Chapter 1
At one in the morning, my husband, David Stone, suddenly shoved me off the bed.
Before I could even react, he was already at the closet, yanking clothes out in a panic.
"Get out of here! Don't ask questions and don't look back!" His voice was raw with fear, a tone I'd never heard from him before.
We drove all night to the next city. David didn't say a single word but just gripped the steering wheel like his life depended on it.
The next morning, I turned on my phone to check the news, and I froze in shock.
What happened in our building last night?
The headline was stark: [Two families missing, whereabouts unknown. No survivors among the other residents.]
With shaking hands, I tapped on the video. Police were coming and going in our hallway.
I turned to David. He was staring at his phone, his eyes hollow, almost frightening.
"Did you... Did you know what was going to happen?" My voice was shaking.
*****
It was one in the morning. My husband suddenly shoved me off the bed.
My name was Julia Stone, and my husband was David Stone.
We'd been married for five years, and he'd never been this rough with me before.
I hit the cold floor, and the icy jolt woke me up instantly.
"David, what the hell are you doing?" I shouted.
I winced, rubbing my sore shoulder as I looked up at him.
David ignored me completely.
Moonlight filtered through the gap in the curtains, washing his face in a ghostly glow.
His forehead glistened with cold sweat, and his eyes held a terror I had never seen before.
It was a pure, primal fear of death itself.
David rushed to the closet, yanking clothes out and tossing them onto the floor.
"Hurry up, Julia, get dressed!" he shouted. His voice was raw and commanding.
"What's going on? Is it an earthquake?" I asked.
I stood up, my heart pounding wildly in my chest.
"Don't ask!" David growled. With a rough motion, he grabbed a coat and threw it at me.
"Put it on, hurry, and don't look back!" he barked.
His eyes locked onto mine, filled with both warning and desperate pleading.
I didn't dare ask any more questions.
Our building was old, and the walls were paper-thin. But now, it was dead silent outside.
Not even the stray cats downstairs were making a sound.
I quickly threw on my clothes and pants.
David was dressed. He glanced at his phone, and the screen's glow made his face look even more ghastly.
He snatched the car keys and yanked me toward the door.
"Wait, my phone..." I said.
"Forget it," David snapped.
His grip clamped down on my wrist like a steel trap, making it ache.
We didn't turn on the lights.
Feeling our way through the darkness, we reached the door. David nudged my shoes to my feet.
"Put them on," he said.
I hurriedly slipped my shoes on, and he was already opening the door.
The hallway's motion sensor lights stayed off. It was pitch black.
There was a strange smell in the air, something I couldn't quite describe, but it set my nerves on edge.
"Take the stairs." David kept his voice low as he pulled me toward the stairwell.
We lived on the ninth floor. David was practically dragging me down the stairs.
Our footsteps echoed through the empty stairwell, each step sounding painfully loud.
My heart was in my throat.
I kept fighting the urge to look back. I wanted to know what was going on up there.
"Don't look back!" David seemed to sense exactly what I was thinking, shouting before I could even turn.
I jolted, and any urge to look back disappeared instantly.
We ran all the way down to the first floor.
When we pushed open the fire door, the cold night air rushed in, and I finally felt alive again.
Our apartment complex was eerily quiet. The streetlights cast long shadows behind us.
David didn't stop. He dragged me, sprinting all the way to the parking lot.
He fumbled for the keys and unlocked our car. The piercing beep echoed across the silent night, sounding way too loud.
He practically shoved me into the passenger seat and jumped in after me.
The moment the engine roared to life, I instinctively looked up at our building.
The windows on the ninth floor were pitch black. The whole building was swallowed by darkness.
It loomed there, silent and massive, like some ancient beast lying in wait in the night.
The car lurched forward, tearing out of the parking lot.
The sudden acceleration slammed me against the seat, making it impossible to move.
I glanced at the rearview mirror, watching our apartment complex recede into the distance.
The building got smaller and smaller, swallowed by the night. Then it disappeared completely into the darkness.
David floored the gas, and the car shot down the empty streets like a bullet.
I couldn't hold it in anymore. "David, what are we running from?" I finally asked.
He didn't even glance at me, just kept his eyes glued to the road ahead.
"Something... that can't be seen," he muttered.