I. The Pursuit by the Beast
The phone was inert, a dead slate in Arden's hand, the call abruptly terminated. The silence that followed was punctured by a strange, rising trio of musical notes—not the sound of telephonic failure, but something chillingly alien.
"Attempt the connection again," Kael urged.
She obeyed. Redial. But the device yielded no ring, only an immediate silence, followed once more by those three unsettling, ascending tones. She terminated the call. "We must immediately reach her office."
"The hour is past midnight," Kael countered.
"I am aware." Arden was already in motion, sprinting back toward the closed T station. "A grave peril has befallen her. Dr. Cross does not succumb to terror; not after thirty-three years of survival, not after conquering the Game itself. Something profound has transpired."
They ran through the cold, relentless rain, through empty streets. Boston at this hour possessed a profound, unnatural stillness. The T station was barred and gated, the last train long departed.
"A hired carriage," Kael proposed, reaching for his phone. "I shall summon—"
"There is no time for delay." Arden pointed. "We run."
Dr. Cross's office, according to the card, lay within the Longwood Medical Area. A distance of three miles—a forty-minute walk, or twenty minutes of agonizing, flat-out effort.
They ran. Arden's lungs were aflame after five blocks; her legs screamed in rebellion after ten. But the possibility of stopping remained unthinkable.
Behind them, a low, persistent sound began to surface: the heavy rumble of a bus engine.
She glanced backward. Nothing met her eyes—only empty street, rain, and impenetrable darkness. Yet the sound intensified, steadily closing the distance.
"Kael."
"I perceive it."
They accelerated, cutting through a narrow alley, emerging onto the broader, better-lit thoroughfare of Huntington Avenue. The street lay abandoned; no traffic, no witnesses. Only the two of them. And the bus.
It materialized at the avenue's furthest extreme, its headlights slicing the rain-soaked air. It was jet Black. Sleek. Wrong. Its destination sign bore the inescapable mark: 000.
"It hunts us," Arden gasped, the realization suffocating.
"Buses are incapable of tracking specific targets."
"That is not a mere bus. That is a predator."
It gained upon them, not with speed, but with an appalling inevitability, as if it comprehended their trajectory, herding them toward a predetermined path.
"There." Kael indicated a narrow, residential side street. "We turn there."
They veered off, sprinting down the confined side street, a path too narrow for the massive vehicle to follow. Yet the sound of the engine did not diminish; it merely shifted, circling back. They emerged onto another avenue, and the bus was already there, half a block distant, waiting in silent ambush.
"It anticipates our movements," Arden stated.
"How? It is a vehicle. It lacks mind, it lacks strategic thought."
"It is not the vehicle. It is the intelligence that commands it." She pulled him away. "The Conductor. The Entity itself. They do not wish us to reach Dr. Cross."
"What is the motive?"
"She discovered the vulnerability. Something they deemed too perilous for us to possess."
They ran again, altering their course toward Back Bay, away from Longwood. The bus did not pursue; in one moment it was visible, and in the next, it had simply vanished.
Arden halted, chest heaving. "Have we evaded it?"
"No," Kael said, his voice taut with recognition. "It permitted our escape. It has secured its objective: it successfully prevented us from reaching Dr. Cross."
"Then we must return now—"
Her phone vibrated. A text message. Unknown number.
She opened the message. It contained a photo: Dr. Cross's office door, open, the lights glaring upon the floor. And upon that floor lay Dr. Cross. Motionless. A slick, dark pool of blood spread beneath her.
Beneath the image, a message was brutally displayed:
STOP SEARCHING. STOP INTERFERING. ACCEPT THE GAME. OR BECOME PART OF IT.
Arden's hands trembled violently. "No. No, this cannot be."
Kael studied the photograph, his face hardening into granite. "We must immediately contact the police."
"And what narrative shall we offer?" Arden's voice cracked. "That a supernatural Entity murdered a woman for her research? They will suspect us. They will locate our prints, our recent connection to her at the library. The support group is aware of our inquiry."
"What course remains for us?"
"We proceed there. Now. Before any other soul discovers her. We must secure her research. We must comprehend the discovery she made. We must complete her final work."
"That course is madness."
"Every aspect of this existence is madness." She began running once more, turning back toward Longwood. "But she sacrificed her life for a truth. The least we can offer is to utilize that truth."
II. The Theft of the Secret
They reached the Medical Area—a landscape of cold, towering buildings. Dr. Cross's office was housed within an older, five-story brick structure, mostly dark. The front door was sealed. Kael located the fire escape. "Fourth floor. There."
They began the ascent. Metal stairs, wet and treacherous, their hands slipping, their boots echoing with desperate clangs. Up, up, until the fourth-floor window. It yielded; they slid it open and climbed inside.
The hallway was pitch black, save for one office door that stood ajar, light spilling forth. Office 412.
Arden advanced, slow and cautious, every instinct screaming for immediate flight. But she forced herself into the room. The office was a scene of chaos: papers scattered, books tossed, the desk violently overturned. And in the center of the wreckage, Dr. Cross lay face down in a widening pool of crimson.
Arden knelt, searching for a pulse. Nothing. The skin was cold. She had been dead for at least an hour.
"What manner of blow was struck?" Kael stood guard at the doorway.
Arden examined the body. There were no marks, no wounds, no visible cause of demise. "I cannot ascertain. There is no trauma. She simply ceased."
Like the Empty girl. As if a soul had died too often, lost too many pieces, and simply stopped existing.
"The Entity possesses that capability," Kael whispered. "To extinguish life without physical contact. If it truly knows you, if it has marked you. It can merely switch you off."
"Why now? Why commit the act after thirty-three years of dormancy?"
"Because she found the truth. Something profoundly dangerous."
Arden rose, scanning the room. Where was the research? The answers? The vulnerability? The desk was overturned but intact. She righted it. The drawers had been violently emptied. Files were missing. The laptop was gone.
"Someone has taken her work," Arden announced. "After the killing, they cleansed the area."
"The Entity has no use for electronic devices."
"No. But human agents do." She checked the filing cabinet—also emptied. "Another presence was here. A human presence. They stole everything."
"Margaret," Kael said, his voice heavy with certainty. "She preached the uselessness of resistance. Perhaps she decided to violently end all further attempts at defiance."
"Would she resort to murder?"
"To ensure her survival? To maintain the facade of her peace?" Kael glanced toward Dr. Cross's body. "I believe she would not hesitate."
III. The Vote of Condemnation
Arden's phone buzzed again. A different number. She answered without conscious thought.
"Hello?"
Heavy breathing. Then a voice—young, female, terrified. Riley.
"Arden? Oh God. Arden. I am... I am within the Game. I am in Terminal Zero. There are forty-six others. Forty-seven in total. But the reality is fractured. The Stations are glitching. Changing. As if the system is broken. As if the Entity is unwell."
"Riley, state your location. Can you perceive an egress?"
"No. There is no escape. Only doors. Seven doors. But they flicker constantly. One moment they exist, the next they are gone. And Miranda. Miranda Magnificent. She is... she is malfunctioning. Repeating herself like a broken recording."
"Riley, heed my instruction. You must seek out the other players. Cohere. Do not enter any Station alone."
"But the rules. Miranda decreed that we must. We must compete. We must survive. We must—" Her voice devolved into static. "—counting. Always counting. Forty-seven. Forty-seven. Forty-seven—"
The line severed.
"She is in Terminal Zero," Arden stated. "Now. Game 248. But the system is compromised. Something is fundamentally wrong."
"You starved the Entity six months ago," Kael reminded her. "Perhaps it remains weakened. Perhaps it is incapable of conducting a proper Game. Perhaps—"
A sound interrupted him. Footsteps. Multiple, heavy footsteps approaching the office in the hallway.
"The authorities?" Arden whispered.
"Or whoever murdered Dr. Cross." Kael moved swiftly to the window. "We must vacate this place immediately."
They scrambled onto the fire escape, descending with desperate speed. Above them, voices: someone had entered the office and discovered the body.
But they were not the voices of the police. They were chillingly familiar.
Margaret.
"She was encroaching too closely," Margaret's voice drifted down, cold and precise. "I issued the warning thirty-three years past. I instructed her to cease her inquiries. But they never heed the warning. None of them listen."
Another voice, male and older: "What of Vale? She was here. I detect her scent. The trail is fresh."
"Allow her to look. Permit her to search," Margaret commanded, her voice utterly devoid of mercy. "She shall locate nothing. I ensured that outcome. And when Game 248 concludes, when the Entity has regained its strength, it shall claim her. Permanently this time. No resurrection. Simply gone."
They reached the ground and ran. Into the shelter of alleys. Into the vast embrace of the night. Finally, they stopped, gasping, concealed within a dark doorway.
"Margaret is the killer," Arden deduced. "Or she commissioned the act. She is in league with a companion. One who tracks by scent. Something non-human."
"A Conductor," Kael confirmed. "A former player who accepted the Entity's compact. Joined its staff. They are granted the ability to track, to hunt, to commit murder for the master."
"What drives Margaret to this?"
"She survives through non-interference. Through the strict acceptance of the Game. By sacrificing others to maintain her safety." He looked at Arden. "And you pose a direct threat to that existence. You seek to halt the Game, to shatter the pattern. Thus, she eliminates the threat."
"We must inform the others. The support group. They must know the truth."
"They will dismiss your words. They will assume paranoia, trauma, enemies manufactured by a disturbed mind." He drew her deeper into the shadow of the doorway. "Margaret has been their leader for years. Their trust resides in her. You are the newcomer. The agent of disruption."
Arden's phone buzzed. She ignored it. It buzzed again. And again, a rapid cascade of notifications. It was the support group's digital chat thread.
She scrolled, reading the recent entries. Her blood ran cold.
MARGARET: "Emergency meeting. Tomorrow. Noon. Community center. Attendance mandatory. We harbor a traitor among us."
CALLUM: "Who is the source of this betrayal?"
MARGARET: "Someone who attempts to interfere with the sanctity of the Game. Someone whose actions caused the demise of Dr. Cross. Someone who endangers every one of us."
JIN-HWA: "Who is it?"
MARGARET: "Arden Vale."
Messages flooded the thread: accusations, fear, blind fury.
DMITRI: "I recognized her instability."
OLLI: "She will bring about our collective destruction."
CALLUM: "We should surrender her to the Entity. Offer her as an appeasement."
MARGARET: "I am considering that course. But first, we shall meet. We shall vote. Democracy will rule."
Arden's hands shook violently. "They intend to surrender me as a sacrifice."
"Not if we anticipate their action." Kael seized her phone. "We possess until noon. Twelve hours. We require evidence. Proof of Margaret's complicity in the murder, proof of her alliance with the Entity. Something irrefutable."
"Where shall such proof be obtained?"
"Dr. Cross's home. If she stored research in her office, she kept far more at her domicile. Backups. Private notes. Evidence." He consulted the address on the card's reverse. Cambridge. "We proceed there. Now. Before the thought occurs to Margaret."
They moved, exhausted, terrified, yet driven forward. Because to stop was to invite death. Because the Entity was rousing. Because the Game was fractured. Because forty-six souls were trapped in Terminal Zero, Riley counting to forty-seven as the Stations dissolved around her. Because Dr. Cross perished uncovering a vulnerability. Because Margaret hunted them.
And because in twelve hours, the circle would vote on Arden's fate.
The rain intensified, becoming colder, heavier. They ran through it, two fugitive ghosts in a city blind to their existence. Toward Dr. Cross's apartment. Toward answers. Toward the truth. Toward the terrible unknown that awaited them.
Behind them, unseen by the rushing fugitives, Bus 000 materialized. It parked. It waited.
The Conductor stepped out—a figure of imposing height, clad in a Victorian uniform, his face obscured beneath a peaked cap.
He raised his head, inhaling the scent of the night.
"Found you," he whispered.
And began to walk, following the fresh trail. Hunting.
The Game was mutating.
The rules were dissolving.
The Entity was starved.
And the harvest had begun.