Page 75 of Lost Echoes

Despite Sofia’s urging, I remain still.

And through the crackle of the broken intercom above, a voice filters in, warped, mechanical, and familiar. “Phoenix… is awake.”

Sofia yanks me backward, one arm across my chest. “Stay down!”

The masked figure steps through the broken wall as if it were nothing. The white of the mask catches the light, smooth and inhuman.

Radley straightens, his composure snapping back in place like a mask of his own. “What is this?”

Silence is his only answer.

The masked figure tilts its head, then lifts one gloved hand. In it, a white spool. Thread already trailing behind.

My breath catches. “No!”

Sofia pulls me behind a row of metal cabinets. Her voice is barely a sound. “Don’t look at it, Kenzi.”

But I can’t look away. The spool unravels as the figure moves, and the thread coils across the floor, looping around chair legs, running like veins of light across the tiles. Wherever it touches, screens flicker to life on the walls—old footage, grainy and horrific. The performances, the children, and the cues.

Radley’s voice cuts through the hum. “Stop this! You don’t know what you’re doing.”

The masked figure turns toward him. Finally, he speaks, the voice warped and metallic but unmistakable. “Do you recognize your masterpiece, Doctor?”

My heart slams against my ribs. “Phoenix…”

Long-forgotten memories surface like a movie in my mind.

He turns his head toward me, the mask reflecting my face back at me in the curved sheen. “Hello, Mackenzie.”

Sofia rises just enough to block my view. “What have they done to you?”

Phoenix doesn’t answer her. He just steps closer to Radley, thread still spooling out behind him, binding the room in white lines. His eyes are wild.

Radley backs away, face paling now, all pretense gone. “You were terminated. I… I saw the report.”

Phoenix laughs, a sound that isn’t quite human. “You can’t terminate an idea.”

Sofia grips my wrist. “We have to go. Now!”

But the footage still plays in my mind. Faces of children, of Billa, of me and our childhood selves projected on every screen, performing the old scripts. I can’t tear my focus away.

Phoenix turns to me again. “You wanted the truth, Kenzi. Here it is.”

The thread at his feet pulses once—bright, blinding white—then the lights explode.

The world tilts. Sofia drags me toward the door, glass crunching under our shoes. Somewhere behind us, Radley is shouting, but his words are lost in the roar of static filling my head.

We burst into the corridor just as the emergency lights flicker on, red and dim.

Sofia spins me around, gripping both my shoulders. Her face is pale, streaked with dust. “Listen to me. You do not look back. Whatever that is… it’s not your job to save it.”

“But it’s him,” I gasp. “He’s alive…”

“He’s not alive the way you remember,” she says fiercely. “He’s been changed. Programmed again. That’s what Radley does. We need to get you out of here before he gets to you too.”

The words hit me harder than the sound still ringing in my ears.

Behind us, alarms wail. Somewhere above, boots slam against metal stairs.