looked as if vines and roots were growing out of it.
Red paint that was probably older then Tommy’s dad. An abandoned truck. The moonlight pointed out the mirror.
Then, Tommy had an idea.
He grabbed the old, cracked mirror by the metal frame around it and hauled. This truck must’ve been drove by someone half a century ago, back before the warehouses were here. Back when people could afford nice things. He wrenched it free, and the rusted-out arm it was attached to gave away.
”Yeah. I got it now.” He plodded back over and chucked the mirror at the arrangement of floating sticks, it was subsumed into the gold energy, glowing all the same.
”So…” The mirror and the sticks looked vaguely like something with four legs, so Tommy held out and hand and pictured an animal in his head. Something on all fours, that could see as well as a mirror could. The pieces he gathered moved and swirled around each other.
Gold Lux weaved between the pieces and around them, filling out what would be flesh on anything else. He paid attention to the eyes the most, and then the body felt like an extension of that. Wavy patterns reminiscent of spades, made from interlocking strands of wood.
The creature glowed, settled on the ground. The Nine of Spaces glinted gold against the light from Tommy’ phone. He had created a canine, something like a coyote that sat upright and craned its head at Tyler. Its eyes were the purest white, opalescent with a yellow sheen.
It didn’t move a muscle.
”I made the bird to hurt things… This one, I think I want him to watch for things. A guard dog.”
Fascinating.
Tyler’s curiosity piqued at the display of magic before him. This fucking loser might prove to have some worth, creating a line for him to command the field behind. That would require him to be fucking worth the effort, and Tyler did not think that he had a single heroic or decent bone in his body. He would need to be tested, he would need to be taken through a baptism by fire, and if he emerged on the other side of two-a-days in one piece, he would earn the right to be a part of his team. Tyler leaned down and grabbed a twig, and tossed it above.
“I can swap objects with each other.” Tyler paused as he swapped the twig in the air with the stone he had tossed above his hand, catching the twig as it swapped before waiting a second for the stone to drop down a second later and catching it as well.
”Sounds useful.” Tommy flexed the fingers of his busted hand. ”Is that how-”
The dog thing opened its mouth and made some groaning noise. It turned its head to look at something past the trees.
”...What the fuck now?” He grabbed his phone and pointed the flashlight that way.
For a moment the light shined on a still forest, a hard shift from the calamity that was occurring just beyond the trees. Then as the conversation stilled the boys would be able to hear it: a strange, arrhythmic wail interspliced with the distant sounds of all hell breaking loose from the warehouse. Perhaps it was the siren of an emergency vehicle on the way to the warehouse, only instead of getting further away it was coming closer, growing louder, sounding less mechanical and more guttural, feral.
The illuminated leaves began to rustle and shake as the horrible noise began to fill the air around them, becoming oppressive, perhaps bloodcurdling, when suddenly erupting from the brush was a wide-eyed, bloodsoaked Vicky. Brambles stuck to her ruined outfit and a few twigs had nestled their way into her hair. A fresh scratch was on her cheek, hidden beneath the crimson mask, her face twisted in a look of horror that rapidly jumped to confusion as she threw up a hand to shield from the light before shifting to recognition and then finally settling on rage.
“What! The! Fuck! Tyler! You! Ab—”
Vicky jumped as a coyote growl cut her off. She didn’t even hesitate as she caught sight of the critter, balled up the heavy jacket in her hands, and chucked it at the animal as hard as she could. Her mind hadn’t fully registered what she had just done as she blitzed Tyler, seemingly unaware that Tommy was even present, throwing wild, windmill punches at the motherfucker who had the gall to completely ditch her in her time of need. Normally her strikes would have some oomph to them—her pre-football game ritual of trying to give Tyler a dead arm for “good luck” proof of that—but given her state of inebriation, her form was sloppy and flailing, like a toddler getting into a slapfight.
Still, the image was terrifying.
“You unbelievable piece of shit!” screeched Vicky through big, angry sobs. “I’M GOING TO KILL YOU!”
For a brief moment, Tommy was feeling secondhand embarrassment.
”...It’s just her.” He scoffed.
Tyler sighed as the punches landed. Is that what that weakling, dead ex boyfriend, had to deal with any time the devils favorite princess didn’t get her way? It’s not like it was his fault, he didn’t know what his magic even really did. In the end, he learned he can only swap one item with another at a time thanks to Vicky. The desperate girl should be grateful. Tyler’s head craned again. On the other hand, he had just given her the notice that he would get her home, protect her even, and at least make the rest of this horror-filled night at least safe. He knew that he must look like a colossal asshole, especially because he did not come back for her.
He needed to pivot the focus.
Or he needed to own up to his mistake.
He could take the easy road and blame Tommy for this. That would be easy, however, he was establishing a rapport with his eventual pawn and he couldn’t afford to throw them under the bus before an actual bus was coming to run him over. That left two more roads he could go down. Own up to his mistake, or pivot the focus? Tyler thought this over for two seconds, weathering the weak storm of punches, before turning his head back to Vicky with a somber look in his eyes.
“I’m sorry Vicky,” he paused, still at the crossroads, “ever since I used my power to save you,” focus her attention on the good he did should make the relentless assault stop, “which inadvertently killed that nerd,” guilt trip her with the reminder that her life came at the cost of some weird dude, “I haven’t quite figured out the way it works. I wouldn’t have left you there on purpose.
The middle road. The combination of the two less desirable options to put Vicky back on the back foot. Perfection.
Tommy’s canine creature lowered its head and Vicky’s jacket hit the dirt.
”Did anything follow you out here?” Tommy asked. ”Giant werewolf, psychopath with an axe, another insufferable football player?”
Tyler’s play had seemed to work, as Vicky’s furious wet noodle assault came to a standstill. Then again, perhaps it was the realization that there was a whole other person there witnessing her have a total meltdown as Tommy spoke that truly made her stop, feeling a sudden wave of embarrassment. It was a good thing that she was covered in her boyfriend’s, ahem, ex-boyfriend’s blood as it hid the self-conscious flush of red on her cheeks. She picked a dead leaf out of her hair as she tucked a strand behind her ear, shuffling her feet awkwardly, not quite able to make eye contact with Tommy.
“Who would follow me?” said Vicky, still too upset to form a sentence with the words coming out all staccato. “There was this orange light, and then an explosion, only it wasn’t…I don’t know what it was. I saw the town, but it was wrong, stuck inside of this swirl and…the warehouse was collapsing and…”
Vicky’s eyes grew so wide that they almost matched Tommy’s watchdog as she started to draw in sharp, panicked breaths of air.
“I think everyone’s dead!” she shouted, covering her face as she erupted into tears.
”Not all of them, I think. A lot of them, though, yeah…” Tommy wasn’t really in a spot to process that in full. ”Some of them are fighting whatever’s in there. We can’t stay here, something might find us.”
Something like Regina George. Tyler's eyes shifted back to Vicky. Those crocodile tears did not fool him, not one bit. “I told them to run, and they still stayed and died,” Tyler shook his head from side to side, “we do need to get out of here. Get all the way away from this hell.”
A splash of blue peaked out from between frames of red as Vicky’s fingers parted and then closed once again as she shot a dirty look Tyler’s way. Was This Fucking Guy seriously jumping to victim blaming already? From behind her hands she let out a ragged, desperate choke that sounded something like an “uh huh”, the desire to get as far away from this nightmare being the only thing stopping Vicky from repeating “I told them to run” in a mocking voice. Wow, what a brilliant fucking idea that nobody had thought about doing. How many concussions did it take to come up with that one?
Still sniffling, Vicky pulled her head out of her hands and shivered. Where was Chef’s jacket? Wiping a very real tear from her eye (and noting how her contacts were killing her), her hand froze midswipe as her brain fully processed the canine seemingly constructed out of glassy twine. At least she tried to fully process whatever it was that she was looking at. Did it have some kind of weird disease? Was it fake? She had seen a robot dog before, a construct like this one, but its movement had been stuttery and poor, capable only of walking a few steps before doing a flip and falling over.
Her finger dropped from her cheek as she pointed at the…thingy…and let out a flat, monotone, “What.”
The jacket was right there next to it, but there was no way in hell she was approaching that thing as Vicky sniffed and let out yet another, more flabbergasted, “What?”
”I made that. Don’t worry about it right now…” Tommy reached down and grabbed the card the beast had come from. Without thinking, he pointed at it, and it disappeared. To Tommy's senses, it was inside the card, somehow.
Vicky’s jaw dropped.
”We should go. If my car didn’t get blown up yet, you two can just ride with me.”
And just as Tommy nearly finished saying that, Vicky screamed out over him, “WHAT!?”
”Sorry, I’m a little deaf in one ear, you wanna scream a little fucking louder in case that monster didn’t hear you?”
Vicky looked simultaneously appalled that Tommy had the nerve to talk to her like that and terrified that the monster might still be out there, hunting her.
“I’ve been through a lot, okay?” whined Vicky. “You don’t have to be so mean. It’s not my fault that I got dumped and all my friends are dead! Sheesh!” Vicky wrapped her arms around herself with a shiver and turned her back on the boys. “And I’m freezing! Where’s my jacket?”
If they thought she had simply overlooked the coat while freaking out at the disappearing dog, that illusion would soon be dispelled as Vicky held out a hand, making it all too clear that when she had asked, “Where’s my jacket?” what she really meant was, “Why haven’t one of you assholes picked up my jacket for me?”
Tommy buried his face in his hand and muttered something incoherent.
”For the love of fuck, here-” He grabbed the jacket off the ground and tossed at her with his non-bloody hand. ”Come on, car’s that way. You.” He pointed at the golden bird thing he’d made, which had landed in a tree.
It tilted its head at him.
”Don’t attack people. If there’s some fucking monster still around, kill it or something… Follow us.” He stuffed his deck away and started hobbling back through the woods towards the warehouse. The bird took flight.
“You could have just left it on the ground,” Tyler narrowed his eyes as he looked from Vicky to Tommy, “she would have picked it up eventually.” Tyler looked to the direction Tommy was heading, and realized his own truck was nearby. His pawn would lead the way. If there was any danger he would be the first to face it.
Vicky slipped her jacket on with a triumphant hmph, the victory short lived as she struggled to get her arm through the sleeve. With a nervous side eye to the weird bird thing and her left hand still trapped in the elbow of Chef’s oversized jacket she followed behind the two boys, sticking closer to Tyler. Perhaps it was because the mean kid who made animal friends in the woods made her nervous, or maybe it was a tactical decision, choosing the larger of two human shields just in case that monster had heard her scream.
“Dibs on sitting up front,” said Vicky. Sobriety still one terrible hangover away from even being a possibility, the adrenaline that had been pumping through her veins had now cooled enough for her to realize how much her body ached. She grabbed the back of Tyler’s shirt and slumped against him. “Tyler, my feet hurt. How much further is it?”
“For the love of,” Tyler whispered to himself as he leaned his head back and stared up at the stars. Was this his punishment? Would he need to be around that bitch every day, hearing that grating voice every day, and having her ask those asinine questions every day? He shifted his head towards Vicky. “We’re almost there, Vicky, hold it together, please.”
Tommy rolled his eyes. Was she doing that shit on purpose, or was she just coping? ”We go around, not through. Easier to hide in the bushes that way,” He decided. And whatever monster it was killing people could’ve been busy eating bodies, too distracted to-
Okay, that was a little fucked up.
The unlikely trio pressed on through the woods. Tommy led the way, his golden bird of prey circling overhead. Tyler and Vicky followed after him, the latter practically gluing herself to the former lest he try that teleporting away shit on her again. The going was thankfully not especially treacherous but painfully slow, partially due to their roundabout path but mostly thanks to Vicky. Twice she had tried to get Tyler to carry her. More accurately, she had asked him once to carry her, pouted when the answer was (ridiculously, she thought) no, and then a few minutes later had just tried to clamber up his back, assuming that once she was locked in with the piggyback Tyler would be forced to just go with it.
That ended up not being the case, and once it was made clear that either it was Vicky would walk out of the woods on her own two feet or she would get left in them the attempts stopped. It wasn’t too long after that when the trio hit the treeline, the ruined warehouse looming across the field, the silence that hung in the air around it bonechilling and unwelcome. Before the warehouse were cars parked in the grass, less than before the party got crashed, but still far too many remained, either left behind in a panic or serving as temporary tombstones. A few bodies shuffled around outside of the warehouse. Perhaps people. Perhaps not.
“I’m not going back out there. Go get your car, and then come pick us up,” whispered Vicky, although even her whisper wasn’t quiet. It sounded like she was right by Tommy’s ear, yet she was crouched behind Tyler.
Tommy withdrew a switchblade, flicked it open and crossed the distance. A not so hushed “He has a knife! Why does he have a knife?” echoed behind Tommy as he stayed low, and the golden bird stayed high. It circled the warehouse looking for a piece of action, but there didn’t seem to be anything especially dangerous.
He pulled his jacket off and used to wipe the blood from his arm, rolling it up and sticking it in the glovebox. A moment later, his car, much nicer than Tyler’s coal-belching debt machine, pulled around the corner. He motioned for them to hurry their asses up, while he moved the passenger seat for someone to climb in the back.
Vicky gave Tyler an uncertain look. She really didn’t know Tommy outside of seeing his face around school, but he was the kind of guy who brought a knife to a party. Like who the hell brought a knife to a party? Even for as drunk as she was she still had enough kinda functioning brain cells to be nervous about showing the knife guy where she lived.
The sound of sirens closing in on the warehouse sent a wave of relief through her that crashed violently against a cape of fear. As weirded out as she was by Tommy being a fricking knife guy (seriously, what the hell, why did he have to be a knife guy?), the thought of getting busted for underage drinking AGAIN was a lot scarier. Last time Officer “Don’t call me Officer Bobby, it’s Officer Ferguson” Bobby said that if he caught Vicky drinking one more time he wouldn’t let her off with a warning, even if she was Winston’s kid sister. She rushed over to Tommy’s car and popped open the passenger door.
However, instead of getting in, as she had not been joking about needing to ride shotgun, she turned and bellowed as emergency vehicles started to arrive at the warehouse, “TYLER! IT’S THE FUCKING COPS! GET IN!”
”Hurry!”
The golden bird disappeared mid-air as Tommy did the thing to make them vanish. He didn’t know how that worked. Not yet.
Tyler looked at Vicky, then to Tommy, and then to the approaching vehicles. His head turned towards Vicky, a wicked grin spreading across his face. He grabbed a rather large rock and chucked it in the opposite direction of the lights and sirens. He tossed up a peace sign towards Vicky and, when the stone slowed down after bouncing across the grass, swapped positions with it and disappeared into the night.
A second after he was out of view a squad car pulled up and shined their spotlight onto the car. A dumbfounded, horrified look was frozen on Vicky’s face, her mouth agape, unable to believe what she had just witnessed. Her bottom lip began quivering as the door of the cruiser opened up and outstepped a man in uniform. Stupidly she raised her hands up in a surrender, an admission to guilt before a question had even been asked. Half blinded by fear and with the other half seeing double, tears began running down Vicky’s bloody face as she started to panic. This was unfair. This was so unfair. She didn’t even want to be here. She hated parties.
“Off–Office–Officer Bobby,” whimpered Vicky.
She was dead, she was so dead, and the next time she saw Tyler he was dead too. Deader than dead. Dead like her relationship. Dead like her future. Her crying became broken, heaving sobs as she tried not to hyperventilate. In one last ditch effort to get out of trouble, one of her hands dropped so it could point a finger at Tommy.
“He–He–He has a kniiiiiife!!!”
Screeeeeeech.
Decades of dust, dirt, and flakes of glass from previous parties flew up into the air. The cop got his fancy uniform and face caked in so much dreck that Tommy severely doubted he’d even see Vicky standing there, let alone the color of his car or the plate on the back.
It had been a few days since the warehouse party turned nightmare, when Tuyen had managed to stumble home. She hadn’t left the house since.
The small, two storey house looked uninhabited. Perfectly clean and empty rooms were visible through the ground floor windows. The only sign of life came from a small window at the corner of the house on the top floor, with the occasional movement from behind the drawn curtains.
With her aunt and uncle still out of town with Min, Tuyen was the only one in the house. Even with the whole place to herself, she’d practically locked herself in her room. The rest of the house didn’t feel safe. Even her room didn’t feel safe. It never really had- it wasn’t home like the tiny apartment she’d stayed in with her dad was, but at least it was somewhere she could be alone. Before. Now there was always another voice whispering in her ear. She didn’t know what it was- if it even was something. It was probably just her losing her mind.
She’d barely slept, dark circles underneath her eyes stark against her pallid skin. At least there was no one to see the state she was in, except the shadow slinking around her that only she could see. It was silent for once, as she sat on her floor with her back against the bed. Maybe it thought she was doing a good enough job at torturing herself. A dark, loose skirt covered her legs pulled up to her chest and all the evidence of how much she’d spiralled these past few days.
She held Vicky’s phone in her hands, resting against her knees. She kept thinking she should give it back to her family… But she couldn’t bring herself to leave the house. Selfishly, she didn’t want to lose the last thing she had of her best friend either. The first day, she’d hoped it was some kind of horrendous hallucination. That would be better than Vicky being dead. But when she hadn’t turned up asking for her phone or demanding an explanation, Tuyen realised it hadn’t been. Vicky was really dead… And it was her fault.
Once, not so long after Tuyen’s father had passed, a promise had been made. It happened during the quiet hours of a sleepover in Vicky’s living room, one of the final ones they would ever have together before Vicky would become obsessed with her image and would never ever engage in something so lame and childish. A concerning amount of empty soda cans had lined the coffee table, nothing was left in the giant bowl for popcorn besides kernels and salt, and the only light was the dim glow from the TV as scenes from an R-Rated movie they were definitely way too young to watch looped on a DVD menu.
It was in this room, in that fugue state between nodding off only to momentarily jerk awake when their heads dipped too quickly, that Vicky, calling back to a conversation earlier in the night, groggily called out to Tuyen. Back then Tuyen’s friend was capable of sincerity, a trait that Vicky would shove down deep inside of her once she became popular, assuming she hadn’t killed it completely. So, without feeling the slightest bit awkward about it and wanting to find a way to make her friend who had lost not one but both parents feel some kind of comfort, Vicky promised she’d always be there for Tuyen no matter what.
Even if she died.
“I’ll just haunt you,” explained Vicky, as if it was something she could just do.
At the time it had seemed like she was just trying to be funny, breaking the tension of the heavy subject with a joke, but now it was more like a threat. A metaphorical haunting, perhaps, the dead phone of a dead friend serving as a constant reminder of one’s own abundant inadequacies, but if Tuyen had taken that moment to draw back the curtain and peep out the window she would’ve just seen a spirit in a bubblegum pink tracksuit fly up her driveway on a bicycle and skid to a stop.
The very-much-still-breathing Vicky groaned ever so slightly to herself as she glared at Tuyen’s front door, put down the kickstand, and adjusted the empty bat holder. She absolutely *hated* coming to Tuyen’s house even if it gave her a chance of running into Min. It was just so tiny and drab and there was nothing to do there. They didn’t even have a pool! How people could choose to live like this was truly bewildering to Vicky.
However, the worst part about Tuyen’s place was her aunt. When Vicky was younger she was kind of scared of her, Tuyen’s own anxiety whenever the woman was around spreading to Vicky. Now, Vicky just thought Tuyen’s aunt was a bitch, and Vicky was well versed with handling bitches. Despite this, Vicky’s hand still seized as she went to knock on the door, remembering the first time she’d come to Tuyen’s house, so excited to finally be allowed over, only to be yelled at by her aunt for knocking too loud. Her knuckles lightly rapped against the door.
The sound would be barely audible in Tuyen’s room. However, a few heartbeats later, as patience grew thin on the doorstep, there was a louder knock, followed by a banging. The banging subsided and in its place came a call from beyond, “Tuyen? Tuyen!”
Outside, Vicky made a flustered noise as she stepped back. Her hand patted at her pocket, briefly forgetting that her phone had completely disappeared in the chaos of everything that she did not want to think about right now. Fuck. She was probably missing out on like a thousand of text messages at this point. It was so stupid that her parents wouldn’t just buy her a new one. Ugh! She threw her head back with a sigh, rolling her eyes, her gaze stopping at the window of Tuyen’s room.
Ten seconds and Vicky was throwing a rock. Five. Four. Threetwoon—
Before Vicky got a chance to find the perfect rock for throwing at a window, the door opened. Tuyen just stood there, hands half covered by her sweater gripping tightly onto the handle. Her face was slightly damp, and she'd pulled her hair back into a low ponytail in an attempt to hide how greasy it was. The first knock had been barely audible, quickly written off as her imagination. The banging wasn't something she could ignore- even if it turned out to be a hallucination.
She'd expected it to all be another trick her mind was playing on her when she heard Vicky's voice. It still could be. It was a cruel trick. Maybe her guilt was manifesting. Maybe Vicky had come back to haunt her for leaving her to die.
”V- Vicky?” She stammered out, her voice slightly hoarse. In an unexpected move from someone who never took the initiative, and was constantly scared of rejection, she stepped forward to hug her friend. She'd learned the one thing her hallucinations couldn't imitate was touch. She felt real. Unless it was someone else with Vicky's face… No, that wouldn't make sense, anyone else would push her away immediately. Vicky was alive. Then what had she seen? Was that all a hallucination too? Or was none of this real?
The hug was short lived, Tuyen quickly stepping back when she confirmed her friend wasn't a ghost but a real, living and breathing person. She managed a small, nervous smile, really hoping her glasses did a good enough job at hiding the massive bags under her eyes. She should've quickly put on some makeup rather than just splashing water on her face on the way down. She didn't want anyone to see her like this, but especially not Vicky. Even if she was alive, Tuyen had still abandoned her. The grief she'd just begun to feel morphed into more guilt and a different kind of anxiety.
Vicky must be mad at her. She hadn't visited for days… Not even when Tuyen had her phone. She should just apologise first. But Vicky had told her it was annoying when she always apologised, so maybe that would make her even angrier. Saying she'd thought Vicky was dead would just sound like an awful excuse. It was best to act like normal, and wait for Vicky to tell her what she'd done wrong. ”I’m glad you're alright- I didn't know what to do after the… Party. Do you, uh, wanna come in? My family's still away, so it's just me. We can even sit in the living room… Did you come for your phone?”
If Vicky was mad her face didn’t show it, although the smile she had offered Tuyen faded quicker than usual as the party was mentioned. Her memory of it was scattered and broken, swathes of the evening blacked out from either alcohol or pure terror. What she could recall were things that Vicky wished she couldn’t. It had taken a few days to warp those horrific images, turning them into the fuel she needed to pull herself out of a cocoon of bedsheets to do something other than talk to the cops, rebranding the trauma as motivation.
So when Tuyen said “Party” and Vicky heard Chef’s dying scream as he was bisected in her head she was hardly bothered by it at all. If anything, it just reminded her of how much it sucked that she had to throw out her party outfit because of all of the blood. Vicky was doing fine. She was doing great. She was doing better than Tuyen was doing, that was a fucking fact. Vicky had whiffed a bit of funk during that short hug. It smelled like victory. Normally Vicky was the one in need of consultation. It was a nice change of pace.
For a second Vicky thought that she really should check and see if Tuyen was okay. Perhaps even two seconds.
“You have my phone? Thank God!” said Vicky. She was completely nonchalant as she breezed past Tuyen, happily ignoring the “no shoes in the house” policy now that Tuyen’s aunt was gone as she made a beeline for the couch. She dropped down across it with a violent thump, kicking her sneakers up on the armrest, knocking down a couple of throw pillows that she didn’t bother to pick up, taking the entire couch to herself. Her right hand was draped out oddly off the couch, slightly raised, as if she was resting it on something that wasn’t there.
“I must’ve missed like a million texts. Everyone is probably worried sick about me! Fucking Diane. Still can’t believe that after all I went through she grounded me anyway. So glad to be out of that house,” said Vicky.
That was a lie, and Tuyen would know it was a lie. Even if Vicky’s mother Diane did ground her daughter, which she wouldn’t, there was no way in hell that Vicky would abide by the grounding. It was just a better excuse than, “Sorry I would’ve come over sooner but I was too busy staring blankly at the wall next to my bed.”
“Tuyen!” barked Vicky, jumping back up to her feet despite having just sat down. She pointed at Tuyen with the same kind of enthusiasm she would have if she was thrusting out a pom pom. “What are you doing today?”
Her phone, Tuyen’s shitty, sad appearance, and the opportunity to finally chill in a part of Tuyen’s house that wasn’t her bedroom had briefly distracted Vicky from the reason for the visit. If there were any hard feelings about the party, Vicky was blowing right past it and resuming the friendship as if one of them didn’t completely abandon the other to die in a warehouse. Water under the bridge, that, or more likely it was just ammunition saved for later, waiting to be loaded and fired when Vicky really wanted to pressure Tuyen into doing something for her.
Without allowing the girl an opportunity to answer, because the answer was always going to be whatever Vicky wanted her to do anyway, Vicky said, “You’re going to shit your fucking pants!”
The hand that pointed at Tuyen wiggled back and forth. Apparently it wasn’t an order so much as it was a prediction. Whatever Vicky believed would make Tuyen incontinent was held within her very hand. Only, Vicky’s hand wasn’t fully closed, but cupped in a loose grip, and the wiggling made it quite clear that what she was holding was nothing.
“What do you see?” asked Vicky, barely able to contain the grin.
Was this another trick? Was Vicky playing a trick on Tuyen?
Unlike Vicky, she didn't have the chance to sit down and jump back up, too overwhelmed by the whirlwind that was her friend. Brief relief that she wasn't immediately pushed away turned into anxiety over the dirt from Vicky's shoes transferring onto the couch armrest. Hopefully it would be easy to clean off… She didn't want to think about how angry her aunt would be if it wasn't. Min wouldn't even be there to diffuse the situation anymore either. Then there were other anxieties: why was Vicky lying about being grounded? Because she was upset with Tuyen but didn't want to say anything? Did she look so bad Vicky was worried about upsetting her, when normally she'd be brutally honest? At least, in the last few years she was… Maybe the party had changed things a bit.
Or not, based on how Tuyen couldn't get a word in otherwise. Any offer to run upstairs and actually get Vicky's phone was blown away with the wind, as were any other words Tuyen might have wanted to say. Thankfully, she didn't have anything to do today… Not that she really wanted to be around anyone right now. But she couldn't say that to Vicky, especially when she seemed to be in a good mood, all things considered.
Not that she could ever say that to Vicky.
”Nothing.” Tuyen answered eventually, squinting at Vicky's outstretched hand. Her eyes dropped as if looking at the floor out of confusion, when really she was looking at her shadow.
It was normal. A perfectly normal fuzzy shadow cast by the living room windows. No sinister smiles- no smile at all. She'd been beginning to suspect it was behind all the things she was seeing and hearing, because her shadow hadn't moved before. It was the only constant in the last few days. But now it was gone.
So was she really going mad? What if there really was something in Vicky's hand, and it wasn't a trick, and she'd just outed herself as being crazy? Tuyen bit her lip, taking off her glasses to rub her eyes before putting them back on and squinting again. Still nothing. Certainly not something that would make her shit her pants- a hard task after everything that she'd seen during and since the party.
”Should I be able to see something? Maybe I need new glasses.” She laughed it off with a small smile. Maybe Vicky was having hallucinations too, and it was caused by mass psychosis post seeing their classmates die. That would be nice. The moment she had that though her smile wavered, guilt tightening her chest. She shouldn't think something like that, she should be grateful to even be alive. Just concentrate on Vicky right now. Like nothing had happened she smiled again, dark eyes raptly watching Vicky in the way she always did when she happily listened to anything her friend said. Not that Vicky ever needed that encouraging look. ”What is it meant to be?”
Vicky just shook her head, the smile on her face growing smug as she took an excited step towards Tuyen. Something lightly prodded Tuyen’s chest even though there was still a gap between the two girls. Vicky took her left index finger, placed it at her right wrist, and then drew her right hand back like she was pulling a ripcord as the phantom pressure on Tuyen’s chest disappeared. Suddenly there was a bat where there was once seemingly nothing, reappearing the second that Vicky’s finger had slid all the way down from the grip to the tip, reversing the Strikeout spell she had cast on it.
“Sooooo, magic’s real,” said Vicky, triumphantly slinging the bat over her shoulder.
”Oh.” Tuyen’s initial verbal reaction was lacklustre, unlike her reactive flinch away from an invisible force. But her eyes did widen as she stared at the now visible bat, then at Vicky.
Magic was real. It shouldn’t surprise her, but some part of her was still in denial about what happened at the party. She’d believed Vicky was really dead, but it was hard to accept it had been by some invisible force- that there’d been a monster there. When Vicky turned up alive, it was more likely that it was all a hallucination.
But it turned out only Vicky dying had been. She didn’t understand why, and she couldn’t think about it, because she was standing there stupidly staring at her friend without any further reaction. Hopefully Vicky would just think she’d been shocked stupid.
“Oh?” repeated Vicky, having hoped for a bit more.
”What? You can use magic?” Tuyen finally gasped, actually surprised. Just because monsters were real didn’t mean normal people could suddenly use magic. She couldn’t. Though that wasn’t much of a surprise. Why would someone like her get magic? It made sense that someone like Vicky would, but not her. She was so weak that she’d ended up seeing things for days after just seeing a monster. ”How- How did you do it?”
That was better.
“Oh, it’s easy. It just comes naturally,” said Vicky, cycling between the bat being visible and invisible. Each time it disappeared a spark of light gleamed from her finger nail as she traced it along the bat.
Truth be told, she couldn’t even begin explaining how it was possible, or how she could do it, or what she was even really doing. The spell was simply replication, stolen from a foggy vision during her Kindling that had survived being purged from her memory. Still, why pretend like she was anything other than a super cool, ultra powerful witch?
“And that’s not all!” Vicky turned her head slightly and poked at her cheek, giving Tuyen a clear target. “Hit me.”
Tuyen's awe towards Vicky quickly turned back to anxiety when she was faced with a lose-lose situation. Was this how Vicky wanted to get her anger out? Was she planning to get upset when Tuyen punched her, or if she didn't do what she asked?
She didn't want to, but it was easier to do what Vicky said. She'd make sure it was a weak punch- not that she could deliver a strong one anyway.
”O-Okay.” Tuyen clenched her fist, and aimed a pathetic punch at Vicky's cheek.
Vicky waved a hand behind her back as Tuyen’s fist, well, it didn’t quite soar through the air so much as it reluctantly trudged through it. There was a static pop and a flash of dim light moments before knuckles touched cheek. If Tuyen had thrown a real haymaker she might’ve ended up with a sore wrist. Instead, all she would feel was a kinetic slap across the knuckles as Vicky dramatically oversold the absorbed punch. She spun and twisted her head down as she doubled over, grabbing at her cheek, her hair and hand covering up the magical weave as it snapped and vanished.
“Owwww! Ohmygawd, Tuyen! Whatthefuck!?” shouted Vicky, a champion in overreacting to a slight injury. “I didn’t think you’d actually do it! Ohmygawd, you might’ve broken my face!”
Vicky stood up straight and flicked her hair back, revealing that it had all been just a bit to give Tuyen a bit of panic and that her face was still absolutely perfect. She let out a sharp, meanspirited laugh, the kind that left no question when it came to determining if Vicky was laughing with or laughing at.
“I’m fine, I’m fine. Didn’t feel a thing,” said Vicky, still cracking up at herself. “I think even if I didn’t use magic I wouldn’t have felt anything, either. If that’s the hardest you can hit we need to get you to a gym. Should we try it with something else?A knife?” Vicky let out a loud gasp. “No, wait! Does your uncle have a gun?”
Tuyen wrung her hands in front of her, panicked apologies dying on her lips. There was still panic in her eyes, lingering as Vicky’s fake pain overlapped with horrific images. A disembodied head, blood dripping from torn flesh at the neck, glazed over eyes staring at her. Blond hair turned crimson. A half open mouth filled with blaming words. Sinister, mocking laughter rang in her ears.
She snapped out of it, covering the moment of real fear up with an awkward, self deprecating smile. ”No he doesn’t.” Something she was very thankful for now. ”I don’t want to try with something else… What if it really hurts you? I know you’ve got magic and it’s really strong, but I just don’t think I can try and hurt you.”
When disagreeing with Vicky, it was best to compliment her too, in the hope it would dampen any strong reaction. Throwing in a compromise wouldn’t hurt either. ”Maybe I can throw something at you?”
“I’ve seen you throw before. No thanks,” said Vicky, falling back onto the couch with a pout. “Forget it. I guess we’ll just have to wait until Jared’s crazy ass breaks out of prison to find out if I’m bulletproof or not.”
It was clear that Vicky was a bit disappointed, although it really wasn’t because of Tuyen’s compromise. While she was absolutely thrilled to have magic, she didn’t consider it to be really strong despite what Tuyen had said. Her only other spell was creating some lame quiet space, it wasn’t showy or cool at all. There was no point in even showing it to Tuyen. Tyler could make himself teleport, and Tommy could summon a bird to shit all over somebody’s car or peck out their eyes. She couldn’t even make herself go invisible, only small stuff. So, what, she could easily shoplift some lipstick like some lameass criminal? It fucking sucked how everyone got cooler magic than she did.
Maybe she could convince Tuyen to go raid the 7-Eleven with her. But even then they could only snag one six pack of beer.
“So what about you? You get some magic too?” asked Vicky, adding under her breath, “Seems like everyone else did.”
After some hesitation, Tuyen sat down on the edge of the armchair that was expressly her aunt’s, with no one else ever allowed to sit on it. But it was closest to where Vicky’s head was, and her aunt wasn’t here. She gripped onto her knees, fingers subtly clenching into her skirt.
Magic was yet another thing for her to feel insecure about. Someone like her didn’t deserve it, and she’d never been lucky either. It wasn’t a surprise everyone else had it and she didn’t. Even if she did have it, she probably wouldn’t be able to use it well. She really was useless. At least if she had a little bit, she could have helped people at the party.
”No, I didn’t,” she said quietly, looking at her feet. Not unless a possibly sentient shadow counted. But it was just as likely she was going mad, and the one consistent factor between all her hallucinations was really just a part of them. ”I can’t do anything. I’ve seen some strange things, but I don’t feel any different.”
Though the hallucinations counted as strange things, that wasn’t what she meant. There’d been the monster at the party, and other less scary things she’d seen peering out her window at night. She didn’t understand why that was happening… And maybe it was all from her imagination. But she had a gut feeling some of that was real.
”Who else got magic? Did you all form some kind of magical link because of it?”
“No, I don’t think we did?” replied Vicky, quickly hiding the sly smile that had emerged on her face upon learning that Tuyen didn’t have magic. “I hope not, anyway! Tyler has it, too. Ick, imagine having to be linked to him forever. So does that one weird kid, the one obsessed about his lame old car?” Vicky pretended not to be able to remember Tommy’s name. “Double ick.”
Did anyone else…Vicky sat up, suddenly recalling a part of the night she had forgotten, a look of horror on her face.
“Oh man, I think Ella has magic too! Ick, ick, ick! I do not want to be linked to her,” said Vicky, her voice suddenly shifting into a surprisingly decent Ella impersonation, complete with gratuitous, needless posing and peace signs. “Ohhoho, Vicky-sama, it is such an honor to be a magical girl alongside you, senpai.”
Seriously, why did all the assholes and losers get magic? Wait, did that mean that Vicky was—no, nope, nah, absolutely not. Just a coincidence. Still, she didn’t like the company she was in, not one bit.
“Ugh! They’re all so intolerable. It sucks that you didn’t get magic. I don’t want to be stuck with them,” said Vicky.
She flopped back down, rolled onto her stomach, and buried her face into her arms with a loud groan, kicking her feet against the arm of the couch before she completely deflated. Vicky said something muffled into the couch cushion, followed by a pause, followed by a muted “wait” before she pushed herself back up and let out a loud gasp.
“What if I could teach you? I learned by seeing it, sorta, so maybe that’d work for you?”
Although finding out so many other people had magic was a blow to Tuyen's already fragile self confidence, it was at least softened by the Ella impersonation. Her laugh was actually genuine, her eyes creasing behind her glasses and tense frame relaxing just slightly. Tuyen liked Ella, but she knew the overly energetic girl wouldn't notice her if she wasn't Vicky's friend and thus the occasional sub for the soft ball team, so she didn't feel much guilt about finding it funny. And the impression really was accurate. A smile remained even when Vicky went back to complaining. It wasn't unusual for Tuyen to smile- pretend she was alright was second nature, and it was an important part of that. It was even genuine most of the time. The current smile was more like her normal ones in that regard, rather than the awkward or nervous ones she'd been trying to force out.
She felt a bit more normal again, even if her normal wasn't exactly happy. She may not have magic, but at least she had Vicky. For days she'd thought she had no one left. Not having magic was expected, and just another thing to feel inferior over, but she was already so much worse than everyone-
”You really think I could learn?” She leaned forward, looking at Vicky with wide, excited eyes. Having hope led to disappointment, but she could never stop herself from hoping. At least this time, it doesn't matter if it doesn't work, because it's time spent together… Right?
”I’d like to try. Even if it doesn't work, it doesn't necessarily mean you're stuck with them, unless you have to form some kind of magic team… Even then, I'll help somehow.” For a moment, the image of a shadowy creature cutting a path through teenagers flashed through her mind. But that hadn't been her. It couldn't have been. She forced away the image, concentrating on Vicky, staring at her with excited expectation tinged with admiration. ”I wouldn't leave you alone with them… But let's try it. Please teach me.”
“It will work,” said Vicky, having absolutely no idea of how to even go about such a thing but still able to convince herself that she could.
Vicky hopped up to her feet, rolled her shoulders to loosen up, and directed Tuyen to stand up with her. Now, where to actually start? She was pretty sure if she threw a punch at Tuyen while trying to teach her how to cast a Shutout spell it would just immediately end their training session, so instead she’d teach her how to make something invisible. Then later they could shoplift two six packs of beer. Vicky grabbed one of the throw pillows she had knocked off of the couch and set it on the coffee table.
“Okay, this is an easy one. Requires less precise timing. All you have to do is take your finger, run it across the length of the pillow, and think…” About how nobody else deserved to have it, “...of it like you’re striking it out like a word from a page. Like this.”
Vicky swiped her finger across the pillow and it was gone, her softball bat reappearing in her hand. A swipe in the other direction and it was back again. She stepped back and leaned on her bat as she crossed her leg in front of the other, gesturing for Tuyen to step up to the challenge.
“Go on. Give it a shot,” said Vicky. She snapped her fingers. “Oh, and like, really focus.”
Vicky made it sound incredibly easy, though Tuyen knew things were rarely that easy for her. Maybe this time it really would be so simple. Even if it took a few tries, she’d still be able to use magic. If it could even be taught.
”Alright, I understand. I’ll try my best.” Tuyen slid forward, kneeling in front of the pillow. Her shadow followed her, its growing strangeness out of her sight and invisible to anyone else. She’d watched Vicky raptly, easily taking in each small movement. She was experienced in that, after all. Though she couldn’t read Vicky’s mind and know if she was thinking something specific when using magic… She could only hope Vicky would’ve told her.
Tuyen took a deep breath, and swiped a finger across the pillow with much less confidence than Vicky had. As her finger lifted up, the pillow disappeared right before her eyes. She let out the breath she’d been unknowingly holding in and her eyes widened.
”Did I do it?” she gasped, hardly believing it, but desperately wanting to at the same time.
Vicky covered her mouth as she snorted at Tuyen’s genuine excitement for failing so hard.
“Oh, wow! Yeah! You did it!” teased Vicky before bursting into laughter. It took her a moment to recompose herself. “Oh my god, that was fucking adorable. I mean, the motion was spot on but I never doubted that you could move your finger. Okay now, like, do it again, a little faster maybe, only this time actually make it go invisible, okay? You got this. I believe in you.”
Vicky squatted down across the table from Tuyen and gave her an intense stare that was one part motivational and two parts intimidation: don’t fuck up this time. “And remember: focus.”
Tuyen’s momentary joy was quickly shattered by Vicky’s laughter. Her stomach sank. Horror filled her gaze that she forced to stay on the pillow she couldn’t see, rather than looking towards her friend- or something else. It wasn’t the teasing that upset her, or the laughter. Vicky had even said it was adorable, which made the sting of failing a little less sore.
It was that she couldn’t see the pillow at all. It had disappeared, but only for her. She thought the hallucinations had stopped, at least when was with Vicky- that being with someone made it better.
”Right, it was just a joke… I almost got you, right?” Tuyen laughed, uncomfortable under twin intense stares, one much more sinister than the other. She still stared intently at where the pillow should be, pretending it was to focus instead of to prevent Vicky seeing the emotions she couldn’t hide from her eyes. ”Sorry, I’ll focus.”
She didn’t know where the edge of the pillow was so she could only go by her memory. Thankfully her finger landed on its softness rather than continuing down to the hard table, though to Vicky it would be obvious she was closer to the centre than one end of it. She narrowed her eyes and forced a confident, slightly fast swipe. The pillow stayed hidden and she didn’t immediately react this time, waiting for Vicky first. Though she had a sinking feeling it hadn’t worked, and never would.
“You’re not focusing!” Vicky let out a frustrated groan as she slapped her forehead. Not only was the pillow visible, she didn’t even do the motion right. How many times did she have to say focus to get Tuyen to stop goofing around and fucking focus? Her voice became an annoyed growl. “Do you want magic or not? Then. FOCUS!”
Wait, focus? Vicky smacked her forehead again.
“Oh my god, Tuyen. I’m so sorry. I forgot the most important part. It’s way easier if you have a focus to channel your magic through. You know, like a magic wand or a wizard’s staff…or a bat, apparently,” said Vicky, wiggling her Channeler. “Just grab anything sticklike and that should do it. Oh, and get my phone, too!”
Tuyen subtly flinched as Vicky got more frustrated at her. She was fighting a losing battle, trying to focus on something that she couldn’t see. But that was just an excuse for how lazy she was. She wasn’t even trying because she already knew she’d fail. She was useless. She couldn’t even use a little bit of magic.
”Oh, it’s alright… I’ll be back in a moment.” Tuyen smiled, glad for the excuse to be alone for a moment while also feeling guilty for feeling that way. She quickly disappeared out of the room, practically silent when she was out of sight, even when going up the stairs.
Vicky’s phone was where she’d left it on her bed. Finding something sticklike took a bit more work… But it wasn’t so much of a problem as the pull her bedroom had on her. Once she entered, Tuyen didn’t want to leave again. It didn’t feel as safe as it once had, but it was still safer than anywhere else. At least here there was no one to witness her breakdown.
She thought she’d be able to handle spending time with Vicky. She thought it might stop the hallucinations. But it didn’t. It was too much for her. Everything was.
She was snapped out of it by a sudden fear, grabbing a pencil and rushing back out. If she took too long Vicky wouldn’t just wait, she’d shout for Tuyen and maybe even come upstairs to find her. Tuyen couldn’t have her coming into her room right now. It made it obvious how the last few days had gone for her, and there were things in there she really didn’t want her friend to see.
”Will this do?” She asked, reappearing after what had felt like an age but had really not been much more than five minutes. She held up a pencil in one hand, holding out Vicky’s phone with the other.
“Yes!” cried an absolutely elated Vicky.
Given how quickly she snatched the phone out of Tuyen’s hand it might not have been in response to the question. Then Vicky made it quite clear that it wasn’t as she hugged the phone to her chest, let out a delighted little squeal to finally, finally, finally be able to check in with all of the other popular girls (no way would she show up to their house like she had with Tuyen, that was way too uncool) and let them know that their queen had survived. She beamed, absolutely radiant, ready to bath her face in that wonderful blue light. Her trembling finger hit the button on the side, her head falling down in a slump the second she saw the black screen with a picture of an empty battery on it.
“What the fuck, you didn’t charge it?” bitched Vicky, a flash of heat rising in her voice that quickly dispersed. She waved away the complaint before Tuyen had a chance to apologize (and God would she apologize, sheesh). “Don’t worry about it. Seriously, thank you so much for saving this. Oh Tuyen, you’re just the best.”
“Keep practicing. I’m sure you’ll get it,” said Vicky, starting to walk out of the room towards the stairs. “Be right back. I’m just gonna steal your charger.”
”Wait!” Tuyen called out with more assertiveness than she could normally muster, quickly following behind Vicky to stop her. Quick, she had to come up with an excuse. ”My room's a mess right now… I was in the middle of tidying it. You won't be able to find my charger, it's probably hidden under something, I'll get it.”
Her explanation was hurried but at least it was partly truthful. It was just more than the mess. It was evidence of how much she was struggling. She couldn't have Vicky seeing that, she really couldn't. She tried to move past Vicky, looking down at the floor as the brief bout of assertiveness quickly gave way to guilt over lying.
Vicky slid to the right and then to the left to block Tuyen from getting past her. A mess? Yeah, right. She knew an excuse when she heard one. Sometimes Tuyen just needed a little push, especially when it came to anything moderately difficult. First she'd offer to grab the charger, then she'd suggest they get a snack, and so on and so forth before Vicky had been completely distracted and forgotten about the whole thing.
”Ohhhh no you don't. Get back in there and keep practicing. I want the pillow to be gone when I get back,” said Vicky, putting a foot on the first step.
”God, you're so lazy. No wonder you don't have magic.” A poor imitation of Vicky whispered in Tuyen's ear.
”I’m not trying to get out of practicing! It's really not an excuse!” Tuyen actually snapped, reaching out to grab Vicky's wrist. It was a fairly pathetic snap, with barely any bite to it, but it was completely out of the ordinary for her. Immediately her eyes widened and the hand holding onto Vicky trembled slightly, but didn't let go. Oh God, what had she done? ”I- I'm sorry, but I'm really not lying, it's really messy- C-cause nobody else is home, I've been lazier with it, I'm really sorry, Vicky, I didn't mean that… Just please let me get the charger for you.”
Vicky was briefly stunned by Tuyen’s sudden bark, absolutely gobsmacked by her friend’s unbending insistence. An apology started to approach Vicky’s lips before it retreated back down into the pit of her stomach as she wrenched her wrist free from Tuyen’s grasp and rubbed it. Vicky glared down her nose at Tuyen, feelings of confusion and suspicion drowned out by a lowpitch whine that became a feral scream in her head as her temper flared. What the actual fuck was Tuyen’s problem? The more Tuyen made it clear that she didn’t want Vicky in her room, the more Vicky wanted to push her away and storm up the stairs to see what she was hiding.
“Oooooooooooookay,” said Vicky, stretching the word to buy time to abate the fury inside of her.
Vicky knew Tuyen. The mess was probably nothing more than some clothes on the ground and an untucked bed. She had wanted a charger and she was getting a charger. Who got it didn’t matter. Vicky took her foot off of the step and moved to the side to let Tuyen through with a sneer.
“You’re not acting weird at all. If you don’t want me in your room, just say so. I don’t care.” Vicky walked back into the living room, calling out behind her, “It’s not like I don’t know what’s going on. It’s pretty obvious what you get up to when nobody’s home, sinner.”
Tuyen froze, a panicked gaze following Vicky’s back. She was right. Tuyen was a sinner. But how did Vicky know that? She couldn’t know about the self harm. Tuyen hid it too well, even her cousin didn’t know, and they’d lived together. It couldn’t be that… Then had she found out about Tuyen’s disgusting feelings? She thought the Tuyen- think of that- No, then their friendship would be over. But what else could it mean? Did she really know Tuyen hurt herself, and didn’t care?
Filled with panic, Tuyen forced herself to run upstairs, finding her charger as fast as she could to avoid upsetting Vicky further.
When Tuyen came back downstairs, Vicky was pacing in the living room. She snatched the charger out of Tuyen’s hand without a thanks or even a simple acknowledgment of her existence. Vicky found the closest wall outlet, hooked everything up, and sat down on the floor. It was quite clear that she was still annoyed by Tuyen for standing up to her, even if it was over something so minor, as Vicky’s attention remained solely focused on the black screen of her phone as she waited for the big, fat zero hovering over the battery symbol to become a one.
The room felt oppressive as Vicky finally spoke without looking up, breaking the uncomfortable silence but not the tension, “Why do I still see a pillow?”
”I- I’m sorry,” Tuyen stammered out, having not even gone back to the pillow. In fact, she’d barely moved since Vicky took the charger. Her nervous gaze flickered from the floor to Vicky, then back again. Her expression was bad, but how she felt was much worse. Years of practice let her hide it under a mask of normal anxiousness, so it wasn’t visible just how terrified and miserable she felt. It had been a lose-lose scenario, but why did she snap at Vicky? Why did she make everything so much worse?
She didn’t know how to fix things. Normally she’d get something for Vicky to break the silent treatment, before doing whatever she was asked to. But she couldn’t drag herself out of the house to Starbucks to get her whatever sugar-free coffee was her current favourite this time. Just the thought of leaving the house had her heart pounding in her chest and her breathing growing even quicker. Her shadow slunk around her, the corners of her vision seeming to grow darker, like she was getting trapped in. She wanted to leave, to hide in her room to escape this situation. But she couldn’t. She had to try and salvage the only friendship she had. Even though it was probably already over.
”I’ll try harder.” Tuyen made her way back to the pillow, thankfully visible to her again. At least she’d be useful again if she managed to make it disappear. Grasping her pencil, she tried again.
And again and again, for five minutes, ten minutes, without a single change. Tuyen practically disassociated, arm going through the motions as her mind disconnected from it. She didn’t feel frustrated at the lack of progress, only hopeless. It was like her chance of fixing things was slipping away with each failed swipe. She could only give up. She couldn’t use magic, no matter how hard she tried. She just wasn’t good enough.
She took a deep breath, managing to push back down the despair she was feeling and that had slipped into her expression. Then she turned towards Vicky with an apologetic smile, nervously wringing her hands together. ”I really don’t think I can do it. Maybe only certain people can use magic, and it can’t be learned… Maybe I wasn’t chosen, and you were.”
Vicky had her head down, thumb swiping as she stared down at her phone. She hadn’t looked up since she had been able to turn it on, seemingly unaware that Tuyen had been still attempting magic. Normally, in the absence of a present, some praise (yes, yes, but of course she’d be chosen) might be enough to warm up Vicky’s cold shoulder. Yet her irritation had shifted, becoming darker and more glum. All she could offer up as she continued staring into the screen was a halfhearted, “Yeah, maybe…”
It just didn’t make sense. Something must’ve been wrong with her phone. Perhaps it was glitchy. Perhaps it had needed an update. Maybe it just had to be connected to the WiFi. Yet Vicky had troubleshooted everything while Tuyen was failing to disappear a pillow and her phone should’ve been functioning normally. So why then did she have so few new text messages? She had seen some of her friends’ cars were missing while getting questioned by the cops, so they weren’t all dead. And it wasn’t like she had stopped getting texts after her phone had died, because one had been delivered to her the moment she had turned it on.
It had been from an unknown number, a long, a heartfelt message from someone named Rebecca expressing her deepest sympathies for what Vicky must’ve been going through with the loss of her boyfriend, confessing that they too had recently lost a loved one, and offering to take her out for a coffee if she needed someone to talk to. It was nice, and thoughtful, and immediately deleted once Vicky realized that Rebecca was actually Dumbfuck Dickbrain aka that weasel Danny Graham’s girlfriend.
It was a mystery why Bitchface O’Whoreslut thought Vicky would ever want her consolation, but the bigger concern was why had none of her friends texted her? Everyone knew by now that Chef had died at the party, so why wasn’t she getting bombarded with attention? And in memoriam had played the other day on the local news, so they would’ve known that she wasn’t actually dead. Even the group chat she was in with all of her friends had no new messages. That simply was impossible. Something was up. Something was wrong.
“Tuyen,” said Vicky, breaking away from the shackles of her phone to close the distance between them. She plopped down across the coffee table from her, brushed the pillow off the top, and held open her palm as she gave Tuyen an unflinching staredown. “Give me your phone.”
”A-Alright,” Tuyen immediately agreed, though she was scared about why Vicky wanted her phone. Was she trying to find evidence of the sinning to use against her? Or maybe she was going to do something in revenge, like text her aunt something that would get Tuyen in loads of trouble. She had no idea, but at the same time was desperate to make things up to Vicky.
She patted her skirt, before belatedly realising it didn't have any pockets. Where was her phone? She hadn't seen it in her room… When did she last use it? Oh, right, last night when she planned to try and eat, only to be interrupted by a call from her aunt scolding her for something Tuyen didn't remember doing. It had killed any appetite, and she'd left her phone in the kitchen when fleeing to her room.
”One minute.” Tuyen quickly got up and scurried through to the kitchen, grabbing her phone off the counter. There weren't any important messages thankfully, just a few from Min this morning telling her to not mind what his mum had said and that she'd been in a bad mood last night for other reasons. As she walked back through, Tuyen sent a simple ‘it’s okay' in response. She exited her messaging app and put her unlocked phone in Vicky's outstretched hand. Maybe Vicky's phone was just broken somehow, and it wasn't anything bad. Tuyen's phone may be a very outdated smartphone, but it was sturdy, so it worked no matter the circumstances. She hoped that was it. ”Here you go… What do you need it for?”
“Hopefully nothing,” said Vicky through gritted teeth as she snatched the phone, her stomach starting to twist itself into knots.
Immediately, she reopened the messaging app. There was shockingly little to look at, the inbox so desolate that Vicky didn’t even have to scroll, although perhaps it shouldn’t be so surprising at all. Knowing Tuyen’s aunt, that overbearing woman would probably scrub through her niece’s phone looking for any excuse she could find to critique the poor girl. Tuyen probably just deleted her messages to avoid getting into trouble, rationalized Vicky, ignoring the fact that one of the only active threads in the inbox was from Vicky with the blurb beneath it reading: bitch cmon lets get wasted.
Vicky sighed. The group chat she was looking for wasn’t here and in a way it was kind of a relief, as it allowed her to delude her suspicions. She was about to hand the phone back to Tuyen when she paused. Tuyen was in the group chat, but she never responded to the chat, so anytime their group was doing something Vicky always had to send a separate message. She pulled up the tab for muted conversations and there it was sitting above a vile message from John Miller sent the night of the party: the group chat containing all the girls that sat at their lunch table, the last message sent under an hour ago.
So she had been right. They had kicked her out, but they had forgotten about Tuyen.
“Fucking bitches,” growled Vicky under her breath as she opened the chat. Vicky jumped up to her feet and began pacing the room as she scrolled through the log, finding the night of the warehouse party. Her face began to turn a shade of red as she read through the new messages, the topic shifting from how crazy it was that an earthquake hit Cornell (or perhaps it had been a gas leak, or both, the girls weren’t sure) to a nasty rumor Gwen had heard from Natasha about Vicky and Chef.
Everything then degraded from there. It went from how much of a bitch Vicky was (i never liked her anyway), to how Vicky was responsible for getting Chef killed, to how Vicky actually killed Chef by using him as a human and pulling him in front of a high tension steel wire as it had snapped to protect herself. It became absurd, declaring that Vicky immediately made a move on Tyler after Chef had died (as if he would date someone like her), that she had snuck off in the woods with him, that someone had seen her coming out of the woods with two guys (omg what a skank!) that she must’ve been fooling around with.
Funnily enough, they had nothing bad to say about Tyler: Boys will be boys.
Vicky stopped pacing, a look of horror fixed on her face as she continued scrolling, not wanting to read more but unable to look away:
You just know she’s gonna make Chef’s funeral all about her.
It sucks that she survived
ugh i no i absolutely dread seeing her at school i can’t believe they’re opening it back up
Should I send her screenshots of this chat? Maybe she’ll fix that problem for us!
oh my god that’s horrible lol
I meant she wouldn’t come to school gawd not that … Wait do you think she actually would?[/color]
[code]I HOPE SO
OMG GWEN STOP!! LMAO!!!
Vicky sniffed, wiped her eyes, and then wordlessly handed Tuyen her phone back with a hollow smile. The screen was still open to the group chat. She had her fill. She collapsed into Tuyen’s aunt’s chair, hands on her forehead, her eyes on her shoes as she tried to remember how to breathe.
Tuyen's eyes widened as she saw the messages on her screen. She quickly scrolled up to read the rest of the messages, eyes widening further. She felt sick. Vicky didn't deserve any of those things said about her. She was a good person, good enough to still be friends with someone like Tuyen. She definitely didn't like Tyler- she'd been so upset after breaking up with Chef too, though Tuyen was fuzzy on the exact details. This wasn't fair.
Her fingers hovered over her phone keyboard, trembling slightly. Just the thought of sending a message made it difficult to breathe. She knew these girls weren't her friends- they only put up with her thanks to Vicky, which Tuyen had always been grateful for, no matter how uncomfortable being around them made her feel. She didn't need anything more, didn't even deserve it. They probably didn't even remember she existed… It would be easier to be a coward and not say anything at all.
It's not like that. Just sending that one message took a lot of effort on her part. Before she could send another, responses quickly came through.
Ew, who left Vicky's lapdog in?
soz I forgot about her
lol maybe SHE'LL fix the problem for us
There was a pause before Tuyen was kicked too.
”Vicky…” Tuyen dropped her phone, shuffling over to Vicky and crouching in front of her. She bit her lip, looking nervously at her. She wouldn't take the words to heart and do what they'd suggested, would she? No, no- not everyone felt like they didn't deserve to exist like Tuyen did. Vicky was normal. She wouldn't consider that. But of course she was upset. ”They don't know what they're talking about, they- They don't deserve a friend like you. They're talking like that because they're… jealous.”
She truly believed that everything they said was bullshit, but she didn't know how to comfort Vicky about it either. It didn't really matter if it was false because it was still horrible things they were saying about her. She wanted to hug her again, but she was worried how that'd be received- especially if Vicky knew the thoughts Tuyen sometimes had. No, best not to.
”I’ll always be your friend, no matter what. I know you're nothing like that.” She looked up at Vicky, managing to look like she truly believed what she was saying. She did, she just didn't think her friendship was worth much at all.
“It’s fine,” said Vicky with a sudden look of determination as her teeth stopped gnawing ineffectively at her acrylic nails. If she’d snapped out of her funk any faster it would’ve been accompanied by a sonic boom, but instead the only ringing was in her ears. She put her hand on Tuyen’s shoulders as if to show gratitude for her kind words only to use her for leverage as Vicky pushed herself up out of the chair. “You’re right, they’re just jealous. I don’t even care what they think about me anyway.”
She didn’t. She totally didn’t. She just couldn’t help but think that if Tuyen was supposed to be such a good friend then she should’ve been there for her in the warehouse because like, and it wasn’t Tuyen’s fault, but if Tuyen had been there to help Vicky escape instead of Tyler then those bitches wouldn’t have seen them together. Again, it wasn’t Tuyen’s fault, but really, the more Vicky thought about it, if Tuyen had been there instead of Tyler then nobody would’ve believed those stupid fucking rumors Lexi’s dumb friend had spread.
And honestly, it wasn’t Tuyen’s fault, it wasn’t, it wasn’t, it wasn’t right to blame her, but really, somebody had to be a fault here, and it wasn’t Vicky, and it wasn’t Tyler, because at very least Tyler had been there for Vicky when she needed someone, and he didn’t even claim to be her friend, in fact he fucking hated her, just like everybody else apparently hated her, so how come if Tuyen was supposedly such a good friend then:
“WHY—”HADN’T TUYEN FUCKING BEEN THERE? “—would you look at the time?”
Vicky looked at an imaginary watch on her wrist then grabbed her phone and her bat.
“I promised Diane I’d help her with dinner. This was a lot of fun. It sucks that you can’t do magic. But really, don’t worry about me. I’m totally fine. Oh, but Tuyen, you really shouldn’t lie,” said Vicky hypocritically, having just told a bunch of lies herself.
The bat vanished from Vicky’s hand. A second later, Tuyen would feel it poke her chest again. Vicky gave her a proud, wicked smile.
“We both know that I’m as big of a bitch as they say I am. And now that I have magic? Oh, I can be so.” Poke. “Much.” Poke. “Worse.”
Thursday 12th September. Cornell First Presbyterian Church.
Tuyen had been sorely mistaken when she thought an emergency church service on a Thursday would be quieter than the normal Sunday one. While the church wasn’t full, it was busy enough for her to feel uncomfortable. She’d been squashed in the middle of a row between two separate sets of grieving families. She vaguely recognised them, but thankfully they were too caught up in their emotions to pay attention to her. Even so, she did her best to make herself as small as possible.
She didn’t particularly want to be here, but she was desperate. Her hallucinations hadn’t gotten any better, and it was getting more difficult to tell which thoughts were hers or something else’s. She was almost certain now that her shadow was the cause of everything. She didn’t know what it was- a ghost or a demon- but if something awful had been attached to her, maybe it could be removed.
It didn’t seem particularly affected by being in such a holy place, however. It lurked at her feet, tauntingly watching her. Its whispers overlapped with the sermon she was struggling to pay attention to. It even collaborated with Reverend Mars, following his words to tell Tuyen how she’d gone against the teachings and sinned. She wasn’t particularly devout, but her Aunt had instilled plenty of Christian guilt in her. She couldn’t just shake off the Shadow’s words… It was right, after all.
Her hands clasped tightly in her lap and she kept her head slightly bowed as if in constant prayer, her eyes flickering between the Reverend at the front and her feet. The longer the service went on, the more anxious she felt about what she was here to do. Reverend Mars terrified her on the best of days… But who else would be able to exorcise a possible demon from her?
“...After all, my brothers and sisters, turn yourselves to the gospel of Luke! Our Lord Jesus drove an impure spirit from the soul of a man in Galilee!” Reverend Michael Mars spoke with resolute passion, accent occasionally and subtly alternating to a southern preacher or transatlantic salesman - like an actor still ironing out the subtleties of a character.
“I see many sad faces here today; which is why I felt it my duty to offer these additional sermons for those seeking spiritual guidance.” Reverend Mars gently closed his eyes, arms extended as if offering an embrace. “Our children have sinned, YES! And some have, unfortunately, paid the price for it. But what is it the bible teaches us, my brothers and sisters? Hate the sin, YES!... But love the sinner...”
A solemn gravitas, Michael let that note linger in the air for a moment much like he had when rehearsing yesterday in his office mirror. While his face wore a mask of grim compassion, inside he was beaming. His sermons had all been home runs as far as his performances were concerned, part of him was actually a little envious of the audience - many of whom were too busy crying into handkerchiefs to appreciate the high quality preaching they were receiving.
“Now!” Michael’s eyes snapped back open, almost jarringly cheerful. “I ask you all here today to find room in your hearts for charity and the expenses that go into making these extra sermons possible,” a nod to someone between the pews “my son, Daniel, is bringing the collection plate now. Please, give generously!”
A mumble of sympathy to the nearest mourning elder and Daniel Mars had done his duty of passing off the collection plate. Now left to stand there with his diverted gaze and hollow expression as the plate filled so he could take it back and begin counting the money. He spared a brief glance up at his father who, for a fraction of a second, dropped his kindly look to give his son a contemptuous frown.
Being let out of the house this morning was out of necessity as his father needed all hands on deck to handle the unexpected (and lucrative) demand for religious aid after the warehouse party. Otherwise, Daniel was still very much grounded and in the proverbial doghouse, both for disobeying his parents by going to an evil - probably satanic - underage drinking party and for his sister’s late night tears waking Michael up from his slumber and forcing him to actually parent his youngest daughter.
As the collection plate reached Tuyen, she felt pressured by the stare of the middle aged woman who passed it onto her. She quickly fumbled in her pockets for a five dollar bill, then another as the woman continued to stare expectantly at her. It felt like she was being judged as one of the sinners… Which she was, but she felt guilt less around the ‘sinfulness’ of the party itself and more her actions during the chaos.
As the sermon finished, Tuyen stayed sitting in the pews as everyone began to filter out. She didn’t want to get caught in the crowd. She was already on the edge being among so many people for the first time since the party, and she couldn’t afford to panic. She had to talk to Reverend Mars. She could do it. It didn’t matter if she was judged, or word got back to her aunt, because none of that was worse than having some evil being attached to her.
Or was it? She didn’t know what would happen if her aunt found out. Min wasn’t around anymore to diffuse things, so Tuyen would take the full brunt of her anger… Was the current situation really worse?
Yes it was. It definitely was. She had to do this.
Tuyen finally got up, joining near the end of people still trailing out. She clasped her hands together in front of her to stop herself from nervously scrunching up her long skirts, taking a deep breath. There were plenty of people who seemed to want to talk to the Reverend on the way out, but most didn’t seem to need more than a few words of condolences. She just had to ask for help, or to talk… Maybe to confess? Was that a thing she could do?
”R-Reverend Mars, your sermon was really- really good, uh, can I… Talk to you about something?”
An almost quizzical look passed on Michael’s face before it settled back into the smile of a used-car salesman. He quickly grabbed Tuyen’s hand and shook it as he did to every other attendee today.
“Course you can, darling.” Reverend Mars said in a warm, familiar tone. “I have a number of housecalls to make, lotta folk in dire need of wisdom from the good book,” and were willing to pay a premium for outcalling the reverend’s services “just get in touch and we’ll book you in at the earliest available day. Take care now!”
Punctuating his dismissal with a hand against Tuyen’s back, he not-quite-forcefully but certainly not kindly guided the teenager out of the church, following after her and locking the door behind them. One final insincere smile and Michael brushed past Tuyen to walk around the side of the church building, whistling contentedly to himself.
Adjusting his coat, Michael came across his son, dutifully filling the trunk of Michael’s baby blue Camaro convertible with boxes of religious paraphernalia. He was feeling so confident in his salesmanship that Michael’d even had Daniel dig out some of the old, questionably racist Thanksgiving decorations - believing he could rebrand them with some vague anti-sinner messaging and be rid of them.
“Alright, my boy. That’ll do.” Michael announced, slamming down the trunk. “Everything inside prepped for tomorrow morning?”
“Yes, sir.” Daniel said, wiping the sweat from his brow.
“Good. Now the vegetation’s startin’ to look a mite overgrown for my tastes so I want you to go into the shed and trim it some.” Michael opened the door to the driver’s seat, leaning on the door’s edge as he addressed his son. “Now, I’ve got important work to do then a well-earned evening break at the bar. So, I expect you to get your behind home and back to bein’ grounded the second you’re done here.”
“Ok, sir.” Daniel replied with a nod
“Don’t go thinkin’ I’m being too hard on you, boy.” Michael said, pointing at Daniel. “You disobeyed me, left your sister on her lonesome and, don’t forget, stirred me out’ve my top five most favourite dreams.”
“The Oscars dream, sir.” Daniel ruefully acknowledged.
“The Oscars dream!” Michael confirmed, his previously-neutral expression morphing into visible annoyance. “With Billy Crystal handin’ me the statue and- no, forget it. Forget it. I’m just gonna get mad again.”
A slam, Reverend Mars shut his car door and drove off, leaving his son behind with a long list of work to still be done. Daniel watched the convertible shudder down the dirt path and onto the asphalt road. He sighed and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, making his way to the front of the church to start surveying where he’d need to focus his gardening efforts.
Tuyen stood frozen just outside the church door, having not taken another step after being ushered out. Her eyes focused on the ground as she took long breaths to calm herself down. She was all too familiar with rejection, even if this time it had come in the form of a polite dismissal. She didn’t even know how to get in touch to book in… She didn’t realise that was necessary. Of course she hadn’t. She always did things wrong.
And she was still stuck with her sentient shadow, silent as it was being. She’d learned that the quiet didn’t mean good, after a fair few times of relaxing only to be dragged back down into the depths as it went back to tormenting her.
She was snapped out of her thoughts at the sound of quiet footsteps, finally moving. For a moment she looked like a deer caught in headlights. Her obvious shock quickly disappeared for a genuine appearing smile as she realised the footsteps belonged to an actual human- and someone she knew, even if they didn’t talk very often. There was still lingering anxiety in her eyes, but it was otherwise easy to cover up.
”Daniel… Hi,” she said, managing not to sound horrendously awkward. Should she ask him instead? He wasn’t a Reverend, but he was brought up religiously enough he might know how to perform an exorcism… Then again, telling anyone at school was risky. Daniel didn’t seem the kind to gossip, but things could always slip out. She didn’t want this spreading… She couldn’t have Vicky finding out.
”How are you?” She asked, before rubbing the back of her neck with a rueful laugh. ”Sorry, that’s a stupid question after what happened in the warehouse… Uh, am I in your way?” She shifted to the side, out of the way of the door, thinking there might’ve been something left behind he was going to get. ”I’m not planning to hang around and get in your way, don’t worry. Oh, but do you know how I’d make an… appointment with your dad?”
“O-oh, Tuyen!” Daniel exclaimed, lost in his world of confusion and chastisement that the quiet girl’s appearance took him by surprise. “I’m, uh…!”
He let his sentence die out, unsure how to revive it. He struggled to look at her, diverting his head entirely. He had nothing but positive things to say about Tuyen under normal circumstances, she was nice and friends with many of the popular folk so that likely meant she was the most popular girl in school. But things were actually going extremely badly, a divine punishment had been enacted upon him, a demon welded to his very soul, everything he knew about life and reality altered irreparably under an ocean of teenaged blood. Other than that, he supposed he couldn’t complain.
“I don’t know.” He finally admitted, eyes still gazing out at nothing. “I could give you our house phone number; but he told me he’s using a wait list to create a sense of urgency. So…”
Normally he’d offer an apologetic smile, a dedicated effort to try and find a solution or, if nothing else, a personal ensurement to whatever hurting soul that their concerns were being valued and heard. But, lost in his own world, all he could do was stifle a pained expression as he cast his eyes down on the ground.
“Um… I’m sorry, Tuyen, but… I, uh, actually have a lot of work to do.”
Daniel stood there for a moment, a deep shame washing over him. Solitude would be nice, but where would he find it? The demon within him was largely indifferent to the mundanity of Daniel’s life and therefore made its presence largely ignorable, but all it took was a perceived failing, jaywalking, littering, agreed upon social contracts being flaunted and broken. Daniel rubbed his right hand, faint bite marks on the palm and back from the last time he managed to, barely, force the demon back into its cage. Even if he were damned and marked, Tuyen had done nothing to him and deserved the respect he’d failed to show the Lord.
“I’m sorry.” Daniel gently said, finally looking Tuyen in the eye. “Everything’s just been… very hard.” A ghost of a smile passed on his lips, reassurance that even if their struggles were unsolvable, they were struggling together. “I’m not a skilled preacher like Father, but I happen to be a good listener. If that’d help at all?”
Tuyen hesitated a moment, before nodding. Normally she hated inconveniencing someone else. The moment Daniel said he was busy she was ready to leave, back to the self made prison of her room at home. Even when he offered to listen, she still took a moment to decide that she'd take him up on the offer. She felt guilty for doing so, since he was clearly struggling himself… But she was really desperate. The longer this went on the harder it was to hide how much she was suffering. Just telling someone would make it harder to keep suppressing it around everyone else. Maybe she could help him too, then she wouldn't just be burdening him.
”Thank you. I think that'd help,” she replied with a warm smile, though she really didn't know if it would. Maybe he'd just think she was going mad. ”What kind of work do you need to do? Maybe I can help while we talk… I can do most things.“
It was a genuine offer that helped ease her conscience a bit. Then she'd be a bit less of a burden.
”Since the party, have you… Noticed anything different? Strange things or, uh, voices?” she asked, testing the waters first before delving into what she actually wanted to talk about. She'd barely gotten up the confidence to try talk to Reverend Mars about it, and there'd always been a high chance she'd wimp out before admitting there was probably a demon attached to her.
“Oh, it’s no trouble, I just have to clear the grounds a little. I wouldn’t want you to get dirty on my account.” Daniel insisted, his smile becoming a little more natural, worrying about chores made it easier to delude himself back to normalcy.
Until Tuyen mentioned strange voices.
Daniel buckled as if the words dropped on his shoulders like weights, a tremble in his knees and a forlorn expression as he again looked away from Tuyen. An attempt to ground himself by retrieving the clippers resting in his back pocket and trimming at the edges of a nearby hedge.
“I’m… I’ve heard a lot of different things from people.” Daniel admitted, remembering the sleepless nights following the party where he scoured social media trying to make sense of contradicting recollections. “I’m not really sure what to believe.”
Perhaps its ears were burning, a tightness clutched Daniel’s heart, not enough to be painful but plenty to draw a sharp inhale from the boy. He had no idea what happened to Tuyen, what she’d seen or been party to that hellish night. Perhaps she was also trying to make sense of the claims others had made, magic, demons, the walls of reality coming undone. He didn’t want to frighten her, but the burden was tearing at him more each day.
“That night...” He said, softly, weighing how best to word it, what to admit and what to conceal. “I’ve been hearing something, in my head.”
He looked up at Tuyen, the dark circles under his eyes hollowing his stare more under the morning sun. “I prayed that night, and I think something answered. I’m afraid of what did.”
Tuyen felt a hint of relief, followed by immediate guilt for being relieved someone else was suffering like her. She wasn’t relieved because Daniel was suffering, sharing the same dark circles under his eyes- but because it meant maybe she wasn’t going completely insane. There was a chance they both were, but… she wanted to believe that wasn’t the case. Especially after seeing proof magic was real.
”Me too,” she admitted quietly, hands clutching her skirt. She felt confident enough to speak about it at least a little bit after Daniel’s answer. ”I mean, I’ve also been hearing something in my head. It didn’t answer any prayers, it just… appeared. I don’t know what it is- if it’s anything- just that I’m afraid of it too. I want to get rid of it.”
You’ll never be rid of me.
She barely suppressed a shudder, glancing down at her feet- or more accurately, her Shadow. It was the first time it had directly responded to her in a way she could easily tell it apart from her own thoughts.
”Maybe we’re dealing with the same thing. Have you also… Been seeing things that aren’t there?”
An ache formed in Daniel’s throat. Sympathy, kindredship, despair and relief. He heard some of the rumours, others having been afflicted with similar - for lack of a better term - conditions. Other than Lynn, who perhaps had the ability to save Daniel’s sorry hide, he hadn’t met anyone else in the haze of police and ambulance lights that followed that night. He hadn’t known for sure what was real and what was hysteria when the survivors began spreading accounts of that night, all he knew was that magic, in some perverse way, was real. It was attached to his soul, after all.
“No.” Daniel said, quickly rising to his feet and looking at Tuyen with intensity. “It’s- it’s like… someone else’s thoughts, forcing their way into my head? He’s- it’s always listening, judging.”
“It…” He looked hesitant, the catharsis of sharing his woes stumbling. Would Tuyen make fun of him? She’d always been a nice person, but even Daniel would have a hard time believing this from someone else. He swallowed and let his voice drop to a whisper. “It can change me. I know how that sounds. But, at the party. It did. I don’t… I don’t know how to get rid of it.”
Tuyen’s expression filled with sympathy, while internally she began to downplay her own suffering. She was also dealing with someone else’s thoughts forced into her head, but at least it wasn’t changing her. Everything was seemingly internal for her. It just seemed to be pushing her towards the edge, like it wanted her to plummet into a pool of despair she couldn’t get back out of. She couldn’t figure out why.
Would it take over her body then?
”Mine hasn’t tried to change me but- but it's been showing me hallucinations since. I can’t always tell what’s real, and it seems crazy, so… I believe you.” She gave him a comforting smile, recognising his hesitation and nervousness over sharing that. After all, she felt the same. She was terrified of people thinking she was going mad, or of them digging and realising just what her demon was feeding off of. ”I don’t know if mine can do anything physical… It’s just always there watching me. I can always see it even when it isn’t forcing thoughts into my head.”
She looked down at the floor, at her shadow. She wasn’t sure if she should tell him exactly what it was, or her suspicions about what it had done that night- no, what she’d done. She’d killed those people. It wasn’t all it.
”Has it changed you since the party?”
“It hasn’t, thankfully.” Daniel replied, he didn’t sound entirely convinced. “But I am sorry you’re going through that, Tuyen.” As violent and unwanted as the demon within him was, Daniel at least had managed to glean that it had little interest in his daily life, much less altering his perception of it.
“Has your… has it shown you anything useful? Anything you can make sense of?” Behind him, Valor was not there, he knew this. Yet he also knew, instinctually, that the black knight was looming over him, looking down at Tuyen.
No, looking past Tuyen. To something not bound by this reality much like itself, entwined with the soul of another.
Tuyen shook her head. ”It only shows me things I don't want to see.”
It was a roundabout way of saying it was digging up her deepest fears and insecurities. She couldn't exactly admit to what it was showing her, because that meant being open about things she didn't want to share. She couldn't burden him with something like that. It would still be there when she was rid of the shadow, just… better.
Was it really better?
The Shadow was still at her feet even as it whispered to her, as if it couldn't sense the presence of another Apparition like itself. It didn't care about external factors after all.
”Most of it's realistic enough that I'd believe it. So I can make sense of them, but they don't mean anything. I think it's doing it to torment me, and no other reason, like a… demon would, if that's what it is. I was hoping for an exorcism.” She gave a small, sad smile. It felt unfair that where others were getting magic they got parasites. But if anyone deserved that it was her. ”But maybe we can help each other if we're stuck like this. I'm not sure how… but it's better than being alone.”
“Help each…?” Daniel trailed off, realisation settling in. An exorcism wasn’t within his ability to perform, especially while host to a demon of his own. His father, knowledgeable as he was, might not even be able to do so, if he ever had the time to try. “Ah…” He said, softly. They could support each other, in whatever small ways. Emotionally, spiritually, and, if the worst came to pass…
Daniel said nothing else, looking at Tuyen with his eyes unblinking. Warm blues appeared to pale in the sunlight.
“Are you sure you’re capable of upholding that promise?” Daniel asked in an abruptly harsh, accusatory tone, any trace of characteristic warmth wrung out of him.
“Are you?” Valor repeated.
Tuyen’s eyes widened, biting her lip nervously. She couldn’t answer, because she really wasn’t sure.
She couldn’t, the Shadow thought for her. And it didn’t care what that uptight ghost did. It could kill the boy for all it cared, as long as it got it meals.
Though it didn’t bother with any verbal response to show its presence, a shadowy arm manifested as if out of nowhere. Sharp claws scraped across the church wall, causing rubble to fall to the ground and leaving even more of a mess for Daniel to clean. It responded by doing something it could sense would piss off Valor: flagrant vandalism.
Unlike most of her schoolmates, Lexi didn’t have to deal with stupid things like overbearing parents or being grounded in the aftermath of the warehouse party. She didn’t even have that much trauma, only really caring about her best friend slash drummer who was torn apart in front of her. That had been pretty rough to deal with after the drugs had worn off and she realised what happened was real.
But she wasn’t the kind of person to lie around feeling sad. There was shit to do. For a start, she didn’t have a drummer anymore… And just as importantly, she had fucking magic. In the couple of days since the party shit had just kept getting weirder, so concentrating on figuring that out had become a priority.
Which was why she was in a small clearing, well off the beaten path, in the woods. At first she’d planned to go to the abandoned steel mill, but it was a common hangout for her group of rule breaking friends- the ones that were still alive, at least. She couldn’t be bothered to go through the motions of explaining shit to them right now. It was just too bothersome. How would she explain all the dead animals she’d collected without looking like a psycho anyway?
There were five small bodies in front of her, in varying states of decay. They were all small- three rats and two birds. She hadn’t killed them herself, obviously, but she seemed to have a knack for just finding corpses now. Maybe it was the magic. What a bullshit power that’d be if that was all there was to it. At least the Purple side, from what she could tell, had given her violent telekinesis.
Death isn’t the end. For some it is the beginning. Based on the cryptic words her ancestors had left her, she clearly had access to some kind of Necromancy. The only question was how the fuck did she use it?
Whoosh.
Somewhere overhead, between the branches of the trees, a bird soared. It was fast, too. Faster than most birds around Cornell, and that was probably because it looked like something straight from a storybook. It was bright gold, with red streaks at the end of its feathers.
Lexi tilted her head back, squinting at the brightly coloured bird. Did they get birds that bright here? Probably not, but she wasn’t some fucking bird expert. Maybe it had escaped from the nearest, and ended up here after hours of flying. It wasn’t exactly the strangest thing she’d seen. At least it wasn’t an ugly budget werewolf.
After staring at it for a moment, she went back to the dead animals in front of her. She poked one, trying to drag up a little spark of magic. Nothing. Fuck her stupid ancestors for leaving with with no proper instructions. Assholes. She scowled, pulling out a cigarette, playing with her lighter as she took a long drag. Her gaze went back to the tree line to see if the disgustingly gold bird was still there. Not her style, but if it dropped dead she may as well use its corpse.
”What the hell are you looking for over here?”
From the brush behind Lexi, Tommy stepped out. He had been walking through the woods with his golden creatures, looking for things. As he appeared, another golden animal followed him. And then another.
One looked like a giant, fat marten with a body big enough for someone to hide inside of. The other was a coyote made of glassy twine, plodding along behind him.
He saw Lexi and squinted.
”Is it Summon Satan hour already?” He remarked, looking at the dead animals on the ground in front of her.
”Oh no, you caught me, Timmy.” Lexi intoned, tone dripping with sarcasm. As turned around to face him her smile dropped, replaced by a lazy smile. She quickly glanced over the new golden animals, though she didn’t acknowledge them as her narrowed gaze went back to Tommy. ”A demon’s the only way to deal with Tyler. Maybe he’ll stop being such an ass when he takes one up there.”
The flicked cigarette ass onto the ground, taking another drag. ”I’m pleasantly surprised you haven’t offed yourself yet. Did you find your calling traipsing through the woods with some new, lame pets?”
”Something like that.” The big chunky one trotted over to him, and the side of his body opened up like a window. It was hollow inside. Tommy reached in and pulled out a water bottle. ”Magic’s weird as shit. You ever seen someone make a bird out of blood?”
As if to illustrate his point, the golden bird flew down and landed on the carrier monster’s head.
Lexi raised an eyebrow, though her expression didn’t change much at either the display of magic or mention of it. She just mentally added him to the list of ‘losers with magic’. Lucky him, he was second on it, right after Tyler.
”Not a party trick I’ve bothered seeing before, no,” she sneered. Though it did give her an idea. Thankfully getting an idea from Tommy wasn’t the end of the world- while he was an outcast in the lamest way possible, he wasn’t one of the people she’d go out of her way to target. He wasn’t some up his own ass rule follower. This didn’t earn him any respect from Lexi, but it at least lessened her disdain from him.
”You got a knife?”
”Uh-” He patted his pockets to look for it, then checked the creature. He pulled a switchblade out of its internal storage and tossed it at her.
Lexi caught it smoothly, not bothering to thank him as she turned back to her dead animals. She flicked out the blade and calmly cut her right pinkie with it. It wasn’t exactly the best finger to get blood from, but she wasn’t going to ruin her bass playing for some unlikely to work magical experiment. With the switchblade having served its purpose, she unceremoniously tossed it back to Tommy.
She pressed her hand onto one of the dead rats, playing with her lighter in the other. Even with her warm blood pressed into its cold body, there were no signs of life. Blood’s useless, then. But as she gripped her lighter a little tighter, the body started to change subtly underneath her hand. The skin that had begun to peel off regrew, its little legs getting a little less floppy. It was still a corpse, just a fresher looking one.
”Shame, I’d hoped that’d be enough to summon Satan.”
”Seems that everyone who does magic needs something to do it with.” Tommy pulled out his deck of cards from his jacket. They started to glitter with golden smoke. ”I always have to pull monsters out of these, or make one with them. Tyler’s got that cheap football ring, Vicky uses her bat.”
”She has magic?” Lexi sneered, seeming to focus on Vicky’s magic rather than the whole object to do magic thing. She wasn’t exactly going to admit she hadn’t realised and thank him now, was she? It explained why nothing had been happening before, if her lighter was that object for her. Made sense. She’d been holding it the whole attack. ”Like she needed something to inflate her ego further.”
She looked at Tommy’s magically smoking deck of cards. Her lighter didn’t have any flashy effects, beyond its actually practical use of letting her smoke. And freshen up corpses, it seemed.
”Did your ancestors tell you that, or were they just as useless as mine?”
”They did not tell me shit. They told me magic’s real, which… You fucking think? Then they hurried off like something was gonna kill ‘em. No, I had to figure it out myself.”
The coyote scratched at the dirt.
”So, you’re a necromancer or something? You can’t just conjure up a ghost to go haunt someone?”
”Then I’d have to deal with some dead asshole chatting about how sad they are to be dead.” Lexi rolled her eyes. She turned her attention back to the fresh corpse, finding it more natural to channel her magic now that she’d figured out the secret- having her lighter in one hand. Now turned back to its state on the day it died, its legs started to twitch, and it suddenly flipped onto its front. It stood perfectly still and stared at Lexi, waiting for orders.
She didn’t actually know if she could conjure up a ghost, but it wasn’t all that appealing of an idea. Ghosts always talked in movies. Plus, it wasn’t like there were any dead people she wanted to see.
”Yeah, I’m a necromancer. I’m not just gathering corpses for fun.” She held out her hand and the undead rat crawled up it, before resting on her shoulder. ”What’re you, a flashy summoner?”
”Guess so. I made these things, been figuring out how that works. Came out here to grab tree limbs or rocks, whatever I can use to make more of them.” Tommy watched the rat move around. It probably stank.
”I bet if I get a piece of some monster like the one that tore up the party, I can make something weird. Like a werewolf or something, I dunno.”
”Oh right, I’m sure a monster like that’ll happily give you a limb to play with.” Lexi rolled her eyes. She’d forgotten quite how boring and unreactive Tommy was. Sure, he sometimes gave out good jabs in return to the shit she threw at him, but he was acting like she cared about what he was doing. She didn’t give a fuck about how he made his summons or what he was going to do. Didn’t affect her. She’d only be tolerating him cause it had been entertaining for a while, and useful.
”I bet you’d enjoy a freaky werewolf summon- if you don’t get ripped apart tryna harvest some monsters organs for it.”
”Yeah, maybe I’ll send it to rip Tyler’s face off. Or Vicky’s, after she almost fucking got me arrested because she thought the cops would do something.”
Tommy walked over to a tree and wrenched a branch off it. He needed things that were sturdy, like bits of metal or wood. Stuff he could work with. ”I mean, who expects cops to know anything about wizard shit?”
Lexi let out a short huff of air that was almost a laugh. She’d had plenty of run-ins with the town’s cops. They were absolutely itching to catch her doing something properly illegal, but she ran circles around them. They were horrendously incompetent.
”Like they know shit about anything. They only care about acting intimidating, but none of ‘em have the brains to back shit up.” At least he was talking about something interesting now. ”Vicky fits right in… But she’d snitch to a ghost if she thought she’d get something outta it. That bitch was probably tryna preserve her own skin. Not a surprise when she used her ex-boyfriend as a meat shield.”
Tommy stopped what he was doing and turned to give Lexi the most What the fuck? stare he could manage. ”She just let that werewolf thing kill him? What the fuck is wrong with people who play sports? I’m seeing a pattern, there… Jesus fuck. It’s the concussions, isn’t it? Swelling their damn brains so much there’s not enough air going in or some shit. Explains a few things.”
Lexi actually laughed this time. She didn’t know for a fact that Vicky had pushed her boyfriend in front of the monster, but she’d heard the rumours. It didn’t matter if it was true or not to her. ”Oh yeah, it’s the same for all those jocks. It’s easy to damage something already so fucking small.”
With a grin she crouched back down in front of her animal corpses, placing her hand on one of the birds this time. It was a bit bigger, so it took more work as her magic started to channel through it. ”Vicky’s always been a selfish bitch, but the brain damage is definitely why Tyler’s got grand delusionals of being some kind of fucking hero. He’ll probably be the next guy used as a meatshield by her… And he’ll deserve it.”
”Guess so.” He wrenched a relatively straight limb off of a tree and had his bird saw it in two with its feathers. They went into the carrier. ”Son of a bitch thought that thing was my fault. Appeared out of thin air, blaming me for what happened. You try doing that on a person when it happened?”
”What, the raising the dead shit? What fucking corpse would I have done it on? Everyone was torn apart.” Lexi rolled her eyes. She definitely hadn’t thought about it, because she was barely thinking at the time- what with being drunk and high. The telekinesis had come more naturally in the moment. ”I don’t have any use for a flesh puddle, much as it would’ve been fun to see people’s reactions to it.”
”Hm. Maybe it’d get bigger when you kill something. Stick a corpse in the puddle and move it around. Kill a bunch of birds, make it even bigger.” Tommy made some half-assed jazz hand gestures. ”Flesh tsunami.”
”Wow, psycho over here wants me to kill animals for a flesh monstrosity,” Lexi intoned. For once her sarcastic taunting didn’t seem to be jabbing at Tommy, but rather friendly ribbing going along with the conversation. Probably. ”Find me another fucked up corpse and I’ll make it.”
”How many fucked up corpses do you have? You got some way of keeping them from rotting too much?”
”Oh, a whole fridge full. I have preserving them down to an art.” Lexi intoned sarcastically. ”Fucking none, obviously. I didn’t go dragging dead bodies away after the party, I’m not a complete psycho.”
For a brief moment, Tommy considered calling her out on that. He didn’t. ”Yeah, well… Cornell’s covered in woods, maybe we go bag a few more birds and stitch ‘em together. Actually, you can probably find some weird animals now. Who the fuck knows what’s different after Cornell got fucking split open.”
He grabbed two more relatively straight branches off of trees, chopped them down with his golden summon, and stashed them. ”There are pieces of the town that are different, after that night. Like whole blocks got replaced with fakes. It’s worse when you drive out towards the highway, and I’m pretty sure some people are just pretending no one died.”
’Did I ask,’ was on the tip of Lexi's tongue, but for once she let it die there rather than voicing the snide thought. There was an eye roll, however. He was acting like she was some idiot who had been cowering inside instead of going through her normal routine of playing truant on the streets till well past the curfew she should have. She'd seen some of the strange shit. It just didn't really bother her.
”People are great at ignoring the shit they don't understand… Town's always been a bit fucking weird at night, though. It's just noticeably worse,” she shrugged nonchalantly. ”And don't go thinking that just cause I'm not ripping you a new one we're friends or some shit. There's no we traipsing around the forest looking for dead birds like a pair of psycho losers. Once you've collected all your wood, you can go on your merry loner way.”
”Yeah, yeah… Fuck you very much and so on and so forth,” Tommy remarked, throwing a middle finger over his shoulder at her without sounding offended, which he wasn’t. He grabbed a rock and shoved it into the summon.
”You.” He pointed at the bird. ”Get gone, do your thing. You-” Then the dog. ”Back to work, monsters and whatnot. Big guy, go small, we’re done here.”
The bird took to the air, the dog trotted off, and the mustelid thing just vanished.
Lexi rolled her eyes, giving him a snide smile. It was a shame he wasn’t easy to piss off like so many other teenagers… One of the reasons she didn’t bother targeting him. It was also a shame for every thing he said that Lexi agreed with, he went on to say some lame shit she didn’t care about.
”Try not to die,” she said, sounding more like a curse than a genuine wish. ”It’d be a shame, since you’re not completely lame. Oh- You don’t happen to play the drums, do you? I need a new expendable drummer.”
“I’D LEAVE TOO IF I WAS MARRIED TO YOUR FAT ASS, DIANE!”
Vicky slammed the front door of her house, threw her arms down by her side, wrinkled her face, and released a steaming sigh of frustration that loudly morphed into a full blown, FUCK! The early birds dropped the worms from their mouths, shocked by the profanity, and scattered. The kitschy, wide plank sign standing next to the door that her mother had lamely painted the word ‘hello’ vertically on it in sloppy cursive with one L noticeably larger than the other fell over, floored by the vulgarity. The rolled up newspaper slipped out of her neighbor’s hands, this interruption to a normal, peaceful suburban morning likely to be the headline for tomorrow’s issue of the Cornell Daily.
“Oh! Morning, Mr. Parker,” said Vicky with a sudden twist of cheer, whatever rage she had carried outside seemingly had left her body alongside the FUCK! that had reverberated around the cul-de-sac and was now heading out of the neighborhood.
She gave a big smile and a wave at Mr. Parker as the old man gawked at her, a smile that fell from her face the second she walked past him, mouthing ‘you old motherfucker’ as she rolled her eyes. She hated Mr. Parker. She hated how he thought it was okay to wear a robe outside with nothing under it except for his tighty whities. She hated how he always seemed to have yard work or some other reason to be out anytime she was tanning so he could trap her in a conversation. Mostly, however, she hated him because he was old and fat and boring and how he had been born in Cornell and how he will die in Cornell and how every time she walked by him she couldn’t help but think in abject horror, Oh God one day that could be me!
Vicky hated a lot of things now. She hated her friends for talking shit about her behind her back and ignoring her. She hated Chef because now that he was dead she was single. Also, his funeral had been weird and his mother had made some big ol’ scene about how Vicky didn’t deserve to be there, that Chef would’ve still been alive if they weren’t dating, about blah blah whatever, how was it Vicky’s fault that college boy’s mother had raised such a loser that he was dating a high schooler? Maybe it was better to say that she hated Chef’s mom. She hated her parents, too. She had hated them before, but now she had new things she hated about them.
She also decided that she kind of hated her magic, because as cool as magic was, the moment she got magic was the same moment her entire life started falling apart.
But that didn’t matter now, no! Why? Because school was back in session, great, wonderful, stupid, boring, underfunded school, with its cardboard pizza and its massacred student body and it was actually kind of crazy that they were already going back to school, actually, if she thought about it, actually it was, like so many kids were dead. Still, it was a return to normalcy. Normalcy was good. Normalcy meant her friends would stop being such little bitches and repledge their fealty to the fucking queen of Cornell High. So, as with every other normal day of school, Vicky walked down to the end of her street, stood on the corner, and waited for Gwen to come pick her up.
And waited.
And waited.
“Whatthefuck,” muttered Vicky under her breath, fusing with the oversized sleeves of Chef’s varsity jacket, the blood all washed out along with the color. She was still unsure if it was a smart idea to wear it, worried that it might make her look desperate for sympathy and attention—which she was—but even more worried what everyone would think if she didn’t wear it.
Not that I care, she told herself as she let out a little surprised gasp at the sound of an approaching vehicle.
Her body sank into the coat as the vehicle turned the corner and revealed itself to be a school bus, the hiss of the air brakes sending a chill up Vicky’s spine, her throat gulping as the door swung open. An eternity passed as she locked eyes with the bus driver. Vicky was not a stupid, friendless bus kid. Only losers rode the bus. She was cool. She was a car kid, even if it had to be someone else’s car because she wasn’t allowed to drive she was still a car kid. It wasn’t like it was her fault she couldn’t drive. The instructor was just a prick. Vicky had been right: if those cones were kids they would’ve moved.
“Well, ya getting on or not?” asked the bus driver.
“I got a ride,” whined Vicky, acting so offended by the frankly outrageous question that the bus driver was taken aback and apologized before closing the door and driving off.
Vicky stared after the tail lights, frowning. Maybe she should’ve gotten on, actually. There was no way she was going to get in a car with Diane, who was probably still drunk off of last night’s box of wine, and even if she wasn’t it would still mean being in a car with Diane. Her bicycle, maybe? Nah, the sound of the garage door opening would fill her mom with hope, send her rushing out, and then Vicky would be dealing with fucking Diane’s bullshit again. Absolutely not.
The bus turned the corner, Vicky waited a few more seconds, and then she started to walk in the same direction with her chin up. It had fallen by the time she got to the end of the neighborhood and ran out of sidewalk, the darkening rain clouds above telling her that this was becoming a bad idea.
Tommy’s two-door car rounded the corner, on the way to school. He drove himself pretty much every day since he had finally finished turning the veritable coffin of diverse microbiology into something indistinguishable from brand new. It was a pretty peaceful experience, being alone in a car and unbeholden to the schedules of either a parent or a bus full of people who didn’t know Tommy’s name.
His dad had words for him the day after that party. Like any decent parent, he was worried beyond reason. Kids had turned up dead, there were police there and it was the one time Tommy had actually thrown his hat into that kind of social gathering.
He had to lie about a few things. How could he have explained that he was a wizard now? That a dozen or so people who survived were wizards? The true part was that he just hauled ass home. The false part was that he had done so before he made sense of anything. And then his mom had her turn at fussing over the entire situation, looking at the cuts he’d received from slipping on shitty alcohol.
So Tommy was technically on notice. They didn’t want him meandering much. He had places to be and he was the sort of kid who actually did things, but he was expected to be home at a reasonable hour and refrain from dying in a dark alleyway.
He saw Vicky moping on the corner of the street and stopped. The window went down.
”I think you missed the bus already, it’s usually here earlier.”
Vicky had tensed when a car pulled up alongside her. There was no relief in her face when she saw that it was just Tommy.
”I don't ride the bus,” scoffed Vicky with a flick of her hair, wincing as she felt a raindrop hit her forehead. ”Ugh. Just great.“
”...Right.” He glanced up at the sky. ”Get in. You’ll get soaked waiting there for somebody.”
Thunk. The left-side door unlocked. Vicky glared at Tommy, her arms crossed, her mind made up for her the moment she felt a second raindrop.
“Fine, fuck it. I’m texting my friends, though, so you better not stab me,” she said as she jumped into the passenger seat, tossing her backpack down at her feet as she slid the seat as far back as it could go. It was accompanied by a mysterious clank, the source of the sound imperceptible. She kicked her pearly white sneakers up on the dash as she pulled out her cell, “What’s your name again?”
”Tommy. And get your damn shoes off the dashboard, or you’re walking.”
With the doors shut and the windows up, it was easy to hear the barely-audible CD Tommy had on the radio at the moment. The car started to move, and they were off the block in the next minute.
“Wow,” said Vicky as she moved her feet with a huff. She had to admit, it was probably the cleanest boy’s car she had ever been in. Whenever she got a ride with Chef it felt like she was inside of a motorized gym bag. Still, her shoes were clean too. Ridiculous. “Not rude at all.”
They came to a stop sign. The way to school was to the left, just a mile or two of awkward silence and Tommy would be free of Vicky. Instead, she said, “Take a right here. I need to get some Starbucks.”
It was pretty damn clean. Solid black seats that had to be something after-market, not a speck of dust on the dashboard, and weirdly enough, it didn’t seem to have that obnoxious ozone smell new cars often had. Tommy took care of it.
”Yeah.” Caffeine sounded good right about now, actually. They went right.
Vicky slumped against the window, at first seemingly content with watching the rain streak down the glass and listening to the quiet tunes. Yet Tommy would be able to feel her eyes on him any time his eyes were on the road, Vicky quickly glancing away anytime his head turned her direction, back to the window, back to the rain, and then always back to him. Studying. Analyzing. The staredown solidified. The next time his head turned she didn’t look away. Instead, she just kept glaring. Until finally she broke the silence, unable to bear it anymore.
“So what’s your deal?”
”...I have no idea what you mean. Did you prefer to just walk through the rain, or something?”
“Yeah, that. That right here,” said Vicky, gesturing at Tommy’s whole being. “That whole thing. What’s up with that? Like normally anytime I’m in a car with a boy they at least attempt to make some kind of conversation, but you? Pfft. You’re acting like I’m bothering you, so why even stop?”
”Why not? Costs pretty much nothing to just give you a ride. And it’s not like we talk much anyway, figured you didn’t have much to say either.” She was everyone’s favorite bat-swinging Pick Me Girl, and Tommy was that weird kid who could fix things and make coins disappear. She didn’t even remember his name.
”I guess hanging around Tyler as much as you have, you’ve never heard of the concept of being a decent human being.”
Vicky let out a hmph. Or had it been a muted laugh acknowledging the truth in Tommy's words? ”So a decent human being brings a knife to a party?”
”You walk into a place full of people slinging shitty drugs and cheap beer, you bring some way to defend yourself,” Tommy remarked. ”It’s either that or I pack a gun, and that’s not happening.”
Vicky raised her eyebrows, genuinely weirded out by the response, and then she let out a small, annoyed sigh. He was fucking with her, right? He had to be fucking with her.
“Yeah, otherwise someone might ask you to do a kegstand or a bong rip. Those parties are sooooo dangerous,” teased Vicky.
Her face quickly screwed itself up, her mind catching up with her mouth, a guttural screaming cut through the sad bastard music playing on the stereo as she felt herself soaked once again in warm blood and viscera. Nope nope, nope, nope, nah, nah, nah, she blinked it away. No more talking about that, no more thinking about that. Move on, change the subject, tuck and roll out of the car, something, anything, other than reliving that night.
Vicky bristled and cleared her throat, her tone turning confrontational, “What did you mean when you said you figured I didn’t have much to say?”
”You don’t know me.” He shrugged with one shoulder, eyes on the road. ”I mean, I don’t do softball or whatever else people do after school. Was I wrong?”
“Do softball, Jesus fucking Christ,” groaned Vicky, smacking her forehead. She turned towards Tommy, her expression a mixture of disbelief and disgust, as she jabbed a finger at him. “Are you just fucking with me, or—”
She let out a loud UGH!
“I know who you are, dude. I just pretended to forget your name because—” She was a bitch. She thought it would be fun. Perhaps Vicky had wanted to create a power dynamic, clearly, that at some point Tommy had seemingly reversed. She kept ranting,“Everyone knows who you are. Do you think that just because you refuse to participate you aren’t noticed? It makes you stand out even more! You’re, like, the most talked about guy in our school.”
Vicky shook her fists by the side of her face as if she was quaking in terror, pretending to be the other kids at school, as she shrieked like a banshee:
“EWW! IT’S TOMMY BRACKEN. I HEARD HE’S PART OF THE TRENCHCOAT MAFIA!”
“EWW, TOMMY BRACKEN! I HEARD HE’S HAS A HITLIST IN HIS LOCKER!”
“EWWWWWWWW-UH, TOMMY BRACKEN! I HEARD HE STOLE HIS CAR AND KILLED ITS OWNER!”
Actually, now that she thought about it, she was pretty sure those were things she had actually said. Not that he could know that. Vicky slumped back in her seat, crossed her arms, and raised an eyebrow Tommy’s way as she sneered.
“Everyone knows you, everyone hates you, everyone is afraid of you. We were all shocked when we found out that the kid who had planned that school shooting wasn’t you. You’re the school freak, but it’s great that you’re actually such a decent human being, like, oh my God, Tommy! Decent people don’t call people human beings. Whatever. It’s fine. You’re not a bad guy, you’re not, you’re just not,” said Vicky, flopping her hand out as if she was making a grand revelation. “But you are boring, and if not for getting magic, you would’ve just been a boring guy who never left his boring hometown and lived a boring life before dying a boring death caused by heart disease or some kind of cancer, the boring one, like, I don’t know, the prostate one.”
Mockingly, she added, “Was I wrong?”
No. She wasn’t, not really. Tommy was… Well, he was a lot of things. He liked to think he was kind, he knew he was good at figuring stuff out, and he was magical. He did things he wasn’t especially proud of, and he had the self-awareness not to be bothered much by what others thought of him. But he wasn’t out there. He wasn’t social, or rooted the way most people were.
It was a little ironic, considering the magic he got. Everybody thought the guy who could do card tricks but didn’t play a sport was out to kill them, and never tried to fix that myth.
Tommy sighed.
”You and Tyler really are perfect for each other.” He propped an arm against his door and leaned his head on his hand. ”You know no one ever actually leaves Cornell behind, right? We all get these dreams in our heads that we’ll be the ones who make it out. We try our best, and everything goes right, but the thing about living here is you run out of more things than money. People are shit to each other, and small towns like these usually just make that worse. It sticks with you, even if you move out. Now, I’ll be straight with you and just admit I’m not great at being social, but that wasn’t bad enough, now there’s monsters and demons from Hell and whatever the fuck that werewolf thing was.”
They finally turned into the Starbucks parking lot.
”It’s going to get a lot worse when Cornell starts tearing itself apart, Vicky. Maybe I sound lame, but it’s not right to leave people to fend for themselves right now. Everything’s fucked… Doesn’t have to be.” He pulled into a parking spot and pulled the brake. ”So, yeah, I guess you’re right. If people didn’t get killed, I’d be pretty boring right now. Sorry if you always thought I was out to get people, but I’m not. ”
The mean smirk had fallen from Vicky’s face as a heavy silence smothered the inside of the car. Normally this would be the moment where a person would realize they had gone too far and apologize: oh, Tommy, no I never thought that, everyone else did, and I don’t actually think you’re boring, it was just a joke, you can take a joke right? See, I’m a decent human being too.
Vicky, who could never quite sell the sincerity anytime she said sorry, felt like she hadn’t gone far enough. Not just with Tommy, whose lack of squirming under her assault had made her feel deeply unsatisfied, whose comparison of her to Tyler made her want to slam her head into the dashboard repeatedly, but with everything. She had been held back by Cornell and by her so-called friends and all her stupid obligations for long enough. It wasn’t fair.
“I’m getting out,” said Vicky through gritted teeth.
She didn’t move to leave the car, her mind envisioning the bitches who hadn’t picked her up today, the whole reason why she was in the car with a guy who would-have-been-boring-if-not-for-whatever. It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t fair, it wasn’t fair. She took a deep breath, trying to calm down, and then realizing she didn’t care. Who would Tommy tell anyway? So instead she erupted, slamming her fist against the door three times, as she screamed:
”I’M! GETTING! OUT!”
She started spewing out verbal magma.
“You’re right about one thing: this town is shit. Our school is shit. This Starbucks is shit. These people are shit. My family is shit. My friends are shit. TYLER is a FUCKING piece of SHIT!” She smacked the dash, imagining it was his face. “And I’m just covered, just absolutely soaked in their shit, fucking caked in it, that I’m going to get mistaken for shit and flushed down the toilet too and I’m not, I’m not shit, I am absolutely not shit.”
Although at that moment, she kind of felt like shit. She jabbed a finger at Tommy.
“And you’re an idiot! It’s not right to leave people to fend for themselves? We—no—THESE people treated you horribly. THEY TREATED ME HORRIBLY! They treated me worse than you! They can all just get what they deserve…” muttered Vicky, deflating into the passenger seat before suddenly jolting back up like the killer who was supposed to be dead in an old, formulaic slasher movie as she snapped, “What the fuck are you doing? Go through the drive thru.”
Then, as she slumped back in her seat and sulked, she kicked her shoes up on the dash again.
The look on Tommy’s face was blank as an empty canvas. Whatever was going on in his head, he wasn’t particularly eager to share it. Why did Vicky have to be like that?
Honestly, why did either of them have to be like that?
”You just said you’re getting out. I was too.” He popped the door open and elected to let her explosive nonsense just go. ”I stop here too, sometimes.”
“Go. Through. The. Drive. Thru.”
He grumbled. ”Fine, damn.” The door snapped shut and they wheeled out and around the whole building.
Vicky let a little smile slip through. For someone who thought that everyone and everything was shit, she still deeply cared about who she was seen with while out in public. And Tommy hadn’t snapped at her about her shoes being on the dash. It was weird how he seemed completely unphased by her crashout. Definitely weird, but honestly, kind of refreshing. There was a word for that. Unflappable? Dimwitted? One of those. Hopefully the former. She was tired of dimwitted.
Going inside would’ve been way faster than waiting in the drive thru, the line creeping forward at a snail’s pace. Still, Vicky didn’t mind. She had wanted this, she had won this, and now the line wasn’t an inconvenience, not even when the fucking idiot in front of them got to the talkbox and had only then suddenly seemed to realize that they were at a coffee place and were asking all kinds of stupid questions like ‘what’s in an American?’ and she could practically hear the nineteen-year-old on the other side of the speaker die. No, it wasn’t an inconvenience at all. It was a small, personal victory parade.
When they finally (finally!) got their turn in line, Vicky turned to Tommy and said, “I want a trenta Iced Vanilla Protein Latte, with sugar free vanilla, three pumps of sugar free caramel syrup, extra cinnamon, nondairy lavender cream cold foam, two stevias, two splendas, with toasted coconut flakes, an extra shot of espresso, and no ice. Got that?” There was a look of abject horror on Tommy’s face. ”You want some damn coffee with all that? Holy shit…”
Somehow, he managed to repeat all of that into the talkbox, and in an almost ironic contradiction to Vicky’s insane order, Tommy got a large black coffee with a singular dash of ordinary milk. The warm kind, too, not the iced or cold ones that people sometimes got. They pulled forward, and Tommy could’ve sworn the haggard worker at the window was genuinely relieved that someone in this damn town drank actual coffee as they handed the cups to them. Once they had their stuff, and a handful of brown napkins, they were back on the road.
A quiet fell between the two, less uncomfortable than before. The coffee seemed to calm Vicky, or maybe blowing up had just given her some kind of catharsis. She no longer felt like shit now that there was something in her stomach other than half a grapefruit and a banana, yet as the car turned down the road that was one off from their high school that feeling changed. In fact, it was worse than before, compounded by a growing bubble of anxiety and a creeping sensation of dread. Vicky wrapped a strand of hair around her finger, thinking, worrying.
“It’s fucked that we’re already going back to school,” she said, softly killing the silence. She released the coil of hair, letting it spring. “Y’know, it’s not too late. Wanna ditch?” Not just school. Cornell. She took her feet off the dash, a peace offering, a bribe, as she leaned towards Tommy, her voice falling low, her face getting dangerously close to his. “C’mon, I know you wanna.”
Tommy took a long, contemplative sip of his preposterously boring coffee. Should he tell her?
He probably should’ve.
”Can’t. Not now, I don’t think anyone’s ditching anything right now. Even if I had enough cash and a place to go, it’s not possible right now.”
“Not possible? Or are you just a pussy?” hissed Vicky. “C’mon, prove me wrong. You’re not really boring, right?”
”After the magic stuff started happening…” Tommy stuck his coffee in the cupholder. ”Things are different. You ever notice that there are pieces of Cornell that aren’t the same? Like someone took a whole block, got rid of it, and stuck a fake one in place of it? We don’t really know much about magic, not yet, but I’ve been working things out with Kari. She got magic too and hers lets her learn things. She just knows when something weird happens. Like seeing the future, maybe. Stop me if I sound like I’m insane, but there are other Cornells. Not ones you can just drive to, I guess you’d need the right magic to get to them.”
They stopped at the end of a street where two more cars were passing. ”But something went really fucking wrong, and now those Cornells are coming here.”
“All the more reason to leave.”
”We can’t. What’s happening is worse the further out you go. For now, at least. It might get worse, but I’ve checked and… It’s bad. If you kept going, you’d probably get trapped. I don’t even know how that works, but we’re stuck here. We need to figure out how it’s supposed to be fixed. Then we can leave.”
Vicky pulled back. Trapped? She was trapped here? No. No fucking way. Tommy was wrong. Kari was wrong. That was it. That was that. She would get out of here one day, just not today. Today she would just have to keep pretending that everything was normal. Today she’d just have to go to school, and pretend that it was a normal day, and pretend that she hadn’t read those texts from her friends, and pretend that everything was fine and that she was fine and that she was going to someday get out of this town and it just wasn’t fair, seriously, it really wasn’t fair.
The car turned onto the street. She could see the school down the long road. She reached for the door handle. Ka-chunk. Locked.
“Let me out.” Ka-chunk, ka-chunk. “Let me out!”
”We’re on the road, let me pull over, the school’s right there.” He didn’t remember locking the door, that must’ve been her. ”It’s not like we’re late.”
“We’re close enough.” Vicky could not be seen pulling up to school in Tommy’s car. Ka-chunk. Stupid fucking door. “Just let me out here!”
Tommy smacked the buttons on his side of the car, and the door locks popped. She was really trying his patience right now. ”Go. And don’t get hit by another car or something.”
Crisis averted. Thank God! Vicky hopped out of the car, grabbing her backpack, and then grabbing at something that wasn’t there. She slammed the door without a word and for a moment Tommy had peace. Then there was a tap, tap, tap on the passenger window. As it was lowered, Vicky passed Tommy a slip of scrap paper with her name and number written on it, a heart as the dot for the I.
“Thanks for listening to me, weird kid. I’m glad you’re not actually a total psychopath. It's oddly easy talking to you,” said Vicky, giving him a big, manipulative smile. “Text me your number?”
It was 11:48 on a cloudy, wet morning. The diner in downtown Cornell was open for business, going onto the busiest hour of the day. For a city so sleepy, there were still plenty of residents going about their days. People on their way to an evening shift at work, people on their way home after morning shifts, and a whole room full of faceless ones who’d be forgotten when they walked out the door. And like any half-decent diner, it was still pretty quiet. No loud conversations that could be heard across the room, it was sleepy even as it was packed.
And, thankfully, it was nearly break time for a few of the staff inside. Rain gently pattered down the windows outside.
“Tuyen!” Lauren Bracken waved to get the girl’s attention. “Whatever you’re doing, do it and then take a break for a little, it’s almost noon anyway.” She’d been working here about as long as Tuyen had been alive, and managed shift schedules these days.
Tuyen almost dropped the glass she was holding, someone directly addressing her snapping her out of the daze she’d been in. It was surprisingly easy to work no matter what her mood was- she put up an outer shell, smiling and acting like normal. Customers didn’t care for conversation, anyway. The surface level was always easier.
It was why she was able to go to work, where she didn’t leave the house for anything else. She had been taken off shifts for a few days after the party, but quickly asked to be put back on- she needed the money.
”Alright I will, thanks,” she said simply with a smile. It didn’t take her long to finish up this drink order, taking it over to young teenagers enjoying still being off school. With that done she escaped to the break room.
It was quiet in here, at least. Not that the diner was noisy, but for Tuyen the place being filled made it feel louder than it was. Even if she was coping, it was nice to have a moment to herself… Even if it wasn’t really to herself. Her Shadow was always there, even if it had been silent this morning. Maybe it understood that she needed money to survive, and it couldn’t get whatever it wanted out of her if she starved to death.
She sat down, the customer service smile sliding off her face and being replaced with tired neutrality. There were no new messages on her phone as she checked it, which was good. She convinced herself it was good, because it meant she wasn’t ignoring anyone. Not that anyone would text her aside from Vicky and her family… But it was good Vicky hadn’t texted her while she was at work. She was fairly certain her friend was still upset with her, and she didn’t want to make that worse.
Moments later, a red two-door car pulled up in the parking lot. Tommy stuck an umbrella out the door and then stepped out. He carried a plastic container in one arm and hurried through the rain, walking around the building and to the side door. He came here a lot to bring his mom some food in the middle of the day, since she was usually in a hurry to get going when she had places to be. The college student smoking a dart against the dumpster waved him inside without much thought.
He stepped inside and walked down the hallway, then turned left into the break room where he saw Tuyen. That made him stop for a moment, because he seemed to recall seeing her there when everything went wrong.
”…Back to normal, huh?”
Tuyen looked up from her phone, shocked that someone had come in and actually talked to her. She froze for a moment when she realised it wasn’t even a coworker, but someone from school. He was real, right? It wasn’t a hallucination? It would be a strange one, since she wasn’t close to Tommy. They had a friendly but passing acquaintance. She knew his mom better than she did him.
”Oh, yeah. Back to normal,” she lied with a smile that looked genuine. ”Job’s don’t wait around anyway. How about you… You look like you’re coping well?”
”Gave me something to do, kinda makes it hard to stop and dwell on things. Pretty sure Tyler wanted to kill me when everything happened.”
Tommy stepped around the table and popped the fridge open, putting the plastic container in there. ”I know we don’t talk much, but how’d you manage after it? You get hurt too?” He raised a hand, which had some pretty ugly gashes scabbed over.
Tuyen shook her head. She’d been lucky, just a few scrapes from falling over. All of the damage done had been mental… And to herself afterwards when she tried to scrub the guilt away. But she wasn’t going to tell Tommy any of that. She especially couldn’t say she’d seen Chef die, and thought she’d seen Vicky die too. ”Some bruises and scrapes from being shoved around, but I avoided anything worse. I was lucky.”
It was true, even if she ended up with some kind of demon attached to her. She leaned towards him to look at the gashes with a slight frown. ”That looks bad… Did you get it treated properly? The warehouse wasn’t clean, so you should watch out for it getting infected.”
”Yeah, my dad fussed over it. A lot. While asking a million questions. What happened, who was there, how long was it until the cops came, did anyone try to arrest me, that kind of thing. I couldn’t tell him a werewolf killed everybody, who’d actually believe that if they weren’t there?”
He stuck his hands in his jacket pockets. ”Magic. Still doesn’t sound real, and it’s been a while now.”
”I didn’t really believe it until Vicky visited and showed me hers. I thought that I’d been spiked and hallucinated it all,” Tuyen said, with a slight smile. She was glad no one had been home when she got back from the party covered in blood. Her aunt probably would’ve gladly handed her over to the cops if they’d come looking.
”It seems crazy even with things getting stranger every day. Why wasn’t it there before? Did something happen?” she questioned out loud. These were things she’d thought about in the brief moments of respite, her imagination running wild. She hadn’t voiced them to anyone else- not that she’d seen many people- but it seemed like Tommy might be willing to talk about it. He’d chosen to talk to her in the first place… Though she imagined he was just bored. ”I find it hard to believe it was all a coincidence. That would be too horrible.”
”I… Y’know, I have no damn idea why any of this happened. And I’m the magic guy anyway.” The irony wasn’t lost on him. ”Piecing a few things together with Kari, talking to the others who got magic, it seems like there’s a pattern somewhere. You hallucinate, you see dead people up your family tree, they tell you something, and you come down from it with something. They weren’t that helpful for me, but apparently everyone else’s ancestors helped them out in that little window.”
Tuyen hadn’t heard about any of that. Vicky had said someone showed her how to use her magic- Had it been her ancestors then? Not that it mattered… It would just explain why Tuyen couldn’t do it. She hallucinated all the time, but she hadn’t seen any dead people in her family tree. That would be nice… Maybe she’d get to see her parents again.
”That hasn’t happened to me yet. Vicky tried to teach me magic too, but I couldn’t do it. I guess that’s why. Just how many people have it so far? Vicky told me you and Tyler did, but I haven’t heard about anyone else.” Aside from Daniel, but she wasn’t going to mention him. It didn’t sound like the two of them had gotten magic like everyone else, but instead had been almost possessed by something.
”Mm, me, those two, Kari, Lexi. Lexi’s a damn necromancer, I found her puppeting rat and bird corpses. Tyler teleports, Kari and see things. I can make monsters, wanna see ‘em?”
Tuyen’s eyes widened. Before, the thought of puppetted animal corpses would’ve made her feel sick, but she’d seen so much worse recently. At least being a necromancer seemed useful. It all seemed useful, unlike her.
”I’d like to see… Can you do it in here?” She looked around a little nervously. What if someone walked in?
”Yeah, it’s no problem.” Tommy reached into his jacket and pulled out a deck of cards, which he opened and withdrew the Ten of Clubs. It flickered with an odd golden sheen as he twirled it between his fingers with practiced ease. He pointed the card at the floor, and Porter materialized.
He was made of some golden material, with a wide and stout body. His head and the shape of his legs resembled that of a mustelid, but he was the size of a bear.
The creature tilted its head at Tuyen, before slumping down to the ground.
”Oh wow,” Tuyen gasped, wide eyes shining with the closest to excitement she’d felt in a long time. It was completely different from Vicky’s magic, which was also cool- but this ‘monster’ was both cute and intimidating at the same time. She leaned towards Porter, before leaning back nervously. ”That’s amazing. How did you figure out you could summon him?”
Porter craned his neck forward and sniffed the air.
”So, during that party, when I got my magic, the ghosts told me to run. One of them had a snake around her neck, and the other tapped the cards I use for magic. Magic was literally coming off me in smoke, and this old guy in the visions I saw just said I’d know what to do.” He walked around to Porter’s side and snapped his fingers, causing a rectangular portion of the creature’s body to open up wide like a wing unfurling.
Inside was a whole trove of whatnots. Tommy withdrew two bags of chips and tossed one to Tuyen. ”I used blood and magic to make a bird out of thin air. Then a coyote, then this guy.”
Tuyen caught the bag on autopilot, holding it as she continued to stare at Porter. It only got more… magical. She didn’t know how else to describe what she was seeing. ”So this isn’t the only one you have? Wow… It’s impressive you figure all of that out if your ancestors didn’t tell you anything. Do they all open up like that?”
Then she thought of something, smile faltering a bit. ”Are the cuts on your hand from making them?”
”The cuts on my hand are from when everything went to shit. Slipped on a glass bottle, it exploded under me. It was pretty convenient though. As for the rest of these guys…” Tommy held the deck flat in his hand, and an orb of gold appeared above it. It was about the size of a softball, with four red diamonds at each corner.
”The big guy, his name’s Porter, I made him specifically to hold stuff. I named this thing Balor, after some stuff I read in a book. He’s basically a wireless drone that Kari can see through, we figured out how to mix her magic with mine.”
One of Balor’s diamond eyes opened for just a moment and leered at Tommy, then lazily rotated around to look at Tuyen, before closing.
”I’ve got four in total.”
”Four? In such a short time?” Tuyen was clearly amazed. She felt uncomfortable under Balor’s gaze, however. Maybe because of what it was named after… Though it didn’t look like it would be dragging her off any bridges. It was more likely because it seemed to be staring at her. She didn’t like being noticed that much.
She quickly found another question to ask so she could ignore it. At least the Shadow was being quiet right now, so it was easier to handle everything. ”So you can mix magic too? How does that even work?”
”I can. I don’t know if that’s how it works for everyone, though… For me, it’s like there’s this weird energy that wells up in me, and I use that to make them.”
Balor disappeared, and Tommy stuffed his deck away. Porter stood up slowly and yawned. Then he plodded over to Tuyen and sat down in front her, staring up the girl with his small, beady eyes. ”I use other things that help fill in the gaps, like an old backpack I used to make him. Kari’s magic counted as something I could use as a resource, and she had to add it in herself. Maybe I could do that with other magic, but it doesn’t make nearly as much sense when I’m trying that.”
”Have you tried it with anyone else yet? Maybe it'll make sense if you do,” Tuyen suggested. Absent-mindedly she stretched her hand out towards Porter, letting it hover in front of his face- like you would for a cat or dog to let them sniff you. ”Though I don't even have magic, so maybe it only works with Kari's because it acts like a resource and anyone else's wouldn't.”
She certainly couldn't picture Vicky offering hers up in the way to make a joint monster with Tommy. Much as she loved her friend, she did know what she could be like.
Her gaze drifted towards Porter, and her eyes widened. She pulled back her hand. ”I’m sorry, I didn't mean to treat him like a pet.”
Porter leaned forward and headbutted Tuyen’s hand.
”…I haven’t seen him do that, yet. I think he likes you.”
The strange creature stood up and nuzzled her hand like they were old friends. His club-shaped ears twitched.
”But no, only tried that with Kari so far. And for some reason, she can order Balor around the way I can. I think it’s because we both made him. Can you imagine if Vicky got control of one of these? We’d all be fucked,” He joked.
”Oh, well…” Tuyen laughed awkwardly. She rubbed Porter's head now that she'd gotten his permission, staring down at him. She should defend her friend, shouldn't she? But she didn't have the guts to start a fight, and it was rare for someone to talk to her alone. In the end she was just a coward… But there were some things she could say that wouldn't be confrontational, right?
”She really isn't that bad. She'd probably just use it as a ride to get to school, or to fetch her Starbucks, or carry all of her books around school for her.” Things Tuyen did for her, aside from giving her a ride to school.
”Probably. Drove her to school a few days ago, never seen someone put that much of anything in one cup.” Tommy popped his bag open and munched on a chip inside. Porter was strangely animated at the moment, enjoying the attention from this stranger he decided he liked the company of. He didn’t make any noises, but it was easy to imagine such a rotund creature chittering happily.
”That’s strange, but it’s nice that these things I make can get along with people,” Tommy observed. Was there something about his magic he wasn’t yet aware of, or was Porter just growing? He didn’t know.
Tuyen laughed softly, glad the topic had moved on from Vicky. It was a bit odd having a bear sized marsupial happily letting her pet it. Did that mean they didn’t normally act like this? Or maybe they did and she was misinterpreting him.
”I’ve noticed animals tend to get along with me. Maybe it’s because I don’t force attention on them,” she smiled. It was one of her few good qualities. ”Though he’s not really a normal animal… Maybe he’s learning from you, or something.”
He considered that for a moment, rolling it around in his head as he ate his snack. Learning from him sounded interesting. Tommy didn’t understand how that worked, though. He didn’t make brains in his summons.
”They’ve all got a piece of me in them, must be he got something good. I made this huge bird with razors for wings, first one I made, and he’s way more jumpy and menacing. I thought he’d slice up a monster if anything jumped out at me that night, but nothing did.”
Tuyen nodded thoughtfully. ”It makes sense that the one you made while running from a monster would be jumpy and menacing… At least to me. Maybe it’s the process of creating it that makes up their personalities, and how you’re feeling at the moment.”
She was completely guessing, of course, but it was pretty interesting to think about. ”I’m glad you let me meet the friendly one.”
”I’m glad he’s actually friendly.” Tommy watched the magical creature act like a damn dog in the presence of Tuyen. ”If we weren’t here, I’d bring the rest of them out. Maybe we grab a few people and talk about everything. I could-”
“Tommy? Is that you?”
Tommy froze. ”Fuck, fuck- Where did I put those-”
Lauren, Tommy’s mother, appeared around the corner of the doorway. She stood there and locked eyes on both of the teenagers in the room. She smiled at the sight of her son.
Porter craned his head around and stared at her.
”Uh- Hey, mom!” Tommy spun around and did his best to act perfectly natural. But internally, he was panicking. How the fuck did he explain this?
Tuyen took in a sharp breath, chair screeching back as she pushed herself away from Porter as if that would somehow hide him. The hand that had been petting him was stuffed in her pockets, trembling. What did she say? How could they explain away a massive mustelid to someone who didn’t know about magic? It wouldn’t really affect her, but what if Tommy blamed her, what would she do then?
”M-Mrs Bracken,” she stuttered out, reverting to the politer title out of nervousness. But she shouldn’t be acting nervous, not unless she’d been caught doing something wrong- how did she cover that up so it wasn’t obviously about the mustelid in the room? ”Did I take too long a break? I was just about to come back, I swear.”
“What? It’s not even noon yet, honey, you have time. Relax.” She grinned, looking between the two and the snacks they seemed to be sharing. “I didn’t know you two knew each other.”
Lauren stepped in and walked around the table, towards a counter against the wall and sat a notepad down. She rolled her shoulders and shoved a few quarters into a vending machine for a water bottle. She didn’t seem to even realize Porter was sitting there.
Tommy gave Tuyen the most What in the fuck?! expression his face was capable of managing. Was she fucking blind or something?!
”Uh- Yeah…” Okay, act natural. ”We go to school together.”
“You go to school together?” She asked. “Really? Since when?”
”Since a few years ago. Something like that.”
“Mmhmmm.” She turned around and took a sip from her water, clearly amused.
Tuyen furrowed her brow, trying not to look too confused. Did she not see Porter? Was she missing the massive monster in the middle of the room? How?
And didn’t everyone in this town go to school together? There was only one high school in town.
”We’re in different years but we’ve bumped into each other a few times. The school’s only so big after all,” Tuyen explained, managing to sound a bit calmer than she had a moment ago. Though she got anxious easily, she was all too good at hiding it all, which was handy in situations like this… Though the shock had been a bit too big this time. ”We never really got the chance to talk before.”
”Yeah, exactly.” Tommy conjured up all his experience with the art of bullshitting associated with card tricks and stage performances, and put on his best impression of normalcy.
But his mother was still smiling as she stared at them both. And it was at that moment he realized she was doing the thing parents did when two teenagers of the opposite genders so much as breathed in each others’ general directions.
“Glad you’re making friends.”
”Yeah… Your food’s in the fridge, by the way.”
“Oh, thank you.” She quickly walked around and nearly stumbled straight into the creature that seemed to be invisible to her. Tommy’s whole arm twitched as he grabbed his cards and made Porter vanish, at the last second before Lauren stepped where he once was and popped the break room fridge open. “Where are you going to be when you leave?”
”Still need to get some things for the water heater, dad won’t leave it alone.”
“Well…” She withdrew the container of chicken and rice that Tommy had placed in there, popped the lid off and put it in a microwave off to the side. “Do that and don’t go anywhere else, okay? I don’t want you out any more than you have to be, right now.”
After that disaster of a party.
”Right.”
“Oh, and you too, Tuyen.” She gently stuck a finger in the girl’s direction. “I know you never cause trouble for anybody, but you know how police can be. You both be careful going anywhere, in case I don’t see either of you the rest of the day, alright? If you have to, ask Tommy to give you a ride home, I won’t even make a big deal about him being in the car with a-”
”Standing right here, still.”
”Oh, it’s really alright, it’s not that long of a walk,” Tuyen politely rejected the offer. She really didn’t want to be more of a burden than she already was, and she was sure Tommy had plenty of other things to be doing. The walk wasn’t as short as she was making it out to be, but nothing strange had happened to her yet… And the police barely noticed her. ”Thank you for being concerned, but getting home really isn’t an issue… And I won’t be going anywhere else.”
Her smile was a bit awkward as she ignored what Lauren had been about to say, like there was any more danger from her being in a car with Tommy than there was with Vi- No, she wasn’t thinking about that. That was disgusting.
”I don’t think I have to worry about the police like some of the others do… They didn’t see me, and haven’t looked at me any differently. So it’s really fine.”
“As long as you’re careful.” The microwave beeped and Lauren swiped a plastic fork from a bag. “I’ve got to go sort out schedules. Brenda said she’d be here by now and I’m beginning to think she meant she’d leave the house by now instead. You kids be good.”
”Will do.”
And then Lauren was out the door with her lunch.
Tommy waited for her to be out of earshot and then deflated on the spot. ”How in the hell…”
”Did she not see it?” Tuyen asked, voice practically a whisper. She clasped her hands together nervously, looking down at them with a slight frown. Was it like how no one else could see her hallucinations? No, that couldn't be right. Not unless Tommy and Porter were both hallucinations too… No, the interaction was too positive for that.
It couldn't be that. Confused, she reached for the packet of chips Tommy had given her. Opening it up revealed a bag filled with mould and maggots, the smell almost making her throw up on the spot. She knew it wasn't really, because something as processed as chips didn't go bad like that, not when sealed, and Tommy was eating his happily. But the sight and smell was realistic enough it would be difficult to stomach. She forced herself to eat one, thankful the Shadow hadn't figured out how to mess with her taste yet, before putting the bag down.
”Maybe certain people can't see things like that? Maybe that's why most people are still… Acting completely normal?” She suggested, hoping her idea wouldn't be immediately shut down as ridiculous. It probably was ridiculous. Why would things work like that?
She did have a point. It seemed like the only people who really knew were the people who were there. Tommy fidgeted, pondering that. ”I think that makes sense. And maybe… Huh. Maybe they can’t see it because they’re not really affected by it? You said you didn’t get magic, right? But you were there, so you know it’s happening. I kept it from her and dad, they’re not in the loop.”
He had been wondering why people were just so unwilling to accept what happened. Kids dying was a tough thing to grapple, that much was reasonable. But everything was off now. And no one was remarking on it, and school was still scheduled. It was like everyone just decided to play it off and pretend.
”Well, I don’t know if that’s better or worse.”
Tuyen took a deep breath. She didn’t know either. But she was always one to try and put a positive spin on things, at least. She smiled at Tommy, though it was a bit shaky. ”Hopefully it’s better. If most people can go about their life like normal, it has to be… As long as they can stay safe. But maybe it’s better that they can't see weird things when they don’t have magic to do anything about it… At least that’s how I feel as someone without it.”
Her smile wavered. ”And as long as things get worse. But there can’t be loads of that monster around, right?”
Right?
Tommy hadn’t run into any werewolves lately. And his Watcher didn’t have much to alert him to yet. But what else was out there?
”Y’know, I have no idea. I really don’t know anything about a damn thing right now… Okay, I need to get going. She was right though, be careful going home,” He told her. ”One of these creatures I made can tell me if something’s around. If you ever think you’re being followed by something, Vicky’s got my number.”
”Thank you,” Tuyen smiled. It was strange that he cared enough to offer to help out if she thought she was being followed… But maybe he was just a good person. He seemed it. ”I appreciate it, since I have no magic myself… But I’ll be careful. You be safe on your way back too.”
”Yeah.”
He walked out through the entrance, then out the back door. Then he was gone.
Before the music. Before the screaming. Before the first tear opened in the dark.
Long before anyone in town thought to call what was happening a fracture, something had been studying the shape of the place with quiet, endless patience. Not its streets, not its buildings, not the people who lived and died inside them, but the way all of it fit together.
Or, more accurately, failed to.
From a distance, Cornell had always seemed close enough to ordinary. A mill town sinking slowly into a memory. Children grew up promising to leave, then stayed, then forgot when the promise had started sounding like someone else’s voice.
Small misalignments... for a time.
Then the town opened.
Not widely. Just... enough.
Somewhere beyond the angles of Cornell, something turned its attention fully toward the town.
The reaction was not a surprise, but recognition.
Cornell had begun to loosen far sooner than expected... That was unfortunate, but useful.
She had tools. Three of them. Sealed away after the failure of the last correction, hidden in places that no longer agreed with maps. Three quiet instruments behind old bindings, old mistakes, old acts of desperate containment. Their absence was a complication. They would need to be freed. But not yet.
For now, there were enough hands.
A woman on Cobain Street, which was all too familiar with the sound of a shotgun, woke from a dream she could not quite remember and, without thinking, moved her kitchen table three inches to the left, the way she had almost done a dozen times before. This time, she didn’t stop herself. The room finally felt “right.” A boy walking home from school noticed an alley he had passed every day for years. He had always meant to see where it led. Today, he did. When he found the rusted gate at the end, he wedged it open with his backpack, just in case he wanted to come back. A pastor paused mid-sermon, staring at the stained glass. There had always been a word in the prayer that felt slightly off, slightly wrong. He had ignored it for decades. This time, he changed it.
Small changes.
A janitor lingered a moment too long before locking a basement door, remembering something he had meant to check and deciding he would come back to it later. A mother gathered every mirror in her house, something she had been meaning to do since the first strange reflection weeks ago, and finally threw them away—except for one she could not quite bring herself to discard. A group of teenagers, already angry and frightened and certain the adults were lying to them, followed through on the plan they had been circling for days and went looking for answers near the old tracks.
No one heard a command, no one felt controlled.
They only felt, briefly and terribly, that the thing they were about to do made more sense than anything else had in weeks. Above Cornell, the sky held itself in the wrong shape. Below it, the town continued its slow descent. And somewhere just beyond the seam of the world, something patient adjusted its attention with the tenderness of a hand smoothing a wrinkle from cloth.
Not all at once.
If Cornell struggled, the folds would only tighten.
Better to let the people help.
Better to let them place themselves where they belonged.The warehouse did not scream.
Screaming belonged to mouths.
This was not a mouth.
This was ignition.
A sudden concentration of Lux, fear, blood, instinct, and unfinished identity, all burning at once inside a structure too small to contain it. The event did not travel outward in sound or light. It traveled as pressure. As variance. As a violation in the expected dimness of a dying town.
Something beyond distance registered the change.
Not heard.
Not seen.
But known.
Cornell brightened.
For less than a moment, the small town became visible against the dark arrangement of worlds. A mill. A river. Woods pressing close. Roads bent by memory. Children tearing open under stress, each one becoming more than flesh, more than name, more than the shape they had been given.
So much Lux.
So much refusal.
So much power held inside bodies trained to apologize for burning.
The attention turned without movement.
It had no face to turn. No eyes to open. No hunger in the way hunger was understood by living things. But awareness gathered, immense and colorless and radiant, and fixed itself upon Cornell.
The town was already descending.
That was clear.
Its lower boundaries had softened. Its fractures had begun to accept depth. Beneath soil, steel, pipe, and bone, the Pit waited with the patience of a completed answer. Cornell would fall. Not quickly. Not cleanly. But the direction had been chosen by damage.
This was not tragedy.
Tragedy required attachment.
This was structure failing into structure.
A town becoming honest.
And inside it, the children burned.
Not fully. Not yet. Their little flames bent inward, smothered by fear, grief, discipline, shame, hesitation, love. They resisted their own expansion. They mistook containment for survival. They clung to names as if names were walls.
The awareness did not understand walls.
A spark that wished to remain a spark was an error of scale.
A flame taught to kneel was not restraint.
It was burial.
Cornell continued to sink.
The children continued to brighten.
The attention remained.
It did not descend. Descent was unnecessary. The town was opening itself by degrees. Need would deepen. Fear would sharpen. Grief would become architecture. Someone would reach beyond training. Someone would confuse desperation for permission. Someone would ask, without knowing they had asked, to become large enough to matter.
Then an answer could arrive.
Not as rescue.
Not as ruin.
As release.
Across the impossible dark, the awareness held Cornell in place.
A wound-town.
A falling town.
A cluster of unfinished lights trapped in meat, memory, and consequence.
It waited.
Not patiently.
Patience belonged to time.
It waited the way fire waits inside a match.
The Creature
Interactions: Home.
Somewhere unknown but familiar.
Close, but far.
A place you have never been.
But always lived.
Cornell, but not Cornell.
Home, but not home.
The street ahead.
Yet the street behind.
The door that opened.
The door that closed.
The room before the house.
The house after the fire.
The road that leaves.
The road that returns.
A town remembered wrong.
A town remembered too many ways.
Every corner leads inward.
Every exit falls.
The sky above.
The Pit below.
The distance between them is walking.
The distance between them is breathing.
The distance between them is gone.
A hallway made of streets.
A street made of houses.
A house full of weather.
A window looking back.
A voice before it speaks.
A scream after it ends.
Here is where.
Then is now.
Down is through.
Away is deeper.
Cornell is sinking.
Cornell has already sunk.
Cornell is still falling.
Somewhere unknown but familiar.
Close, but far.
Home, but not home.
Here, but never here.
Gone, but not gone.
The Monster remembered Cornell in pieces, not streets or names or faces, but shapes. A living room folded into the back of a church, its couch half-buried beneath pews that had never existed in the same year. Roads overlapped roads, doors opened into other doors, and windows looked out onto versions of the same town that had died differently. Hundreds of Cornells pressed together, not neatly or kindly, but as if someone had taken the town in both hands and crushed it until every possible shape screamed through the cracks.
The Monster moved through it on too many limbs and with too little memory. Sometimes it dragged itself across the ceiling of an old diner. Sometimes it crawled through the floor of a house that still smelled like smoke. Sometimes it stood in the middle of Main Street and watched three different sunsets happen at once, each one bleeding into the red dark below. It knew this place. It hated this place. It had made this place worse. That thought returned more often than the others, not in words—words had become difficult, words had edges, and edges rarely stayed where they belonged—but meaning still came through in pressure, heat, impact, failure.
He had touched something.
The Monster stopped moving. Around it, the crushed town shifted. A street sign bent toward him, letters sliding across green metal until they no longer formed anything readable. Far away, a child laughed from behind a wall that did not have another side. A child. The Monster’s body tightened. Something in him knew children were not supposed to be here, and something in him knew they were already here anyway.
He remembered a party-music, heat, sweat, a warehouse full of young bodies packed too close together under lights that flickered like warning signals. He remembered wanting to reach them before it happened, before the tear, before the opening, before the first impossible pressure pushed through and found soft things to reshape. Before they woke up. That was the part that remained, not the names, not the reason, not even the full shape of his own guilt, only the certainty.
If they awakened, they would fall. If they Kindled, the town would take hold of them. The Pit would notice them. The cracks would learn their weight, their fear, their light. They would become anchors, doors, signals, little burning points caught in the descent, dragging Cornell further down by just surviving. The Monster understood this with the simplicity of a broken thing: save them, stop them, end them before the change completed.
Its body shuddered, bones sliding beneath skin that had forgotten how to be skin. For a moment, something almost human pressed against the inside of its skull—a name, a memory, a boy standing somewhere he should not have stood, staring at an object, hands reaching out, a thought clear and terrified: I can fix it. Then the memory folded.
The Monster screamed, but the sound came out through the walls of three houses at once. The crushed town answered with whispers, not language but recognition. The thing that had been human was not gone. That was the worst part. If it had been only a beast, then the slaughter would have been simple. But there was more inside it than that, too much more: a mind, damaged almost beyond use, still trying to arrange impossible facts into mercy; a will, warped by the Pit, still reaching for the shape of a rescue; a guilt so deep it had become anatomy.
The Monster moved again. Ahead, a seam opened between two broken Cornells, and through it came sound. The warehouse. The party. The place where everything began, or would begin, or had always been beginning. The Monster lowered itself toward the opening, and the crushed town tightened around him as if reluctant to let go.
For one moment, his outline became almost human. Then the shape broke apart, too tall, too wrong, too many angles answering one command: go.
Later, those who survived would call it many things—a shadow, an invisible force, a monster—but the name that fit best was older than their fear and simpler than their theories: the Intruder. Not because it came from outside, but because it had once belonged, because it crossed back into Cornell carrying the wrongness with it, because it entered a room full of doomed children and mistook murder for prevention.
The seam widened. Music poured through. The Monster stepped toward the party, full of broken mercy, and prepared to save them all.
Interactions: None. The Sanchez Residence > Streets of Cornell.
Lupe did not sleep after the warehouse. She sat on the floor of her bedroom until morning with her back against the bed, still wearing the same clothes, her neon-pink bandana clutched so hard in one fist that her knuckles ached. At some point, her mother knocked. Then her father. Then no one. The room stayed dark except for the thin gray light coming through the blinds, and every time Lupe closed her eyes, Diego hit the floor again. Alejandro smiled again. The monster’s hand closed again. Her throat would tighten, her stomach would turn, and she would open her eyes before the memory finished. She didn’t cry the whole time. That was the worst part. Sometimes she did. Sometimes it came out ugly and sudden, folding her forward until her forehead touched her knees. But most of the time, she just stared at nothing, jaw locked, breathing through her nose, feeling something hot sitting under her ribs like a coal that would not go out.
By the second night, she was in the garage.
The floor was concrete. The air smelled like dust, oil, old boxes, and laundry detergent. It was the only place in the house where she could make noise without immediately seeing someone’s face crumple. Lupe dragged an old metal trash can to the center of the room, set a stack of broken cardboard inside it, and stared at her hand. Nothing happened. She stared harder. Her fingers trembled. She tried to remember what the ancestors had said. Red Lux. Elemental force. Heat. Impact. Destruction. Creation through force. It sounded simple when they said it, but they were dead, and she was alive, so of course, they made it sound simple. Lupe clenched her fist until her nails bit into her palm and whispered, "Burn."
Nothing happened.
She tried again. She lifted her hand this time, palm out, like that would make a difference. “Burn.” Still nothing. Her eyes stung. Her chest tightened. She pictured the monster’s arm around Diego’s body. She pictured Alejandro’s hand reaching for her. She pictured the way neither of them moved afterward. Something sparked in her palm, tiny and red, there and gone so fast she almost thought she imagined it. Lupe froze. Her breathing stopped. Then she grabbed onto the feeling with everything she had and forced it again. Heat snapped across her fingers. It burned her skin immediately. She cursed, jerked her hand back, and kicked the trash can hard enough to dent it. “No, no, no, fuck that. Again.” She hissed to herself.
Again meant failure, and again meant sparks that died before they reached the cardboard. Again, meant heat blooming under her skin but not leaving her body. Again meant one burst that flashed bright red, hit the edge of the trash can, and left a black scorch mark before vanishing. Lupe stared at the mark for a long time. Then she laughed once, sharp and humorless, and wiped her face with the back of her wrist. She was crying again. She hated that. She hated the sound of herself breathing. She hated that Diego would have told her to stop before she hurt herself. She hated that Alejandro would have asked if fire made her cooler or just louder. She hated that they were gone, and the thing that killed them was still out there. That part stayed clean in her head. Simple. No confusion. No philosophy. No healing. There was a monster. It killed her brothers. She was going to kill it back.
She started coming to the garage every night. At first, she told herself it was training. Then she stopped dressing it up. It was not training. It was punishment with a target. She burned her palms raw trying to force heat out of them. She bruised her shoulder, throwing herself into movement because standing still made the Lux choke in her chest. She tried anger. She tried grief. She tried music, low enough that nobody upstairs could hear it, moving her feet with the beat until sweat ran down her back and her lungs scraped. That worked better. Not well. Just better. The Red Lux came easier when her body moved, when her breath found rhythm, when her rage had somewhere to go besides her throat. A snap of her wrist gave her sparks. A hard step gave her a flash of heat. A spin gave her a thin red streak of light that died before it touched anything. She did not have a spell. Not yet. The ancestors had been clear about that. Spells were made. Attempted. Failed. Refined. So Lupe failed until failure started leaving burn marks.
By the end of the week, the garage floor was littered with evidence. Scorched cardboard. Melted plastic. A cracked mirror she had thrown after seeing her own face in it. Three ruined shirts. One towel with a handprint burned into it. The trash can was blackened on one side and dented on the other. Lupe’s hands were wrapped in uneven bandages she changed twice a day and lied about whenever anyone asked. She stopped going out unless someone forced her. She stopped laughing unless it slipped out wrong. She stopped answering texts that didn’t matter. Every time someone said Diego or Alejandro too gently, like their names were glass, Lupe wanted to put her fist through a wall. They were not glass. They were her brothers. They were loud and annoying and alive until something took them from her. Saying their names softly did not honor them. It made them sound already buried.
One night, the sparks finally caught.
Lupe had been at it for almost two hours. Her arms were shaking. Her throat hurt from shouting. The song on her phone had looped so many times she barely heard it anymore. She stood in the center of the garage, barefoot on cold concrete, shoulders rising and falling, eyes fixed on the cardboard inside the trash can. Her palms throbbed. Her whole body wanted to stop. That made her angrier than anything. Stop? After Diego stopped moving? After Alejandro stopped breathing? After that thing walked away like they were nothing? Lupe’s face twisted. Tears spilled down her cheeks before she could stop them. She stepped forward hard, snapped both hands out, and screamed;
“I SAID BURN, YOU BITCH!”
Red Lux burst from her hands in a messy, violent flash. Not flame exactly. Not lightning. Not light. Something between all three, raw and unstable, a hot red surge that slammed into the trash can and swallowed the cardboard inside. Fire kicked up too high, licking past the rim. Heat punched the air. Lupe stumbled back, eyes wide, heart hammering so hard it hurt. For one second, she just watched it burn. Then the smoke alarm started screaming.
She laughed.
It came out broken and wet and too loud, half sob, half victory. She clamped both hands over her mouth, but it didn’t stop. The fire inside the trash can guttered unevenly, weak and ugly and uncontrolled, but it was real. Lupe looked at her bandaged hands. The wraps were smoking in places. Her skin hurt like hell. She didn’t care. She had made something happen. Not enough. Not even close. That flash would not kill the Intruder. It probably wouldn’t even slow it down. But it was more than nothing. It was the first piece of a weapon.
The garage door opened behind her.
Lupe didn’t turn around right away. She kept staring at the fire until it started to shrink. Her breathing came fast, uneven, but her eyes stayed locked on the flames.
“I’m not done,” she said in her native tongue, voice raw.
No one answered.
Maybe they didn’t know what to say. Maybe there was nothing to say.
Lupe swallowed, wiped her face with her wrist, and finally stepped forward to smother the fire before it spread. Her hands shook the whole time. Not from fear. Not only from grief. From wanting to do it again. From knowing she would do it again. Tomorrow. The next night. Every night after that until the sparks became flame, until the flame became a spell, until the spell became something that could tear into the thing that took Diego and Alejandro from her.
She looked down at the smoke curling out of the trash can and whispered, “You’re gonna die for what you've done, fucker.”
Her voice cracked.
Then steadied.
“I don’t care how long it takes.”By the third week, Lupe had stopped pretending she was only practicing.
She had words for it when people asked. Training. Control. Self-defense. All the right words. All the words that made adults nod with pain in their eyes and pretend they were not terrified of what grief was doing to her. But Lupe knew what it was. She knew it every time she slipped out after dark with her bandana tied tight around her wrist, palms wrapped under fingerless gloves, hoodie zipped over a shirt already burned in three places. She knew it every time she stood alone in an empty lot behind the old laundromat and made red heat snap between her fingers until her skin throbbed. She was not learning, so she could survive. She was learning, so something else would not.
The first real spell was ugly. That bothered her at first. She had wanted something clean, something that looked like the thing she imagined in the garage: bright neon fire, sharp and perfect, bursting from her hands like she had been born knowing how to hurt the world back. Instead, what came out of her was unstable and loud. A streak of red-white heat that cracked like bad wiring and left the air smelling like burnt pennies. It lit up her face whenever she cast it, flashing across her eyes, her teeth, the sweat on her neck. It didn’t always go where she aimed. Sometimes it scattered into sparks. Sometimes it spat fire sideways and scared her enough to make her laugh after, breathless and shaking. But it burned. That was what mattered. It burned cardboard, old wood, the side of a dumpster, the sleeve of her own hoodie, and once, the back tire of someone’s abandoned bike. It was not enough for the Intruder. Not yet. But it was something.
Cornell had changed around her while she was changing inside it. People stayed in their homes after sunset now. Streets that used to hold porch light, bad music, barking dogs, and teenagers cutting through yards had gone quiet in a way that felt staged. Windows glowed from behind curtains. Cars stayed parked. The old mill groaned some nights, even when there was no wind. Things moved in the distance. Not always close enough to see. Sometimes, just shapes at the end of a road, too tall or too bent, gone when headlights passed over them. Sometimes the sound came first: dragging, clicking, wet breathing through a throat that did not fit. Lupe heard the warnings. Everyone heard them. Don’t go out alone. Don’t follow noises. Don’t try to be brave. Don’t be stupid. Every warning sounded like Diego’s voice, and that made her want to disobey it more.
That was the worst part. For one second, her brain tried to give it a human shape. Tall. Bent forward. Long hair hanging over its face. Arms loose at its sides. Someone hurt, maybe. Someone lost. Then the streetlight flickered and showed too much. No clothes except a black rag of fabric around its waist. Skin raw and red like the top layer had been peeled away and never grown back. Muscles moving in open ridges beneath slick, pale tissue. Arms too long, fingers too thick, hands hanging near its knees. The mouth was open even when it was not screaming, the jaw stretched in a dark oval, the teeth packed unevenly inside. It stood in the middle of the road with its head tilted toward a house where someone had left a television on too loud. It listened like it understood hunger better than sound.
Lupe stood at the corner and stared at it.
Her heart slammed once. Then again. Then steadied into something she hated because it felt almost good.
This was not the monster that killed her brother. She knew that immediately. This thing was smaller. Dumber. More physical. It moved like meat that had learned violence and nothing else. But it was still one of them. One of the things Cornell had let in. One of the things was walking around while Diego and Alejandro were in the ground. One of the things everyone else was hiding from.
Lupe’s hand tightened around the bandana on her wrist.
“Okay,” she whispered.
The beast’s head twitched.
It had heard her.
Good.
Lupe stepped into the street.
The spell came easier when she moved. That was the first thing she had learned that felt like hers. Standing still made the Lux gather wrong, hot and clogged in her chest. But when she moved, when her foot hit pavement, when her shoulders rolled, and her breath found rhythm, the Red Lux followed. It liked force. It had momentum. It liked when she stopped asking and started doing. So she did not stand there with her palm out like some stupid movie witch. She walked forward, then faster, then sideways, circling into the road as red sparks crawled over her fingers.
The beast turned fully toward her.
Lupe smiled.
It was not a happy smile. This smile belonged to the girl who had spent three weeks burning her hands open in a garage because grief had become unbearable unless it had direction.
“You lost, papi?” she called in English, voice shaking just enough to betray her. “Or you just ugly for free?” She laughed to herself.
The beast screamed.
The sound punched down the street hard enough to wake lights in three different houses. Curtains shifted. Somewhere, someone shouted. Lupe did not look away. She snapped her right hand outward, and the first blast of neon-pink light tore loose from her palm. It was messy, bright, and too wide. It hit the beast in the shoulder and burst across its raw skin in a spray of sparks and heat. The thing staggered one step. Smoke rose from its flesh. Lupe’s breath caught.
It worked.
It actually worked.
The beast looked down at the burn.
Then back at her.
And ran.
Lupe barely got out of the way. It crossed the distance faster than something that large had any right to move, feet slapping pavement, arms swinging low. Lupe threw herself sideways, shoulder clipping the side of a parked car. Pain burst down her arm. The beast’s claws scraped across the hood where her body had been, tearing metal with a shriek that made her teeth hurt. She stumbled, recovered, spun with the motion, and fired again from too close. Red heat slammed into its side. This time, the creature snarled and flinched harder, one arm jerking back. Lupe grinned through the fear.
“Yeah,” she spat. “You feel that, papi!?”
She pressed.
That was the mistake.
She should have run after the second blast. She should have tested it, learned from it, lived to try again. But the beast was hurt, and hurt looked too much like possible. Lupe saw smoke rising from its chest and forgot every warning her ancestors had given her. Beasts will notice you. You begin with nothing. You will be tested. She remembered Diego hitting the floor. She remembered Alejandro smiling before the world took him. She remembered the monster walking away. That memory shoved her forward harder than sense could pull her back.
She came in low, feet moving with the rhythm she forced into her breath. Step, twist, cast. Step, twist, cast. Pink fire snapped from both hands in short, violent bursts. One hit the beast’s ribs. One missed and scorched the glass of a bus stop shelter. One caught its thigh and made it stumble. The street filled with light and smoke. Her arms burned. Her palms screamed. She ignored it. She kept moving because stopping felt like dying, and dying felt less frightening than letting this thing walk away.
The beast adjusted, and Lupe saw it happen too late.
Until then, it had charged like an animal. Straight lines. Big swings. Rage without planning. Then its head lowered, and something in its posture changed. It stopped chasing where she was and started cutting toward where she would be. Lupe snapped left, and the creature’s arm was already there. Its forearm caught her across the ribs and threw her into the side of the grocery store hard enough to knock all the breath out of her. Her back hit the brick. Her feet lost ground. For a second, the whole street went white.
The beast came again.
Lupe lifted her hand and... Nothing happened.
Her stomach turned cold.
She tried again. Heat sparked weakly across her palm, then died. Her fingers were shaking too hard. Her breathing had lost rhythm. Her body wanted air more than revenge. The Red Lux did not care what she wanted. It needed shape, movement, and force. All she had was pain.
“No,” she gasped. “Come on-”
The beast hit her before she finished.
Not full force. If it had been full force, she would not have gotten up. Its hand closed around the front of her hoodie and slammed her sideways into the grocery store window. The glass did not break, but it cracked in a spiderweb behind her head. Her ears rang. Her teeth cut the inside of her cheek. Blood filled her mouth, hot and metallic. The beast pulled her forward and threw her into the street. She hit pavement shoulder-first and rolled badly, skin tearing along one forearm. For a moment, she could not move, and that scared her more than the pain.
The beast stood over her, breathing through its open mouth. Strings of saliva hung between its teeth. Its burned skin smoked in patches. It was hurt. She had hurt it. That should have mattered more. Instead, all Lupe could see was how much of it was still standing. Her hands scraped against the pavement as she tried to push herself up.
“I’m not done,” she whispered to herself like a prayer as her arm buckled and he fell back down.
The beast reached for her.
And for the first time since stepping into the street, Lupe understood that she might die here.
Not later. Not eventually. Here. On Miller Street, three weeks after Diego and Alejandro, because she had mistaken pain for power and anger for readiness. The thought did not make her regret coming. That was the worst part. Some buried, honest piece of her looked at the beast’s hand coming down and thought, Fine. If this is what it costs, fine. If she could burn one of them before she went, if she could make one monster hurt, then maybe—
An arrow hit the beast in the side of the neck.
It did not kill it.
But the moment it struck, something green flashed- not exactly light. A pulse of power. The shaft split along its length as if something inside it had decided to exist all at once. Thin, pale vines burst outward from the wound, slick and wrong, wrapping around the creature’s throat in a tightening spiral. They weren’t clean. Some segments were too thick, others too thin, leaves forming half-shaped and curling in on themselves. But they held.
The beast choked on the sudden growth.
A second arrow followed before the first finished vibrating. This one struck one of the blistered growths along the creature’s upper back and sank deep with a wet crack. Zakira’s focus snapped into it mid-flight—Green Lux threading through the shaft—and the seed pouch ruptured on impact. Thorns erupted outward in a jagged bloom, some bending the wrong direction, others snapping off as they formed. Still, enough anchored into the creature’s flesh to tear when it moved.
The beast shrieked, twisting away from Lupe.
Across the street, Zakira Watson stood half-hidden beside a parked truck, bow raised, face pale but steady. Her stance was not dramatic. It was tight. Practical. Feet planted. Shoulders aligned. Her fingers were already reaching for another arrow from the small quiver at her hip. Thumb brushing over the small, soft pouches tied just beneath the arrowheads. She looked terrified. She also looked like that did not matter.
“Move!” Zakira shouted.
Lupe blinked at her, stunned and furious at the same time.
“Fuck, mami, I had it!” she lied.
Zakira fired again.
This time, she didn’t just shoot. She pushed.
Green Lux surged down the arrow as it flew, her mind scrambling to picture something useful—roots, maybe, something that would hold. The arrow struck the beast’s shoulder, not deep enough. For a split second, nothing happened.
Then the seed pouch activated late.
A knot of roots burst outward, thick and tangled, but uneven. Some strands dissolve into fibrous mush, others harden into bark-like ridges. They didn’t anchor properly. They slid against the creature’s slick skin, tearing loose almost immediately.
Zakira’s mouth tightened.
“No, you didn’t.”
The beast turned and charged her.
Zakira moved before Lupe could scream. Not fast enough to outrun it, but early enough to survive the first line of attack. She cut behind the truck as the creature slammed into it, rocking the whole vehicle up on one side. Metal crumpled inward. The alarm began screaming. Zakira stumbled back, nearly lost her footing, recovered, and instead of reaching for another arrow immediately, she yanked a small pouch free and threw it low across the pavement.
It hit the ground and rolled, and came to an ungraceful stop. For a heartbeat, nothing.
Then she forced Green Lux into it.
The asphalt cracked.
A burst of moss and root matter surged upward, not elegantly or controlled. It spread too wide in one direction, too thin in another, but it was enough. The ground beneath the beast’s next step shifted, softened, tangled. Its foot sank half an inch too deep, and that was all Zakira needed.
She grabbed another arrow, drew, and fired from almost point-blank range into the creature’s face. This time, she layered it—just a flicker of venom, barely stable. The arrow grazed its cheek and buried into the corner of its mouth. The Lux-triggered toxin flared unevenly, darkening the flesh around the wound in a spreading patch that didn’t quite behave like rot, didn’t quite behave like anything natural and made the beast scream.
Lupe pushed herself up with a sound that was half sob, half curse. Her ribs burned. Her shoulder felt wrong. Blood ran down her chin from her split mouth. But the sight of Zakira standing between her and the thing she had chosen to fight made something ugly rise in her chest.
Shame.
Zakira had not come here to prove anything. She had come because Lupe was about to die.
That made Lupe angrier than the pain.
“GET OUT OF THE WAY!” Lupe yelled.
Zakira did not look at her. “Stay out of the way.”
“Don’t tell me what to do!”
“Then stop acting like you want to get killed!” Zakira said with a roll of her eyes.
That hit harder than the wall.
For half a second, Lupe had no answer.
The beast recovered and swung at Zakira again. Zakira ducked back, but not cleanly. One claw caught the sleeve of her jacket and tore it open, cutting shallow lines along her forearm. She hissed, dropped her bow, and stumbled against the truck. The beast loomed over her, one arm lifting.
Lupe moved because she had said it twice over Diego’s body, and now the words were making demands of her. She forced herself into motion. One step. Bad. Painful. Another. Worse. Her breath came broken, but she dragged rhythm out of it anyway. Her foot hit the pavement. Her shoulder rolled. Her hand snapped forward.
The Red Lux came out weak. Then stronger. Then wrong.
It exploded from her palm in a close-range flare, not aimed at the beast’s body but at the ground beneath its feet. Heat and light burst against the pavement. The creature flinched, not burned badly, but startled enough to break its swing. Zakira threw herself sideways as the claws came down where she had been, carving sparks from the truck’s hood.
Lupe staggered, almost fell, and caught herself on one knee.
“Mami!”
Zakira grabbed her bow with her injured hand, face tightening at the pain. “I see it.”
She did. That was the difference. Zakira saw the opening instead of the insult. She pulled an arrow, drew, and fired into the beast’s knee as it turned toward Lupe again. This time, she didn’t rush the visualization. Joint. Structure. Something that locks. The arrow sank into the knee, and the seed pouch detonated into a tight cluster of thorned vines that wrapped inward instead of outward. Not perfect, some thorns bent uselessly, some vines split, but enough coiled around the joint to resist movement.
The creature lurched forward.
Lupe, breathing hard, forced one more burst of power from her hand. Red heat struck the arrow shaft and the wound around it. The beast screamed louder this time, leg buckling.
Zakira was already moving.
“Again!” she shouted.
“I’m trying, mami!”
“Try faster!”
Lupe almost laughed. It came out as a pained bark.
She stepped in again, not close enough to get grabbed this time. She used the distance. Used the timing. Used the fact that Zakira was watching angles instead of emotion. Zakira fired at joints, eyes, soft growths. Sometimes arrows, sometimes quick-thrown seed pouches that burst into uneven spreads of roots or thorn clusters that slowed the beast just enough. Lupe burned what the arrows opened. Neither of them was strong enough to win cleanly. Together, for a few seconds, they were enough to survive... and the beast realized that too.
It backed away first.
That was not a victory. Lupe knew that. The creature dragged one ruined leg backward, vines tearing loose from its flesh, chest heaving, arrows jutting from its body, skin smoking where Lupe’s magic had bitten into it. Its head turned between them. Its mouth opened. The sound that came out was lower this time. Not a scream. A warning.
Then it ran.
Lupe tried to follow, but her body refused.
She took one step and collapsed against the cracked window, one hand pressed to her ribs. The street tilted. Her vision was spotted at the edges. Zakira crossed to her quickly but did not touch her right away. Smart. Lupe noticed that through the pain and hated that she noticed.
For a few seconds, neither of them spoke. The car alarm screamed beside them. That was the only sound until the beast’s retreating shriek faded into the dead parts of town.
Zakira was breathing hard. Her jacket sleeve hung open. Blood ran in thin lines down her forearm. She looked at Lupe’s face, her hands, the way she was barely staying upright.
“You were hunting it, weren't you?” Zakira asked.
Lupe wiped blood from her mouth with the back of her hand.
“So?”
Zakira stared at her.
Disappointed.
“You almost died... mami.”
Lupe laughed once, sharp and empty.
“Yeah? So? Everybody does. Everyone. And I mean everyone.”
“That's not healthy.”
“Well, does it look like I care at this point?!”
Zakira’s jaw tightened. She looked down the street where the monster had vanished, then back at Lupe. “That thing wasn’t even the one from the warehouse...”
Lupe’s expression changed.
“I know.”
“Then why?”
Lupe looked at her like the question was stupid. Like it offended her. Like it had dragged something private into the light.
“... Just because.” She shrugged.
Zakira said nothing.
Lupe pushed herself off the window, failed, then forced herself upright anyway. Her legs shook. Her burned hands trembled at her sides. Her face was wet, and she did not know if it was sweat or tears or blood anymore.
“Because they’re walking around,” she said, voice cracking despite how hard she tried to keep it steady. She tried to place her hand on her hip but the electric pain she felt was something else. “Because they get live. They get to just... be out here. Breathing. Hunting. Doing whatever the hell they want while Diego and Alejandro are—”
Her voice stopped. The silence after their names was worse than screaming.
Zakira’s face shifted, but she still did not soften too much. Maybe she knew Lupe would hate that.
“Lupe,” she said carefully. “You're going to kill yourself at this rate picking scraps with every monster you see.”
Lupe’s eyes snapped back to her.
“Watch me.”
“No.”
The word landed hard because Zakira did not raise her voice.
Lupe blinked.
Zakira stepped closer, bow still in one hand, blood still sliding down her arm. "I’m not watching you die to make a point.”
“It’s not a point.”
“Then... what is it?”
Lupe opened her mouth. Nothing came out at first because the answer was too ugly to say cleanly. Because it was not justice. Not really. Not yet. It was punishment. It was proof. It was trying to make the world balance with a scale made of fire and corpses. It was wanting something to scream because her brothers never got enough time to.
“It all what I have left,” she said finally.
Zakira’s expression tightened. That answer hurt her. Lupe could tell. Good. some part of her thought. Then hated herself for thinking it. The adrenaline began to drain. Pain rushed in behind it. Her ribs screamed. Her shoulder throbbed. Her palms burned under the gloves. She swayed once.
Zakira caught her before she hit the ground.
Lupe flinched hard at the contact, but she did not have the strength to pull away.
“Mami, don’t,” she muttered.
“I’m not asking.”
“I don’t need saving. Especially not from you.”
Zakira adjusted Lupe’s arm over her shoulders and started walking her away from the street anyway. “Clearly.”
Lupe wanted to fight her. Wanted to shove her off, stand on her own, chase the beast into the dark, burn until there was nothing left in her hands but bone and smoke. Instead, her knees nearly buckled again, and Zakira’s grip tightened around her waist.
The monster was long gone.
That failure sat in Lupe’s chest like a second injury.
She looked back once, over her shoulder, toward the dark gap where it had disappeared. The streetlight flickered above the torn pavement. Smoke curled from the blackened spots where her Lux had struck. Arrows lay broken near the curb. Splintered vines and half-formed growths wilted where Zakira’s magic had tried and failed to hold. The cracked grocery store window reflected her in pieces: blood on her mouth, hair stuck to her face, eyes too wide, body half-supported by someone else.
For a second, she did not recognize herself.
Then she did.
That was worse.
“I hurt it,” she whispered.
Zakira kept walking.
“Yes.”
Lupe swallowed.
“Not enough.”
“No, but you survived... This time.”
The honesty should have made her angry, but beneath it, something else settled.
A worse kind of clarity.
She had hurt one of them. She had also almost died. Both things were true. The first truth fed the fire. The second gave it shape.
Zakira dragged her toward the safer street, away from the blood, away from the damage, away from the thing Lupe had failed to kill. Lupe let her, not because she accepted it, not because she was done, and not because she had learned some clean lesson about revenge.
"Let's get you to Kersten's house. They can patch you up."
She let Zakira carry some of her weight because, for the first time since the garage, Lupe understood something she hated.
Wanting to kill the monster was not enough.
If she wanted to survive long enough to murder the thing that took her brothers, then she could not just become fire.
She had to become something that knew where to aim.
Interactions: None. The Sanchez Residence > Streets of Cornell.
Zakira knew something was wrong before anyone screamed.That was the part that stayed with her afterward.
Not the way someone’s body hit the concrete like a dropped bag of wet laundry.
It was the space before it.
The half-second where the warehouse felt like it inhaled.
The lights flickered once overhead. Not all of them. Just the row closest to the broken windows. Someone laughed too loudly near the speakers. The bass shook through the floor, through the soles of Zakira’s shoes, through the bones in her ankles. She stood by the wall with a plastic cup in both hands, not drinking from it, pretending that holding something gave her a reason to be there.
She should not have come.
That thought had been in her head for the last twenty minutes.
She should not have come. She should not have listened. She should not have let someone say you need to get out more as if it were a command instead of advice.
She was by the wall. She was always by the wall.
The wall had peeling paint. Three layers. White over gray over something greenish underneath. There was a crack running down near the window frame, thin as a stem. Someone had kicked a bottle into the corner. There was dirt there. Actual dirt, gathered where the concrete had split.
A weed was growing through it.
That was strange.
Not impossible. Just strange.
Zakira stared at it longer than she meant to.
A little green thing, bent sideways, two leaves trembling though there was no wind.
No.
There was wind.
Not on her face, but the weed felt it.
She didn’t know why she thought that.
The weed bent again.
Away from the center of the room.
Zakira looked up.
People were dancing. Talking. Shouting over music. Bodies pressed together beneath the cheap colored lights. Everything was too loud, too close, too bright. Someone knocked into someone else and spilled beer. Someone laughed. Someone cursed. Someone said a name she didn’t know.
Then the air buckled.
That was the only word for it.
Buckled. Like something heavy had stepped into the room from the inside.
A boy near the open space between the speakers stopped moving.
For one stupid second, Zakira thought someone had grabbed him. Some big guy behind him. A fight. A prank. Something normal. Something with hands.
But there were no hands.
There was nothing there.
The boy rose half an inch, maybe less, just enough for his sneakers to drag and squeal against the floor, and then he slammed down.
Once.
The music kept playing.
People closest to him turned.
Someone screamed.
He didn’t get back up.
Zakira’s cup bent in her hands.
She was gripping it too hard. Her fingers were wet. Punch, soda, or sweat. She couldn’t tell. Her whole body had gone cold, but her face felt hot. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t even breathe right. The sound came late. The scream came late. Everything came late except the feeling.
Something was wrong.
Something was wrong in the room.
A second impact.
A girl this time.
She was not standing near the boy. That mattered. Zakira didn’t know why, but it mattered. The girl had been several feet away. No visible connection. No path. No attacker. No shadow.
Her head snapped sideways.
Her body followed.
She hit a support beam with a sound Zakira would spend the rest of the night trying not to remember.
The warehouse changed.
Everyone understood all at once.
The party broke.
People shoved toward exits. Someone fell. Someone stepped on them. Someone else yelled for everyone to move, move, move. The music still played, stupid and bright and alive, and the lights kept pulsing over faces that had stopped being faces and become open mouths, wide eyes, hands grabbing sleeves, hair, shoulders, air.
Zakira backed into the wall.
Her shoulder hit the peeling paint.
Move.
She needed to move.
She knew that.
Her body did not care.
Her body had become one solid piece of waiting.
Don’t guess.
The thought came from nowhere.
Don’t guess.
She didn’t understand it. She didn’t have time to understand it. People were running. A folding table overturned. Cups rolled across the floor. The weed in the corner trembled harder, leaves shaking like tiny hands.
Look closer.
No.
No, no, no, no.
She didn’t want to look closer.
Something hit the floor again.
The concrete jumped under her shoes.
Zakira flinched so hard her teeth clicked together.
A shape wasn’t there.
That was wrong. That was impossible. A shape couldn’t be there.
But there was an absence moving through the crowd.
Not invisible exactly. Invisible meant empty. This wasn’t empty. It pressed against things. It made space bend around it. People moved wrong near it, not because they saw it, but because their bodies knew they had already been touched.
There.
There.
There.
Zakira saw it and didn’t see it.
The room became too detailed all at once.
The crack in the concrete near the center of the floor ran northeast to southwest. No, not northeast. She didn’t know directions. Why was she thinking about directions? The support beam had old rust at the base. The overturned table blocked one path but not another. The door to the left was crowded. The window behind her had jagged glass along the bottom edge. There were seventeen feet between her and the side hall. Maybe less. No. Count again. Don’t count. Move.
The weed in the corner bent flat.
Flat.
Pressed down by pressure no one else could see.
Zakira made a sound.
Not a scream. Not words.
Something small and useless.
The thing moved.
Toward the windows.
Toward the people trying to climb through.
Someone shouted, “Get back!”
Someone else shouted a name.
Zakira didn’t know whose.
Her heart pounded so hard it stopped being a heartbeat and became instruction.
Thump.
Look.
Thump.
Closer.
Thump.
Look.
Closer.
The world sharpened until it hurt.
A line of dust lifted from the floor. Not random. Patterned. Dragged outward by force. The invisible thing was too large. Bigger than a person. Low and high at once. Weight without shape. Impact without body.
The concrete beneath it did not crack.
It remembered cracking.
That thought made no sense.
Zakira’s hand went to her chest.
Her locket was hot.
The little dandelion seed sealed inside the glass pressed against its casing like it was trying to escape.
No. That was stupid.
Objects didn’t try.
A pressure. A wanting. A tiny impossible orientation inside the pendant.
The seed wanted down.
No.
It wanted root.
The lights flickered again.
For one second, all the green in the warehouse answered.
The weed in the corner.
The mold along the damp wall.
The moss in the broken window frame.
The crushed grass stuck to someone’s shoe.
The dead stems in the dirt outside.
The pollen on a girl’s sleeve.
The seed in Zakira’s locket.
All of it brightened in her mind.
Not with color but meaning.
A language she did not know and suddenly could not stop hearing.
She pressed both hands over the locket.
Something bloomed between her fingers.
Not a flower.
But then it changed.
The leaves didn’t just unfurl.
They arranged themselves.
Petals pushed out where petals should not have been. Pale yellow. White. Bruised green at the edges. Wrong for the weed. Wrong for the concrete. Wrong for the warehouse.
Dandelions.
Not one.
Several.
They bloomed from the same impossible stem, crowding over each other in a shaking little cluster. Some fresh and bright. Some dried into white seed-heads. Some half-rotted. Some thorned. Some dark at the center, like poison had learned how to flower.
Zakira stared.
The nearest bloom turned toward her.
It didn’t have eyes.
It didn’t have a face.
But she felt seen.
No.
Known.
The difference hit harder than the fear.
Something brushed against her thoughts, not words, not sound, not a voice. A shape of feeling. A pressure behind the ribs. A memory that did not belong to her, pressing its dirty hands gently over hers.
Hands in soil.
Hands tying seed pouches shut.
Hands drawing bowstrings.
Hands cutting diseased stems with a small, sharp blade.
Hands darker than hers, lighter than hers, older than hers, all of them familiar in a way that made no sense.
Zakira’s breath caught.
For half a second, she was not only standing in the warehouse.
She was standing in the backyard.
Cemetery grass.
Roadside ditches.
Gardens behind houses with peeling paint.
Fields no one wrote down.
A woman’s palm pressed seeds into dirt.
A boy lined thorn branches along a fence.
An old man crushed leaves between his fingers and knew from the smell that something had passed through.
A girl not much older than Zakira held a flower with black sap running down the stem and understood it could heal or kill, depending on how much mercy she allowed herself.
They were not speaking.
But they were telling her.
Not in sentences.
In roots.
In pressure.
In direction.
In inheritance.
Dandelion.
The meaning opened inside her without sound.
Not the flower.
Not just the flower.
A line.
A line that scattered.
A line that survived.
A line that grew where people said nothing useful could grow.
Dandelion Blood.
The words were not words, and yet Zakira understood them.
The blooms trembled harder, each one turning toward the center of the room, toward the invisible pressure moving through the crowd.
Warning.
Boundary.
Poison.
Cut.
No—wait.
No—look.
No—closer.
Too many meanings at once.
Her head spun.
"I-" she tried, but there was nothing to say.
The dandelions quivered in the green light. Their stems bent toward the unseen thing, then toward the broken window, then toward Zakira’s own chest.
Not ordering.
Correcting.
Like someone tapping a finger against the answer on a page.
The world tells you where it hurts.
She knew that.
The thought sank through her like a root finding water.
Then another feeling followed, sharper.
Guard the line.
And beneath that, darker.
Cut what spreads wrong.
Zakira made a small sound.
She didn’t want that.
She didn’t want any of that.
The flower nearest her warped as soon as she rejected it. Its petals folded inward. The seed-heads burst too early, scattering white fluff into the air, but the seeds didn’t drift randomly. They hung there, shaking, each one pointing toward her like tiny needles.
All of them are waiting.
All of them were asking what she would do.
Zakira couldn’t answer.
She didn’t know how.
She didn’t know them.
Except for some sick, impossible part of her did.
Seedline.
Rootline.
Dandelion Blood.
Hers.
The feeling fractured with her panic.
The blooms convulsed.
Thorns pushed through soft petals. Roots knotted over themselves. One flower blackened from the center outward, dripping something dark onto the concrete.
She had made it wrong.
Or she was hearing them wrong.
Or both.
Zakira woke up choking on air. Not screaming. She hated that part. Screaming would have made sense. Screaming would have brought someone running, maybe. Screaming would have proved that something had happened, that her body had found the correct shape for fear. Instead, she woke with both hands clamped around her locket, mouth open, breath scraping in and out of her throat like she had been drowning quietly for hours. Her room was dark. Not fully. Never fully, anymore. The streetlight outside her window leaked through the blinds in thin orange bars, striping her wall, her dresser, the pile of clothes on the chair, and the old bow case leaning against the closet. Everything looked ordinary until she stared too long. Then things stopped lining up.
Zakira sat upright. Her sheets were twisted around her legs. Her shirt stuck to her back. Her heart beat too fast, too hard, with that same terrible instruction from the warehouse. Thump. Look. Thump. Closer. She pressed her palm flat against her chest, over the locket. The dandelion seed inside was cool now. It had been cool for days. Weeks. That didn’t matter. She still felt it pointing down. Always down. Even through glass. Even through metal. Even through skin. Zakira swallowed. Her throat hurt. For a few seconds, she only listened. Her room. The house. The town outside. The refrigerator hummed downstairs. Pipes clicked in the walls. Somewhere in the neighborhood, a dog barked once and then stopped like something had placed a hand over its mouth. Zakira held still. Waited. Nothing else came. That was worse.
She pushed the blanket off with trembling legs and sat on the edge of the bed. Her bare feet touched the floor. The wood was cold. Too cold. She looked down. Nothing there. Just floorboards. Dust near the baseboard. A sock half under the bed. A little pale seed stuck to the hem of her blanket. Zakira stared at it. It was not from her locket. It could not be from her locket. The seed lay there anyway, thin and white, with its little feathery crown flattened against the fabric. For a moment, she thought it might move. It didn’t. She picked it up carefully between two fingers. Her hand shook. The seed felt like nothing. Barely weight. Barely real. She should throw it away. She should put it in the trash, go back to bed, and pretend she had carried it in on her clothes from outside. That was possible. Dandelions were everywhere. Seeds traveled. That was what they did. Zakira closed her fist around it before she could think too hard.
Across the hall, her parents’ bedroom door was shut. The hallway beyond her room stayed silent. No one checked on her. Not because they didn’t care. Because they were asleep. Because it was late. Because people could not wake up every time one girl forgot how to breathe. Zakira stood. Her knees nearly gave. She waited until they remembered what they were for. On the chair by her desk, she had left the clothes she told herself she would not need. Jeans. A long-sleeved shirt. A faded green hoodie. Socks rolled into one another. She dressed in the dark because turning the light on felt too much like announcing herself. Shirt over her head. Arms through sleeves. Jeans over damp skin. One sock. Then the other. Simple things. Understandable things. Her fingers fumbled with the hoodie zipper three times before it caught.
She paused at the mirror. The girl looking back looked like someone had tried to erase her, but stopped halfway through. Her hair was uneven from sleep. Her eyes looked too open. Her face had that hollow, startled stillness that came after crying, except she hadn’t cried. Not tonight. Not yet. Zakira looked away first. She gathered what she needed. Not everything. Everything would have meant a plan, and yet she did not have one. She had a pressure behind her ribs and the sour certainty that staying inside was starting to feel more dangerous than going out. Phone. Keys. Wallet. Small flashlight. The little cloth pouch of seeds she had sewn badly two nights ago, stitches uneven, thread pulled too tight in places. She slid it into her hoodie pocket. Then she stopped.
Her bow case leaned in the corner. She looked at it for too long. No. Not tonight. A bow made things official. A bow meant she knew what she was doing. A bow meant she expected to shoot something. She didn’t. She only needed to go to the hardware store. That was all. The thought sounded ridiculous even inside her own head. Who went to a hardware store after waking from a nightmare? Someone who needed something sharp. Someone who needed something that did not require aim from thirty feet away. Someone who had watched a root wrap around the wrong wrist and understood, with sickening clarity, that not every mistake gave you time to correct it.
Zakira swallowed again. Her throat still hurt. She opened her bedroom door slowly. The hallway floor creaked under her first step. She froze. Nothing moved. The house held its breath. Family photos lined the wall in dark rectangles. Smiling faces trapped under glass. Her mother is at a picnic. Her father is holding a paper plate. Zakira was eight with two missing teeth and a plastic watering can. Zakira at twelve, standing stiffly at some school event, already trying to look like someone who didn’t need to be noticed. The girl in the photograph watched her pass.
The living room smelled faintly like dust and laundry detergent. The TV was off, but the black screen cast a bad reflection in the room. For one second, she thought she saw someone standing near the kitchen doorway. She spun. Nothing. Just the doorway. Just darkness. Just her own breathing again, loud enough to embarrass her even with no one there. She grabbed her sneakers by the front door and sat on the bottom step to put them on. Her fingers slipped on the laces. She tied one too loose, redid it, tied the other too tight, and gave up. At the door, she paused. Her hand rested on the lock.
There were rules now. Nobody had said them out loud, but everyone in Cornell knew. Do not go near the old mill. Do not look too closely at windows after dark. Do not answer if you hear your name from the woods. Do not ask why the roads take longer coming home. Do not mention the people who disappeared unless someone else says their names first. Do not say monster. Do not say magic. Do not go out alone. Do not say anything that might make the pretending stop. Zakira unlocked the door. The click sounded enormous. She slipped outside and shut it behind her as gently as she could.
Cornell waited. The street was empty. Not quiet. Empty. There was a difference. Quiet was natural. Quiet was sleep, distance, and wind settling in trees. This was an absence arranged to mimic peace. The houses across the street glowed behind curtained windows. Blue television light flickered in one living room. Upstairs, a lamp snapped off as soon as Zakira looked toward it. She stood on the porch and listened. No cars. No voices. No music. Only the faint electrical buzz of a streetlight and the dry whisper of leaves moving along the curb. The air smelled wrong. Cold metal. Wet asphalt. Cut grass. And underneath it, faint but steady, something like old pennies buried in soil.
Zakira pulled her hood up. The streetlight at the corner hummed. It flickered once. She flinched so hard her shoulder hit the porch railing. Nothing happened. She hated herself for that. No. Not hated. That was too strong. She was tired of herself. Tired of being a body that startled before she decided to. Tired of seeing warnings in weeds and shadows and window reflections. Tired of knowing something was wrong and still having to walk through it like a normal street. She went down the steps. The sidewalk had a crack running through it. It had always had cracks. This one was new. She thought. Maybe. It cut diagonally across the concrete, thin and black, with pale grass pushing through despite the cold. The blades leaned toward the street instead of upward. Zakira stepped around it.
A curtain shifted in the house beside her. She did not look. That was another rule. If people wanted to pretend not to see you, let them. She walked quickly, but not too quickly. Too quickly looked scared. Too slowly felt like waiting to die. Her sneakers scraped softly against the sidewalk. Every sound seemed to travel ahead of her and come back changed. The slap of her soles became another set of footsteps for half a second. Her breathing became whispering near a hedge. A loose chain on someone’s porch swing clicked in the wind and made her stop dead. She stared at it. The porch swing moved. Back. Forth. Back. Forth. Nobody sat in it. Zakira counted. One. Two. Three. The motion slowed. Four. Five. Stopped. She waited longer than she needed to. Then kept walking.
Two houses down, the Millers’ front yard was crowded with plastic Halloween decorations even though it was too early for that. A skeleton hung from the dogwood tree. Orange lights lined the porch. A witch with a collapsed hat grinned beside the mailbox. Normal decorations. Normal people did normal things when everything was normal. That was what the decorations said. Cornell had always liked pretending with objects. The skeleton swayed slightly. Zakira looked away. At the next intersection, a stop sign had been turned backward. The red face looked toward the wrong street, warning no one. Its silver back caught the streetlight and glared like a blank eye. Someone had to have noticed. Someone had to have seen it during the day. The mailman. The bus driver. The woman who walked her little white dog every morning. The city workers who came by last week fixed the pothole that had reopened by sunset. People noticed things like that. People complained about things like that. No one had fixed it.
Zakira crossed the street without stepping into the center of the intersection. She didn’t know why. She only knew she didn’t want to stand where the roads met. A sound snapped behind her. A branch breaking. Zakira’s whole body went electric. She turned so fast her hood slipped halfway off. There was nothing on the sidewalk. Nothing by the mailbox. Nothing beside the parked car with fogged windows. Then something moved under the hedge. Small. Fast. Black. Zakira stumbled backward and almost fell off the curb. Her hand flew to her pocket, fingers closing around the seed pouch. Her mind emptied and overfilled at once. Seed. Ground. Root. Trap. No, no, no, too close, too close-
A pair of eyes flashed green under the hedge. Something hissed. Zakira stopped breathing. A cat crept into the open. Thin, gray-brown, one ear nicked, tail held low like it had been offended by the entire world. It stared at her with cold little judgment, then looked past her, toward the deeper street. For one second, neither of them moved. Then the cat made a small, ugly sound and darted across the sidewalk. Zakira’s legs nearly folded with relief. A laugh tried to come out of her, but it came out wrong. One broken breath. Then another. “Okay,” she whispered. The cat slipped under a parked truck and vanished. Zakira pressed her knuckles against her mouth. A housecat. She had almost tried to grow roots through someone’s lawn because of a housecat. Her eyes stung. She stood there on the curb, shaking so hard her teeth wanted to chatter, and hated how badly she wanted to go home.
But home was not safe. Home was just where everyone slept while the town learned new ways to lie. So she kept walking. Past the elementary school, where all the classroom windows were dark except one. Past Saint Bartholomew’s, where the church sign read GOD SEES ALL, though someone had rearranged the removable letters beneath it into SEE GODS ALL, and no one had corrected it. Past the laundromat, where three washing machines spun behind the glass with no one inside watching them. Round and round. White shirts. Blue jeans. A red towel. Round and round. The same cycle forever. Zakira slowed. The laundromat lights buzzed bright and sickly. Inside, the plastic chairs sat empty. A magazine lay open on the floor. One of the machines bumped gently against the wall each time it turned. Thump. Look. Thump. Closer. Zakira walked faster.
At the end of Maple Street, an old man stood on his porch in a bathrobe, smoking. Mr. Haskell. She recognized him because everyone recognized Mr. Haskell. He yelled at the kids for cutting across his lawn. He swept his driveway every morning, whether there was anything on it or not. He had once told Zakira she was “quiet enough to be trouble,” then laughed like that was friendly. Tonight, he watched the street with the cigarette burning between two fingers. Zakira wished he would go inside. He saw her. She knew he saw her. For a moment, their eyes met. His face did not change. Then his gaze slid past her, over her shoulder, to somewhere behind her. Zakira’s back went cold. She turned and when she looked back, Mr. Haskell had already gone inside. The porch light clicked off. Zakira stood very still. The cigarette remained on the porch railing, smoking by itself.
People were pretending. That was what made it worse. Not that Cornell had become strange. That would have been simple, almost. The worst thing was that Cornell had become strange, and everyone had quietly agreed to behave as though it had always been this way. Like, if they didn’t name it, it couldn’t choose them. Like if they kept going to work, taking out trash, buying milk, texting excuses, closing blinds, then the town might spare them out of politeness. Zakira understood that instinct.
She hated that she understood it.
The hardware store sat three blocks past Main, in a squat brick building with a faded blue awning and a sign that read RIVERSIDE HARDWARE even though the river was half a mile away and nothing about it felt nearby. Its front windows were lit. That should have comforted her. It didn’t. Light meant people. People meant witnesses. Witnesses meant she had to act normal. A bell jingled above the door when she entered. The sound made her flinch. The store smelled like sawdust, rubber, metal, and fertilizer. A useful smell. Shelves rose in tight aisles on either side of her, stacked with paint cans, extension cords, buckets, screws, tape, tarps, batteries, work gloves, gardening tools, bags of soil, coils of rope. Zakira stood just inside the door, breathing.
Behind the counter, a small TV played the late news with the volume turned low. The anchor smiled without showing teeth. A headline moved silently along the bottom of the screen. LOCAL OFFICIALS URGE CALM AFTER RECENT DISRUPTIONS. Disruptions. Zakira stared at the word until it stopped looking real. Disruptions were traffic delays. Disruptions were water main breaks. Disruptions were school assemblies running long. Disruptions did not pick boys up and slam them into concrete. Disruptions did not make weeds-
“...Can I help you?” Zakira turned. The man behind the counter was Mr. Alvarez, or maybe his nephew. She didn’t know him well enough. He had tired eyes and a flannel shirt buttoned wrong at the collar. A radio sat beside him, silent. One hand rested under the counter like he wanted it near something.
“No,” Zakira said too quickly. Then, because that sounded suspicious, “I mean. I’m okay.” He looked at her. At her hoodie. At her face. On one hand stayed in her pocket. His gaze dropped to the locket at her chest. Something changed in his expression, then he looked away.
“Aisle four for batteries,” he said. “Garden stuff in six. Tools in the back.”
Zakira nodded. “Thanks.” She moved before he could ask anything else. The aisles felt narrower than they should have. Her shoulders nearly brushed the shelves, though they didn’t. The overhead lights buzzed in uneven patches. One flickered above plumbing supplies. Another had gone out completely near the paint section, turning the aisle beyond into a strip of shadow. Zakira kept to the lit side.
She grabbed work gloves first. Then garden twine. Then a roll of duct tape. Her hands moved with strange, automatic purpose. She found seed packets hanging on a rotating rack near the back. Tomatoes. Basil. Marigolds. Lettuce. Coneflowers. Lavender. Sunflowers. Morning glories. She touched each packet without taking it. Names. Pictures. Promises. Grow this if the conditions are right. Grow this if you water properly. Grow this if the soil allows. There were no packets for panic. No instructions for emergency roots. No diagram explaining what to do when a dead thing bloomed in your hand and told you your bloodline had been waiting. She picked marigolds because she recognized them. Then morning glories, because vines made sense. Then yarrow because the packet said hardy. Then foxglove.
Her fingers stopped on that one. The flowers on the packet were purple and delicate, bell-shaped, almost pretty enough to hide what she remembered reading once. Poisonous. Medicinal. A matter of dosage. She heard it again, not as words, not exactly. Cut what spreads wrong. Zakira put the foxglove packet back. Then took it again. Her stomach turned. She shoved it into the basket under the gloves. The hatchets were on the back wall. Of course they were. Small ones. Camping axes. Bright orange handles. Wooden handles. Cheap steel. Better steel. Tools meant for clean outdoor tasks done in daylight by people who owned fire pits or pretended the world stayed ordinary if they kept buying the right things. Zakira stood in front of them and could not move. Her reflection stared back at her from the polished head of one. Small. Warped. Divided by the curve of the metal. She looked away. This was stupid. She didn’t know how to use a hatchet. She barely knew how to hold one. A hatchet meant close. A hatchet meant blood on her hands instead of distance. A hatchet meant no time to aim. No time to breathe. No time to understand. But the roots had gone wrong. The roots had gone around the girl’s wrist. And if something came close enough, if seeds failed, if the ground was wrong, if she panicked, if she needed to cut through something she had made before it hurt someone. She picked the hatchet with the orange handle. Not the largest. Not the sharpest-looking. The one that looked most like a tool and least like a weapon.
It was heavier than she expected. Her wrist dipped. She adjusted her grip and hated how quickly her body began trying to understand it. Weight. Balance. Handle length. Edge direction. The distance from her thigh if she carried it low. Don’t guess. Just look-
“... That’s kind of intense.”
Zakira almost dropped it. The voice came from the mouth of the aisle, too close and too sudden, and when she turned, Jeremy Cole was standing there with one hand curled around the strap of his backpack and the other pressed against the shelf like he had been caught leaning. He looked exactly like he always looked at school: thin with nerves, shoulders slightly hunched, hair a little messy, eyes too quick and then too still. A boy built out of almost-apologies. Someone who looked harmless until he decided his discomfort permitted him to make someone else uncomfortable. Zakira stared at him. Jeremy glanced at the hatchet, then at the seed packets in her basket, then at her face, and his mouth twitched like he had found a joke he wasn’t brave enough to say cleanly.
“Didn’t think you were the axe type,” he said. His voice trembled at the edges, but he smiled anyway. “You, uh. You planning something? I mean, sorry. That sounded bad. I just meant... that’s a lot.”
“No.” Zakira said. Too fast. Her fingers tightened around the handle. Jeremy noticed. Of course he noticed. His eyes dropped to her hand, then slid back up again, and the movement made her skin crawl even though it was small, almost deniable. Everything about him was almost deniable.
“Relax.” he said, raising both hands a little. “I was just asking.”
He stepped into the aisle. Not all the way. Just enough to make the shelves feel closer. Just enough that the path behind him narrowed. Zakira looked past his shoulder toward the front counter. Mr. Alvarez was there, but half-turned toward the small TV, face blank in the low blue light. The headline moved silently along the bottom of the screen. LOCAL OFFICIALS URGE CALM AFTER RECENT DISRUPTIONS. Disruptions. Jeremy followed her eyes, then looked back at her.
“You out here by yourself?” he asked.
The question landed wrong. Wrong in the way the weed at the warehouse had bent before anything happened. Zakira’s thumb shifted on the hatchet handle.
“... I’m buying something.” She squeaked.
“Yeah, I can see that.” Jeremy laughed quietly, then swallowed as the sound had embarrassed him. “It’s just late. You know. For you.”
For you. Zakira did not know what to do with that. Some people could make a sentence ugly without changing any of the words. Jeremy had that kind of ugliness tonight. Nervous ugliness. Lonely ugliness. The kind that wanted company and punishment at the same time. He took another small step.
“I mean, I can walk you home if you want. Since you’re, like...”
He gestured vaguely at her, and the gesture was worse than if he had finished the sentence. Her hoodie. Her hair. Her face. She is alone. She was visible because he had decided to look.
“No,” Zakira said. “I’m fine.”
Jeremy’s smile tightened.
“You don’t have to act like I’m being creepy.” He said it softly, almost wounded, like she had injured him by noticing. “I’m just trying to be nice.”
Zakira’s heart started doing the warehouse thing again. Thump. Look. Thump. Closer. The aisle sharpened. Hatchet behind her. Jeremy is in front. Seven feet, maybe less. No. Six. His right shoe angled inward. His backpack zipper is half-open. A pack of batteries in his left hand. Mr. Alvarez was at the counter, not looking but hearing. The burnt-out light above paint supplies. The smell of rubber. Sawdust. Fertilizer. Something wet beneath the floor. The dandelion seed inside her locket pressed downward until her chest ached.
“Move.” Zakira said, but the word came out too small.
Jeremy blinked.
“What?”
“I need to pay.”
“Okay,” he said, but he didn’t move. He looked at the basket again, at the gloves, the twine, the foxglove, the hatchet, and his expression shifted into something that tried to be amused and came out hungry for leverage.
“You know, people are going to think you’re weird if they see all that.”
Zakira’s mouth went dry.
“... They already do.”
She had not meant to say it. Jeremy’s smile faltered, then returned worse because now he had something.
“I don’t,” he said. “I mean, I notice you.”
The words made the aisle feel airless.
“At school. You’re always just kind of there. Quiet. But not in a bad way.”
His eyes flicked down again, not long enough to accuse him of anything, long enough for her body to understand.
“You’re actually kind of-”
“Don’t.” Zakira said.
Jeremy’s face changed. For a second, he looked genuinely stung. Then angry because he was stung.
“I didn’t even say anything.”
“You were going to.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Move.”
He laughed under his breath.
“Wow. Okay. I guess I’ll just be over here, then.”
But he still didn’t move. Instead, his hand reached out and caught the edge of her basket, not pulling, not enough to be a fight, just touching what she was carrying as if that gave him a claim on the moment. Zakira went cold. Every plant name in the basket seemed to brighten at once. Marigold. Morning glory. Yarrow. Foxglove. Poisonous. Medicinal. A matter of dosage. Her fingers tightened around the hatchet until her knuckles hurt. The roots had gone wrong before. The roots had wrapped around the girl’s wrist. If she panicked here, in this narrow aisle, if something answered before she understood it, if thorns came up through linoleum or vines snapped around the wrong throat—
A bright voice cut through the aisle like a match strike.
“Jeremy.”
Jeremy turned so fast he nearly bumped the shelf. Lupe Sánchez stood at the end of the aisle with a pack of batteries in one hand and a pink bandana tied around her wrist, not her hair. The bandana looked too bright under the hardware store lights. Everything else about her looked tired. Her eyes were shadowed. Her mouth was set in a shape that made her seem older than sixteen by several mean years. She looked at Jeremy, then at his hand on Zakira’s basket, then at the way Zakira was holding the hatchet. Something small and electric passed across her expression. Not a spark. Not yet. Just the promise of one.
“Take your hand off her shit if you want to end the day with your hand still attached... papi.”
Jeremy released the basket immediately, but tried to turn it into a shrug.
“I wasn’t doing anything.”
“That’s crazy, because I didn’t ask. I told you to let go of her shit. Now.”
Lupe stepped closer. That was what made Jeremy shrink before she even reached him. Lupe had the kind of anger that had already decided where it was going.
“Get out of here.”
Jeremy’s ears went red.
“I was just talking to her.”
“And she told you no like forty times now”
Lupe tilted her head.
"I'm not going to say it again, Jeremy. If you don't let go of her...”
Mr. Alvarez looked over from the counter then. His hand was under the counter again. Jeremy saw him see. That mattered. Boys like Jeremy loved shadows until the lights remembered them. His mouth opened, closed, opened again.
“Whatever... Everybody’s sooooooo dramatic now,” he muttered.
Lupe smiled without warmth.
“Go be misunderstood somewhere else. Preferably in front of a train. Dickhead.”
Jeremy looked at Zakira once more. Not sorry. Not brave enough to be cruel out loud anymore. Just resentful in a way that made her feel like he would replay this later and turn himself into the victim by morning. Then he squeezed past Lupe too carefully. At the end of the aisle, he glanced back like he might say something. Lupe lifted the pack of batteries slightly, as if weighing how hard it would be to throw.
He didn’t. The bell over the front door jingled a moment later, sharp and final.
For a few seconds, neither girl said anything. The aisle seemed to expand again, though nothing had moved. Zakira realized she was still holding the hatchet up, not raised exactly, but ready enough that her wrist had begun to ache. She lowered it slowly. Her breath came in shallow pieces. Lupe watched her, and for once, Zakira did not feel like the watching was something trying to take from her. It was checking. Calibrating. Making sure the danger had actually passed.
Lupe threw a thumbs up.
“You good?” Lupe asked.
Zakira hated that question because the answer was never really yes anymore.
“I’m fine,” she said automatically.
Lupe’s eyebrow lifted.
“That’s not what I asked.”
Zakira looked down at the basket. Jeremy’s fingers had left a slight dent in the cardboard edge of the foxglove packet.
“I don’t know,” she said, and that felt more dangerous than lying.
Lupe nodded once, like that answer made sense. Then laughed.
“Yeah. Same.”
From somewhere deep in the store, maybe the stockroom, came a soft scraping sound. Scrape. Pause. Scrape. Zakira looked toward it. Lupe did too, but her reaction was not fear first. It was recognition of the fact that sounds meant something now. Mr. Alvarez did not look back. That was how Zakira knew he had heard it too. The man’s hand stayed under the counter, close to whatever he had hidden there. Lupe’s jaw tightened.
“You buying that?” she asked, nodding toward the hatchet.
Zakira looked at it.
“I think so.”
“You know how to use it?”
“No.”
“Well, sounds like you're about to learn the hard way, mami,”
Zakira looked at her. Lupe shrugged, but there was (strangely) no humor in it.
They went to the register together. That was not discussed. It simply happened. Lupe walked half a step behind and to the side, not crowding her, but making it very clear that no one else was going to slip into Zakira’s space without going through her first. Mr. Alvarez rang everything up without comment. Gloves. Twine. Duct tape. Seeds. Hatchet. He paused at the foxglove packet (Only for half a second) then scanned it. Lupe put her batteries and a cheap flashlight on the counter beside Zakira’s things. The TV anchor kept smiling above them. Onscreen, footage showed Main Street in daylight. Police tape. Two officers near an alley. A reporter speaking silently into a microphone while people walked behind her, pretending not to look. The headline changed. CORNELL RESIDENTS ENCOURAGED TO CONTINUE DAILY ROUTINES. Zakira stared. Continue daily routines. Buy groceries. Go to school. Do homework. Smile at neighbors. Don’t look at the cracks. Don’t listen if the plants bend away from something you cannot see. Don’t ask why the stop signs turn themselves around. Don’t notice the lights going out one row at a time.
“Disruptions,” Lupe said quietly.
Zakira looked at her.
“What?”
Lupe nodded toward the television. Her face did not change, but her hand tightened around the flashlight.
“That’s what they’re calling it. Disruptions. Like somebody knocked over traffic cones.”
Mr. Alvarez bagged the smaller items. His mouth pressed into a hard line.
“Thirty-six eighty-two,” he said.
Zakira fumbled with her card. It declined the first time because she inserted it incorrectly. Her face burned. Lupe did not look at her hands. That was another small mercy. Zakira tried again. Approved.] The receipt printed slowly, inch by inch, whispering out of the machine. Mr. Alvarez wrapped the hatchet in brown paper without asking. Not fully. Just enough to cover the blade. He handed it to her handle-first. Their fingers did not touch.
“... Don’t walk down Miller’s Creek,” he said.
Zakira froze. Lupe went still beside her. The TV volume seemed to lower by itself. Or maybe everything else got quiet. Mr. Alvarez looked at the window, not at either of them.
“The road’s bad that way.”
Road’s bad. That was all. Not monsters. Not rifts. Not people disappearing near the creek. Not something dragging its feet where the asphalt folded. Road’s bad. Lupe’s expression sharpened.
“Bad like potholes, or bad like Cornell bad?”
Mr. Alvarez did not answer right away. The scraping sounded again from the back. This time, there was a second sound beneath it. Breathing. Slow. Wet. Maybe pipes. Maybe the building is settling. Maybe nothing. Mr. Alvarez looked at them then, finally. His face said leave. His mouth said, “Have a good night.” Lupe stared at him for a second longer, then took her flashlight off the counter.
“Yeah. You too.”
The bell above the door jingled as they stepped back outside. The cold hit first. Then the silence. Then, the feeling that the street had moved while they were inside... Just not enough for anyone to prove. But enough that the buildings across the road seemed angled differently. The laundromat sign was visible when it should not have been from here. The church steeple leaned above the rooftops two blocks away, though Saint Bartholomew’s was behind them. Zakira stood under the hardware store awning with a bag of seeds in one hand and a paper-wrapped hatchet in the other. Her locket pressed against her chest. Inside it, the dandelion seed pointed down. The sidewalk crack beside her shoe widened by a hair. Lupe saw it. Zakira knew because Lupe’s eyes flicked down, then away too quickly. Pretending, but not fully. Not like the adults. More like someone covering a wound because she had not decided who was allowed to see it yet.
“He mess with you before, mami?” Lupe asked.
It took Zakira a second to realize she meant Jeremy and not the thing inside the store, or the road, or Cornell itself.
“No,” she said. Then, because the truth had become slippery, “Not like that.”
Lupe made a quiet sound through her nose.
“He’s the kind of guy who thinks being pathetic means nobody’s allowed to call him dangerous.”
Zakira looked down at the wrapped hatchet.
“He’s scared too.”
“Yeah. Everyone is at this point,” Lupe’s voice hardened. “Doesn’t give him permission to act like a fuckin creep.”
Zakira had no answer for that. She knew Lupe was right. Knowing did not stop the old reflex from trying to explain him, soften him, make him smaller so the moment would feel smaller too. Jeremy was awkward. Jeremy was lonely. Jeremy was scared. Jeremy had still blocked the aisle. Jeremy had still touched her basket. Jeremy had still looked at her like her fear was something he could use.
They stood there a moment, side by side, watching the empty street. The hardware store lights hummed behind them. Somewhere far off, a siren started and stopped after two seconds, cut short like an embarrassed cough. Lupe tucked her batteries into her jacket pocket.
“You shouldn’t be out alone.”
Zakira almost laughed.
“You are.”
“Yeah, and I’m stupid.”
That did make Zakira look at her. Lupe’s mouth twitched, but only barely, and the expression vanished before it could become anything generous. The hardware store lights hummed behind them. The street ahead waited, empty in the way Cornell kept being empty now, not abandoned but withheld. Zakira shifted the bag in her hand. The seed packets slid softly against one another beneath the gloves and twine. The wrapped hatchet pulled at her other wrist, brown paper crinkling over the blade whenever her fingers tightened. Lupe looked down the street, then toward the intersection, then away from it with immediate disgust, like the road had said something rude. “... Not that way, mami.”
“Why?” Zakira asked, though her feet had already agreed.
“Because I don’t like it.”
“That’s not a reason, Lupe.”
“It is tonight.” Lupe clicked her flashlight on, then off, then on again, and rolled her eyes. The beam came out weak and yellow, trembling over the sidewalk before steadying against the curb. “We cut behind the laundromat, then take Bell’s lot. It adds liiiiiiiiiiiike five minutes.”
“You know that’s safer?”
“No.” Lupe started walking anyway. “Buuuuuuut I know the ways I’m sure as fuck not taking.”
Zakira followed because the alternative was standing outside a hardware store with a hatchet, a bag of seeds, and the feeling that the street had moved while they were inside. The cold pressed through her hoodie. Her breath made thin pale clouds in front of her face. Beside her, Lupe walked with her shoulders lifted slightly, not quite hunched, not quite relaxed, the flashlight held low in one hand and the pack of batteries stuffed into her jacket pocket. The pink bandana around her wrist moved in the wind like something alive enough to object. Neither of them spoke for the first half block. Their footsteps sounded too loud and too soft at the same time, scraping ahead of them, coming back wrong, doubling for half a second behind parked cars and under hedges. Zakira kept looking at the lawns. She tried not to, but she failed. The grass had a direction tonight. Not all of it. Not enough to prove. But enough that her eyes kept finding the lean, the subtle angle, the little pale blades bending toward some pressure beneath the street.
“You keep looking at the ground, mami,” Lupe said. “Everything good?”
Zakira’s stomach tightened. “Sorry.”
“Wasn’t a complaint, mami.”
“Oh.”
“Was it doing that before?”
Zakira looked at her. Lupe did not point. She only tipped her chin toward the strip of grass growing between sidewalk slabs. It was leaning toward the curb. Not with the wind but against it. Zakira swallowed. “I don’t know.” Then, because Lupe had not laughed at her once yet, because Lupe had stood between her and Jeremy without turning her fear into a performance, because the town was too quiet to keep lying inside, she added, “Maybe.” She shrugged.
Lupe nodded like maybe was an answer worth keeping. They passed the laundromat. The machines were still running inside, three bright circular mouths turning behind the glass. White shirts. Blue jeans. Red towel. White shirts. Blue jeans. Red towel. No attendant. No customers. No one sitting in the plastic chairs. Just the machines doing their work because machines did not know when a town had become wrong. Or maybe they did, and this was how they prayed. Lupe slowed without meaning to. Zakira felt it happen. The red towel slapped the glass once, then again, then again, each impact wet and soft behind the pane.
“That place open all night, mami?” Lupe asked.
“I think so.”
“Anybody in there?”
Zakira looked. She wished she hadn’t. The magazine on the floor lay open under one of the chairs. A soda bottle had rolled near the vending machine. The fluorescent lights made every surface look overexposed and sick. In the leftmost washer, the red towel came around again and struck the door like a palm. “No.”
“Cool.”
“It’s not.”
“I know, mami.” Lupe’s voice was flat. “I’m saying cool because if I say what I’m thinking, I’m gonna start screaming, and if I start screaming, something is going to hear me. And we don't want that.”
They kept walking. Behind the laundromat, the alley narrowed into a service lane lined with dumpsters, stacked milk crates, weeds, and the back doors of shops that had closed before sunset. The hardware store’s light fell away behind them. Here, the dark was thicker. The kind of dark that did not simply happen because of missing light but seemed to gather in corners and press itself flat against brick. Lupe’s flashlight skimmed over a row of trash cans, a broken pallet, a spray-painted smiley face on the wall with one eye scratched out. Zakira’s locket pressed cold against her chest. The dandelion seed inside pulled down and slightly left. She almost said so. Then she didn’t. Then she did.
“It’s pulling.”
Lupe stopped. “Your necklace?”
Zakira nodded, fingers going to the glass pendant before she could stop them. “Down. But also... that way.” She nodded toward the darker end of the alley, where Bell’s vacant lot opened behind a chain-link fence. The fence sagged in the middle. Beyond it, dead weeds stood waist-high around cracked asphalt and the rusted skeleton of an old sign.
Lupe stared into the lot. “Of course it is.”
“We can go another way.”
“Is another way better?”
Zakira did not answer.
“Yeah.” Lupe exhaled through her teeth. “That’s what I thought, mami.”
They moved through the break in the fence one at a time. Lupe went first. Zakira hated that she was relieved by it and hated more that Lupe seemed to know and said nothing. The lot smelled like wet weeds, old oil, and rust. Somewhere under that, faint and sour, was the penny-in-soil smell again. Zakira’s shoes crunched over broken glass. The seed packets shifted in her bag. She thought of the names printed on them. Marigold. Morning glory. Yarrow. Foxglove. Pretty names for things that could root, climb, heal, choke, poison. Pretty names for instructions she did not understand yet. Lupe swept the flashlight beam across the lot. The weeds bent away from the light. No. Not from the light. From them. Or toward something beyond them. Zakira did not know which was worse.
“So...” Lupe said, too casually, “Are we gonna talk about the grass doing that thing again, or are we pretending the sidewalk is just excited to see you?”
Zakira almost tripped. “It’s not me.”
Lupe looked at her.
“... Not on purpose. I think,” Zakira corrected, smaller.
“Mhm, mami, mhm.” Lupe swept the flashlight beam across the curb. The strip of grass growing through the sidewalk seam leaned against the wind, every pale blade bent in the same direction. “Because last time I saw plants acting weird around you, they were choking out a monster and saving my ass, mami.”
Zakira’s grip tightened around the paper-wrapped hatchet. “That was different, and you know that.”
“Different how?”
“I made that happen... mami,.” Zakira looked down at the grass. It stayed bent toward the deeper street, patient and wrong. “Or I tried to. This is just happening.”
Lupe’s joking expression faded a little. “Okay.” She shrugged.
Zakira glanced at her.
“I’m listening, believe me, mami, I'm listening,” Lupe said, before Zakira could apologize for not making sense. “Don’t make it weird.”
Zakira swallowed. The air tasted metallic. “At the warehouse, before I knew anything, I saw a weed bend before the monster moved.” She touched the locket through her hoodie. “Then my locket got hot. Then there were flowers. Dandelions, but wrong. Some fresh, some dead, some with thorns, some with black centers. They were trying to tell me something.”
Lupe walked slower. “Tell you what, mami?”
“I don’t know.”
“You keep saying that, mami.”
“Because I don’t.” It came out sharper than Zakira meant. She flinched at herself. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize for being freaked out.” Lupe’s voice was still sharp, but not cruel. “You pulled vines out of arrows and poisoned a thing a few nights ago. We are past normal at this point.”
Zakira breathed in. “It felt like family.”
That made Lupe glance over.
Zakira kept her eyes on the ground. “Not my parents. Not anyone I know. Older than that. Hands in soil. People tying seed pouches. Drawing bows. Cutting diseased plants. Making boundaries. Using poison like medicine. It wasn’t words, but I understood some of it.” Her fingers tightened around the hatchet. “'The world tells you where it hurts.' 'Guard the line. Cut what spreads wrong.'”
Lupe was quiet for several steps. That was rare enough that Zakira noticed.
“... That’s not what it felt like when you saved me, mami,” Lupe said finally.
Zakira looked at her.
Lupe kept her eyes forward. “A few nights ago. When you showed up, it looked like you were scared shitless and still aiming better than I was thinking.”
“I was scared.”
“Yeah. No shit.”
“And I wasn’t even aiming that good. I aimed better when...” I'm shooting targets that stand still.
“You hit the monster more than I did.”
“You were hurt. I couldn't let it kill-”
“I was stupid.”
Zakira did not answer.
Lupe’s mouth tightened. “Don’t do that quiet thing, mami.”
“What quiet thing?”
“Ooooooooh, I don't know. That one where you don't say you disagree because you’re just too polite.”
Zakira looked down.
Lupe laughed once, humorless and low. “Yeah. Thought so, mami... Thought so.”
They walked past a parked car with fogged windows. Lupe’s flashlight slid over the glass and found nothing inside except the pale blur of their reflections. Zakira looked away first.
“You were hunting it.” she flatly said.
Lupe’s face closed immediately.
“I was dealing with it, mami.”
“And look how that went.” Zakira said harsher than she meant. “That thing almost killed you.”
Lupe stopped walking and turned on her, flashlight hanging low in her hand. The beam cut across the sidewalk instead of Zakira’s face, shaking just enough to betray her before her voice did.
“And if I stayed home, then what, mami? It oh-so politely waits outside until we’re ready?”
Zakira went quiet.
Lupe’s mouth twisted. Not quite a smile. Not even close.
“Fuck that, mami. That’s what everyone's doing. Sitting inside. Locking their doors. Closing their blinds. Turning the TV-or whatever the fuck-up whenever someone is getting ripped to shreds to the street. Acting like if we just close our eyes and pretend, everything's gonna fuckin' be okay.”
She pointed the flashlight down the street, toward houses with curtains drawn tight and porch lights left burning like offerings.
“It won’t. You know it. I know it. And everyone knows it but are too fuckin' pussy to admit it.”
The words came out flat. Certain. Not emotional enough to be a confession. Worse, maybe, because she sounded like she had already tested the idea and hated the answer.
“If something is coming, mami, I’d rather meet it in the street than wait for it to pick a window.”
Zakira’s grip tightened around the bag. “That doesn’t mean you can fight it by yourself.”
“Didn’t say I did a great job.” Lupe shrugged.
“You almost died.”
“A lot of people almost died. Your fucking point?”
“Lupe.”
“... Don’t start with me, Mami.”
The words cut harder than the volume should have allowed. Lupe looked away first, jaw tight, eyes fixed on the dead stretch of road ahead of them.
“Don’t say my name like you’re about to make me explain myself. Like you're my madre.”
Zakira swallowed. “I’m not trying to be.”
“Good. One's already enough of a pain in my puss.”
They walked several more steps. The silence between them did not soften. It dragged behind them like something caught on a nail.
Then Lupe said, quieter but no less sharp, “You showed up. It helped. Great. Wow. Thank you.”
Zakira glanced at her.
Lupe kept staring forward.
“Just to remind you, I never asked for your help. So if you're going to hold that over me, then just find that monster and toss me in its fuckin' mouth.”
Zakira sighed, defeated.
“Okay.”
“And don’t do the quiet thing where you pretend okay means you’re not judging me.”
“I’m not.”
“You should be, though, mami.”
That landed strangely.
Zakira looked at her again, but Lupe’s face had already sealed back over.
“I was stupid. You said it without saying it. I’m saying it with my chest. Happy?”
“No.”
Lupe blinked.
Zakira looked down at the sidewalk, where a thin strip of grass leaned toward the street against the wind.
“I’m not happy you almost died.”
For a second, Lupe had no answer.
Then she scoffed, soft and defensive.
“Yeah, well. Same.” She shrugged.
“Did it at least help?” Zakira asked.
Lupe’s jaw flexed.
“No.”
Zakira nodded once.
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you understand.”
Zakira’s hand tightened around the bag. The seed packets whispered together. Marigold. Morning glory. Yarrow. Foxglove.
“... I think I do.”
Lupe looked at her then, sharp and wounded.
Zakira continued before she could lose the nerve. “At the warehouse, when I tried to climb out, someone grabbed my ankle. A girl. I don’t know who. I panicked, and something grew. A root or a vine. It wrapped around her wrist instead of the window frame.” Her voice thinned. “She screamed. I didn’t mean to. I stopped thinking, and it let go, but I still hurt her.”
Lupe’s anger dimmed into something heavier.
“I left after that.”
For a few seconds, there was only the sound of their shoes and the far electric buzz of a streetlight.
“Did she get out?” Lupe asked.
Zakira stared at the sidewalk. “... I don’t know.”
“Then how'd you know you killed her?”
“I know I hurt her.”
“Yeah.” Lupe’s voice lowered. “Maybe you did. But if you're going through all these mental gymnastics to find a clean way of surviving that night-news flash; there isn't one, mami.”
Zakira’s eyes stung. “That sounds like something people say when they want to excuse themselves.”
Lupe looked away.
“Yeah,” she said. “Maybe it is.”
The honesty sat between them, heavier than comfort would have been.
Lupe started walking again. Slower this time. Zakira followed.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Lupe nodded without looking at her. “Yeah.” Then, after another step, “Me too.”
They crossed Bell’s lot and came out near a row of closed storefronts. A barber shop. A tax office. A pawn shop with metal bars over the windows. In the reflection of the pawn shop glass, the street behind them looked too long. Zakira saw herself and Lupe stretched thin, walking side by side with a gap between them that looked wider in the reflection than it was in real life. Behind their reflected shoulders, something pale moved across the mouth of the alley.
Zakira turned.
Nothing.
Lupe turned half a second later anyway. “You good, mami?”
“I thought I saw something.”
“I love that.” Lupe lifted the flashlight. Its beam shook over brick, trash, weeds, empty air. “Seeing things is like a fucking Olympic sport at this point, mami.”
“It was probably nothing.”
“Well, nothing has been real fuckin' busy lately, mami.”
They kept walking. The town opened around them again, but it did not feel wider. The roads curved where they should have stayed straight. Porch lights glowed behind them, and ahead of them in patterns Zakira could not place. A car sat at the curb with all four doors closed and the windshield wipers moving slowly over dry glass. Back. Forth. Back. Forth. Neither girl mentioned it. Zakira noticed Lupe noticing it too. That was becoming its own language between them. Not pretending exactly. Choosing what not to touch because there were too many wrong things and only two sets of hands.
“Do you think it’s all because of the warehouse?” Zakira asked.
Lupe’s laugh came out flat. “Mami... I think the warehouse was when we stopped being able to pretend it wasn’t already happening.”
That answer chilled Zakira more than she expected. “You think it was happening before?”
“Don’t you?”
Zakira thought of the roads taking longer. Adults going quiet when certain places came up. The old mill looking slightly different depending on the day. The way people in Cornell talked about leaving like it was a joke they had all agreed to keep telling because the alternative was admitting nobody really did. She thought of the weed at the warehouse, already growing through concrete before the monster came. “... Maybe.”
“There’s that word again.” Lupe said in a sing-song.
“It’s a useful word.”
“Well, find a new fuckin' one before I burn that bitch out of the dictionary.”
Zakira looked at her, hurt before she could hide it.
Lupe noticed. Her mouth tightened.
“No. I don’t mean you, mami.” Her voice was still sharp, but less careless now. “I mean everybody else. The town. Adults. News people. Cops. Teachers... Me.”
She looked toward the houses with their curtains drawn tight and their porch lights glowing like nothing could be wrong.
“Maybe this. Maybe that. Maybe gas. Maybe animals. Maybe stress. Maybe mass hysteria. Maybe we all just need sleep, mami.” As she walked, she gestured with her hands together on one side of her tilted head as if she were asleep. “Maybe if we keep saying maybe, nobody has to say monster.”
Zakira looked down at the sidewalk. A dandelion grew through the seam by the curb. Its yellow head had closed for the night, but it turned slightly as they passed. Not toward the moon. Not toward the streetlight. Toward her.
“Monster,” she said quietly.
Lupe stopped.
The word did not echo. It did not summon anything. The street did not split open. No windows shattered. No unseen thing lunged from the dark. But Cornell seemed to listen harder.
Zakira’s pulse thudded in her ears.
Lupe looked at her. Something like approval passed over her face, brief and grim. “Yeah.”
Zakira swallowed. “Or magic.”
The dandelion by the curb trembled.
Lupe breathed out. “Yeah.”
“People disappeared.”
“Yeah.”
“The roads are wrong.”
“Yeah.”
“Cornell is...” Zakira stopped. The last word sat behind her teeth like a seed she was afraid to plant.
Lupe finished it for her, quieter this time. “Fucked, mami. Possibly beyond fixing.”
They stood together under the dead eye of a streetlight that had gone out sometime while they were speaking. The darkness around it seemed circular and deliberate. Zakira realized her hands had stopped shaking. Not completely. But less. Saying the words had not fixed anything. It had not made her brave. It had not made the hatchet lighter or the road safer or the wrongness less wrong. But it had done something. It had made the pretending thinner.
“What do we do?” she asked.
Lupe looked toward the direction of Miller’s Creek. Not directly. Like even looking too hard might permit the place to look back. “First? We don’t go where the scary hardware man told us not to go.”
“Good.”
“Second? We find people who aren’t useless.”
“Who?”
Lupe looked at her. “You tell me. You’re the one with the plant compass and the creepy family flower slideshow.”
Zakira almost smiled. It hurt and helped at the same time. “Kari.”
Lupe nodded like she had expected that. “I haven't spoken to her since shit popped off, but okay. Better late than ever, mami.”
“I talked with her. She has... some kind of information magic. I think? She can tell when monsters have been coming into Cornell. She knows things. Not everything, but more than most people.”
They started walking again. The houses here were smaller, pressed closer to the road, windows curtained tight. Somewhere behind one of them, someone laughed at a television show too loudly, the sound bright and fake and abruptly cut off. Zakira looked toward it. The curtains did not move.
“Anyone else, mami?” Lupe asked.
“Tommy, maybe.”
Lupe gave her a look. “Weirdo Tommy?”
“He can make monsters.”
“Of course he can.”
“And Tyler can teleport.”
“Tyler can what?”
Zakira blinked. “Teleport.”
“You said that tooooooo casually.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. Just never say ‘Tyler can teleport’ like you’re telling me he finally swiped his card.”
Zakira did smile then. Barely. It vanished quickly, but Lupe saw it.
“There she is.”
“Don’t.”
“Fine, mami.” Lupe’s own smile faded. “Kari first, though.”
“She might not answer.”
“Then we just gotta call her twice.”
“She might think we’re crazy.”
Lupe stopped walking and stared at her until Zakira regretted saying it.
“Zakira. Mami.”
“What?”
“... Crazy left like three weeks ago.”
That laugh came easier. Still small. Still broken around the edges. But real enough that the street seemed to hate it. A porch light across from them flickered twice, then steadied. Lupe looked at it and raised the flashlight slightly, as if daring the house to comment.
“Do you think Kari will help?” Zakira asked.
“She will... It's mami. Ol' reliable Kari. Whenever she gets the fuck out of the house, she's like the smartest bitch in town.”
“When she doesn't?”
“Then Jeremy gets to pretend being the only boy in the room counts as having a personality.”
Zakira almost smiled despite herself.
“That’s also a low bar.”
“See? You’re learning.”
They reached the corner near Zakira’s street. Her house was still several blocks away, but the route from here was familiar enough that her body recognized it before her mind did. That should have made her feel safer. It didn’t. Familiar things were worse now because they could betray you personally. A strange street did not owe you anything. Your own street did. Your own street knew where you lived.
Zakira stopped under a maple tree. Most of its leaves had not turned yet, but several lay dead around its roots, curled and black at the edges. The grass around the trunk leaned toward her in a narrow ring.
Lupe noticed. Of course she noticed now.
“That normal?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly. No "maybe" this time. No apology.
Lupe looked at her.
Zakira looked at the grass.
The locket pulled downward.
Like whatever waited below Cornell did not need to hurry because everything above it was already falling.
“We should call Kari now,” Zakira said.
Lupe’s expression sharpened. “Now-now?”
Zakira's eyes drifted towards the side. Landing on her neighbor across the street whose house was dark. Curtains closed. No lights. No sign of life. For weeks now. She wondered if he was even still alive.
“... Before I talk myself out of it.”
Lupe crossed. “Then do it, mami. We don't got forever.”
Zakira shifted the bag onto her wrist and dug her flip phone from her pocket. Her fingers were still cold. The screen lit up too bright, washing her face in pale blue. For one second, there was no service. Then one bar appeared. Then vanished. Then came back as if the phone had reconsidered. Zakira found Kari’s contact and stared at it.
She had never called Kari before. Not like this. Not outside school. Not past midnight. Not while standing under a tree whose grass leaned toward her with Lupe Sánchez holding a flashlight beside her and Cornell pretending to sleep around them.
Calling felt worse than texting.
A text could be edited. Softened. Deleted. A call meant breathing into the silence and hoping the other person did not hear exactly how afraid you were.
Zakira pressed the button anyway.
The phone rang.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Each ring sounded impossibly loud in the empty street.
Lupe stood beside her, close enough now that their sleeves almost touched.
On the fifth ring, the call connected.
For half a second, there was only silence.
Then Kari’s voice came through, low and wary.
“Zakira?”
Zakira’s heart jumped hard enough to hurt.
“Kari?”
“Yeah, in the flesh,” A pause. ”I mean it's through the phone-but that's neither here nor there.”
A beat.
“Why are you calling so late?”
Zakira almost forgot the answer.
Not because she didn’t have one. Because Kari sounded wrong.
Not terrified. Not exactly. Kari was too controlled for that. Too careful. But there was movement under her voice. Breath tucked between words. A faint rush of air. The soft, uneven rhythm of footsteps that did not belong to someone standing in a bedroom. Zakira heard gravel. Then pavement. Then something that might have been leaves brushing against a sleeve. Kari was outside.
Or going outside.
Or already somewhere she should not be.
Zakira’s fingers tightened around the phone. “... Are you home?”
There was a pause. Short. Too short to be innocent.
“... Why?”
Lupe’s head turned.
Zakira looked at her. Lupe’s expression had sharpened instantly, all the half-smile gone from her face. She mouthed something.
"Speaker."
Zakira hesitated.
Lupe widened her eyes and pointed at the phone harder.
"Speaker, mami."
Zakira swallowed and clicked the button. Kari’s breathing widened into the night between them, thin and staticky through the cheap little speaker. The sound made the street feel smaller. Closer. Like whatever direction Kari was walking in had opened inside Zakira’s palm.
“... Did you just put me on speaker?” Kari asked.
“Yeah,” Lupe said, leaning closer. “Hi, mami!”
Another pause, but his one was longer.
“... Lupe?”
“In the flesh. Also through the phone. Crazy how technology works, mami.”
There was another pause. This one brief.
“I really can’t do this right now.”
Lupe looked at Zakira, but her locket was pulling downward.
“Kari...” Zakira said. “...Where are you?”
“I’m outside.”
“Yeah, mami, we got that part...” Lupe rolled her eyes, and Zakira had a feeling Kari could feel it.
“I’m fine.”
“Nobody asked if you were fine. They asked where the fuck you were.”
Kari made a small frustrated sound. The phone crackled as she shifted it, maybe moving it from one hand to the other. Something metallic clinked faintly. Keys. A fence. A chain. Zakira did not know which. She hated that she was listening closely enough to guess.
“Look, I need to go.”
“No.”
The word surprised Zakira as much as it seemed to surprise Kari.
Lupe glanced at her.
Zakira kept staring at the strip of grass by the maple tree. It leaned toward the street like every blade was being combed by an invisible hand.
“You don’t get to say you need to go when you sound like that.”
Kari’s breathing hitched once, almost too faint to hear.
“Like what?” Kari said incredulously.
“Like you’re speed-walking into some bullshit. The bullshit we don't need right now.”
“I am not speed-walking.”
A beat.
The footsteps continued quickly through the speaker. Lupe looked at Zakira and lifted her eyebrows.
“... Ooooooooooooooooo-kay.”
“I’m not—” Kari stopped herself, exhaled sharply, and kept moving. “Why did you call me?”
Zakira remembered the reason, suddenly and all at once. The hardware store. Mr. Alvarez. Road’s bad that way. The scraping in the stockroom. The TV anchor smiling while Cornell called death a disruption. The grass bending. The dandelion turning toward her. Her neighbor’s dark house. Lupe beside her with a flashlight and anger held like a match.
“Something is wrong near Miller’s Creek.”
Kari went quiet.
The footsteps did not stop.
That was worse.
“Aw fuck, here we go,” Lupe said under her breath.
“Mr. Alvarez warned us not to go there.”
“Mr. Alvarez from Riverside?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“He said don’t walk down Miller’s Creek because 'the road’s bad'.”
Kari’s footsteps faltered for half a second. Then they got faster.
“Oh, I hate that. I FUCKING hate that a lot.”
“Kari?”
“I’m not going to Miller’s Creek.”
Lupe’s eyes narrowed.
“That was a very specific answer, mami....”
“Then where are you going?”
Kari did not answer.
The phone caught the sound of wind now, more open than before. Not neighborhood wind through porches and trees. Wider. Colder. The kind that moved across empty lots and industrial roads with nothing soft in its way. Somewhere far behind Kari, a dog barked once and stopped. Zakira’s stomach twisted.
“Kari.”
“I said I’m not going to Miller’s Creek.”
“Mami.” Lupe’s voice flattened. “If you say ‘technically’ right now, I’m going to lose my fucking mind.”
Kari breathed out through her nose.
“The steel mill.”
Zakira’s blood went cold.
Lupe stopped moving entirely.
For a second, Cornell seemed to stop with her. The porch lights. The wires. The dry tree branches. The faint hum of someone’s TV behind closed curtains. Everything held still around those two words.
Steel mill.
Old steel mill by the river. Old steel mill near the creek. Old steel mill where adults told stories that stopped being funny if you asked too many questions. Old steel mill with the locked gates kids still climbed because teenagers loved proving a place was only dangerous in the boring way.
“... Why?” Zakira asked.
Kari did not answer fast enough.
“Kari,” Lupe said. “Why the fuck are you going to the steel mill!?”
Another metal sound came through the phone. A rattle. Chain-link, maybe. Kari’s breath pushed closer to the speaker.
“Camille and Kersten went there.”
Zakira’s grip slipped on the phone.
Lupe caught her wrist before she dropped it.
“What?”
“They went to the steel mill.” Kari’s voice stayed low, but the control was thinning at the edges. “Kersten texted me twenty minutes ago asking if I knew anything about the runoff channels under the east side. I told her not to go near them. She didn’t answer. Camille sent me a picture after that.”
“A picture of what?”
Kari’s breathing grew louder.
”Oh nothing,” Kari sarcastically said, “Water on the wrong side of a wall.”
Zakira did not understand at first.
Then she did, or thought she did, and wished she hadn’t.
“Like it was climbing,” Kari said. “Not spilling. Not leaking. Climbing.”
Lupe looked toward the distant shape of town beyond the houses. The steel mill was not visible from here, but everyone in Cornell knew where it sat. You always knew where it sat. Even when you couldn’t see it, it lived on the edge of the skyline, a dark suggestion of pipes and rust and old smoke.
“Did you call them?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“Kersten didn’t pick up. But Camille did.”
Kari’s footsteps slowed just enough to mean she was remembering.
“He whispered my name. Then something hit metal near him, and the call cut off.”
The cold pressed into Zakira’s hoodie.
Lupe’s mouth opened slightly, then shut. For once, no joke came out.
“Kari, call the police.”
“And tell them what?” Kari snapped, then lowered her voice immediately, like the sound had scared even her. “That two kids went somewhere stupid, and my magic thinks the building is screaming?”
The street listened.
Zakira did too.
“The building is what?”
Kari cursed quietly, not loud enough for the word to matter.
“I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Try.”
“I don’t have time.”
“Make time, mami.”
Kari’s footsteps stopped. Then Kari spoke, quieter.
“Something is wrong with the boundary around the mill.”
Zakira’s locket pulled harder.
“Not the fence. Not the property line. The place itself. It feels...”
She paused.
Zakira could imagine her face too clearly: Kari small and tense somewhere under bad light, phone pressed to her ear, eyes narrowed like she was reading something nobody else could see.
“Thin.” Kari said. “Like the air has been rubbed down until there’s almost nothing left between here and somewhere else.”
Lupe whispered, “Jesús.”
“I felt it from my house.”
Zakira’s breath caught.
“I tried to ignore it.” Kari started walking again. Faster. “I thought it was just another spike. There are always spikes now. But then Kersten texted me. Then Camille called. And now I can feel them near it.”
“Feel them how?”
A pause.
“Wrong.”
“Mami.”
“I said I don’t know how to explain it.” The words came sharp, then broke smaller. “Like their fear is moving ahead of them.”
Zakira went still.
Lupe looked at her.
Kari kept going, voice tight now, almost breathless. “Like something there already knows where they’re going to stand before they stand there.”
The dandelion by the curb bent lower.
“Okay, nope. Fuck that.” Lupe took a step toward the road, then stopped herself. “Kari, listen to me. You do not go in there.”
“I’m not going in.”
“You are absolutely going in. I can hear it in your smartass voice.”
“I’m going to stop them before they go inside.”
“Are they inside already?”
Kari did not answer.
Zakira’s stomach dropped.
“Kari.”
“I don’t know.”
There it was.
The word.
Maybe’s cousin. I don’t know. Honest and useless and terrifying.
Lupe shut her eyes for half a second like she was physically holding back a scream.
“Where are you right now?”
“By the service road.”
“Which service road?”
“East side.”
Lupe’s face changed. Recognition. Anger. Panic made practical.
“By the drainage ditch?”
“Near it.”
“That’s Miller’s Creek, dumbass.”
“It feeds into Miller’s Creek... for your information.”
“Oh my god, I hate smart people.”
“Kari, wait for us.”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
“I'll be in and out. I promise.”
“Please.”
“Zakira, they’re already there.”
“Then wait outside.”
“If they’re inside, waiting outside means I’m listening to them get hurt.”
Zakira flinched.
Lupe’s jaw tightened.
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
The quiet certainty in Kari’s voice made both of them stop.
“I don’t know everything. I don’t know what’s in there. I don’t know how bad it is. But I know that if I turn around right now, something happens to them and after Isabelle I can't let that happen again!” Kari's voice got louder with each word.
The wind moved through the trees above Zakira and Lupe.
For a moment, neither girl on the sidewalk answered the girl walking toward the mill.
“That’s why I’m trying to get off the phone.” Kari filled the silence.
Lupe gave a short, humorless laugh.
“That is the worst possible way to make me trust you, mami.”
“I’m not asking you to trust me.”
“Good, because I don’t.”
“Kari,” Zakira said. Her voice sounded thin. Too thin. She hated that. “Tell us how to get there.”
“No.”
“Giiiiiiiiiiiirl.....”
“No. If you come here, that is more people in the same place going wrong.”
“We’re coming anyway.”
Lupe looked at her.
Zakira did not look back.
Her house was several blocks behind them. Her bow was in the corner of her room. Her arrows. The seed pouches tied beneath the heads. The careful things. The official things. The things she had left behind because bringing them would have meant admitting she expected the night to become this.
The night had become this anyway.
“Zakira—”
A sound cut through Kari’s voice.
A long, low groan of metal shifting under pressure.
Kari stopped moving.
The phone filled with silence.
Then, faintly, from Kari’s end, came another sound.
A voice.
Too far away to understand.
Too afraid to be nothing.
“Kari, where are you?”
Kari did not answer.
There was gravel under her shoes now. Fast. Then faster. Her breath burst through the speaker as she ran.
“Kari!”
“I heard them.”
“No shit, we heard something too, mami. Do not run toward it.”
Kari was already running.
The phone shook with each step. Wind battered the speaker. Something clanged as she hit or pushed through a gate. Chain-link rattled violently. A loose piece of metal scraped over concrete. Kari cursed under her breath.
“Camille!”
No answer.
Then another voice, farther away.
Kersten.
Maybe.
A shout cut short.
Kari’s breath turned ragged.
“Kari, stop!”
“I can see the east entrance.”
“Stay outside!”
“The door’s open.”
Lupe’s face went pale with fury.
“Of course the door’s open.”
The metal groaned again.
This time louder.
Zakira heard it through the phone and, somehow, from far away in the town itself. A deep industrial complaint rolling under the streets, too low for a normal sound and too big for one building. The grass around the maple tree flattened all at once. Not bending now. Flattening. Every blade pressed toward the soil like something had exhaled over it.
Zakira looked down.
Her locket jerked against her chest.
Hard.
“Lupe.”
Lupe followed her gaze.
For once, she said nothing.
Through the phone, Kari whispered, “I’m at the door.”
The words came out small.
That scared Zakira more than if she had screamed.
“Mami?”
Kari did not answer.
The phone picked up the sound of her breathing. Slow now. Careful. One step onto old concrete. Then another. The hollow interior of the mill swallowed every sound and sent it back wrong.
Somewhere inside, metal clicked.
Wetly.
“Kari, leave.”
Kari took another step.
The clicking stopped.
For half a second, there was nothing.
Then Kari inhaled.
Not a gasp.
“No...” she whispered.
Lupe’s hand tightened around the flashlight.
“What?”
Kari did not answer.
The phone crackled against her hand. Her breathing went thin and broken.
“Oh my god....”
“Kari, what do you see?”
A wet dragging sound moved through the speaker.
Heavy.
Slow.
Close.
Then Kari made a sound that was almost a word and almost a sob.
“Camille...”
Zakira’s stomach dropped.
“Kari, get out.”
“It... it has him.”
The street went silent around Zakira.
“It ate Kersten too.”
Lupe’s mouth parted, but nothing came out.
Through the speaker came another wet click. Then a low, pulsing sound. Not chewing exactly. Worse because it was too large for that. Too slow. Something working meat and bone between parts of itself that did not sound like teeth until Zakira’s body understood them anyway.
Kari’s voice broke.
“It’s eating them!”
“BITCH YOU DON'T RUN!” Lupe shouted.
The phone erupted with noise.
Kari screamed.
The sound tore through the speaker so sharply that Zakira nearly dropped the phone. There was a crash, then a heavy impact as Kari’s phone hit the concrete. It bounced once. Skidded. The world on Kari’s end turned distant and sideways. Kari was still screaming, farther now, warped by the hollow belly of the steel mill.
Something enormous shifted near the fallen phone.
Wet.
Hungry.
Then a voice filled the speaker.
Not Kari’s.
Not Camille’s.
Not Kersten’s.
Low and ruined and thick with something that had never needed language until something tried to take from it.
“MY FOOD!”
Then the call cut.
Silence slammed into the street.
The screen glowed in Zakira’s hand.
CALL ENDED.
For a second, neither of them moved.
The little words stared up at them like a verdict.
Then Zakira turned and ran.
“Zakira!”
She did not answer. Her shoes hit the sidewalk hard, too hard, every step jarring up through her knees. The bag of hardware supplies slapped against her leg. The wrapped hatchet banged against her wrist. Lupe cursed behind her and followed.
“Where the fuck are you going!?”
“My house.”
“This is not the time for a bedtime routine!”
“.... My bow.”
Lupe did not argue after that.
They ran.
Cornell blurred around them in pieces. Porch lights. Dark windows. The backward stop sign shining silver. A hedge. A parked truck. The empty face of her neighbor’s house. The dead maple tree leaves scraping across the sidewalk behind them like something trying to keep up. Zakira’s lungs burned. Her heart fell back into its old instruction.
Thump.
Look.
Thump.
Closer.
But this time she did not freeze.
She reached her front porch with Lupe half a step behind her and almost slammed into the door because her hands were shaking too badly to get the key into the lock.
“Move.”
Lupe took the keys, shoved the right one in on the second try, and twisted. The lock clicked open louder than a gunshot.
Zakira pushed inside.
The house was still dark.
Still pretending.
She kicked off nothing. Took off nothing. She ran up the stairs with the hardware bag still in her hand and Lupe behind her, trying to be quiet and failing because panic had weight. The hallway family photos watched them pass. Zakira did not look at the girl with the plastic watering can. She went straight to her room.
The bow case waited against the closet.
Of course it did.
Like it had known she would come back for it.
Zakira dropped the hardware bag onto the bed. Seed packets spilled across the sheets. Marigold. Morning glory. Yarrow. Foxglove. The little pale seed from her blanket lay on the nightstand where she had left it without remembering she had done so. The locket at her chest pulled toward the floor.
Lupe stopped in the doorway, breathing hard, flashlight beam shaking over the room.
“How fast can you do this!?”
Zakira opened the case.
Her hands stopped shaking.
Not completely.
Enough.
“Fast enough.”
She lifted the bow.
The official weight of it settled into her palm. Familiar. Terrifying. A promise she had tried not to make. She grabbed the quiver next, fingers moving over the arrows, checking the small tied pouches beneath the heads by touch. Some were neat. Some were ugly. Some she had made half-asleep with thread pulled too tight and knots too large. They would have to be enough.
Lupe looked at the arrows.
Then at Zakira.
For once, she did not make a joke.
Zakira placed the quiver on her hip and strapped it in and grabbed the paper-wrapped hatchet too. The brown paper had torn near the blade. She tucked it through the strap of the bag because leaving it behind now felt impossible.
Downstairs, something creaked.
Both girls froze.
A single soft groan of wood under pressure.
Lupe lifted her hand - lowering it then raising the flashlight toward the hallway.
Zakira’s hand went to the bowstring.
Nothing followed.
The house held its breath.
Then, from somewhere outside, far away but not far enough, the steel mill groaned again.
Low.
Wet.
Hungry.
Zakira moved first.
She ran down the stairs, through the living room, past the black TV screen, past the closed kitchen doorway, past every normal thing that had failed to protect anyone. Lupe followed her out into the cold.
The door shut behind them too loudly.
No one woke up.
No light came on.
No voice so much as called her name.
Zakira stood on the porch for half a second with her bow in one hand, arrows against her hip, hatchet at her side, and Lupe Sánchez breathing hard beside her.
The grass in every crack of the sidewalk bent toward the steel mill.
Not warning anymore.
Pointing.
“Okay, mami.” Her voice was low now. Stripped down. “We go fast, we don’t go stupid!”
A rare sentence for you. Zakira kept the comment to herself as she looked toward the dark shape of town beyond the houses.
“We get Kari.”
Lupe’s jaw tightened.
“And Camille and Kersten, if they’re still alive, that is...”
Kari picked Cornell Park because she already knew what it felt like when it was normal.
That mattered now. Normal had become a baseline, not a comfort. She needed somewhere familiar enough that she could tell when the shape of it changed. Cornell Park sat near the edge of town, close enough to the woods that the walking paths always felt a little too willing to disappear into them. In the afternoon, it was full of people pretending nothing had happened. Kids screamed near the swings. Parents talked on benches. Someone jogged past with earbuds in. A dog barked at nothing near the tree line. The town had gone back to moving as if it had never seen bodies hit concrete.
Kari sat on a bench with her notebook open on her lap and her friendship bracelet wound tight around her fingers. She had stopped writing the names of her first spells like they were mysteries. Warning, Boundary Disturbance, and Emotional Thread were not easy, but they were hers now. She knew the difference between Warning and anxiety. She could tell when Boundary Disturbance was Cornell reacting instead of her own nerves. Emotional Thread no longer drowned her every time she touched it. Not always, anyway. That was why she was here for something else.
At the top of the page, she had written:
Rift Reading? Fracture Sense? Bad names. Fix later.
Under that:
Goal:get information from damaged spaces. Not just “wrong.” What kind of wrong?
Kari stared at the last sentence for a while, then underlined information twice. White Lux was supposed to be information magic. That sounded clean until she remembered information did not arrive in neat sentences. It came as pressure, timing errors, direction, dread, noise, emotional residue, and half-formed meaning that could be real or could be her brain trying to make sense of trauma. Her spells worked because she had learned how to sort the signal from the mess. This new thing had no sorting system yet.
“Okay,” she muttered. “Baseline first.”
She closed her eyes and let Warning settle at the edge of her awareness. It did not flare. No half-second lurch. No cause-and-effect skipping. No immediate danger. Good. The barking dog was just a barking dog. The kid shrieking at the slide was playing, not dying. Her own heartbeat was fast but not prophetic. Kari wrote: Warning clear. No immediate threat.
Then she shifted into Boundary Disturbance. That one felt different. Less like checking the air and more like pressing her palm against Cornell’s pulse. The park stayed loud around her, but beneath it, something strained. Not breaking. Not yet. Just pulled too tight in one direction. Her attention slid toward the old drainage tunnel at the far end of the slope, half-hidden by weeds and chipped concrete. The same place she had noticed twice before. The same place everyone else kept ignoring.
Kari wrote: Boundary confirms disturbance near tunnel. Stable? Persistent? Not active?
She tested Emotional Thread next, carefully. She did not reach for everyone. That was the old mistake. Instead, she found one familiar thread first. Elsa. Warm, distant, distracted, alive. Kari let herself hold it for only three seconds before releasing. Then she tested the people nearby without grabbing onto them. Surface impressions only. A parent’s impatience. A child’s excitement. A jogger’s exhaustion. Nothing like collective panic. Nothing like a crowd sensing danger. Nobody else felt the tunnel.
That made it worse.
“Of course not,” Kari whispered.
A boy ran past with a melting ice cream cone, laughing while red syrup dripped down his wrist. For one second, it looked like blood. Kari blinked, and it was just cherry dip. His mother called after him to slow down. The dog near the trees started growling.
Kari looked up. The drainage tunnel sat dark at the bottom of the slope. The air around it did not shimmer. No monster crawled out. No rift split open. No red sky appeared on the other side. It was just a tunnel. That was what made it hard. The wrong things never had the decency to look wrong long enough to be studied.
Kari turned to a fresh page.
New spell attempt 1:read disturbance, not detect it.
She inhaled slowly and focused past Boundary Disturbance. Not “where is the wrongness?” She knew where. The question was different. What did the wrongness know? When did it happen? Did something pass through? Was it opening, closing, waiting? Was there an other side, or was Cornell just folding in on itself?
The moment she pushed, the park noise thinned.
Kari kept her eyes open. That was one of her new rules. Closing her eyes made everything feel more dramatic and less reliable. With her eyes open, she could compare the impression to reality. The tunnel remained still, but her perception caught on its edges. The concrete mouth seemed deeper than it should be. The inside was not black anymore, exactly. It had depth behind the depth, like a hallway drawn over another hallway. Kari wrote without looking down: depth distortion. pressure. maybe old opening?
The pressure sharpened. For half a second, she smelled wet stone, rust, and something hot under it. Her hand tightened around the pen. Then the impression collapsed.
A basketball bounced somewhere behind her.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Then it bounced from inside the tunnel.
Kari went still.
Warning did not flare. That was almost worse.
The basketball bounced again.
No one else reacted.
Kari forced herself to keep breathing. The kids behind her were still excited. The parents were still bored. The dog was afraid, but dogs got afraid of garbage bags and squirrels. None of that proved anything.
“Okay. So either that was real, or I’m being fucked with...”
Her own voice came back from the tunnel.
Okay.
Kari’s fingers went cold.
She wrote: voice mimic. unreliable. do not answer.
Then, under that:
DoNOTanswer.
The pen dragged harder than intended.
The park path beyond the tunnel stretched in the corner of her eye. Kari refused to look directly at it at first, because she already knew what Cornell did when it caught her watching. The path was wrong by maybe twenty feet. No, thirty. No, not distance. Relationship. The path was taking longer to reach the same place. A road could not procrastinate, but that was the closest phrase her brain had. This was exactly the kind of thing she wanted the new spell to explain.
Recent? Maybe. Used? Maybe. Direction? Down, but not physically down. Pressure? Inward. Or outward. Both? Residue? Fear, but not human. Color? Red, but not light. Sound? Breathing. Dragging. Her voice.
Kari stopped before the impressions could pile higher. Her nose had started bleeding. Not badly. Just one warm line slipping over her lip. She wiped it with the back of her hand and stared at the red smear.
“... That's a sign I need to take it easy... well, easier...” she said under her breath.
The swings creaked behind her, she turned this time.
The swings were full of children.
They were moving normally. One kid kicked his legs. Another shouted for her dad to push higher. A third twisted in circles until the chain wound tight. Nothing sat there that should not have been there.
Kari looked down at her notebook. Under her notes, in handwriting close to hers but not exact, a new line had appeared.
... You are asking the wrong side.
Kari stared at it, but she did not panic. Not fully. No one nearby had noticed her page writing itself. That meant either the phenomenon was selective, internal, or not fully physical. That was a useful thought.
Kari wrote beneath it: Wrong side of what? The red ink bled through the paper before she finished the question. Not normal bleeding. The letters sank downward, like the page had depth inside it. For a second, Kari could see the words falling through layers of white paper into a dark place below.
Then the page snapped back.
Her written question was gone.
So was the line that had appeared.
Kari’s mouth went dry.
The new spell had not given her information. It had given her a conversation she could not verify, with a thing she could not identify, about a place she did not understand. Borderline useless. Worse than useless, maybe. It was the kind of useless that made her want to keep trying.
That was dangerous.
She shut the notebook.
The moment she did, the park returned at full volume. Kids yelling. Dog barking. Parents talking. Cars passing. A lawnmower starting somewhere down the block. The world resumed its performance without missing a cue. Kari sat there for another ten seconds, notebook closed beneath both hands.
“Nope.”
Her voice was flat.
“Not doing this today....”
The tunnel said nothing. She packed slowly because moving too fast felt like admitting something had chased her off. Notebook in bag. Pen in front pocket. Bracelet back around her wrist. She checked her phone. 4:42 PM. Then 4:42 PM again. Then 4:43. Good enough.
As she stood, the path to the gate looked longer than it should have.
Kari stopped and stared at it.
“I can see you doing that.”
Nothing changed for a second.
Then the path shortened back to normal.
Kari did not write it down.
She left the park without looking toward the tunnel again. Behind her, the dog stopped growling. The swings kept creaking. A woman laughed too loudly near the benches, and everyone else kept being normal because normal was apparently the town’s favorite lie.
Once Kari reached the sidewalk, she realized her hands were still shaking. Her head hurt, her nose felt raw, and her notebook seemed heavier than it should have been. The new spell had no name, no method, no safety limit, and no reliable output. It had told her almost nothing except that the damage near the tunnel could answer back.
Or pretend to.
She wiped at her nose again, checked that no blood remained, and looked down Main Street. The library could wait. She needed water, tissues, and something with sugar before she tried to turn psychic nonsense into notes.
Naomi Chen’s store was only a few blocks away.
Kari adjusted her bag on her shoulder and started walking, keeping to the side of the street where the storefront windows reflected her clearly. After the park, she wanted proof that only one of her was following along. The store looked normal from the outside, which immediately made Kari distrust it.
The front windows were clean enough to reflect the street behind her. Shelves of snacks, cheap phone chargers, household supplies, bottled drinks, and overstocked seasonal decorations crowded the inside. A bell chimed when Kari pushed the door open, too loud in the quiet. The air smelled like plastic packaging, floor cleaner, and old cardboard. Somewhere near the back, a refrigerator hummed with a low mechanical rattle that kept almost becoming a growl whenever Kari stopped paying attention.
Naomi stood behind the counter, sorting receipts with the kind of focus that made everything around her look inefficient by comparison. She did not greet Kari. She only glanced up once, saw her, and went back to her papers.
Naomi felt wrong.
Not Boundary wrong. Not Cornell wrong. Not rift wrong. Just absent. Kari had gotten used to people carrying emotional noise whether they meant to or not. Irritation, boredom, worry, hunger, grief, impatience. Even strangers had some kind of loose thread around them if Kari brushed close enough. Naomi had nothing. No emotional direction. No readable pressure. No pull. It was like trying to listen through a wall and realizing the wall was not blocking sound. It was eating it.
Kari stared too long.
Naomi looked up again.
“... Can I help you, young lady?”
Kari jolted and immediately hated herself for it. “No. Sorry. I’m just looking.”
“Then look with your eyes. Not your entire body.”
Kari blinked. “... What?”
“You’re standing in the aisle like you’re waiting for the building to tell you something.”
Heat crawled up Kari’s neck as her eyes shifted. “I’m not doing anything.”
“... That's usually what people say before they do something.”
Kari pressed her lips together and turned sharply toward the drinks, pretending she had meant to go there the entire time. She grabbed a water bottle from the cooler. The refrigerator rattled again behind the glass, and for half a second, the bottles inside looked too far back, like the shelf extended deeper than the store allowed. Kari shut the cooler door fast.
Naomi noticed.
Of course she noticed.
Kari moved to the tissues next. She picked up a small pack, then put it back, then grabbed it again because her nose still felt raw from the park. Her hands were shaking a little. She tried to hide that by reaching into her bag for her wallet, but her fingers brushed the edge of her notebook instead. The notebook shifted, half-sliding upward.
“... Take your hand out of the bag.”
Kari froze.
The store went quiet in a way it had not been quiet a second ago. The refrigerator still hummed. The street still moved outside. But the space between them locked.
Kari slowly pulled her hand free. Empty.
Naomi’s expression did not change. “Open it.”
“... Excuse me?”
“Your bag. Open it.”
Kari stared at her. “I didn’t steal anything.”
“I did not ask what you did. I told you to open the bag.”
Kari’s grip tightened around the water bottle until the plastic crackled. “You can’t just accuse me because I’m nervous. Everyone's nervous these days.”
“You walked in, stared at me, stood in my aisle muttering, touched five things, put your hand in your bag, and jumped every time the cooler made noise. Believe me young lady, if I called you nervous, I'd be generous.”
“... Maybe I’m nervous because you’re talking to me like I’m already guilty.”
Naomi’s eyes narrowed. “You probably are guilty.”
That hit harder than Kari expected. Not because it was true, but because it was so blunt. So certain. After the park, after the tunnel, after her own voice coming back wrong, this was almost worse because it was ordinary. No monster. No magic. Just an adult deciding what Kari was before Kari could explain herself.
“I just came in for water and tissues.”
“Then pay for water and tissues.”
“I was-.”
“After opening your bag.”
Kari looked toward the windows. A woman passed outside without looking in. A car rolled by. The whole town kept moving past the glass like this was not humiliating, like Kari was not standing in the middle of a convenience store being treated like a thief because she could not stop flinching at things no one else noticed.
Naomi leaned forward slightly, scanning without touching. Her gaze paused on the notebook.
“What is that?”
“A notebook.”
“I know what a notebook is, child.”
“Then why did you ask?”
Naomi’s mouth flattened.
Kari immediately regretted saying it, but not enough to apologize.
“Open it.”
“No.”
The word came out before she had time to soften it.
Naomi’s eyes sharpened. “No?”
“No. You wanted to see if I stole from you. I didn’t. My notes are not your business.”
“They became my business the second you walked into my store.”
“Owning a store doesn't mean you can boss people around, Ms. Chen.” Kari narrowed her eyes.
The second she said it, Kari felt something ugly twist in the air between them. Not magic. Not exactly. Just the sudden awareness that she had chosen the worst possible response
Naomi went very still.
Kari swallowed, but she kept her ground. Her heart was beating too fast now, Warning still silent because this was not that kind of danger. This was social danger. Adult danger. Reputation danger. The kind that did not trip her spells but still made her feel cornered.
Naomi stepped out from behind the counter.
Kari stiffened.
“I have had teenagers steal from this store before you even learned to talk, young lady,” Naomi said. “They smile. They lie. They cry when caught. They say it was a mistake. They say they were just nervous. Do not stand in my store and tell me what I am allowed to do.”
Kari’s face burned. “And do not stand there and act like you're more important than you actually are because you own a stupid store!” Kari spat back. Kari immediately regretted saying it, but not enough to apologize.
That stopped Naomi for half a second.
Kari heard her own breathing. Too loud. Too uneven. She forced the water and tissues onto the counter with more control than she felt.
“I’m buying these. Then I’m leaving. That's it.”
Naomi stared at her for a long moment.
Then she returned behind the counter and rang up the items with quick, clipped motions. The total flashed green on the register. Kari paid with cash because she did not want to wait for the card reader. Naomi gave her the change without touching her hand.
For one second, Kari almost said something else. Something about Cornell. About how everyone was pretending. About how maybe Naomi of all people should know what it looked like when a place was rotting under clean floors and organized shelves.
Instead, she took the bag.
Naomi spoke before she reached the door.
“Next time, leave the bag at the counter, young lady.”
Kari turned back.
Her throat felt tight. Her hands still shook. The blankness around Naomi remained absolute, unreadable, infuriating.
“There won't be a next time, because I’ll just go somewhere else.”
Before Naomi could get out another word, Kari was out of the store. The loud ring of the bell ringing was the last Kari heard of Naomi's store.
Outside, Kari walked half a block before stopping beside an empty storefront. She pressed the heel of her hand against her eye and breathed through the sting in her throat. She would not cry because Naomi Chen was rude. She would not cry because a store owner thought she was stealing. She would not cry because for one horrifying second, being unreadable had felt more frightening than the tunnel speaking back.
She pulled the notebook out just enough to check the cover.
Still there.
Still hers.
No new writing.
Good.
Kari shoved it back into her bag and looked toward the library at the end of the street. Her headache had not gone away. The water helped a little. The sugar could wait. The embarrassment would have to wait too.
She needed context.
If the park could answer back, if Naomi could vanish from her senses while standing right in front of her, if Cornell could stretch roads and then pretend it had done nothing, then Kari needed more than practice.
She needed records.
She started walking toward the library, keeping her reflection in the storefront windows beside her the whole way.
Interactions: None. The Library.
It was thirty minutes past six in the afternoon when Tommy gave up on the second book on the subject I of witchcraft and the occult. He sat it off to the side, on top of the first one. The first one had held his attention for longer, a book about a variety of demons that were said to be conjured up on certain days of the year. But that wasn’t of much use to him. The second was about what the term “witchcraft” actually meant, and skimming bits of various chapters yielded nothing practical either. It was a small wonder that these books were found in the back corner where few went, and not up front where most people actually read around relatively comfortable tables. He sighed and leaned back, pulling out a notepad and a pen from his jacket.
Ancestors- Talk to them?
Tyler- Teleports around. Has to trade places with something. Vicky- Smacks things with a magic bat. ?? Me- Make things that thin, order them around.
Try to do Tyler’s thing. Throw a card. Didn’t work Witchcraft? Nope.
He sighed. Tommy didn’t have much to go off of. Could he fill another card with something that understood this stuff better? Did it even work like that?
There were monsters running around in the damn streets, what did anything even work like?
He turned around in his chair and stood up, going for a third try with a third book.
Kari nearly misses him at first. The occult section was tucked away in the back of the library, a place most students avoided. In recent days, Kari saw why those shelves no longer felt right. Not haunted or magical, but heavier with possibility. Her eyes lingered on the abandoned books beside him. Demons, witchcraft, occult history. Her chest tightened. She knew someone else was watching, too. Tommy looked exhausted in that specific way like someone who’s stopped sleeping well but still pretends to have things under control. Kari immediately recognized it because she was feeling the same. For a moment, she thought about leaving. Then her eyes caught the notepad: ‘Ancestors — Talk to them?’ ‘Tyler — Teleports around.’ ‘Vicky — Bat.’ Kari froze. The world shifted with that awful little lurch again—the kind she’d noticed since the warehouse. Not a vision, just recognition. Too many threads connecting.
“... You were there too.” It wasn’t really a question. Her voice was quieter than she intended.
Tommy stopped, book in hand. He turned around and looked at her. He didn’t really talk to Kari, but he didn’t really talk to most people. She was usually pretty quiet from what he understood, not quite in the social periphery he knew.
She was there. Everyone was.
”Yeah. Last time I accept an invitation to a party,” He snarked, deadpan. ”Almost died, and now-“ He dropped his half-assed notes onto the table.
”Now Cornell’s on fire.”
”It might be a lil more than on fire at this point.” Kari sighed-then stopped herself. Hesitantly glancing at the door, before the question quietly left her lips, ”May I have this seat?”
”Yeah, sure.” He took a different one, sitting back down with a book titled Fairies and Folklore: 800 Years of Myth. ”I’m not convinced anyone else has been back here since the Cold War, everything’s so old. Since when did people read stuff like this until now?”
”It's Cornell, half the city is illiterate” Kari deviously snorted, before she glanced at the book then up at Tommy, ”Question, have you seen anything in these books about something called ‘The Owl’, or something called ‘Observation?”
As she asked, a smile crept on her face but she fought it down. ”... Or White Lux.”
”Nope. Not unless there’s a dictionary back here. You find anything about a lion? Or people who make monsters?” He asked. ”Because I’ve got basically nothing.”
Kari paused for a moment where the silence was louder than any word. “Why do you ask that?”
”When I got magicked, or Kindled, whatever it’s called, I saw people who could make monsters. I can do it too, but they just left me to figure most of it out. Magic is real, they said, then they left in a hurry.”
He shoved the book aside and withdrew his deck of cards. They felt different in his hand ever since. Tommy opened the top and flicked the flat end with his finger, causing a card to jump up.
Then his woven coyote creature he called the Watcher appeared, curled up at his feet half-asleep.
”Abracadabra.”
Kari stared at the creature a second too long. Not the card trick but the creature itself. The way it breathes against the floor… Her stomach dropped.
”... Okay,” Kari couldn't help but laugh. ”So we are doing THIS now.”
She laughed again… Thin and nervous. Her gaze flicked between Tommy, the creature, and his deck of cards.
“My ancestors basically told me I’m supposed to watch people. Protect them. Figure things out before they happen.” A pause.
“Which feels like a really unfair thing to dump on someone before disappearing, by the way.”
She glances back down at the creature.
”That’s more than I got. They just told me to be proud and that I’d know what to do. And I damn well don’t, so I’m just grasping. For whatever looks magic. And this?” He gestured at the books. ”Not much better so far.”
Kari let out another quiet laugh, though this one sounded more tired than amused. Her fingers drummed nervously against the table before stopping altogether.
“Yeah, mine acted like they were dropping off a group project before class started.” A pause.
” But, I don't think we are going to find the answers in normal occult stuff.
”I don’t know where else to look.” He leaned back in his chair. ”Doubt anyone else does, either. I’d like to, maybe get to figuring out what got done to Cornell while I’m at it. But… Unless there’s a demon named Stolas going around planting magic trees, then yeah, these books aren’t working for me.”
Kari stayed quiet for a second, eyes lowering toward the books scattered across the table.
“... What if we’re looking in the wrong Cornell?”
The words left her before she fully thought them through.
She immediately rubbed at her forehead.
“Okay, that sounds insane but hear me out.”
A nervous laugh escaped her.
“But ever since the warehouse, things keep feeling…” She searched for the right word. “Off. Like parts of the city don’t fully match anymore.”
Her gaze flicked briefly toward the shelves around them.
“And the monster wasn’t 'normal'. None of this is normal. So maybe the answers aren’t either.”
A pause.
“Maybe there are places overlapping ours. Other versions of Cornell. I don’t know.” She slumped back slightly in her chair.
“I just know these books feel…” Kari gestured vaguely at the occult section.
“Too small for whatever’s happening.”
Tommy blinked.
”...I’m not sure I know what “normal” means. Not anymore, whatever happened, it happened for a reason. So- So maybe you’re right. I don’t know how you could be, or what that means, or how the fuck there’s more than one Cornell.”
They didn’t know this stuff existed, and now they were literal wizards. What else did they not know? Or how much digging they had to do?
”I think there’s an explanation somewhere. I’ll take any answer right now, your guess is as good as mine.” He chose to run with it. ”If there was another Cornell, or two, or three, and we’re in the wrong one, which one’s the right one?”
Kari stared at him for a second.
Then she laughed.
Not a normal laugh either. short at first, then spiraling into something thin, exhausted, and genuinely neurotic. She covered part of her face with one hand like that might somehow stop it.
“Oh my God.”
Another laugh escaped her.
“See, this is exactly the kind of bullshit that would’ve gotten someone institutionalized like two weeks ago.”
She shook her head quickly, trying to regain composure, but the smile stayed strained.
“How do we even know this is our Cornell?”
A beat.
“Like seriously how would we know? What if we’ve already crossed into something else and just didn’t notice?”
”Fffffuck if I know?” He threw his hands up. ”Tyler’s acting like a sociopath all of a sudden, Vicky’s got a magic bat, I can make that thing. Dead people are talking to us, oh, and now people are pretending that party didn’t happen. After people got killed.”
He crossed his arms and stared up at the ceiling. ”I got nothing for any of those, don’t get me started on that. I mean, it’s not like we can ask those dead people to give us more answers, can we? Gotta do something, though. Maybe- Huh. Maybe…”
An idea came to him.
”Hang on. What can you do? What magic did you actually get?”
”My ancestors told me that I have ‘White Lux’,” Kari shrugged.
”Information magic. I was told I had to find an owl- No THE Owl. To learn the family spell.”
She sighed.
”I’ve figured out pieces of it, but not the big one.”
Well, that was ominous.
”Information. Okay. We need a lot of that. I’ve got three of these monsters. One’s a bird with razors for wings and the other carries things. I can make more, I think…” Without thinking, he thumped the bottom end of his cards against the table. The whole stack rose up, and he pulled them out. They glittered under the lights as if they were coated in foil.
”Each one’s got a piece of me, kind of. I bled for one of them. I think I can make more, and stick each one in these cards. So, maybe you’ve got options? What if you learned how to follow where one of them went, that way, we didn’t have to risk our necks? Or… Maybe you make something too? Like- I dunno, a crystal ball, just out of thin air. Then I take that and make another monster out of it and it beams information to one of us.”
His fingers began to move, and the top card was suddenly spinning between them like a coin.
Kari watched the card spin between his fingers, her expression slowly shifting from overwhelmed to intensely focused.
“Okay, wait. If each one has a piece of you in it, then they’re connected, right? Because my magic isn’t about making things. It’s about perception. Following connections.
The words came out faster now, thoughts tripping over each other.
“So maybe I don’t need a crystal ball. Maybe I just need…” She gestured vaguely at the spinning card. “An anchor.”
A pause.
“If your creatures can move around independently, then maybe I could eventually learn to see through one.”
”Now you’re onto something. That one there, he watches things. I made him to keep an eye out for things and- It feels like hell, but I feel it when he sounds the alarm. So I could make another one, maybe something that’s smaller or faster.”
Watcher yawned on the ground, and sniffed at Kari.
”Maybe we make it with both your magic and mine so it’s easier on you. Then send it out to look around.”
”Sounds like a plan,” Kari laughed. ”Shall we begin?”
It was remarkable how little attention the two received. In that back corner of the library, against the wall where books had last been touched before a generation ago, one could forget they had ever even walked in. Tommy had arranged the books off to the side in an organized stack and summoned Porter for a brief moment to store his jacket away.
His small menagerie of beasts lay dormant within the deck. He chose to use the Jack of Diamonds for this experiment he was undertaking with Kari. With the table clear and the card face-up between them, he took to pushing Gold Lux into it. That took some time, mostly because he was beginning to notice that it was harder to build a creature without a reference; Raptor’s was his own blood, Watcher’s was wood and glass, and Porter was based on a backpack.
There was a lattice structure made of smoke hovering above the card, not unlike a hologram. An orb of some kind, with four diamond-shaped eyes in each direction.
”This is harder when there’s nothing solid to go off of,” He finally spoke. ”I don’t really know how to touch or chip away at magic, but this’ll do. How’s yours looking?”
Kari didn’t answer immediately.
She was staring at the construct above the card with painful concentration, elbows on the table and fingers pressed tightly against her temples. Every few seconds her eyes unfocused slightly, like she was trying to look through it instead of at it.
“Bad.”
A short, frustrated laugh escaped her.
“I think I’m trying too hard.”
The lights above them flickered faintly.
Kari’s gaze snapped back toward the floating orb.
“Your magic feels…” She hesitated. “Loud. Not literally loud, just...”
Her hand gestured vaguely in the air.
“Structured. Like there’s layers inside it.”
”I...” His face scrunched for a moment. ”Maybe. There’s the magic, and there’s the part of me that it gets. And there’s what I’m turning it into. I don’t understand much of it myself.”
He left the unfinished thing there and sat a hand palm-up on the table. Thin trails of gold smoke rose off his fingers. The raw stuff. ”Maybe try this?”
Kari stared at the smoke curling from his hand with immediate suspicion.
“This feels like a terrible idea.”
Despite saying that, she leaned forward anyway.
Carefully, Kari held her own hand just above his palm. Not touching. The moment the gold smoke brushed against her fingers, her breath caught sharply.
For a split second, Kari could feel the shape of it. Tommy’s magic wasn’t random at all. It branched outward in layered threads, all leading back toward him like nerves attached to a central body. The unfinished construct above the card flickered in her vision alongside it, suddenly clearer than before. Then the sensation hit too hard.
Kari jerked back immediately, nearly knocking her chair over.
“Jesus Christ on a cro-”
Her hand flew to her forehead.
“Okay, okay, I saw something.”
A nervous laugh escaped her as she stared back at the smoke.
“I think your monsters are all still connected to you.”
A pause.
“Like they’re extensions instead of separate things.”
”…Think so?” He sounded worried, and he really didn’t know what the fuck they were doing here. ”Is that something we can take advantage of?”
“I think so yeah,” Kari lowered her hand from her forehead. “If they are connected to you then they leave trails. Not physical ones. More like...”
Kari made a vague motion between them.
“... Information. Presence. I don't know yet.”
”Like you just know they’ve been somewhere?” He just knew certain things about the monsters he made. How they were holding up, what amount of strain they could take. It had to be that “Tommyness” in them, because in some small way, they had pieces of what made him Tommy.
”So… So if they’re connected to me still, maybe now you just stick magic in this thing? Or stick it in the smoke coming off me, and I’ll do it. I think. Honestly, if you don’t know, I sure as hell don’t.”
Kari stared at the unfinished construct.
Then at Tommy.
Then back at the floating smoke-orb thing.
“Okay.”
She lifted one hand slowly, as if approaching a wild animal. The white Lux around her fingers shimmered faintly of a nervous little glow that looked about as confident as she felt . “I’m going to do this veeeeeeeeeeeery carefully.”
The construct rotated in place, four diamond-shaped eyes blinking in different directions. Kari narrowed her four eyes
“Do not look at me like that.”
She tried to press the White Lux gently into the center of the construct.
Nothing happened.
She tried again, focusing harder.
Still nothing.
The orb wobbled once, almost offended.
Kari’s face tightened.
“Rude.”
She leaned closer, searching for anything that looked like an anchor point, a seam, an opening, some kind of magical intake valve—anything. Her White Lux slid along the outside of the Gold structure, refusing to sink in.
Then she saw it.
A tiny gap near the bottom of the lattice. Kari froze.
“... No, absolutely not.”
The construct turned slightly.
The gap remained exactly where it was.
Kari stared at it with growing horror.
“That is not an anchor point. That is a butt.”
Her White Lux pulsed faintly, like it disagreed.
“No. Don’t encourage this.”
Another second passed.
The construct hovered.
The library stayed quiet.
Kari slowly inhaled through her nose.
“... I hate magic.”
Then, with the grim determination of someone committing an unforgivable crime, Kari jabbed two fingers forward and shoved a thin stream of White Lux directly into the bottom of the construct.
The orb spasmed.
“Oh my God.” The construct shot six inches upward, spun violently in place, and made a tiny, horrible squeaking noise that absolutely should not have come from something made of smoke and cards. Kari yanked her hand back like she’d touched a hot stove.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! I didn’t know where else to put it!”
The White Lux threaded through the construct all at once, lighting the inner lattice like veins under glass. Its four eyes snapped open in perfect unison. Kari leaned back in her chair, mortified.
“Okay. So. Good news? I think it worked.”
She looked at the newly glowing construct, then immediately covered her face with both hands.
“... I’m never explaining this to anyone.”
”Yeah…”
Tommy clapped his hands around the creature, and finished its construction. The lines began to fill in, as if a painting were being completed. The empty lines became solid walls, the diamonds turned pearlescent red.
The end result was a glowing orb that could see in all directions, linked to both of them.
”Me either.”
It floated back down, and stared at them both with its strange eyes. Tommy felt the odd connection begin to settle in, he felt aware of what exactly it was looking at.
He tilted his head. ”I’ll call you Balor.”
”’Balor’” Kari parroted, as a catty grin formed on her face. She tried to fight it off. ”You’re going to give our child a name like that.”
There was a beat.
Before Kari erupted into laughter.
Tommy stared back at her. He didn’t see what was funny about it.
”In one of these books,” He waved at the stack. ”There’s these things called Fomorian. Big ogre things, and Balor is their king. He’s said to have a magic eye.”
Of which their “child” had four. The glowing orb floated in place, spinning slowly. Its red diamond eyes blinked at them.
Kari threw her hands up. ”It was just a joke. You don't need to nerd out on me.” She laughed.
”I got it,” He made a snrk sound. ”Okay, so, it’s alive… Now what?”
Kari wiped at the corner of her eye, recovering from laughing.
“Now?”
She looked at Balor, then at the table, then very deliberately avoided looking at the tiny gap she had violated to make this happen.
“Now we pretend that was a very professional magical procedure.”
Balor blinked all four eyes.
Kari’s smile twitched.
“... Don’t judge me.”
She leaned forward slowly, trying to focus on the thread of White Lux woven through the construct. It was faint, but there. Not like Tommy’s connection. Where his felt structural, like bones holding the thing together; hers felt thinner, more like a window someone forgot to close.
“Okay... I think I can feel it.”
Her voice quieted as her expression shifted into concentration.
“Balor, go to the end of the aisle.”
The orb floated in place.
Kari narrowed her eyes.
“Please?”
It drifted forward.
The second it moved, Kari flinched.
For one awful second, she saw the library twice: once from her own seat, and once from Balor’s strange, hovering angle. Shelves stretched differently. Light bent wrong. Tommy’s cards glittered from above. Her own face looked startled and deeply embarrassed.
Kari grabbed the edge of the table.
“Oh. Okay. That is weird.”
She blinked hard, forcing herself back into her own eyes.
“Good news? I can see through him.”
A pause.
“Bad news? I hate seeing through him. But… it worked.”
Balor blinked again from the end of the aisle.
Kari swallowed, a nervous smile creeping back in.
Tommy watched the orb flutter about. ”Maybe shut your eyes when he’s out. Or maybe you can get used to that. Come back here-” He stuck a hand out, causing Balor to disappear. He re-summoned the construct above its card, so it wouldn’t make Kari vomit from moving.
”Okay, great. It’s stable. We basically made a drone hooked up to a phone, cool. I guess… Now I just send him flying? Maybe I can see through him too, or something close to it, and just shunt him back into his card when we don’t need him. Usually, I toss one or two of these out and just bring them back that way, instead of making them find me.”
Kari nodded quickly, though the motion made her stomach twist a little.
“Yeah. Shutting my eyes is probably smart. I don’t think my brain likes two camera angles at once.”
She rubbed at the bridge of her nose, then looked back at Balor’s card with a strange mixture of pride and horror.
“But if you can send him somewhere and bring him back instantly, that’s actually huge.”
Her voice lowered as the thought settled.
“We could check places before walking into them. Alleys, empty houses, the warehouse again…”
The last one came out quieter than the rest.
Kari swallowed and forced herself to keep going.
“Or places where Cornell feels wrong. If there’s a rift, or something close to one, maybe Balor can get near it without us getting killed.”
Kari swallowed again. Shifting in her feet.
“Baby steps.
”Yeah. Yeah, we’ll do that. I’ll throw him out and have him look in places. If you need me to pull him back, just say so. Or message me, I’ll write my number down before we go.”
Tommy pulled his phone out and checked the time. It was getting late.
”…Damn. So, I should get going before someone asks what I was up to. How about I send him off and bring him back to me in a bit? See what happens.”
Kari’s eyes went toward the windows, where the evening outside had already started turning darker than she liked. The library felt safe in that fake way public places did, but the thought of Balor floating through Cornell without either of them nearby made her stomach twist.
“Okay. But don’t send him too far.”
She paused, realizing how ridiculous that sounded when talking about a magical eye-drone they had made less than ten minutes ago.
“Actually, I don’t know what ‘too far’ means yet. So… maybe just somewhere close. Somewhere boring first.”
Kari looked down at the Jack of Diamonds, her expression caught between worry and reluctant excitement. The White Lux thread inside Balor still felt faintly present, like a tiny open window in the back of her head. She didn’t like it. She also didn’t want to lose it.
“If it starts feeling wrong, I’ll text you. If I say pull him back, just do it. No questions, no experimenting, no ‘maybe one more second.’”
Her voice came out firmer than she expected. It surprised her a little, but she didn’t take it back.
She gathered her notebook and pens, then hesitated before writing one more thing at the bottom of the page.
Kari stared at the word dangerous for a second, then underlined it once.
“This is probably the first smart thing we’ve done since the warehouse.”
A small, tired smile tugged at her mouth.
“Which is concerning, because it involved magical butt stuff.”
She closed the notebook and slipped it into her bag, but her hand stayed on it for a moment.
“Be careful, okay?”
The words were soft, but not casual. Not really. Kari glanced once more toward Balor’s card, feeling that thin thread tug at the edge of her awareness.
“Cornell’s already weird enough without us accidentally making it worse.”
”Yeah, I’ll…” He picked up Balor’s card and stowed it, surprised it even worked. ”I’ll do that. I’m going. I’ll keep my phone on.”
Balor followed him out, his eyes taking in everything around him. The way there were less cars than one would expect, even at this hour. The complete lack of people. The wronging tilt of Cornell being so different now. His eyes saw everything the two could see and more.
He drove home quickly.
Interactions: The Streets of Cornell to the one place she said she wouldn't go.
The library doors shut behind Kari with a soft mechanical click, and for one second, she stood under the outside lights without moving.
Evening had settled over Cornell too quickly.
That had become one of the town’s smaller cruelties. The sky did not go dark all at once, but it always felt like she had missed a step. One minute there was late afternoon hanging over the rooftops. The next, the streetlights were on, the windows were black, and the spaces between buildings looked deeper than they should have. Kari adjusted the strap of her bag against her shoulder and checked the sidewalk behind her.
Only one shadow followed.
Good.
She hated that she had to check.
Tommy had already gone, Balor tucked away with him in that Jack of Diamonds card like any of this counted as normal. Kari could still feel the thread faintly, not enough to see through it, not enough to know where it was, but enough that there was a tiny open window somewhere in the back of her head. It made her skull feel drafty. She pulled out her phone before she could talk herself out of it.
Elsa answered on the fourth ring.
“.... Heeeeeeeeeey, what's shakin bacon? You still alive?”
Kari closed her eyes for half a second, facepalming.
“That is such a bad greeting.”
“Yeah, well, you answered, so it worked.” Elsa’s voice was low, casual in the way it got when she was trying too hard to sound casual. “Where are you?”
“Leaving the library.”
There was a beat.
“... By yourself?”
Kari looked down the street. A car passed too slowly, headlights dragging over the pavement. For a second, the road shone wet even though it had not rained.
“... Technically.”
“Kari.”
“I’m alone, yes. I’m walking on Main. I’m not near the woods. I’m not near the warehouse. I'm not near the Steel Mill. I’m not doing anything stupid.”
“... Sounds like you're near one of the three.”
“Honestly? I would feel the same way,” Kari sighed. ”You wouldn't believe this day so far.”
Elsa was quiet for a beat. Then softer, “What happened?”
Kari started walking because standing still made the street feel like it was waiting for her to make a decision. She kept to the side with the storefront windows, watching her reflection move beside her. Coat, bag, tense shoulders, tired face. Still her.
“I practiced earlier.”
Elsa whispered, “... Magic practiced?”
“No, Elsa, clarinet.” Kari rolled her eyes. ”Of course with magic!”
“There she is.”
Kari gave a tiny laugh, but it came out thin. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. Be sarcastic. It lets me know you're still you and not possessed by a ghost or something.”
Kari swallowed and passed a closed barbershop. The striped pole outside turned lazily, though the place was dark. Red, white, blue. Red, white, blue. For a second, the red stripe looked too thick.
She looked away.
“I went to the park. Cornell Park. I wanted somewhere familiar because I’m starting to realize that’s the only way I can tell what’s changed.”
“That is such a terrifying sentence.”
[color=#eac6ae]“I know.”[/color]
“What did you find?”
Kari thought of the drainage tunnel. The basketball bouncing from inside the dark. Her own voice coming back wrong. The notebook swallowing her question.
“There’s something near the old runoff tunnel.”
“Something like a monster?”
“No. Maybe. I don’t know.” Kari rubbed at her forehead with two fingers. “That’s the problem. I can tell when something is wrong now. I can tell when danger is close, when something comes through, when people are emotionally...”
She hesitated.
“Emotionally what?”
“Loud.”
Elsa did not answer immediately.
Kari kept walking.
“But that’s not the same as understanding. Warning tells me something is about to slip. Boundary Disturbance tells me Cornell itself is reacting. Emotional Thread tells me where people are, sort of, and what they’re carrying. But none of that tells me what is going on.”
“So you tried to make a new one.”
Kari smiled despite herself. “I hate that you knew that.”
“You do this thing where you get scared, then immediately try to make a whole ass system for the thing scaring you.”
“That is not true.”
“Kari.”
There wass a beat.
“... It's kind of true.”
“Uh-huh.”
Kari stopped at the corner, waiting for the crosswalk light even though no cars were coming. Across the street, the road stretched past the traffic signal for a second too long. She watched it until it snapped back into place.
“I tried to read the disturbance itself instead of just detecting it.”
“That sounds useful.”
“It was not.”
“How not useful?”
“It gave me fragments. Red. Pressure. Down but not physically down. Fear, but not human fear. My voice coming from places my voice should not be.”
Elsa went quiet.
Kari crossed the street.
“Then my notebook wrote back.”
“What?”
“It wrote, ‘You are asking the wrong side.’”
“Kari.”
“... I know.”
“No, I need you to understand that I am saying your name in the ‘why are you still walking around alone’ way.”
“I stopped after that.”
“You stopped after the haunted notebook started talking to you?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sooooooooooooo proud of you,” There was a silence that stretched on too long. "I'm being sarcastic by the way."
“That’s fair.”
Kari passed the alley beside the Riverside hardware store. She did not look down it. She could feel it there, though. Just slightly wrong at the edges, like Cornell had been folded and unfolded too many times.
Elsa’s voice softened again. “Are you okay?”
Kari almost lied.
She was very good at almost lying now. The sentence rose automatically: I’m fine. I’m just tired. It’s okay. I handled it.
But the bracelet on her wrist felt tight.
“No.”
“Okay.”
“But I’m less confused now.”
“That sounds like a version of okay.”
“It’s not okay. It’s just... I think I’m starting to understand how my magic works.”
“Tell me.”
Kari exhaled slowly.
“It doesn’t give me answers. It gives me relationships.”
Elsa said nothing, giving her room.
Kari kept going, faster now because the thought had shape. “Danger isn’t just danger. It’s a relationship between what is about to happen and what should happen. Boundaries aren’t just lines. They’re agreements. This belongs here. That doesn’t. People aren’t just emotions. They’re connections. Threads. Distance. Pulling away. Coming closer.”
The words sounded strange out loud, but not wrong.
“White Lux is too much because everything is connected to everything else, and I have to figure out which connection matters before something kills us.”
Elsa breathed out. “Jesus.”
“Yeah.”
“So you’re becoming a psychic detective.”
“Please don’t call me that.”
“... Magic guidance counselor?”
“Worse.”
“Trauma librarian?”
Kari laughed once, then covered her mouth because it almost turned into something else. “That one is kind of close.”
“Okay. So what did the actual library say?”
“Normal occult books are useless.”
“Shocking.”
“Tommy was there.”
“The weird guy?”
“Yeah.”
“What did you two do?”
Kari winced before answering.
“We made a magical drone.”
Silence.
Then Elsa said, very carefully, “You made a what?”
“A. Magical. Drone.”
“With the future school shooter?”
“It was actually a pretty good idea.”
“Those words are how people die in movies.”
“It can scout places before we go in.”
“That is also how people die in movies.”
“Elsa.”
“I’m listening.”
Kari turned onto the next block. The library was behind her now, but she could still feel the shape of it in her head: the old shelves, the table, the stack of useless books, Balor’s four red diamond eyes blinking open.
“Tommy’s constructs are still connected to him. I can feel the connections. So we made one with some of my White Lux inside it, and now I can sort of see through it if it moves around.”
“'Sort of.'”
“Nauseatingly.”
“That does not make me feel better, girl.”
“It shouldn’t.”
“At least you know that.” Elsa laughed.
Kari glanced at her reflection in a dark store window. For half a second, her reflection’s mouth was still while she spoke.
She stopped walking.
Elsa caught it immediately. “What?”
Kari stared.
The reflection stared back.
Then it blinked with her.
“Nothing.”
“Kari.”
“Window was weird.”
“... You should know not to look in windows after dark”
“I know.”
There was a silence.
“I hate this town.”
“Yeah, me too.”
Kari started walking again.
For a little while, neither of them spoke. Elsa stayed on the phone anyway. That helped more than Kari wanted to admit. The simple sound of someone breathing on the other end made Cornell feel less able to swallow the street whole.
Then Elsa said, “... Do you think Isabelle is dead?”
Kari’s steps slowed.
The question hit clean through everything else. The park. Naomi. Tommy. Balor. The window. All of it fell away, and she was back at the warehouse, seeing Isabelle lifted wrong, seeing that thread yanked out of place.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you feel her?”
Kari closed her eyes for one second too long.
She had tried. Quietly. Privately. More than once. Every time, the answer was either nothing or something too tangled to trust. Isabelle had not felt like a normal absence. She had felt interrupted.
“Not clearly.”
“That’s not a no.”
“No.”
Elsa’s voice dropped. “Kari.”
“I don’t want to say it means anything.”
“But?”
Kari swallowed.
“But when someone is gone, I think there’s supposed to be an end to the thread.”
“And Isabelle?”
Kari looked toward the hills beyond Main Street, where the last light sat dirty and low behind the old buildings.
“Isabelle feels like someone cut the thread and tied it somewhere I can’t reach.”
Elsa did not answer, and Kari wished she had not said it.
Then her phone buzzed against her cheek.
She pulled it away and looked at the screen.
Kersten.
The text was plain enough that it took a second to become frightening.
hey weird question do u know anything about the runoff channels under the east side of the steel mill?
Kari stopped walking.
Elsa’s voice came through smaller now, tinny against the night air. “Kari?”
Kari stared at the message until the letters stopped looking like letters.
“No.”
“What happened?”
Another text came in.
camille thinks there’s a way under. not going in far. just looking.
Kari’s mouth went dry.
“No no no no no....”
“Kari, what happened?”
Kari typed too fast.
Do NOT go near them. Leave. Now. I’m serious.
She sent it.
Then another.
Where are you exactly?
Then another.
Kersten answer me
Elsa’s voice sharpened. “Talk to me.”
“Kersten just texted me about the runoff channels under the east side of the steel mill.”
“The steel mill? Why?!”
“Because apparently everyone in this town is competing to see who can make the worst posssible fucking decision.”
“Kari.”
“They’re there with Camille.”
“Call them.”
“I am.”
Kari hit Kersten’s contact.
It rang.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Voicemail.
She called again.
Voicemail.
Her stomach pulled tight, but according to Emotional Thread, they were fine. That did not ease the girl.
Her phone buzzed again.
Not Kersten.
Camille.
A picture.
Kari opened it.
For half a second, she did not understand what she was seeing. Concrete wall. Rust streaks. A narrow maintenance passage. A line of dark water running along the side.
Except the water was not on the floor.
It clung to the wall in a vertical sheet, crawling upward through cracks in the concrete like it had decided gravity was optional.
Kari’s ears rang.
Elsa said, “Kari?”
Kari did not answer.
The picture shifted in her hand.
Not actually. The image did not move. But her White Lux caught on it anyway, and suddenly the steel mill was there in the back of her skull. Not visually. Structurally. Boundary Disturbance slammed into focus so hard she nearly dropped the phone.
The mill was screaming with wrongness.
With the feeling of a place being rubbed thin from the inside.
Kari grabbed the side of the empty storefront beside her and bent forward, breathing through her teeth.
Elsa’s voice spiked. “Kari!”
“I think something came through.”
“What?”
Kari tried to answer, but the words tangled. The mill was not close enough for her to feel like this. It should not reach this far. Boundary Disturbance had limits. Everything had limits.
Cornell kept proving that wrong.
“The mill.”
“The steel mill?”
“Something just came through.”
“Kari, what came through?”
A beat.
“... I don't know.”
She called Kersten again.
No answer.
She called Camille.
He picked up on the second ring.
For one second, there was only breathing.
Too close to the phone.
Too quiet.
“Camille?”
Static shifted.
Then a whisper.
“Kari?”
Relief hit so hard she almost missed the fear under his voice.
“Camille, where are you?”
Metal screamed somewhere behind him.
Not struck. Dragged.
The sound ripped through the call, long and awful, like something huge had leaned its weight against a wall that was not supposed to move. She checked Emotional Thread and could only sense fear.
Camille gasped.
Kari pressed the phone hard against her ear. “Camille? Camille, listen to me. Get out. Get the fuck out right now.. Where’s Kersten?”
His breathing hitched.
“Kari-”
Something slammed into metal.
The call cut off.
Kari stood frozen on the sidewalk with the dead phone against her ear. The pull of Emotional-Thread was overwhelming.
Elsa was still on the other line, her voice distant and panicked. “Kari? Kari, answer me. What happened?”
Kari lowered the phone.
For a second, she could feel too much.
Kersten. Maybe. Camille. Maybe. Fear moving wrong. Not behind them. Ahead of them. Like something in the mill knew the shape of their panic before it happened. Like the building had already made room for where they were about to stand.
Kari’s hand shook as she switched back to Elsa.
“I’ll call you back.”
“Kari-”
She ended the call before Elsa could sound any more afraid.
For a second, the sidewalk went quiet around her. A traffic light clicked above an empty intersection. A loose sign knocked softly against brick. Somewhere behind her, a car rolled past too slowly, then turned onto a side street and disappeared. Without Elsa’s voice in her ear, the town felt wider. Like every street had opened its mouth at once.
Kari looked east.
She could not see the steel mill from where she stood, but that did not matter. Everyone in Cornell knew where it was. Even when buildings blocked it, even when the river fog hid it, even when you tried not to think about it, the mill lived at the edge of town like a stain that had soaked too deep to scrub out.
Boundary Disturbance kept pulling at the back of her skull, but Emotional Thread was worse.
It screamed without sound.
Kersten’s fear came in bright, jagged bursts, panicked and disorganized. Camille’s was lower, trapped under shock, like he was trying very hard not to fall apart and failing anyway. Kari could not hear their thoughts, but she could feel the direction of them. East. Down. Inside.
Every step toward the mill made the threads sharper.
Kari tried to breathe through it and failed.
“This is stupid,” she whispered.
She kept going anyway.
Kersten still had not answered. Camille’s number would not reconnect. Kari tried both again as she moved, cutting through Main, then behind the hardware store, then down the narrower streets that led toward the industrial side of town. Each call either rang until voicemail or died before the first tone finished. She texted while walking fast enough that her thumb hit the wrong letters twice.
[i]Answer me. Leave if you can.[/i]
Then, after staring at the screen for a second too long:
Please.
No response.
Boundary Disturbance kept pulling at the back of her skull. The pressure grew worse with every step. Heavier. Like the mill was not a building anymore, but a bad direction. Kari crossed an intersection without waiting for the signal. Halfway through, the painted crosswalk lines stretched under her shoes, dragging east like someone had pulled the road thin. She looked down. The white stripes ran too long for a second, then snapped back so suddenly she stumbled.
“Nope. Keep walking.”
Her voice sounded steadier than she felt.
Her stomach pulled tight, and Emotional Thread answered so violently she almost dropped the phone.
Kersten.
Camille.
Not words. Not images. Just direction and feeling.
Fear.
Close enough to reach for, far enough to be useless. Their terror pulled east, hard and frantic, like two hooks set under Kari’s ribs. It did not tell her where they were exactly. It did not tell her what had them. It only told her they were scared, they were together or close enough to blur, and their fear was moving wrong.
The service road ahead was mostly dark. Gravel replaced pavement in broken patches. The fence along the mill property leaned inward, rusted chain-link trembling in the wind. Beyond it, the old steel mill rose in pieces: pipes, skeletal catwalks, broken windows, black brick, dead machinery. Most of it was still hidden by distance and bad light, but the shape was there. Too big. Too quiet. Waiting at the end of the road.
Kari’s stomach turned cold.
She was closer than she ever meant to be. That was a lie. She had meant to be this close. She had just not wanted to admit it until the mill was already in front of her.
Her phone rang.
Kari nearly dropped it.
For one awful second, she thought it was Kersten. Or Camille. Or no caller ID. Her hand shook as she looked at the screen.
Zakira.
Kari stared at the name while the ringtone cut through the empty service road. The mill loomed ahead, dark against the last weak strip of sky. Somewhere near the fence, metal clinked softly. Chain-link. A gate. Something loose moving when there was not enough wind to move it.
Kari stopped so hard that gravel scraped under her shoes. For one second, she thought it was the mill itself. Another groan of metal. Another pipe shifting in a building too old to keep pretending it was stable. But then it came again, thinner this time.
A voice.
Far away. Small. Strangled by distance and concrete.
Kari’s fingers tightened around the phone.
“Kari, where are you?”
She barely heard Zakira. Her attention had already gone ahead of her, pulled through the service road, through the leaning chain-link, through the open dark of the east entrance.
“I heard them.”
“No shit, we heard something too, mami,” Lupe snapped through the speaker. “Do not run toward it.”
Kari was already moving.
The fence gate was supposed to be locked. She knew that because everyone knew that. The mill had been closed for years, and adults liked to say “closed” like a padlock could make a place safe. But the gate hung loose now, chain snapped or cut or pulled apart, the metal links swinging gently in the wind. Kari pushed through, and the whole thing rattled so loud it made her teeth hurt.
“Camille!”
Her voice broke against the mill yard and came back wrong.
Camille.
Mille.
Ill.
She ran harder.
The ground changed under her feet. Gravel first, then cracked concrete, then something wet that made her almost slip. She looked down long enough to see dark water running in a line along the ground, except it was not flowing downhill. It crawled sideways toward the building, collecting in the seams between slabs like it was being pulled by a mouth.
Warning hit so hard her vision narrowed.
The mill was not just wrong. It was open.
Not a door. Not a hole. A place where the world had thinned until something on the other side had leaned its weight through. The air tasted like rust and flooded basements and old blood. The windows above her were broken black squares. The pipes along the outer wall trembled softly without steam moving through them.
“Kari, stop!”
“I can see the east entrance.”
“Stay outside!”
“The door’s open.”
“Of course the door’s open,” Lupe said, voice going pale with anger.
The entrance was a wide service door rolled halfway up, bent at one side like something had forced it from underneath. Beyond it was darkness, not complete, but layered. A few emergency lights still glowed inside, weak red bulbs throwing long strips over the floor. Water clung to the wall to her left in a vertical smear, climbing through cracks in the concrete. Camille’s picture had not been a trick of angle.
It looked worse in person. The water pulsed and Kari slowed at the threshold. Everything in her told her not to cross it.
Warning stayed uselessly quiet, because this was not danger approaching. This was danger already happening. Boundary Disturbance screamed about the mill itself, about the place being open, thin, rubbed raw between Cornell and somewhere else. But Emotional Thread was the thing that made her step inside.
Kersten and Camille were in there.
Their fear dragged at her so hard it hurt. It was not clean anymore. Not two separate threads she could follow easily. The mill distorted them, stretched them, bent them through walls and corridors until their panic smeared ahead of their bodies. Camille felt closer. Kersten felt lower. Or farther. Or fading.
Kari’s throat tightened.
”I'm at the door.”
“Mami?”
Kari stepped inside.
The mill swallowed her immediately.
Sound changed first. Outside, the wind had space to move. Inside, everything came back bent. Her breathing climbed the walls. Her shoes clicked under her and then answered from too many directions. Somewhere high overhead, a chain knocked once against metal. The red lights made the puddles look black. Old catwalks crossed above her in layers, their railings warped and rusted. The place smelled like iron, mold, hot dust, and something sour underneath.
Kari lifted the phone closer to her mouth as she muted her end for a second.
“Camille?!”
No answer.
She took another step.
Then another-
She turned mute off.
The concrete floor sloped where it should not have sloped. Not enough to see from outside, but enough to feel in her ankles. It pulled toward the right, toward a maintenance corridor marked EAST RUNOFF ACCESS. The sign hung crooked, one bolt missing, swinging slightly though there was no wind inside.
A wet click sounded from somewhere in that corridor.
Kari froze.
“Kari, leave.”
Kari could not answer.
The click came again. Slow. Heavy. Not a machine. Not water. Something thick moving against something hard.
Then a faint scrape.
A shoe dragging over concrete.
Kari’s throat closed.
The corridor narrowed around her, walls stained with rust and black water. Pipes ran along the ceiling low enough that she had to duck once. Her phone shook in her hand. The flashlight on it caught pieces of the hallway in jerks: peeling paint, wet footprints, a smear on the wall, a backpack ripped open near a drain.
Kersten’s backpack.
Kari stopped.
A sound came from farther in.
A deep breath.
Not Kari’s.
The corridor opened into a larger chamber.
Kari stepped into it, and the world dropped out from under her.
The room had been some kind of pump station once. Old equipment filled the space in dead rows: tanks, valves, hanging chains, wide pipes disappearing into the floor. Red emergency lights blinked overhead, too slow and uneven. Water crawled up the far wall in dark veins, defying gravity, pooling around broken gauges before sinking into cracks that should have led nowhere.
It was enormous. Not tall in a clean way, not built like something meant to stand upright, but swollen into height by sheer mass. Pale flesh hung over slabs of muscle and hardened fat. Its shoulders were thick enough to block half the chamber. Its stomach sagged forward, slick with grime and dark stains, rising and falling with slow, greedy breaths. Its skin looked wrong in the red light, waxy in some places, bruised in others, yellow-green under the surface like old infection. Its mouth was too small for the size of its body until it opened.
Then it was not small at all.
Then Kari saw what it was doing.
Camille was in both of its hands.
Not held.
Pinned.
The creature had him lifted close to its chest, one massive hand clamped around his lower body while the other dug into him with slow, possessive force, dragging him closer every time he twitched. Its mouth was pressed into him, working wetly, feeding in heavy, pulls like it was its last meal. Blood ran down Gorge’s chin and disappeared into the folds of its neck. Every few seconds, its shoulders flexed, and Camille’s body jerked weakly in its grip.
Kari’s mind blanked.
Camille was alive.
That was the first thing her brain grabbed onto because anything else would have shattered her.
He was alive. Barely. His hand moved once against Gorge’s wrist, fingers opening and closing without strength. One arm hung at a bad angle. His face was turned toward the floor, eyes open but unfocused, mouth moving around words that did not reach her. He looked smaller than he should have. Not because he was small, but because Gorge made everything human look temporary.
Kersten was closer to the creature’s feet.
Or what was left in the red light looked like Kersten.
Emotional Thread screamed through Kari so violently she almost lost her balance.
Camille’s fear was still there. Raw. Choking. Alive. His thread thrashed in Gorge’s grip like a live wire. Kersten’s was weaker, fraying at the edges, collapsing into pain and numbness and then something Kari’s mind refused to name.
Kari made a sound that did not become speech.
The phone crackled near her cheek.
“Kari, what do you see?” Zakira asked.
It's head lifted.
Slowly.
It had been focused on Camille, devouring him like nothing else mattered in the world. Now its small, sunken eyes found Kari through the dark. The room seemed to bend around its attention.
Kari’s knees nearly gave.
“Camille...”
“Kari, get out.”
“It...” Kari’s voice cracked. “It has him.”
Kari had no plan. No weapon. No spell that could move something that size. Warning did nothing. Boundary Disturbance only screamed about the room itself. Emotional Thread gave her the horrifying certainty that if she froze, Camille would disappear into that mouth while she watched. Kari backed up one step.
The creature followed with its eyes.
Camille stayed in its grip.
Then Kari saw Kersten again.
The truth arrived all at once.
Gone in the way Isabelle had not been gone. Gone with an ending. Gone so clearly that Emotional Thread found the frayed edge and cut her on it.
Kari’s voice broke.
“It ate Kersten too.”
Lupe’s side of the call went silent.
For half a second, even the mill seemed to stop.
Then Gorge moved.
It was not fast at first. One huge foot dragged forward. Concrete complained under the weight. Its belly shifted. Its shoulders scraped a pipe, bending it with a shriek. Camille dangled from one hand, and the other hand reached toward Kari with slow, certain hunger.
Kari backed away.
“It’s eating them!”
“BITCH IF YOU DON’T RUN!” Lupe screamed through the phone.
That snapped something in Kari.
She screamed.
Gorge lunged.
She ran.
Her phone slipped from her hand.
It hit the concrete with a sharp crack, bounced once, then skidded under a rusted worktable. Zakira and Lupe’s voices spilled from the speaker, distant and tinny.
For all its weight, it moved suddenly, violently, like a wall deciding to fall forward. Its charge slammed through a row of old equipment instead of cleanly around it. Metal folded. A pipe burst from the ceiling, spilling dark water upward for one impossible second before it splashed sideways across the chamber. The floor shook so hard Kari stumbled, shoulder clipping the wall. She threw herself behind a pump housing as Gorge crashed into the wall where she had been. Camille was still in its hand.
Kari pressed both palms over her mouth before she could make another sound.
Her whole body shook.
Gorge turned slowly.
Too slowly. That was the only reason she was still alive.
Its mouth opened.
A voice came out, low and ruined and thick with something that had never needed language until something tried to take from it.
“MY FOOD!”
It dragged one foot, then the other, head shifting as it listened. Its nostrils flared. It could smell her. Or feel her. Kari tried to make herself small, unreadable, quiet. But her fear was everywhere.
Kari’s eyes widened.
“No...” she mouthed.
Each step shook the floor. Its toes spread against the concrete, pale and dark-stained, too heavy to lift cleanly. It bent with a grunt, bulk folding over itself, and for the first time Kari saw how its face changed when it was close to food. Empty and sharp at once. Stupid with hunger, but not stupid enough to ignore a sound.
Gorge’s head lowered toward the floor.
Kari stayed behind the pump housing with both hands clamped over her mouth, trying to breathe through her nose without making any sound. It did not work. Every breath felt too loud. Every tremor in her chest felt like it moved the whole room. Her shoulder burned where she had hit the wall. Her sleeve was torn open. Cold water soaked through one side of her jeans. Somewhere under the rusted worktable, her phone lay silent. No Zakira. No Lupe. No one telling her what not to do.
Just Gorge.
The creature dragged one foot forward, then the other. Slow. Heavy. Patient in a way that made Kari’s stomach twist. It had stopped roaring. That was worse. The anger had gone quiet, buried under something more focused. Its nostrils opened and closed, sucking in the air. Its head shifted slightly from side to side.
It was smelling for her. It was not reading spells or threads for information. It was hunting the simple things her body could not hide.
Breath.
Heat.
Sweat.
Fear.
Kari squeezed her eyes shut and tried to make herself smaller. She pressed her back into the rusted metal, forced her breathing shallow, and tried not to shake. That only made her chest hurt worse. White Lux did not help. It wanted to notice everything: the warped pressure in the room, the wrong water on the walls, the damaged boundary around the mill, Camille’s terror, Kersten’s fading thread, Gorge’s huge body shifting somewhere too close. Her magic was making her afraid enough to give herself away.
Gorge made a low sound in its throat.
Camille was still in its hands. That was the worst part. Gorge had not forgotten him. One massive hand clamped Camille close, pinning him against its bulk, while the other held him like food it had not finished deciding how to eat. Camille’s body twitched weakly whenever Gorge shifted. Blood and water ran together beneath him, spreading slowly across the concrete. Gorge lifted Camille closer to its mouth.
Kari’s hand found the broken metal rod beside her before she realized she had moved. Her fingers closed around rust and old grease. The rod was heavy, useless, stupid. She lifted it anyway-then something clicked above her.
Kari froze.
Not Gorge.
The sound came from the ceiling. Click.
Click-click.
A shape unfolded from the catwalk above the chamber.
At first, Kari thought it was a sheet of metal peeling away. Then it moved wrong. Too many joints. Too much thinness. A narrow body slid between the railings, long arms hooked around rusted beams, its back covered in bent metal scraps and wet gray hide. Its head hung upside down from the catwalk, face split by a vertical mouth lined with needle teeth. Thin cables or tendons dangled from its jaw, twitching like feelers.
It had been there the whole time.
Watching.
Kari stopped breathing. The thing’s head turned toward her. Then toward Gorge. Then toward Camille. It clicked again, louder. Gorge stopped. The enormous creature’s head lifted. For the first time since Kari had hidden, its attention left her. The smaller monster hit the floor lightly, too lightly for something that size, folding on all fours before rising halfway upright. It was thin where Gorge was massive, all stretched limbs and sharp angles, its ribs showing under slick skin. One arm ended in too many fingers. The other dragged a strip of rusted chain that had somehow grown through the flesh of its wrist.
It opened its mouth and shrieked.
The sound stabbed through the chamber.
Kari flinched behind the pump housing, nearly crying out. The shriek was not just loud. It was bright, piercing, full of panic and challenge and hunger. It bounced off the pipes and woke every dead machine in the room. Gorge turned fully toward it.
For one second, Kari understood what had happened.
The smaller thing had made itself louder. A moving body full of noise and panic, right in front of Gorge. It had put itself between Gorge and the rest of his meal. Gorge hated that.
The thin monster rushed first.
It was fast. Faster than anything that broken-looking should have been. It crossed half the chamber in a blur of clicking joints and wet feet, leaping over a broken pipe and throwing itself at Gorge’s side. Its teeth sank into the folds near Gorge’s shoulder. Its fingers clawed for purchase.
Gorge barely moved.
The smaller monster tore at him, ripping dark strips from skin and fat. Gorge’s body absorbed most of it. The wounds opened shallowly, then squeezed around the damage like the flesh itself was trying to swallow the injury. The thin monster shrieked again, angrier this time.
Gorge’s hand opened.
Camille hit the floor with a wet, broken sound.
Camille moved.
Barely.
Gorge did not look down at him.
The thin monster tried to leap away.
Gorge caught one of its legs and the thin monster thrashed, chain-arm scraping sparks across the concrete. It clawed at the floor, at Gorge’s wrist, at anything. Gorge lifted it off the ground with one hand. Its joints clicked wildly. Its mouth opened and closed around shrieks that broke into frantic chattering.
Gorge looked at it.
Then he bit down.
The sound was immediate and terrible.
Kari shoved her fist against her mouth so hard her teeth cut her knuckle. Tears streaked down her face. The thin monster convulsed in Gorge’s grip. Its limbs kicked against his chest. Its chain-arm whipped once, striking Gorge across the face with a crack that would have dropped anything human. He fed with both hands now, dragging the creature into his mouth, tearing into it with thick, possessive force. Pieces of metal and bone and wet gray flesh cracked between his teeth. The smaller monster shrieked until it could not. Its body folded in places bodies were not supposed to fold. Gorge pulled it apart like he was opening something wrapped too tightly.
Gorge ate faster.
That was when Kari saw the change.
His shoulders rose.
His back thickened under the skin, muscles swelling in slow, pulsing shifts. The torn places near his shoulder pressed closed. The bruised yellow-green color under his flesh deepened, then spread. His breathing changed from slow and heavy to wet and eager. He shoved more of the creature into his mouth, not chewing properly now, just crushing, tearing, forcing it down.
The chamber shook with every swallow.
Camille lay on the floor behind him.
Alive.
Somehow still alive.
Kari’s whole body leaned toward him before she could stop herself.
Gorge’s nostrils flared.
Kari froze.
Toward her breath.
Toward the tiny sound she had made when she moved.
Toward the heat of her body pressed behind rusted metal.
Kari went cold.
For one second, the smaller monster still hung from Gorge’s hands, half-eaten, twitching once. Gorge stared across the chamber, chewing slowly. Blood and black fluid ran from his mouth down his chest.
He remembered there was more.
Warning finally sparked, late and brutal.
Move.
Kari moved.
She lunged out from behind the pump housing and grabbed Camille under one arm.
He made a broken sound.
“I’m sorry,” she gasped. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry-”
She pulled.
Camille barely moved.
He was heavier than he looked. Or she was weaker than she needed to be. His shoes dragged through the water. His hand slipped against the floor. Kari’s shoulder screamed with pain as she hauled him behind the valve assembly, trying to get him farther from the center of the room, farther from Gorge, farther from the thing that had already eaten Kersten.
Gorge took one step.
The floor complained.
Kari looked up.
He was still eating the smaller monster while moving.
That was the worst part. He did not choose between meals. He shoved the last of the thin creature into his mouth with one hand and reached for them with the other. His body had become more urgent, less careful. Feeding had made him stronger, but it had also stripped away the patience. Kari dragged Camille behind a rusted tank as Gorge’s hand slammed down where they had been.
The concrete cracked.
The shock knocked Kari off her feet. She hit the ground beside Camille, breath punching out of her lungs. For a second, she saw nothing but red light and black water.
Then a pipe burst behind Gorge.
Dark water exploded upward instead of down, spraying the ceiling and raining sideways. Gorge turned his head toward the motion, confused for half a second by the impossible flow.
Kari used it.
She grabbed Camille again, but his fingers weakly closed around her wrist. His mouth moved.
No sound came out.
Kari leaned closer despite every instinct telling her not to.
“What?”
Camille’s eyes shifted past her.
Behind.
Kari turned.
Gorge was coming around the tank.
Faster now.
Too fast. Kari let go of Camille and threw herself backward as Gorge’s arm swept through the space where her head had been. The blow hit the tank instead. Metal caved inward with a shriek, and the whole thing tipped, tearing free from old bolts. Kari scrambled away on her hands and knees as the tank crashed between her and Camille.
“No!”
Gorge roared.
The fallen tank had cut off the direct path. Not by much. Not for long. Gorge slammed both hands against it, denting it deeper with each hit. The sound punched through Kari’s chest. One hit. Two. Three.
Camille was on the other side.
Kari pushed herself up, looking for a way around, but the chamber had changed. Or maybe panic made it feel changed. Pipes crossed where they had not been. The red lights blinked slower. The corridor she had entered through looked farther away than before. The mill was stretching again, folding distance around fear.
Gorge hit the tank again.
It moved.
Kari backed away.
“Camille!”
No answer.
Emotional Thread gave her a flicker.
Alive.
Still alive.
But barely at this point.
Gorge shoved the tank aside.
It screamed across the floor.
Kari ran.
This time she did not run deeper on purpose. She ran because every direction became the same when Gorge moved. Behind her, the monster charged, no longer slow, no longer patient. Each step landed like machinery dropping from a crane. He smashed through a row of pipes rather than turn around them. Kari reached the corridor and for half a second, she thought she was going to make it.
Then the floor dipped.
The concrete under her feet softened into the wrong angle, sloping sharply toward a drainage channel that had not been open before. Kari slid, caught herself on a pipe, and felt old metal tear into her palm. Pain flashed white.
Gorge slammed into the corridor mouth behind her and for one blessed second, his shoulders caught against the frame. Kari stared back at him. Gorge stared at her. His mouth opened, full of the remains of the smaller thing and his own endless hunger.
Then he pushed.
Concrete split.
The frame widened by force.
Kari turned and ran.
The corridor ahead was low and narrow. Her flashlight was gone with her phone, so she moved by red emergency light leaking from behind and the faint shine of water climbing the walls. Her breath came ragged. Her shoes slipped. Her torn sleeve slapped wetly against her arm. Behind her, Gorge tore through the opening with a sound like the mill being unmade piece by piece. He was too big for the corridor.
He came anyway.
His shoulders scraped both walls. Pipes burst against his body. Chunks of concrete fell around him. He did not slow. Feeding had made him reckless. Stronger. Hungrier. Dumber in the exact way that made him impossible to reason around. Kari ducked under a pipe and nearly fell.
Emotional Thread pulled back toward Camille.
It hurt.
It felt like leaving someone underwater.
“I’m sorry!” she choked.
The words disappeared under Gorge’s roar.
A side door appeared on her left, rusted open just enough for a person to fit through. Kari threw herself at it. The gap scraped her ribs as she squeezed through, backpack catching for one awful second. She yanked hard, straps cutting into her shoulders, and tumbled into a narrower service passage.
Behind her, Gorge hit the doorframe.
The wall shook.
The opening was too small.
Kari crawled backward, coughing, one hand leaving bloody prints on the floor. Gorge’s arm punched through the gap, his fingers scraped inches from her shoe. Kari kicked away and hit a rack of old tools. Something fell with a clatter.
Gorge shoved harder.
The wall cracked.
Kari stumbled to her feet and ran down the service passage. It smelled worse here. Damp concrete. Burnt metal. Rot. The ceiling was low enough that she had to hunch. Every few feet, the wall pulsed with climbing water. The mill did not feel like a building anymore. It felt like a throat. Behind her, Gorge screamed.
The wall behind her cracked again.
Then again.
...
...
...
He was coming through.
Kari reached a fork in the passage and stopped for half a breath.
Left led down.
Right led toward a strip of gray light.
Emotional Thread pulled left.
Camille.
Still somewhere behind.
Still alive.
Barely.
The gray light pulled right.
Outside, maybe.
Escape, maybe.
Kari stood there shaking, blood running down her palm, Gorge breaking through the wall behind her, and for one horrible second, she understood-
Then Warning flared so hard the world skipped.
Right.
Now.
Kari went right.
The wall behind her gave way.
Gorge burst into the passage with a roar that shook rust from the ceiling.
Kari ran toward the gray light as the mill screamed around them, and behind her Gorge came faster, fed enough to be monstrous, hungry enough to keep chasing, dragging the whole building’s wrongness after him.
The gray light was not outside.
Kari realized that too late.
She reached the end of the right passage and skidded to a stop so hard her injured palm slapped against the wall. Pain shot up her arm. For one second, all she could do was stare.
The tunnel was collapsed.
Concrete, old brick, twisted rebar, and rusted pipe filled the passage from floor to ceiling. The strip of gray light came from somewhere beyond the debris, leaking through cracks too narrow for her hand, let alone her body. Dust drifted through the beam. Cold air breathed out from the other side.
Behind her, Gorge tore through the corridor.
The sound was getting closer.
Kari spun around, heart hammering. The passage behind her was too narrow, too straight, too stupid. No side doors. No ladder. No window. No miracle. Just broken walls, climbing water, and something too big to fit coming anyway.
“No, no, no, no—”
Gorge’s shape filled the far end of the passage.
He was wedged sideways for half a second, shoulders scraping both walls, head lowered, mouth wet with black fluid and gray meat. He pushed once. Concrete screamed. The walls gave him another inch.
Kari looked at the collapse behind her.
Then at Gorge.
Then back.
Her breath caught as she grit her teeth.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me!” She hissed.
Warning sparked again, brutal and immediate.
Kari understood.
She backed toward the collapsed wall, one step at a time, keeping her eyes on Gorge. Her body wanted to freeze. Emotional Thread still pulled back toward Camille, thin and fading behind walls and distance. Boundary Disturbance screamed from every surface around her. The mill felt less like a place now and more like a wound trying to close around them.
Gorge shoved forward again.
The corridor widened by force.
Kari swallowed hard and lifted both hands, as if that meant anything.
“Hey!”
Gorge stopped.
For one second, he only breathed.
Kari’s voice shook, but she forced it louder.
“Hey! Over here you fucking... you fucking stupid thing!”
His head tilted.
The motion was almost curious.
Then his nostrils flared.
Kari saw the exact moment he found her fear again.
His mouth opened.
No word came out this time. Just a low, starving sound that made the loose pipes tremble overhead.
Kari stepped sideways, pressing her back near the collapsed wall, close enough that dust coated her hair and shoulders. She could feel cold air leaking through the cracks behind her. Something green and damp touched the back of her neck. She flinched but did not look.
Gorge charged.
There was no build-up. No warning beyond the one already tearing through Kari’s skull. One second he was wedged in the passage. The next, he launched forward with all his weight, shoulders scraping sparks from the walls, hands dragging, mouth open. Kari threw herself sideways and hit the floor hard, rolling into the drainage channel as Gorge smashed into the collapse.
The impact erased sound.
For a second, everything became pressure.
The wall exploded inward. Pipes snapped with sharp metallic cracks. Dust and gray light burst over Kari as the whole passage shook. Something heavy struck her back. A chunk of brick bounced off her shoulder hard enough to leave a nasty bruise later. She curled into herself, arms over her head, screaming without hearing it.
Gorge crashed through the blockage. The collapsed wall gave under him like a rotten tooth knocked loose. The gray light widened into a broken gap. Air rushed through, wet and warm and full of green smell.
Not river smell.
Not mill smell.
Leaves.
Rot.
Rain.
Kari coughed, spat dust, and pushed herself up on shaking arms. Gorge was stuck halfway through the broken passage, his bulk buried in shattered concrete and twisted pipe. He thrashed once, roaring, and the remaining debris shifted around him. Kari saw the opening beside his left shoulder.
No time to think.
She crawled for it.
The gap tore at her satchel. A broken pipe scraped across her ribs. Rebar snagged her jeans and held for one awful second before she yanked herself free. Gorge’s arm swung blindly through the dust behind her, fingers smashing into the wall inches from her ankle. Kari pulled herself through-
Then she fell.
Not down far. Maybe three feet. Maybe ten. Her stomach flipped like the floor had forgotten where it was supposed to be. She hit something soft, rolled, and came up gasping with wet leaves stuck to her face. For a moment, she did not understand where she was.
The steel mill was gone.
No.
Not gone.
Changed.
Kari was in a room too large to belong underground. A massive industrial chamber stretched around her, wide enough to hold half the pump station and taller than the library. The walls were still steel and concrete, but they were split open by roots. Vines hung from catwalks in thick curtains. Ferns grew out of broken control panels. Moss covered the old machinery in soft green sheets. Trees had forced themselves up through the floor, their trunks wrapped around pipes and ladders like the mill had been dead long enough for a forest to claim the body.
Somewhere above, light filtered through a ceiling that should not have existed. Not sunlight exactly. Pale green, thick and sour, like the sky beyond the roof had been replaced by something under glass. Insects clicked in the leaves. Something small moved through the branches overhead and stopped when Kari looked up.
There was no doorway behind her.
Kari turned too fast and nearly fell.
The broken passage she had crawled through was not there.
Only a wall of vines and rusted metal, sealed tight as if it had always been that way.
“No.”
Her voice sounded wrong in the room. Too small. Too clean. The jungle swallowed the echo.
Kari stumbled to the nearest wall and shoved aside vines with both hands. They were real. Wet leaves slapped against her wrists. Roots had grown through the concrete in thick knots. She clawed at them anyway, searching for a seam, a gap, anything. No entrance. No exit. Just the room. Boundary Disturbance did not scream here.
That scared her more.
It did not feel safe. It felt distant. Disconnected. Like she had stepped into another version of the mill where Cornell’s rules had been replaced by something older and greener and even less interested in her survival. The wrongness was not tearing open. It had already settled.
This place had accepted itself.
Kari backed away from the wall, breathing too fast.
“Okay. Okay, think, Kari. Think..”
Her voice shook.
A low groan came from the wall behind the vines.
Kari froze.
Concrete cracked.
The wall bulged inward.
"... Food."
Gorge hit from the other side.
The impact shook leaves from the trees. Birds, or things shaped enough like birds to upset her, burst from the rafters in a panic. Kari stumbled backward as the vines trembled. Roots tightened around the wall like muscles trying to hold it shut.
Gorge hit again.
The vines split.
A massive hand punched through the greenery and concrete, fingers flexing in humid air.
Kari ran.
The room was huge, but open in the worst way. No corridors. No clean exits. Machinery rose in islands: rusted tanks covered in moss, conveyor frames buried under vines, old platforms swallowed by branches. Kari ducked behind a tree growing through the center of a cracked furnace and pressed herself against the bark.
Bark.
Inside the steel mill.
She almost laughed.
It came out as a sob.
Gorge forced himself through the wall.
The jungle room resisted him at first. Roots wrapped around his shoulders. Vines caught on his arms. Concrete clung to his bulk. Then he pushed, and the whole wall gave with a wet, grinding tear. He crashed into the room on hands and knees, dragging pieces of the previous passage with him.
For a second, he looked confused.
The air was different. The smells were different. Heat. Leaves. Wet soil. Living things everywhere.
His head lifted.
He breathed in.
Kari clamped both hands over her mouth.
Gorge’s nostrils flared.
The jungle had too many scents. Rot, insects, sap, wet bark, fungus, old metal, standing water. It bought her a second. Maybe two. Gorge turned his head slowly, searching, listening.
Kari sank lower behind the tree.
Her injured palm left blood on the bark.
She stared at it.
Too late.
A drop slid down the trunk.
Gorge’s head snapped toward her side of the room.
Kari stopped breathing.
He took one step.
Then another.
Each foot sank slightly into the moss-covered floor. Roots cracked under him. Vines dragged across his skin. The jungle seemed to dislike him, but not enough to stop him. Leaves trembled around his passing. Small things scattered through the undergrowth.
Kari looked around.
There had to be another way out.
There had to be.
She moved from the tree to a moss-covered tank, crouching low, keeping machinery between herself and Gorge. Her shoes sank into wet soil that had no reason to be there. The air was so humid her lungs felt coated. Sweat ran down her neck. She wiped it with her sleeve and immediately hated that she had moved. Gorge stopped and Kari froze behind the tank. His head tilted.
Listening.
Her breath was the loudest thing in the world right now. She pressed herself tighter against the tank and tried to breathe slower. In through her nose. Hold. Out through her nose. Too fast. Gorge turned.
One step.
Two.
The tank hid her from sight, but not from heat. Not from breath. Not from fear.
Kari looked over her shoulder.
The far wall was solid. No door. No window. Just rusted steel swallowed by roots and a curtain of vines so thick it looked like a forest wall. A catwalk ran above it, broken halfway across, leading nowhere.
Nowhere.
The room had no exit.
“No,” she whispered.
Gorge heard.
His hand came over the top of the tank.
Kari dropped flat as the metal caved inward above her. The impact rang through the room. She scrambled backward on her elbows, mud and leaves sticking to her clothes. Gorge’s fingers dragged down the tank’s side, peeling moss and rust with a horrible squeal.
Kari crawled under a fallen conveyor belt.
For half a second, she was hidden.
Then Gorge shoved the tank aside.
It toppled into a tree, crushing branches under its weight. The whole room shuddered. Kari crawled faster. Her bag snagged on a piece of metal. She yanked. It held.
Gorge’s feet hit the ground behind her.
She twisted, tearing at the strap.
“Come on, come on-”
The strap snapped.
Kari lurched forward, leaving part of the bag caught behind her. Not the notebook. Please, not the notebook. She did not have time to check. She scrambled out from under the conveyor and pushed herself up.
Gorge was there.
Directly in front of her.
His shadow covered her before his hand did.
Kari turned to run.
Gorge grabbed her.
His fingers closed around her middle and one arm, huge and hot and slick with blood and water. The pressure stole the air from her lungs. Kari’s feet left the ground.
For a second, there was no pain.
Just disbelief.
Then his grip tightened.
Kari choked, both hands clawing uselessly at his fingers. His skin was thick and damp and impossible to move. Her injured palm smeared blood across his knuckles. Her ribs compressed. Her shoulder screamed.
“No!”
Gorge lifted her closer.
His mouth opened.
The smell hit her first.
Rot. Meat. Metal. The smaller monster. Camille’s blood. Something old and bottomless.
Kari kicked once, weakly, her shoe striking his stomach and doing nothing.
White Lux flared in pure panic.
Not a spell.
A flood.
The jungle room snapped into unbearable clarity: every vine, every root, every pulse of moisture in the walls, every line where this version of the mill did not match the one she had entered. No exit. No door. No safe path. Only one thing mattered.
Gorge’s grip.
His breath.
His mouth.
Warning screamed.
Too late again.
Gorge pulled her toward his teeth.
Kari’s body locked.
Not because she wanted to freeze. Not because she had accepted it. Because there was nowhere left for her fear to go. Her legs kicked once, weak and useless. Her hands clawed at Gorge’s fingers until her nails bent. His grip did not loosen. His breath rolled over her face, hot and wet, thick with meat and rot and the sour stink of something that had eaten too much and still wanted more. His mouth opened wider. The inside was dark red and slick, lined with teeth that did not match each other. Some were flat and grinding. Some were long and jagged. Some looked broken and grown back wrong. Strands of black fluid stretched between them as his jaw lowered.
Kari tried to scream.
Nothing came out.
Warning screamed without words.
Too late.
[i]Too late.
[b]Too late.[/i][/b]
Then something hissed through the jungle room.
Fast.
Sharp.
Almost delicate.
An arrow struck Gorge in the mouth.
Not the cheek.
Not the jaw.
The mouth.
It punched past the lower teeth and buried itself deep into the wet dark behind them. Gorge’s head jerked back. His grip tightened hard enough that Kari saw white at the edges of her vision...
A second arrow followed.
Then a third.
Then a fourth.
Each one came from the far side of the room in a tight, controlled rhythm, cutting through vines and humid air with a sound like angry insects. They vanished into Gorge’s open mouth one after another. Small pouches tied beneath the arrowheads burst on impact, spilling dark seeds, powder, and damp packed soil across his tongue and throat.
For half a second, Kari did not understand.
Then green light moved inside his mouth. Deep green. Root green. The color of things pushing up through graves and sidewalks and old foundations because nobody had told them they were allowed to stop. Wood erupted between Gorge’s teeth, forcing itself into being. Thin roots snapped outward first, threading through gums, wrapping around teeth, lashing over the inside of his mouth. Then thicker growth followed, pale wood swelling from the arrow shafts in violent knots. Branches split and multiplied, stabbing across his tongue, wedging his jaw wider. Splinters drove upward into the roof of his mouth. Vines coiled around broken teeth and pulled tight.
Gorge choked.
Muffled by the sudden tangle filling his mouth.
Kari dropped half an inch in his grip as he convulsed.
Across the chamber, standing in the broken green light near a wall that had not had a door until something had made one, Zakira lowered one bow and already had another arrow drawn.
Her face was pale with terror.
Her hands were steady anyway.
“Kari!” She tried.
Kari could not answer.
Gorge twisted toward the sound.
Zakira fired again.
The arrow struck the wooden mass already choking his mouth. The seed pouch burst against the growth, and the wood thickened instantly, crawling deeper, branching through itself, becoming a plug. Gorge’s jaw strained against it. The wood cracked. Then grew over the crack. For one impossible second, Kari thought that might be enough.
Then Gorge bit down.
The wooden mass cracked.
Zakira’s face changed.
“No...”
Gorge chewed.
Not well. Not cleanly. Branches snapped between his teeth. Roots tore out of his gums with wet popping sounds. Splinters drove deeper into his mouth, but he did not stop. He crushed the living wood against his tongue, grinding it down with the same slow, horrible certainty he brought to meat. Sap and black saliva spilled over his chin. A branch punched through his cheek from the inside.
He ate that too.
Lupe stared.
“Oh, that is some bullshit.”
Gorge swallowed.
The motion traveled down his throat in a thick, visible pulse.
The wood was not stopping him, it was feeding him. His shoulders hitched wider. The burns along his hand tightened and split. The torn places in his mouth pressed around the splinters, swallowing them into meat. His jaw opened again, not all the way, not cleanly, but enough.
Enough to keep eating.
Enough to keep bringing Kari closer.
“Lupe, keep burning the hand!”
“BITCH, what does it look like I'm doing?!”
Neon-pink fire crawled over Gorge’s fingers, but his grip stayed locked around Kari’s ribs and arm. The surface blackened. Blisters rose and burst. Underneath, his flesh shifted, wet and dense, smothering the damage before it could go deep enough.
Kari choked.
“Can’t-”
Zakira drew another arrow - this one had no pouch beneath the head. Her fingers shook when she set it against the string. For one second, she could not see the whole monster. That was too much. Too big. Too alive in ways she did not understand. She forced her focus smaller.
Hand.
Green Lux ran down the arrow shaft, darker than before. Not leaf green. Not garden green. Something bitter. Wet. Venomous. It gathered around the arrowhead in a thin, trembling film.
Zakira breathed in.
Her fear narrowed.
“Rot,” she whispered.
She fired.
The arrow struck Gorge’s hand between two thick knuckles, right where Lupe’s fire had already blistered the skin.
The impact was small.
The effect was not.
Green-black Lux snapped outward from the wound like a bruise blooming too fast. Gorge’s flesh puckered around the arrowhead. Then it softened. The skin sagged, splitting in wet seams. Fat and muscle darkened around the wound, breaking down in an ugly circle that spread unevenly across his hand. Gorge made a sound that was not a roar - it was almost confusion.
His fingers twitched.
Kari sucked in half a breath.
Lupe saw the gap.
“Oh, you don’t like that, do you, fatass?”
She stepped forward and drove both hands out.
Neon-pink fire slammed into the rotting patch around the arrow. This time, the flame went deeper. The damaged flesh could not smother it cleanly. Fire licked into the split tissue, burning through softened meat and exposed channels where Gorge’s grip had begun to fail. The smell changed instantly: not just burned fat now, but spoiled meat cooking from the inside.
Gorge convulsed.
His hand spasmed open.
Kari slipped lower.
Gorge caught her again with two fingers and a thumb, crushing down reflexively.
Kari screamed.
“Again!” Zakira shouted.
“I’m trying!”
“Same spot!”
“... I fucking see it!”
Lupe focused the fire into a narrower stream.
Pink flame bored into the necrotic wound.
Gorge shook his arm violently, trying to fling the pain away, but the arrow stayed lodged in his hand. The venom effect was already fading. Zakira reached for another arrow, then stopped. Venom Arrow would not stack. Not cleanly. Not this fast. If she forced another one, it might bloom wrong, too shallow, too scattered, useless.
So she did not waste it.
She grabbed a seed arrow instead and fired into Gorge’s mouth again.
Not to stop him.
To make him choose.
The pouch burst against his tongue. Roots snapped outward, filling his mouth for a second time. Gorge snarled around them, already chewing, already breaking them apart. But his mouth was busy, his hand was burning, and Kari was slipping.
“DROP HER AL-FUCKING-READY!” Lupe screamed.
The fire brightened until the whole jungle room flashed neon pink. Zakira fired one more seed arrow into Gorge’s jaw. The wood burst open, tangled with the half-chewed growth, and wedged his mouth wide for one more heartbeat. Which was enough for Gorge to release Kari.
She hit the moss-covered floor on her side.
The impact knocked every thought out of her.
For a second, she could not move. Could not breathe. Could not understand that she was no longer in his hand.
Then Lupe was there.
She grabbed Kari under the arms and hauled backward with a panicked strength Kari would not have believed she had. Lupe was crying and furious and still burning, one hand dragging Kari, the other flinging messy bursts of pink fire toward Gorge whenever he leaned forward.
“... Move, mami! Move, move, move!”
Kari’s legs did not work right.
“But Camille-”
“I know...”
“He’s still-”
“... I KNOW!”
Behind them, Gorge spat half-chewed wood across the moss.
Then he swallowed the rest.
The burn on his hand smoked. The venom-blackened tissue sagged around the arrow wound, but already the edges were trying to close. His mouth worked around splinters and roots, grinding them down, turning the thing meant to stop him into fuel.
Zakira stepped between him and Kari anyway.
She drew another seed arrow.
Her hands were shaking now.
Her aim stayed level.
Gorge spat another clump of half-chewed wood into the moss. It landed with a wet slap, twitching once as the roots inside it tried to keep growing even after being crushed. Gorge’s mouth worked around splinters. His jaw cracked. Sap, saliva, and black fluid ran down his chin in strings. The burned hand twitched at his side, venom-blackened flesh sagging around the arrow wound.
Then the edges began to pull together.
Lupe saw it.
“Oh, fuck no.”
Zakira fired.
The seed arrow struck Gorge in the shoulder. The pouch burst against him, spilling dark soil and seeds across slick meat. Green Lux flashed. Roots snapped outward, trying to dig into him, trying to bind shoulder to neck, arm to chest, body to itself.
Gorge leaned into it, but the roots stretched.
Held.
For at least one second.
Then his shoulder rolled, and the roots tore out with wet popping sounds, dragging strips of flesh with them. Gorge barely reacted. The wounds pinched inward, pressure and mass forcing the damage closed before it could matter.
Zakira’s mouth tightened.
“That should have slowed him....”
“Hey, I don't want to hear 'should' right now, mami!”
Gorge took a step.
Lupe let go of Kari with one hand and shoved her backward.
“Mami, stay behind me.”
Kari almost laughed.
Not because it was funny. Because Lupe was five-foot-one, shaking, crying through rage, and standing between her and something that could eat cars if it got bored.
“Lupe-”
“Behind me, damn it!”
Lupe raised both hands.
The neon-pink fire around her fingers changed.
It tightened first, pulling inward from loose flame into bright, vibrating threads. Then it cracked. Sound entered it. A sharp electrical snap that made the air prickle against Kari’s skin. Pink light crawled up Lupe’s arms in jagged veins, brighter at her palms, white-hot at the center and neon at the edges.
The jungle room answered.
Leaves lifted. Fine hairs on Kari’s arms stood up. The insects in the rafters went silent all at once. Somewhere in the moss, old machinery clicked like dead switches remembering electricity.
Lupe’s eyes locked on Gorge.
She thrust both hands forward.
Neon pink Electricity hit Gorge in the chest.
The blast cracked across the room in a violent pink-white arc, splitting into branching lines as it struck him. For one beautiful second, it looked like lightning had found a body and decided to punish it. The electric brilliance wrapped over Gorge’s torso, snapped across his shoulders, jumped to the wet vines dragging against his skin, and exploded in tiny bursts where old metal fragments stuck out from the moss around him.
Gorge stopped.
Kari’s heart jumped with him.
The electricity crawled across him, snapping over fat, burned skin, saliva, blood, wet moss. Pink fire flickered underneath it, catching where the current kissed open wounds. Gorge’s muscles locked for half a breath.
Then the current died into him.
It did not travel deep. It did not seize his whole body the way it should have. It burned the surface where it touched, charring patches of skin, boiling moisture, blackening the edges of wounds. But Gorge’s body was too dense. Too thick. Too layered in fat and swollen meat and whatever impossible Pit-born mass held him together. The electricity could not find a clean path through him.
It scattered.
It sparked over him like weather over a mountain.
Gorge’s head lowered.
Smoke rose from his chest.
He moved again.
Lupe’s face fell for half a second.
“... You gotta be fucking kidding me.”
Zakira fired another arrow before Gorge could lunge.
This one struck the side of his neck. Seeds burst. Wood grew fast and ugly, hooking around his jaw, pulling his head sideways. Gorge’s neck muscles bulged. The roots strained.
“Again!”
Lupe screamed and fired again.
This time she aimed for the damaged hand.
The neon arc struck the venom wound.
That worked better.
Gorge’s burned fingers spasmed wide. Pink electricity dug into the softened tissue, snapping inside the split meat instead of sliding over it. His hand jerked open and closed, open and closed, like it belonged to something dead receiving commands from a broken wire. The arrow still lodged between his knuckles vibrated hard enough to blur.
Gorge roared.
Zakira’s head snapped toward Lupe.
“There! The rotted parts!”
“Yeah, I noticed!”
“Can you keep doing that?”
“For how long!?”
Zakira did not answer.
Gorge answered for her.
He ripped the wooden growth from his jaw with his good hand and shoved half of it into his mouth.
“I hate him.”
He chewed.
Zakira fired again.
The arrow struck his knee. The pouch burst. Roots wrapped around the joint, crawling down into the moss-covered floor and up around his thigh. For a moment, Gorge’s leg locked. He stumbled, weight dropping heavily enough to shake leaves from the trees.
Lupe hit the same knee with electricity.
Pink-white arcs snapped around the fresh roots. The living wood conducted better than Gorge did. Light ran along the vines, through the wet seed-growth, into the places where the roots had bitten into his skin. Gorge’s leg buckled.
Kari sucked in a breath.
“That hurt him.”
Zakira’s eyes narrowed.
“The roots carry it.”
“So keep giving me roots!”
Zakira drew fast.
Too fast.
The next arrow wobbled when it left the string.
It struck Gorge’s stomach instead of his other knee. The pouch burst. Roots spread across his belly in a frantic green web. Lupe sent electricity through it anyway.
For one second, Gorge’s whole front lit up.
Pink brilliance raced through the root-web, burning it black, snapping against the slick folds of him. The smell was immediate and awful: scorched moss, burned meat, boiled sap. Gorge staggered backward a step.
Then he leaned forward.
The burned roots snapped, sank into the folds, and disappeared as he crushed them against himself.
Zakira’s breath hitched.
“No...”
Gorge took another step.
The floor sank under him.
Lupe fired a third burst.
Then a fourth.
Each one hit harder than the last, bright enough to turn the green room pink-white, loud enough to crack against Kari’s teeth. The arcs jumped to hanging chains, dead panels, old conveyor frames. A rusted control box on the wall burst in a shower of sparks. Vines caught fire in short, neon-edged flashes before the wet jungle smothered them.
Gorge kept coming.
The electricity burned him.
It did not stop him.
Black patches spread across his chest, shoulders, and burned hand. His flesh blistered. His mouth leaked sap and smoke. The venom wound on his hand opened again, sagging wider with each electrical strike. But underneath every injury was more mass. More wet density. More body waiting to absorb whatever they did.
Lupe’s arms shook.
“Why won’t you go down?!”
She threw both hands forward and poured everything into one violent burst.
The bolt hit Gorge in the face.
Pink-white light exploded across his eyes, mouth, and jaw. Electricity crawled between his teeth. Fire chased it, flaring through half-chewed wood and saliva. His head snapped back. The roar that came out of him broke into a choking, electrical bellow. For one heartbeat, Gorge stopped completely.
Zakira seized the opening.
She fired three seed arrows in a row.
One to the mouth.
One to the knee.
One to the burned hand.
The shots were not perfect, but they landed.
Green Lux burst in three places. Wood filled his jaw again. Roots lashed around his knee. Hard growth snapped over his damaged fingers, trying to force them open, trying to brace them apart before they could close around anyone else. Lupe dropped one foot back and drove electricity into all three growths. The room became pink and green violence. Roots lit up like wires. Gorge’s knee buckled. His burned hand jerked uselessly. His mouth choked around wood that sparked and smoked between his teeth.
Kari, half-collapsed against a mossy support beam, stared through watering eyes.
For one impossible second, she thought maybe this was it. Maybe not kill him, but enough to give them a window to escape.
Gorge fell to one knee.
The impact shook the chamber.
Lupe gave a broken laugh.
“Yeah! Stay down ya' bitch!”
Gorge’s hand slammed into the floor, his fingers dug into the moss and soil. Then he pulled himself forward. Zakira’s smile, barely there, died before it fully formed. Gorge chewed through the sparking wood in his mouth. His knee dragged against the roots until the growth tore apart, strips of flesh and vine coming loose together. His burned hand twitched against the wooden brace, then crushed through it by force, deadened fingers closing anyway. The electricity had scorched him. Zakira’s roots had slowed him. Venom had rotted part of his hand. His face was burned. His jaw was split at one corner. One eye had gone cloudy from the electrical flash.
And still, he stood.
Bigger than before.
Hungrier.
The half-eaten wood moved down his throat in a thick swallow.
White Lux made it cruelly clear.
Damage did not mean defeat.
Gorge’s body accepted injury like weather. It endured it, folded around it, ate what it could, dragged the rest forward. They could hurt him. They could delay him. They could make him angry.
They could not kill him here.
Zakira knew it.
Kari saw the exact moment her face changed.
“... We can’t kill him.”
Lupe’s fire flickered around her hands.
“Don’t say that, mami.”
“We just can’t.”
“Then we hit him harder!”
“... With what?”
The question cut through the room sharper than any arrow.
Lupe looked at Gorge.
Then at her own shaking hands.
Then at Kari, barely standing.
The anger on her face cracked, and fear showed through.
Gorge took one step.
Slow.
Heavy.
The jungle floor dipped under him.
Zakira drew another arrow, but now Kari could see the truth in it. Zakira was not aiming to kill anymore. She was aiming to interrupt. To redirect. To buy movement.
Seconds.
That was all they had ever been buying.
“Don’t fight him straight,” Kari whispered.
Lupe looked back.
“What?”
Kari swallowed, throat raw.
“He’s too heavy. Too slow to turn. He breaks things when he charges.”
Gorge’s nostrils flared.
His cloudy eye fixed on them.
Kari forced herself to look around the room, through the pain, through the pink afterimages, through the green light pressing against everything.
No exit.
No door.
No safe path.
But there were walls.
Roots.
Catwalks.
Old machinery.
The place where Gorge had forced himself through.
The wound in the room.
“We don’t kill him.”
Gorge lowered his head.
Preparing to charge.
Pink electricity dug into the softened tissue, snapping inside the split meat instead of sliding over it. Gorge screamed. Not in pain exactly. In offense. His entire arm jerked sideways, the seed-grown wood around his neck snapping apart as he twisted. Zakira ducked when one splintered branch flew past her face. Gorge slammed his damaged hand against the ground once, trying to crush the feeling out of it. The jungle room shook.
Kari stared. Not at Gorge. At the floor. At the wall behind him. At the wall he had already broken through. Her thoughts were moving strangely now. They could not kill him. That much was obvious. Zakira's arrows hurt him. Lupe's fire hurt him. The electricity hurt him more when they gave it somewhere soft to go. And none of that mattered enough. Every wound closed. Everything he ate made him worse. Every second they stayed here was another chance for one of them to end up in his hands.
Kari's eyes moved across the room. Broken machinery. Collapsed conveyor. Trees growing through furnaces. The first hole in the wall, still dripping vines and cracked concrete around the edges. Gorge had made that. Not the room. Not the rift. Him. Kari's breath caught.
“Wait.”
Lupe looked back at her like she had lost her mind.
“What?”
Kari pointed across the room.
“The wall.”
Zakira did not look away from Gorge.
“What about it?”
“He got in here through one.”
Gorge pushed himself upright. His burned hand hung low at his side. Already, the blackened tissue was tightening.
Lupe's eyes widened.
“Oh.”
Kari looked toward the far side of the jungle room. The wall there was different. She had noticed it before. Steel beneath vines. Concrete in places. Roots spreading across it in thick braided knots. But now that she was actually looking, really looking, White Lux caught along its shape. Not a vision. A relationship. The wall belonged here. And somewhere behind it, something else did too. A corridor, maybe. Another room. Something built. Something closer to the mill she remembered. Kari could not see through it. She did not know where it led. But it led somewhere.
“We can't beat him.”
Lupe snapped around.
“Thanks, mami, who would have thought?!”
“No, listen to me!”
Kari's own voice surprised her. Lupe stopped. So did Zakira. For half a second. Gorge did not. He started toward them. Kari pointed at the far wall.
“We make him open it.”
Zakira finally looked, then back at Kari.
“How?”
The answer came immediately. Kari hated it.
“We piss him off.”
Lupe stared at her. Then Gorge. Then Kari again.
“... Oh, that's easy.”
“Lupe.”
“What? He already pissed me off first.”
Gorge charged.
“MOVE!”
The three scattered. Gorge hit the rusted frame where they had been standing. Metal folded inward with a scream. The impact threw moss and wet soil into the air. Kari ran left. Her ribs hurt. Her shoulder hurt. Her head hurt. Her whole body felt like something someone had dropped down a staircase. She kept running. Behind her, Gorge tore himself free from the machinery and roared.
“FOOD!”
His voice shook leaves loose from the branches overhead. Kari reached the far wall and slapped one bloody palm against it. She pointed toward a section half-hidden behind a curtain of vines. Zakira ran toward her.
“You sure?”
“No.”
Zakira's face tightened. Kari grabbed her wrist.
“But it's thinner.”
“That is not the same thing!”
“I know!”
Lupe screamed from across the room.
“CAN YOU TWO BITCHES CONFESS YOUR LOVE FOR ONE ANOTHER SOME OTHER TIME?!”
Gorge was after her. Lupe ran backward, both hands raised, throwing bursts of neon-pink fire into his face. The flames splashed across his forehead and cheeks. Gorge barely slowed.
“Yeah, come get me! I'm the most tasty snack here, fatass!”
“LUPE!”
“What?! You said piss him off!”
“I DIDN'T SAY GET EATEN!”
Gorge swung. Lupe ducked so hard she fell onto one knee. His hand passed over her head and demolished the trunk of a young tree behind her. Wood exploded. Lupe scrambled up.
“Okay! Okay! He's mad!”
Kari looked between Gorge and the wall. Distance. Direction. The path between them. Her mind wanted more information. She forced herself to stop. She did not need more. That was the mistake. Always one more detail. One more confirmation. One more piece before she committed. There was no time.
“'Kira!”
Zakira looked at her. Kari pointed toward Gorge's injured hand.
“Can you make him turn?”
Zakira's eyes moved. Hand. Wall. Gorge. A plan formed between them without needing the whole sentence.
“I can make him react.”
Zakira pulled an arrow. Lupe finally reached them, breathing hard enough to choke.
“... Please tell me we're leaving, mami.”
“We're going to stand in front of the wall.”
Lupe blinked.
“... Girl, what.”
“Then we're going to move.”
“Girl.”
“He's going to hit it.... Ideally.”
“Mami.”
Kari grabbed both of Lupe's shoulders.
“I know!”
Her voice cracked. All three of them went still. Kari's hands were shaking. Her eyes burned.
“I know, okay? I know this is stupid. I know.”
Gorge ripped the broken tree from the floor behind them. Roots came free with wet snaps. Kari looked at the wall, then at her friends.
“But I don't have any better ideas!”
That was the truth. No dramatic revelation. No secret answer. Just the best thing she had. Zakira nodded first.
“Okay.”
Lupe looked at her.
“Seriously?”
“Do you have something else?”
Lupe's mouth opened. Closed. Gorge threw the tree.
“GET DOWN!”
They dropped. The trunk crashed against the wall above them. Concrete cracked. Kari stared at the fracture spreading through the surface. A smile almost happened.
“Oh my God...”
Lupe looked up.
“What?”
“He already started.”
Gorge came toward them. Not running yet. Walking. One huge step after another. The room moved around his weight. Kari backed against the wall. Zakira stood to her right. Lupe to her left.
“... This is a terrible idea.”
“You're one to talk,” Zakira rolled her eyes.
“Hey, that was one time.”
“If it wasn't for me, that monster would be eating your yams.”
Lupe coughed, tried to force sarcasm when she replied, “Oh no. Not my yam-”
“... Can you two focus? This isn't the time.”
“I'm focusing.”
Gorge stopped thirty feet away. His nostrils opened. Closed. Blood. Sweat. Burned flesh. Three terrified girls pressed against the same wall. His mouth opened.
“... FOOD.”
Kari's stomach dropped. Warning hovered at the edge of her mind. Not yet. Gorge leaned forward. Kari's heart hammered.
“Wait.”
Lupe looked at her.
“Bitch?”
“Wait.”
Gorge took one step. Then another. Zakira raised her bow. Kari grabbed it and pushed the tip down.
“Not yet.”
“Kaaaaaaaaaaaari—”
“He has to commit.”
Gorge moved faster. The distance narrowed. Twenty feet. The floor shook. Fifteen. Lupe's electricity started crackling around her fingers.
“Mami—”
“Will you just fucking wait?!” Zakira snapped.
Ten. Gorge's mouth opened. His body lowered. Kari felt reality stutter. There. Warning ripped through her.
“...NOW!”
Zakira fired. The arrow struck Gorge directly in the burned hand. Green Lux bloomed through the damaged flesh. Gorge jerked. Lupe screamed and drove both hands forward. Pink electricity struck the arrow. The current buried itself into the rotting wound. Gorge's whole arm spasmed. His body twisted. But he did not stop. He charged harder. Exactly what Kari had been hoping for. Exactly what every terrified part of her body now deeply regretted.
“MOVE!”
Zakira went right. Lupe went left. Kari tried to move. Her leg gave. For half a second, she stayed exactly where she was. Gorge filled the room in front of her. Too big. Too close. Again. Not again. Lupe caught the back of Kari's shirt. The fabric tightened against her throat. Then Kari was yanked sideways so violently she hit the ground and rolled. Gorge missed them by inches.
He hit the wall.
The sound was enormous. Concrete detonated outward. Steel screamed. Roots tore apart. The entire section of wall folded around Gorge's body and then disappeared with him into the space beyond. A cloud of dust swallowed the room. For a second, nobody moved. Then came another crash from the other side. Then another. Gorge had not stopped at the wall. He had gone through whatever was behind it too.
Kari coughed.
“... Did it work?”
Lupe stared through the dust.
“Mami, if it didn't, I'm going to shove my foot sofar up your-”
Zakira was already moving.
“Get up.”
Kari pushed herself onto one knee. Her legs shook. Zakira grabbed one arm. Lupe grabbed the other. Together they hauled her upright.
The hole in the wall was ugly. Not a doorway. Not even close. A human-sized gap existed mostly because Gorge had taken the rest of the wall with him. Broken rebar curled inward. Roots hung torn and dripping. Beyond it was a dark industrial corridor, unmistakably part of the mill. Real concrete. Real pipes. Real rust. Kari had never been so happy to see ugly fucking concrete in her life.
“Let's go.”
They went. Lupe climbed through first, kicking loose concrete out of the way. Kari followed. Zakira came last, bow held tight against her chest. The second Kari crossed the broken wall, Boundary Disturbance slammed back into her skull. She nearly fell. The mill. Cornell. Wrongness. Everything returned at once.
“Oh, fuck—”
Zakira caught her.
“What?”
“Nothing. Nothing, we're back.”
“Back where?”
“I don't know. Hopefully home!”
Lupe threw her hands up.
“Great!”
A crash sounded somewhere ahead. All three froze. Gorge. Not behind them. Ahead. Somewhere beyond the pipes and intersecting corridors, he was moving. Then came another impact. Metal folded. A machine screamed across the floor. Gorge roared.
“FOOD!”
Lupe whispered.
“Oh, I am sick of looking at this ugly mother-”
Kari grabbed her hand.
“Run.”
They ran. The corridor split almost immediately. Left. Right. Straight ahead into darkness. Kari stopped.
“No, no, no—”
Zakira grabbed her shoulder.
“Which way?”
“I don't know.”
A roar echoed through the pipes. Closer. Lupe looked over her shoulder.
“Bitch, you're the magical information girl-bitch!”
“Shut up! I'm trying!”
Left felt wrong. Straight felt nothing. Right—her thoughts skipped. For half a second she saw Lupe moving before Lupe moved.
“Right!”
They turned. Their shoes hammered against the concrete. Behind them, Gorge hit something. The whole corridor shook. A pipe burst overhead. Steam exploded into the intersection they had just left.
Lupe looked back once.
“I think we lost him.”
“Bitch, shut up before he hears us!”
Another crash. Then another. Gorge was tearing through the mill instead of following its corridors. Kari realized that was both good and extremely bad.
“No, I mean he doesn't know where we went!” Kari said quietly.
Zakira understood first.
“The room must have confused his scent. Shuuuuuuuut up!”
Gorge groaned somewhere behind the walls.
“FOOOOOOD...”
“I AM NOT THE LOUDEST THING IN THIS BUILDING RIGHT NOW!”
Lupe threw a middle finger up behind her.
“SEE?!”
They reached another intersection. Kari grabbed the wall. Her head was spinning. Everything inside the mill felt wrong. Too many directions. Too many disturbances. Camille's thread—
Kari stopped.
She almost reached for it. Almost. Zakira grabbed her.
Zakira did not let go. A sudden silence followed. Then, somewhere deep inside the mill, Gorge stopped thrashing. Kari's blood went cold.
Lupe whispered.
“... Aw shit.”
A low sound rolled through the corridors. Breathing. Listening. Kari covered her mouth. All three stood completely still. The mill creaked around them. Water dripped somewhere. One drop. Two. Three. Gorge's breathing stopped.
“Go.”
They moved. Not running yet. Fast. Quiet. Shoes placed carefully against broken concrete. Lupe's fire disappeared completely. Zakira held her arrows against the bow so they would not rattle. Kari led now. Not because she knew the way. Because every few seconds, she waited for the tiny wrong feeling and chose another direction. Left. Down a stairwell. Across a service platform. Through a door hanging off one hinge. The mill unfolded around them in broken pieces.
And behind them—
BOOM.
Gorge had started again.
Lupe jumped.
“Jesus fucking Christ!”
Another crash. Then a roar. Then metal ripping apart. He was moving in the wrong direction. Something might have caught his attention. Kari knew it was either going to get away... or not. Long as he was going away from them that was all that mattered. Eventually, they reached the pump chamber. Kari recognized it immediately. The red emergency lights. The vertical water. The blood. Her stomach folded inward. Kersten. Camille. She stopped. Lupe ran into her back.
“Mami, why did we stop?”
Kari stared toward the center of the room. The place where Gorge had been feeding. Empty. Blood everywhere. No Gorge. No Camille. Her chest tightened until it hurt. Zakira stepped in front of her.
“Don't.”
Kari looked at her.
“We don't know.”
“No.”
“I can check.”
“Kari.”
“I can—”
A crash echoed from somewhere below them. Closer than before. Zakira grabbed her hand.
“We came here for you.”
Kari's face twisted.
“I came here for them.”
“I know.”
“I can't just—”
Lupe grabbed Kari's other hand. Her voice was quieter now.
“Mami.”
Kari looked at her. Lupe was still crying. She had probably never stopped.
“We gotta go.”
Kari looked back once. At the blood. At the impossible water crawling upward. At the phone still somewhere under the rusted worktable. At everything she was leaving. Then she let them pull her.
They ran through the narrow maintenance corridor, past Kersten's torn backpack, up the sloping concrete that had felt wrong on the way in. The steel mill shook behind them. Gorge hit another wall. Then another. He was not following their path. He was making his own. That was worse somehow.
The east entrance appeared ahead. Dark blue night beyond it. Real sky. Kari almost cried at the sight of it. Lupe did.
“Oh my God.”
“Don't stop.”
Nobody stopped.
They burst through the service door and into the mill yard. Cold air hit Kari's face. The difference was violent. No jungle heat. No mold-thick corridor. No blood smell except what they had brought out with them. Just night. Grass. Rust. The river somewhere beyond the property.
They ran across cracked concrete, past dead machinery, past a loading platform collapsing under weeds. Behind them, the mill groaned. Not naturally. Something hit the inside wall hard enough to send dust from the broken windows.
Lupe screamed, flipping off the monster.
“HE'S STILL FUCKING LOOKING!”
“KEEP GOING!”
They reached the fence. The gate hung open. Kari's foot caught on the broken chain. She went down hard. Zakira stopped immediately. Lupe doubled back.
“No, no, no, get up, mami!”
Kari tried. Her legs finally refused.
“I can't-”
“Yes, you can.”
“I actually can't!”
“You absolutely fucking can!”
Lupe grabbed under one arm. Zakira took the other. They lifted her between them. Kari screamed when her injured shoulder pulled.
“Sorry.”
“Don't apologize, just go!”
They half-ran, half-dragged her through the gate. The service road stretched ahead. Too long. Kari stared at it.
“No.”
Lupe looked at her.
“What?”
“The road.”
“What about it?”
“It's doing that thing again.”
“What thing?!”
“THE LONG THING!”
Lupe looked at the road. Then at Kari.
“Mami, I don't know what that means!”
“It means don't look at it!”
“Oh, perfect!”
They ran anyway.
Behind them-
BOOM.
Every bird in the nearby trees exploded into the sky. The mill's upper windows rattled. Something huge moved behind them in the dark. Not outside. Still inside. Gorge roared again. Distant. Furious. Hungry.
The words rolled through the dead mill and out across the yard. Kari's legs found strength they did not have. She ran. All three of them did. Nobody spoke. Nobody looked back. The service road bent toward Main. The mill disappeared behind warehouses and trees, but the sounds followed. Crash. Metal screaming. Silence. Then another crash somewhere else. Gorge tearing apart rooms. Checking corridors. Breaking through walls. Looking for three smells that had already escaped him.
Kari could still hear him when they reached the first streetlight. Lupe bent forward with both hands on her knees. Zakira grabbed the back of her shirt.
“No.”
Lupe wheezed.
“Giiiiiirl—”
“Keep moving.”
“I am about to fucking throw up.”
“Throw up while walking.”
“Fuck you.”
“Walk.”
Kari laughed. She did not mean to. The sound escaped her in one broken, exhausted burst. Lupe stared at her. Kari laughed again, then covered her mouth, then started crying. Her whole face just folded.
Lupe immediately straightened.
“Oh, mami...”
Kari shook her head.
“No.”
She wiped her face too hard.
“No, no, we have to keep moving.”
Zakira watched her carefully. Kari turned toward the road. Her hands were shaking. Her clothes were soaked. Her shoulder screamed. Her ribs hurt every time she breathed. Kersten was dead. Camille was still in there. Maybe. Kari didn't have the strength to check his thread right now. Isabelle was somewhere she could not reach. The town was breaking. The mill had opened into a jungle that should not exist. And somewhere behind them, Gorge was still tearing rooms apart because he could not understand where his food had gone.
Kari started walking. Lupe came beside her. Then Zakira. Behind them, far inside the steel mill, something enormous slammed into another wall. The sound reached them several seconds later. None of them turned around. Kari listened anyway. She could not help it.
They could faintly hear him scream about food. Kari's fingers closed around the friendship bracelet on her wrist. She kept walking.
“Next time, don't go into the fucking mill! Dumbass ho.”
Kari laughed through her tears. Zakira shook her head.
“What in the hell were you thinking?!”
“You have to understand,” Kari laughed. ”I can't lose anyone else.”
The laugh cracked halfway through.
Lupe stopped walking.
“Don't say that shit like it's funny.”
Kari's smile disappeared.
“I'm not.”
“You almost died.”
“I know.”
Kari looked between them, exhausted.
“I could feel Kersten and Camille in there. They were terrified. What was I supposed to do?”
“Wait for us. Call for backup. Literally anything, bitch!”
“And if waiting got them killed?”
“And if going in got you killed?”
Kari went quiet.
Lupe wiped angrily at her face.
“You think you're the only one who can't lose people?”
That hit harder than anything else.
Kari looked down.
“No.”
“Then stop acting like everyone else can take it.”
For a few seconds, the only sound was Gorge crashing through something far behind them.
Kari nodded.
“I'm sorry.”
Lupe sighed and stepped closer.
“Yeah. You should be, dumbass.” Lupe rolled her eyes.
Then she pulled Kari into a careful hug.
Kari winced immediately.
“Ow-
Lupe loosened her grip.
“Shit. Sorry.”
“It's okay.”
“No, it ain't. You look like Jeremy's mom after she got that train ran on her.”
Kari laughed weakly.
“That's... so mean. I mean he deserves it, but it's still awful.”
“Shut up.”
They started walking again.
After a few steps, Kari slowed.
Her fingers tightened around the bracelet.
Zakira noticed.
“Don't.”
Kari looked toward the mill.
“... I just need to know.”
“Kari.”
Lupe moved closer beside her.
“Mami... Just leave it alone. I know you got that stupid know-it-all magic, but not every question needs an answer.”
Kari tried.
She really did.
But uncertainty had already gotten inside her.
She reached.
Emotional Thread stretched back toward the steel mill, faint and exhausted. Past the roads. Past the broken gate. Past concrete, blood, impossible water, and rooms that should not exist.
Kari searched for Camille.
Nothing.
She tried again.
Not the tangled interruption she felt when she searched for Isabelle.
An ending.
The thread was there only in the way a cut string was still a string.
She knew that before she opened her eyes. The sound came first: metal screaming somewhere in the dark, water dripping upward, then Camille breathing. Not speaking. Breathing. Wet and shallow and too far away. Kari tried to move, but her legs would not. The corridor stretched between them, longer every time she blinked. Camille lay beneath the red emergency lights at the other end, one hand reaching weakly toward her. Behind him, something moved. Too big for the hallway. Too hungry for the space around it.
“Camille!”
His mouth moved. She could not hear him.
The floor lengthened. Ten feet. Twenty. Fifty. The corridor stretched until Camille looked small enough to hold between two fingers. Then Kersten appeared beside him, standing, and for one second, relief hit Kari so hard she sobbed. Then Kersten looked down; there was nothing below their waist.
The rest of them was gone.
Kari screamed. The red lights blinked. Kersten disappeared, and Camille was suddenly in Gorge's hands again. Kari could feel his thread. Alive. Terrified. Pulling.
“I'm coming!”
She ran. This time her legs worked. She reached him, grabbed his arm, pulled-
And his body came apart in her hands.
Kari jerked awake.
She sat upright so quickly that pain ripped through her ribs.
“Ah-fuck!”
Her hand flew to her side. For several seconds, she did not know where she was. Dark room. Curtains. Desk. Bookshelf. Drawings taped crookedly to the wall. Cornell. Home. Her bedroom. Not the mill. Kari breathed through her nose. Once. Twice. Again. Her sheets were twisted around her legs, and sweat had soaked through the back of her shirt, leaving the fabric cold against her skin. Her friendship bracelet had wound tightly around her wrist during the night, the threads pressing faint lines into her skin.
She stared at it.
Then immediately looked away.
The clock on her nightstand read 4:17 AM.
Kari groaned and rubbed both hands over her face. Her palms smelled faintly medicinal from the ointment her mother had made her use before bed. For some reason, that almost made her cry, but she swung her legs over the side of the bed.
Bad idea.
Pain pulled through her shoulder first, sharp enough to stop her halfway upright. Her ribs answered with a deeper ache. Her bruised hip hurt when she stood, and the healing cut across her palm stretched angrily when she flexed her fingers. Kari stood there bent slightly forward.
“Okay...”
Her voice sounded awful.
“We're doing great, aren't we?”
The room did not answer.
...
...
...
This time.
She shuffled toward the bathroom; fortunately, the hallway was dark and quiet. Normal quiet. Kari hated that she had started categorizing silence: Normal quiet, Wrong quiet, and Listening quiet. The bathroom light was too bright when she turned it on. Kari winced and stared at herself in the mirror. She looked terrible. The bruise across her shoulder had darkened over the last few days, purple and yellow spreading beneath the collar of her shirt. A smaller bruise sat near her jaw. Faint scratches marked her cheek, injuries she had not noticed until the morning after the mill. Kari turned on the faucet and let the water run cold.
She watched it carefully.
Down.
It went down.
...
Good.
She cupped both hands beneath the stream and splashed water over her face. Once. Then again. The cold helped a little. Kari kept her hands against the sink and lowered her head-
Camille's arm coming apart in her hands.
Kersten standing there incomplete.
Gorge's mouth.
Lupe screaming.
Zakira telling her to move.
Kari shut her eyes.
Wrong choice.
For half a second, the bathroom light became red.
She opened them again.
White tile. Mirror. Sink. Normal.
“Stop it...”
She whispered it to herself.
“You're home.”
Her reflection looked unconvinced. Kari reached for the bottle on the counter. Painkillers. She twisted the cap, shook two tablets into her palm, hesitated, then checked the label. She swallowed them with water from the sink and stood there waiting as they might work instantly.
They did not.
Rude.
Kari returned the bottle to the counter and stared at herself again. A few days ago, Camille had been alive. The thought arrived without warning. Kari gripped the edge of the sink.
“I... didn't leave him.”
Her reflection said nothing.
“I had to go.”
Nothing.
Her throat tightened.
“I had to.”
The second time sounded worse. She looked down at the drain. Water circled once before disappearing. Camille had been alive when she ran. Kersten had still been something she could feel before becoming... past tense. Kari had gone into the mill because she could not leave them there, and she had come out without either of them.
What was worse was that she had almost added three more names.
Lupe.
Zakira.
Herself.
Kari's grip tightened. She could still see Lupe standing in front of her in the jungle room, crying and shaking and telling Kari to stay behind her as if Lupe wasn't barely taller than she was. She could still see Zakira's hands trembling while her aim stayed steady. They had gone into that place because of her-not Camille, not Kersten-because she had gone in alone.
“Idiot.”
The word came out quietly.
She was not sure whether she meant herself or the reflection.
Probably both.
Kari pushed away from the sink and immediately regretted it when her ribs protested again. She pressed one arm against her side and breathed until the ache settled. The pills would help eventually. The bruises would fade. Her shoulder would stop hurting. Her palm would heal.
That was the problem.
Everything on the outside had an obvious direction.
Bruise.
Pain.
Medicine.
Rest.
Healing.
The rest of it did not. Kari left the bathroom light on and returned to her room. She did not want the hallway dark behind her. Her notebook sat on the desk, she stared at it from the doorway. The last several pages were filled with mill notes. Not proper notes. Fragments.
Gorge.
Feeding = stronger?
Other creature consumed.
Damage works. Not enough.
Rot + electricity effective.
Roots conduct.
Jungle room? Another Cornell?
Camille—
Kari had stopped writing there. The pen line had dragged halfway across the page before she lifted it. She sat at the desk slowly. Her body complained the whole way down. The chair creaked. Kari opened the notebook, turned past the mill notes, past the page where she had tried to describe Gorge's movement, past the rough sketch of the jungle room, and stopped at the names.
Kersten.
Camille.
For a while, she did nothing.
Then she wrote:
I went because I thought knowing they were in danger meant I had to do something.
Kari stared at the sentence.
Then added:
I didsomething.
Her pen stopped.
The next sentence came harder.
It wasn't enough.
Kari's eyes burned. She blinked until the words stayed clear.
Then:
Lupe and Zakira almost died because they came after me.
The pen pressed harder into the paper, that was the part she could not rearrange. She could explain Camille. She could explain Kersten. They were already inside. Already trapped. Already hurt. But Lupe and Zakira? Kari had brought them into her mess. Her fear had pulled her into the mill. Their fear had pulled them after her. Her magic gave her relationships. Connections. Threads. She had spent so much time thinking connections were what saved people. What if connections could get people killed too? That made Kari's stomach turn. She shut the notebook too fast.
The sound cracked through the room.
She froze.
Waited.
Nothing answered.
Kari exhaled. Then, very carefully, she reached for the friendship bracelet around her wrist. Elsa's thread was there. Kari let herself feel that for one second. Only one. Then she released it. Her room stayed quiet.
The clock changed to 4:31 AM.
Kari leaned back in the chair and immediately winced at her shoulder.
“Ow.”
She laughed once. Lupe's voice came back to her.
Don't say that shit like it's funny.
Kari looked down.
“Sorry.”
She was not sure who she was apologizing to.
Lupe.
Zakira.
Camille.
Kersten.
Or herself.
Maybe all of them.
Outside her bedroom window, Cornell was dark and still.
For once, Kari did not look too closely at it. She tried for maybe thirty seconds... then her eyes drifted back toward the glass. The houses across the street sat dark beneath the trees. A car passed at the end of the block, headlights briefly stretching across wet pavement before disappearing. Somewhere farther off, a dog barked once and stopped. Nothing moved wrong. No road lengthened. No reflection lagged behind her. No voice came from somewhere it shouldn't.
Normal.
Apparently. Kari stared until that word irritated her. Normal was what everyone kept calling it. Normal was school never reopening. Normal was adults whispering in kitchens and going quiet when their children walked in. Normal was police tape disappearing from places where people had died. Normal was the warehouse becoming a story people lowered their voices to tell. Normal was Camille and Kersten not coming home while everyone waited for somebody else to explain why.
Kari's jaw tightened. She looked away from the window and toward her notebook, the page was still open beneath her hand.
Lupe and Zakira almost died because they came after me.
Kari stared at the sentence. Then lower, where the page remained empty. Her ancestors had said something to her at the warehouse. Not everything. Most of that night was still broken into pieces in her memory. Isabelle disappearing into the woods. Ella glowing in the chaos. Nora too close to the creature. The world falling apart around her while she stood against that wall trying to understand what was happening.
Then those voices.
Old and familiar.
Far too casual for what they were telling her.
Your friends are waking up.
Kari's fingers curled around the pen.
She remembered the next part more clearly than she wanted to.
There's only one like you in Cornell.
The observer.
At the time, she had barely understood what that meant-she wasn't sure she understood now-but another line returned with uncomfortable clarity.
You're not just watching, Kari. You're responsible for what you see.
Kari closed her eyes, sighing.
“Yeah, well...”
Her voice was quiet in the room.
“You could've explained that just a little better.”
No ancestors answered.
Of course.
They had apparently mastered the family tradition of giving someone a life-altering responsibility and then becoming unavailable for follow-up questions. Kari looked down at the page again and she thought about the adults. Not her parents specifically, but all of them. Parents telling their children not to go out after dark without explaining why. Police asking questions about the warehouse like anyone could answer them without being called insane. People walking through Cornell Park while something beneath the runoff tunnel answered voices.
People shopping.
Going to work.
Opening stores.
Pretending.
Kari understood why, and that was the worst part.
Pretending was easier.
Pretending meant you could still go to sleep.
Pretending meant you did not have to ask why water climbed walls or why streets changed length or why creatures that should not exist were hunting children through abandoned buildings.
Pretending meant somebody else would deal with it.
Except nobody was.
Kari sat still for a long time.
Then she turned to a clean page.
At the top, she wrote:
WHO KNOWS?
She stared at it.
Crossed it out.
Then wrote:
WHO CANHELP?
That was better.
Kari started with the names she knew.
Tommy.
Gold Lux. Constructs. Balor.
Zakira.
Green Lux. Plants. Venom. Roots.
Lupe.
Pink Lux? Fire. Electricity.
Tyler.
Teleportation. Trades places.
Vicky.
Magic bat?
Kari stared at the question mark.
“.. I really need better notes.”
She kept writing.
Ella?
Nora?
Others from the warehouse?
Isabelle—
The pen stopped, then she drew a line through the blank space after Isabelle's name.
Unknown.
Unreachable.
Not.Dead.
She knew the difference now. Kari turned the pen between her fingers; her ancestors had told her the others had the strength—the power.
But to stay alive, you're going to need a little more than muscle.
At the time, it had sounded almost reassuring.
Now it pissed her off.
“Then maybe everybody should know what everybody else can do.”
The idea settled slowly.
Not a team.
The word felt too dramatic.
Not a club.
Absolutely not.
A Coven?
That was just silly; she needed to get her head out of the books.
A meeting.
Information. Compare what happened; who had seen what, what creatures they encountered, what their magic did, what it couldn't do, which places in Cornell were changing, who was missing, who had heard voices, who had seen rift, who had gone somewhere that should not exist, and most importantly, how to fix things.
Kari's pen started moving faster.
WAREHOUSE.
MILL.
PARK TUNNEL.
OTHER CORNELLS?
MONSTERS.
RIFTS.
MISSING PEOPLE.
She stopped.
Then added:
NO ONE GOES ALONE.
Kari stared at that one for a long time.
The words blurred slightly.
She blinked until they sharpened again.
“Okay.”
Her heart had started beating faster as her nerves set in. That was fine. She could work with nerves. Kari reached for her phone (4:38 AM), opened her messages, and her thumb hovered over the keyboard.
She typed:
We need to talk.
Deleted it.
Typed:
I think everyone from the warehouse who has magic needs to meet.
Deleted that too.
Too insane.
Except insanity had stopped being a useful standard several days ago.
Kari tried again.
I think we need to get everyone together. Everyone who changed after the warehouse. Tommy, Tyler, Vicky, whoever else we know. We need to compare what we can do and what we've seen because the adults are not doing anything and people are dying.
She stared at it.
Added:
And NOBODY is going anywhere alone anymore.
Then:
(Yes, I know what you're going to say)
Kari sent it to Lupe.
Then Zakira.
She hesitated before opening Tommy's contact.
The last thing they had done together was create Balor in the back of the library.
That somehow felt like it had happened a year ago.
She sent him a shorter version.
We need another meeting. Bigger this time. Everyone we know from the warehouse who has magic or has seen something. We need to put everything together.
Kari paused.
Then added:
Please don't make another creature before we talk.
She sent it.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
Then her phone buzzed.
Lupe.
why the fuck are you awake
Kari stared at the message.
Another appeared.
actually why the fuck am I awake
Then:
and fuck no bitch you are not organizing another field trip
Kari covered her mouth.
The laugh hurt her ribs.
She typed back.
Not a field trip. A meeting.
The reply came almost immediately.
same shit
Kari smiled despite herself.
Then Zakira replied.
Where?
Kari's expression changed.
Just like that.
No argument.
No question about whether it was necessary.
Just where?
Kari looked down at the list again-the names, the abilities, the places, the questions-or the first time since the mill, the mess in her head did not feel smaller, exactly but it had direction.
Kari typed:
Library maybe. Somewhere public. Somewhere everyone can get to.
She hesitated.
Then added:
And somewhere with more than one exit.
Zakira's response took several seconds.
Good.
Kari set the phone down. The room was still dark around her. Cornell was still outside. Gorge was still somewhere beneath or inside the mill. Camille and Kersten were still dead. Isabelle was still somewhere beyond the reach of her thread. Nothing had improved in the last ten minutes, but something had changed.
Kari looked toward the notebook.
The one who sees first.
She had hated that.
Still did.
Because seeing first meant being afraid first, knowing first, and sometimes failing first. But maybe it also meant being the first person to say something out loud. Kari picked up the pen and added one more line beneath the names.
TELL THEM EVERYTHING.
She underlined it.
Then added:
Even the parts that sound insane.
Kari sat back carefully.
Her ribs protested; she pressed one hand against her side and looked around the quiet room.
The house remained silent.
This time, Kari did not wait for it to answer.
She started planning.
And...
Interactions: None. The woods in Cornell.
Isabelle woke because something cracked.
At first, she thought it was a bone.
Her eyes opened sharply, but there was nothing to see. Darkness pressed against them from every direction, warm and close, and for one disorienting second she couldn’t understand where she was. Her cheek rested against something soft but resistant. Her arms were folded tightly against her chest. Her knees were drawn upward. She tried to move and found barely enough room to twitch her fingers.
Panic came immediately.
Her breathing—
No.
Isabelle went completely still.
Something was wrong.
She waited.
One second.
Two.
Three.
Nothing.
Her lungs did not burn, her chest did not tighten, there was no desperate reflex forcing her to inhale. Isabelle’s eyes widened in the dark, she sucked in a breath anyway. The air came reluctantly, squeezed through whatever surrounded her, damp and stale. Her chest expanded. Her lungs filled. She held it.
Five seconds.
Ten.
Twenty.
Her body remained quiet.
Isabelle released the breath in a shaky rush.
“No...”
Her voice barely existed. The word was swallowed by the enclosure around her, but the sound of it terrified her more than the silence had. She sounded normal. She swallowed and immediately became aware of how dry her mouth was. Her tongue moved slowly behind her teeth. She felt every tooth. Every ridge. Her lips. Her throat.
Normal.
Her heart-
Isabelle froze again.
She waited for it.
Nothing. “No...”
Her hand jerked against her chest. There wasn’t enough space. Her palm scraped over herself uselessly until she forced her fingers beneath the collar of her shirt and pressed them against her sternum.
Nothing.
She pressed harder.
Nothing.
“No, no, no, no, no, no...”
Her hand moved to the side of her neck-she missed the place at first. Tried again.
Nothing.
She dug two fingers beneath her jaw so hard it hurt.
Nothing.
Her breathing became fast now, though some distant part of her understood she was doing it herself. Her body wasn’t demanding air. She was pulling it in because she was scared. Because people breathed when they were scared. Because she was a person.
“Help.”
The word cracked.
She twisted, pushing against the walls around her. Something stretched with her movement and held.
“Help!”
Her voice came back to her muffled.
No answer; memory returned in pieces; the warehouse, the floor dipping beneath invisible weight, someone holding her wrist (Don’t leave me). Three steps. The impact. The trees. The thing in the forest.
You are damaged.
Isabelle stopped struggling.
Her entire body went rigid.
D’rryha.
The name came from somewhere that did not feel like memory.
Isabelle’s eyes darted through the darkness.
“No.”
Something moved against the back of her neck.
Not outside.
Inside.
She screamed.
Her body jerked violently, shoulder driving into the wall around her, and the enclosure cracked again. A thin line of cold air touched her face.
Isabelle stared toward it, then hit it over and over again until the wall split. Light stabbed through. She recoiled, covering her eyes, but immediately shoved at it again. Whatever surrounded her tore reluctantly, opening in stringy layers that clung to her hands and sleeves. She pushed harder, sobbing now, kicking until the thing split around her and she fell forward. Isabelle collapsed onto all fours and dragged herself away from the torn cocoon without looking back. She crawled until her hand slipped in mud and she nearly fell onto her face.
She caught herself.
Stayed there.
Hands buried in the dirt.
Hair hanging around her face.
Her shoulders moved quickly with each breath.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
She stared at the ground.
The forest was quiet.
Too quiet.
Morning light came weakly between the trees, pale and gray, though Isabelle had no idea what morning it was. She couldn’t feel the cold properly. She knew it was cold because she could see damp mist hanging low over the earth and because the air entering her lungs was sharp.
But her skin didn’t react.
No goosebumps.
No shivering.
Nothing.
Isabelle looked down at her hands.
They were dirty.
Normal hands.
Brown skin beneath dirt. Nails ragged from clawing out of the cocoon. A small split across one knuckle.
She stared at it.
A bead of something dark pushed slowly through the cut.
Isabelle leaned closer.
It wasn’t red.
The liquid was almost black.
Thick.
It sat on the wound without running.
Her face changed.
“No...”
She wiped it against the dirt.
The cut was already closing.
Isabelle stopped.
A thin movement passed beneath the skin of her hand.
She screamed and slammed it against the ground.
Once, then again.
“... Get out!”
And again.
“GET OUT OF ME!”
Her knuckles split.
Dark blood surfaced.
Something moved beneath the torn skin.
Tiny legs.
Isabelle stopped breathing.
A spider pulled itself through the wound.
Then another.
She made a sound that wasn’t quite a scream and scrambled backward so quickly she fell. The spiders remained on her hand, moving over the broken skin with horrible purpose. Thin strands stretched between them.
“No. No, no, no, no—”
She grabbed at them with her other hand.
The first spider crushed between her fingers.
She threw it away.
The second disappeared into the cut.
Isabelle stared.
The wound sealed, not like healing. It simply closed behind the thing like a door. Her hand looked normal again. Isabelle held it away from herself as if it belonged to someone else. For several seconds, she made no sound. Then she began wiping it against her jeans.
“Get off.”
Nothing was there.
“Get off me.”
She scratched at the skin.
“Get off.”
Her nails dug harder.
“Get off me!”
She tore four lines through the back of her own hand.
Movement followed beneath it.
Isabelle screamed and stopped touching herself.
She sat there with both hands raised, afraid to lower them.
Her breaths came faster.
Still unnecessary.
Still hers only because she was making them happen.
“Oh my God....”
She pressed her lips together.
Looked around.
“Mom?”
The word left her before she could stop it.
Nothing answered.
Isabelle turned slowly.
The cocoon stood between two trees behind her. It was larger than she expected. Her size. Pale strands stretched between branches, layered so thickly that the torn opening looked wet and fleshy in the morning light.
Isabelle stared at it.
She remembered being placed inside.
You will stabilize here.
Her stomach turned.
Or she thought it did.
She pressed a hand to her abdomen.
Nothing.
No nausea.
Only the memory of nausea.
That was worse.
“No.”
She stood too quickly, but her body rose with strange ease. Isabelle swayed, reaching for a tree, her hand hit the bark harder than she expected. Slowly, she stepped back, but her legs felt wrong. As though the instructions to move reached them before she consciously sent them.
She lifted one foot.
Set it down.
Lifted the other.
The movements were hers.
She knew they were hers.
But there was something beneath them.
A second rhythm.
Correction.
Isabelle took another step.
Her foot caught beneath a root.
Her body corrected before she stumbled.
She froze.
“No.”
She deliberately leaned too far to one side.
Her muscles tightened automatically. Too precisely. Yet she tried again.
Faster.
Her body corrected.
“Stop.”
She threw herself sideways and something inside her responded. Her spine twisted, her foot planted, then her balance returned instantly. She hadn’t chosen to catch herself.
She went pale.
“Stop.”
Nothing answered.
“D’rryha?”
The name sounded horrible aloud.
Silence.
Isabelle looked around.
“D’rryha?”
Nothing.
Her jaw tightened.
“Where are you?”
The answer came from inside her.
"Here" "Here"
Isabelle’s whole body seized.
She screamed and clawed at her chest.
“No!”
Her nails caught her shirt.
“NO!”
"... You are stable."
“Get out!”
There was a pause.
"No."
Isabelle stumbled backward.
“Get out of me!”
"You will die."
“I don’t care!”
Silence.
The answer came slowly.
"That is untrue.." "That is untrue."
Isabelle shook her head violently.
“You don’t know what I want.”
"You wanted to live."
“I wanted to go home!”
"You were dying."
“That doesn’t mean-”
Her voice broke.
Isabelle grabbed at her hair, fingers tangling painfully in the curls.
“... That doesn’t mean you can do this to me!”
D’rryha did not answer.
Isabelle waited.
“Say something!”
"You persist."
“Stop saying that!”
Her voice ripped through the forest.
A flock of birds burst suddenly from distant branches.
Isabelle flinched.
Silence returned.
She covered her mouth.
For the first time, she became aware of the taste lingering there.
Something metallic and old.
She wiped her lips.
Nothing.
Her stomach still did not move.
She could not feel hunger.
Could not feel cold.
Could not feel her heart because there was nothing there to feel.
She lowered her hands slowly.
“I need to go home.”
"No."
Her face hardened immediately.
“You don't get to tell me that.”
"You are not ready."
“I don’t care.”
Isabelle turned.
She had no idea which direction led anywhere.
That realization stopped her only briefly.
She picked one.
Started walking.
After several steps, she noticed she wasn’t getting tired.
She walked faster.
Branches scraped her jacket. One caught her cheek.
She felt the sting and her hand rose instinctively. By the time she found it, it was gone. Isabelle stopped walking as he touched the spot again. Smooth skin. Her fingers trembled but she moved on. Faster now. Not toward anything in particular but away. The forest shifted around her in ways she couldn’t understand. Paths seemed to appear and disappear. Trees repeated. Shadows leaned in directions that had nothing to do with the morning sun.
Still she kept moving.
Eventually, she heard water.
Isabelle turned toward it.
A narrow creek cut through the woods, shallow enough that stones broke through its surface. She stumbled down the bank and dropped to her knees.
Water.
She needed water.
Did she?
The thought made her hesitate, but she leaned forward anyway and cupped it between her hands. The water was cold- she knew that, but it did not hurt.
She drank.
The first mouthful tasted like dirt and leaves.
The second tasted the same.
Her body gave no response.
No relief.
No sense of thirst disappearing.
Isabelle stopped.
Water spilled between her fingers.
Slowly, reluctantly, she looked down.
Her reflection waited between the ripples.
Isabelle stared.
For one horrible second, she didn’t recognize the girl.
Then she did.
Her face.
Her eyes.
Her nose.
Her mouth.
Her hair tangled and dirty around her face.
She touched her cheek.
The girl in the water did the same.
Isabelle leaned closer.
There should have been something.
Anything.
A wound.
A scar.
A split lip.
Bruising.
Some proof of what happened.
Nothing.
She lifted her shirt, stopping before her chest... the place where the thing had punched through her body was gone. Her stomach looked exactly as it had before the warehouse. Isabelle touched it.
Nothing.
She remembered being opened.
She remembered something inside her tearing.
She remembered blood filling her mouth.
She remembered the absolute certainty that her body was finished.
And now—
Nothing.
Her fingers dragged over smooth skin.
She started shaking.
“No...”
She looked back at the water.
Her own face stared up at her.
Normal.
Completely normal.
That was when the horror truly reached her.
Not when she found the black blood.
Not when the spiders emerged.
Not when D’rryha spoke from inside her body.
This.
Her face.
She looked exactly like herself.
The same girl who had walked into the warehouse.
The same face her mother knew.
The same face her friends would recognize.
The same face that belonged to a girl with no heartbeat.
A body that did not need to breathe.
A body full of spiders.
Isabelle touched her reflection.
The water broke apart beneath her fingers.
“I look the same...”
Her voice was very quiet.
D’rryha said nothing.
“I look the same.”
She said it again, louder this time.
Her reflection reformed.
Isabelle stared into her own eyes.
Something felt missing; she couldn’t explain it. There had always been noise inside a body. A thousand little things she had never noticed until they disappeared. Pulse beneath the skin. Breath moving automatically. Warmth. Hunger. The quiet ache of staying in one position too long. The weight of fatigue behind the eyes. Her stomach shifting. Her heart speeding up before she understood she was scared.
All gone.
Her body had become silent.
Vacant.
Isabelle stared at herself(?).
The girl in the water looked alive.
She hated her.
“No...”
She hit the surface.
Water splashed over her face.
The reflection vanished.
Isabelle sat back, breathing hard because she wanted to breathe hard. Because she needed to hear something human happening.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
She pressed both hands against her chest.
Nothing.
“Come on.”
She pressed harder.
“Come on.”
Nothing.
She struck her chest once.
Again.
“Come on!”
Again.
“Come on!”
Nothing.
Her voice broke.
She curled forward.
“I can’t feel it.”
D’rryha remained quiet.
Isabelle struck herself again.
“I can’t feel anything!”
"You can feel," D'rryha said.
“Not like before!”
"You are functioning."
“I don’t want to function!”
The words echoed back from the trees.
She went still.
Her mouth remained open.
Tears finally came.
That relieved her for half a second.
Then she touched one.
Looked at the moisture on her finger.
Even crying felt like a test now.
Isabelle wiped angrily at her face.
“Am I dead?”
Silence.
“Answer me.”
"No."
“Am I alive?”
A longer pause.
Isabelle’s expression slowly collapsed.
“Answer me.”
"You persist."
She screamed.
Her fists struck the ground.
Isabelle froze.
She looked down.
Her hands had sunk several inches into mud and stone.
She pulled it free slowly.
Her fingers were unhurt.
The skin across her knuckles was perfect.
She stared.
Something shifted behind her shoulders.
Isabelle became completely still.
The sensation came again.
Pressure.
Deep beneath the skin of her back.
Growing.
“No.”
The pressure spread.
“No, no, no-”
She reached behind herself but sheouldn’t find anything. The pressure sharpened. Isabelle screamed as something forced outward beneath her shoulder blade. A long, jointed limb punched through the fabric of her jacket. Isabelle fell sideways.
Another emerged.
Then another.
Black, segmented, glistening in the morning light, their pointed ends driving into the soil around her.
She screamed until her throat hurt.
“PUT THEM BACK!”
The limbs twitched.
One lifted.
Isabelle watched it move.
Her stomach should have turned.
It did not.
“PUT THEM BACK!”
"You are frightened."
“YES! I FUCKING AM!”
"There is no threat."
“YOU'RE THE THREAT!”
The limbs went still.
Isabelle sobbed, curling into herself while the things remained arched above her.
“Please.”
The word came out small.
Immediately, humiliatingly familiar.
“Please put them back.”
The limbs slowly withdrew and Isabelle screamed again as they folded into her. The torn jacket remained. Her back—
She twisted, trying to see.
Her hands reached behind.
No wounds.
Nothing.
Only torn denim.
Isabelle sat there, shivering despite not being cold.
That frightened her too.
She wrapped her arms around herself.
“I want my body back....”
D’rryha was quiet.
“I want it back.”
"It was destroyed, child."
Isabelle shut her eyes.
“No.”
"You were damaged beyond natural repair."
That word stuck out more than it should have.
“Stop.”
"You could not breathe."
“Stop.”
"Your organs were failing."
“Shut up.”
"You were dying."
“SHUT UP!”
Silence.
Isabelle lowered her forehead to her knees.
For a long time, nothing moved except the creek.
Eventually, she opened her eyes.
Her reflection was visible again from where she sat.
Still unmistakably hers.
She crawled closer.
Slowly.
Almost afraid it would change before she reached it.
It didn’t.
Isabelle looked at herself.
Her face was swollen from crying now.
Good.
She almost laughed.
Good.
At least that looked real.
Good.
She leaned closer.
“I’m... Isabelle Morgan-Sato.”
Nothing answered.
“I’m sixteen.”
Her voice trembled.
“I live in Cornell, Pennsylvania.”
The creek moved around stones.
“My mom...”
She stopped.
Tried again.
“My mom is...”
Her voice failed.
Not because she had forgotten.
Because saying her mother’s name would make home real.
And if home was real, then she had to understand what would happen if she walked through the door looking the same.
Her mother would run toward her.
Would hug her.
Would touch her.
Would feel how cold she was.
Would wait for the heartbeat that wasn’t there.
Isabelle covered her mouth.
“No.”
What would the police do?
Doctors?
Her friends?
What happened when someone saw the blood?
The spiders?
The legs?
She imagined someone reaching for her.
Holding her down.
Calling it help-
"It will be easier if you stop fighting, child."
Isabelle recoiled from the thought.
“No.”
Her reflection stared back.
She looked normal.
That was the problem.
Isabelle slowly raised a hand to her face.
The reflection copied her.
“I look at my reflection...”
Her voice disappeared.
She swallowed.
Tried again.
“I look at my reflection... and I’m not sure what’s looking back at me anymore.”
For several seconds, there was only water.
Then D’rryha answered from somewhere behind her thoughts.
"It is you, child, Isabelle Morgan-Sato," D'rryha began, "You are the same but..."
Isabelle’s face twisted.
She stared at the reflection.
D’rryha spoke again.
"... Improved. I perfected you, child. Broke the natural limitations of your body and made you into something beautiful."
Isabelle stared at herself.
For a second, she didn’t move.
Then-
“... Beautiful?”
A short laugh escaped her.
“You think this is beautiful?”
"It is stronger. Resilient. Free of the weaknesses that would have otherwise killed you."
“Stop.”
"You will no longer break so easily."
“I said stop!”
Isabelle struck the creek.
Her reflection shattered.
She stumbled backward, scrambling to her feet too quickly-
And her body caught itself.
Perfectly yet again.
She froze.
“... No,”
Isabelle threw her weight sideways yet again.
Her foot planted automatically.
She stayed upright.
“Stop doing that.”
She tried again.
The same thing.
Her muscles corrected before she could fall.
“STOP!”
"You are distressed."
“GET OUT OF MY HEAD!”
"I am not merely in your head."
Isabelle stopped.
Slowly, her hands moved to her chest.
Her stomach.
Her throat.
“... Where are you?”
"I am within you."
Something shifted beneath the skin near her spine.
Isabelle screamed.
She clawed frantically at her back.
“GET OUT! GET OUT-GET OUT-GET OUT! GET OUT OF ME!”
"... I tire of this, child."
“I DON'T CARE!”
"You wanted to live."
Isabelle went still.
Her face twisted.
“I just wanted to go home....”
She dug her nails into her arm.
Black blood surfaced.
Small shapes moved beneath the wound.
Isabelle recoiled.
“No...”
Spiders emerged and began closing the scratches.
“Stop it...”
They continued.
“Please stop...”
"You are damaged... I must correct..."
“IT'S MY BODY!”
Her voice tore through the forest.
Isabelle hit her chest with both hands.
“My body!”
Again.
“My blood!”
Again.
“My heart!”
Nothing beat beneath her fists.
She stopped.
Her hands remained pressed against her chest.
Nothing.
Her voice shrank.
“And you took it...”
"I preserved it."
“I said no.”
Silence.
“I begged you to stop.”
"You were afraid."
Isabelle looked up.
“I said no.”
D’rryha did not answer.
Isabelle turned back toward the creek.
Her reflection had already returned.
“You didn't improve me...”
Her voice trembled.
“You made me into...” Her voice cracked, “... A monster.”
"Despite it all, you remain Isabelle Morgan-Sato,"
“Stop saying my name...”
"It is your name."
“DON'T SAY IT!”
She covered her ears.
It did nothing.
"You are still yourself."
Isabelle slowly lowered her hands.
Her reflection stared back.
“.... You don't know that.”
"I know what you are."
That made her still.
Isabelle looked down at the water.
“That's the problem.”
Her fingers touched her own cheek.
“You know what I am.”
Her voice broke.
“I don't.”
For once, D’rryha was silent.
Isabelle stared at her reflection.
Waiting.
Terrified that eventually—
it might move before she did.
Jeremy Cole and...
Interactions: None. insert location later
Jeremy had been sitting beside the railroad tracks for almost an hour, trying to make the scanner pick up something other than static. He had built it from an old emergency radio, a police scanner he bought online for twenty dollars, and several pieces of equipment he probably should not have taken from the abandoned signal shed.
Probably.
Nobody used the line anymore anyway. Jeremy had seen trains on it twice in the last month. Neither had appeared on any schedule he could find.
The scanner hissed between his knees.
He adjusted the dial.
Static.
Turned it back.
More static.
A voice almost formed beneath it.
Jeremy leaned closer.
Nothing.
“Fuck you too.” He slapped the side of the scanner. “Piece of shit.”
Jeremy almost threw it.
He twisted around.
June Summers was sitting on the opposite rail.
He stared at her.
The tracks between them were empty; Jeremy had been facing them for the last fifteen minutes. There was no way she could have crossed without him seeing her. June sat with her knees together and her hands folded neatly in her lap. Her fingers were woven together in the wrong order.
Jeremy stared for a second before realizing why.
One of her thumbs was underneath the other hand.
“Jesus Christ, June.”
She smiled.
“You should not strike machines when they fail to give you what you want.”
Jeremy looked back at the scanner.
“Thanks?”
“It damages them.”
“No shit.”
June tilted her head.
Her body remained perfectly still.
Only her head moved.
“You do that often.”
Jeremy glanced at her.
“What?”
“Become angry when systems refuse to behave correctly.”
A pause.
Jeremy turned the dial again.
Static filled the space between them.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes.”
He waited.
June did not continue.
Jeremy looked over.
She was closer.
Still sitting on the rail.
Same posture.
Same folded hands.
But closer.
Jeremy frowned.
“Did you just move?”
“No.”
He looked at the gravel between them.
Then back at her.
June smiled again.
“You spend a great deal of time imagining what you would do differently.”
Jeremy’s fingers stopped on the dial.
“What?”
“If something happened twice...”
The scanner hissed.
June leaned forward.
Her spine remained completely straight.
“... What would you change?”
Jeremy stared at her.
“About what?”
June looked past him.
Down the tracks.
“Everything.”
“That’s a stupid question.”
“Yes.”
The answer came without offense. Jeremy looked back at the scanner as static hissed through the speaker. He turned the dial harder than necessary. He huffed.
“There’s a lot of stuff.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I know enough.”
Jeremy laughed under his breath.
“Sure, you do, bitch.”
June remained sitting on the rail.
The light from the dying evening stretched everything longer than it should have. Telephone poles leaned in shadows across the gravel. Trees crowded both sides of the tracks, their branches barely moving despite the wind Jeremy could feel on his face. June’s hair did not move either.
“You think about the hardware store.”
Jeremy’s hand stopped.
The scanner whispered between stations.
He kept his face down.
“What?”
“You replay it.”
Jeremy’s jaw tightened.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do.”
He looked up sharply.
June had moved again.
She was no longer sitting.
Jeremy had not seen her stand.
She stood between the rails now, hands hanging loosely at her sides.
Her feet were placed directly between the wooden ties.
Centered.
Exact.
“You imagine saying different things.”
Jeremy said nothing.
“Standing somewhere else.”
“Can you not?”
“Making Lupe stop speaking. I know you picture doing it with your genitals.”
His face grew hot.
“Shut up.”
June stopped.
For a moment.
Then:
“Would you?”
Jeremy stared at her.
“What?”
“If you could. Would you?”
Her expression did not change.
“If you could make her stop.”
The words hung there.
Jeremy looked down the tracks.
“I... don’t know...”
June tilted her head.
“Yes, you do.”
“No, I don’t.”
“You imagined slapping her across the face.”
Jeremy went still.
June took one step forward.
Gravel shifted beneath her shoe several seconds after her foot had already settled.
“Before anyone could stop you.”
His mouth went dry.
June continued.
“Then forcing her onto her knees.”
“Yes.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“No.”
Jeremy looked at her.
June tilted her head.
“Being angry does not mean you wanted to do those things... .”
A pause.
“... Wanting to do those things means you wanted to do those things.”
Jeremy’s jaw tightened.
“I wouldn’t have actually done it.”
“I know.”
“Then what’s your point?”
“I wonder what you would do if those consequences became optional.”
June smiled.
“Most people lie about what they want. You only lie afterward.”
Jeremy looked at her.
The smile vanished.
Gone.
She stepped closer.
“You are ashamed after.”
Something about the way she said it made him uncomfortable.
“After what?”
“Everything.”
Jeremy picked at the torn rubber around the scanner antenna.
“That’s... that's not true.”
“You rehearse apologies you will never give.”
His fingers stopped.
“You rehearse insults you will never say.”
The static sharpened.
“You imagine violence you will never perform.”
“Jesus Christ...”
“And then you feel guilty for things that didn't even happen.”
She tilted her head.
“Sad.”
Jeremy stood abruptly.
The scanner fell from his knees and hit the ground with a few ungraceful clinks.
June watched.
“You don’t know me.”
“I do know you, Jeremy Cole.”
“No, you don't.”
“I know what you repeat.”
“What does that even mean?”
June pointed at the scanner.
Jeremy followed her eyes.
The static had changed.
A voice surfaced beneath it.
“—clear the—”
Jeremy grabbed the tuning knob.
“Hold on.”
He turned it slightly.
The voice vanished.
“Fuck.”
Jeremy turned it back.
Nothing. He leaned closer.
“Come on...”
June watched him.
Jeremy tried again.
Static.
“Fuck. I had it.”
“Yes.”
“For, like, two seconds.”
“Three.”
Jeremy looked at her.
“That’s not the point.”
“It is.”
June pointed at the scanner.
“You had what you wanted. Then you made the wrong adjustment and lost it.”
Jeremy frowned.
“Okay?”
“You know the correct choice.”
“No shit. I know that now.”
June stepped closer.
“Yes.”
Her eyes remained fixed on him.
“That is the problem.”
Jeremy stared at her.
June reached into her jacket pocket.
“What if you knew afterward beforehand?”
Jeremy blinked.
“... That doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does.”
Her arm went deeper into the pocket. Too deep. The fabric should have bunched around her wrist. It didn’t.
At least, that was the closest word Jeremy had for it.
It was a broad cuff of dark, battered metal fitted over worn brown leather, the outer band broken into heavy overlapping segments. Faint swirling patterns curled across the metal in long engraved lines, worn shallow in some places and sharp in others. At the back sat a square clasp housing, thick and mechanical-looking, with a spiral stamped into its face. It looked old. June held it out.
But Jeremy did not take it.
“... What is that?”
“A correction.”
“Of what?”
“You.”
Jeremy stared at her.
June stared back.
Then her mouth curved upward.
Jeremy could not tell whether she had made a joke.
“Very funny, June.”
“No.”
She took his hand.
Jeremy flinched.
June turned his wrist over.
“Hey-”
She wrapped the band around him before he could pull away.
The leather lining pressed cold against his skin.
Then the metal segments shifted.
Jeremy felt them settle one after another around his wrist-
click.
click.
click.
The square clasp locked shut.
“What the hell?!”
Jeremy jerked his arm back.
He grabbed at the metal cuff, trying to wedge his fingers beneath it.
The leather lining tightened just enough to make that impossible.
Jeremy froze.
June released him.
“What did you just put on me?”
“Press the spiral.”
“What?”
“The spiral.”
Jeremy stared at the device.
“June.”
“Press it.”
“No.”
June waited.
Jeremy glared at her.
She did not move.
Did not blink.
Jeremy looked down. The cuff had no screen, no buttons that he could see. Only the engraved patterns winding around the metal and the small spiral stamped into the square clasp. He pressed it with his thumb. Something inside the cuff shifted. A tiny rotation beneath the metal. The engraved lines trembled.
Jeremy jerked his hand away.
June watched.
“What the fuck is this?”
“A choice.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“No.”
Jeremy looked at the cuff again.
The spiral sat motionless beneath his thumb.
Then he pressed it.
Click.
The railroad tracks split.
Jeremy gasped. Not physically. He knew that immediately and somehow not at all. He was still standing beside the tracks. June was still in front of him. The scanner was still resting on the gravel. But there were two versions of what happened next. In one, Jeremy stumbled backward. His heel caught the rail. He fell hard, his hand slapping down onto the gravel as a sharp piece of metal drove into his palm. Pain exploded through his hand.
“Fuck!”
He looked down.
Blood.
Then-
Click.
Jeremy was standing again. His hand was uninjured. He stopped breathing. The memory of pain remained, but the sensation was gone. He looked at the gravel behind him. The piece of metal was there, exactly where it had been. Jeremy stumbled sideways instead, away from it.
“What the fuck?”
June smiled.
“You learned.”
Jeremy looked at his hand and turned it over. Nothing.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No, I fell.”
“Yes.”
His head snapped up. June’s smile widened slightly.
“You did not keep it.”
Jeremy stared at her. The scanner crackled and he flinched as a voice came through.
“—eastbound freight approaching—”
The message dissolved into static. Jeremy barely noticed.
“What did you do to me?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit.”
June crouched. Her knees touched the ground before the rest of her body seemed to lower. Jeremy took a step back as she picked up a small gray stone, flat on one side.
“This device, The Echo Dial, allows you to examine an immediate consequence.”
Jeremy’s eyes went to the rock.
“You act.”
She tossed it lightly. It landed near Jeremy’s shoe.
“You see what follows.”
June bent and picked it up again.
“You reject.”
She tossed it to the same place.
“Or retain.”
Jeremy watched her.
“That’s time travel.”
“No.”
“Then what is it?”
“Rehearsal.”
June rolled the stone between her fingers.
“Very convincing rehearsal.”
Jeremy looked down at the cuff. The spiral on the clasp looked deeper than it had before. He rubbed his thumb over it. Metal. Nothing else.
“You’re saying I can see the future?”
“No.”
“A future?”
“No.”
“Then what the fuck am I seeing?”
“A possibility.”
The wind passed through the trees. June’s clothes remained still.
“You choose.”
The stone left her hand. Jeremy barely saw the throw before it came directly at his face. He recoiled. The Echo Dial clicked once, hard, and the metal tightened around his wrist. Jeremy threw up his arm. The world thickened. The stone did not stop completely, but crawled through the air, slowly rotating. Jeremy stared.
“What—”
“Reach.”
Jeremy looked at June.
“Reach for it.”
He extended his hand. The stone drifted past his fingers.
“Too slow.”
“Shut up.”
Jeremy moved again. The cuff shifted against his skin as several tiny mechanisms turned beneath the clasp. The stone accelerated. Jeremy yelped and ducked. It shot over his shoulder and clacked against the rail. He spun around.
“You could’ve hit me!”
“Yes.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?!”
June did not move. Jeremy’s anger stalled, only for a second. Then June pointed at the stone.
“Bring it back.”
Jeremy looked at it.
“How?”
“You already moved it.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did.”
“The bracelet did.”
June stared.
“The Echo Dial is on you.”
Jeremy stared back.
“So?”
“So.”
Jeremy looked at the stone and raised his hand. Nothing happened.
“This is stupid.”
June waited. Jeremy tried again. The cuff gave a faint internal tick, then another. The metal grew warmer against his wrist. The air around the stone shimmered. It scraped against the gravel, moving an inch, then another. Jeremy’s eyes widened. He pulled his hand toward himself.
Click-click-click.
The stone shot across the ground. Jeremy jumped out of the way. June did not. The rock struck her shoe. She looked down, then at Jeremy.
“You moved.”
“Yeah.”
“You could have made it move.”
Jeremy frowned.
“I was trying.”
“You reacted instead.”
“I didn’t want it to hit me.”
June’s expression softened. The change was almost convincing.
“Exactly.”
Jeremy looked at her. June stepped past him toward the scanner.
“There are things already moving. Those are easiest.”
She nudged the scanner with her shoe.
“You can catch them.”
She bent.
“Delay them.”
June picked up the scanner.
“Redirect them.”
Then she threw it.
“Hey!”
The scanner arced toward the rocks beside the tracks. The Echo Dial contracted around Jeremy’s wrist, one metal segment pressing into the next.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Jeremy reached instinctively. The scanner slowed, not smoothly, but jerking through the air in tiny increments, each movement accompanied by a faint tick beneath the cuff. Jeremy’s teeth clenched. He pulled. The scanner curved, hit the gravel, bounced once, but did not smash. Jeremy ran over and grabbed it.
“You asshole!”
June was suddenly beside him. Jeremy recoiled.
“How do you keep doing that?”
June didn't reply.
Jeremy stared at her. June looked down at the scanner.
“Functional.”
“Barely!”
Jeremy checked the casing. A new scratch. Nothing worse. He looked at the Echo Dial. The metal plates had settled again. Still. Heavy. Ordinary. He rubbed one of the engraved curves with his thumb. For a moment, he could have sworn the groove continued farther beneath his finger than the width of the cuff allowed. He pulled his hand away.
“How much can this do?”
June began walking down the tracks. Jeremy hesitated, then followed.
“I asked you a question.”
“Yes.”
“How much can it do?”
“More when you understand.”
“Understand what?”
“Motion.”
June stepped onto one of the rails. Her shoes balanced perfectly. She walked without looking down.
“Speed.”
One step.
“Direction.”
Another.
“And, most importantly," She paused, "Intention.”
Jeremy climbed onto the gravel beside her.
“What about people?”
June stopped. Jeremy almost walked past her. She turned. Her feet remained facing forward for a moment too long before rotating after the rest of her.
“People are difficult.”
Jeremy felt a strange little disappointment.
“How difficult?”
“They resist.”
“Resist what?”
“Being told where they belong.”
Jeremy stared. June lifted one hand.
“Try.”
“Try what?”
“Move me.”
Jeremy laughed.
“I don’t know how.”
“You know enough.”
The Echo Dial clicked softly. Jeremy looked at June. He thought about pushing. Nothing happened. He focused harder. Something rotated beneath the clasp. June’s jacket twitched, then her shoulder shifted slightly backward. Jeremy’s eyes widened. June remained still. He tried again. The metal plates tightened fractionally. June staggered, one foot sliding off the rail. Jeremy laughed. An actual laugh.
“Holy shit.”
June looked at her foot, then slowly placed it back.
“Again.”
Jeremy did. The Dial began ticking, slowly at first, then faster. The field tightened. June’s hair lifted slightly Her hand slowed, moving as though underwater. Jeremy grinned. The ticking became frantic. Then pain stabbed behind his eyes. The mechanisms inside the cuff stopped all at once, the effect collapsed, and Jeremy stumbled. June was suddenly normal again.
“Fuck.”
“Living things resist.”
Jeremy rubbed his temple.
“You could’ve said it hurts.”
“I could have.”
He glared at her. June looked down the tracks. The rails began humming. Jeremy noticed it through his shoes first: a faint vibration, then stronger. The scanner crackled. A distant horn sounded somewhere beyond the trees. Jeremy looked toward the curve in the tracks.
“Train.”
“Yes.”
“We should move.”
June stayed where she was. Jeremy frowned.
“June.”
She stood between the rails, facing the distant bend. The vibration grew. Jeremy grabbed her sleeve.
“Come on.”
June looked at his hand, then at him.
“Do you think it would stop?”
“What?”
“For you.”
Jeremy let go.
“What kind of question is that?”
“The train.”
Another horn. Closer. June tilted her head.
“Would it stop because you are misunderstood?”
Jeremy stared.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Would it apologize?”
The rails trembled beneath them. Jeremy stepped off the track bed.
“June, move.”
“Would it care what you intended?”
His stomach tightened. The headlight appeared around the distant curve, small and growing. Jeremy looked at June. She remained centered between the tracks.
“Okay, seriously-”
“Motion does not care about fairness, Jeremy Cole.”
The horn screamed. Jeremy grabbed her arm. June did not move. It felt like pulling a fence post.
“June!”
“You must move it.”
“I CAN’T MOVE A FUCKING TRAIN!”
“No.”
June looked toward the approaching light.
“You can move yourself.”
Jeremy pulled harder. Nothing. The train was coming too fast. Too close.
“Are you fucking insane?!”
June turned her face toward him, perfectly calm.
“... You know what happens if you choose incorrectly.”
Jeremy froze. The Echo Dial contracted sharply, the metal segments pressing together around his wrist. The clasp turned beneath his skin.
Click.
Reality split.
In one path, Jeremy kept pulling. The train screamed closer. June remained immovable. Jeremy waited too long. He jumped. His shoe caught between the rail and one of the wooden ties. He fell; light swallowed everything.
Then-
Click.
Jeremy was standing several feet from the tracks, gasping. June stood beside him. The freight train tore past. Wind and noise slammed into him. Jeremy staggered backward, his whole body shaking. He could still remember the instant before impact, could still feel his ankle trapped, could still feel the certainty that he was going to die. June watched the train. Her hair did not move in the violent wind. Jeremy stared at her.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“You fucking knew!”
“Yes.”
“You could’ve killed me!”
“No.”
Jeremy’s face twisted.
“What?”
June finally looked at him.
“You chose correctly.”
The train roared between them and the forest beyond. Jeremy’s breathing came fast. His hands shook. He looked down at the Echo Dial, then back at June.
“You’re fucking crazy.”
“No.”
“You stood on the tracks!”
“Yes.”
“You made me-”
“No.”
June stepped toward him. Jeremy backed away. She stopped.
“You pulled me.”
He stared.
“You chose to remain.”
Another freight car thundered by.
“You chose to leave.”
Another.
“You know both.”
Jeremy said nothing. June’s voice softened.
“Isn’t that what you wanted, Jeremy Cole?”
The train passed. Noise drained from the world. The sudden silence felt enormous. Jeremy stared at the Dial. The engraved spirals looked different. One curve seemed tighter. Another seemed to end somewhere it had not ended before. Jeremy blinked. Everything was normal again.
“I don’t understand why you’re giving this to me.”
June stepped closer.
“You are tired.”
Jeremy laughed shakily.
“Yeah. No shit.”
“Not physically.”
He looked at her.
“You are tired of finding the correct response after people leave. Tired of understanding what you should have done when it is no longer useful.”
June’s eyes were very still.
“Tired of being told that your intentions do not matter.”
Jeremy looked away.
“Tired of losing arguments that only happen once.”
He swallowed. The hardware store returned to him. Lupe at the end of the aisle. The batteries in her hand. Her stupid smile. Zakira holding that hatchet like he was a serial killer. Mr. Alvarez looking at him. Everyone looking at him. For all the wrong reasons. Jeremy rubbed his thumb over one of the shallow engravings.
“What am I supposed to do with it?”
June looked down at his wrist.
“Whatever you decide.”
“That’s it?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t want anything?”
“No.”
“Nobody just gives somebody something like this.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
June considered him. Measuring.
“You imagine many things you never do.”
Jeremy’s skin prickled. June stepped around him. Her shoulder passed close enough that it should have brushed his.
It didn’t.
“Perhaps you should find out which ones you regret.”
Jeremy turned.
June was several yards away... He had not heard her move.
“What the hell does that mean?”
She kept walking.
“June!”
She stopped.
Her head turned over her shoulder. Then the rest of her body followed.
Jeremy’s mouth closed.
June smiled.
“... You should hurt someone with it.”
Jeremy went cold.
“What?”
For a moment, June remained perfectly still-
Then something changed. Her head shifted slightly. Just enough to return to an angle a human neck was meant to hold. She blinked. Once. Twice. Her shoulders loosened. A sharp breath entered her lungs like she had forgotten she was supposed to breathe.
June looked at Jeremy.
Actually looked at him.
Confusion crossed her face.
“... Jeremy?”
He stared at her.
June looked around, her brow tightened.
“What the hell...?”
She rubbed at her temple, then her eyes dropped to Jeremy’s wrist.
The Echo Dial.
Her hand stopped.
“What is that?”
Jeremy looked down at it.
Then back at her. “What?”
June’s confusion sharpened.
“That thing on your arm.”
Jeremy said nothing.
June looked down the tracks, then toward the road beyond the trees.
“Where are Claire and Zoey?”
Jeremy stared at her.
“What?”
“I was just-”
June stopped.
Her eyes moved slowly across the tracks again.
“I thought I was with them.”
Jeremy said nothing.
June looked at him.
This time her expression was uncertain.
Normal.
Annoyed, even.
“.... Why are you looking at me like that?”
Jeremy stared at her for several seconds.
Then sighed. “Nothing.”
June frowned.
“Okay... weirdo.”
She looked at the Echo Dial once more.
Then at Jeremy.
Whatever question she had seemed to die before reaching her mouth.
June turned and walked away.
Jeremy watched until she disappeared between the trees.
Then he looked down at the Echo Dial.
Behind him, the scanner crackled.
Jeremy turned as a voice pushed through the static.
“—repeat, eastbound line is clear—”
He looked toward the tracks.
Then at the place where June had been standing.
Jeremy thought about Lupe.
Not for long.
Something beneath the square clasp turned once.
Click.
Interactions: Cornell High.
The school looked wrong without cars in front of it.
Kari had seen Cornell High empty before. Summer break. Teacher workdays. Sunday afternoons when her mother forgot something in her office and dragged Kari along because she didn't feel like leaving her home alone. Those versions of the building had still felt temporary. Sleeping.
This one looked abandoned.
The parking lot was empty except for weeds beginning to push through cracks near the curb. A plastic bag had caught against the bottom of the chain-link fence and inflated whenever the wind moved through it. Several classroom windows had been covered from the inside, either with blinds or whatever teachers had found after the closure. The marquee near the road still displayed the same announcement it had the week everything stopped.
WELCOME BACK STEELHEADS!
The letters beneath it had started leaning.
Lupe stared up at the sign, rolling her eyes.
“That's depressing as fuck.”
Zakira adjusted the strap of her backpack.
“Everything is depressing to you.”
“No. Some things are sexy.”
“Name one.”
“Me.”
Zakira looked at her.
Lupe looked back.
Kari kept walking.
“I regret bringing the two of you...”
“You invited us,” Zakira said.
“Yeah, mami,” Lupe added. “At four-thirty in the fucking morning!”
“It was four thirty-eight.”
“That's worse!”
Kari carefully stepped over a crack in the pavement, one hand briefly pressing against her ribs when the movement pulled something unpleasant beneath her shirt.
Lupe noticed.
“Mami.”
“... I'm fine.” Kari immediately replied.
“You did the face.”
“What face?”
“Oh I don't know, that 'little white people pain face.'”
Kari stopped.
“I'm Black.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I don't actually.”
Zakira walked between them.
“She means you grimaced.”
“I know what she meant.”
“Then why the fuck did you ask, mami?”
Kari glared at both of them and resumed walking toward the side of the building.
The entrance they were heading for was mostly hidden behind the gymnasium, past a narrow delivery lane and several dumpsters that smelled even worse now that no one was regularly emptying them. Kari had been through the door dozens of times. Her mother used it whenever she worked late and didn't feel like walking around to the main entrance. Kari reached into her jacket pocket. The key ring jingled.
Lupe stopped dead.
“Noooooooooooo...”
Kari looked back.
“What?”
“You stole the keys?”
Kari pushed her glasses up her nose with one finger, “I borrowed them, for your information.”
“From who, mami?” Lupe was barely containing her laugher. “Whoooooooooo?”
“... My mom.”
Zakira stared at Kari, who looked between them. She narrowed her eyes,
“What?”
Lupe slowly pressed both hands together.
“Dios, mios,”
“Lupe.”
“No, no, I'm sorry. I didn't realize who I was dealing with.”
Kari's eyes narrowed.
Lupe lowered her voice dramatically.
“Kari Wilson the criminal who steals from her own momma!” She said, jamming her elbow into Zakira who just rolled her eyes.
“... Shut up.”
“Breaking and entering.”
“With a key?”
“Possession of stolen property.”
“They are not stolen.”
“Betraying your own momma.”
Kari pushed the key into the lock.
“I am going to leave you outside.”
“Grand theft cafeteria.”
Zakira snorted.
Kari turned around so fast her ribs complained.
“... Really, Zakky?”
Zakira's mouth flattened.
“No.”
“You laughed.”
“I breathed.”
“You breathed funnily, like something was funny.”
Lupe was already losing it, but Kari muttered something impolite and turned the key.
The lock clicked and Kari pulled the door open. Darkness waited on the other side.
“You first, criminal.”
“Why me?”
“You have the getaway keys.”
Kari switched on her phone flashlight.
“You know what? This meeting was already a mistake.”
“Already?”
They stepped inside.
The door shut behind them with a heavy metallic sound.
Kari immediately looked back.
Zakira noticed.
Neither of them said anything.
The hallway beyond the gymnasium was exactly as Kari remembered it, which somehow made it worse. Trophy cases lined one wall. Posters advertising a homecoming dance that never happened hung crookedly beside classroom doors. Someone had left a stack of flattened cardboard boxes against a drinking fountain. The overhead lights were off, but pale evening light reached through the narrow windows in the classroom doors.
Their footsteps echoed.
Lupe looked down both ends of the hallway.
“Why does this school turn spooky when nobody's in it?”
“... That's everywhere, Lupe,” Zakira said.
Kari glanced over.
Zakira's expression tightened slightly.
For half a second, nobody spoke.
Then Lupe pointed at her.
“Exactly why I'm questioning this guest list.”
Kari sighed.
“... We're not doing this again.”
“We haven't done it once.”
“You've complained about it the whole fucking time,”
“Because you invited every crazy motherfucker and hoe you can think of.”
“I invited people who were at the warehouse. People with magic.”
Zakira adjusted her bag again.
“Who exactly did you invite?”
Kari hesitated.
Lupe stopped walking.
“Oh, no.”
“What?”
“That pause.”
“There wasn't a pause.” Kari rolled her eyes.
“There was a whole commercial break, mami.”
Kari continued down the hallway toward the cafeteria.
“I invited Tommy.”
“Fine,” Zakira said immediately.
Lupe shrugged.
“Nora.”
“Fine.”
“Ella.”
“Fine.”
“Tuyen.”
Lupe nodded.
“Vicky's homie but she's fine... when that bitch isn't around,”
“Daniel.”
Lupe blinked.
“The virgin, mami?”
Kari looked back at her.
“Daniel.”
“That's what I said.”
Zakira frowned.
“You don't know that he's a virgin. Unless...” Zakira stopped that train of thought there.
Lupe turned toward her.
“Zakira, that boy looks like he asks Jesus for forgiveness after holding hands.”
“Can we not speculate about Daniel's sex life?”
“His what?”
Kari stared at her.
Lupe smiled.
“Sorry.”
She was not.
Kari turned back around.
“Whatever Daniel is connected to fought that thing at the warehouse. He needs to be here.”
Kari continued walking.
“Lynn.”
Silence.
Kari looked over her shoulder.
Lupe frowned.
“Who the fuck is Lynn?”
Zakira looked equally confused.
“I don't know a Lynn.”
“She's new.”
“That answers nothing...”
“I know.”
“New from where?”
“I don't know.”
“Do you know anything about her?”
Kari frowned.
“She was involved enough that I thought she should be here.”
Lupe stared at her.
“That is the most suspicious thing you've ever said, and you literally stole keys from your momma.”
“Again, I borrowed them. I'm going to put them back when I'm done.”
“Where is Lynn from?”
“For the last time; I don't know.”
“Okay, so we're inviting strangers now.”
“She is not a stranger.”
“Do you know her?”
Kari paused.
Lupe threw both arms up.
“STRAN-GER.”
Zakira looked at Kari.
“How new?”
“I don't know. New enough that neither of you know her.”
“That's not a measurement.”
“And I didn't make a chart, Zakira.”
“You made a list.”
“That's different.”
“Barely.”
Kari pushed through the double doors separating the academic hallway from the cafeteria corridor.
“She's invited. Moving on.”
Lupe made a suspicious sound behind her.
“Vicky.”
“No,” Lupe said immediately.
Kari kept walking.
“She was at the warehouse.”
“Fuck no.”
“She has magic.”
“I care even less.”
Zakira glanced toward Lupe.
“What did Vicky do to you?”
“Everything, mami.” Lupe threw both hands into the air. “Watch, she’s gonna make the whole damn thing about herself. Somebody’s gonna be talking about how a monster ate their grandma, and she’ll be like-”
Lupe straightened her posture, pushed her hair back, and made her voice several octaves higher.
“‘Oh my God, you guys, I literally broke a nail at the warehouse. You have noooooooooooooo idea what I’ve been through!’”
She finished with an exaggerated shriek that echoed down the empty hallway.
Zakira stared at her.
“That impression came from the heart...”
“I’m just observant, mami.”
“More like angry.”
“I’m not angry.”
“You did a voice.”
“Because she annoys the fuck outta me.”
Kari glanced back at her.
“That still isn’t a reason not to invite her.”
Lupe pointed at her.
“See? That right there. You keep saying ‘reason’ like being irritating isn’t one.”
“It isn’t. I’m not casting a reality show, Lupe.”
“... To you.”
Kari just ignored her.
“Tyler.”
This time, both girls reacted.
Zakira groaned.
Lupe actually stopped.
“No.”
“He has magic.”
“He's Tyler.”
“And?”
“He's just a male Vicky.”
Zakira frowned.
“He is useful... that's all I can say about him.”
Lupe looked betrayed.
“Zakira, I thought you were my boo.”
“He can switch places with people.”
“He can switch places with my ass.”
Kari rubbed her forehead.
“See? This is why I didn't ask for your approval.”
“Clearly.”
“Lexi.”
Lupe stared at her.
Zakira looked away.
Kari slowed.
“What?”
Lupe's voice became very calm.
“Mami.”
“What?”
“... Why?”
“Because she was there.”
“A lot of people were there.”
“And I invited a lot of people.”
“And you couldn't find anyone better than her?”
“I guess not.”
“Voluntarily?”
“Yes, Lupe.”
“With your own fingers?”
Kari stopped walking.
“What exactly do you think is going to happen at this meeting?”
“I don't know anymore! Lynn might backstab us. Vicky is going to make me wish the monster ate my ass-" Zakira commented under her breath that neither Lupe or Kari could make out. "Tyler is going to act like a meathead. And Lexi?”
There was a pause.
“... She's going to be fuckin' Lexi.”
Zakira rubbed her temple.
Kari looked down at the keys in her hand. For several seconds, none of them moved.
Then Zakira stepped closer to the doors.
“... Who else?”
Kari shook her head.
“That's it. That's everybody who's coming.”
Zakira looked at her.
“Who's not?”
Kari's mouth twisted.
“Claire and Zoey.”
Lupe raised an eyebrow.
“They said no? I'm shocked.”
“They're looking for June.”
The humor faded from Lupe's expression.
Zakira was quiet for a moment.
“Still nothing?”
Kari shook her head.
“Even if there was a lead, they didn't tell me.”
Lupe looked down the empty hall.
“Fuck.”
Kari nodded.
“I asked them anyway. Zoey wanted to come, I think, but they're not stopping the search.”
“Good.”
Kari glanced at Zakira.
“Not good that June is missing. Good that they're looking.”
“I know what you meant.”
There was a brief silence before Kari added:
“Elsa isn't coming either.”
Lupe looked at her.
“Elsa? Ya girl?”
Even Zakira seemed surprised.
“I thought she'd be the first person here.”
“She wanted to be.”
Kari's fingers tightened slightly around the key ring.
“She has to stay with her grandmother.”
Lupe's expression softened.
“Everything okay?”
“I think so. Her grandmother just needs her right now.”
Zakira nodded.
“Then that's where she should be.”
“Yeah.”
Kari said it quickly.
A little too quickly.
Lupe studied her for a second.
“You wanted her here... didn't you, mami?”
Kari looked at her.
“... Of course I wanted her here.”
“Mhm.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.”
“Lupe.”
“I said nothing!”
Zakira looked between them.
“It clearly means something.”
“Can everybody stop analyzing me?”
Lupe folded her arms.
Then her eyes narrowed slightly.
“Wait. And that's the whole reason Claire and Zoey aren't coming?”
Kari hesitated.
Lupe's eyes narrowed further.
“Dios mios, another pause.”
Kari sighed, “... They also didn't like some of the people I invited.”
Lupe immediately pointed at Kari.
“SEE?”
“That doesn't mean you're right.”
“What's that dumbass name they call themselves? Oh, yeah..."Lupe finger quoted, “'The Terrible Trio' has spoken.”
Kari narrowed her eyes at Lupe.
“You don't even like Claire.”
“I didn't say I liked her. Just that she does something right.”
Zakira looked at Kari.
“Who did they have a problem with?”
Kari looked toward the cafeteria doors again.
“Some of the same people you two did.”
Lupe nodded vigorously.
“Because we're right, mami. You should take this as a sign.”
“That remains unproven.”
“Democracy says otherwise.”
“That's not democracy.”
“Three people disagree with Kari. That's a landslide.”
“Claire and Zoey are two people.”
“I'm the third.”
“I understood the math.”
“Then respect the voters.”
Kari sighed.
“Claire and Zoey have their own priorities right now.”
Her voice softened slightly.
“June matters more to them than this meeting.”
Zakira nodded.
“She should.”
Kari looked at the cafeteria doors.
“I just hope they find her...”
There was a pause.
”... Alive.”
Nobody had anything funny to say after that.
After a moment, Zakira broke the silence.
“You said Tommy?”
“Yes.”
“Nora?”
“Yes.”
“Ella and Tuyen?”
“Yes.”
“Daniel?”
“The virgin.”
“Lupe.”
“Sorry.”
Again, she was not.
“Lynn.”
“Unfortunately,” Lupe muttered.
“You don't know her.”
“Exactly.”
Kari ignored her.
Zakira looked toward the dark cafeteria windows.
“And all of them said yes?”
Kari's mouth twisted.
“Not exactly.”
Lupe crossed her arms.
“Oh, good.”
“Some of them responded.”
“How many?”
Kari unlocked the cafeteria.
“How many, mami?”
“Enough.”
“That is not a number, mami.”
The lock clicked.
Kari pulled one door open.
The cafeteria beyond was enormous in the dark.
Long rows of folded tables had been pushed against one wall after the school closed. Chairs were stacked upside down on several of them, their legs jutting toward the ceiling. The serving counters sat empty beneath dead menu screens. Vending machines hummed near the far wall, two bright rectangles of color in an otherwise gray room.
Kari stepped inside as her shoes squeaked against the tile. She remembered lunch, people shouting across tables, someone always playing music from their phone too loudly, Vicky crossing the room with half the cheer squad around her, teachers pretending not to notice people leaving through side doors.
Normal things.
Now every sound came back to them twice.
Lupe stepped in behind her.
“Oh, this is horrible, mami.”
“You complain about everything, Lupe.”
“No, I mean this room is fucking haunted.”
“It isn't haunted.”
“You don't know that, do you, mami?”
Kari opened her mouth.
Closed it.
“Fair.”
Zakira walked toward one of the wall switches.
“Lights?”
“Only some of them.”
“Why?”
“We aren't supposed to be here. Let's not attract too much attention.”
Zakira flipped the switch.
Three fluorescent rows flickered to life.
One buzzed.
Another blinked twice before stabilizing.
The rest of the cafeteria remained dark.
Lupe looked around.
“Fantastic.”
Kari walked toward the center of the room and slowly turned. There were three exits she could immediately see. The main cafeteria doors. A side hallway near the kitchen. Emergency doors leading outside. Four if the serving area connected to the loading dock the way she remembered.
Good.
She had counted them before she noticed she was counting.
Zakira noticed her noticing.
“Enough ways out?”
Kari looked at her.
“Four.”
Lupe frowned.
“Four what?”
“Exits.”
Lupe's expression changed.
“Ooooooh....”
Kari looked away.
“We should move some tables.”
Zakira nodded.
Lupe still watched her for a second before clapping her hands once.
“All right, gang,”
Kari sighed.
“... Don't call us that,”
“Absolutely not, mami. We broke into a school with stolen keys to hold a witch meeting with a possible school shooter and a virgin with a demon-knight-thing as his Stand.”
“Daniel isn't-”
Kari stopped.
“Go ahead.”
Kari stared at her.
“Finish that sentence.”
“... I hate you.”
“That's what I thought.”
Zakira grabbed one end of a folded cafeteria table.
“... Are you helping?”
Lupe looked offended.
“I am emotionally supporting you, mami.”
“Help.”
“Fine.”
Lupe took the other end.
Kari moved toward another table.
Both girls looked at her.
“No,” Zakira said.
Kari stopped.
“What?”
“Your ribs.”
“I can move a table.”
“No.”
Lupe pointed toward the chairs.
“You can lead, mami.”
Kari narrowed her eyes.
“... I hate both of you.”
“Good,” Lupe said, lifting the table with Zakira. “Put it on the agenda.”
Kari watched them drag it toward the center of the cafeteria, then she pulled out her notebook. At least this part she could do. On the first clean page, she wrote:
WHAT WE KNOW.
Beneath it:
WHAT WE THINK WE KNOW.
Then:
WHAT WE DON'T KNOW.
Kari paused.
Her pen hovered.
Finally, she added:
WHAT WE DO NEXT.
Behind her, Lupe and Zakira argued about whether the tables should form a circle.
Kari looked up at the dark cafeteria.
At the empty serving line.
At the Warriors banner hanging crookedly above the far wall.
At the doors.
Four exits.
Enough.
Hopefully.
She looked back down and underlined the last heading. For the first time since the mill, Kari was not going somewhere because a thread had pulled her there.
This time, she was asking everyone else to come to her.
The clock on the nightstand showed it was three in the morning. Almost four. Tommy was awake.
The last few nights had been rough, and “rough” was putting it charitably. He found sleep hard to come by, his mind restless in a way that made it easier to wear himself down mentally by staring possibilities in the face than to just shut his eyes and sit still. He sat on the edge of the bed, head bowed forward, fingers knitted together. The Watcher was curled up between his feet, not dissimilar to a dog that was napping by its master.
Balor floated above the desk where his notes lay. He didn’t move in the air, and his eyes were shut.
Raptor and Porter were stored away.
Next to him, a small notebook sat open. Tommy had taken to writing down what he could, he found that it helped make sense of things.
There are categories of magic.
Kari has one and I have another one. There’s a pattern to it that I don’t understand yet. Kari mentioned White Lux. Her information magic. Mine is different.
Tyler’s teleporting is a different one. So is Vicky’s bat.
How many kinds of magic are there?
Can we have more than one? Is itgeneticAncestors pass it down.
Why do I need my deck for it? Why does Vicky need her bat?
I can’t fucking sleep.
Everything was shifting in small ways. Yesterday, on his way home from town, Tommy had noticed a street sign that used to say King’s Street suddenly read nonsense. The letters weren’t letters, they were just writhing shapes that couldn’t sit still. He blinked and it went back to normal.
He wondered if people pretending that things hadn’t change made things change less. Or slower. If that was the case, then maybe it was a self-sustaining process where normal lead to more normal. But if that were true, why did things still go wrong? There had to be an explanation. The condition Cornell was suffering from originated in that warehouse, and was sprawling out everywhere. There were people walking around like no one’s son or daughter had died, and also acting like they weren’t from here.
Some people completely ignored the roads that weren’t present the day before.
Not even a real police report. Just a disturbance.
Tommy stood up and rolled his shoulders. He grabbed the book and sat down at his desk. He wanted to try his hand at more creatures. But he only had so many cards in the deck- Tommy wondered if he could connect his magic to another deck, maybe something like Tarot cards or blank ones that could behave differently if his summoner shit was channeled in. He started writing again, under a desk lamp.
I saw ancestors. Mine. I didn’t recognize any of them. Something tells me mom or dad wouldn’t either.
“Be proud.” What does that even mean??? They were being cryptic.
It’s like they wanted me to figure it out myself. Kari’s gave her way more. Tyler’s apparently did too. Did theirs just hand them spells? Could the old guy have given me a creature?
That fucking woman had a snake around her neck.
Why’d they expect me to do this the hard way?
Not that it wasn’t working.
His monsters weren’t the most impressive things in the world. Tommy didn’t have anything to compare them to, so he had no idea if he was doing anything right. What else could he make? If he were to chop up one of those things crawling out of the cracks in the world, what could he use those for? Kari’s magic gave her a way to see through Balor, and he wondered how much of that was the connection compared to the information magic.
He sighed.
”…I don’t suppose any of you dead people are listening now?”
Nothing.
”Figures.” He rubbed his eyes.
He had to do something. People were dying.
Tommy didn’t want people to die. Cornell sucked, but it wasn’t “Let everyone die” bad.
Beep. His phone went off. He checked it, and… Yeah. That sounded right. Tommy wasn't the only one trying to make sense of this. Kari was too, and the others were surely getting curious about what they were capable of. He quietly typed a response to her.
Tuyen says she didn't get magic but I know she knows. Showed off to her when we ran into each other one day. Turns out people who didn't get exposed can't even see the things that are happening.
Can't sleep either so I'm coming. Don't know if she's awake at this hour. Don't have her number anyway.
The radio was just quiet enough to be heard between the sound of the engine's rumblings. The headlights were off, because he didn't need them to see under the moonlight and the street lamps that were, strangely, still on at four in the morning. He didn't know if that was a good thing or not, or perhaps the universe was helping him out. The streets were empty, no one walking, no one driving. The town knew that nothing and no one good skulked about at this hour, even if they were pretending to keep up appearances.
Tommy's eyes peered left and right, watching for anything dangerous. A person's eyes had a way of seeing things that weren't really there when it was dark. The corners of vision were always swimming with shapes as the brain tried to parse the lack of sight into something with sense.
He was used to this quiet.
Eventually, the car rolled into the Cornell High parking lot. Above the building, Raptor circled around and landed on the chain link fence. He didn't see anything, and neither did Tommy. He could just barely make out the presence of light. Someone was in the cafeteria. Instinctually, Tommy’s hand found his switchblade.
Going out alone like he was doing felt dangerous. Bright lights in the middle of the 4AM darkness felt dangerous. Did she fucking walk here on foot? At least he was never technically isolated.
Tommy reached into the backseat where Porter was resting. The beast unfurled, and Tommy withdrew a can of cold brew. He made a point to stock up on a few things lately. Like things to drink and eat, tools like a pry bar and measuring square if he got into an emergency. The can wasn’t cold, but the chain store coffee was fresh enough.
Switchblade, check.
Notebook, check.
Phone. Deck of monsters… Check.
Tommy held up a hand, and Balor appeared, one eye open towards him in the dark.
”Fly over. Then stay. Go easy on her,” He instructed, opening the door and letting the orb soar up. Balor stopped a dozen feet above the school’s roof, and then floated in place. All of his eyes slid partially open, allowing Kari a sign that Tommy was both here, and giving her an unmoving picture of their surroundings.
Porter and Raptor disappeared as he stepped out.
He took one long look at the school and cracked his can open.
The caffeine hit his throat, and he knew it’d be a long night.
”Okay.”
He walked across the parking lot, one hand in his jacket’s pocket, and then through the building. With the hood draping over his head, it was difficult to see him in the gloom. Every shadow held his attention longer than it would have a month ago. Every single blade of grass warranted a once-over and Tommy hated that he needed to be so careful right now. Every tile on the floor, every painted brick in the walls.
There was something so fucked about being in a school at this hour. All the rooms pitch black, the way he stopped and listened for every single noise as if it’d be another werewolf thing.
Tommy didn’t dare shine a light down the hallways. Nothing that would give his attention away to something hungry or pissed off at the existence of a person. How long would he have to do this for? Traipsing through places like this at this hour, knowing damn well demons from hell or wherever the werewolf crawled from could be watching him, lurking in the shadows to avoid being spotted by things he barely had a name for?
He heard voices around the corner. Young voices, bantering voices. He recognized them, so he hurried along and entered the cafeteria. There, Tommy put aside any doubt he felt, and put on a confident face.
Kari Wilson, Lupe Sanchez, Zakira Watson. He wasn’t on particularly familiar terms with any of them.
”The hell are you three doing up so late?” He joked, deadpan, taking another drink from his can.
Interactions: Tuyen and Tommy mentioned A sad bed in a sad room
Vicky had been pretending a lot since the party.
She pretended that she was grateful when her cheerleading coach “temporarily” removed her as captain of the squad so that she could properly mourn the death of Chef, even though she was only pretending to be sad, or rather, she was sad, but she was pretending to be sad for the right reasons. She had pretended that she hadn’t read those ugly text messages her friends had sent about her and she pretended like it didn’t bother her when they had given her the cold shoulder at school, ignored her in the hallway, or moved tables away from her at lunch. She pretended that she didn’t know how gum got on their seats, or why they hadn’t seen it before they sat down, or what kind of psychopath stuck thumbtacks in the gum, like that was so dangerous and not funny at all, “Gosh, were they okay?” she would ask, pretending to care.
Vicky pretended like she wasn’t ignoring Tuyen. Vicky was fine, everything was fine, if she said she was fine that meant she was fine, except the times that meant Vicky was not fine, which was most of the time, but seriously this time she was actually fine. Seriously, she was. She was fine. She was just busy. Busy with what? Magic stuff. Magic, y’know? That special thing Vicky had and Tuyen didn’t, which Vicky somehow always managed to bring up anytime they ever talked, and then she’d have to pretend how it didn’t make her feel happy, just like she’d have to pretend that she didn’t live to experience that tiny look of disappointment from Tuyen anytime Vicky blew her off.
The look lasted only a split second but was still always there and Vicky loved it, because people should be upset when Vicky was ignoring them, that was normal, not the other way around, which was how things were now, and it was fucked, and insane, and absolutely not fine and so unfair and stupid and dumb. Then, the look would go away, and everything would be better, because then they’d be just two girls pretending they were fine like they had always been since they entered high school together. Why fix something when they could just pretend that it was working?
Vicky only had to look to her parents to realize that never truly worked, but still, she could pretend.
She got why her dad had left Diane and understood why he would want nothing to do with his son, but leaving Vicky behind? That was a dick move. She hoped loudly that something terrible had happened to him, and she prayed quietly that he was trying to come back for her but he couldn’t, that it was like Tommy said, even though contradictory she still pretended that the bike ride to the edge of town didn’t take longer and longer each time she did it, just like she pretended that the reason she didn’t cross over wasn’t because she was afraid of what would happen if she did despite knowing the reality check would break her, just as it had broken everyone who had tried leaving Cornell before her to only come stumbling back defeated, depressed, and done with everything.
Even now, as Vicky laid in her bed, pretending that she hadn’t been there since Friday night, getting up only to go to the bathroom, get a cup of water, or force a shitty microwaved dinner down her throat so that her stomach stopped grumbling, she found herself immensely tired of pretending. So what if it made her a quitter? She was tired. The game of life was so unfair and rigged completely against her. It was stupid to even try. All the adults before her, everyone else in the world before her, they all had a chance to get out, whereas Vicky never, ever, EVER even got her chance, struck out before she got up to bat.
Bullshit.
It was utter bullshit. She wrapped herself up tighter inside of her comforter like it was some kind of protective cocoon, staring at the wall of her room, the dim glow of her television the only source of light as a sitcom played, the laugh track laughing at how much of a loser she had become, or that she was, that she had always been, and that she always would be. No boyfriend. No friends other than Tuyen. No future outside of Cornell. She had magic, but all that was good for was keeping people from hearing her crying in the bathroom during school lunch. If she was Tyler, she could teleport away. Again, bullshit.
Her phone dinged. It had to be Tuyen. Vicky couldn’t. She just couldn’t pretend that she was fine right now. She rolled herself up tighter. She was starting to sweat inside of the comforter and it was starting to stink, but she kept tightening it around her. If she made it tight enough, maybe air wouldn’t come in, and she would pass out, get some rest that was riddled with nightmares, and reemerge, reinvigorated and reinvented, like she had done years ago after her brother’s “incident”, or maybe she wouldn’t get back up, and she’d just live inside of her blanket forever, and that would be okay too, even if that was quitter talk, and she wasn’t a quitter, she wasn’t, she really wasn’t, she was just tired, and did her phone just ding again, seriously, Tuyen, what the fuck, she was so annoying sometimes!
Correction: everybody was always so annoying and she hated everyone and she wished that they would all just go away and leave her alone and Ding!ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME ANOTHER! Vicky bolted upright with a feral scream, thrashing her arms around violently to free herself from her comforter cocoon, and grabbed her phone. She was about to hurl it across the room when she saw the text was from Tommy, not Tuyen, the latest message asking her to meet at the school cafeteria. Vicky let out a weird noise that she was unaware she could even produce, something between a squeal and a yelp, a squelp, as she threw her phone in a panic as her mind raced and her heart fluttered with excitement or acid reflex.
A boy, a boy, a boy had asked her out! Even if it was a weird boy, even if it was a scary boy who had a knife and might actually be doing this to murder her (that was kind of exciting, too, wasn’t it?) but he also had a car and that car could go fast and if they went fast enough maybe she could escape Cornell and holy shit, when was the last time a boy had texted her? Or anybody that wasn’t Tuyen for that matter?
But wait, it was super weird that he wanted to meet at the school, right, like whose idea of a first date was breaking into the school, unless they were breaking into the school to setup an act of revenge or something, but Tommy was a lame-oid who’d given her a “with great power comes great responsa-whatever” speech, so it probably wasn’t that, unless he had been paying attention to how horribly everyone had been treating her, and he had to be, what guy wouldn’t, and clearly he realized that she was being treated so unfairly so he wanted to show her the nailbomb he was going to put in Gwen’s locker for her which, frankly, she deserved even if it was a bit too extreme of a gesture, like, wow, Tommy, Vicky got it, if she was a guy she’d kill to be with a girl like her too, but seriously, that was kind of—FUCK HER PHONE!
“Oh nooooooo,” cried Vicky, freeing herself fully from her blanket prison, as she picked up the phone and saw the spiderwebbed cracks on the screen.
She poked desperately at the screen, but it no longer responded to touch, preventing her from viewing the earlier messages. She hung her head and let out a whine. This was the third screen this year! Ugh! Just another example of how unfair life was for her generation. Things were just designed to break. She hadn’t even thrown it that hard! Vicky gave the screen a few more hard pokes before throwing the phone again and let out another little scream like a hissing tea kettle.
Why’d she do it again!?
She was all discombobulated. This was Tommy’s fault. Finally, he had done it! She had given him her number so long ago, and she was really starting to feel like shit when he hadn’t taken the bait—not, not, not that she was excited that he’d asked her out, ew, no, ew. I mean I guess he’s kinda…weird! No! Stupid!
Like, it wasn’t like, she didn’t actually, who was she even trying to justify things to, there was nobody else around but her and her thoughts, still it was just like, if he did snap (even though he was super boring and wasn’t going to snap, but like, imagine if he did), perhaps he wouldn’t stab her if she hung out with him a few times, y’know, as friends, just friends, definitely not a rebound, definitely not, like, dating dating, just hanging out, nothing serious, seriously, nothing serious, she’d totally make that clear.
Vicky frowned as she picked up her phone, the screen so shattered that it looked like nothing more than a thousand dollar kaleidoscope.
Maybe she’d wait to set hard definitions until after she got Tommy to buy her a new phone.
This was weird, this was definitely, definitely weird.
Vicky chained her bicycle up to the rack outside of the high school, slipped her sneakers off of her feet, and swapped them for the heels in her bag. For something that was totally just a casual hang sesh, a normal, no-strings attached breaking and entering between a girl and a boy, she was dressed up as if it were a date.
A hairband kept her hair out of her face, the blonde waves styled and sprayed so that not a single strand was astray. She wore the amount of makeup that a teenage girl thought she should wear, that is to say a bit too much, but not so much that she looked like a clown, or a stripper, or a clown stripping to pay their way through clown college, the standout from the blend being a bold, sparkly eyeshadow the color of toxic waste. She was dressed more like she was sneaking into a club than a cafeteria, her outfit skintight and lowcut, and even the wind had not been enough to blow away the cloud of flowery perfume that hung around her like a thick miasma.
Crowning all of this was the look of complete confidence on Vicky’s face, a look that scoffed and said,“Yeah, I always look like this and it definitely didn’t take two hours to pull off”, a look that didn’t crack when she scanned the parking lot for Tommy’s car and didn’t see it, a look that wasn’t worried at all even though deep inside Vicky knew that this was really fucking weird and she kind of wanted to throw up and was she nervous? Why was she nervous? She didn’t get nervous. There was just something off, and weird, and wrong, so she grabbed her invisible bat, and maybe she should just get back on her bike and go back to bed and—she saw her reflection in the glass of the front doors of the school, saw the look, and the look told her to stop being such a pussy.
She reached for the door. It didn’t budge. Locked. Of course it was locked, of course it was, because this was a prank, right, that was it, it was a prank?
No, no, no, the look told her, that couldn’t be it. He wouldn’t. He fucking wouldn’t. And if he did, she would break the windshield of his car with her bat, and smash the doors in so that they couldn’t open, and slam the trunk so hard that it wouldn’t close, and—she should check around back. The cafeteria was closer to that side, anyway, and if Tommy was breaking in then he was probably smart enough to not use the front door. So she circled the building, checking side entrances and fire exits, each locked door setting off more vows of vandalism, quickly running out of car parts so that she had to move on to body parts, getting to just above the knees when she found the unlocked door.
See, she told herself he wouldn’t. Nobody would stand her up. Nobody would fucking dare. Especially not a loser like Tommy.
It dawned on her that she hadn’t replied. She couldn’t have, not with her permanently locked and very broken phone, but what if he wasn’t here and somebody else was? Or rather, something? She had seen stuff around town while riding her bike, quick little glimpses, gone when Vicky looked back to do a doubletake but there enough the first time to make her question if it had been human. Or was that just her imagination? Jumping at shadows, seeing monsters. Still, it put her on edge, and her heels, with their clack-clack-clacking, would guarantee that whatever was waiting for her heard Vicky first before she heard them.
Unless…
“FUCK!" screamed Vicky, because it was the only word she could think of to scream.
The word did not echo down the empty halls of the high school. Instead, it was caught in a bubble of Yellow Lux and silenced as Vicky created a Shout-Out field around herself. The visual of the field fading while the silence remained, the clicking of her heels becoming a personal metronome that couldn’t escape the bubble as she pressed down the otherwise now deathly quiet hallway. What she knew of her magic was limited, but she knew she had to keep talking to keep the spell going, so she gave herself a little pep speech, the same thing she did every morning when she glared at the ugly bitch in the mirror.
“There’s nobody else here, Vicky. Nobody else but Tommy. You’ll get to the cafeteria, and he’ll be there, and it’ll be a little weird, but you can handle it. It’s not a prank, it’s totally not a prank, and hey, even if it was a prank, who cares right? Who’s the joke on? You? No, no no no, no it’s never on you, not unless you let it be on you, and you won’t, because you’re strong, and you’re confident, and you can handle anything. And, honestly, you kind of want it to be a prank, right? You want to walk into the cafeteria and Gwen and all her stupid fucking cunt friends are there and they all start laughing at you and they think they won but they haven’t won, no, they haven’t won, in fact, they just lost because that means that they’re just jealous of you, that’s what it is, they’re jealous of you, they’ve always been jealous of you and they should be jealous of you. And, and, and, honestly, when you think of it, it’s kind of sad, because imagine? Imagine being such a loser that you’d be jealous of someone like you, you stupid fucking bitch, seriously, whatthefuck are you even doing here, Vicky? Oh, oh, look at me, I’m better than everyone, that’s why I’m sneaking into the school cafeteria to meet with a little fucking freak who carries a knife around and is only friends with papermache animals, like, seriously, what is your fucking problem? What the fuck is your fucking problem? You’re talking to yourself. Fucking psycho, bitch ass loser. Why are you even here—wait, where is the cafe—but seriously, why are you even here? You that desperate? You really that desperate? Have some self-fucking-respect, see, see, see, this is why, this is why nobody…”
Vicky trailed off. She noted Tommy’s car through the window, thank God, but then her eyes locked on to the trophy case displayed in the hall outside of the cafeteria—the smaller of the two trophy cases that were in the hall, the bigger and more prominent one dedicated to all the boys teams and all of their middling accomplishments. She always hated that she was featured in the smaller one, but at least there was something. Last month it might as well have been a personal shrine to the girl, with photos of the softball and cheer team, Vicky front and center as she should be, trophies they won, that SHE had won, lined up next to the photos. Posters for the Homecoming Dance (it had been delayed, right?) had been hung up over the team photos. She ripped down the one in front of the cheer squad. The photo was new, featuring the new captain, with Vicky nowhere to be seen. Whatever. It was fine. Cheerleading was stupid anyway.
She ripped down the one in front of the softball team as the Shout-Out field around her faded due to her not speaking.
In the cafeteria, everyone would hear a voice screaming from the hall.
“FUCKERS!”
Vicky’s scream was still echoing through the cafeteria as it was joined by the clack, clack, clacking of her heels. She entered the cafeteria like a hurricane, throwing the crumpled up posters on the ground, her face flushed and full of fury, as she locked eyes on Tommy (how did he beat her to the cafeteria?) and only Tommy, the girls moving tables and chairs lost in the sea of red that was crashing in on her as she continued her tirade.
“The swim team? The fucking swim team? They took down my photo and replaced it with one of those stupid sluts? It’s not even a school team, Tommy! It’s a community swim team. A. Community. Swim. Team. Like, are you fucking kidding me right now? Who are they teaming up to swim against anyway? Beavers!? Unbelievable. This is un-FUCKING-believable. Ugh, this week, this fucking week. I’m so glad you’re here, Tommy, you have noooooooooooooo idea what I’ve been…” Vicky’s eyes widened as she finally acknowledged that they weren’t alone. “...through. Oh.”
Maybe if she was lucky, they just happened to be here and Tommy had invited her to the cafeteria to stab her to death. She glanced between Kari and Zakira and, oh, goddamnit, Lupe was here too? She began to hear sirens wailing inside of her head as her stomach twisted and knotted inside of her instead of mercifully being sliced open by a switchblade and spilled out on the floor. She felt so many things in that moment: embarrassed, confused, disappointed, but terrified most of all. The fear flashed upon her face briefly before she was able to rein it in and slap her game face back on.
Okay, okay, so she had no clue what was going on here, but that was fine, that was totally fine, it wasn't like they knew why she thought she was here anyway. Just be cool. Not hard. She was cooler than all of them still, even if she no longer had the approval of her peers.
“Oh. Oh! I’m so glad you three are already here! I was worried that nobody else would show.” Show? Show for what? Why were they here? There were a bunch of tables and chairs in the middle of the room. Why were there a bunch of tables and chairs? “Is this everyone, Tommy? We should start if we wanna finish before it gets dark out.”
Of the tables there was one that had been centered with a semicircle of tables forming around it, making it stand out as the most important one. Vicky had to take it. She slipped past Kari, accidentally bumping her in the ribs with her invisible bat without apologizing, wondering why everybody was staring at her like she was some kind of asshole as if the rules of social hierarchy didn’t still apply here. They were at school, and at school you got out of Vicky’s way. They could’ve gone to a Dairy Queen if they wanted equal footing, because it didn’t matter what those stupid little bitches said, at Cornell High she was still the goddamn queen.
She didn’t take a seat at a chair, instead Vicky ascended the center table and sat upon it like it was a throne. She crossed her legs and silenced any dissenters who wanted to contest her seat of choice with a stare, ensuring that once all the little peons sat down that she would be well more than a head above them. It was clear, likely intentionally, that the way she had positioned herself that Vicky had made herself the most important person in the room, the one that could not be ignored, the one that everyone would see first when they entered and make them immediately know that this was still her cafeteria, this was still her court, and she was in charge of this.
“Lupe, you always have something to say. Why don’t you get the ball rolling?” demanded Vicky, stifling a yawn as she pulled at her absolutely battered phone and lobbed it at Tommy. "Hey, car guy, you can fix that, right?"
Interactions: Vicky (@Atrophy), & Tommy (@Blizz) Cornell High.
”The hell are you three doing up so late?”
Kari looked up from her notebook and stared at Tommy for a second before glancing toward the cafeteria windows, where broad daylight was very obviously spilling through the glass.
“... It's like... twelve PM, Tommy.”
Lupe turned toward Kari. “Mami, maybe that's late for him.”
“Maybe he just woke up,” Zakira added with a shrug.
“Damn. Gooooooooooood morning!”
Kari sighed and returned to her notebook. “Can we please just act normal when everyone gets here...?”
Lupe and Zakira looked at one another.
“No.”
“That's wishful thinking,” Zakira rolled her eyes.
Kari closed her eyes. “Great.”
She had just started rearranging the notebook and pens on the table for the third time when someone screamed from the hallway. Kari froze, Lupe's head snapping toward the doors while Zakira's hand immediately went toward her bag. For half a second, Kari's heartbeat surged hard enough to hurt her ribs.
Then the voice continued.
Loud.
Angry.
Familiar.
Kari exhaled through her nose. “Oh my fucking God...” Placing both hands on her temples.
Zakira's hand remained near her bag. “She doesn't sound happy.”
Lupe looked at her. “She's never happy.”
“Lupe.”
“Whaaaaaaaaaat, mami.... I'm just saying.”
The heels came next.
Clack.
Clack.
Clack.
Kari looked toward the entrance as the noise approached.
Then Vicky entered.
Kari watched the tirade unfold in silence. The swim team. The pictures. The posters. The injustice. The complete and total devastation apparently brought upon Cornell by somebody rearranging a simple trophy case.-
Then came...
“-You have noooooooooooooo idea what I’ve been…”
Kari's eyes closed.
No. Absolutely not.
Beside her, Lupe went completely still, and Kari slowly opened one eye. Just one. Lupe was no longer looking at Vicky. She was looking directly at Kari. Her head had turned almost unnaturally slowly, and an enormous smile spread across her face until it practically reached both ears.
Kari stared at her.
Lupe said nothing.
She didn't have to.
Kari raised one hand and flipped her off.
Lupe's smile somehow widened.
Zakira looked between them. “Don't.”
Lupe placed a hand against her chest and spoke completely monotone, for once, “I haven't even said anything, mami.”
“Your face is too loud.”
“I'm just observant, boo.”
Zakira's mouth twitched. “... You predicted that almost word for word.”
Kari's middle finger remained raised. “I will flip you off too if you don't quit it.”
“I didn't invite her.”
“Neither did you, Lupe!” Kari slammed both hands onto the desk, and the echo boomed through the halls, then returned. The one blood vessel in Kari's brain that Lupe had spent the morning aggravating had finally reached critical mass.
Then went back to flipping Lupe off.
Lupe's eyebrows rose. “Exactly, mami. That's the lesson here.”
“There is no lesson.”
“There is a beautiful lesson, mami.”
“Shut up. Just shut up, before I hang myself in the bathroom.”
Kari lowered her hand and tried very hard to focus on literally anything else. It did not help when the invisible bat clipped her ribs. Pain immediately bit through her side. Kari sucked in a breath and folded slightly toward the injury before catching herself against the table.
Lupe's smile disappeared immediately.
“Mami?”
“I'm fine.”
Zakira looked over. “You did the face again.”
“See? Now she gets it.”
“Sit down. Please.”
“I'm already sitting.”
Zakira looked at her.
Kari looked down.
She was, in fact, half-standing with one hand against the table.
“... Well, I was going to.”
She lowered herself carefully into the nearest chair. Lupe was still staring toward the center table now. Kari knew that expression. She had seen several different versions of it during the walk over. It was the expression Lupe made when she had just been handed an opportunity to become everybody's problem.
“Lupe.”
Lupe didn't look at her. “What?”
“No.”
“I didn't even do anything!”
“You're thinking loudly.”
Zakira glanced at Kari. “Now everyone's face is too loud...”
Lupe crossed her arms.
For several seconds, Kari genuinely believed the situation might survive...
“Lupe, you always have something to say. Why don’t you get the ball rolling?”
Then Vicky directed the conversation toward Lupe.
Kari saw Lupe's entire body change. Her shoulders straightened. Her chin lifted. Her mouth opened.
“Oh, believe me, bitch, I didn't bring a notebook but I got a whole ass-”
“No.” Kari cut it off.
Lupe stopped and slowly looked at Kari. “Mami.”
“No.”
“She was talking to me.”
“Yes... I heard her...” Kari rolled her eyes.
“So I'm just answering-”
“You're going to start a fight. We don't need that right now.”
Kari pushed herself carefully upright again, one hand remaining against the edge of the table. “Nobody is getting the ball rolling by starting shit... Vicky,” Her gaze moved briefly toward Vicky and then back to Lupe. “This is bigger than your stupid drama.”
Lupe threw her hands up. “Why am I getting lectured? I didn't even say anything yet, mami!”
“Because I know you.”
“That's profiling, mami. And you know it.”
“... Or pattern recognition.” Zakira rolled her eyes.
Lupe turned toward Zakira. “Zakky! Whose side are you on?”
Zakira thought about it. “... Mine.” She shrugged.
Lupe stared at her. “Cold.”
Kari rubbed at her forehead. “This is what I was trying to avoid, you know....”
Zakira glanced at her, and shrugged yet again. “I mean, so far, this is exactly what Lupe said would happen.”
Kari's head turned slowly.
“Zakira.”
“... I'm not saying she was right.”
Lupe gasped. “You don't have to, boo. Lord knows I am.”
“Lupe.”
“I'm done.”
She mimed zipping her lips.
A second passed.
Two.
“But fooooooooooooor the record-”
“... Shut up!”
“Damn!”
Kari took a breath, then another. Her ribs still hurt. Her meeting had barely started. Half the people weren't even there yet.
And Lupe had already been proven right once.
Kari hated today.
She looked toward the tables, then toward Lupe. “You wanted to get the ball rolling?”
Interactions: My Demon Friend, The Scooby-Doo Gang Casa de Mars
It stared at Daniel Mars. Daniel moved his head, so it moved its head. Daniel raised his eyebrows, so it raised its eyebrows. What Daniel disliked most, he realised, was the uncompromising reality, even when reality itself had become so fluid lately.
His reflection looked at him with the same expectant expression, the darkness under his eyes having receded since his chat with Tuyen but not erased completely. There was a harshness to Daniel that hadn’t existed before, paler skin, lips deflated into a neutral frown. Thanks to chores and extracurricular activities Daniel had always been in good shape, however a small amount of muscle had raised up his shoulders and arms thanks to a new training regiment. Push-ups on his knuckles, sit-ups, pull-ups and any other exercise he could do quietly at home, all at the insistence of an unwelcome passenger who demanded the best vessel possible.
“MEETING. WHO WILL BE THERE?” A voice in his head asked, or more accurately, demanded.
“I don’t know.” Daniel replied, sharply. He’d stopped jumping at the intrusive thoughts but their arrival still made him tense and shut his eyes for a moment.
All the superfluous exercise was, in part, a way to try and silence the demon within. The hope Daniel had was that if it was placated to some extent it would be less likely to invoke its presence, after all it didn’t seem terribly interested in anything about his life save his potential capacity for justice. Even still a thought gnawed at the boy, if this being, which mocked the very concept by proclaiming itself “Valor”, was able to physically change Daniel, could it be doing so mentally? Suggesting, threatening, anything so that Daniel Mars just so happens to be on the desired path, little by little becoming Valor.
His reflection disappeared as Daniel shut his eyes and tried to ignore that possibility. He opened his eyes to find his face scrunched into a seldom-seen frown, hopefully Tuyen was having more luck with her problem. It was the main reason he agreed to the meeting when Kari had texted him, they weren’t very close but the pool of people who survived that night - much less obtained magical powers - wasn’t very deep, Daniel didn’t even need to see the breaks in reality to know things in Cornell were only going to get worse. With a dusting of water and a thin layer of cream on his face, Daniel began shaving the stubble that had accrued on his chin ever since this nightmare began.
“NO ONE WILL BE THERE.” The voice again boomed in Daniel’s mind. “THEY ARE WEAK. DIVIDED. ONLY WE HAVE THE POWER TO CLEANSE THIS EVIL. ONLY WE-”
“Darn it!” Daniel hissed through gritted teeth, blood began dripping down his jaw and for once the rest of Valor’s proclamations fell on deaf ears as his sudden reappearance caused Daniel to accidentally nick himself with the shaving razor.
Cornell High
It probably wasn’t a good sign for Daniel, as he hoisted up the bag on his shoulder while looking around the deserted building, that the school had seemed so deserted and yet so easy to enter. It wasn’t a good sign when he glimpsed his own reflection in a window and saw the freshly-applied bandage pressed over the cut on his jaw. It certainly wasn’t a good sign that the first sounds Daniel did hear were screams of profanity.
“FUCKERS!”
Daniel couldn’t help but wince. His pace quickened, thinking that someone might be in trouble (prior to this, his hesitancy about breaking into a school had made him lag slower than normal). It was only after the tirade continued did Daniel recognise the shrill tones, he heard them enough times at summer camp whenever Vicky would get… passionate, about a ruling during group games. Truthfully, it set Daniel at ease somewhat, provided a lingering sense of familiarity and normalcy, certainly it proved he hadn’t disobeyed his father and snuck out again for nothing.
Compared to the previous entrant, Daniel’s arrival in the cafeteria was more subdued, calmly opening the door and holding onto it as it closed so that it wouldn’t slam shut - as if the noise would possibly make a difference at this point. Valor, initially having been silenced by the fact that its predictions were wrong and people had shown up, began to filter in its unimpressed displeasure at the turn out. Daniel could tell whenever a feeling or emotion wasn’t his now, but, ever the optimist, was struggling to objectively disagree with the apparition’s appraisal.
Vicky Prescott, snapping back from divine fury and offense to saccharine and agreeable then to haughty indifference, sat atop one of the tables. Daniel was never exactly sure whether he found her ability to dart between emotional extremes impressive or creepy. The target of her rotating emotions, Tommy Bracken, seemed to be the most calm about the situation, he always seemed so calm around issues, hopefully he maintained that, rationality seemed in short supply. The other three, Zakira Watson, Lupe Sanchez and Kari Wilson, chattered amongst themselves. Daniel didn’t know any of them all that well beyond thinking they seemed nice. Other than Kari, who occasionally made polite but impersonal conversation with him whenever they were both in the library. She seemed to be the only one trying to direct the proceedings.
“Hello everyone.” Daniel said, fully entering the meeting. His voice loud enough to be heard but not enough to shout over anyone, though compared to the last entrant he might as well have announced himself in a whisper.
Walking towards the nearest table, Daniel rested his bag atop the surface and opened it up. He pulled out a clear plastic container filled with a fluffy, ordered row of chocolate cupcakes, followed by two six packs of store bought soda.
“I thought people at this meeting might like refreshments. I wasn’t sure what everyone liked… yeah.” Daniel trailed off, his face locked in a tired neutral expression since he arrived. He didn't stutter over his words as much anymore, at least.
Walking away from the treats and drinks to give it its own space for anyone who wanted to indulge, Daniel walked to the opposite table and took a seat at the chair, resting his hands in front of him, not really sure what to say next. Within him, something did know what to say, a feeling he resisted as it urged him to wrestle control of this meeting and begin directing these maladjusted, hormonal simpletons to action.
