FELIX
The woods swallowed the road quickly. Branches clawed overhead, tangled and close, blotting out what little light the sky offered. Felix walked with his hood up, hands in his pockets, the weight of his bag a steady pull on his shoulder.
Gravel crushed underfoot. The fog moved around him like breath, parting just enough for each step forward.
Half a mile wasn't far, but the walk stretched like the world was slowing down just to watch him go.
Ahead, he caught glimpses of broken fence posts and a rusted "NO TRESPASSING" sign bent in half like someone had tried to eat it.
The trees thinned, and the silhouette of Eloise began to take shape through the fog, its jagged rooflines and broken windows like a crown of thorns.
The closer he got, the heavier the air felt. Like gravity had thickened.
He paused just before the clearing. Something about the silence here was wrong. Not quiet. Empty.
Felix pulled a small silver lighter from his pocket and flicked it open, letting the tiny flame dance for comfort more than heat. It didn't flicker. Not even with the breeze.
He clicked it shut.
"Alright then," he muttered. "Let's see what's still breathing in the belly of the beast."
ELOISE INTERIOR
Inside the asylum, the group began to spread out, their voices dropping as the silence swallowed their footsteps. The building loomed around them like a sleeping beast, its breath long gone but its weight still pressing down.
Chloe and Snax took the west wing, their flashlights sweeping across peeling paint and hanging ceiling tiles as they disappeared down a sagging hallway.
Milo, Sadie, and Breezy stayed near the central corridor by the main stairwell. The grand staircase had long since crumbled, its banister broken, steps bowed and splintered with age. A half-rotted sign above it still read ADMINISTRATION, its letters faded and clinging by rusted bolts.
Zee and Tyler moved toward the east side, aiming to check the second floor. Their voices faded quickly as they vanished beyond the edge of the corridor, swallowed by the rising dark.
The cold was getting worse.
Not a steady drop, but a stuttering fall. Milo glanced down at the thermometer on his rig. The numbers blinked and shifted in erratic jumps.
Thirty-five.
Thirty-two.
Twenty-nine.
The air felt wrong. Too still. Too heavy. Like it was pressing in on their chests, thick with something they couldn't name.
Sadie stood a few steps away from Milo, lingering near one of the heavy wooden doors that lined the corridor. Her flashlight was on, but she wasn't aiming it at anything. The beam wandered without focus, brushing across walls, cracks, and discarded debris.
Her eyes were wide. Not with fear, but with a strange, transfixed wonder. Like she couldn't quite believe where she was. Or what she might be seeing.
She whispered, more to herself than anyone, "It's colder here."
Breezy didn't look up from her audio rig. Her headphones were clamped tightly over her ears, fingers dancing across knobs and dials with growing tension. "Still picking up the static," she said, her voice low and uneven. "But it's louder now. Closer."
Milo's head snapped toward her. "What do you mean closer? You think it's moving?"
Breezy paused, eyes flicking to the left as if something had passed just out of sight.
"I don't think it ever stopped."
WEST WING
Chloe's boots crunched on broken tile as she led the way down a corridor choked with old medical carts and collapsed ceiling tiles. Her flashlight cut a narrow path through the gloom, steady but dim.
Ahead, the remnants of a nurse's station slumped against the wall. The structure looked like it had been caved in, half-swallowed by time and rot.
She swept her light across it and froze.
Something was scrawled across the tile behind the station.
Rough, uneven lettering. Not paint.
Charcoal. Or maybe ash.
The words were smeared in long, black streaks, still clinging to the wall as if they had been burned in rather than drawn.
WE NEVER LEFT
Snax leaned in behind her, breath fogging in the air. "Well, that's... cheerful."
Then his flashlight flickered once. Twice.
So did hers.
The hallway behind them dimmed for a fraction of a second, just long enough for the shadows to twitch in the corners of their eyes.
Something shifted.
Not forward. Not toward them.
But sideways. Like the dark itself was breathing.
Chloe spun around, heart pounding in her ears.
The beam of her light swept the hall.
Nothing.
Nothing she could see.
She grabbed the walkie on her shoulder and pressed the button. "Tyler, come in. Are you getting anything?"
Static hissed in response.
Then a long, slow exhale pushed through the speaker. Wet. Close. Like someone standing inches from the mic.
Then silence.
The kind that made your skin crawl.
The kind that meant something else was listening now.
FELIX - OUTSIDE
Felix reached the rusted gates of the asylum, their metal bones twisted with ivy and worn thin by time. A corroded chain sagged between them, more for show than security. It looked so brittle a strong breeze might snap it in half. But he didn't need to touch it.
Someone had already made a path.
Near the corner, a section of fence had been peeled back like a scab. The hole was jagged, torn wide through the perimeter. He slipped through without hesitation, the cold kiss of rusted metal brushing against his jacket.
The courtyard beyond was overgrown and silent. Wet leaves and slick moss formed a spongy carpet underfoot, carrying the sharp, sour scent of rot. With every step, his shoes sank deeper into the softened earth, the ground squelching beneath him like it wanted to pull him under.
Up ahead, the asylum rose from the fog like a forgotten tomb. Its windows gaped like hollow sockets, lifeless and watching. The main entrance stood intact. Heavy. Sealed tight. Not just locked, but warded. The air shimmered faintly around the doorway, rippling like oil on water.
Felix stopped just short, breath misting in the sudden drop of temperature.
His eyes dropped to the ground.
Footprints.
Seven distinct sets.
They were fresh. Clear. Panicked.
Some trailed wildly, deep impressions from people running without direction. One set lingered near the edge, smaller than the others. Hesitant. As if whoever left them had second thoughts.
"Kids," he muttered.
His tone was flat but carried something heavier underneath. Not surprise. Not anger. Just the familiar weight of inevitability. "Of course."
He stepped forward and grabbed the handle.
It didn't move.
Instead, an invisible force pushed back. Not violently, but firm and steady. Like walking into a wall of pressure. Something old still lingered here. A ward. Faint, but intact.
Felix narrowed his eyes.
Blue flame sparked across his palm, and the dagger snapped into existence, its obsidian blade pulsing with heat and low sound. He drew it across his skin with practiced ease, slicing just deep enough to sting. Blood welled to the surface.
He pressed the bleeding cut against the doorframe.
With his free hand, he raised a finger and traced a sigil into the air. His blood followed like ink in water, the lines glowing red for a moment before catching fire.
The symbol burned for a second, then cracked apart with a brittle snap.
The pressure disappeared all at once, like a breath being let go.
The door groaned open just a sliver. Enough for him to slip inside.
This was a bad idea. Every instinct told him so.
But Felix had never been the type to walk away from a bad idea.
Especially not when there were kids trapped inside.
He stepped over the threshold.
ELOISE ASYLUM INTERIOR
The silence inside wasn't empty. It was swollen. Like lungs held too long without breath. Every creak of the walls, every moan of the pipes sounded like something breathing just beneath the skin of the building. It didn't feel abandoned. It felt like it was listening.
The east wing groaned under Zee and Tyler's shoes as they climbed the stairs. Each step gave a reluctant whine, as if the building resented being disturbed. The air grew thicker the higher they went. Denser. Like they were walking through syrup, each breath slower than the last.
Zee kept her flashlight low, its beam jittering across peeling paint and broken tiles. Tyler rubbed his arms, his breath drifting in short puffs.
"Jesus. You feel that?" he asked.
Zee nodded without looking back. Her voice came out low and tight. "It's colder here. Like... freezer cold."
Tyler swept his camera across the corridor ahead, the small screen casting a faint glow over the walls. The hallway seemed to stretch longer than it should have, the shadows swallowing the edges of the beam.
"Colder than outside," he muttered, pulling his coat tighter. His voice barely carried. "That's not just cold. That's wrong. Like... the air's dead."
Zee said nothing. She kept her flashlight steady, moving in slow, careful arcs. The beam slid across peeling wallpaper, rusted handrails, a toppled gurney frozen mid-spin like it had been abandoned mid-escape. The light seemed to dull as it moved deeper into the corridor, as if the darkness there wasn't just the absence of light, but something thicker. Heavier. Hungry.
They reached the turn at the end of the hallway. The sound of their boots scraped softly on the cracked linoleum, echoing far too loud in the dead silence.
They turned the corner.
And stopped.
Tyler instinctively lifted his camera, though his hands had started to tremble.
There, at the far end of the hall, stood a figure.
It was white. Not glowing. Not ghostly. Just the pale, dry white of bone under skin. A hospital gown hung loose around its frame, stained with something dark and old. Its arms dangled at its sides. Bare feet rested flat on the floor, toes pointed forward. Perfectly still.
Its head lolled unnaturally to one side, like a broken doll propped up wrong. The neck bent far too much. It looked like it had been dislocated on purpose, tilted not in curiosity, but in unnatural mimicry of it. Like it was trying to understand what humans did with their heads when they listened.
The figure didn't move.
Didn't breathe.
Didn't blink.
It just stood there. Watching. If it even had eyes.
Zee's grip tightened on the flashlight, her knuckles pale. Her voice was a whisper, tight in her throat.
"Do you see-"
The hallway lights burst overhead.
One by one.
A rapid pop-pop-pop as the bulbs exploded in a chain, starting from where they stood and racing down the corridor toward the figure. Glass rained down in tiny, glittering shards, pattering against the floor like broken ice.
Then the hallway was plunged into darkness.
A heartbeat of silence.
Then came the scream.
It wasn't close. But it wasn't far enough.
It echoed through the building, bouncing off walls that hadn't heard a living voice in decades.
It wasn't just fear.
It was pain.
Tyler lowered the camera, slowly.
Zee didn't move.
Neither of them said a word.
The only sound left was the low, electric whine of the flashlight.
And the soft click of something moving in the dark.
CENTRAL CORRIDOR
Milo flinched as the walkie on his hip spat a burst of static loud enough to make his teeth clench. He grabbed it with both hands, thumb pressing the button like it might steady the signal.
"Zee? Zee, are you-" he began, voice tight with urgency.
The response came out garbled. A screech of digital distortion, like something clawing at the inside of the transmission. Then silence. Thick. Suffocating. The kind that didn't just feel empty but expectant.
He lowered the walkie slowly. The hallway stretched ahead of them, dim and quiet, but it didn't feel still.
Behind him, Sadie turned her head.
Her movement was slow, deliberate. Not sharp like someone reacting to fear, but fluid, like she had already known what was coming.
She stared down the corridor behind them, her eyes wide and glassy. Her face was unreadable, frozen somewhere between trance and clarity.
"We're not alone," she said.
Her voice was calm. Almost too calm.
Milo swallowed, the silence pressing in from every direction. Breezy shifted beside them, her hands adjusting the dials on her audio rig with movements that had started to shake.
The screen on her device blinked erratically, the feed skipping like an old VHS tape.
"There's something in here," she muttered. "It's not just static. It's voices. I can almost—wait."
She leaned closer to the monitor, eyes narrowing, fingers adjusting the gain.
The speaker crackled again. Louder this time.
A sound slipped through.
It was faint. Almost soft.
A whisper, too wet to be human. It dragged through the speaker like molasses over gravel.
"Come closer."
The words weren't just spoken. They were pressed into the air, like someone breathing them directly against the side of their faces. Milo's skin crawled.
The hallway light above them buzzed once, then dimmed. Then, at the far end of the corridor, one flickered on.
It wasn't a slow flicker. It was violent. It stuttered into life like it had been shocked awake, pulsing in and out of brightness.
Then they heard it.
A door.
It creaked open, slowly and deliberately, from somewhere ahead.
No footsteps. No hand to open it.
Just the door, shifting with that long, aching groan of rusted hinges that hadn't moved in decades.
The sound didn't echo. It scraped along the walls and through their nerves like nails dragging across the surface of their minds.
Breezy's screen went dark.
Sadie didn't blink.
Milo's voice came out barely above a whisper.
"…What the hell is that?"
WEST WING
Snax smacked the side of his flashlight with the heel of his hand, harder this time. The beam flickered, shuddered, then sank into a dull glow that barely pushed back the dark. It pulsed weakly, like it was struggling to stay alive.
He let out a dry laugh, brittle and forced. "This is way past my horror movie comfort zone, Chloe. We're talking full therapy bill level. Like, skip the coping phase and go straight to group sessions and weighted blankets."
No answer.
He turned to her.
Chloe wasn't listening. She hadn't heard a word.
Her flashlight was fixed downward, her arm locked rigid. Her whole body had gone still, except for her eyes, which were wide and unblinking.
They were staring at the floor.
Snax followed her gaze.
There, between the cracks in the old tile, something was taking shape.
Letters.
Slow and jagged.
They weren't written in chalk. Too dark. Too thick.
And not paint either.
The material had a strange, oily sheen to it. Almost wet. A viscous black that shimmered faintly when the light hit it.
Steam rose off it in wisps, curling into the cold air.
It was like watching the floor bleed language.
Chloe took a half-step back. Not out of fear—at least not fully—but out of some instinctive, bone-deep knowledge that they were witnessing something they weren't supposed to see.
The letters dragged themselves across the tile as if invisible fingers were pulling them into place. Not quickly. Not cleanly. Like whatever was writing them had to force its will into the world, one agonizing stroke at a time.
Snax's breath hitched. "You're seeing that too, right? Please tell me you're seeing that."
Chloe gave the faintest nod, eyes still locked on the message forming beneath their feet.
They were being written as they watched.
And whatever was writing them wasn't finished.
WE SEE YOU
Snax stepped back instinctively, eyes darting.
Something behind them breathed. Wet. Close.
Chloe spun around, flashlight sweeping the wall behind them.
And saw it.
A mirror.
It hadn't been there before.
It reflected a different room. Not this hallway. Not this time. An operating room, half-drowned in shadow. The walls were streaked with rust and blood. Chains hung from the ceiling. Tools dangled and swayed like pendulums.
And something moved.
A shape skittered along the far wall. Just out of frame.
Snax reached out without thinking.
Then he was gone.
Chloe blinked. Looked at the mirror.
No reflection.
She turned around.
He wasn't there.
FELIX - INTERIOR
The front door slammed shut behind him like a tomb lid falling into place.
Felix stopped just past the threshold. His breath came out in a white puff, already frosting in the air.
The temperature had plummeted. It wasn't just cold. It was lifeless.
The building shifted around him. He could feel it. The pressure. The pull.
Whatever had sealed the asylum hadn't just been protecting it. It had been containing something else.
He walked forward. Slowly. shoes tapping against cracked tile. Every step echoed wrong, bouncing back like there was more than one version of him walking.
The smell hit next.
A mix of bleach and rust. Copper and old flowers. Sweet and sour at the same time. Like a funeral soaked in formaldehyde.
He passed an overturned gurney and a rusted wheelchair. One of its wheels spun slowly, even though there was no wind.
The walls bore deep gouges. Not scratches. Claw marks.
He paused in front of one. Four slashes, parallel. Carved deep into concrete.
Then he saw it.
A smear of blood, fresh and sticky, dragged across the wall in a jagged arc.
A single word stood out in smudged red:
RUN
His jacket pulsed at the chest.
Felix reached inside himself and summoned his blade. Blue fire licked across his fingers illuminating the dark. The dagger formed in a sharp blink, black as obsidian, hot to the touch.
"I hate when they write creepy shit like that," he muttered.
And then he heard it.
Not footsteps.
Not whispers.
Laughter.
Soft. Giddy. A child's laugh.
But it sounded wrong. Distorted. Like something trying to pretend it remembered what laughter sounded like.
It echoed down the corridor. Far away. Then closer. Then everywhere.
Felix turned his head, slow and deliberate, scanning the dark.
His grip on the blade tightened.
"Guess I'm going the right way."
"I think."