Reel to Reflection

The tide moved in slow and deliberate waves, breaking against the rocky shoreline outside the safe house. Jessica stood at the window, watching the water shift beneath the moonlight, restless but methodical, like something alive. The words from the phone call still echoed in her head.

Follow the current. It will bring you to the shore. The words looped in her mind like a riptide. But what if the current didn’t lead to shore? What if it pulled you under?

Behind her, Leanna and Olivia had turned the table into a war room. Maps and documents were spread across the surface, marked with lines and notes in hurried script. The business card Vasquez had given them sat untouched in the center.

Leanna tapped her pen against the table. “We’re missing something. The radio station was a dead end, and the facility records don’t give us a location.”

Jessica turned from the window. “Maybe it’s not about finding it. Maybe it’s about being led to it.”

Olivia raised an eyebrow. “You think they want us to find it?”

Jessica picked up the card, rolling it between her fingers. “No. I think they want me to find it.”

Silence settled over the room.

Leanna leaned back in her chair, exhaling. “Then we follow the current.”

Jessica’s fingers tightened around the card. “Yeah. But we don’t let it drown us.”

---

Montevideo’s outskirts were quieter at night, the city’s lights fading into the darkness of the coastal roads. They took two cars—Jessica and Leanna in one, Olivia following a few car lengths behind. It wasn’t paranoia. It was habit.

The coordinates they had pieced together led them to an abandoned industrial dockyard, skeletal cranes rusting in the salt air. The last of the rain clung to the pavement, puddles reflecting the pale glow of the distant city.

Jessica pulled the car to a stop, scanning the empty lot.

No movement. No sounds.

Leanna checked her sidearm. “Either we’re early, or someone’s already watching.”

Jessica stepped out, boots crunching against gravel. The cold air bit at her skin, but she barely felt it. Something about this place felt... wrong. Not in an obvious way. Not in a way she could explain. Just wrong.

A single warehouse loomed at the far end of the lot, its doors hanging slightly open. A light flickered inside—weak, intermittent.

Jessica glanced at Leanna. “We go in quiet.”

Leanna nodded, following as Jessica led the way.

---

The inside smelled of damp concrete and oil, the remnants of old machinery lining the walls. The flickering light came from a single desk lamp, its glow barely reaching the far corners of the room.

An empty chair sat in the center of the space. A reel-to-reel recorder rested on the desk beside it, the tape still spinning.

Jessica’s stomach twisted.

Leanna stepped forward cautiously, inspecting the recorder. She gestured to the speakers. “It’s still playing.”

Jessica reached out, fingers hovering over the stop button. Something about it felt ritualistic, irreversible. Like once she heard it, she wouldn’t be able to unhear it.

Then she pressed it. A voice crackled through the speakers.

"They called it Hollow Man. But it was never the body. It was what’s left after.” There was a short pause, "The ghosts we make… they don’t die. They replicate."

The voice was distorted, distant. A man speaking from the past, or maybe from the edge of sanity.

Leanna tensed beside her. Olivia had just stepped inside, gun drawn. “We’re not alone.”

Jessica forced herself to focus. “The message was left for us.”

Leanna gave her a sharp look. “Or for you.”

Before Jessica could respond, something moved in the shadows. A metallic scrape against concrete. Slow. Deliberate. They all turned at once, weapons raised. Nothing was there.

The tape kept playing, "Find the Facility. Find the others."

Jessica’s skin prickled. Then, the tape cut out, and the room went completely dark.

---

The first thing she heard was the sound of footsteps. The footsteps weren’t loud—but they lingered. Not just in the space behind her, but inside her like echoes or memories. They were distant at first, then closer. Then... right behind her. Jessica spun, sidearm raised. Nothing was there, but the feeling remained.

The lights flickered weakly, buzzing back to life in a sickly yellow glow.

Olivia had her back to the door, scanning for movement. Leanna was breathing heavily, hand still tight on her pistol.

Jessica’s fingers felt cold around her weapon. Something was here. Not someone. Something. The air itself felt altered.

Leanna exhaled sharply. “We need to go.”

Jessica swallowed, nodding. But as they turned to leave, her foot hit something on the floor. She looked down to see a white wooden pawn. The breath left her lungs. She knelt, picking it up slowly. There was a note tucked underneath it. She unfolded it carefully. The handwriting was familiar. It was Mr. Black’s

"We are the architects of our own reflections. But tell me, Jessica—what happens when the reflection looks back?"

Jessica’s grip tightened around the paper. Leanna and Olivia were already moving toward the exit, scanning their surroundings.She forced herself to follow, tucking the pawn and the note into her pocket. The cold feeling in her chest didn’t leave.