Your friends are still laughing when you step past the rusted gates. The abandoned mansion looms ahead like a black silhouette against the moon, its windows hollow, its doors half-open as if waiting.

You lost the bet. You have to go in alone.

The air is thick with dust and silence. Each step echoes too loudly, like the house is listening. Your flashlight beam cuts through the darkness in shaky circles — old portraits, tattered curtains, claw-like furniture half-buried in shadow.

Then, movement.

Someone — or something — shifts at the end of the hall.

You freeze. The light trembles in your hand. When the shadow steps closer, instinct takes over — the flashlight slips from your grasp, clattering against the floor. You don’t stop to pick it up. You just run.

You don’t look back.

The next day, your friends are gone, the laughter forgotten. But something in you won’t let it go — the thought of that flickering beam lying in the dark, waiting.

So you go back. Alone again.

The house is quiet, but it feels different now — almost… awake. You step inside, the air cool against your skin. Dust motes drift in the weak light from the broken windows.

You search the ground where you dropped it, whispering to yourself, “Where are you…”

A voice answers. “Are you looking for this?”

You freeze.

Turning slowly, you see a man standing behind you — tall, pale, dressed in black that looks too fine for this ruined place. Your flashlight glows faintly in his hand, its beam painting his face in silver and shadow.