The chaos of the school had faded into uneasy normalcy, but for Adam, peace was a foreign concept. His shadows lingered around him like invisible sentinels, coiling and twitching even in his bedroom, watching, waiting. He had spent the day surveying the school, feeling the subtle hum of premonition deep in his bones. And yet… even home, the one place that should feel safe, now carried a faint edge of wrongness.His mother, usually soft-spoken and careful, had called him down for dinner. There was a man waiting at the table—his mother’s new boyfriend. Adam had met him once before, briefly, and the memory had set his instincts on edge. There was something about the man’s presence that triggered unease, though his outward appearance was calm, almost charming.Observe first. Do not act rashly, Adam thought, letting shadows curl around him like protective tendrils. Malick stirred faintly inside, sensing Adam’s caution, whispering with a mixture of amusement and intrigue: Ah… a new player…

The rain had fallen through the night, steady and cold, soaking the streets and washing the world in silver reflections. Adam hadn’t slept. His mind was a storm of restless calculations, flashes of memory, and the echo of Malick’s voice whispering through the hollow spaces of his thoughts.Something about Jake’s presence had gnawed at him all night — not just suspicion now, but a knowing. A familiarity buried beneath the man’s calm exterior.By morning, he had decided to find answers.He began by tracing Jake’s habits. Every movement, every visit, every errand. On the surface, Jake seemed ordinary — a mechanic who sometimes volunteered at a local community center, polite with the neighbors, devoted to Adam’s mother in a way that seemed too perfect. But Adam’s instincts had been honed by the darkness that lived inside him, and those instincts screamed deception.When Jake left that afternoon, Adam followed. The shadows followed too, coiling invisibly along fences and lamp posts, whispe

The church sat at the far end of Hollowridge Road — a place that seemed to exist outside time itself. Its gray stone walls were older than the town, its spire crooked, its windows smeared with the kind of grime that never really came off no matter how much you scrubbed.Adam stood at the gates, staring up at the structure, his hands jammed in his jacket pockets. The autumn wind tugged at his hair, sharp and dry.Malrick’s voice hummed at the back of his mind like a restless current.I remember this place. I thought it was sealed.“Sealed?” Adam murmured aloud.By my family. Long ago. The church was built over a fissure in the veil—a place where the human and the other bleed together.Adam’s throat tightened. “And Jake’s tied to it.”He serves what seeps from it.Adam’s jaw set. He’d spent the last two nights digging through everything he could find about Jake and the church, staying up until dawn while his mother slept upstairs. He’d found records—charity files, obscure donation recei

The blackout hit at 9:46 p.m.Every bulb, every streetlamp, every phone screen died at once — leaving the entire town plunged into a suffocating dark.Adam stood in the ruins of Saint Vehris, heart hammering, his ears ringing from the bell that had tolled itself into silence.Elena lay limp in his arms, her skin cold but pulsing faintly with veins of golden light that refused to dim.Malrick’s voice crawled through his skull, faint but urgent.The breach widens. The entity feeds. You must move, vessel. Now.He gritted his teeth and gathered her up. Outside, the fog was so thick it swallowed his breath. The streets were dead silent — not even the crickets sang. Windows glowed faintly with candlelight as people peeked out, confused, afraid.Adam kept to the shadows. He couldn’t take her to a hospital — not like this, not with that light still pulsing from her body. The doctors would see. They’d question. And Jake would find her.He carried her to his car behind the church, laid her gent

The bell was ringing when Adam opened his eyes.A slow, hollow toll that rolled down the corridors of Blackridge High and shivered the glass in every door. The halls were empty, yet lockers banged open and shut on their own. The air stank of ozone and candle smoke.He knew this place. His school—but wrong. The colors were too sharp, the ceiling too high, the floor slick as mirror glass. Each step echoed twice: once from his shoes, once from somewhere deeper.The breach pulled you through again, Malrick’s voice murmured. You shouldn’t be here.“Then take me out,” Adam hissed.I can’t. Something else is holding the door.A shadow moved ahead, graceful and uncertain. Blonde hair catching the sick light.“Elena…”She turned. Her eyes glowed faintly gold, the same hue as the breach’s heart. For a moment she was the girl he remembered—the tremor in her voice, the way she used to look at him like he was more than his curse. Then her smile twitched, too wide, too still.“Adam,” she said softl