By Wednesday, I couldn't take three steps without someone calling my name in the hallway.
A freshman asked for a selfie. Some girl from the school paper shoved a notebook in my face, asking how it felt to "bring down a cult." One of the guidance counselors even handed me a pamphlet about "navigating sudden attention" like this was some kind of red carpet.
I smiled. I nodded. I walked.
Inside, I felt like I was splintering.
They kept calling me brave. Said I was a hero. That I "saved the town."
But no one mentioned the fact that Sebastian was still gone.
And no one cared—not really.
Zaire was with me all day. He stayed close, quiet, like a ghost that wouldn't leave but didn't know what to say anymore. I could feel the anger radiating off him. I knew I'd pissed him off. I also knew I didn't have the energy to care.
After school, I found him waiting by my locker like always.
"I'm going to meet Andy," I said. "You should come."
He didn't answer right away. Just stared past me like he was looking at someone he didn't recognize.
"Mia..."
"She might know something," I pressed. "About the phone. About Sebastian."
He shook his head. "You're still chasing that?"
"Yes."
"I told you—"
"I don't care what you told me." My voice cracked, but I didn't let it fall apart. "He's out there, Zaire. I'm not just gonna sit around and wait for them to drag his body out of a river."
He flinched, like I'd slapped him. "You don't get it. You keep digging, you're gonna end up like—"
"Like my mom?" I cut in.
He didn't say anything.
I looked at him and said, flat, "I don't know who you are anymore."
His jaw clenched. "Yeah? I don't know who you are either."
I walked away before I could say something worse.
Andy was waiting near the old library courtyard. She looked smaller somehow—like the flight home from whatever campaign she was working on had sucked the light out of her. When she saw me, she opened her arms.
"Come here, you psycho."
I hugged her like I hadn't seen her in years.
"Can't believe you're back," I said.
"Can't believe you blew up a cult," she shot back. "Jesus, Mia."
I didn't laugh.
We sat on the stone wall beneath the trees, and I told her everything—Sebastian's message, the jail visit, the phone, the terrifying connection between every person I blocked and the way they just... vanished.
Andy stared at me like I was unraveling in front of her. Maybe I was.
"That's... that's insane," she said finally. "You think the phone is cursed?"
"I don't know what it is. But it's not just a phone."
I held it up between us like it might bite.
"Every time I block someone, they disappear. Not figuratively. Literally."
She went pale. "Wherever Sebastian is—he's gone because someone else blocked him?"
I nodded once. "That's what I think."
She ran a hand through her hair. "Jesus. Okay. Okay. I got the phone from a guy in my motivational class."
"What guy?"
"I don't know. Just this dorky dude. Hoodie, glasses, barely spoke to anyone. One day after class he said he was selling his old phone. Looked fine. Said he needed cash. I thought you needed a phone, so... I bought it."
"You didn't get his name?"
"No. Just handed him eighty bucks and left."
I stared at the phone again. It looked so normal. That's the part that made me sick.
"We need to find him," I said.
Andy looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "And do what?"
"We ask him why every time I block someone, they disappear."
Meanwhile...
Sebastian came to with a gasp—air dry and sour in his throat, head pounding like a drum inside a tin can.
Everything was wrong.
His eyes flicked open, unfocused at first. The light overhead buzzed low, flickering like it could go out any second. He tried to move, but couldn't—his wrists were shackled to the arms of a rusted metal chair, legs bound at the ankles with zip ties, raw and biting into his skin. The smell hit him next.
Bleach. Blood. Rot.
The room around him looked like it had once been a house—maybe a cellar or a back room—but now it was gutted. Cold tile lined the floor, most of it cracked. A stretcher sat to his left, rusted and sagging in the middle. Old blood crusted its edges. Some of it was darker, aged—other parts looked wet. Fresh.
The walls were stained. Brown smears. Splashes that bloomed like awful flowers across the white paint. Someone had tried to scrub parts clean but gave up halfway. A drain sat at the center of the floor, crusted with filth.
It looked like a morgue no one was supposed to find.
His heart hammered. Panic surged hot through his chest. "Hello?" he called. His voice came out hoarse. "HELLO?"
Nothing. Just silence.
And then—click. A door opening somewhere behind a wall. Followed by a drag. The unmistakable sound of metal curtain rings scraping across a ceiling rail.
Someone was coming.
"Hey!" Sebastian shouted. "HEY! I'm in here! I'm—!"
The curtain to his right was yanked open with a sharp swish.
A man stepped into view.
He wore all black. Hoodie. Jeans. Surgical gloves that gleamed under the lights. His face was too clean. Too calm. His grin made Sebastian's stomach turn—it was wide, hungry, like he'd been waiting for this moment all day.
In one gloved hand, he held a scalpel.
"Fuck you," Sebastian spat. "Let me go. You don't have to do this."
The man tilted his head, eyes glittering. "Oh, Sebastian. We've already done so much."
Sebastian yanked at his restraints, skin burning. "You're not gonna get away with this. Even if you kill me—someone will find out. They'll come for you."
The man chuckled. "You really think this is about punishment? About fear? No, no... You're not a warning, Sebastian. You're just a piece of the puzzle."
He stepped closer.
"Get the fuck away from me," Sebastian growled. "I swear to God—"
The scalpel's tip met the skin of his forearm. The man didn't speak as he dragged it across the flesh with surgical precision. The first cut was shallow, then deeper. A second slash across the forehead, just above the brow, blood rushing into his eye, stinging.
Sebastian screamed.
"STOP! You sick bastard, STOP!"
The man didn't flinch. He reached into his pocket and pulled out something small—a glass vial.
Salt.
He unscrewed the cap with care, almost reverence.
"Please," Sebastian begged now. "Don't."
The man said nothing. He tilted the vial. White crystals spilled into the open wounds.
Sebastian's body convulsed. The pain was electric—raw and wrong and blinding. He screamed until his voice cracked, back arching against the restraints.
The man watched, fascinated.
"Pain," he murmured, almost lovingly. "You know what's funny? Most people run from it. Hide behind their screens and pills and prayers. But pain—it's honest. It strips everything away. Titles. Lies. Secrets."
He crouched so they were eye to eye.
"You're going to tell me what you feel. About her."
Sebastian panted, blood dripping from his face, hands clenched.
The man leaned in, lips brushing his ear.
"And if you don't," he whispered, voice like a blade, "I'll peel your soul from your bones, one inch at a time."
He stood back, admiring his work like a painter evaluating a canvas.
"I never wanted her to suffer, you know. But now, I want her scared, Sebastian. I want her to feel every single thing I do to you."
He smiled again—cold, awful.
"Let's make her scream next, if she doesn't stop digging obviously."