Page 145 of Stay Scared

The red room appears. I say the phrase. Cade releases me. Owen leaves the door alone. Ash removes his mask. That is all the public gets.

The confessions stay private. So does the aftermath, along with everything that happened between Owen and me in the server room. Rook stole enough already.

I lean closer to the camera. “The footage you were shown removed every moment where I changed what was happening.”

Static crashes through the feed. Rook’s beak flashes over my face, then Owen forces him out again.

“The owners of Crimson Night have crossed lines with me. I am not asking anyone watching this to trust them.”

Ash looks at me. Cade remains in the doorway. Owen’s shoulders tighten.

“I am telling you that Rook is holding Mark inside the theater and has tied the property perimeter to a purge mechanism.”

I point toward Owen. He routes Mark’s live feed beside mine. Mark appears beneath the fire-curtain assembly. His right hand is almost free.

“If police are watching, do not cross the perimeter until the theater trigger is disabled. Do not trust a door because a screen says it is open. Do not send an emergency signal through Crimson Night’s network. Rook has been using it.”

The blue lights beyond the park are brighter now. The comment stream changes. People start tagging law enforcement accounts, and someone claims they are recording the stream externally. Good. Let them preserve it.

I look toward the stage camera. “Mark is alive. Evan Ross is injured and with a medic inside the property.”

Rook steps into Mark’s frame. His beak turns toward our camera. The feed distorts violently.

Owen’s arm shakes against the relay. “He found the insertion point.”

“Can you keep it?”

“Approximately a minute. Possibly less.”

Rook’s voice cuts through beneath mine. “And still you need an audience to believe your version.”

I look at his image. “No. I need them not to kill Mark trying to rescue me.”

Cade makes a rough sound from the doorway.

Rook’s mask turns toward me. “Then tell them what happened in the storage room.”

My stomach turns. The thumbnail appears beside him. My wrists bound over Cade. The angle he stole.

Cade leaves the doorway before he can stop himself.

I point back at it. “Stay there.”

His boots stop. Every muscle pulls tight beneath his clothes.

Rook laughs through the speakers. “Ask him whether he enjoyed tying you up.”

Something hard crosses Cade’s face.

I reach for the physical switch.

Rook notices. “Close your lens, Salem. Mine stays open.”

“Then talk to yourself.”

I kill our feed. The local monitor goes black.

Owen stares at me. “That concludes the public clarification.”