Evan didn't remember how he escaped the collapsing laboratory.
He only remembered running, the world flashing in violent red strobes as alarms howled through the steel corridors. His legs carried him with a frantic instinct he didn't fully control, as if someone else inside his body was pushing him forward—shoving him into the darkness ahead because the thing behind him was worse.
Much worse.
The echo of the last explosion still vibrated in his teeth. His lungs felt shredded, scraped from the inside. Every breath tasted like burnt plastic and blood.
And behind him…
The sound.
The sound that ruined every thought he tried to form.
Not footsteps.
Not voices.
Not the crackle of fire.
It was dragging.
A deep, bone-grinding scrape, like a massive metal chain being pulled across steel tiles—slow, uneven, too heavy to be carried by anything human. The sound crawled up his spine in icy needles. Even when he couldn't hear it, he felt it imprinted inside his skull.
Something was following him.
Something that didn't need to rush.
Not when it already knew exactly where he was.
Evan staggered into an intersection and pressed himself against the cold wall. Sweat dripped into his eyes. His body shook so violently his nails scraped the metal panel.
Quiet. Quiet. Breathe.
For a moment, he forced himself to peek around the corner.
The hallway behind him was empty.
But the air…
The air was trembling.
He swallowed, but it did nothing to steady him. He pushed off the wall and moved again, passing flickering lights that smeared shadows across the floor like ink stains.
Up ahead, a large metal sign hung crooked:
SECTOR D — BIOSECURITY WING
LEVEL 0: HUMAN RESEARCH
LEVEL -1: RESTRICTED — AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED
Evan didn't know where he was. He didn't know why he woke up here. He didn't know why he felt like someone had already ripped a piece of his life away.
But his body—
his instincts—
seemed to know this place far too well.
He stumbled into a security chamber. Its glass walls were shattered, and the smell of copper was so strong he gagged. Emergency lamps buzzed overhead like dying insects.
And then he saw it.
A dead scientist slumped against the console.
The man's head hung at a painful angle, throat bruised violet by finger-shaped marks. His lab coat was stained dark red all down the front. The wound looked recent—fresh enough that blood glistened under the blinking light.
But Evan did not freeze because of the wound.
He froze because of the face.
The dead man was smiling.
A stretched, unnatural grin carved much too wide, as if grown by force instead of emotion. His lips were pulled back so far they looked torn.
Evan pressed a hand over his mouth to stop the scream threatening to rip out.
"No… no… please—please tell me you didn't—"
Then the dead man's smile twitched.
Evan staggered backward, slamming into a glass wall. His breath stuttered in sharp gasps. The man didn't move again, but the smile lingered like something alive on a corpse.
He forced himself to look away.
Just for a second.
The security monitor flickered awake.
He hadn't touched it.
Lines of code rolled across the broken screen before stopping on two words:
ACCESS GRANTED
WELCOME BACK, DR. EVAN MARSH
His stomach fell through the floor.
"No," he whispered. "No, that's not right. I don't work here. I've never— I don't even know—"
A crackle filled the room as the speakers activated.
Then a voice spoke.
His voice.
"You shouldn't have come back."
Evan spun, pressing both hands to his ears, but the voice wasn't coming from outside.
It was in his head.
"You left me here."
Soft. Cold. Familiar in a way that made him nauseous.
"You shouldn't have left."
"Stop!" Evan screamed. "Who are you?! What do you want?!"
A low chuckle—
his exact laugh, its rhythm and breath—
rolled through his skull.
"Evan… you already know."
He stumbled backward, nearly tripping over the corpse. The dragging sound began again from far down the hall—slow, confident, closing in.
"No. No, not again—"
He tore through the security chamber and into another corridor. He didn't dare look back even when something slammed against the wall he'd just passed, shaking dust loose in a thin gray cloud.
He ran.
Past containment tubes, some intact, some shattered. Past machines he didn't recognize. Past windows showing rooms filled with shadows too tall to be human.
Every reflective surface he passed showed his face delayed by a second.
His reflection watched him.
Tracked him.
Smiled.
He forced himself to keep running.
But when he rounded another corner—the hallway wasn't empty.
A woman stood in the center of it.
Barefoot.
Drenched hospital gown clinging to her skin.
Her hair hung wet across her shoulders as if she'd crawled out of a lake.
Her skin was ghostly pale.
But it was her eyes that stopped his heart.
Completely black.
No whites.
No irises.
Just endless dark.
"Hello, Evan," she said softly.
His throat closed. His mind blanked with terror.
"How— how do you know my name?"
She smiled, and her lips trembled as if being dragged upward by invisible threads.
"You told me."
"I— I don't know you."
"Yes, you do." She took one slow step forward. "You meet me every night."
His blood froze.
"What… what does that mean…?"
"You promised you wouldn't leave me," she whispered. "But you always do."
"I didn't— I would never—"
Another step.
The floor beneath her shimmered, warping like heat mirage waves.
Her voice softened into a fragile, breaking sound.
"Why are you running from me again, Evan?"
He backed away, shaking his head violently.
"Stay back. Please. I don't know you. I swear I don't—"
She blinked.
And when her eyes opened…
They weren't black anymore.
They were his.
His exact eyes.
Down to the small fleck of gold near the pupil.
"No—" he whispered.
Her voice dropped an octave, shifting… cracking… until she spoke with his voice:
"Come back."
Evan broke.
He turned and sprinted, adrenaline exploding through his nerves. Every muscle screamed. His ribs ached. He didn't care.
Behind him—
CRASH!
The wall exploded outward as something slammed into it from the other side. Fragments of steel and concrete rained down like shrapnel.
He ran until his legs felt like rubber, until his lungs felt like knives. Doors blurred past. Signs flashed unreadable. His vision darkened at the edges.
Then—
A half-open door appeared ahead, sparking violently. He dove through it and slammed it shut behind him, collapsing onto cold metal.
Everything went dark.
Completely dark.
His heartbeat thundered in the suffocating silence. He forced himself upright and squinted, letting his eyes adjust.
A dim shape loomed in front of him.
A mirror.
Another one.
Tall. Cracked at the top. Fingerprints smudged around the edges.
Evan stared at his reflection—panting, pale, terrified, eyes wide with horror.
Slowly…
Too slowly…
His reflection's mouth curved upward.
Evan didn't move.
The reflection smiled wider.
Then wider.
Until it split impossibly far across its face.
A hand—his hand—lifted and pressed against the glass from the other side.
Evan's body refused to move.
Refused to scream.
Refused to breathe.
His reflection leaned closer.
Their faces inches apart.
And in a whisper so soft it felt breathed directly into his bones, it said:
"Found you."