“Everything does,”he adds, and my laugh cracks.
“Not them,” I say, but he doesn’t answer, which only makes the hole in my chest deepen. I push myself up slowly as the room tilts again, but not like before—worse. Like it’s… lagging. My head jerks to the side and, for a second, I see him. Jagger—standing by the wall with blood on his knuckles while he watches me with ragged breath. Relief hits so fast it hurts. “I knew it—” I gasp, but then he’s gone. There’s nothing there. Just peeling paint and a crack running down the wall. My stomach drops as I turn. There—Killian at the table… perfectly still, eyes locked on me. Studying. “You’re real,” I whisper as I take a step, and he disappears. The chair is empty. No one was ever there. “No, no, no— ” My hands shake harder. This isn’t—this isn’t how this works. They don’t just—vanish. “They’re here,” I say again, my voice a mere whisper, less certain. “They have to be.”
“Or you’re losing them,”Jethro chimes in.
“I’m not losing anything,” I growl.
“You’re losing everything,”he taunts.
“Stop!” I yell as heads turn again. Too many eyes once again crawl up my skin—watching, judging, but most of all, ignoring. I spin in a slow circle, searching—begging.
“Did you see them?” I ask a girl with stringy hair and hollow eyes.
“See who?”
“The four of them,” I say, and she smiles.
“They’re not real,” she sings, and I narrow my eyes.
“They are, you dumb bitch!” I spit, and she leans closer.
“They’re in your head,” she states, tapping her temples. “Right here.” I shove her and she laughs, stumbling back. I stop in my tracks when that laugh—the same laugh that’s too familiar. My mother. The cafeteria stretches as I reach for a fork, twirling it through my fingers. “You always make things up,” she sings, spinning around me. I mirror her movements as I continue to twirl the fork through my fingers over and over again. “You always need friends that weren’t there,” she taunts.
“They were here,” I spit, pulling my face down as I tilt it a bit.
“Just like you weren’t in the oven?” She cackles, and I snap, lunging at her. I take the fork, lifting my arm, and stab her right in the eye, twisting the metal.
“Fuck you!” I yell, ripping the fork from her eye and slamming it into the other. I giggle, twisting around and around. “They were fucking here!” I scream again as tears pour down my face, but I don’t stop giggling as the alarms blare and the cafeteria warps into chaos. My shoulders shake as my head drops. Guards come flooding in, and I don’t know whether I’m crying or laughing. Maybe both. “Say something,” I whisper. Not to the room. Not to the creatures that live here. To them. To anyone. “Please.” But nothing. Not Jagger. Not Killian. Not Lucifer. Not Vinny. Just fucking silence. Then Jethro. Quiet but closer than before.
“You’re still here,”he says, and I swallow thickly.
“That’s not enough,” I cry out as he lays a hand on my shoulder but I shrug him off.
“It has to be,”he says, and I tilt my head slowly. My smile creeping back.Wrong. Unstable.
“…no,” I whisper, because if they’re gone… If they were never here… Then something else is. Something that replaced them, something that’s watching me fall apart and is enjoying it.
My eyes lift, scanning the room only slower—more carefully. And just for a second—I swear—I see all four of them, standingtogether. Watching me. Waiting.
My breath catches as I take one step towards them. And just like that…They’re gone.
My smile snaps wider and a giggle slips out. “Okay.. I see how this works now,” I say as my fingers twitch. “You can hide them… but I’ll find them.”
“That’s my girl,”Jethro laughs, then my gaze looks up at the camera in the far corner of the cafeteria and I smirk.
“Game on, Master D… Game fucking on!”
The Silence Room
Lucifer Davenport
Silence is a lie. That’s the first thing I decide. It’s not empty or peaceful, it's unethical. The room swallows everything. My breath doesn’t echo and my footsteps don’t return, even the shift of my clothes dies the second it exists. Nothing lingers or stays, but I smile anyway. “Cute,” I mutter, but my voice disappears the moment it leaves my mouth. No bounce or response. “Say something clever,” I think to myself, but nothing answers.
I walk the perimeter of the four walls I’m locked within. No seams, no corners that give anything away, just a mirror. I stop in front of it. There I am. Perfect. Untouched. Unbothered. I tilt my head and the reflection does the same, only a fraction too late. Ah.
“There it is,” I whisper, or at least try to. The sound dies again as the reflection watches, not quite matching me. I step closer, and so does he, but a half a second off. “You’re sloppy,” I say, smiling wide, but he says nothing. No one does. That’s fine. I don’t need anyone. Never have.
“Tell that to them,” a voice usually says, but nothing. The thought hangs heavily. Where are they? I wait. Just a second. They’ll answer. They always do.
