Chapter 3 – The On-Call Curse

Living five minutes away from a supermax prison for eldritch horrors sounds convenient on paper.

In reality it’s a trap.

The real estate agent called it a cozy bungalow with rustic charm and great privacy. The facility HR department called it a mandatory housing benefit for the Head Warden of Special Containment. I call it the only place I can afford on my salary that doesn’t require a two-hour commute.

It sat at the edge of the woods.

The siding was peeling gray paint. The porch listed slightly to the left. The whole place vibe-checked as a murder cabin from a bad horror movie.

But it was mine.

I parked my beat-up Volkswagen in the gravel driveway. The engine sputtered and died with a final wheeze like it was relieved the trip was over.

Silence wrapped around the car.

For a second I just sat there. Hands on the wheel. Staring through the windshield at the dark windows of my house.

“Please just let me sleep.”

I grabbed my bag from the passenger seat.

The air outside smelled like pine needles and damp earth. A nice change from the sterile ozone and terror-sweat smell of the facility.

I unlocked the front door.

The inside was a disaster zone of takeout boxes and laundry. Cleaning wasn’t exactly high on my priority list when my day job involved negotiating with literal gods.

I tossed my keys on the counter.

They skidded across the laminate and hit a stack of unopened mail. Probably bills. Maybe a jury duty summons I would definitely ignore.

My bed was calling my name.

It wasn’t a fancy bed. Just a mattress on a frame I assembled myself and a comforter that had seen better days. But right now it looked like the most comfortable object in the known universe.

I didn’t even bother changing out of my uniform.

I face-planted onto the pillow.

The fabric felt cool against my cheek. My muscles started to unknot one by one. The tension of dealing with Thalia’s obsession and Loki’s chaos began to drain away.

My eyes closed.

Drifting.

Just drifting.

The silence was perfect.

BZZZZT.

My phone vibrated against the nightstand like an angry hornet.

I groaned into the mattress.

“No.”

BZZZZT. BZZZZT.

It wasn’t stopping.

I reached out blindly, my hand slapping the wood until I found the device. The screen brightness was blinding in the dark room.

Caller ID: Containment Control.

I swiped answer and held it to my ear.

“This better be an apocalypse.”

“Kai! Thank god!”

It was Miller. The night shift supervisor for Sector 4. The guy sounded like he was hyperventilating inside a paper bag.

“Breathe, Miller. What happened?”

“It’s Loki. She… she did something to the floor.”

I rolled onto my back and rubbed my eyes.

“Define ‘did something’.”

“It’s gone, Kai! The floor is gone! We opened the viewing shutter to do a headcount and the floor of the hallway just isn’t there anymore. Just infinite sky. Jenkins almost fell in!”

Classic Loki.

“It’s an illusion, Miller. The floor is still there.”

“It feels real! I threw a pen and it just kept falling forever!”

“She’s messing with your depth perception and localized gravity. Put me on speaker.”

“I… okay. Hang on.”

There was a fumbling sound. A loud clatter like he dropped the phone. Then the echoey quality of a speakerphone in a concrete hallway.

“You’re on.”

I cleared my throat.

“Loki.”

Silence.

“Loki, I know you can hear me.”

A familiar giggling voice drifted through the speaker.

“Kai? Is that you, Kai? You sound tired, Kai!”

“I am tired. Because I’m in bed. Which is where I want to stay.”

“But Kai! The guards looked so bored! I just wanted to give them a nice view, Kai! Everyone likes skydiving!”

“Miller does not like skydiving. Miller likes walking on solid ground.”

“Miller is boring, Kai.”

“Turn the floor back, Loki.”

“Or what?”

I could practically hear the grin in her voice. She was testing boundaries. Seeing how far she could push the remote parenting dynamic.

“Or I cancel our game session tomorrow. No riddles. No banter. Just me sitting outside your cell reading a technical manual in silence for an hour.”

A gasp.

Dramatic. Loud. Absolutely fake.

“You wouldn’t! That’s cruel, Kai! That’s torture!”

“Try me. Three seconds. One.”

“You’re being mean!”

“Two.”

“Fine! Fine! You win, Kai! You’re such a buzzkill sometimes!”

“Zero.”

“It’s back! It’s back!”

Miller’s voice cut in again. He sounded relieved enough to cry.

“The floor is back. Oh god. The floor is solid.”

“Great. Goodnight, Miller. Tell Jenkins to stop looking at her shifting tattoos or he’ll throw up.”

“Thanks, Kai. Seriously.”

I hung up and dropped the phone on the floor.

Peace.

Finally.

I closed my eyes again.

The adrenaline spike from the call was fading. My heartbeat slowed down. The pillow was soft. The blanket was warm.

Sleep was right there.

Just a few inches away.

RIIIIING.

This time I actually screamed into the pillow.

A muffled, frustrated sound of pure agony.

I snatched the phone off the floor.

Caller ID: The Warden.

This was bad. The Warden didn’t call for pranks. The Warden called for containment breaches and end-of-the-world scenarios.

I sat up, running a hand through my messy hair.

“Talk to me.”

“Mr. Evans. We have a situation in Block Seven.”

Voice steady. clipped. Professional. But I could hear the background noise. Alarms. People shouting.

“Thalia.”

“Thalia. The temperature in the sector has dropped forty degrees in the last three minutes. Frost is forming on the monitoring equipment. The structural integrity of the glass is compromised.”

“Is she trying to break out?”

“No. She’s… sulking.”

Of course she was.

“Put me through to the intercom.”

“Patching you in now.”

There was a click. A burst of static. Then the sound of wind howling through a confined space.

“Thalia.”

The howling stopped instantly.

“Kai?”

Her voice was small. Vulnerable. It didn’t match the terrifying reality-warping frost she was generating.

“Darling? Is that you?”

“It’s me. Why are you freezing my coworkers?”

“I felt you leave.”

“We talked about this. I have to go home to sleep.”

“Your home is too far. I can’t feel your heartbeat from here. It’s… cold. The void is cold without you.”

“So you decided to make everyone else cold too?”

“They don’t matter. Only you matter.”

I rubbed my temples. A headache was building behind my eyes. A sharp pressure that had nothing to do with psychic attacks and everything to do with sleep deprivation.

“Thalia, listen to me. I need you to warm up the room.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t want to. I want you here.”

“If you don’t stop, the glass will crack. If the glass cracks, the emergency lockdown triggers. If lockdown triggers, I can’t come in tomorrow morning.”

Silence.

Heavy. Weighty.

“You wouldn’t come?”

“I couldn’t come. The blast doors would be sealed for twenty-four hours. Automatic protocol.”

“I could break the doors.”

“Then I’d have to file paperwork. Hours of paperwork. Do you want me doing paperwork or visiting you?”

She made a frustrated noise. A sound that was half-human sigh, half-eldritch growl.

“I hate paperwork. It steals your time.”

“Exactly. So stop the frost.”

“Fine.”

“Promise?”

“I promise. But you have to bring me something.”

“Bribery? Really?”

“Compensation. For my emotional distress.”

“What do you want?”

“Something that smells like you. A shirt. Or that jacket you wear.”

This was getting weird. Weirder than usual.

“That’s against protocol, Thalia.”

“I don’t care about protocol! I need an anchor! Just… something. Please?”

The desperation in her voice was real. That was the problem with Thalia. She was a world-ending monster, but she was also terrifyingly lonely.

“I’ll see what I can do. But only if the temperature is back to normal in five minutes.”

“It’s already rising. I can be good. See? I’m being good for you.”

“Goodnight, Thalia.”

“Dream of me, darling. I’ll be dreaming of you.”

“I’m sure you will.”

I ended the call.

The Warden’s voice came back on the line.

“Temperature is normalizing. Crisis averted.”

“Great. Can I go to sleep now?”

“Actually, while I have you, the board mentioned they want to move up the evaluation to—”

“No.”

“Mr. Evans, it’s not a request.”

“It is tonight. I am off the clock. Unless something is literally eating the city, do not call this number again.”

I hung up on my boss.

Bold move.

Probably a career-limiting move.

But I didn’t care. I was beyond caring.

I tossed the phone across the room. It landed on a pile of laundry with a soft thud. Far enough away that I wouldn’t reach for it immediately.

I fell back onto the bed.

My body felt like lead. My brain was a slush of static and adrenaline.

I stared at the ceiling fan spinning slowly in the dark.

One blade was slightly bent. It made a rhythmic click-whoosh-click-whoosh sound.

Hypnotic.

Finally.

Silence.

No alarms. No screaming guards. No obsessive eldritch girlfriends.

Just me and the fan.

My eyes drifted shut.

Darkness took me.

It was bliss.

I was floating in a void of pure nothingness. No responsibilities. No monsters.

Ring-ring.

Ring-ring.

My eyes snapped open.

I stared at the ceiling.

“You have got to be kidding me.”

It wasn’t my cell phone.

It was the landline.

I didn’t even know I had a landline plugged in. The dusty beige phone on the kitchen counter that came with the house.

Nobody had that number.

Literally nobody.

I dragged myself out of bed.

My legs felt heavy. I stumbled into the kitchen, stubbing my toe on a chair leg.

“Son of a—”

I hopped on one foot, biting back a curse.

The phone kept ringing.

shrill. Old-fashioned. Demanding.

I grabbed the handset.

“Who is this?”

“Hey kiddo! Did I wake you?”

The voice was cheerful. Too cheerful. And familiar in a way that made my stomach drop.

I leaned against the counter, rubbing my face with my free hand.

“Dad?”

“The one and only! Well, technically not the only one since the multi-verse is a thing, but the only one that matters right now!”

“Dad, it’s…” I squinted at the microwave clock. “It’s three in the morning.”

“Is it? Time is so relative when you’re hopping dimensions. I’m currently in a timezone where it’s basically lunch.”

“You’re supposed to be in containment.”

He laughed. A wheezing, happy sound.

“We both know containment is just a suggestion for people like us. Besides, I wanted to check in! heard you got the job. My old room, right?”

“Dad.”

“Proud of you, son! Keeping the family tradition alive. Although you really should ask for a raise. The benefits package is terrible.”

“How did you get this number?”

“I’m me. I get numbers. It’s what I do. Also, I read it off your employment file when I stopped by the office earlier.”

I froze.

“You were at the facility?”

“Just a pop-in! Wanted to see the old gang. Didn’t want to disturb you while you were working. You looked busy with that girl… the one with the tentacle hair? Intense energy. High maintenance. Not my type, but hey, you do you.”

He had been there.

Patient Zero. The most dangerous entity on the planet. My father. He had walked right past security, looked at my file, watched me work, and nobody had even noticed.

“Dad, you can’t just—”

“Relax! I didn’t break anything. Well, I might have borrowed a pen. But look, I’m calling because I heard something interesting through the grapevine.”

His tone shifted. Dropped an octave. Became serious.

“The grapevine?”

“The cosmic grapevine. The whispers between worlds. Something is coming, Kai.”

“Something always is.”

“Not like this. This is big. And it’s heading for your little prison.”

“What is it?”

“No idea! That’s the fun part! But it’s going to be a messy week for you. So, you know… drink plenty of water. Get some rest.”

“Dad—”

“Love you, kid! Gotta run, the fabric of reality is unraveling in this sector and I want to get a souvenir.”

Click.

The line went dead.

I stood there in the dark kitchen.

The refrigerator hummed. The tap dripped.

My toe was throbbing.

I looked at the phone in my hand.

Then I looked at the microwave clock. 3:05 AM.

“I hate this family.”

I hung up the phone.

Sleep was definitely off the table now.

I opened the fridge and grabbed a cold slice of pepperoni pizza.

Might as well have breakfast.

It was going to be a long week.