The psych book lay splayed on my desk, pages open to a chapter titled 'Shared Delusions and Collective Psychosis'. Bullshit. My fingers twitched toward my phone. If I texted back the unknown number, would I end up like Keating? My thumb hovered—then a sharp knock at my door made me jump.
"Claire?" Liam's voice, tight with concern. "Open up. Campus is going nuts."
I shoved the note under my mattress just as the door swung open. Liam stood there, rumpled and sleep-mussed, his usual golden retriever energy replaced by something darker. His gaze flicked to my shaking hands. "You look like hell."
"Gee, thanks." My laugh sounded brittle. Behind him, the hallway buzzed with panicked chatter, "did you hear?" and "they're saying she was alone", but Liam's eyes locked onto mine. And then I saw it, the faintest flicker of gold along his jawline, pulsing once before vanishing. My breath hitched.
"You okay?" He stepped closer, smelling like spearmint gum and fabric softener. The cracks never lied—he was scared. Of what?
I forced a shrug. "Just freaked. Who wouldn't be?"
His fingers brushed mine, warm, solid, real, but I pulled away. The unknown number burned in my pocket. Liam's frown deepened. "You're hiding something."
Liam exhaled sharply. "Tell me". The words clogged my throat. What am I supposed to say? *I see people break. And Keating saw it too. And now she's…*
. . . Dead? . . . Murdered?
My phone buzzed. Unknown number again: "*Library. 10 AM. Burn this.*"
Liam's gaze dropped to my pocket. "Claire…"
"I need air." I sidestepped him, bolting into the hallway where students clustered around phones, voices hushed. Someone sobbed near the stairwell, her cracks glowing bright as neon. I pushed past them all, Liam calling after me.
The library loomed ahead, its glass doors reflecting my hollow-eyed stare. Inside, the air smelled like dust and dread. I ducked into the stacks, heart hammering.
A hand grabbed my wrist . . .icy fingers, skeletal-thin.
"Too late for answers," a voice rasped.
I spun. The old janitor stood there, his eyes boring into mine. Gold veins spiderwebbed down his neck.
"But just in time," he whispered, "to see it happen again."
His grip was stronger than it should've been. I tried to yank free, but his nails dug into my skin. "What the...?" I hissed.
A scream cut through the stacks. The janitor's head snapped toward the sound. The cracks flared brighter...then vanished as his expression smoothed into blank indifference. "Third floor. West wing." He released me and shuffled away, humming tunelessly.
My legs moved before my brain caught up. The stairs creaked underfoot. The west wing was deserted, the silence thick. Then...a choked sob. Behind a study , a freshman I recognized from my drafting class crouched over her notebook, fingers clawing at her scalp. Gold lines radiated from her temples like sunbursts.
"Hey," I whispered. She didn't look up. Her pencil snapped in her grip, the sound unnaturally loud. The cracks pulsed...then suddenly, she went still. Her head lifted. Her eyes were glassy, unfocused.
"Claire Carter," she said, but the voice wasn't hers...it was layered, echoing. Keating's voice.
I stumbled back. The girl's mouth kept moving: "Find the blueprint. Burn the rest."
Her body jerked violently. The gold flared...then extinguished. She blinked up at me, confused. "What...?" Her fingers touched her wet cheeks. "Why am I crying?"
I ran.
My phone buzzed—another unknown text: "They're using us. Break the cycle."
Behind me, the freshman called out, "Wait! Did you see Professor Keating?"
I didn't turn around. The library's exit blurred. Outside, Liam stood waiting, his hands clenched at his sides.
"Where the hell…"
I grabbed his arm. "We need to go. Now."
The cracks along his jaw pulsed again.
This time, they didn't fade.
Liam's jawline glowed gold under the harsh library lights, the cracks spreading like ink in water. His grip tightened around my wrist. "Talk to me." The plea in his voice didn't match the way his pupils dilated, black swallowing brown. His other hand twitched toward his pocket. Something metallic clicked inside it.
The scent hit me first…burnt sugar and ozone, the same smell from Mom's kitchen the night she shattered every plate in the house. My pulse roared in my ears. "Liam." I forced my voice steady. "What's in your pocket?"
His breath hitched. The cracks reached his collarbone. "You wouldn't believe me." A lie. The gold flared brighter.
Behind us, the library doors hissed open. Footsteps, too deliberate. Liam's head snapped toward the sound. His fingers dug into my skin hard enough to bruise. "We can't stay here."
"Why?" I twisted free.
A shadow moved between the stacks. Liam's whole body went rigid. The cracks weren't pulsing anymore—they were. . . bleeding, liquid gold dripping down his neck. His whisper was raw: "The ones who fix the breaks."
A book thudded to the floor in the distance. Liam yanked me behind a pillar just as three figures rounded the corner.
"Shit." Liam's hand flew to his pocket again. The metallic thing clicked louder. "They're harvesting."
The security guards turned in unison, necks creaking like rusted hinges. One smiled, lips splitting wide enough to show molars. The cracks spiraled across his cheeks, forming words: "COME HOME."
Liam shoved me toward the emergency exit. "Run. Don't look back."
"Not without you!" I grabbed his sleeve. The fabric disintegrated under my fingers, revealing skin mapped with golden scars ,old, healed breaks I'd never seen. His eyes locked onto mine, desperate.
"You *see* them, Claire. That makes you a threat." He pressed something cold into my palm, a key, tarnished and sticky with gold. "Find the room behind the boiler. Burn everything but the…"
The security guard's hand closed around Liam's shoulder. His scream was cut short as the cracks increased, swallowing him whole. The guard's head tilted, gold dripping from his grin. "Ms. Carter. You're wanted upstairs."
I ran.
Behind me, Liam's voice echoed, distorted: "They'll make you choose!"
Choose..?
Choose what..?
The exit door slammed shut on the sound of bones cracking.
I sprinted down the alley, lungs burning, Liam's key biting into my palm. Behind me, the library's windows pulsed gold…once, twice…then went dark. My phone vibrated violently. Unknown number: "*They'll hollow you out next."*
The boiler room. Liam's scars. *Harvesting.* The words twisted in my skull. I ducked behind the engineering building, pressing my back to the brick. My reflection in a puddle showed my own cracks…thin, glowing lines spidering from my left eye. Fuck. Fuck.
Rain started falling. I ran again, slipping past maintenance sheds toward the old dorm's basement. The boiler room door was rusted shut. I jammed Liam's key into the lock. It stuck, then turned with a shriek.
Inside smelled like copper. The far wall was wrong… clean concrete where the rest crumbled. My fingers found the hidden door, painted over.
Something clattered upstairs. Voices. Too close.
The hidden door gave way. Inside: a single desk. A blueprint pinned under a flickering lamp. And Keating's briefcase, splattered with gold.
The blueprint showed our campus, but twisted. Towers where lawns should be, bridges to nowhere. And beneath it all, veins of gold branching like roots. A signature in the corner: *L.K.*
Liam's initials.
Footsteps pounded down the stairs. I grabbed the blueprint, kicked over the lamp. Flames licked up the desk as I bolted out the back exit.
The rain hit like a slap. I crouched behind a dumpster, watching gold-veined figures swarm the boiler room. One turned its head…slow, puppet-like, and stared right at me.
Its mouth unhinged. No scream, just Keating's voice: "*Too late, little Seer."*
I fled toward the train tracks. Toward home. Toward Mom and whatever waited there.
The train rattled beneath me, its rhythm as uneven as my breathing. I clutched the blueprint tighter, my cracked reflection on the rain-streaked window. Across the aisle, a businessman tapped his briefcase absently. Gold lines crawled up his neck each time his phone buzzed. I looked away.
Mom's neighborhood hadn't changed, same cracked sidewalks, same rusted playground where I'd scraped my knees at eight. But the air smelled wrong. Not the usual stale pizza and wet dog. This was sharper. Like burnt hair and overripe fruit.
Her entrance hall light flickered. I hesitated, finger hovering over the doorbell. The note in my pocket (burn this) crinkled as I shifted. Inside, something shattered. Mom's voice, thin and strained: "Not again..."
The door swung open before I could knock.
She stood there in Dad's old sweater, sleeves frayed. No visible cracks. But her pupils were wrong pinpricks swimming in gold. "Claire." Her smile stretched too wide. "You're just in time."
Behind her, the living room pulsed. The walls weren't walls anymore, just veins, pulsing amber light. The coffee table floated three inches off the floor.
I stepped back. "What is this?"
Mom tilted her head. "Home." Her fingers brushed my cheek...cold. "Don't you remember?"
The blueprint seared my palm. Liam's voice echoed in my skull: "They'll make you choose."
Then I saw it... the photo frame on the entryway table. Our old vacation shot. Only now, where Dad's face should've been, the paper peeled back to reveal more gold.
Mom followed my gaze. "He never left, sweetheart." Her voice fractured into layered whispers. "He's 'part' of it now."
The house inhaled.
Something moved in the walls.
I ran.
Mom's laughter chased me down the street, not hers, not human. The sidewalk buckled. Golden roots erupted through concrete.
My phone buzzed. Unknown number: "NOW you believe us."
The roots snaked after me, splitting pavement with wet cracks. I veered into an alley, shoulder slamming against brick as I fumbled for my phone, unknown number still flashing. My thumb smeared blood across the screen as I typed: "WHAT IS THIS?"
A pause. Then: "The Breaks are bridges. They built them wrong."
Behind me, Mom's voice echoed from the streetlight speakers: "Claireee..." The bulb exploded in a shower of gold sparks.
I bolted toward the train station, the blueprint crumpling in my fist. The 10:15 idled on the tracks, doors hissing open.
Last chance. I leapt aboard as the roots breached the platform.
The doors sealed. The train lurched forward.
In the reflection of the darkened window, my left eye was all gold now, cracks branching toward my hairline.
My phone buzzed. Liam's number this time.
I answered with shaking hands. "You're alive?"
A wet cough. "Not for long." His voice murmured, like his lungs were full of liquid gold. "They're rewriting the blueprint. You have to..."
The line cut.
The train entered a tunnel. Lights flickered. Every passenger was staring at me...cracks glowing in unison.
The conductor's voice crackled overhead: "Final stop: Terminus."
The brakes screamed.
Outside the windows, the tunnel walls pulsed with veins of light. The passengers stood as one, their jaws unhinging. Not words—just Keating's layered voice pouring out: "WELCOME HOME, SEER."
The doors opened onto a platform I'd never seen—smooth black stone, a single door marked "ARCHITECT".
The passengers didn't move. Just watched as I stepped off.