The moon, waning and watchful, hung over the Lennox estate, radiating pale light that streamed through the east wing's upper windows. The world was still quiet and gray, just before it began to move again. The atmosphere in the house felt tight, like a violin string held too long.
Moonlight illuminated dust, which flowed in beams, suspended in mid-air as if time had paused. The mansion held its breath, bracing for the cry it already knew was coming.
Dash was the first to witness it, only because he'd woken before the house did, before the first kettle hissed, before the estate's servants shuffled into their routines. He crept down the east corridor barefoot, drawn by an itch beneath his ribs he couldn't shake, the air still holding the brittle hush of pre-dawn.
He saw something: a panel knocked loose near the base of the stairwell, cracked like a rib. Chipped plaster dusted the floor like bone meal. And next to it, he froze, a shattered metal collar, its inner circuitry blackened and dead.
He crouched slowly, breath caught somewhere between his chest and throat. The collar wasn't just broken, it had been ripped apart. Not unclasped, not disabled. Torn. The way wires split when yanked from flesh.
A faint smear of blood marked the marble tile underneath, dried but unmistakable. Dash reached toward it instinctively, then stopped.
He'd seen this model before. Around Igor's neck. Always humming faintly like a sleeping wasp.
Not anymore.
The realization settled like ice behind his ribs. Igor had been here. Not just here, awake. Something had happened last night, something no one had reported. No alarms had sounded. No lights. No warning.
Dash stood and backed up a step, suddenly aware of the floor's creaking. The collar lay there, proof of a storm that had passed in silence. He glanced behind him, then up the staircase, the shadows at the landing stretching too long, too still.
Dash forced himself to step away from the shattered collar. He stepped toward the eastern corridor, long and dusted with moonlight, and it was utterly still. The household's servers were near, just behind the old linen wall where the central console for security feeds buzzed day and night, hidden from the family's view but never off duty.
He slipped through the passage, ducking under a decorative beam where ivy had crept in through cracked stone. The little access room was dark. Not powered down. Not glitched. Purposely dormant.
He tapped the panel. He tried the override code, but nothing happened.
Dash reached into the auxiliary port below the terminal and plugged in the pocket decryptor he'd stolen from Mara's old drawer.
The system had been scrubbed, and lines of garbled code flashed across the small screen.
Someone burned the trail and swept the ashes, leaving logs gone, timelines clipped, internal cameras missing key frames, no motion alerts, no sound triggers, and no pinged proximity sensors.
Dash stared at the decrypted logs, the silence of the mansion now swelling in his ears like pressure underwater.
"Someone didn't just leave," he muttered aloud. "They erased the idea of leaving."
He felt a chill spread across his skin. This wasn't a panic reaction; it was precision. Someone had the time, authority to bury the movements. Who? Not Leo. Not Maisie. And certainly not any of the outside staff.
He was hit by it. This wasn't just about Igor.
Someone inside the estate had helped him disappear. But why?
Dash slowed his pace as he passed the grandfather clock at the end of the west wing.
It had stopped ticking.
He had passed the other two in the east corridor earlier, noting the same thing. It scratched at the edges of his nerves, but now it felt like a pattern.
The estate was quiet, like the world had been paused and no one had pressed play again.
He checked his watch. 4:13 AM.
The silence felt staged.
Dash moved slowly past the dining room, catching the gilded mirror's eye and feeling a familiar shiver down his spine as if it were watching him back. The hallway lights cycled dimly, stretching long shadows across the ornate wallpaper.
Then, something stopped him cold. Shadows moving.
Two figures stepped out from the parlor corner, proceeding cautiously: Gene Vance and his sister, Maisie.
Dash gasped. He hadn't expected to see either of them here at this time of night, least of all together.
"Gene? Maisie?" Dash's voice was low, cautious.
Gene, with her hood pulled back, looked worn, her eyes tired but sharp. Maisie stood beside her, quiet but alert, her gaze flickering between Dash and Gene.
Dash's mind raced. Why is Gene here? After everything, after she vanished? He swallowed hard, voice measured but curious. "I didn't know you were back. Why are you here, Gene?"
Gene met his gaze steadily. "I needed to see for myself. I spoke with Maisie last night in the greenhouse. There's something wrong. The cameras have been wiped clean. Someone erased hours of footage."
Maisie nodded softly. "The estate feels off. The clocks, the silence, it's like everything's been muted."
Dash rubbed the back of his neck. "I noticed too. The security feeds were wiped clean."
Gene's voice dropped. "From what I remember, this kind of erasure usually means a recall protocol was triggered when a subject goes off-script."
Dash frowned. "You mean Igor?"
Gene shrugged slightly. "It fits the pattern. But… I don't know. There's something else at play here."
Dash and Maisie exchanged a glance, uncertainty hanging between them.
"I haven't seen Igor," Dash admitted. "But last night, I thought I heard footsteps. Quiet... Like someone scurrying in the shadows."
Maisie's eyes darkened. "He's changing. Something's wrong with him."
Dash glanced between them. "And you both just came back here to figure this out? How did you get inside? Security is tight."
Gene's expression was steady but weary. "We needed answers. The power glitches started in the south wing."
Dash shifted uneasily. "That wing's mostly unused."
"Exactly why it's the perfect place to hide something," Gene said.
Maisie added quietly, "Or someone."
Dash nodded slowly. "Alright. South wing it is."
The three of them moved down the corridor, footsteps resounding in the silence of the sleeping estate.