Page 86 of Stay Scared

Another recording rearranges Ash’s questions until my answers follow demands he never made in that order. Then the tracks merge. Cade’s hands cut against Owen’s photographs while Ash’s voice carries over a door shutting behind me.

DECAY BRIGADE’S FINAL GIRL fills the screen.

The timeline ends at an empty section marked DAWN.

Ash moves closer to the monitor.

“You intend to release this.”

“I intend to finish it.”

The theater returns. Rook stands beneath the torn movie screen. Mark remains behind him, still working one wrist against the restraint.

“The story is simple,” Rook says. “Three men built a private experience around a woman they had already been studying. She entered Crimson Night and never came out.”

The titles on the editing timeline make sense now. Cade becomes the violent former lover. Owen becomes the stalker who planned everything. Ash becomes the man who built the place where I disappeared. And I become the woman whose own footage proves all of it.

Ash’s hand settles against the console.

“You omitted the fourth founder.”

“I removed myself from the story.”

“You cannot remove Evan.”

“Evan proves the attraction escaped your control.”

Cade leaves the chair and starts around the console while Rook keeps talking.

“Your history with Salem gives the police motive. Owen’s archive supplies planning. Ash’s waiver provides method.”

Cade stops at the control-room door.

“You think killing her burns the whole company down?”

“It completes the review she never published.”

A webpage opens. My site. My name. My formatting.

CRIMSON NIGHT: THE HAUNT THAT REFUSED TO LET ME LEAVE.

The article beneath it has been built from pieces of my old reviews. Familiar phrases sit between descriptions of tonight that I never wrote. It sounds close enough to fool someone who wants to believe it. And after the footage Rook has assembled, plenty of people will want to.

“You wrote under my name.”

“I wrote the ending your career was always chasing.”

“You never understood my work.”

“I understood the part that mattered. People believed you because you always came back.”

Mark shifts on the theater feed. The restraint near his thumb loosens another fraction. I keep my eyes on the false article.

“What happens at dawn?”

Rook answers immediately.

“You die inside the attraction.”