Since my personal investigation at the bar didn't go as fruitful as I had hoped—unless you count embarrassment from a British man as a win—I decided to go back to the museum. Maybe I could get at least one clue about what really happened. Because clearly, me sitting at home overthinking wasn't doing me any favors except raising my blood pressure.
But this time, I wasn't coming back as Marcella, curator of artifacts. I came back as a visitor.
That alone felt ridiculous. Me. Sneaking into a place I'd practically lived in for years. But life comes at you fast, and apparently now I was playing undercover detective in my own workplace like some low-budget Nancy Drew.
I stood in front of my mirror earlier that morning, deciding to try something different, something that might make me feel less like the exhausted, jobless woman under investigation. A white pant suit with a matching jacket and a purple blouse underneath. Black heels. Purple lipstick to match. My hair—normally in braids—was straightened for once. The woman staring back at me looked… sophisticated. Maybe even rich. Definitely not like the museum girl who'd cried over broken glass a few nights ago.
I'd stared at myself for a while, unsure whether I looked powerful or like I was about to sell overpriced real estate. But at least I looked like someone else. Someone who wouldn't be stopped at the entrance and asked if she had something to confess.
When I arrived, the guards barely glanced at me. Perfect. The new version of me worked. I slipped in easily, though most of the main crime scene was sealed off with bright yellow tape. That area was cut off, guarded, and crawling with police markers. Still, the smell of the place—clean floors, faint dust, the hum of lights—felt achingly familiar.
It was strange walking in as a stranger. My heels clicked differently. My steps didn't carry the usual confidence of someone who knew where every artifact had been stored since 2018. I felt like I was visiting the ghost of my old life. The halls felt colder. Or maybe that was just me.
Trying not to look suspicious, I drifted toward another exhibit, one of the quieter ones tucked deeper into the museum. I kept my movements casual, even though my heart thumped loudly enough that I was sure someone could hear it. Every time a guard shifted or someone looked in my direction, my body tensed like I'd been caught stealing government secrets.
That's when I saw it.
A stone tablet.
At first, I walked right past it, thinking it was just another piece I must've overlooked during a busy shift sometime last year. But something tugged at my attention—something in the shape, the way it sat under its lights, the way the carvings pulled at my eyes like a magnet.
I didn't remember this one being here. It must've belonged to one of my colleagues' collections, maybe a piece they'd recently added while I'd been busy with the new necklace.
Curiosity got the better of me. I stepped closer, heels clicking softly against the polished floor. The carvings were faint but detailed, running across the surface like ancient veins. The kind of detail that made your brain slow down and try to understand what you were looking at.
A symbol sat in the center of the stone. I squinted at it.
"Wait…" I muttered under my breath. "That looks like the one on my inner forearm."
It did. Almost perfectly.
The shape was identical—curved lines intersecting in a pattern that had always seemed random to me, like a birthmark that just refused to fade. I used to joke that it looked like a badly drawn tattoo someone doodled on me as a baby. But here it was, carved into a centuries-old tablet, displayed under museum glass.
My mouth went dry.
The rush of air-conditioning suddenly felt too cold. My fingers tingled, and I had to press my hand to my chest to steady my breathing. I leaned a little closer to the glass—not too much, didn't want to trigger any alarms—and stared at the symbol like it might jump out at me.
I rubbed the inside of my forearm absentmindedly through the fabric of my suit. It was just a birthmark. Just a weird, annoying mark I'd always had. This… this didn't make sense. And the more I stared, the more my stomach twisted.
The accompanying plaque had a few lines of text written in a language I didn't recognize. Not Latin, not Greek, not anything I'd seen in my years of curating. The translation line was blank, just a note from the research team: Language undetermined. Possibly pre-Sumerian.
A chill crept down my spine.
This was beyond creepy.
The museum wasn't exactly known for paranormal activity. At worst, we dealt with tourists breaking things or kids touching artifacts with sticky hands. Not… whatever this was.
Before I could even take a step back, a sudden gust of wind rushed through the exhibit hall. The air whooshed past me, cold and sharp, though no doors had opened. The papers on a nearby podium fluttered aggressively, like someone had walked by too fast. The lights above started flickering, stuttering like something out of a bad horror movie.
"What the hell—" I whispered, instinctively gripping my arms.
I looked around quickly, expecting to see someone playing a prank. A vent malfunction. Something normal. Something explainable. But the air didn't feel like air-conditioner cold. It felt unnatural. Heavy. Charged.
The air changed. Heavy. Dense. Like the moment before a storm.
And then—clear as day—a voice whispered.
"You are not what you think you are."
The words slithered into my head, soft and cold. My whole body jolted. I spun around, heart pounding. No one was there.
Just a family on the far end of the hall, taking pictures. A security guard tapping something on his phone. A couple whispering near a display of bronze masks.
No one close enough to whisper in my ear.
I blinked hard, trying to convince myself I'd imagined it, but the whisper came again—fainter this time, echoing inside my skull like a broken record.
You are not what you think you are.
I stumbled back, chest tight. My hands felt sweaty. My pulse hammered in my ears. The light flicked once more before steadying, the wind gone as quickly as it came.
Everything looked normal again.
But I wasn't.
My brain scrambled for logic. Stress. Exhaustion. Lack of sleep. Maybe I was hallucinating from too much museum drama. Maybe that British man's ego had knocked something loose inside my skull. Because the alternative—voices from ancient stones—was not something I was emotionally prepared to add to my week.
I couldn't breathe right, couldn't think straight. I grabbed my purse and ran. My heels clacked against the marble floor as I headed for the exit, ignoring the confused looks of a few visitors.
Whatever that was—whatever had just happened—I wanted no part of it.
My so-called investigation was over.
And yet, even as I pushed open the glass doors and stepped into the sunlight, I couldn't shake the feeling that something had followed me out.
The air outside was warm, the sky painfully bright, cars rushing by as if nothing in the world was wrong. But I felt it—something lingering behind me, brushing the back of my neck like a shadow that didn't belong to me. And for the first time since this entire ordeal started, a tiny thought crept into my mind, unwelcome and persistent:
What if I wasn't imagining it?
What if something really had woken up?