I was running.
The corridor stretched before me, its walls breathing in the dim, pulsing light. My bare feet slapped against the damp concrete, each step echoing too loud in the suffocating space. The air smelled of rust and something sweetly rotten—like overripe fruit left to ferment in the sun, or the butcher's backroom near the factory.
Was I chasing the shadow flickering just ahead? Or was something chasing me?
A voice cut through the dark, familiar and desperate: "Run! You're the only one who can—"
The ceiling caved in with a groan. Before the blackness swallowed me whole, I saw them—amber eyes gleaming from the wreckage. Not human. Not animal. Something else. Something hungry and alone.
---
I woke with a gasp, my throat raw as if I'd been screaming.
The hospital room swam into focus, sterile and suffocating. The fluorescent lights buzzed like a swarm of insects, their flickering casting jagged shadows across the walls. My arms ached, mottled with crescent-shaped cuts—self-inflicted, judging by the dirt and blood caked under my nails. An IV line snaked into my forearm, the cold fluid making my veins burn.
How did I get here?
The last thing I remembered was the factory—the hawk, the file, the darkness swallowing me whole. Now, my body ached like I'd been dragged through gravel, and my throat burned as if I'd been screaming for hours.
Beneath the antiseptic sting of the hospital, the factory's scent clung to me oil, damp earth, and that same sickly-sweet decay from my dream.
A soft rustling drew my attention to the corner of the room. A shadow shifted too tall, too still before melting into the darkness between one blink and the next.
Then I noticed her.
My mother slumped in a chair beside me, her face drawn with exhaustion. Asleep, she looked younger. Vulnerable. The kind of woman who might've laughed easily once, before life carved lines into her skin.
Her sleeve had ridden up. A twisted symbol, half-hidden, marked her wrist, the same one from the factory files.
"Why was she here? How long had I been out?"
---
The door creaked open without a knock.
A man in a black suit stepped inside—too polished for a hospital, too calm for a visitor. Blond hair, swept back like he'd stepped out of a vintage film. Sharp features, carved from marble. A smile that didn't touch his ice-blue eyes.
His cufflink caught the light the same twisted symbol.
"You're awake," he said, as if we'd met before.
I stayed silent. My tongue felt heavy, my instincts screaming.
He leaned over the bed, adjusting my blanket with eerie precision. His fingers lingered a second too long, the tips cold as gravestones. "Someone found you outside the factory," he murmured. "Carried you here myself. Called your mother."
I tried to sit up, but my limbs felt heavy, sluggish.
"Who… brought me here?"
The man smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. "A passerby. They didn't leave a name."
Something about the way he said it made my skin prickle. Every word rang hollow. A rehearsed script.
I swallowed, my throat dry as bone. "Why were you there?"
His smile widened. "Let's just say I have a vested interest in lost things."
Before I could respond, his gaze flicked to the corner where the shadow had been. A smirk tugged at his lips.
"Stay safe," he added, pausing at the door. "You've got more journey ahead."
His gaze flicked to the corner again. A smirk. Then he was gone.
The silence he left behind was deafening.
---
My mother stirred, her eyes flying open. When she saw me conscious, she choked back a sob, clutching my hand.
"Are you okay?"
The concern in her voice was real. But her fingers trembled.
Her thumb rubbed at the inked symbol on her wrist, like she could scrub it away. I've never seen that mark before. So why is it suddenly visible now?
I asked the only question that mattered:
"What happened to me? Why am I here?"
She replied with a soft, rehearsed voice. "You collapsed. It was exhaustion."
A lie. I could see it in the way her eyes darted to the door, the way her grip tightened like she was afraid I'd vanish.
I remember collapsing before the factory. But she said it was exhaustion.
I didn't push. Didn't confront her. Instead, I asked one more thing.
"Who was that man?"
She stiffened. "What man?"
"The one who just left. The one who brought me here."
Her face drained of color. "No one came in. I was awake the whole time."
A chill crawled down my spine.
I just talked with him. She was sleeping. But she's saying she was awake the whole time.
My heart trembled. Racing. Hollow.
---
My mother left soon after, her boss calling her away to work. She paused at the door, her back to me. "Don't ask about the factory again." Not a warning—a plea.
The moment the door clicked shut, the room felt heavier, the air thick with something unsaid.
I was alone.
No answers. No explanations. Just the hum of the hospital and the weight of the unknown pressing down on my chest.
I stared out the window. The sky was a bruised purple, clouds hanging low and oppressive. Silent. Waiting.
Then movement.
The hawk.
It soared into view, wings slicing through the gloom before perching on the ledge outside my window. Its golden eyes locked onto mine, unblinking.
My breath hitched. I wasn't afraid. It was pulling me. Closer. Deeper.
I couldn't look away. Those eyes—amber, like the ones in the wreckage—held me captive.
And for a heartbeat, I swore it smiled.
---
The hawk didn't move.
It watched me.
Golden eyes pinned me through the glass, unblinking, unbreathing. The longer I stared, the more the world outside the window unraveled—clouds stretched like skin over bone, trees bent backward as if snapped by invisible hands. My reflection shuddered in the glass, my face twisting for a heartbeat into something sharp-toothed and grinning.
Then—
Knock.
Not at the door.
At the window.
The hawk's beak struck the glass. Once. Twice.
Tap. Tap.
Like a clock counting down.
My breath fogged the pane as I leaned closer. The room's temperature plummeted, my exhale hanging in the air like a ghost.
The third knock didn't come from the hawk.
It came from inside the wall,a wet, meaty thud, knuckles punching plaster from the other side. Right where the shadow had slithered away.
I jerked back, my IV line tearing at my skin. The heart monitor screamed, its frantic beeps syncing with my pulse.
The hawk's wings snapped open, blotting out the sky.
The wall swelled.
And then—
A voice. Not the hawk's. Not the others.
Mine.
It slithered up from my own throat, but the words weren't mine:
"You're almost out of time."
The door exploded inward. A nurse lunged for the monitor, her face blanching. "Your vitals—" Her words died as her gaze locked onto the window.
Empty.
No hawk. No warped glass.
Just my own wide-eyed reflection—and the handprint smeared beneath it, fingers too long, nails too sharp, pressed against the inside of the pane.
---
The hawk was gone.
Only the storm remained, its wind clawing at the window like something begging to be let in. The nurse had left in a hurry after my vitals stabilized, but the air still prickled with the weight of something unnatural.
Then I felt it.
A whisper of movement beneath the bed.
Not the jagged, grasping shadows from before—this was different.
Softer.
Familiar.
I should've been afraid. But as the darkness coiled around my wrist, all I felt was warmth. A quiet joy, like a lost piece of myself sliding back into place. The hollow ache in my chest eased as slender, shadowed fingers laced through mine.
I know you.
Not with my mind, but with whatever shattered thing passed for my soul these days. This shadow wasn't like the others. It didn't leer or lurk—it held me. Like it had been waiting.
Like I'd been the one who'd left it behind.
The comfort was a lie, though. I could feel it. This thing beneath my bed was hollow too.
Just like me.
Just like the man with the ice-blue eyes. Just like my mother's trembling hands and that twisted mark on her wrist. Just like the hawk's golden stare, pulling me toward something I couldn't name.
The shadow squeezed my hand.
And then
Cold wetness seeped into my palm. I yanked my hand back.Blood streaked my fingers, fresh and glistening.
But it wasn't mine.
Scrawled across my skin in jagged, desperate strokes, a single word
"LYRIA."
The shadow's grip tightened—then dissolved into smoke. But the letters remained, burning like brand marks.
I pressed my bloody palm to the hospital sheets. When I lifted it, the word had changed.
"LYRIA" now read "LIAR."
The heart monitor flatlined.
And from the hallway, a voice—sweet, girlish, and long buried whispered
" They're lying to you about me."
The heart monitor screamed back to life just in time to catch the second voice, this time from under the bed
"But I never lied to you."