The old clock in Seraphine Vale's bedroom had always been a little off. Its hands moved unevenly, dragging themselves forward with a stubborn, almost deliberate hesitation. Tonight, however, it stopped entirely at 3:03 AM. One second it ticked normally, the next, the soft mechanical hum vanished, leaving only silence—and an uneasy stillness in the room that pressed against her chest.
Seraphine's eyes fluttered open. Moonlight spilled through the half-open curtains, illuminating dust motes that hung suspended in the air like tiny stars. The soft glow painted the familiar walls of her room in silver, but the shadows in the corners stretched too long, curling unnaturally, as though the light itself recoiled.
A sound drifted from the hallway—soft, urgent, but not quite right. Her younger brother, Ethan, murmuring in his sleep. She rubbed her eyes, sitting up on the edge of her bed. "Ethan?" she whispered, her voice barely carrying past her lips.
No response. Only the faint echo of his voice, layered strangely, like two whispers pressed into one. It was distorted, almost alien, vibrating against the edges of her mind. Her stomach twisted. This was wrong. Something in the air was wrong.
She slid her feet onto the floor. The wood was cold, biting at her skin, sending a shiver up her legs. She moved toward his door, every step feeling heavier than the last, as if gravity itself had thickened in the room. The hallway stretched before her, impossibly long, and the familiar night sounds—the hum of the fridge, the distant barking dog outside—had disappeared.
The door to Ethan's room was slightly ajar. A thin ribbon of light from the hallway lamp painted a stripe across the carpet. But something flickered in the corner of her vision. Shadows. They weren't ordinary shadows. They slithered along the floor like smoke, pooling and thinning with a life of their own.
She pushed the door fully open. Ethan sat upright in bed, his eyes closed. His lips moved silently, but the words she heard were warped, layered with something not his own.
Three… oh… three…
Her heart slammed against her ribcage. The air grew colder, thick enough that each inhale burned slightly in her lungs. She took a cautious step closer, reaching out as though she could break the spell with her hand. But the room itself felt different—the familiar walls were bending, stretching just at the edges of her vision. Her fingers brushed against the blanket. It felt heavier than it should, almost damp with an invisible weight.
Then she realized—it wasn't just the room. It was the world.
The curtains had stopped moving mid-sway. Dust hung frozen, suspended like glittering motes in a dark pond. Her ceiling fan hovered mid-spin. Even the soft hum of the refrigerator had vanished. Only she moved. Only she breathed.
A whisper curled along the edges of her hearing, soft and intimate, yet terrifying in its certainty. "We see you".
Shadows in the corners twisted and coiled, growing darker, feeding on the absence of sound. They moved toward her with patient, deliberate intent, silent as smoke, but alive. Her pulse spiked, a frantic drumbeat against the eerie stillness.
Seraphine's gaze snapped back to Ethan. He was still upright, still whispering, but his form wavered slightly, as though the edges of his body were dissolving into the frozen night. She reached out—but a tendril of darkness stretched toward her hand, licking at her skin without touching, cold and hollow, like a mouthless scream.
A scream that wasn't her own caught in her throat.
The world had stopped. She was alone in it.
And somewhere, beneath the shifting shadows and silver light, she understood the truth with a clarity that made her stomach drop: the Hollow Hour had begun.