The thing that wore his voice stood motionless.
Kaden felt its stare—not with eyes, because it had none, but with something deeper, something that crawled under his skin like an invasive thought.
Juno's breath hitched beside him. He could hear her shifting, her hands tightening on the rifle, but she hadn't raised it yet.
"Kaden," she murmured.
He couldn't speak.
The shadowy figure twitched. The motion was wrong, as if it existed in two places at once, flickering between them. Then, in a slow, deliberate movement, it tilted its head.
Kaden did the same—without meaning to.
His stomach turned.
It's copying me.
A pulse ran through his body, a sensation like stepping too close to the edge of a sheer drop. The world around him warped—just slightly, just enough that he noticed the pavement beneath his feet shift.
The entity moved again, and this time, it stepped forward.
Juno reacted first.
Her rifle snapped up. "Don't move!"
It did.
Kaden felt it move before it actually did, as though its motion echoed in him before it happened.
Juno fired.
The shot rang out—a sharp, cracking sound that should have torn through the thing's head.
But the bullet never landed.
Instead, the moment it should have struck, reality shuddered.
The air around the entity fractured, bending inward like glass under pressure. The bullet slowed, twisting midair, spiraling as if caught in invisible hands.
Then it simply wasn't there anymore.
Juno sucked in a sharp breath. "What the hell—"
The entity took another step.
Kaden felt it inside his ribs.
Something inside him pushed back—a reflex, like a muscle twitching in response to pain.
The world rippled.
The air around them pulsed outward in a silent shockwave, and suddenly the entity staggered back, its shape distorting for a split second, as if it had been shoved by an unseen force.
But Kaden had felt himself push it.
He hadn't moved. But he had.
The entity stilled.
Then, slowly, its featureless form unraveled.
It didn't disappear. It didn't fade. It simply... ceased.
One moment it was there. The next, it wasn't.
The silence that followed was worse than the encounter itself.
Juno turned to Kaden, rifle still half-raised, her eyes narrowed.
"What the hell did you just do?"
Kaden's throat was dry. He didn't have an answer.
Because whatever had just happened…
He was sure it wouldn't be the last time.