WHISPERS IN THE DARK

Asheville had always been a quiet town, the kind of place where everyone knew each other's names and secrets. But now, a shadow hung over it—a presence cold and unseen.

Detective Everett Reed stood at the edge of Mrs. Barker's property, his boots crunching against the frost-kissed grass. The air smelled of damp earth and something faintly metallic, like the remnants of a storm. Yellow police tape fluttered weakly, a half-hearted barrier between the living and the dead. The house behind him loomed, its windows hollow and dark. Mrs. Barker had been found there, her body twisted and drained of life, but with no apparent cause of death.

Everett lit a cigarette, the smoke curling in the frigid air. "Third one this month," he muttered, his voice low.

"Fourth," a voice corrected behind him. Officer Lane, young and jittery, stepped forward. "You didn't hear? Another one's gone. Dan Porter. Disappeared last night from his shop. No sign of a struggle."

Everett's brow furrowed. "No body?"

Lane shook his head. "Just... gone. Same as the others."

Everett exhaled slowly. "What the hell's happening to this town?"

The air inside Mrs. Barker's house was stale, thick with the scent of old wood and something sour. The living room was untouched—no signs of a break-in, no overturned furniture. A half-knitted scarf sat abandoned on her armchair, the yarn still threaded through the needles, as if she had simply vanished mid-stitch. But she hadn't vanished. She had died—alone and screaming, according to the neighbors who heard but never saw.

Everett's eyes caught on the floor. The hardwood, though dusty, bore faint, strange markings—like scratches, but not from any tool or animal he recognized. He crouched down, running his fingers over the grooves. They were shallow but deliberate, forming a pattern he couldn't decipher.

"Get forensics to photograph these," he ordered. Lane nodded, snapping shots with his phone for the time being.

Everett's gaze shifted to the walls, where picture frames hung—family, holidays, a life lived fully. But one frame was broken on the floor. He picked it up carefully. The photo inside was intact—Mrs. Barker holding a small, fluffy cat.

"A cat," Everett murmured. "Did she live alone, Lane?"

"Yeah. Husband passed years ago. No kids. But, uh... neighbors say she had a cat. Haven't seen it since she died, though."

Everett's fingers lingered on the glass. "Find it."

Hours passed, and the winter sun dipped behind the hills, dragging long shadows across the streets. Everett sat at his desk in the Asheville precinct, the desk lamp casting a warm but insufficient glow over the clutter of case files and coffee cups. Four missing. One dead—Mrs. Barker. No connections, no motives. Only the unease that threaded through the town like a creeping vine.

The phone rang, jolting him from his thoughts.

"Detective Reed," he answered.

The voice on the line was breathless. "Sir—this is Officer Gray. We just got another call. Kid's gone missing."

Everett's grip tightened around the receiver. "Where?"

"Briarwood Road. Name's Thomas Redding. Thirteen years old."

Everett felt his stomach knot. "I'm on my way."

The Redding home was chaos—sobbing parents, flashing police lights, and a tension so thick it felt like the walls were closing in. Mrs. Redding, her eyes red and wide with panic, gripped Everett's arm the moment he entered.

"He was just here!" she wailed. "We were watching TV—he went to his room to get his phone, and then—then he was gone! No sounds, no doors, nothing!"

Everett's voice was calm but firm. "We'll find him, ma'am. I promise."

He moved swiftly through the house, his eyes scanning for anything out of place. Thomas's room was neat—a teenager's shrine of posters, video games, and discarded clothes. The window was locked from the inside. No sign of forced entry.

But there—on the carpet. Faint, almost invisible. Scratches. The same pattern from Mrs. Barker's floor.

Back at the station, Everett laid the crime scene photos side by side. Mrs. Barker's floor. Thomas's carpet. The same scratches—curved, intersecting lines like claws dragged with a purpose.

His desk phone rang again, sharp and sudden.

"Reed," he answered.

A male voice, low and unfamiliar, spoke. "You're looking in the wrong places, Detective."

Everett's heart quickened. "Who is this?"

A dry chuckle. "I'm just someone who knows... the cat always comes back."

The line went dead.

Everett slammed the receiver down, his pulse thundering. The cat. Mrs. Barker's cat. The only thread connecting the chaos

Night deepened, and the streetlights outside the precinct buzzed and flickered. Everett sat in his car, the engine idling, his fingers drumming against the wheel. The voice on the phone—it wasn't a threat. It was a warning.

He decided to follow the one lead he had. Mrs. Barker's neighbor, old Mr. Carson, had mentioned seeing the cat after her death. Near the woods behind her property.

Everett drove toward the tree line, the headlights carving a path through the darkness. The car's tires hummed against the wet asphalt, but the noise felt too distant, too small against the heavy silence of the night. As he neared the woods, the temperature dropped, the air turning sharp and biting.

A sense of unease crawled over his skin. This wasn't just a search for a missing cat—it was a hunt. And he wasn't sure what was hunting him.

The forest swallowed the sound of his engine, leaving only the rhythmic crunch of dead leaves beneath his boots as he stepped out of the car. The trees seemed to lean toward him, their gnarled branches twisted like fingers, reaching for something just beyond the veil of the present.

Then, through the trees, he heard it.

A soft, almost melodic sound—a purring, low and vibrating in the air like the hum of a tuning fork. It didn't belong to any normal cat. It was too resonant, too unnatural. Everett's instincts screamed for him to turn back, but his feet kept moving.

He paused at the edge of a clearing, the moonlight cutting through the trees in narrow beams, illuminating the space with an otherworldly glow. And there, sitting perfectly still on a fallen log, was the cat.

But it wasn't just a cat. Not anymore.

It was black as night, its fur sleek and shining under the pale light, but the eyes—those eyes were what drew him in. They glowed like twin shards of amber, reflecting his every movement. It was like it knew he was there before he even saw it.

For a long moment, they stared at each other. Everett's heartbeat quickened, but he couldn't look away. The cat's gaze was too powerful, as though it could see into him—into every secret he'd ever buried. He took a step forward, his voice barely a whisper.

"Here, kitty."

The cat tilted its head slowly, its pupils narrowing to slits. And then, the most unsettling thing happened: it smiled.

Not a simple twitch of the lips, not a trick of light—it was a full, unnerving grin. Its teeth were small but sharp, gleaming in the dark like rows of needles. The smile didn't belong to any animal he knew, and it sent a chill down his spine.

Everett froze, every muscle in his body tensing, urging him to move, to get the hell out of there. But his feet were glued to the earth. He couldn't take his eyes off the creature. He took another step forward, and that's when the air around him shifted. It grew colder, but not the kind of cold you feel when the temperature drops. This was something darker, something that wrapped around his ribs and squeezed.

The shadows around him deepened, stretching and distorting. They didn't move like natural shadows—they crawled, slithering across the ground toward him, and Everett could swear he saw faces in them. Faces that whispered, that begged. He couldn't make out the words, but the desperation was clear.

The cat's purring grew louder, reverberating in the pit of his stomach, a deep, rumbling sound that didn't seem to come from any living thing. It was like the cat itself was a conduit for something else—something ancient, something hungry.

Suddenly, the cat's head snapped back up, and its eyes glinted brighter, as if it had been waiting for something. A sharp, icy wind swept through the trees, sending a shiver through Everett's spine. Then, out of nowhere, a voice—soft, almost tender—whispered from the shadows, "She's watching you now."

It came from nowhere and everywhere all at once. The voice didn't feel human—it was far too cold, far too old.

And then, the cat stood.

Its body seemed to ripple as though it wasn't quite solid, its form blurring in and out of focus. The shadows clung to it, writhing like a cloak of darkness, and as it moved toward him, Everett could feel the pull of it—something magnetic, something wrong.

The air around him felt thick, suffocating, pressing against his chest. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came. His breath came in ragged gasps, and he could feel the ground beneath his feet beginning to tilt, as if reality itself was unraveling.

And just as he took another step back, the ground beneath him cracked. The world shifted—and Everett's vision blurred. He felt his pulse pounding in his ears, the sounds around him becoming distorted, like he was submerged underwater.

He turned—

And everything went dark.