Kai's car rumbled down Route 16, the headlights cutting through the darkness like twin blades. The road stretched ahead, empty and lifeless, flanked by endless fields and the occasional skeletal remains of old barns.
His shotgun rested on the passenger seat, loaded and ready. The report from the trucker weighed heavily on his mind. A figure walking alone in the night. A shifting face.
This wasn't a random sighting. The creatures were moving openly now.
The radio crackled. "Lieutenant, it's Taylor," came the younger officer's voice. "I'm keeping an eye on the trucker. He's still shaken, but I don't think he's making this up."
Kai kept his eyes on the road. "I didn't think he was."
There was a pause. Then Taylor's voice dropped lower, hesitant. "Sir... do you think it's the same thing from the farm?"
Kai considered that. "No. The one at the farm is dead." He tightened his grip on the wheel. "But that doesn't mean it was alone."
Silence followed. Then Taylor asked, "Should I call backup?"
Kai exhaled through his nose. His instinct screamed at him to handle this alone. He'd spent too long fighting these things in the dark to risk anyone else. But he also knew he couldn't do this forever.
"Not yet," Kai said. "But stay on standby."
"Understood."
The radio clicked off, and the only sound was the low hum of the engine.
Kai's headlights caught something ahead. A figure. Standing on the side of the road, just past a curve.
It wasn't moving.
Kai slowed the car, his pulse steady but alert. As he got closer, he could make out the details.
A man. Or at least, something that looked like a man. Tall, thin, dressed in old, tattered clothing. His skin was pale, almost gray under the headlights, and his face—
Kai's stomach twisted. The trucker hadn't been lying.
The face was... wrong.
It wasn't one face. It was many. The features twisted and shifted, constantly rearranging. Eyes appeared and disappeared. A mouth formed, then melted away, replaced by another, grinning too wide. It was as if the creature was struggling to settle on a single identity.
Kai stopped the car, but he didn't get out. Not yet.
The figure turned its head toward him, its body unnaturally still. Then, slowly, it took a step forward.
Kai rolled his fingers over the shotgun's grip. He had killed one of these things before, but this one felt... different. More controlled. More deliberate.
He reached for his radio. "Taylor, I found the hitchhiker."
A static-filled pause. "You need backup?"
Kai watched as the thing took another step, its feet barely making a sound on the asphalt.
"Negative," he said. "But stay on the line."
The figure stopped about ten feet from the hood of the car. For a moment, neither of them moved.
Then, it spoke.
"You shouldn't have come back."
The voice wasn't normal. It was layered, a dozen voices speaking at once—men, women, even children. Each word felt stretched and distorted, as if reality itself was bending to let it speak.
Kai didn't react. "Didn't know I needed an invitation."
The creature tilted its head. Its face kept shifting—sometimes human, sometimes something else.
"The cycle isn't over," it said. "It will never be over."
Kai's grip on the shotgun tightened. He had faced plenty of horrors before, but this was the first time one of them had talked.
"What do you want?" he asked, voice steady.
The creature's mouth twisted into something like a grin.
"To warn you."
Kai raised an eyebrow. "That so?"
The grin widened. "You think you ended it. You think you stopped the cycle. But you only made it worse."
Kai's blood ran cold, but he didn't let it show. "Elaborate."
The thing let out a sound—half a laugh, half a whispering wind. "You took one piece off the board. And now... the rest are waking up."
Kai didn't blink. He just cocked the shotgun.
"Then I'll put them back to sleep."
The thing stopped smiling. Its shifting face finally settled into something almost human. A man, thin, hollow-eyed. The resemblance was unsettling.
It was Kai's own face.
For the first time in a long time, something in Kai's gut twisted.
Then the creature whispered, "You're already part of it."
The air around them shifted. The road blurred, the sky seemed to fold inward, and for a split second, Kai felt like he wasn't standing on a road anymore—he was somewhere else. Somewhere dark.
And then, just as quickly as it happened, it was gone.
The creature was gone too.
The road was empty. No sign of footprints. No sign that anything had ever been there.
Kai stood still, his mind racing.
The words lingered.
"You're already part of it."
Kai exhaled sharply and lowered the shotgun.
He didn't know what that meant. But he knew one thing.
The cycle wasn't just continuing.
It was getting worse.
Kai climbed back into the car, his hands steady but his mind anything but. He grabbed the radio.
"Taylor," he said, voice calm but firm. "Get me everything you can on previous disappearances along Route 16. Cross-check them with any reports of weird sightings, especially in the last year."
Taylor hesitated. "Did you find him?"
Kai stared out at the empty road.
"No," he said. "But I think he found me."
Silence. Then Taylor responded, his voice uneasy.
"Copy that, sir. I'll get on it."
Kai set the radio down and started the engine. The road ahead was dark, but he didn't hesitate. He drove forward, knowing that whatever was waiting for him in the shadows—
It wasn't finished with him yet.