The library closes in twenty minutes.
Arden sits at a corner table. Laptop open. Notebooks scattered. Coffee gone cold three hours ago.
Searching.
Ga survivors. Entity research. Pattern analysis.
Most results are conspiracy theories. Reddit threads. 4chan posts. Useless noise.
Then she finds it.
Academic journal. Neuroscience Quarterly. 2018.
"Shared Trauma Markers in Self-Reported Reality Displacent Survivors"
Author: Dr. Evelyn Cross.
Arden’s hands shake. Clicks the link.
Paywalled. Of course.
She finds a pirated PDF. Downloads it. Opens.
Scans. Brain images. Statistical analysis.
Abstract:
"This study examines 47 individuals who report surviving ’reality displacent events’ (commonly terd ’death gas’ or ’liminal experiences’). MRI scans reveal consistent prefrontal cortex damage across all subjects, suggesting environntal rather than genetic causation..."
Forty-seven subjects.
Arden’s breath catches.
She keeps reading.
"...damage severity correlated with number of reported ’deaths’ within displacent event. Pattern suggests external manipulation of neural pathways..."
External manipulation.
The Entity.
Kael appears beside her. Silent. He reads over her shoulder.
"Find her," he says. Quiet. Urgent. "Dr. Cross. Now."
Arden Googles. Dr. Evelyn Cross. Boston.
Address. Phone number. Email.
She calls. Goes to voicemail.
"Dr. Cross. My na is Arden Vale. I survived the Ga. I read your paper. I need to talk. Please. It’s urgent."
She hangs up. Waits. Phone clutched.
Two minutes. Five. Ten.
The phone rings.
"Arden Vale?" Woman’s voice. Older. Academic. Cautious.
"Yes. I. I was in the Ga. Terminal Zero. Seven Stations. I survived."
Silence. Long. Heavy.
Then: "What was Station One?"
"Castle of Blood. Lady Crimson. Vampire fragnt."
"Station Five?"
"Drowning City. Water everywhere. My sister. She. She died there."
Another pause. Then Dr. Cross’s voice changes. Sharper. Harder.
"et . Tomorrow. Noon. My office. MIT. Neuroscience building. Third floor. Don’t tell anyone. Don’t post online. Don’t. Just co."
"Why—"
The line goes dead.
Arden stares at her phone.
"She knows sothing," Kael says.
"Yeah." Arden saves the address. "Sothing big."
[Next day. 11:47 AM. MIT Campus.]
Dr. Cross’s office is small. Cramped. Papers everywhere. Books stacked floor to ceiling. Whiteboards covered in equations.
And photos. Dozens of them. Pinned to every wall.
Brain scans. All similar. All showing the sa highlighted area.
Dr. Cross sits behind her desk. Sixty-sothing. Gray hair pulled back. Sharp eyes. Exhausted.
She looks at Arden. Studies her. Analyzing.
"You survived." Not a question. Statent.
"Yes."
"All seven Stations?"
"Yes."
"Resurrected?"
"Three tis."
Dr. Cross nods. Writes sothing. Then pushes a consent form across the desk.
"I want to scan your brain. MRI. Today if possible. I’ll pay for it. I just. I need to confirm."
"Confirm what?"
"That you’re like the others. That the pattern holds."
Arden picks up the form. Reads it. Standard dical release.
"What pattern?"
Dr. Cross stands. Walks to the wall. Points to a brain scan.
"This is Sarah. Ga 198. Survived five Stations. Died twice."
She points to another.
"This is Marcus. Ga 203. Survived three Stations. Died once."
Another.
"This is Margaret. Ga 183. Survived all seven Stations. Died six tis."
Arden’s heart stops.
"Margaret?"
"You know her?"
"She. She runs a support group. In Boston. For survivors."
Dr. Cross nods. Unsurprised. "She’s been helpful. Connected with others. But she. She refused to participate in further research. Fourteen years ago. Said she wanted to move on. Forget."
She turns back to Arden.
"Look at the scans. Tell what you see."
Arden looks. Really looks.
All the brain scans. Different people. Different ages. Different genders.
But the sa highlighted area. Front of the brain. Left side.
"They’re all damaged in the sa place," Arden says.
"Prefrontal cortex." Dr. Cross taps the region. "Impulse control. Decision-making. Risk assessnt. Moral judgnt."
She pulls out another scan. Fresh. Recent date stamp.
"This is Jin-Hwa Park. Ga 247. Your Ga. Survived three Stations. Died once. Resurrected two days ago."
Arden stares. Jin-Hwa. The surgeon. Part of her team now.
"How did you—"
"She ca to . Found my research. Wanted answers." Dr. Cross sits back down. Heavy. Tired. "They all do. Eventually. The survivors who can’t forget. Can’t move on. They find ."
"How many?" Arden asks.
"Forty-seven docunted. Probably more I haven’t found. Scattered across decades. Across continents."
Forty-seven. Always forty-seven.
"What causes the damage?" Kael asks. First ti he’s spoken.
Dr. Cross looks at him. Eyes narrowing.
"You’re different. Not a survivor. But connected. Yes?"
"I was. Sothing else. Before."
She doesn’t press. Just nods. Accepts it.
"The damage." She returns to Arden. "It’s too precise to be accidental. Too consistent. Sa location. Sa severity. Across different Gas. Different decades. Different people."
She pulls out a ruler. Lines it up against one scan. asures. Then another. Then another.
"Within two milliters. Every single ti. That’s not coincidence. That’s not random trauma. That’s deliberate. Targeted. Soone. Or sothing. Did this to them."
"The Entity," Arden says.
"That’s what I think." Dr. Cross leans forward. "But I can’t prove it. Can’t scan anyone during the Ga. Can’t observe the damage happening. I only get them after. When they’ve already survived. Already been marked."
She looks at Arden. Intense. Desperate.
"But you. You killed it. Didn’t you? That’s what the forum says. That’s what the others claim. You entered the Ga. Fought. Won. Killed the Entity."
"I weakened it." Arden corrects. "But it’s not dead. It’s. It’s adapting. Coming back. Taking more people."
Dr. Cross’s face falls. Hope dying.
"Then it’s not over."
"No." Arden ets her eyes. "But I’m going to finish it. End it. Permanently. I just need to understand it. Need to know how to kill it. Really kill it."
"I’ve been researching for thirty-three years." Dr. Cross’s voice is hollow. Defeated. "Since I survived Ga 89. I’ve published papers. Interviewed survivors. Scanned brains. Analyzed data. And I still don’t understand it. Don’t know where it ca from. What it wants. How to stop it."
She looks at her walls. At decades of work. At photos of people damaged by sothing they can’t explain.
"But I found sothing. Recently. A pattern I missed before."
She opens her laptop. Pulls up a spreadsheet. Numbers. Dates. Nas.
"Every Ga. Every survivor. They all have sothing in common beyond the brain damage."
She highlights a column.
Arden leans closer. Reads.
Ga 89: May 15, 1978 Ga 134: May 15, 1988 Ga 183: May 15, 1998 Ga 198: May 15, 2003 Ga 247: May 15, 2024
"They all start on the sa date," Arden whispers.
"May fifteenth." Dr. Cross nods. "Every Ga. Without exception. The Entity follows a schedule. Precise. Ritualistic. It doesn’t hunt randomly. It plans. Prepares. Selects."
"Why that date?" Kael asks.
"I don’t know." Dr. Cross closes the laptop. "But it matters. Has to matter. Entities. Gods. Monsters. They don’t do things randomly. There’s always aning. Always purpose. Always—"
Her phone buzzes. She glances at it. Face going pale.
"What?" Arden asks.
Dr. Cross turns the phone. Shows them.
News alert.
47 PEOPLE MISSING IN DOWNTOWN BOSTON - WITNESSES REPORT "PHANTOM BUS"
Arden’s blood goes cold.
"It’s starting again," she says. "Right now. Today."
Dr. Cross stands. Grabs her coat.
"Then we need to move. Fast. Before more people disappear. Before—"
The office door opens.
Riley stumbles in. Seventeen. Blonde. Terrified.
"Arden?" Her voice breaks. "Oh god. Arden. I. I keep seeing a bus. Number 000. It follows . Everywhere I go. I. I think it’s coming for ."
Arden’s heart sinks.
"When did you first see it?"
"This morning. At my coffee shop. Then at the train station. Then outside my apartnt. It’s. It’s real. Isn’t it? It’s not in my head."
"It’s real." Arden stands. Moves toward Riley. "Where are you now? Where’s the bus?"
"Outside. Across the street. Waiting. Just. Just waiting."
Arden runs. Out of the office. Down the stairs. Into the street.
Sees it imdiately.
Bus 000. Black. Wrong. Parked across from MIT.
Empty inside. No driver. No passengers.
Just waiting.
For Riley.
Arden pulls out her phone. Calls Riley.
"Don’t go near it. Don’t look at it. Don’t"
She sees Riley on the steps. Phone to her ear. Looking at the bus.
Then walking toward it.
"Riley! Stop!"
But Riley’s not listening. Not hearing. Just walking. Hypnotized. Drawn.
She reaches the bus. Steps on.
The doors close.
The bus drives away. Into rain. Into nothing. Gone.
Arden reaches the curb. Too late. Always too late.
Kael catches up. Dr. Cross behind him.
"She’s gone," Arden says. Numb. Failing.
"Then we get her back." Dr. Cross’s voice is hard. Determined. "We figure out how this works. How to stop it. How to kill it."
She pulls out her keys.
"My house. Twenty minutes. I have more research there. More data. We find the vulnerability. We exploit it. We end this."
She looks at Arden. At Kael.
"You want to kill a god? I’ll show you how."
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