The university loomed ahead of us, its once-majestic facade now a skeleton of broken windows and overgrown vines. Parang multo ng nakaraan—majestic but abandoned, holding secrets it refused to let go.
Elias walked ahead, the map on his arm guiding our every turn. The jagged lines and symbols etched into his skin glowed faintly under the overcast sky, pulsing like a heartbeat.
"Sigurado ka bang dito?" I asked, my voice laced with doubt. My fingers toyed nervously with the knife strapped to my belt.
He stopped and glanced at me over his shoulder. "This is the place. The map leads here."
I squinted at the structure. "Mukha namang wala nang tao dito. Ano bang hinahanap natin?"
“Answers,” Elias said simply, before stepping through the rusted gates.
I followed reluctantly, my boots crunching against the cracked pavement. The air was thick, heavy with the scent of mildew and decay. The silence here felt different—hindi gaya ng tahimik ng lungsod. This was the kind of silence that watched you, that held its breath and waited for you to make the first mistake.
The map's glow grew brighter as we approached the main building. Elias ran his fingers over the doorframe, his expression pensive. "There’s something here."
"Like what? The cure to all of this?" I gestured around us.
He didn’t respond, just pushed the heavy door open with a groan.
Inside, the hallway stretched endlessly, the walls lined with faded posters and empty bulletin boards. Broken glass crunched underfoot, and every sound echoed like a scream in the quiet.
It was cold here. Too cold.
“May mali,” I whispered.
Elias nodded. “Stay close.”
---
We passed through room after room, each one more desolate than the last. Some were classrooms, their desks overturned and chalkboards smeared with faded equations. Others were offices, their drawers ransacked and papers scattered across the floor.
But it was the laboratory that stopped me in my tracks.
The moment I stepped inside, my chest tightened, and a sharp pain shot through my temples. My vision blurred, and the world around me seemed to shift.
“Liora?” Elias’s voice sounded distant, like he was speaking from the other end of a tunnel.
I barely heard him.
Flashes of images assaulted my mind—a bright, sterile room filled with machines that hummed and beeped. Scientists in white coats moved around, their faces obscured.
And then there was me.
I stood at the center of it all, my hands gripping the edge of a console. I was arguing with someone, my voice raised in anger.
“This isn’t safe! We need to shut it down!”
A man’s voice responded, calm but firm. “We can’t just abandon the project. Do you understand the implications of what you’re suggesting?”
“You’re playing god!” I shouted. “If this goes wrong—”
The memory cut off abruptly, leaving me gasping for air.
“Liora!”
Elias’s hands were on my shoulders, shaking me gently. His face was tight with concern.
“Okay ka lang?”
I blinked, the present snapping back into focus. The lab was dark and silent again, the flashes of my past gone as quickly as they’d come.
“I—” My voice cracked. “I saw something.”
“What did you see?”
I swallowed hard, my heart pounding. “Me. I was here. Working in a lab. There was an experiment, something dangerous.”
Elias’s jaw tightened. “What kind of experiment?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. But it felt... big. Like it could change everything.”
His gaze flicked to the map on his arm. “Whatever it was, it’s connected to all of this.”
Before I could respond, a faint sound reached us—a soft, rhythmic tapping.
Tuk. Tuk. Tuk.
Elias stiffened, his eyes narrowing. “We need to move. Now.”
---
We pushed deeper into the building, the sound of the tapping growing louder with every step. It wasn’t random. It was deliberate, methodical, like someone—or something—was following us.
“Where are we going?” I hissed, my voice barely above a whisper.
“There’s another room up ahead,” Elias said, his pace quickening. “It should give us more answers.”
The hallway opened into a large chamber, its walls lined with towering machines that hummed faintly, their lights flickering like dying stars. In the center of the room was a console, its surface covered in dust and grime.
Elias approached it cautiously, brushing off the dirt to reveal a series of buttons and switches. “This is it,” he said, his voice tinged with awe. “This is where it started.”
I stared at the console, unease twisting in my gut. It felt familiar, like I’d stood here before.
I reached out hesitantly, my fingers brushing against the cold metal.
And then the memories hit me again.
The room was alive with activity, the machines glowing brightly. I stood at the console, my hands flying over the buttons as alarms blared around me.
“We’re losing control!” someone shouted.
“I told you this would happen!” I screamed back. “Shut it down before it’s too late!”
The man beside me hesitated, his hand hovering over a switch.
And then everything went white.
The memory ended with a jolt, leaving me dizzy and disoriented.
“Liora?” Elias’s voice broke through the haze.
I looked up at him, my breathing ragged. “This is where it started,” I said, echoing his earlier words. “The Faded, the end of the world... it all began here.”
Before he could respond, the tapping sound returned, louder and closer than before.
Tuk. Tuk. Tuk.
Elias grabbed my arm, pulling me away from the console. “We have to go.”
But it was too late.
The door slammed shut behind us, and the room was plunged into darkness.
A deep, guttural growl echoed through the chamber, followed by the faint glow of hollow eyes in the shadows.
The Faded weren’t alone.
“Liora,” Elias whispered, his voice barely audible. “Run.”
The growl deepened, reverberating through the chamber like a warning. My chest tightened as the glow of those hollow eyes multiplied. One pair became two, then three—then too many to count.
"Elias," I whispered, gripping his arm. "I thought the Faded didn’t gather in groups."
"They don’t," he muttered, his voice tense. "Not like this."
The tapping sound returned, rhythmic and deliberate, echoing louder with each passing second.
Tuk. Tuk. Tuk.
It wasn’t coming from the Faded.
Elias’s hand moved instinctively to his crowbar as he edged closer to the wall, pulling me along with him. The machines around us buzzed faintly, their dim lights flickering, but the console at the center of the room suddenly whirred to life.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The noise cut through the silence like a knife, drawing the Faded’s attention.
Their heads turned in unison, their empty eyes locking onto the glowing screen of the console.
“What the hell is happening?” I hissed, trying to keep my voice steady.
Elias shook his head, his brow furrowed. “I don’t know. But whatever it is, it’s triggering something in them.”
The Faded began to move, their jerky steps synchronized as they approached the console. Their hollow eyes were fixated, their twisted bodies unnervingly calm.
"Elias," I said, my voice trembling, "we need to get out of here."
But Elias wasn’t looking at the Faded. His gaze was locked on the console, his expression a mix of dread and realization.
“This isn’t just a lab,” he said slowly. “It’s a control center.”
“Control center? For what?”
Before he could answer, the tapping sound grew louder, and the room was suddenly filled with the blaring screech of static.
ZZZZZZZTTT!
I clamped my hands over my ears, wincing at the sharp noise. The Faded didn’t react—they simply stood still, their bodies swaying slightly as if waiting for something.
Then, a voice crackled through the speakers.
“Experiment 047. System Reboot Initiated.”
The voice was cold, mechanical. My blood ran cold as the words echoed in the chamber.
“What the hell is Experiment 047?” I asked, my voice rising with panic.
Elias’s jaw tightened. “I don’t know, but I think we’re standing in the middle of it.”
The console’s screen flashed again, lines of code scrolling rapidly.
Authorization: Liora Anselm. Access Granted.
I froze, my name glaring at me from the screen.
"Elias," I whispered, stepping back. "Why does it know my name?"
His eyes darted to me, then back to the screen. “I think this place remembers you. It’s tied to you.”
The Faded suddenly turned their heads, their hollow eyes snapping to me in eerie unison.
“No,” I muttered, my stomach twisting. “No, no, no—”
One of them lunged, its clawed hand swiping toward me. Elias yanked me out of the way just in time, shoving me behind him as he swung his crowbar.
“Go!” he shouted.
I stumbled toward the door, but it wouldn’t budge. My fingers clawed at the handle, desperation rising in my throat.
"Elias!"
The console beeped again, and the voice returned, calm and detached.
“Commencing Phase Two.”
The machines around us roared to life, their lights pulsing erratically. The ground beneath us began to shake, cracks spidering across the floor.
And then, a low rumble filled the air—something deeper than the growl of the Faded.
Elias grabbed my arm, his grip firm. “We need to leave. Now.”
Before we could move, the far wall of the chamber exploded inward, debris flying as a massive figure emerged from the shadows.
It wasn’t Faded.
It was something else entirely.
Its form was humanoid but grotesquely distorted, its limbs unnaturally long and its skin pulsing with a sickly, translucent glow. Its head tilted unnaturally, empty sockets where its eyes should’ve been.
The Faded turned toward it, their movements hesitant, almost fearful.
“What the hell is that?” I whispered, my voice shaking.
Elias’s face was pale, his eyes wide with horror. “That,” he said slowly, “is what they were trying to stop.”
The creature let out a guttural roar, its voice shaking the very air around us. The Faded scattered like insects, their coordination shattered as they fled into the shadows.
But the creature wasn’t interested in them.
Its hollow gaze locked onto me.
And then it spoke.
“You shouldn’t have come back, Liora.”
I froze. The voice—deep, distorted—ripped through the silence like a jagged knife, sending a cold shiver down my spine. My blood felt like ice as I stared at the creature, its grotesque form towering before me. It was as though the very air was thick with dread.
“You shouldn’t have come back, Liora.”
The words hung in the air, suffocating me with their weight. How could it know my name? My thoughts spun in a chaotic spiral. My breath came in shallow gasps as I stumbled backward, my feet tangling with the wreckage of the ruined lab. My hand went instinctively to the knife at my side, but I knew it wouldn’t be enough against whatever this thing was.
Elias stood next to me, his jaw clenched, his grip on his crowbar tight. His eyes darted between me and the creature, his mind clearly racing for a plan, any plan.
“I don’t know what you are,” I whispered hoarsely, “but I know I don’t want to find out.”
The creature tilted its head, as though studying me with its empty eye sockets, its skin glowing sickly with an eerie, pulsating light. The Faded, who had been retreating into the corners, now seemed to freeze, watching us with a strange, collective stillness.
“We’re connected,” the creature rasped, its voice jagged as though it was scraping through a throat that hadn’t been used in years. “You and I. The experiment. The beginning.” It stepped forward, its elongated limbs moving with unsettling fluidity.
Elias stepped in front of me, positioning himself between me and the creature. “Stay back,” he warned, his voice low and steady, but there was no mistaking the fear in his eyes.
The creature paused, and for a moment, I thought it might attack. Instead, it emitted a low, guttural laugh—one that made my skin crawl.
“Brave. But futile,” it croaked. “You cannot outrun your past. It is written in your blood.”
I gasped, feeling a sharp, biting pain in my wrist. The scar from the map burned, the same as before. It throbbed like a pulse of heat, as though the creature’s words were somehow digging deeper into my flesh, pulling memories from some hidden corner of my mind.
“No,” I whispered, my voice trembling. “I don’t remember—”
“You will,” it hissed. “In time, you will remember everything.”
My knees buckled as the room seemed to tilt. Everything around me blurred, and I could feel my mind pulling apart, unraveling like a thread pulled too tight. The air grew thick, and the buzzing from the machines intensified, their hums and whirs blending into a chaotic symphony of noise.
Then, the creature’s hand shot out, faster than I could react.
“Liora!” Elias shouted.
He lunged forward, pushing me out of the way just as the creature’s clawed fingers slashed through the air where I had been standing. The force of the attack sent him sprawling, his crowbar clattering to the floor.
The creature growled, its elongated fingers flexing. It turned its head slowly toward Elias, who was struggling to get back to his feet. There was no mercy in its movements, no hesitation in its gaze. It was going to kill him.
“No!” I screamed.
My heart slammed against my ribs as adrenaline surged through me. Without thinking, I lunged for my knife, instinctively aiming for the creature’s throat. But as my blade met its skin, it felt like cutting through stone.
The creature flinched, but it didn’t stop. Instead, it gripped my wrist with terrifying force, its fingers squeezing tighter with each passing second.
“You,” it rasped, its voice a low growl. “You’re the key. You always were.”
My breath hitched as the pressure on my wrist intensified. The scar on my arm burned like fire, and I felt a surge of heat radiating from it, spreading to every part of my body. Memories flashed—fragmented, distorted, but painfully familiar.
I saw myself—no, us—working in the lab. My hands, shaking, typing commands into a console. The faces around me, some familiar, some not. A man’s voice, one I couldn’t place, shouting at me to stop, to destroy the project. But I couldn’t.
"Do it, Liora," the voice in my mind urged. "End it, before it’s too late."
But I couldn’t. I hadn’t.
The creature’s grip tightened, snapping me back to the present, its voice cutting through my memories. “You are the reason it all began,” it snarled. “You are the reason they are all here.”
I felt my knees hit the cold floor, my vision swimming. I could barely breathe as the pressure on my wrist intensified, the creature’s words sinking deeper into my mind like an infection.
“Liora!” Elias’s voice broke through the haze. He was on his feet, moving toward me, his crowbar raised high, ready to strike.
But the creature let out a chilling laugh, releasing my wrist with one final, vicious twist. My body jerked in pain, and I fell backward, gasping for air.
“You cannot fight what has already been written,” the creature hissed, stepping back into the shadows. “The end is coming. And you will be the one to bring it.”
With that, it disappeared into the darkness, leaving only the echo of its words hanging in the air.
I stared at the empty space where it had stood, my mind reeling from the implications of what I had just heard.
“What the hell was that?” Elias breathed, his voice filled with disbelief.
I couldn’t answer him. My head was spinning. The weight of the creature’s words crushed down on me. I was the key. I had always been tied to the end of the world.
But what had I done? And why couldn’t I remember?
Suddenly, the screeching sound of metal against metal tore through the silence. I snapped my head up, panic flooding my chest as I realized what was happening.
The door to the lab was opening.
I turned to Elias. “We have to go. Now.”
Without another word, I grabbed his arm, pulling him toward the broken exit. But as I ran, the voice of the creature echoed in my mind again:
“You will be the one to bring it.”
And then, the door slammed shut behind us.