Under normal circumstances, instinct would've taken over.
Duck. Shove. Swing. Something.
But Hao's limbs felt wrong. Heavy. Lagged. Like his body wasn't sized correctly.
Kevin didn't have that problem.
He filled the hallway like a wall of moving muscle, bigger than Hao remembered him to be. His shoulders seemed to stretch the shadows around him, like the house was trying to peel away from his shape.
Cold rushed through Hao's veins. But his legs also finally remembered their job.
He bolted, socks skidding, shoulder clipping a hanging frame and sending it spinning into the floor. Glass burst behind him in a sharp crack that felt far too loud. He didn't look back. Couldn't. The front door was ahead, the one sane object left in the world. Salvation. Escape.
He hit it full-speed.
The impact rattled his teeth. The door didn't budge.
A pressure pressed through the wood, almost gentle. Fingers? A palm? Something bracing the door from the outside. Hao felt it through the frame, a slow push, like whatever was out there had all the time in the world and wanted him to know it.
And behind him, the floorboards creaked under Kevin's weight. A long, steady inhale scraped the air.
Hao's shoulder rebounded hard enough to numb his arm. He pivoted and sprinted sideways into the nearest room, yanking the door closed behind him.
Impact followed a heartbeat later.
The door jumped in its frame. A butcher knife scraped down the other side, metal biting deep, dragging back up with slow, grinding force.
Hao staggered back.
Kitchen. Chemical sting. Old grease. Moonlight cutting a rectangle across tile.
The window stood open and perfect, an obvious exit carved out of the night. Forest and sky waited just beyond the glass.
He climbed onto the counter and reached for the frame—
A voice rolled through his skull, low and settled, like it had roots.
Don't.
His hand froze.
Breath fogged the glass.
Then the kitchen door blew open.
He dropped instantly.
The knife sliced empty air where his leg had been. He rolled under the table, shoulder scraping tile, and then shoved with everything he had.
The table crashed toward Kevin.
Kevin caught it. His fingers dug into the wood as if grabbing foam. He shoved it aside, slamming it into the old cabinets hard enough to rattle every plate.
Hao barely brought his arms up before the kick hit him.
Pain detonated along his ribs as he flew backward, spine cracking off the counter, head bouncing off the corner. The world flashed white.
A moment later, Kevin loomed over him, knife raised high above his head, ready to end everything.
But he didn't expect that Hao's hand would flash out so quickly, as he ripped the nearest drawer free and hurled it into Kevin's face.
The impact cracked loud. Metal forks and dull knives exploded across the floor. Kevin staggered, teeth red, shoulder smashing into cabinets.
Hao didn't wait.
He tore out another drawer and slammed it into Kevin's shoulder. Wood splintered. Utensils scattered.
A third drawer screeched free.
He drove it upward into Kevin's throat.
The last hit finally folded the bigger boy, choking him down to the tiles.
And now the only sound remaining in the dark cabin was Hao's pulse shaking his vision and the high ringing hum of adrenaline coming from inside his head.
He leaned against the cabinets, dragging in shallow breaths through cracked ribs. The kitchen was a wreck of splintered drawers and streaks of red.
He would've thrown another drawer just to make sure, but his searching hand found nothing. He'd already emptied the whole counter.
So for a long second, he just stared at the mess ahead.
The place looked like it had been hit by a hurricane in those few moments he fought for his life. Forks and spoons glittered across the floor, reflecting the dim moonlight from outside. A broken drawer handle lay near his foot. Pieces of wood, some with teeth marks, were scattered across the tiles under his feet.
His eyes drifted lower.
The butcher knife rested near Kevin's limp hand. Not clean. Not soaked either. Just wrong. A real weapon after a fake party. A real weight in a place that didn't follow real rules.
He crouched, ribs screaming, and wrapped his fingers around the handle.
It was heavy, cold, and solid.
The bodies upstairs… those wounds hadn't been carved by anything that used a knife.
Whatever held the front door shut hadn't needed a blade.
Hao swallowed hard, the taste of blood sharp on his tongue. He forced himself to sweep the room again, slower this time, looking for anything he'd missed. Any hint that Kevin had done more than attack him in blind violence.
Nothing matched.
The hallway, the kitchen, the leftover wreckage from their fight. All of it sat there in a crooked, uneasy stillness, and beneath it lay the quiet, ugly truth:
Kevin wasn't the main threat.
Something else was.
Hao tightened his grip on the knife until the handle bit into his palm as he limped into the hall.
As he passed the entrance, something brushed against him. Not a touch. More like a thought nudging his ribs from the inside. A tug he didn't have a name for.
His hand drifted to the front door handle.
He pressed.
Click.
Swoosh.
The door swung open without resistance.
Cold forest air washed over him, thin and sharp enough to sting his lungs. Pine. Frost. Damp soil. And under it, a quieter note. Like a held breath. Like the world outside was leaning closer.
The empty clearing stared back at him. Motionless trees. Moonlight layered over dead leaves. Nothing human-shaped. Nothing monstrous.
The same door that had held like a concrete wall minutes ago now drifted open as if it had been waiting for him to try again.
Hao shut it slowly. The latch settled into place with a soft, obedient tap.
Behind him, somewhere in the kitchen, a sound whispered.
A tap on glass.
A faint, delicate sound as the window opened slowly.
Then another.
The bottom pane of the window shivered, pressure blooming across its surface in tiny fractures.
Pale moonlight warped around the shape behind the glass, bending like light didn't quite know how to pass over it.