Chapter 3: The Unseen Hand

Chapter 3: The Unseen Hand

The pain in his palm was a grounding, undeniable reality. In the sterile white light of his bathroom, Alex washed the blood away, revealing two tiny, perfectly round puncture marks, like a miniature vampire bite. They were deep, precise, and ringed with a faint purple bruise. The horror of the previous night wasn't a dream. It was real. The stone had unfolded. It had tasted his blood.

Panic, cold and sharp, threatened to overwhelm him. This thing couldn’t stay in his room, in his house. Burying it in a drawer was a child’s solution to a monster under the bed. He needed something stronger, something that couldn't be opened by a sleeping hand or a will that wasn't his own.

His eyes scanned the cluttered surfaces of his kitchen, landing on a stainless-steel thermos his dad had given him for a camping trip years ago. It was heavy, double-walled, with a screw-top lid that took a good deal of force to seal. Perfect.

With a trembling hand, Alex retrieved the beetle from his nightstand. Its legs were retracted again, its surface smooth and deceptively inert. It felt different now, no longer just a curious find but a malevolent predator masquerading as stone. He didn't wrap it in a sock this time. He dropped it naked into the thermos. The clink of stone against steel was a sharp, final sound. He screwed the lid on, his knuckles white with the effort, tightening it until the muscles in his forearm screamed. He felt a surge of triumphant relief. Let it try to get out of that.

He stuffed the thermos into his work locker at the Abernathy house, burying it under his change of clothes. He could feel its presence even through the metal and fabric, a cold, dense void in the corner of his awareness. But it was contained. For the first time in two days, he felt a fragile sense of control.

The day’s work was sanding. Dust filled the air, the rhythmic scrape of sandpaper against wood a hypnotic, mind-numbing task. Alex welcomed it. He focused on the grain of the wood, the pressure of his hands, the satisfying smoothness left in his wake. He worked alongside his uncle, their shared labor a bastion of normalcy against the creeping madness.

"You're quiet today," Joe observed, not looking up from a stubborn patch of old varnish he was stripping from a doorframe. "That carpet get to you?"

"Something like that," Alex mumbled, pressing harder with his sanding block.

The afternoon sun slanted through the dusty windows, casting long shadows across the floor. Alex was working on the windowsill in the study, the same room where he’d found the roll-top desk. The air was still thick with that faint, metallic odor, a scent he now permanently associated with the stain on the carpet and the wound in his hand. He ran his fingers over the freshly sanded wood, feeling the fine dust coat his skin. The drone of the orbital sander from the next room was a steady hum. Scrape, wipe, check the grain. Scrape, wipe, check the grain. The motion was automatic, a physical meditation.

He blinked.

The droning of the sander was gone. The house was utterly silent. The sun was lower in the sky, the light now a deep, burnished orange. He wasn't standing by the windowsill anymore. He was in the center of the room, his back to the door. A cold draft tickled his neck.

How did he get here?

A wave of vertigo washed over him. There was a gap. A blank space in his memory, like a skipped frame in a film reel. One moment, he was sanding. The next… this. A minute? An hour? He had no idea.

Then he felt the weight in his right hand.

He looked down slowly, a tide of icy dread rising in his chest. His fingers were curled around a familiar, heavy shape. The greenish-gray stone of the beetle rested in his palm, its surface smooth and cool. But it wasn't the menacing cold from before. A gentle, disturbing warmth radiated from it, seeping into his skin, quieting the frantic hammering of his heart. The stone felt… calming. It felt like it belonged there.

His gaze snapped towards the entryway where his locker was. The door was ajar.

No. No.

He stumbled out of the study and yanked the locker door open. His change of clothes was pushed aside. The stainless-steel thermos lay on its side, the heavy lid resting next to it, perfectly unscrewed. There was no sign of force, no scratches or dents. It was as if he had simply walked over, opened it, and taken the beetle out.

And he had no memory of doing it.

The unseen hand wasn't just the beetle's. It was his own.

"What in God's name are you staring at?"

Alex jumped, spinning around. Uncle Joe stood in the doorway, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of a gritty hand. "You look like you've seen a ghost. I've been calling you for five minutes. It's quitting time."

Alex’s mind raced. He couldn't explain. He couldn't begin to. He shoved the beetle deep into his pocket, the newfound calming warmth of the stone a terrifying comfort against his thigh. "Sorry. Just… spaced out."

Joe grunted, unconvinced. "Daydreaming on my dime. Let's pack it up."

As they loaded the truck, Alex’s desperation for answers overrode his fear of sounding crazy. He had to know more. The beetle was a part of this house, a part of the man who died here.

"Hey, Uncle Joe," he said, trying to keep his voice casual as he heaved a box of tools into the truck bed. "You said that guy, Abernathy, died in his chair. That’s all?"

Joe slammed the tailgate shut. "That's all the coroner cared about. Natural causes. Old age and neglect." He paused, leaning against the truck and pulling out a crumpled pack of cigarettes. "Why the sudden interest?"

"I don't know," Alex lied, the stone in his pocket feeling heavier. "Just a creepy place. Gives you the chills. Seems like there'd be stories."

Joe lit a cigarette and took a long drag, the tip glowing orange in the twilight. He squinted at the dark windows of the house. "Oh, there are stories," he said, his voice dropping slightly. "Small towns. People love to talk. Especially about a shut-in like Abernathy."

He blew a plume of smoke into the cooling air. "The paramedic who was first on the scene, kid named Timmy, his mom is friends with your aunt. According to him, the official report left a few things out. Things the cops wrote off as post-mortem animal activity, you know, mice or whatever."

Alex held his breath, his wounded hand beginning to ache. "What kind of things?"

Uncle Joe took another drag, his practical, no-nonsense face etched with a rare flicker of morbid curiosity.

"Well," he said, lowering his voice as if sharing a dirty secret. "Timmy said it looked like the old man had been… gnawing on his own furniture." He flicked his cigarette ash onto the gravel driveway. "Said the arms of his big oak armchair were all chewed up, and they found wood splinters in the guy's teeth and gums. Like a beaver in a damn cage."