Chapter 5: The Coming Storm

Chapter 5: The Coming Storm

The night was alive with a low, guttural hum. It wasn't a sound Leo could place, but rather a vibration he felt in the soles of his boots and the fillings of his teeth. Outside, a storm had broken over the city, a furious assault of wind and water. Rain lashed against the high, grime-streaked windows of the Atheneum, and each distant roll of thunder was answered by the deep, resonant thrumming from within the museum's stone heart.

Leo’s fear had calcified into a state of hyper-vigilance. He no longer tried to rationalize or deny. He accepted. The museum was a predator, and he was locked in its cage. The tiny red mark on his forearm, the phantom wound from The Puppeteer’s ghostly thread, was a constant, itching reminder of his new status. He wasn't just being watched; he was being assessed.

His patrol was no longer a route; it was a reconnaissance mission. He moved with a practiced economy of motion, his artist’s eyes now scanning for threats, for minute changes in the terrible compositions all around him. And tonight, everything had changed. The storm outside seemed to be agitating the collection, stirring the malevolence that lay dormant within the marble and wood.

He passed the Gallery of Solitude, keeping a wide berth, but he could feel the presence of The Reader even through the thick stone archway. The air around it was colder, and the low hum of the museum was strongest there, a rhythmic, subsonic pulse, like a colossal heart beating somewhere deep in the foundations. The single, violent throb he’d seen on his first night had been a prelude. Now, the beast was fully awake.

Summoning a sliver of courage he didn't know he possessed, he peered into the Gallery of Innocence. The scraping sound he’d heard before was now audible, a dry, intermittent rasp of stone on polished marble. In the strobing, intermittent flashes of lightning from the windows high above, the shrouded figures of the children were not just subtly rearranged. They were actively, slowly, shifting. A small hand emerging from under a velvet cloth. A head turning with a soft, grinding noise. They were like insects stirring in a disturbed nest, their movements growing bolder in the charged atmosphere.

He backed away, his own heartbeat a frantic drum against the slow, deep pulse of the museum. He found himself drawn, against all better judgment, towards the Chamber of the Human Condition. The Puppeteer was in a frenzy. The jerky, agonizing dance was now a violent thrashing. The glistening threads snapped taut and went slack with a speed that blurred their edges, forcing the wooden figure to convulse as if being electrocuted. The dry creak of its limbs had become a series of sharp, cracking sounds, like branches breaking in a gale. The red mark on his arm throbbed in a painful, sickening sympathy.

The storm, Leo realized, wasn't just happening outside. It was happening in here, too. A symphony of silent screams and hidden motion, rising to a crescendo.

It was in the main rotunda, surrounded by the shrouded forms of forgotten kings and mythical beasts, that the security phone on the wall shrilled.

The sound was so alien, so mundane in the face of the supernatural chaos, that Leo flinched violently. It rang again, a piercing, insistent shriek that cut through the thunder. He stared at it, his mind racing. It could only be one person.

With a trembling hand, he lifted the heavy plastic receiver. “Hello?”

“Mr. Vance.” Alistair Finch’s voice was unnervingly calm, a sliver of perfect, cold composure amidst the storm. There was no static on the line, no hint of the tempest raging outside. “I trust you are finding the evening… invigorating.”

“The statues are moving,” Leo said, his voice a hoarse whisper. “They’re all moving.”

“Ah, yes. They do become rather excitable during inclement weather. The electricity in the air,” Finch said with a sigh, as if discussing a triviality. “Which brings me to the reason for my call. I have a new rule for you. An addendum to your duties, if you will. It is of the utmost importance that you listen very, very carefully.”

Leo gripped the receiver tighter, the plastic slick with sweat. He said nothing, waiting.

“When the power fails—and it will,” Finch continued, the certainty in his voice sending a chill down Leo’s spine, “you have precisely one minute. Sixty seconds. You are to get to the security office and lock the door. Do not deviate. Do not hesitate. Do not let the darkness catch you in the halls.”

“What happens in the darkness?” Leo asked, the words catching in his throat.

There was a slight pause, and Leo could almost hear the thin, predatory smile in the curator’s voice. “The collection becomes… restless… without the lights. They dislike being unseen. It makes them... eager for an audience.”

The implication hung in the air, heavy and suffocating. The lights weren't just for illumination. They were a restraint.

“One minute, Mr. Vance,” Finch said, his voice crisp and final. “Do try to be prompt.”

Click.

The line went dead.

Leo stood frozen, the dial tone buzzing softly in his ear. The curator’s words echoed in his mind. And it will. It wasn't a warning about a possibility. It was a statement of fact. This was a planned event, a part of the museum’s terrible, nightly ritual.

A massive clap of thunder shook the very foundations of the building, rattling the glass in the high dome above.

And in the silence that followed, a loud THUMP echoed from the direction of the service corridor. It was the sound of a main circuit breaker tripping.

The buzzing in the receiver died. The dim, amber emergency lights lining the corridors flickered once, twice, and then extinguished with a faint hiss.

The Lachrymal Atheneum was plunged into absolute, suffocating blackness.

It was a darkness so complete it felt like a physical substance, swallowing the beam from his flashlight before it could travel more than a few feet. The storm outside was muted, the world beyond these walls suddenly ceasing to exist.

He was alone. In the dark. And somewhere in the crushing blackness, the collection was restless. His minute had just begun.