Chapter 5: Lunar Frequencies

The city stood still under the blanket of darkness, its usual hum drowned out by the gravity of the situation. Lysandra stood by the window of her apartment, her gaze fixed on the distant skyline. The moon hung low, a crescent scarred by the remnants of forgotten secrets. Her fingers drummed absently against the edge of her desk, the images of the latest murder scattered around her.

Another death. Another symbol. Another victim.

She couldn't shake the sense of familiarity gnawing at her, a creeping feeling that the crimes weren’t just connected by bloodshed, but by something more ancient, more primal. The pattern was undeniable now, woven through the fabric of the city's darkness.

Her phone vibrated, snapping her from her thoughts. A message from Cole flashed on the screen:

Same pattern. Body found in the old docks. You need to come. It's bad.

She didn’t need to read the rest. It was all too familiar now. It had been weeks since the first murder, but every crime scene felt like a mirror, each one presenting new pieces of the puzzle—pieces she couldn’t quite place. Lysandra grabbed her coat and camera, leaving her apartment with a heavy heart.

The docks were quiet, too quiet. The faint scent of saltwater mixed with the metallic tang of decay. The glow of red and blue lights cast long shadows across the abandoned warehouses, illuminating the scene like a macabre theater stage.

Lysandra pushed through the crowd of officers and forensics experts, her press badge clipped tightly to her jacket. Cole was already there, his face haggard, eyes sunken from sleepless nights. He spotted her immediately, his gaze sharp despite the exhaustion that clung to him.

“You’re getting closer, aren’t you?” His voice was barely a whisper, but there was no mistaking the underlying tension in his words.

Lysandra didn’t answer immediately. Her eyes were already scanning the crime scene, drawn to the familiar patterns that had begun to haunt her dreams.

The victim lay sprawled across the cold concrete, his body contorted in an unnatural pose. He was a man in, his mid-thirties, dressed in a simple suit, but the blood surrounding him told a different story. It painted the ground in cruel geometric shapes—sharp angles and fluid curves that didn’t belong in this world. Symbols.

Lysandra moved closer, her camera clicking with methodical precision. The red streaks in the blood seemed almost...alive, glowing faintly under the harsh lights.

“What are they?” she whispered to herself, examining the symbols etched around the body. They were too uniform, too intentional to be random.

Cole stood behind her, arms crossed. “You think this is the same killer?”

Lysandra nodded slowly, her fingers brushing the surface of her camera. “Same symbols. Same ritual. It’s not a coincidence.”

As she zoomed in on one of the symbols, her stomach twisted. The design was almost identical to one she had found in her mother’s journals—the journals that had once been locked away in the dusty corners of her memories.

“You should get a closer look,” Cole urged, his voice low.

She didn’t need to be told twice. Kneeling beside the body, Lysandra leaned in to capture the faint shimmer of something she hadn’t noticed before—tiny particles in the blood that seemed to shift with the light, like stardust caught in the web of time itself.

Her camera flashed again.

Suddenly, everything seemed to freeze.

Lysandra’s breath caught in her throat. For just a moment, she thought she saw something move in the shadows—a figure, tall and thin, its outline blurred and indistinct. But it was gone as quickly as it appeared, leaving only a faint echo of its presence behind.

“Did you see that?” she asked, her voice strained.

Cole frowned, turning his attention to the shadows. “See what?”

Lysandra didn’t answer. She couldn’t find the words. All she knew was that the figure had been real—real enough to make her pulse race. Real enough to make the air feel colder than it should.

Back at her apartment, Lysandra sat hunched over her desk, the soft glow of her desk lamp illuminating the chaos before her. Photographs from the crime scene littered the surface, and her mother’s old journals opened to pages filled with scribbled notes and symbols.

The moon’s pale light filtered through the blinds, casting faint shadows across the room. Her fingers moved absentmindedly over the papers, tracing the symbols from the bodies onto the map she had pinned to the wall. They formed a pattern—an intricate web that connected the victims’ locations, one after another.

She paused on a photo, zooming in. The symbol on the victim’s chest was unmistakable. A crescent moon, its edges jagged and sharp, surrounded by a network of lines that seemed to pulse and breathe with a life of their own.

She flipped through her mother’s journals, stopping at a page filled with detailed drawings of constellations and celestial bodies. One symbol, in particular, caught her eye. It was identical to the one on the victim.

Her breath hitched. The symbols, the rituals, the patterns—they weren’t random. They were connected to something older than she could comprehend. Something that went beyond murder.

Lysandra couldn’t shake the feeling that the killer wasn’t just following a pattern—they were working towards something. A larger, more sinister goal.

Her phone buzzed, pulling her from her thoughts.

Meet me at the old church. You need to see this. It was a message from Cole.

The old church was tucked away on the outskirts of town, a crumbling relic from a time long forgotten. The towering structure seemed out of place among the modern buildings that surrounded it, its steeple reaching toward the sky like a broken finger pointing accusingly at the heavens.

Lysandra felt a chill as she stepped through the door, the air thick with the scent of mildew and old wood. The main hall was dimly lit, but she could make out the outlines of old pews and stained-glass windows, their vibrant colors muted by time and decay.

Cole was waiting for her by the altar, his face grim. In his hands, he held a bundle of photographs.

“These were taken by a local photographer,” he said, handing her the photos. “They were developed yesterday, but I think you’ll see something... strange.”

Lysandra examined the first image. It was a picture of the church’s exterior, but in the background, something was out of place. A figure, faint and ghostly, was standing at the edge of the frame, just beyond the reach of the camera’s focus.

The second photo was even stranger. The figure was closer now, its outline sharper, more defined. Its eyes, hollow and vacant, seemed to stare directly at her from the page.

Lysandra’s hand trembled as she turned the pages. Each photo showed the figure growing closer, its presence more tangible, as though it was trying to make itself known. The last photograph sent a wave of nausea through her.

The figure was no longer in the background. It was right in the center of the church, standing before the altar, its face a blur of shadows and unearthly light.

Her breath quickened.

“Who took these?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.

“A man named Elias. He disappeared last night,” Cole answered quietly. “His camera was found near the church. The pictures... were all he left behind.

Lysandra stood frozen, her eyes still locked on the photographs. The figure, whatever it was, had been following them—closer and closer with each passing day. The lines between the supernatural and the human world were beginning to blur in ways she hadn’t anticipated.

Her heart raced as she turned the photos over, desperate for an explanation. The back of the last photo was covered in strange, almost unintelligible writing. Symbols, much like the ones she had seen at the crime scenes.

“Do you know what this means?” she asked, holding the photo up to Cole.

He shook his head. “It’s in a language I don’t recognize.”

Lysandra’s gaze drifted back to the altar. The air felt thick with something unnatural, a force that pressed against her chest, suffocating her. She felt watched—watched by something not entirely human.

And then, there was a sound.

A low, guttural growl reverberated through the church, as if the walls themselves were alive, groaning under the weight of an unseen presence. Lysandra spun around, her heart in her throat, but the church was empty—too empty.

The growl echoed again, louder this time, reverberating through her bones.

Suddenly, the camera in her hand began to hum. The sound was soft at first, but it grew louder, vibrating through the air like an ancient instrument tuning itself. She turned the lens towards the altar, snapping a picture without thinking.

The flash illuminated the room for a split second, and in that brief moment, she saw it.

The figure.

It stood just beyond the altar, its shape taller, its limbs elongated and distorted. Its eyes glowed with an unnatural light, and its mouth was twisted into a grotesque grin.

It was watching her.

The camera’s screen flickered, and a single word flashed across it.

Run.

Lysandra’s heart stopped. She didn’t need to be told twice. She turned and fled, the sound of her footsteps echoing through the empty halls of the church. Behind her, the growl continued, growing louder with every step.

The camera buzzed in her hands, the lens humming with a strange energy. She could feel the weight of the unseen presence pressing against her, just behind her, as though it was following her every move.

She couldn’t run fast enough.

As she burst out of the church’s heavy doors into the cold night air, Lysandra glanced back over her shoulder, but there was nothing. Only the wind, howling through the trees.

But she knew—it was watching.

The feeling of being watched didn’t leave her. Even as she reached the safety of her apartment, even as she locked the door and pressed her back against it, she couldn’t shake the sensation that something was still out there. Waiting.

She barely remembered sending the message, barely remembered calling Kaelen. But now, as he stood before her, his expression unreadable, she realized she wasn’t just looking for comfort. She needed answers.