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“I’ve lived thousands of years, seen terrible things, the worst the world has to offer. And you terrify me.” The voice doesn’t belong to anyone in the room, yet it vibrates through the very marrow of Cyd’s bones. It is a cold, caustic sound, dripping with a sarcasm that feels like ice water sliding down a spine.
Cyd blinks, but the world is blurred, a smudge of charcoal and grey. Beside her, Shelby is frozen, her expression one of sheer, wide-eyed confusion. They aren’t in Portland anymore. They aren't even in a physical place they recognize. One moment, Naldo had been fumbling with the dials of Barry’s latest monstrosity—the teleporter—and the next, a violent, visceral *tug* had ripped through their midsections, pulling them through a vacuum that felt like being shredded and reassembled in a heartbeat.
Now, they're standing in the oppressive humidity of a New York City autumn, inside a structure that smells of wet rot and old velvet. The "Spooktacular" haunted house is supposed to be a thrill, but the air here is too thick, tasting of copper and ozone.
Cyd reaches out to touch Shelby’s shoulder, but her hand passes straight through the fabric of Shelby's shirt. There is no resistance. No warmth. Only a sickening, hollow void where a physical touch should be.
"Shelby..." Cyd whispers, her voice echoing with a metallic ring. "Look at your hands."
Shelby looks down. She is translucent, a shimmering smudge of a girl, her internal organs visible as ghostly, pulsing silhouettes. They aren't just visitors; they are specters. Some stray incantation, some glitch in the teleportation frequency, has stripped them of their density.
The silence of the haunt is broken by a sharp, guttural scream. Around a corner, two figures collide with them. It’s a girl with a bright, frantic energy and a boy who looks like he was carved out of a redwood tree. Riley Matthews and Lucas Friar. They aren't actors; they are terrified. Riley is shaking, her breath coming in jagged, panicked hitches. When they see Cyd and Shelby, they don't see two fifteen-year-old girls from Oregon. They see two distorted, shimmering entities—visceral reminders of death. Cyd’s form is flickering, her image doubling and tripling like a corrupted video file. It is disturbing, a glitch in reality that makes Riley’s eyes widen in genuine horror.
"Oh god," Riley sobs, her voice breaking. She lunges toward Lucas, clinging to his arm with a grip that turns her knuckles white. "We're doomed. We're actually doomed! I'm never going to see Maya again! I'm going to be a ghost in a costume shop forever!"
Lucas is paralyzed, his chest heaving. He looks at Cyd and Shelby with a primal fear, his muscles locked in a fight-or-flight response that has nowhere to go. The sight of Riley’s desperation triggers something in Cyd. A surge of empathy, mixed with a desperate need to be *felt* again. She looks at Shelby. Their eyes meet—a silent, heated communication born of a crush they've both spent years hiding behind jokes and best-friend banter. The tension between them is a physical weight, a longing for a touch that is currently impossible.
We have to tell them we're okay, Cyd thinks. We have to get Barry's attention.
Cyd doesn't think; she lunges. The sensation is violent. It is a sudden, forceful intrusion. Cyd doesn't just enter Riley; she slams into her. It feels like diving into a pool of warm, thick syrup. There is a momentary, jarring resistance—a psychic wall—and then a sickening slide.
"Ugh, god!" Cyd screams, but the voice is Riley's. The physical sensation is overwhelming. It feels invasive, an aggressive breach of privacy. "Shelby, this is... it’s icky! It feels like sexual assault! Like someone just shoved a foot into my soul!"
Shelby doesn't hesitate. Despite seeing Cyd’s struggle, she throws herself forward, colliding with Lucas. The impact is different—heavier. Shelby feels the raw power of Lucas's heartbeat, the sudden rush of testosterone and adrenaline flooding her senses. The heat of his body is a shock to her ghostly system, a visceral, pulsing warmth that makes her head spin. For a moment, the two girls are no longer ghosts; they are passengers in living skin, feeling the heavy, rhythmic thumping of hearts that aren't their own.
Inside Riley’s mind, Cyd is scrambling. She can feel Riley’s terror, the lingering scent of Maya’s perfume on her clothes, the desperate love the girl has for her partner. Cyd uses Riley’s vocal cords to scream, not in terror, but in a rhythmic, specific pattern—a code Barry taught them for emergencies.
"BARRY! THE FREQUENCY IS WRONG! PULL US BACK!"
Through Lucas, Shelby adds her voice, the deep rumble of his chest vibrating in her core. "NOW, BARRY!"
The physical strain of the possession is immense. It’s a tug-of-war between the soul and the flesh. Cyd feels the edges of her own identity blurring with Riley's. In this heightened state of sensory overload, the secret crush she harbors for Shelby becomes an unbearable pressure. She wants to reach out—not as Riley, but as Cyd—and pull Shelby into her, to feel the actual friction of skin on skin, the salt of sweat and the heat of a real breath.
"Shelby," Cyd gasps through Riley's lips, her voice trembling. "I... I actually really—"
A sudden, violent vacuum opens in the center of the room. The teleporter has locked on. The extraction is a physical assault. It feels like being pulled through a straw. Cyd and Shelby are ripped out of the bodies of Riley and Lucas with a wet, snapping sound. The sudden loss of warmth leaves them shivering, the cold of the ghost-realm returning in a flash.
As they are sucked backward into the portal, the world slows down. They see the aftermath of their departure. Riley and Lucas are stumbling backward, gasping for air, their faces pale from the shock of possession. And then, from the shadows of the haunt, two other figures emerge. Maya Hart and Farkle Minks.
Maya dives forward, catching Riley in a collision of limbs and laughter, her arms wrapping around Riley’s waist with a possessive, protective intensity. Riley buries her face in Maya's neck, sobbing with relief. Maya kisses her—a hard, fast, desperate kiss that speaks of a deep, established bond. Beside them, Farkle catches Lucas, a steadying hand on his shoulder, their relationship an unspoken, grounding force.
Cyd watches them, a bittersweet ache in her chest. She feels Shelby’s ghostly hand brush against hers—not a pass-through this time, but a lingering, intentional touch as the portal closes. Pop. The smell of wet rot is replaced by the scent of burnt toast and ozone. They are back in Barry’s garage in Portland. The lighting is harsh, the air is dry, and they are, finally, solid again. Cyd looks at Shelby. The tension from the haunted house hasn't vanished; it has only intensified, transformed from a ghostly longing into a physical, electric craving. They stand in the silence of the garage, both of them breathing hard, the memory of the icky intrusion still tingling in their nerves, leaving them both raw and wide open.