The Midnight Caller – Part Three

Whispers of the Wandering Mask

Fog rolled over Ravenwood like a living thing, curling around streetlights and swallowing the morning sun. The town had not slept. Doors stayed locked. Curtains stayed closed. And every rustle of wind felt like a warning whispered too late.

Liam Graves sat in the back of Officer Mara Collins’s patrol car, staring at the two masks resting inside a sealed evidence bag on her lap. One was his mask—the one placed on his chest in the woods. The other was the cracked relic from the basement, older than anything that should still exist.

“We’re leaving town,” Collins said, eyes fixed on the road ahead. “We’re taking these masks to the state forensic lab. They’ll find something—DNA, fingerprints, anything.”

Liam kept his gaze fixed on the window. Houses flickered by. Abandoned ones. Boarded-up ones. Freshly repainted ones. Ravenwood appeared normal from a distance, but up close, it was a graveyard of secrets.

“You think he’ll follow us?” Liam asked quietly.

Collins swallowed. “I think he’s already ahead of us.”

She wasn’t wrong.


---

They reached the highway—an endless gray ribbon slicing through the pine forests surrounding town. The farther they drove, the thicker the fog grew, until the world seemed reduced to the faint white lines guiding their tires.

The silence broke with a sudden vibration—an alert on Collins’s dashboard.

Missing Persons Report — Ravenwood
4 residents unaccounted for
Time: 5:13 AM

Collins’s grip tightened on the wheel. “Four people vanished last night.”

Liam’s chest tightened. “Is it him?”

“He doesn’t just take people,” Collins said. “He plays with them.”

Liam closed his eyes, remembering the voice whispering through the dark. The Caller didn’t act out of rage or desperation. He acted out of desire. Out of enjoyment.

Out of obsession.

The car suddenly jolted. Collins hit the brakes, steering sharply to avoid something on the road.

Liam gasped. “What is that?”

At first, the shape seemed like a fallen log.

But as the fog shifted, it became clear—

It was a car.

Crashed. Smoke rising from the hood. Driver’s door hanging open. No driver.

Collins leapt out of the patrol car, gun raised. “Stay inside, Liam!”

But he didn’t listen. Something pulled him forward—fear, curiosity, or something darker. He stepped toward the wrecked sedan, heart pounding.

Inside the car, the dashboard screen flickered with static.

And then a familiar voice hummed through the broken speakers:

“Road trips are more fun with company.”

Liam stumbled back. “He’s here.”

Collins scanned the forest edges. “I don’t see anyone!”

The radio on her belt crackled to life, spitting only faint static at first. Then—

Footsteps.

Not from the forest. Not from the road.

From everywhere.

Too many. Too close. And too synchronized to be human.

The fog thickened until the world dissolved into white.

Then, faint shapes formed—shadows of people, all standing still among the trees.

Collins raised her gun higher. “Back to the car! Now!”

Liam ran.

The figures did not chase.

They just watched.


---

They sped down the highway, tires spraying dust and gravel. Collins didn’t slow down until the forest thinned, replaced by rolling fields and distant farmlands.

Only then did Liam breathe again.

“What were those things?” he whispered.

“They weren’t moving naturally,” Collins said, shaking. “They weren’t… alive. At least not fully.”

Liam stared out the window. The fog had faded, but unease clung to him like a second skin.

“Those missing people from Ravenwood…” Liam whispered. “Do you think—”

Collins didn’t let him finish. “Don’t think about it.”

But he couldn’t stop. The silhouettes in the fog had stood like puppets with cut strings, empty and silent.

The Midnight Caller didn’t just stalk victims.

He collected them.


---

Hours passed before they reached the next town—Harrowsfield—a place that looked forgotten by time. Old wooden houses leaned against one another. Pine needles blanketed roofs. An abandoned diner sat beside a boarded-up general store, its sign hanging crookedly.

“This doesn’t look like a place with a forensic lab,” Liam muttered.

“We’re not at the lab yet,” Collins said. “But we need rest. And fuel.”

Liam nodded, though unease gnawed at him. Harrowsfield felt wrong—too quiet, too untouched, as if the town had taken a deep breath and never released it.

They found an inn run by an elderly man who barely spoke. His eyes lingered too long on the masks in Collins’s bag.

“Storm’s coming,” he rasped. “Best you stay inside tonight.”

“What storm?” Collins asked.

He shook his head slowly. “Not the kind you find on a forecast.”

The inn’s hallways creaked as Liam followed Collins to their rooms. The wood smelled of damp pine and something metallic. The carpet was frayed. The lights flickered.

Liam froze at one door.

Room 13.

The number hung crookedly, as if it kept trying to fall off.

“We’re not staying in that,” Liam whispered.

“We’re staying across the hall,” Collins assured. “But keep your door locked.”

Liam nodded.

But when he entered his room, something inside felt off.

The window was open.

Curtains fluttering.

A cold breeze.

He shut it quickly, breathing hard. “Just the wind,” he muttered. “Just the wind.”

He lay on the bed, listening to the quiet creaks of the building settling. Minutes passed. Maybe hours.

Then—

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The sound came from the wall behind his headboard.

Liam sat up.

Tap.
Tap.
Tap.

A slow, patient rhythm.

He pressed his ear to the wall.

Whispers drifted through.

Voices.
Plural.
Layered.

“Run…”
“Don’t look…”
“He’s coming…”
“He already knows…”

Liam staggered back, grabbing his phone.

Dead.

Again.

He rushed out of his room and knocked on Collins’s door.

No answer.

“Officer Collins?” he whispered.

Still nothing.

He tried the handle.

Unlocked.

The room was empty.

The bag with the masks lay on the bed—unzipped.

Liam’s stomach dropped.

One mask was missing.

The older one.

“Collins?” Liam called, voice cracking.

Silence.

He stepped into the hallway.

The lights flickered once.

Twice.

Then shut off completely.

Darkness swallowed everything.

Liam fumbled for his flashlight, clicking it on. A thin beam cut into the dark. The hallway stretched endlessly, though it had been short moments ago.

“Officer Collins!” he shouted.

Something answered.

But not her.

Footsteps.

Slow.
Measured.
Approaching from the far end of the hall.

Liam backed up, breath shaking.

A figure stepped into the faint light.

The older white mask stared at him.

Cracked smile.
Black hood.
Silent steps.

The Midnight Caller.

But something was wrong—this figure was taller. Broader. The mask didn’t fit perfectly, as if stretched over the wrong face.

A new host.

A new vessel.

Liam ran.

The inn twisted around him. Hallways looped where they shouldn’t. Doors led to rooms that weren’t the right ones. He reached the stairs—only to find them blocked by shadows standing shoulder-to-shoulder in the darkness.

The silhouettes from the fog.

The collected.

“Liam!”

A voice broke through—Collins.

She appeared from a side hallway, grabbing his arm. “Come on!”

Together they sprinted through the warped inn, bursting out the back door into the forest beyond Harrowsfield.

Trees towered overhead, branches clawing the sky.

“Where’s the car?” Liam yelled.

“Gone,” Collins said. “Someone moved it.”

They ran deeper into the woods, branches whipping against their clothes. The forest seemed endless.

Behind them, footsteps followed—soft, deliberate, patient.

The Caller did not rush.

They never needed to.


---

An abandoned cabin appeared through the trees. Its roof sagged. Windows shattered. But Collins forced the door open, pulling Liam inside.

“We’ll hide until morning,” she said, barring the door with a fallen beam.

Liam collapsed on the dusty floor, gasping.

“What does he want?” Liam whispered.

Collins stared at the masks. “It’s not just him anymore. There’s more than one. There’s always been more than one.”

Liam froze. “You mean—”

“The Midnight Caller is a legacy,” she said. “Passed down. Adopted. Maybe chosen.”

A loud thump hit the door.

Then another.

Then silence.

Collins raised her gun.

The thumping moved to the wall.

To the window.

To the roof.

Then—

The whispers began.

Dozens of voices.
Maybe hundreds.

“Liam…”
“It’s your turn…”
“Remember…”
“Come home…”

The door creaked.

The beam holding it began to crack.

Collins grabbed Liam’s hand. “Run the second it breaks.”

The door shattered inward.

Dark figures filled the doorway.

Collins fired. The figures didn’t fall.

Liam bolted through the back window, glass shattering around him. He hit the ground running, sprinting toward the deepest part of the woods.

Branches whipped his face. Roots tore at his shoes. He didn’t stop.

Behind him, he heard Collins scream his name.

Then silence.

Then footsteps.

Not one pair.

Many.

All following him.


---

Liam finally burst into a clearing—moonlight spilling across a wide field.

In the center stood a house.

It shouldn’t have been there. It wasn’t on any map. It wasn’t lit. It wasn’t abandoned.

It simply waited.

The front door creaked open.

A familiar voice whispered from inside:

“Welcome back, Liam.”

His breath stopped.

He stepped backward.

The trees behind him rustled.

Dozens of masked figures emerged, blocking every path except the one leading forward.

Toward the house.

Toward the voice.

Toward the truth.

Liam swallowed hard.

And stepped inside.

The door closed behind him.

Lights flickered.

Footsteps circled the floorboards above.

A phone began ringing in the darkness.

He didn’t answer.

The ringing stopped.

Someone whispered behind him:

“Now the real story begins.”