As they walked, the corridor around them flickered—lights pulsing like a heartbeat, walls occasionally creaking as if the building itself was breathing. But the group kept steady.
Victor led the way with an unnerving spring in his step.
They had turned back, just like Elliot once tried to—acknowledging the shift in the prison's energy. The realization that progress sometimes meant retreat. And now, they were headed toward the very place they'd first arrived in this phase.
Behind Victor, the rest followed cautiously—boots scuffing the dusty floor, water bottles shifting in backpacks, breath warm in the cold air.
A hushed chatter began to stir among the group.
Riley nudged Owen gently with her elbow, walking beside him with a curious smirk. "So, uh… you're not as shy as I thought you'd be."
Noa raised an eyebrow playfully. "Right? You were, like, silent this whole time. But somehow you're the only one who always knows what we're missing in supplies"
Sierra giggled, brushing a bit of loose hair behind her ear. "It's kinda impressive, actually. You're like... quietly heroic."
Owen nearly tripped over his own feet.
"H-Heroic? Me?" he stammered, blinking way too fast, ears turning visibly red. "N-No, I just… I've been keeping in my mind and keeping track of what we should eat and what we should save for future survival—like, just basics and... n-not heroic…"
His eyes darted to the floor, then toward the walls. "I-It's nothing special. I just want us to get out safely, that's all."
Evelyn tilted her head, smiling. "You've been keeping track of all that without anyone asking you to or without having any appreciation, Most people expect appreciation over something like this y'know. That's kind of a big deal."
"I-I mean…" Owen scratched the back of his neck, clearly overwhelmed. "I just thought someone needed to, and I was already… doing it, so…" He pauses for a bit. "You guys are appreciating whatever I have been doing so far so... its fine for me"
"You're cute when you panic," Riley teased with a grin.
That nearly made Owen choke on his own breath.
"I—uh—I—can we just focus on finding the door back?!" he said quickly, eyes darting away. "I-I think we're close. J-just a few turns left."
The girls exchanged amused looks but didn't push further. The teasing stopped, but the warmth lingered—his nervous sincerity had won them over more than anything else could.
And just like that, for a moment, the prison's dread didn't feel so all-consuming.
They were still walking through hell…
But at least they weren't walking through it alone.
As they kept walking for a more while, they realized something.. Something was wrong with this place..
This place, actually looked oddly familiar now.
And that's when it happened.
The tension broke like a snapped bone.
They were back at the cell.
The same cell.
The familiar walls. The rusted bars. The blood-slick floor. The bone fragments still scattered in the corner like they'd never left. It was unmistakable.
A dead silence gripped the group as realization set in, sinking into their bones like cold water.
Ava's voice barely rose above a whisper. Her eyes, wide and trembling, locked onto the chipped wall as if she could will it to change.
"The same thing…"
Her breath hitched.
"Happened."
She turned slowly toward the others, her voice quaking.
"And now… they're all dead."
Her knees weakened, but she didn't fall. Not yet.
Owen felt sweat drip down his temple. His throat tightened. His fingers twitched around the strap of his bag as he glanced toward Victor.
"What… the hell is going on?" he muttered, mostly to himself. His voice cracked at the end.
Samuel ran a hand across his face with a heavy sigh, then stepped toward Victor, his voice sharp and firm.
"Explain. Now."
Victor stood still. For once, confused. His grin faltered just slightly—an uncharacteristic flicker of uncertainty behind his eyes.
Victor stood silent.
Jace exhaled slowly, folding his arms. His calmness didn't come from peace—it came from cold resignation.
"I didn't believe you anyway," he said, not even looking at Victor. "So this isn't new to me."
Behind him, Callen, Lawren, and Wesley kept their eyes on Jace. Seeing his detached posture gave them something to cling to, even if it was paper-thin.
But the girls…
Sierra snapped.
Her patience—gone.
"HUH?!"
She stormed forward, finger pointed, voice slicing through the silence like glass.
"WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR EXPLANATION, NUTSACK?!"
Victor blinked at her, seemingly stunned by the sheer volume of her voice.
"You said the loop would break!" she barked. "You said this was the way out! You made Ava relive everything! You made all of us believe there was a damn point to this!"
Riley didn't speak, but the way she gritted her teeth and stared daggers said enough.
Noa shook her head slowly, muttering, "This place… it's a fucking trap."
Evelyn leaned against the wall, trying to catch her breath, her hand clenching into a fist."We're not getting out, are we?" she whispered.
Samuel stepped in front of him.
"No more maybes, Victor. You don't know anything."
The silence after that was bitter.
Victor's eyes gleamed with that same eerie glint as he muttered, voice low and deliberate—
"You're all wrong."
The group froze mid-breath. Every eye shifted toward him. Silence clung to the air like smoke.
Sierra's scoff broke through it, sharp and venomous. "Oh, we're wrong? How 'bout you go seek some therapy instead, dickhead."
Victor didn't even blink. His voice was calmer now—colder.
"You're all kids. Jumping to conclusions without knowing anything."He pointed slowly toward the far end of the corridor, the place they had believed to be the loop's origin.
"Do you see that place? Do you really think we're back in the same cell?"
A beat.
Nobody spoke. But heads turned.
Even Sierra stopped, her eyes narrowing as she followed his finger. A silence crept over them again—this time, not suffocating, but curious.
Samuel's brow furrowed. His eyes scanned the area. And then—
He saw it.
The water bottle.
The one Owen had tossed aside earlier when the bottle was empty—it wasn't there.
Samuel turned his gaze downward. The floor near where Ava had broken down—where her tears had soaked into the concrete—was dry. Completely. As if it had never happened there at all.
His eyes lifted again, this time more slowly.
The cell looked identical. The bars, the layout, the scratches on the wall—but something was off.
The lighting. The bulb overhead wasn't flickering like before. It looked intact. The tone of the light felt like the other corridors. More structured. More… real.
Everything in this particular cell looked like this cell wasn't a part of the entire prison, the corridors were slightly off shape then the rest of the other parts of the prison. The bulb in this cell was different than the one where the other cells reside.Even the rust patterns on the bars were different. Not cleaner—just other. A variant.
That's when it clicked.
This wasn't the same cell.
Not the one they'd been trapped in.
Not the place they watched Elliot die.
But another cell—eerily similar, painfully deceptive, but inherently different.
Samuel's voice broke through the stillness.
"This is the actual cell we were looking for?"
His tone was quiet, tinged with stunned realization.
Ava looked up, startled. Riley blinked, her earlier anger mixing now with confusion. Noa, Evelyn, and Sierra exchanged glances, and even Callen, Lawren, and Wesley stepped closer, scanning the surroundings again with new eyes.
Jace simply nodded once, as if he had sensed something was off but hadn't yet pieced it together. Owen turned to Victor, wide-eyed.
Victor's grin slowly returned—less mocking now, more satisfied.
"You were so busy panicking, you didn't stop to think. This game doesn't trap you the same way twice."
And just like that, the mood shifted—subtly but undeniably.
Hope.
It flickered in their eyes like light returning to a storm-torn room.
Callen exhaled the breath he'd been holding. Lawren gave a faint, relieved chuckle. Riley leaned her head against Evelyn for a moment, whispering something about how they might actually get out.
Even Ava, her eyes still red and hollow, seemed to sit up a little straighter, a soft spark in her chest beginning to re-ignite.
The tension in the air eased.
That crushing weight—like chains around their ribs—lifted just enough to let them breathe again.
But not everyone was ready to celebrate.
Seirra stood frozen in place, her brows tightly furrowed, arms slightly trembling. Her voice broke through the rising chatter like a knife scraping metal.
"How do you… know all of this?"
Her eyes locked on Victor, filled with suspicion—no longer just annoyance or rage, but genuine fear.
The others turned toward him again. The girls grew quiet. Jace's expression darkened slightly. Samuel instinctively stepped a little in front of Ava.
Victor simply smiled.
That unsettling, drawn-out, too-wide smile.
Not triumphant.
Not proud.
But like he was enjoying the attention.
Like a puppeteer who just watched the strings tug perfectly.
His eyes flicked toward Seirra—but he said nothing.
No words.
No explanation.
Just that smile.
And it creeped the fuck out of everyone.
Owen instinctively stepped back. Riley looked at Evelyn, unease clear on her face. Noa whispered, "What is wrong with him?" under her breath. Callen, Lawren, and Wesley all exchanged glances again—but this time, the fear was back in their eyes.
Even Samuel's hand subtly curled into a fist at his side.
Victor's voice cut through the air again, calm but cryptic.
"And I also know something else..."
He turned his head slowly toward Ava, his tone shifting to something softer—almost reverent.
"Ava girl, your boyfriend Elliot... he was actually right about everything in this prison."
The group, still reeling from his earlier cryptic smile, all went still again.
Ava's brows drew together, not in rage this time, but concern... and a heavy, growing curiosity.
"...What?"
Samuel's voice came sharp from beside her.
He didn't like where this was going.
Victor exhaled, slowly. Like a man about to deliver gospel.
"When I first saw the rulebook…" he began, pacing slightly, hands moving with his words, "...the same thought hit me that must've hit Elliot. That the entities... aren't the real danger here. It's the escape that's dangerous."
"The loop confirmed it," he added, glancing toward the corridor they'd just walked from. "Most people would panic. Give up from exhaustion. From thirst. From the pure weight of fear alone."
"Like we did, when we had fear inside out hearts." he finished, his eyes dragging across Owen, Samuel, and Jace.
Samuel tensed, not liking where this was going.
Jace didn't flinch.
Owen looked away.
Victor continued. "The Warden isn't actually dangerous."
Seirra scoffed hard, arms folded.
"You're just insane," she spat.
She paused—but she didn't argue further.
Because everything else Victor had said before had been right.
And that's what scared her most.
Victor, undeterred, kept speaking, now locking eyes with Ava again.
His voice softened again, like he pitied her.
"Elliot's only mistake… was that they chose to fight instead of escape."
Ava's fists clenched at her sides, eyes glinting—caught somewhere between mourning and reflection.
"Your group was already drowning in fear when they tried to fight the Warden," Victor said."And that fear... fed him. Made him stronger. Faster. Crueler."
He took one slow step forward.
"But if someone fights the Warden without fear… and I don't mean pretending. I mean truly, absolutely..."
He tapped the side of his head. "No fear in the mind. No fear in the heart."
"They will win."
Silence.
Thick and absolute.
Victor looked over the group again—his expression less manic now, more grim. More certain.
"That's how this entire prison works."
He paused, then said the final line slowly, almost like a sermon:
"Fear fuels this prison."
The words hit harder than they should've.
Even Seirra didn't say anything this time.
Samuel stood stone still, processing.
Owen visibly swallowed.
Jace… closed his eyes for a second, as if thinking deeply.
Ava… just whispered under her breath.
"He wasn't trying to fight... he was trying to protect me."
And now, the whole group stared into the shadows ahead of them, realizing—
They weren't just fighting monsters.
They were fighting their own fear.
Victor's voice carried on, dark and unnervingly calm
"I know you guys won't be able to handle your fear like I do…"
He smiled—that same twisted, knowing smile.
"So be ready to escape properly."
THUMP.
A heavy echo rolled through the corridor.
The entire group froze.
THUMP.
It came again—closer this time. Louder. Heavier.
Even though Victor had just told them not to fear…
Even though they'd been given an explanation, the sound alone betrayed their bodies.
Palms went sweaty felt like someone had oiled them up recently.
Legs weakened felt like a bunch of wet noodles.
Hearts raced felt like their heart was gonna come out of their mouth if they won't take deep breaths.
The fear crept in like a toxin.
Victor, on the other hand, only laughed.
Low. Chilling. Amused.
And then—it came into view.
The Warden.
Massive. Cloaked in shadows. Its face still a mystery behind the leather mask.
But it wasn't the mask.
It wasn't the height.
It wasn't the hulking presence that made everyone take a step back.
It was the collection of heads.
Tied to its waist like grotesque trophies.
Like keychains.
And among them—
one stood out.
Messy brown hair.
Half-lidded eyes.
A broken, empty expression still frozen in its final moment.
Elliot's head.
Socket hollow. Lifeless.
And that's when it happened.
Ava broke.
She screamed.
A soul-wrenching, sharp cry—so sudden and raw it cut through the group like a blade.
She fell to her knees, clutching her chest, like the air had been ripped from her lungs.
"NO!"
Tears returned. Heavier. Messier.
But this time, no one moved to comfort her.
Because the Warden…
was staring at them now.
Unmoving.
Breathing.
Ready.
Victor… still smiling… whispered quietly:
"Now let's see what you're all made of."