Page 87 of Stay Scared

Cade lunges. Ash catches him around the chest before he reaches the central monitor. The impact drives both men into an operator chair and sends it rolling across the floor.

“Get off me.”

“Breaking a screen will not get you to him.”

“It’d improve my fucking mood.”

“And give Rook exactly the reaction he wants.”

Cade breathes hard through his nose, staring at my face on the false article. Ash releases him only when Cade stops driving forward.

Rook watches through the theater camera.

“The footage after her death shows three owners discovering what they have done. Panic becomes persuasive once the audience already knows who to blame.”

There it is. He does not need the police to believe every second of his version. He needs enough footage, enough motive, and enough real ugliness that nobody knows where the truth stops.

Owen studies the timeline instead of Rook.

“You separated the audio tracks.”

“I have every microphone in Crimson Night.”

“You can’t maintain false locations indefinitely.”

“I don’t need indefinitely.”

The route map replaces the project. Black lock icons cover the perimeter. Then another warning appears over them.

PURGE PROTOCOL ARMED.

Ash steps closer.

“There is no purge protocol in our system.”

“There is tonight.”

A theater diagram opens. The old fire curtain hangs above the stage with Mark’s chair inside its drop zone. Another line runs from the same command to the servers holding tonight’s original footage.

I follow the diagram again. One trigger. Two consequences. Mark. And the evidence proving what actually happened tonight.

“If anyone sends an emergency call through the property network, the purge activates,” Rook says.

Cade looks toward the locked perimeter.

“Then we call from outside.”

“You have to reach outside first.”

“And if we force a gate?” I ask.

“The purge activates.”

Owen traces the diagram with one finger without touching the screen.

“He tied the perimeter sensors to the same trigger.”

That closes the obvious exits. Call for help through Crimson Night, and Rook activates the purge. Force a perimeter gate, and he activates it anyway. Either way, Mark sits beneath the fire curtain while the original recordings disappear.