Page 4 of Stay Scared

I scroll until shaky footage appears from outside an abandoned amusement park. Red work lights move between dead rides beyond a chain-link fence. A figure in a long black mask crosses a service road while the person filming whispers too quietly for me to understand. Then the masked man stops, turns directly toward the camera, and the phone drops.

I replay the final second. Nothing about the movement looks startled. He doesn’t jerk toward a noise or search the dark for whoever might be watching. He turns with slow precision and finds the lens.

I drag the progress bar backward. One frame shows him walking past. The next has his face angled toward the fence. When I replay it again, I imagine standing where the camera was. He passes without acknowledging me, and I wait until he is several yards away before looking after him, convinced I’m the one doing the watching. Then he stops and turns, and somehow he already knows.

My fingers tighten around the mouse before I close the video.

The comments beneath the compilation are worse. Former guests argue about bruises, panic attacks, and what signing the waiver did or didn’t permit, while prospective participants keep asking where to apply.

One comment appears in screenshots across several threads.

Did anyone else get turned on during the chase rooms?

I stop scrolling. The replies split between mockery and people admitting they understood the question too well. One woman says she went back because nobody had ever made her feel so completely watched.

Another comment survives only in screenshots after the original account deleted it.

I missed being chased.

I read the sentence again. She never explains what happened when she was caught, and maybe that is why it works. My mind supplies the rest without permission: uneven boards beneath my shoes and a masked man somewhere behind me who doesn’t need to shout because I already know he is gaining. I look back to measure the distance, and he is still there.

Years ago, I learned that fear could change shape in the right hands. Wanting to get away and wanting to be caught could occupy the same few seconds without canceling each other out. I have spent a long time pretending I forgot.

I close the thread and open the official Crimson Night site. It is nearly empty. A black video frame dominates the page until crimson fabric passes over the lens, revealing a scratched mask. A man speaks close to the microphone.

“We remember what fear makes you confess.”

The clip restarts with the same mask and the same controlled voice. He never raises it, which makes me listen harder, so I close the video before it repeats again.

Two links appear beneath it.

APPLY FOR GENERAL ENTRY.

FINAL GIRL PROTOCOL.

The second is marked unavailable, which makes my invitation the exception.

I open the public application instead. It asks for identification, emergency contacts, medical information, phobias, medication use, social-media access, and previous haunt attendance. Applicants also authorize Decay Brigade to verify what they provide.

It’s enough to profile a victim, but it doesn’t explain how they knew that woman’s brother’s name.

I return to the public rules long enough to confirm the same restriction from the waiver. Entering means the attraction continues until release, and attempts to leave can be absorbed into the performance.

I call Mark. He answers after the fifth ring.

“What is it?”

“I found the finale.”

“What did you find?”

“Crimson Night invited me into something called Final Girl Protocol.”

His end of the call goes quiet. “You mean Decay Brigade?”

“They’re offering twenty-five thousand dollars and exclusive footage if I last until dawn.”

“That’s not something that should excite you. There’s a reason they’re offering so much.”