Chapter 5 - Echoes in the Dark
The small flashlight on Leo’s key fob flickered, casting a weak, trembling circle of light across the damp stone walls of the sub-basement. Piles of discarded children's clothing—sweaters, overalls, sneakers, and jackets—were stacked in methodical heaps along the perimeter of the room, as if sorted by size and color.
"They didn't just disappear," Marcus whispered, dropping his brother’s denim jacket onto the floor as if it burned his skin. "Everyone in town said they ran away to the city. My uncle told me they caught a bus."
"Look at the tags," Leo said, his voice barely a breath. He pointed his light toward a row of metal lockers rusted shut against the far wall. Scrawled in white paint across each door were numbers corresponding to the current roster of Room 4B.
Marcus walked toward locker number twelve. His own name was etched into the gray metal with a sharp instrument. He reached out and pulled the handle. The door swung open smoothly, revealing a stack of notebooks, a half-eaten apple turned to black dust, and a small cassette recorder with a red blinking light.
"Don't touch it," Leo warned, grabbing Marcus's arm. "It's a trap."
"It's not a trap," Marcus said, his eyes fixed on the blinking light. "It's my voice."
He reached inside and pressed the play button. The tinny, distorted sound of a seven-year-old Marcus echoed off the concrete walls, reciting a list of rules that made no sense. “Rule one: Never look at the clock tower. Rule two: Never speak of the yellow blouse. Rule three: Always stand still when the bell rings.”
"I don't remember recording that," Marcus said, backing away from the locker in sheer terror. "I never had a cassette player."
"Someone's coming," Leo hissed, turning toward the stairs.
Heavy, measured footsteps began descending the concrete steps above them. The beam of a high-powered flashlight cut through the darkness, sweeping across the piles of clothing and coming to rest directly on Marcus’s face.
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"Curiosity," Ms. Gable’s voice rang out, cold and devoid of human warmth as she stepped into the light, holding the school wooden ruler across her palm. "Is the most dangerous trait a child can inherit."
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