Chapter 8
What lurks in the library?
The Viridis Survival Guide is a YA sci-fi serial about Ava, a people-pleasing 17-year-old who enters a virtual program while she sleeps to save her dying brother, only to discover she may never wake back up.
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NEW MESSAGE:
[ROSIE.AI | 09-23 04:45 AM] Rule 5: Prohibited content is off-limits for a reason. If you need it anyway, be prepared to offer something in return. I do love a deal. xx
I’m officially done.
It’s not just the impossible coursework making my brain feel like mush, but also the endless side-eyes and weird, passive-aggressive questioning from students and teachers who seem convinced I’m some kind of interloper—which, honestly, is fair.
I spend most of my Senium History course and my Combat class just thinking about my strange wrist message Follow, trying to piece together what’s going on. Someone is trying to reach me. Maybe the same someone who messed with my student score? The same someone playing a game I don’t know the rules to.
By the time I fumble through Diagnostics, Controls, and Creation 101—failing a pop quiz, erasing my own chair, and creating a cup so mangled it’s both deformed and full of holes—my exhaustion has curdled into self-directed rage. I should have never entered that stupid competition. I should have done literally anything else. Taken a simulated nap. Learned to juggle. Dug a really deep hole and hidden inside until this whole thing blew over. Instead, I’m here, stuck in this nightmare, and for what? Homework while I sleep?
When the reminder bell to log out chimes, I almost weep with relief. The tunnels flood with students, all heading toward the transporter squares, laughing and stretching like it’s the end of a particularly grueling gym class. Reality is only a swipe away. Blessed, merciful reality. We’ll all wake up from sleep feeling rested and happy to start the morning in the real world. I’ll be back home to see Leo and apologize to everyone for a wasted night.
I shuffle into the Viridis common room, and that’s when I notice them.
Lockers.
I hadn’t registered them before. Rows of sleek, cedar-fronted lockers line a narrow corridor. They glow softly; each fitted with a wrist scanner. One by one, students approach, swipe their wrists across the pad, and blink out of existence. Simple. Swipe. Log out. Done.
I mimic them.
I approach a locker, swipe my wrist, brace for freedom— And nothing.
Not even a flicker.
I try again, adding a little flourish this time, like maybe the locker wants pizzazz. Nope. No change.
A nervous laugh bubbles out of me. Okay. Maybe this one’s broken. Totally possible.
I move to the next locker. Swipe. Nothing. Another. Swipe. Nothing.
By the fifth attempt, my smile is brittle enough to crack glass.
I glance around, casually, like, oh yeah, just taking my time. Definitely not stuck in a digital prison or anything. But everyone else is disappearing back to reality just fine. Around me, the last of the Viridis vanish, their lockers clicking shut as they return to their actual, non-virtual lives. And then it’s just me. Alone.
The silence is sudden, oppressive. Panic knocks, light at first, then harder, rattling the edges of my brain. There has to be someone who can help me. Someone who knows what to do when your log out swipe fails.
I’m about to make the trek to Guardian Custos’ office in the hopes that she hasn’t blinked back into reality yet, when I hear a voice.
It echoes faintly down the tunnel, lilting, oddly melodic.
And like my wrist message said, I follow.
The tunnels twist, colder the deeper I go, until I stumble into the creepiest library I have ever seen. And considering my school library once had a raccoon infestation, that’s saying something.
I round a corner and stop dead.
Rosie.
She’s sprawled across a table like she just fainted from Victorian-era boredom, except she’s very much awake, twirling her arms through the air as though conducting an invisible orchestra. She’s wearing a puffed-sleeve black dress that completely drapes the surface like a tablecloth.
“Rosie,” I blurt. Because my brain is nothing if not wildly unhelpful in moments of crisis.
Her eyes snap open, widening with melodrama. “Darling Dud! What on earth are you still doing here?”
Ah yes. That nickname has officially stuck.
I throw my hands up. “Oh, you know. Just living my best life. Except I can’t log out, I’m trapped in this virtual prison, and I may or may not be having a teeny-tiny nervous breakdown.”
She leans in, sniffs me, then pokes my arm with a bejeweled finger.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“You’re not a hack, are you?” she asks, narrowing her eyes.
I groan. “Why does everyone think that? If someone were hacking me, don’t you think I’d be, I don’t know, less suspiciously roaming the Academy after hours?”
Rosie shrugs, twirling a ring. “I can help you find the Conservatory. Or provide vocal lessons. But assisted breakouts aren’t in my wheelhouse.”
Great.
Okay. Think, Ava. Think. I look around, my gaze resting on a spine that reads Sport Controls: On and Off the Field.
“Can you help me find a book?”
She blinks. “Certainly. On which subject? How to create a better wardrobe?”
I ignore the insult.
“Something about logging out. Or being stuck in virtual reality. Or, I don’t know, loopholes.”
“But,” she adds, and I groan because of course there’s a ‘but.’
“You have to agree to a Rosie-style makeover. At an event of my choosing.”
“That sounds terrifying.”
“Take it or leave it, Darling Dud.”
“Fine. Deal.” Desperation wins. “Why are you so interested in my wardrobe? I didn’t think AIs had opinions about fashion.”
Rosie gasps, mouth agape. “I’ll pretend you didn’t just say that. Just so you know, I was modeled after the impeccably dressed Sengineer who programmed me. Unlike some people, she embedded her excellent taste in my code. Taste you are sorely lacking.”
She grins triumphantly, then swans off into the stacks, disappearing behind a mountain of dusty books.
I linger by the table, fingers grazing the cracked leather spines like I’m actually browsing instead of stalling. There has to be a book here that will explain why I’m stuck. And if there is, certainly an AI can find it.
My ears strain, catching the faint pops and sighs of a simulated old building settling. At first, I dismiss it. Libraries have plenty of creaks, this one was probably programmed to resemble a real one. Something shifts in my peripheral vision.
A tapestry stirs. The fabric ripples once, twice, and then parts like a curtain.
And someone steps out. Someone drenched in red.
My stomach nosedives.
It’s one of the Flavus Trials contestants. The one who looked like he wanted to push me off the stage when he said “Cleared” wasn’t an actual score. Except now he’s less mysterious bad boy and more possibly-committed-murder guy.
Blood streaks his shirt, slicks his hands, spatters up his jaw.
Okay. Let’s not jump to conclusions. Could be tomato sauce. Maybe he side hustles at an aggressive Italian Academy restaurant. Maybe the head chef had an accident involving twenty gallons of marinara.
Nope. Nope. That’s definitely blood.
Our eyes lock, and the air goes taut.
I’m alone in a room with a murderous-looking guy who wants nothing more than to destroy me. I should run. Or scream. Or do anything besides stare at him and wonder if he’d look even better in a leather jacket. Seriously, Ava. Priorities.
He takes a step forward.
Oh. That’s bad. That’s really bad.
He wipes the back of his hand across his face, smearing the mess into something even worse, like war paint. Another step, closer now, until the heat of him prickles at the edge of my space.
He’s looking at me like I’m the problem.
Alright. New plan. Definitely scream. Definitely run.
He stops just a foot away from my face, close enough that I can smell the metallic tang clinging to him. He lifts one scarlet-smeared finger, points it right at me, and says in a voice flat as a stone, “I was never here.”
And then he bolts out of the room.
Gone. Just like that.
The tapestry sways in his wake, and the silence that follows feels louder than the roar of the Arena.
What the hell was that? Pretty sure the guy just threatened me. Why is he the only other human left with me here? There’s no way I’m following him to ask for log out help.
Rosie is still missing, her singsong humming swallowed by the endless stacks. The silence makes my skin itch.
My gaze drifts back to the tapestry. It hangs limp and spotless, like a brooding blood-covered guy didn’t just slip out from behind it.
Every instinct tells me to leave it alone, but curiosity presses anyway.
I move toward the fabric, heart hammering. My fingers hesitate at the edge, then pinch the woven threads and tug. The tapestry sways, and behind it yawns a hidden archway practically begging me to go through.
A narrow spiral staircase descends into nothingness.
Down. Into pure darkness.
He probably just cut himself on something in an old basement. Or maybe this is an entrance to a hidden medical ward I don’t know about.
Or maybe there’s something down there that might eventually come for me too.
I know I shouldn’t go down. But someone also here after hours just ran out of there bleeding. Maybe he knows something I don’t. Maybe he is also trying to get out. He must have found some secret exit. I need to know what this place is hiding.
The air changes with the first step—thicker, damper, heavier, like I’ve dipped into another atmosphere. Each scuff of stone under my boots sounds amplified, traitorous.
The farther I go, the colder it gets. The chill seeps through my shoes, worms into my ankles, crawls up my legs until my bones ache with it. The wall under my fingertips is slick, clammy, as though the staircase itself is sweating.
And the smell. That metallic tang. Sharp, iron-heavy, clinging. It snakes down my throat, coats my tongue.
Blood.
By the time I reach the bottom, my heart feels like it’s trying to claw its way out of my chest.
A wooden door waits. Thick, ancient, scarred with scratches. A brass key juts from the lock, gleaming faintly in the dim. This is a terrible idea.
So naturally, I wrap trembling fingers around the key and turn. The lock clicks open with an audible snap that seems far too loud in the silence.
I push.
The door groans, hinges shrieking like they haven’t been oiled in centuries, and the room inside exhales stale air that makes my eyes water.
It’s small—just enough space for a massive oak desk that squats like a beast in the center. A single black candle flickers on its surface, its flame steady in the stagnant air.
The pale light paints the walls in sickly gold shadows, stretching every groove and crack into something sinister.
No blood.
Not a drop.
Like the boy I saw—drenched and dripping—had never been here. Like he wiped it all away with one pass of his hand. Which is somehow worse. Because blood should stain. Blood should stay. But not in this world. In this world, evidence of a minor crime can be magically erased.
I don’t know what I expected to see. Maybe a victim sprawled out on the floor, a puddle of blood beneath him. Maybe another one of the Trial contestants he didn’t deem worthy to compete against. Maybe a broken glass window the boy was attempting to exit through. What could have caused all that blood?
A sound interrupts the thought.
Distant. Low.
Thunder.
It rolls through the chamber, vibrating the candle, rattling the oak desk. But there is no sky here. No storm.
The sound is wrong.
I swallow, force my eyes toward the corner.
There.
Another door, hunched into shadow. Metal, thick, with an iron knob that twitches as though something on the other side is impatient.
The rumble grows louder. Not thunder this time.
A roar.
Deep. Guttural. Alive.
Something that does not belong in a basement.
The iron knob rattles harder, metal squealing.
My breath stutters.
Something drips down the door’s surface—slow, viscous trails glistening crimson in the candlelight. The metallic stench thickens, suffocating, pressing into my nose and mouth until I gag. Blood. Definitely blood.
I stagger back, one hand clamped over my mouth, the other groping for the wall. My legs beg to run, but I force them into a careful retreat. Step by step, inching toward the staircase. My hands shake so violently they scrape raw against the stone.
Whatever secret this room holds, I’m not ready. Not alone. And definitely not tonight. I make it halfway up before—Click.
Creeeeeak.
The bloody door opens. Not wide. Just enough.
Darkness seeps through the gap, thicker than shadow, carrying with it a scrape. Something drags itself across the floor. Heavy. Uneven. Claws against stone. The sound shoots lightning through my body.
I bolt.
I slam the wooden door at the base shut, twist the brass key until it bites, and stumble upward without looking back. Every careful step vanishes. I sprint, boots hammering the stairs two at a time, lungs burning, throat strangled with panicked air.
The growl follows. Low. Hungry. A promise.
The roar that follows rattles the entire staircase.
I burst into the library, yank the tapestry shut, and press my back to the wall, gasping.
Below, claws rake against wood. Long, slow, deliberate.
Whatever is behind that door isn’t trapped forever.
And it knows I was there.