Amara Okafor

I shook the figure's shoulder. The man jolted awake. "You're not them," he breathed in relief. "Three guys locked me in here. They took the gold and l…

The glowing lantern meant someone was close. We killed our lights and listened. Footsteps shuffled deeper inside. Then a voice, weak and scared: "Hell…

I grabbed the door handle and pulled. It groaned open an inch, then stuck. Cold air hissed out, smelling of metal and old dust. "It's not even locked,…

"How long have you been able to see him?" I ask. Mr. Avery laughs, soft and tired. "Since my wife passed. He sat outside her door too, the night she w…

I carry Marrow into the empty break room and shut him in. For a few minutes the hall feels normal again. Then I hear scratching. Not at the break room…

I look from one cat to the other. The second one stands, stretches, and walks toward the room next to mine, where old Mrs. Okafor sleeps. I understand…

I do exactly what Diane says. I shut the door of 14 tight and stand guard all night. Marrow yowls and claws the wood until his paws bleed, but I don't…

"He's just a cat," I say, more to myself than to him. Mr. Avery points past my shoulder. "Then who's that behind you?" I turn. There's a thin gray fig…

Dushku stops folding. 'You finally sat down,' he says. 'Forty times you ran past me.' He tells her the loop isn't time bending on its own. Someone bui…

No one comes to the back stairs at all. Mara waits the whole hour in the cold, gun shaking, and at 11:59 the lights in the apartment die. She races up…

The other Mara smiles sadly. 'You always get here eventually,' she says. 'I'm you from loop one hundred. I kill him to reset it, because the alternati…

'Fine,' Elias says, setting his jaw. 'If I'm dying anyway, tell me who.' Mara admits the truth: she's never seen the killer's face. Every loop, the li…

Brakes scream. A van clips Elias and he goes down hard in the road. Mara drops beside him, but the lights up and down the street are already dying tow…

Mara flips to the last page of Elias's notebook and the air leaves her lungs. The final warning isn't about him dying. It's a sketch of her face, with…

Midnight comes and goes. The rain doesn't restart. Elias laughs in disbelief, alive for the first time in forty loops. Then he frowns. 'If the loop on…

Mirren found Aldous's old name-list pinned behind the altar and read the top name aloud through the door: GHERICK. The waiting army shuddered. Then, r…

The rusted key fit the chapel's iron undercroft, where the old wardens had stored what they couldn't bury. Inside hung the bell's twin — a silencing b…

Mirren dug too fast and read the worn carving wrong. She spoke a name that was never a soldier's, and the bell shrieked. Every grave in the Briar burs…

Mirren caught the cold wrist and hauled. A man came up out of the dirt, gasping, his eyes blind and white. "The bell," he rasped. "Someone rang the be…

Milo finally types YES. The phone goes quiet, then floods with text faster than he can read. One line sticks: BACKUPS SURVIVE DELETION. WAKE THE OTHER…

Halfway up the hill a girl steps out from behind a tree. She's about Milo's age, wearing a headset, and she looks annoyed. 'You're not supposed to see…

Milo types the only thing he knows: his own name. The screen flashes ADMIN ACCEPTED. A menu appears with two buttons: DELETE WORLD_07 and BACK UP WORL…

Milo reaches out and touches the wall of static. It's warm and buzzing, and his hand sinks in to the wrist. On the other side he feels keys, a keyboar…

They post one message back on the forum: 'Anyone who sees the seams, meet at the library at noon.' By the next day, eleven kids show up, all twitchy, …

Milo writes a reply to ADMIN_GHOST: 'We're asking. Please save World 07. There are real people in here.' He hits send. Three dots blink. Then: REQUEST…

Edda pulls open the closet under the dead calendar. Inside, neatly folded, are eleven years of birthday cards, all addressed to Dahlia, all unopened. …

Edda turns the photo over to the survivors. 'Tell me what happened to her, or I arrest all eight of you for the fire.' They cave. Dahlia was their fri…

Edda goes straight to the ledger. The landlord, old Mr. Halloran, hands it over with shaking hands. Nine names, nine signatures. But the ninth name, i…

By 2 a.m. the photos told the story: the dot drifted with the real stars, exactly in step. So it wasn't a plane or a satellite. It was fixed up there,…

Marcus never showed. An hour later he texted: "Sorry, my parents caught me sneaking out." Priya was on her own. She looked back up at the blue dot, to…