Leila smiled faintly as she handed a bag of popcorn to a kid, her fingers still twitching from anxiety. It had been a week since Valeria's near-death return. She and Cody had followed the same plan—and lived. They'd laughed for the first time in what felt like months.
Tonight was meant to be a celebration. A private theater. An old slasher film on the screen. Cheap soda and over-salted snacks.
Leila handed off the last order, wiped her hands on her jeans, and walked toward the theater doors.
Inside, Cody and Valeria laughed together in the middle row, heads tilted, voices echoing gently. The screen flashed with heavy colors—a movie scene of ticking clocks and dynamite under floorboards.
She opened the door.
Her body froze.
The screen exploded.
Not fiction. Not a movie.
Real.
The walls shattered with the force of the blast.
A hellish eruption of fire surged down the aisles. Nails, bolts, planks—metal pieces from behind the projector rocketed through the air like jagged bullets. Seats tore apart. Bodies flung. Valeria was impaled in a split-second, her scream cut off by a splintered wooden rod. Cody's face twisted in horror as flames swallowed his side of the room.
Leila tried to scream—
—and woke up.
Gasping.
Her hands clutched the counter. The popcorn still warm.
The ticket still in her palm.
People were still alive.
She stumbled away from the stall. "No. No no no—"
She sprinted toward the theater.
The door hadn't been opened yet.
Inside, Cody and Valeria sat chatting as the movie previews rolled.
Leila slammed the door open.
"GET OUT! GET OUT NOW!"
They turned.
"What—?" Cody stood, confused.
"THERE'S A BOMB! BEHIND THE SCREEN!"
Some laughed behind them. Others looked up in annoyance.
Leila didn't wait.
She ran behind the screen herself, past the emergency exit, and yanked it open. There—just barely hidden in the shadows—tanks of flammable liquid and wires.
Real. Horrifyingly real.
She didn't think.
She grabbed the nearest fire alarm and yanked it hard.
Sprinklers burst from the ceiling.
Screams followed as water rained down on everyone inside.
The film fizzled. Lights returned.
People stormed out, angry and soaked.
But alive.
Cody and Valeria ran to her, eyes wide, breathless.
"You saw it again, didn't you?" Valeria asked.
Leila nodded, shaking. "It was going to kill everyone."
This wasn't over.
Death had simply changed the script.
The End of Chapter 33