The Langston mansion had stood empty for over forty years.No lights. No owners. No answers.

  Locals avoided it. Not out of fear—at least, not the kind they’d admit to. Just that odd, silent tension people get when passing by a graveyard at night. You don’t look too long. You don’t breathe too hard. You move on.

  But for a group of sixth-graders armed with too much curiosity and a Friday afternoon to kill, the mansion was perfect.

  “Last one to the porch is a chicken!” Tessa yelled, sprinting ahead.

  Her friends followed—groaning, laughing, tossing backpacks to the dirt. There were six of them: Tessa, Milo, Ronnie, Janie, Mark, and Lila.

  Tessa, as usual, led everything. Milo trailed behind, quiet, clutching his backpack like a shield.

  He didn’t want to come. Not really. But he had a crush on Lila, and when she smiled and asked if he was brave enough, what could he say?

  Inside, the house groaned. A slow, settling creak. Almost like it was listening.

  They pushed the door open together. The air inside smelled like wet wood and candle wax. Their shoes scraped across old tiles covered in dust, and cobwebs clung to their arms like fingers.

  “This place is sick,” Ronnie said, grinning as he spun in a circle. “I bet there’s ghosts.”

  Janie smacked his arm. “Stop that!”

  Tessa pointed her flashlight upward. “Second floor looks stable. Wanna play hide and seek?”

  Milo’s stomach flipped.

  “Seriously?” Mark asked. “Here?”

  “Come on, it'll be fun!” Tessa grinned, already climbing the stairs. “No phones. No lights. Real rules.”

  The group murmured, exchanged looks, but followed anyway. No one wanted to be the one who chickened out.

  Milo lingered last at the base of the staircase.

  For a second… he thought he heard something behind him.

  A breath.

  A whisper.

  But when he turned, no one was there.

  They gathered in a narrow hallway upstairs, doors branching into faded bedrooms. Tessa stood in the center, eyes bright with mischief.

  “Okay! One seeker. Everyone else hides. Count to 30. No peeking. No talking. Last one found wins.”

  She grinned. “I’ll go first.”

  Before anyone could argue, she spun to face the wall and began counting.

  The kids scattered.

  Milo ran.

  Not quickly. Not confidently. But with the instinct of prey. He ducked into the furthest room he could find, heart pounding. There was a wardrobe—big, old, and crooked. He squeezed inside, shutting the doors behind him just as Tessa shouted “Twenty-nine… thirty!”

  Then silence.

  Total silence.

  Not just quiet—empty. Like the house itself stopped breathing.

  Milo pressed himself into the wood. His heart thudded so loud he swore it echoed. The air felt thicker. He tried to calm down.

  That’s when he heard the first scream.

  Not playful. Not part of the game.

  Real.

  Milo froze. His hands clutched his backpack tighter. His first instinct was to call out—to ask if Tessa was okay.

  But something deep in his bones screamed: Don’t.

  The hallway outside creaked.

  Then it sighed.

  Yes—sighed. Like the house itself was exhaling, tired of pretending.

  The sound of footsteps came next. Slow. Wrong.

  It wasn’t Tessa.

  Whoever—or whatever—it was didn’t walk like a person. The steps were uneven, dragging. Accompanied by a soft, wet squelch.

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  And underneath it all, something muttered words Milo couldn’t quite make out.

  “One… two… better not move…”

  “Three… four… where’s the door…?”

  He shut his eyes and tried to shrink into the darkness.

  And that’s when it happened.

  The wardrobe shifted.

  The wood grew cold. The space around him stretched. Not physically—but spiritually. Like the room had been swallowed by something bigger. Older.

  Milo opened his eyes and realized…

  The mirror across the room no longer showed his reflection.

  It showed something else.

  A stitched figure with a burlap sack over its face… turning.

  Turning toward the wardrobe.

  Miles away, the flame in Maya’s charm flared.

  She jolted upright on the couch, dropping her bag of spicy chips. “...Whoa.”

  Tenchi looked up from his notebook across the room. “You felt it too.”

  Maya stood, brushing off crumbs. “That was strong. Which one?”

  “Hide and Seek,” Tenchi said, flipping to a new page. His pen moved with calculated precision. “Langston house. Breach confirmed.”

  Maya groaned, grabbing her jacket. “Didn’t we just deal with Red Rover last week?”

  “Entity resonance is escalating. That’s three breaches in under a month.”

  She muttered, “Feels like he’s ramping up the games.”

  Tenchi didn’t reply. He just closed the notebook and grabbed his blade.

  “Langston,” he said again, walking toward the door.

  Maya caught up beside him. “Race you to the anchor.”

  The moment they stepped into the mansion, they knew.

  Maya’s charm flared again, casting flickering orange across the rotting hallway. “Ugh. Layer’s already folded.”

  Tenchi knelt, pressing his fingers to the warped floorboards. “Time is slower inside. We’re minutes late in real time… but hours have probably passed in the Layer.”

  They moved forward in sync—Tenchi scanning the shadows, Maya watching the walls for movement.

  The house had become a maze of flickering doors and hallways that didn’t make sense. Walls shifted when you blinked. Windows showed different scenes. One showed a child’s eye peeking back.

  The Forgotten Layer was alive.

  And it wanted to play.

  “Can you sense the anchor?” Maya asked.

  “Not yet,” Tenchi said. “But I feel something upstairs.”

  As they climbed the staircase, Maya whispered, “Feels familiar.”

  Tenchi nodded. “It’s an old game. But the host… is new.”

  They found the first child on the landing—Ronnie.

  Or rather, what was left of him.

  His body sat frozen mid-crawl. Eyes wide open. Mouth stretched in a silent scream. His limbs were stiff… but not broken. Not bleeding.

  Just… paralyzed. Like someone had pressed ‘pause.’

  Maya knelt beside him. “Residual fear energy.”

  Tenchi added, “He moved during the wrong count. Probably 'Red Light' variation.”

  She stood, eyes burning. “I hate this game.”

  They moved deeper into the house.

  One by one, they found signs.

  A ribbon caught in a doorframe.

  A broken flashlight.

  Tiny footprints running in circles… and vanishing.

  Finally, they reached the room at the far end of the hall.

  And they heard it.

  A whisper. Slow. Playful. Wrong.

  “Five… six… time for tricks…”

  Tenchi’s hand was on his sword before Maya even raised her charm.

  “The seeker’s close,” he said.

  “And the kid?” she asked.

  A soft sniffle answered from behind the wardrobe.

  Tenchi opened the door slowly.

  Milo flinched.

  Tenchi knelt. “Hey. Milo, right?”

  The boy looked up in shock. “How do you—?”

  “No time. You have to stay here. Don’t move. No matter what happens.”

  Maya turned, charm glowing brighter.

  The whisper became a growl.

  “SEEKER… FOUND THEM…”

  The hallway dimmed as if someone had pulled the sun further from the sky.

  The shadows stretched.

  And then… it stepped into view.

  The Seeker.

  It stood at the end of the hall, limbs too long, face hidden beneath a burlap sack stitched with a twisted grin. Buttons for eyes. Its arms dragged behind it, wrists disjointed, fingers twitching in anticipation.

  It didn’t walk—it jerked, like it was being yanked along invisible strings.

  Milo whimpered.

  Tenchi stepped in front of him, sword low. “Anchor’s close. The entity’s bound. We just need to find—”

  “YOU. ARE. IT.”

  The Seeker lunged.

  Tenchi moved fast, blade catching the creature mid-swing. The impact rattled the floor, but it didn’t fall. It laughed. A dry, soulless rasp that filled the hallway with dread.

  Maya shouted, “Cover me!”

  She dashed past, searching the corners for reflections, sigils—anything that would scream “anchor.”

  The Seeker twisted, lunging again—this time at Milo.

  enchi leapt, shadow-stepping in front of the child, and slashed. His blade tore through cloth and void flesh, leaving a trail of black smoke.

  “NO CHEATING…”“NO HIDING…”

  The creature backhanded him into the wall. The wood cracked. Milo screamed.

  Maya ran through two more rooms—each more broken than the last. One wall was covered in drawings… crayon scribbles of kids playing games. In one, a boy was hiding in a closet. In the next panel, he wasn’t alone anymore.

  She turned and spotted it.

  A mirror. Not large. Just a simple hand mirror on a desk—cracked down the center.

  Inside, it didn’t show her reflection.

  It showed the hallway.

  And a stitched figure standing over Tenchi.

  She gritted her teeth. “Found you.”

  Back in the hallway, Tenchi stood, blood dripping from his arm. The Seeker towered above him, limbs twitching. It raised its hand—strings pulling tighter.

  “ONE… TWO… TAG, YOU—”

  CRACK.

  Maya smashed the mirror with a flaming charm. The sound echoed like a scream.

  The Seeker froze mid-motion.

  Then the Layer screamed.

  The house shook. The wallpaper peeled like it was shedding skin. Shadows howled, retreating. The Seeker’s body snapped upright, convulsing, limbs folding in on themselves as if sucked into a hole that didn’t exist.

  It hissed. “The Master…doesn’t like…cheaters…”

  Then it disintegrated—leaving behind only a smear of ash.

  Tenchi exhaled, wiping his blade.

  Milo looked between them, eyes wide. “W-What was that…?”

  Maya offered him a hand. “Something you’ll forget tomorrow. We’ll make sure of that.”

  But before they could leave…

  Tenchi paused.

  There was a second mirror behind the first. Smaller. Shattered. And etched into its back, carved deeply:

  GAME 5

  TAG: STARTING NEXT.

  —Property of the Game Master

  Tenchi’s brow furrowed.

  “This… wasn’t part of this Layer.”

  Maya peered at it. “That’s… a clue?”

  He nodded. “A breadcrumb. A warning. Or a dare.”

  They both looked at Milo, who had already started forgetting their names.

  They walked the boy back to the breach point—a crooked doorway that shimmered like fog.

  Tenchi pressed a charm to Milo’s forehead. “Sleep.”

  The boy slumped peacefully. Maya caught him, smiling softly. “He’ll wake up on his front porch. Think it was a dream.”

  Tenchi stayed silent, watching the shadowy mirror dissolve.

  ? Game: Hide and Seek

  ? Entity: Seeker (Stitched Host)

  ? Anchor: Cracked Mirror (2nd Floor)

  ? Survivors: 1

  ? Status: Game Terminated

  ? Notes: Cross-layer message detected — “Game 5: Tag” confirmed.

  Maya’s Note: “Why is he warning us? He’s never done that before.”

  Tenchi’s Note: “Because he wants us to play… even if we’re not ready.”