The world was collapsing around Mira, but it wasn't like the collapse Gareth had felt. It wasn't a gradual thing, a subtle unraveling. No, Mira felt the weight of the building's presence inside her, burrowing deep, like a shadow that could never leave. She could almost feel its pulse, a steady rhythm beneath her skin, like a beat that had always belonged to her heart—but didn't.
She wandered the corridors, a ghost in the place that had already swallowed so many. Her footsteps echoed through the hollow halls, and though she tried to tell herself it was just the building playing its tricks, she couldn't shake the feeling that someone—or something—was following her.
The air tasted like blood.
The building was different now. It had shifted, grown in a way that was almost imperceptible, yet somehow tangible. The walls were no longer just walls; they were living, breathing things. They breathed with her.
She wasn't alone here.
Mira's thoughts returned to the moment she had first stepped inside, the very first time she had encountered the Watcher. That creature in the shadows, whose gaze had filled her with dread even when its body had not yet manifested. It was only a presence back then—a feeling that burrowed into the corners of her mind, waiting to be acknowledged. And now, it was something more.
Something that wasn't just in her head anymore.
Her fingers brushed against the wall as she passed it, and her breath caught. The skin beneath her fingertips wasn't cold, but warm—warm and pulsating, as though the wall itself was alive. She recoiled, but the sensation lingered, crawling up her arm like an infection.
Her body stiffened. She could feel something in the air now—a presence that made the shadows seem darker, the light more suffocating. It was the Watcher. She could feel it watching her, even though she couldn't see it. It was like an itch at the back of her mind, constantly gnawing at her thoughts.
"Mira."
The voice came from the darkness ahead of her, but it wasn't a voice she recognized.
It was a voice that had been here before.
She froze. Her heart skipped a beat, her breath hitching in her chest. It couldn't be… but she knew it was. She knew it.
"Mira," the voice repeated, the sound wrapping itself around her like a vine, pulling her forward despite herself.
She didn't want to move. Every instinct in her screamed at her to turn around, to run. But the voice—that voice—it was calling her. Calling her to something she couldn't explain, something she didn't understand, but knew she had to see.
Against every ounce of her fear, she stepped forward. The shadows in the hall seemed to shift, becoming more oppressive with every step. The very walls around her seemed to close in, as though the building was trying to consume her again. It was as if it knew she was trying to resist.
But she couldn't stop.
The hallway stretched on, too long, too dark, the walls whispering to her as she moved. The air was thick now, heavier than it had been before, as if the weight of all the things that had come before her had accumulated, waiting for her to reach this point.
And then, suddenly, the hallway ended. There was no door. No room. Only the void.
A deep, endless blackness that swallowed everything in sight.
And in the center of that void, she saw a figure.
A silhouette, faint but unmistakable.
"Mira."
It was him.
Gareth.
But it wasn't the Gareth she knew. The face she saw was warped, fragmented, like something broken that had been pieced back together. His body flickered, half solid, half shadow, his eyes wide and searching. His lips moved, but there was no sound.
"Gareth?" Mira whispered, her voice trembling as she stepped toward him.
His image shifted, distorting like a mirage in the heat of a desert. He was still there, but not fully. His form was barely holding together, as though the fabric of reality itself was trying to reject him.
"Mira… you need to listen." The voice was now clearer, echoing inside her mind, as though Gareth's presence had breached the walls of her consciousness. "You have to stop running. The building—"
He didn't finish the sentence.
The walls around her began to warp, twisting and bending as if alive. The shadows stretched, and a deep, guttural sound reverberated through the corridor—the Watcher was coming. Mira could feel it in every fiber of her being.
It was close.
So close.
She tried to step back, but the ground beneath her feet began to crumble, the floor cracking as though the building itself was fighting to keep her from leaving. The walls shifted, curling inwards like the jaws of some great beast, and the air grew heavy with a weight she couldn't describe.
"No…" Mira breathed, shaking her head as the floor beneath her began to give way.
But Gareth was still there, his form flickering. His words burned through her mind, the last thing he had said to her before this moment: "We're connected. What you do, it changes me. And what I do, it changes you. We have to be stronger than this."
A terrible sound pierced the air, and Mira's legs buckled beneath her. Her hands shot out, grabbing at the jagged floor beneath her as the world around her shattered. The ground broke into pieces, the shadows clawing at her, pulling her down into the blackness below.
And then, just as the darkness threatened to consume her, the floor solidified again.
The shadows receded.
The building, once again, became silent.
Mira was standing in the void now, alone.
Gareth's presence had vanished.
But his words remained.
She couldn't stop shaking. The connection between them—something she hadn't fully understood, something that had always felt wrong—was stronger than she had realized. It wasn't just the building controlling them anymore. It was them controlling each other.
But the question remained: Who was truly in control?
The building's influence over Gareth might have broken, but what about Mira?
The door that had appeared before her now stood wide open, beckoning her forward. It wasn't the way out. No, it wasn't that simple.
It was the only way forward.
With trembling hands, Mira stepped through the doorway.
To be continued...
Mira's journey continues, but what lies beyond the door may be more dangerous than anything the building has thrown at her before. The fractures in reality grow deeper, and with every step, the connection between her and Gareth becomes more perilous.