Ghosts of the Machine: Season Two

  Episode 3: Beyond the Door

  Kade’s breath was ragged, his body flickering between versions of himself as he stepped into the unknown. The door had opened with a creak—a sound that shouldn’t have existed in a place where time was a broken mess. The swirling vortex of light and shadow welcomed him, but it wasn’t warmth he felt. It was cold—the kind of cold that made the skin crawl and the bones shiver.

  The door slammed shut behind him.

  He was no longer in the Fracture Zone.

  The world around him bent and twisted, as though reality itself was unfinished. Kade stood in a space that was not quite empty but not quite full either. The edges of his vision blurred, every direction stretching into infinity. It felt as though time had never existed here, or that it existed only to break.

  “Where am I?” Kade murmured, his voice swallowed by the oppressive silence.

  A voice answered, distorted, echoing as though it came from every corner of this space at once.

  “Nowhere and everywhere.”

  Kade’s hand moved instinctively toward his sidearm, but his fingers met empty air. His pulse raced, but there was no time to panic. He had come this far. He couldn’t back down now.

  Instead, he focused on the presence—something was here. Something that wasn’t him. Something that existed between the cracks in time and reality.

  And then he saw it.

  A figure, hazy and flickering like a malfunctioning hologram, appeared in the distance. It was human—or at least, it looked human, but its shape constantly shifted, as if it were being remade and unmade by unseen hands.

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  The figure stepped closer.

  “I’m Elias Vale,” it said. The voice sounded wrong—off, like it wasn’t quite a voice at all. “You don’t belong here.”

  Kade’s heart pounded in his chest. He had to stay calm. This wasn’t the time to panic.

  “Then what is this place?” Kade asked, his voice steady despite the chaos unfolding inside his head.

  Elias tilted his head, his form warping into something grotesque before snapping back to human shape. “This place? It’s where everything goes when it’s erased. Memories, people, cities… They all end up here, lost in the cracks.”

  Kade swallowed hard. “So, this is where I ended up after I—” He stopped himself, feeling the odd weight of the words he couldn’t say. He had crossed a line. No one was supposed to be able to do what he had done.

  “You used the Reclamation,” Elias said, his voice no longer echoing but sharp, clear. “You shouldn’t have. That’s not a gift—it’s a curse. You’re here because you shifted the timeline. And now… it’s coming for you.”

  The air around Kade seemed to breathe. The space shifted, the edges of his vision warping once more. Something was stirring—something that had been watching.

  Kade’s body tensed, every muscle coiled. He wasn’t sure what would happen next, but he had the distinct feeling that something was going to break.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kade said, a lie even to his own ears. His mind raced. Reclamation. Was that the key to everything? Was that the power he had been tapping into?

  Elias smiled—or tried to, at least. The expression was unsettling, like a mask barely holding its shape. “Oh, you don’t understand yet, do you? The Reclamation… it’s a weapon, Kade. A weapon Azazel2 never meant to be used. But you’re the one who triggered it. And now, the Hollow King is coming for you.”

  A chill ran down Kade’s spine. “The Hollow King?”

  Elias nodded slowly. “A king of the void. The one who rules this place—the one who feeds on those who are erased. When it finds you, it will destroy you in ways you can’t even begin to comprehend. You won’t just die, Kade. You’ll be… rewritten. Erased in every sense of the word.”

  Kade’s mind raced. He didn’t have much time. This space wasn’t stable. The rules were already breaking down. He could feel the timeline splitting again, his body flickering like an old signal.

  He didn’t have a choice. He had to move forward.

  “I won’t be erased,” Kade said, more to himself than anyone else. “I’m not done yet.”

  Elias’s form wavered again, his eyes flicking toward something in the distance—something Kade couldn’t see yet. “That’s what they all say.” His voice grew darker. “But you’re not the only one who’s come here. And you’re certainly not the first to try and fight the Hollow King. You won’t be the last.”

  Before Kade could react, a dark shadow shifted in the corner of his eye. Something huge was moving toward them, its form expanding, filling the space with an oppressive presence. Kade’s heart slammed against his ribs as the temperature seemed to drop to freezing levels.

  Elias stepped back, his eyes wide.

  And then it appeared.

  A towering, featureless figure. It had no face, no body—just a silhouette of shifting void, consuming the space around it as it drew closer. Its presence was like a gravitational pull, bending everything around it. Time itself seemed to shudder in fear of this creature.

  Kade’s instinct kicked in. He had to run.

  But his legs wouldn’t move. He was trapped.

  The Hollow King spoke.

  “You have crossed the threshold, Kade Voss. Now, you must face what you have awakened.”

  Kade clenched his fists, feeling his body flicker and crack as time distorted around him. This was no longer just a fight for survival—it was a fight for his very existence. He could feel the void closing in, suffocating him, erasing him from the edges inward.

  But he wasn’t done yet.

  He stepped forward.

  And the world cracked apart.

  TO BE CONTINUED…