"Fear is clever-it never knocks, it just lets itself in."
- Kylie Rossi-Smith, Genesis: The Catalyst
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Maya had been laughing five minutes ago. There was still glitter on her cheekbone, catching the overhead light in fragments. The kind of glitter that made you look like you belonged in a music video. But now...
Now reality felt off-key. Like something had skipped a beat.
She hadn't even realized her hand was still in Kevin's until she felt him squeeze it gently. The hallway loomed with noise-murmurs on murmurs, layering like static, panic coursing through the crowd like a slow-building wave.
"What's going on?" someone asked.
"Did someone fight?"
"Is that smoke?!"
She didn't know when the music stopped. Or when the screaming started. It had all bled into one long, thumping blur.
The gym's doors burst open as someone pushed through, and the air that rushed in hit her like a warning. Not cold. Not relief. Hot-dense-like breath from something that shouldn't be breathing.
Then came the shouting-teacher voices, sharp and urgent.
"Everyone out! Now! Move!"
From the side doors came a heavy gust of heat, pressing like hands. Maya stepped back instinctively, colliding into Kevin again.
"That's not just a prank," she said.
"Nope," Kevin replied, scanning the horizon. "That's a fire."
She saw it then-just a curl at first, leaking out from the left side of the building like a ghost dragging its feet.
Not steam. Not fog.
Smoke.
Outside, the night was chaos. People huddled in pajamas and heels, barefoot on the concrete. Some were crying. Some just stared blankly. At the back of the building, a faint orange glow painted the sky, and smoke slithered upward like a warning.
"Is it the generator?"
"No," someone near Maya muttered. "It's the parking shed. I saw something blow up."
She turned instinctively-scanning the crowd for familiar faces.
That's when she saw them.
Ava and Layla. Mid-fight.
Layla was crying-raw, trembling-and Eleanor was trying to pull her back. Ava stood rigid near the edge of the crowd, her voice sharp.
"You're acting like I started the damn fire!"
"I'm acting like you've been shady since you disappeared for twenty minutes!" Layla shouted back.
Ava threw up her hands. "Wow. I left to call my mum-want to check my call log too?"
Layla didn't flinch. "You didn't say anything about a text."
Ava blinked. Just once. But it was enough.
"You think I don't know you got one too, Layla? You've been jumpy all night."
Eleanor stepped between them. "You two-seriously? We're beside a burning building. Maybe calm down."
But it was already spiraling.
Maya's chest tightened.
A text?
Something stirred in her-just as her phone buzzed in her purse.
She pulled it out with a shaking hand.
YOU ARE READING
GENESIS: THE CATALYST
Ciencia Ficción"In a world built on control, what happens when the controlled fight back?" Maya Smith's ordinary life is shattered the night she vanishes without a trace. Awakening inside the enigmatic DYG facility, she finds herself imprisoned alongside others wh...
