The woods didn't have a name. Not on the official maps. Just a curl of green in satellite images. Forgotten, fenced off by rusted wire, and shadowed in the stories even criminals whispered about.
That's where the coordinates led.
And Ava Langford drove there alone.
No bodyguards. No backup. Not even Nolan, who was conveniently "out of town" that morning when she'd found the clue. A blurry journal entry. A torn page in Alex's old notebook she found inside a locked drawer in her old apartment. "Red Oak Road – unfinished. Ask N." That was all it said.
She'd ignored the warning. She always did.
By sundown, her car crunched to a stop on gravel that hadn't seen tires in years. The trees stretched like skeletons. The air hung damp and bitter. Her heels sank into the mossy ground with every step.
She walked.
Farther. Deeper.
Until she found it.
A single concrete door, half-hidden behind bramble and stone. No signage. No sound. Just a thick, decaying smell that made her hand fly to her mouth the second it hit her.
Rot.
Her stomach turned. Her skin crawled. Her lungs refused the air.
Still, she stepped forward. Still, she reached for the rusted handle.
And pulled.
The door groaned like a living thing. Inside—it was black. Black like ink. Black like swallowed screams. But she heard something faint… faint and horrible.
Chains.
Dripping water.
Breathing.
A sob?
"Adrien?" she choked out, her voice cracking before she could stop it. "Baby—"
Nothing.
She pulled a flashlight from her coat. Clicked it on.
The beam cut through the dark—and Ava stepped in.
The scent was worse inside. Metallic. Like something wild had been kept here. Something broken.
Her heel crunched over something on the ground—glass. A shattered bottle. Next to it, dried streaks of something too dark to be anything but blood. Her throat closed up.
And then, a sound.
From deeper in the bunker.
A groan. A thud. And—
"Stop—please don't—"
Adrien.
Her baby.
The flashlight shook in her hand.
"Adrien!?" Her voice rose, panicked now. "Where are you?!"
She moved fast, nearly slipping down the slick corridor. Her breath burned in her lungs. Her knees scraped stone. She didn't feel it.
She rounded the corner—
And froze.
At the far end of the hallway, a thick iron door. Closed.
Behind it—shuffling. A voice. A sound that tore through her soul.
"Mom…?"
Ava's scream was silent. Her knees buckled.
She ran.
The keypad beside the door blinked red. She didn't care. She screamed. Punched it. Kicked it. Clawed at the rust. Her baby was behind it. Her Adrien. Her baby. Her child.
She sobbed now, tears and sweat and blood all mixing as she smashed her hand against the panel, desperate—
Until something clicked.
The door creaked open a few inches.
Just enough for the smell to hit her full-force.
Death.
Pain.
Men chained to walls like animals.
She dropped the flashlight.
And in the flickering, half-shattered light that remained, she saw them:
Alex.
Chained. Bleeding. Starved.
And Adrien.
Barely standing. Pale. Eyes wide.
Her heart cracked in two.
They both looked up.
A single breath escaped her lips.
"Baby."
Adrien's voice broke.
Alex's head snapped up.
And Ava Langford stepped into hell.
---
I couldn't move.
For a moment, I just stood there—frozen, breathless, shaking all over. My eyes burned. My fingers went numb. The air in that bunker was so thick I could barely breathe.
Alex.
Adrien.
They were real.
But they looked—
No.
No, no, no, this wasn't right. This wasn't them. This wasn't what was supposed to happen. Alex's face was hollow, pale beneath dried blood and bruises. His wrists were torn where the chains cut into him. His shirt was ragged, barely fabric anymore. His eyes… God. His eyes still lit up the second they landed on me. Like he didn't believe it. Like he was afraid to blink.
Adrien looked worse.
Smaller somehow. He was taller now, but he looked smaller. Fragile. He was holding his side like it hurt to breathe. But he was standing. Barefoot. Shaking.
And then he whispered it. Just one word:
"Mom."
And I broke.
I ran to him. I stumbled over something wet and sticky, but I didn't care. I dropped to my knees in front of him and held his face, whispering, "It's me, it's me, baby, I'm here, I'm here—" over and over again until my voice cracked.
He cried. He sobbed into me like he was five again and I'd kissed a scraped knee better. But this wasn't a scraped knee.
His ribs.
His bruises.
His goddamn eyes.
I kissed his head, his temple, his cheek, his hands. "I've got you, I've got you, my baby, my baby, my love, my heart—Mama's here now, Mama's here—"
He collapsed into me.
I barely caught him.
Alex's voice came next, hoarse, ruined. "Ava…"
I turned. Crawled to him.
I couldn't stop shaking.
"Shhh," I whispered, brushing hair from his face, not even caring that it was matted with blood. "Don't talk. I'm getting you out of here. I'm getting you both out of here. He's not winning."
He just stared at me like he was hallucinating. "You came alone?"
"I would've burned the world down to get to you."
He choked out a sound. It was almost a laugh. Almost.
"I missed you," he whispered. "Every second."
I pressed my forehead to his.
Then the moment shattered.
The iron door behind me slammed shut.
My head snapped around. I stood, pulling Adrien behind me.
Footsteps echoed in the dark.
I reached into my coat pocket, pulled out the only thing I had—a tiny blade. Useless. Laughable.
But I would kill with it.
I would die with it.
And as the shadows shifted again—
I realized:
I wasn't just in hell.
Hell had been watching me walk in.
And now it was smiling.
---
I turned slowly.
I thought it would be someone—anyone—else.
Some old enemy. A ghost from Alex's past. One of the monsters we'd crossed in our lives.
But it wasn't.
It was Nolan.
Nolan.
In a black coat, sleeves rolled up. A smirk stretching wide across his face like a slit carved too deep. His hair wild, messy. His hands stained. His eyes—
They weren't right.
There was something missing in them.
Or maybe too much.
I froze. I didn't blink. I didn't breathe. I just stared.
He opened his arms like I'd come home. "Surprise."
I didn't say anything.
My heart had stopped.
I could feel Adrien behind me, trembling again. I could feel Alex's weak, barely-there strength as he looked up at the man he once called brother.
"You..." I said, voice breaking. "You did this?"
And Nolan—
He laughed.
Like a madman.
Laughed so hard he leaned against the wall, doubled over, gasping for breath through his wheezing, wheezing giggles.
"Did this? Oh, Ava. Oh, sweetheart. I didn't just do this." He stepped forward. "I crafted this. Every scream. Every drop of blood. Every second of silence. This wasn't punishment. This—" he gestured wildly to the room, the chains, the blood-soaked floor "—this is devotion."
I took a step back, hand instinctively going to Adrien's chest, shielding him. I didn't realize I was crying until I felt the tears hit my lips.
He kept coming closer.
"You never saw it, did you?" he whispered, voice sharp and high and sweet like poison. "All those years, all those dinners, those late-night calls, those times I held your hand when he wasn't around. I worshipped you."
"Nolan…" I could barely speak. "What the hell did you do to them?"
He grinned. Wide. Bloody teeth and all.
"I loved you."
"That's not love."
"I gave you a son."
"You took him!"
"I gave you freedom from him," he spat suddenly, a snarl breaking through his grin as he pointed to Alex. "You were chained to him. You cried when he left, didn't you? Every night. I watched. I watched you die every goddamn day without him. But did he come back? No. I stayed. I held you. I comforted you. I was there."
He looked at Adrien then.
Something feral entered his face.
"And he? That ungrateful little brat? He had everything. Every smile, every kiss, every hug. And what did he do? He rolled his eyes. He slammed doors. He called you clingy. Annoying. He didn't deserve you, Ava. None of them did."
I stepped in front of Adrien, blade trembling in my hand.
Nolan just tilted his head.
"Ava," he said, suddenly softer. "You came here. You found us. That means something. That means you knew. Somewhere deep down, you knew it was me. You always felt it."
"No," I said, voice low, trembling. "I hoped it wasn't."
His face twitched. That grin faltered.
"I wanted it to be anyone but you."
His hands clenched into fists.
And then, with a shrill little laugh, he reached out like he wanted to hug me.
I stepped back.
He frowned.
"I did this," he said again, voice rising. "For you."
"No," I whispered. "You did this for yourself."
He tilted his head, eyes narrowing.
I could feel Alex trying to rise behind me. Adrien's hand was in mine, tight, like he was grounding himself through me.
I met Nolan's eyes.
And I didn't flinch.
"You're going to die in this bunker," I whispered. "And I'll be the one to bury you."
His grin returned.
Only this time—
It wasn't human.