The darkness swallowed the room whole, suffocating and absolute. Barto stood motionless, his eyes adjusting, while the others scrambled for their phones, desperate for light. A cold breeze crept through the cracks in the window, and a chilling giggle echoed through the room, low and distorted.
Ellie flicked on her flashlight, the beam dancing wildly as her hands shook. "Who's there?" she demanded, her voice more forceful than she felt.
John stumbled backward, knocking into Barto. "This isn't funny anymore!"
Before anyone could respond, the flickering light caught something near the window—a shadowy figure hunched in the corner, its eyes gleaming a sickly yellow. It moved unnaturally, bending at odd angles like a marionette with its strings cut. The figure lunged forward, and Ellie screamed, but as the light stabilized, it vanished.
"Did you see that?" Nancy whimpered, clutching Aiko's arm.
Barto remained silent, his gaze fixed on the corner. The temperature in the room had dropped significantly, and the faint scent of decay filled the air.
Dami flipped through the diary with trembling fingers. "Lila wrote about this… the shadows that could move on their own. She said they sometimes pretended to be human."
"Great," Bryan muttered, pulling out his pocketknife. "So, what? Ghosts playing tricks?"
Sofia leaned against the wall, her face pale. "No… not just tricks. It's something older. Forgotten."
A loud bang came from the hallway, followed by muffled cries. Without thinking, Barto opened the door, stepping out into the corridor. The others followed hesitantly.
The hallway stretched longer than before, impossibly extending into darkness. At the far end, they saw Charles, his back turned to them. He was mumbling incoherently, his shoulders shaking.
"Charles?" Ellie called out.
He didn't respond, just kept muttering, his hands clawing at his face. As they approached, the words became clearer. "They're in my head… crawling… twisting…"
Suddenly, Charles whipped around, and the group froze. His face was distorted, his eyes sunken and bloodshot, mouth twisted into a grotesque grin. "They said you'd come," he hissed, his voice layered with something inhuman.
Barto stepped closer, noticing that Charles' shadow wasn't attached to him—it was moving independently, flickering and twitching. Without warning, the shadow lunged at Barto, who sidestepped just in time. The darkness slashed the wall behind him, leaving claw marks.
"What the hell was that?" John yelled, dragging Nancy backward.
Ellie raised her flashlight, but Charles lunged at her, his movements jerky and unnatural. Before he could reach her, Barto delivered a swift kick to his stomach, sending him crashing into a nearby desk. Charles convulsed on the ground, his shadow pooling around him like a living thing.
Dami pulled Sofia aside. "The diary says the shadows latch onto negative emotions—fear, guilt, anger. If you let it take over, it consumes you."
"That's why it's targeting us," Sofia whispered. "It wants to break us down."
A loud scraping noise echoed down the corridor. They turned to see the blackboard at the end of the hall—words were being scratched onto it by invisible hands:
"JOIN US OR BE FORGOTTEN."
Suddenly, the locker doors swung open and shut with a deafening clang. Shadows slithered out, stretching along the floor, merging into one writhing mass that crawled toward them.
"Run!" Ellie shouted.
The group bolted, Barto taking the lead. They rounded a corner and found themselves in the gymnasium—a vast, empty space that seemed larger than it should have been. The walls were lined with cracked mirrors, each reflecting their terrified faces.
John was the first to notice. "Wait… where's Charles?"
The door behind them slammed shut, and the sound of heavy breathing filled the room. In the center of the gym, the shadow mass from before coalesced, taking on a vaguely human shape—tall, gaunt, with elongated fingers that scraped the ground. Its face was a featureless void, except for a single, wide grin that stretched impossibly across its head.
Ellie stumbled backward, her flashlight flickering. "What… what is that?"
The entity let out a raspy, guttural laugh, and the mirrors around them began to fog up, words forming on the glass:
"YOU CANNOT ESCAPE WHAT YOU FORGOT."
Aiko started sobbing, and Nancy tried to console her, though her own hands shook violently. Barto, meanwhile, observed the entity, noticing how it didn't cast a shadow of its own—it was a shadow.
The creature suddenly lunged, its limbs stretching unnaturally. Barto pushed Sofia out of the way just in time. The creature's arm slammed into the floor, splintering the wood. It recoiled, twitching as if disoriented.
Dami flipped through the diary. "There must be something—a way to fight it."
The creature let out a high-pitched screech, and the mirrors shattered simultaneously. In the chaos, Barto noticed a single shard reflecting something odd: the shadow entity didn't appear in it. Realization dawned.
"It's not real," Barto muttered. "It's feeding on our fear."
Ellie caught on. "If we don't believe in it… it can't hurt us?"
The creature shrieked again, its form destabilizing. Barto stepped forward, forcing himself to focus on the thought: This is not real. It's just fear manifesting.
Sofia joined him, holding her ground. "We're not afraid of you."
One by one, the others repeated it, their voices growing steadier. The entity howled, its grin widening as cracks spread across its form. With a final, piercing wail, it disintegrated into smoke, the gym falling silent once more.
Panting, Bryan looked around. "Did… did we just beat it?"
Barto remained cautious. "For now. But something still doesn't feel right."
They regrouped, and Ellie took a deep breath. "We need to find Charles. If that thing is gone, he should be okay, right?"
A chill swept through the room, and Barto glanced at one of the broken mirrors. Written in blood-red letters were the words:
"ONE OF YOU IS ALREADY TAKEN."
The realization struck them like a hammer. They weren't alone. One of their own was no longer who they appeared to be.