The screaming had stopped.
There was no thunder. No crash. No fire. Just silence.
And then, breath.
Tom gasped awake on a cold, wet floor — the smell of soil and ash in his nostrils. His hands were scraped, the left one bleeding. For a long moment, he didn't move. The last thing he remembered was clutching Lucas's hand as the plane dropped from the sky.
"Lucas?" he whispered.
There was a groan.
Just a few feet away, his son lay curled on the stone tiles, his head bleeding from a long gash across the temple. But he was breathing.
Tom exhaled. "Thank God."
He staggered to his feet, every muscle aching, every joint heavy. Around them was no wreckage. No trees. No water. Nothing that should have been after a plane crash.
They were in a vast, windowless room with walls made of black stone. Carvings marked the walls — figures writhing in torment, faces without eyes, children floating above thrones made of teeth.
A single door stood at the far end of the room.
And above them… stars.
Not real ones — but constellations carved into the ceiling, flickering faintly like candlelight reflected through a dying man's eye.
Tom felt sick.
"Lucas," he said again, shaking the boy gently. "Come on, wake up."
Lucas stirred. "Dad… where…?"
"I don't know. Just breathe. You're okay."
Lucas sat up slowly, blinking at the strange lights above. "Is this a hospital?"
Tom's silence was enough.
A rustle came from the far corner.
More survivors.
A woman — Evelyn — sat on the ground, holding her daughter Rhea close to her chest. Her face was pale and stained with dirt, but her grip on the girl was strong. Beside them, a boy — older than Rhea, leaner, with sharp features — helped a groaning man sit up.
The man coughed once, then swore under his breath.
It was George.
Tom's eyes narrowed.
"Of course it's you," he muttered.
George looked up. "Don't start."
"I'm not the one who almost got us all killed."
"You're not the one who made the deal either."
"Boys, not now!" Evelyn snapped, her voice cracking like thin ice. "The kids—"
Everyone fell silent.
Even the stone seemed to listen.
There were seven of them now:
Tom, his teenage son Lucas, and Lucas's younger sister Lily.
George, his wife Evelyn, and their two children — Rhea and Mark.
Everyone looked too clean to have survived a plane crash.
That was the most disturbing part.
Not a scratch on the children. Evelyn's hair still in place. No blood on George. Even Lily, the smallest of them, still clutched her pink travel bag, perfectly zipped.
Tom whispered, "This isn't real."
Then the candles lit themselves.
Dozens of them — lining the edges of the black stone walls, casting flickering shadows across the carvings.
The door at the far end groaned open.
From the darkness stepped a man. Or what looked like a man.
He wore a high-collared coat of deep violet stitched with symbols that shimmered. His boots were pale, cracked leather. His hair was too dark to reflect light, and his face… flickered. Like he was made of static. The only clear part of him were his eyes.
Eyes like polished bone.
"I welcome you," he said, his voice both warm and broken, "to the House."
Tom stepped forward, shielding Lucas.
"Who the hell are you?"
"I am the Master of this house," he said, bowing slightly. "Its steward. Its spine."
George narrowed his eyes. "Where are we?"
"A sanctuary," the House Master said. "And a prison."
Evelyn stood, hands trembling. "We were on a plane. It went down."
"Yes," the House Master said. "You were chosen mid-fall. Just before the moment of impact. The House accepted you."
"Accepted?" Tom asked. "We didn't choose this."
"Few do."
The House Master stepped closer, and the stone beneath his feet did not echo. He moved like he weighed nothing.
"This place exists on memory," he said. "And pain. And longing. It is older than you can understand. Built by hands that died in grief, kept alive by souls who cannot forget."
Lucas stepped forward. "Why us?"
The Master looked at him curiously.
"Because you carry weight," he said. "Regrets. Secrets. Unfinished threads."
He turned to the entire group.
"You will be given nine trials. Each different. Each reflecting something you would rather not face."
George scoffed. "And what if we refuse?"
The Master smiled.
"Then the House will feed on you slowly, until you are like the rest. Screaming faces in the walls."
He gestured behind him.
And now they saw — along the stone edges of the room, faces began to press from the surface. Some whispered. Some wept. Others just stared.
"Your only path home is through the game," the Master said.
Tom clenched his fists. "What kind of game?"
"One that asks only for honesty. Suffering. Sacrifice."
He spread his arms. "The first door awaits."
The room shifted.
The far wall cracked and peeled like ancient skin, revealing a circle of nine doors. Each marked with a Roman numeral and a strange symbol:
I — A bleeding tree
II — A shattered mirror
III — A child with no mouth
IV — A banquet table of skulls
V — A drowning well
VI — A crying mask
VII — A thorned crown
VIII — A mother holding a corpse
IX — A blood-stained hourglass
Lucas stepped closer to the doors. "What happens in each one?"
The Master turned his head slightly.
"Some of you will leave each door. Some will not."
Evelyn clutched Rhea and Mark to her sides.
Lily slipped her hand into Tom's.
The Master's voice echoed.
"Each round takes what you least expect. Sometimes memory. Sometimes blood. Sometimes something more… delicate."
George spoke through clenched teeth. "And if we get through all nine?"
The Master's smile widened.
"Then you may go home. Whole or broken — depending on what you are willing to give."
He began to fade — not walk, not move — just unravel into mist and shadow.
Before he vanished completely, he said:
"Choose wisely. The House always remembers."
The silence after he left felt louder than his presence.
Tom looked at George. George looked at Tom.
Whatever fractured history they shared — it would have to wait.
Evelyn wiped her face and stood tall. "We go through together."
"No," George said. "We vote."
"We don't have time for—" Tom began.
"We vote," George repeated.
They looked at the children.
Lucas pointed to Door I.
Rhea nodded.
So did Lily.
One by one, they walked toward the bleeding tree.
The door opened without touch.
And the House exhaled.