The Hollow voices

Elena felt the ground shift beneath her feet as if it were breathing, a slow rise and fall that made her question whether she was still awake. She kept her eyes fixed on Joshua, waiting for some reassurance that this wasn’t another trick, another fragment of the nightmare Wescroft had become. But he merely stared back at her, his expression inscrutable.

“You want me to go back?” she repeated, her voice wavering. “Back into that place?”

Joshua nodded slowly, the movement almost imperceptible. “There’s no other way. You’ve only seen a fraction of it—the surface level. The real Wescroft lies beneath. That’s where the heart of the darkness is, where it keeps everyone trapped.”

“The heart…” she whispered, dread coiling tighter in her chest. She glanced back at the town, now a shadowed silhouette against the horizon. It looked almost peaceful from this distance, but she knew better. She could still feel its cold, hollow gaze on her back, like a predator waiting for her to stumble.

“Every person lost in Wescroft is trapped in their own echo,” Joshua continued, stepping closer. “They’re caught in loops of their worst memories, repeating their last moments over and over. The town feeds on their fear, their pain. The only way to break the cycle is to confront the thing that’s holding it all together.”

Elena swallowed hard. “What is it? What’s holding it all together?”

“The entity that took them. It’s not just a ghost or a memory. It’s… something else. A force that was born from everything we went through—the accidents, the disappearances, the guilt. It’s a living manifestation of all the fear and grief we left behind.”

Elena’s head spun. “But how do I confront something like that? I don’t even know what it is. I—”

Joshua placed a hand on her shoulder, and she froze. His touch was icy, yet she felt a strange comfort in it—a reminder of the boy she used to know, the boy who always seemed to understand her better than she understood herself.

“You know it, Elena,” he said quietly. “You’ve always known. You just have to remember.”

Before she could ask what he meant, a sharp wind whipped through the clearing, carrying with it a faint sound—laughter. Elena’s heart twisted painfully. It was a child’s laughter, light and musical, but tinged with an eerie, hollow echo that set her nerves on edge. She turned instinctively toward the woods, her gaze searching the shadows between the trees.

“Do you hear that?” she whispered, but Joshua was already backing away, his face tightening with fear.

“They’re coming,” he said, his voice urgent. “The other echoes. They know you’re here.”

Elena’s pulse quickened. She could see movement now—shapes flitting through the darkness, circling the clearing like wolves closing in on prey. Faint whispers drifted toward her, growing louder, overlapping, until she couldn’t tell if it was one voice or many.

“Elena… Elena…”

“Joshua, what do I—”

But he was gone. One moment he was standing in front of her, and the next, he melted into the shadows, disappearing as if he’d never been there at all. Panic surged through her, but there was no time to think, no time to question. The voices were closer now, the shadows pressing in.

“Elena, come play with us…”

The laughter rose, sharp and mocking. She spun around, her eyes darting wildly, but there was nothing to see—only the dark shapes, shifting and writhing at the edge of her vision. The world seemed to tilt, the trees bending and twisting as if trying to trap her.

She stumbled backward, her breath coming in short, ragged gasps. “No, no, no… I’m not playing! I’m not—”

A child’s face emerged from the darkness, pale and hollow-eyed. Amy. Her hair hung in matted curls around her shoulders, her mouth stretching into a wide, unnatural grin.

“Why did you leave us, Elena?” Amy whispered, her voice barely more than a breath. “We were friends. We shared everything… even our secrets.”

Elena shook her head frantically. “You’re not real. You’re just a—a memory!”

But Amy only tilted her head, her smile growing sharper, her eyes dark and empty. “I’m more than a memory now. You made me this way, Elena. You abandoned us. And now, you’re going to stay with us. Forever.”

She reached out a hand, her fingers long and thin, stretching toward Elena. Before she could react, something cold and slimy brushed against her arm. Elena screamed, jerking back and nearly falling. The shadows swirled around her, taking on more solid forms—children’s faces, each one twisted in a grotesque parody of the friends she had once known.

Mark appeared next, his baseball cap askew, his body hunched and distorted. “You didn’t even try to help us,” he murmured, his voice thick and slow, as if he were speaking through water. “You just ran away.”

Joshua’s voice joined the chorus, his form flickering in and out like a weak flame. “You’ve been running ever since, haven’t you?”

“No!” Elena cried, pressing her hands to her ears as if that could block them out. But the voices were inside her head now, filling every corner of her mind.

“You let us die…”

“It was your fault…”

“Stay with us, Elena…”

The ground seemed to dissolve beneath her feet, and she felt herself falling, tumbling through a sea of darkness. The faces swirled around her, their accusations melding into one shrieking cacophony. She was sinking, the air thick and suffocating, pulling her down, down—

Get up.

The voice cut through the chaos, low and commanding. It wasn’t one of the whispers. It was something stronger, something… familiar. Elena blinked, gasping for breath. She was lying on the ground, the cold earth pressing against her back. She struggled to focus, the world blurring and shifting.

“Elena, get up!”

She forced herself to her feet, swaying unsteadily. The shadows recoiled, hissing, but they didn’t retreat. She could feel their hunger, their desire to pull her back into the abyss. But the voice—the voice was stronger.

“Elena, you have to move!” It was Joshua again, his voice clear and sharp, cutting through the fog in her mind. “Follow me!”

She turned, her eyes searching wildly. There—just beyond the tree line, his silhouette glowing faintly in the darkness. Without thinking, she stumbled toward him, her feet dragging through the dirt. The whispers rose behind her, screaming now, but she kept moving, pushing herself forward with every ounce of strength she had left.

Joshua’s figure blurred, then solidified again, always just out of reach. He led her through the trees, twisting and turning, until they burst out into another clearing. The air was different here—thicker, heavier, as if weighed down by some unseen force.

“Elena…” Joshua’s voice was faint, and she realized with a start that he was no longer ahead of her. He was standing behind, his form fading in and out like a dying light.

“What—what’s happening?” she gasped, turning to face him.

“This is as far as I can go,” he said quietly. “You’re close now. Close to the heart of it. But I can’t follow you there.”

“What?” Panic surged through her again. “No, I can’t do this alone. I don’t even know what I’m supposed to—”

“Yes, you do.” His gaze was intense, piercing. “You’ve known all along. It’s why you came back. The letter wasn’t a warning. It was a message. From you.”

Elena stared at him, her mind reeling. “What are you talking about?”

“You wrote that letter, Elena. To yourself. You knew you’d forget—knew the town would make you forget. But deep down, a part of you remembered. And that part called you back here.”

She shook her head, tears stinging her eyes. “I don’t understand. I—”

“Go to the treehouse,” he interrupted, his voice firm. “That’s where it started. That’s where you’ll find it. The thing that took us. The thing that took you.”

Elena’s breath caught in her throat. The treehouse. She hadn’t thought about it in years, hadn’t dared to. But now, the memory surged back—the rickety wooden structure high in the branches, the place where they’d shared their secrets, their dreams.

The place where everything had gone wrong.

“You have to go now,” Joshua whispered, his voice fading. “Before it’s too late. Before the town wakes up completely.”

“Joshua—”

“Find it, Elena. And end it.”

And then he was gone, dissolving into the shadows. The clearing felt empty, hollow, the air crackling with static. Elena stood there, trembling, her gaze fixed on the dark shape of the treehouse looming in the distance.

She took a deep breath, steeling herself. There was no turning back now.

With one last glance at the empty clearing, she started toward the treehouse, each step bringing her closer to the truth she’d been running from her entire life.

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