Halloween Possession - (Episode 4 of 5) - "Interference Patterns"

than a few feet apart without excruciating pain. The entity had done something to us, tangled our electromagnetic signatures so thoroughly that separation felt like being turned inside out, which is how I ended up living in Ethan's apartment above the Old Salem Bookstore, sharing his bed, his shower, his every waking moment, while trying desperately not to give in to what our bodies were screaming for. You're staring, he

said from the kitchen, making coffee. He didn't need to turn around to know he could feel my eyes on him, like a physical touch. You're wearing my favorite shirt, I replied, the gray henley that clung to every muscle that made his eyes look darker. I know, of course he did. He could feel my reaction to it, the way my breath caught, the heat that pulled low in my belly, just like I could feel his satisfaction at affecting me.

This is torture, I muttered. Which part He turned coffee in hand, and the morning light through the window made him look like something out of a dream. The entity hunting us, your sister dating my best friend, or the fact that we're sharing a bed but can't touch without feeding the thing that wants to eat us. All of it, but especially that last part. Three nights of lying next to him, feeling every shift of his body, every dream,

every moment he woke up, hard and wanting. Three nights of careful distance of pillows between us like the world's most ineffective protection. Three nights of feeling his desire mixed with mine until I couldn't tell where I ended, and he began. My phone rang, Lily, you need to come to the festival grounds, she said. Marcus found something, something about what the festival really is. Twenty minutes later, we stood in the middle of Salem Common, watching vendors set

up booths for the Halloween Festival. It looked innocent enough, pumpkins, corn mazes, carnival games. But Marcus had different maps spread on a picnic table covered in electromagnetic readings. The festival isn't random, he said. Look at the booth placements, the stages, the paths between attractions. It's a circuit, a massive electromagnetic trap. Ethan leaned over the map and I had to focus

on breathing normally as his scent washed over me. My grandmother designed this sixty years ago, but I never knew why to catch it. Marcus said, the entity Every Halloween, the trap activates, but it's never worked because he looked at us, because it needs bait. Two people with electromagnetic signatures so intertwined that the entity can't resist like us, I said, exactly like you. Your connection is the strongest I've ever measured. You're not just compatible, you're perfectly matched

mirror frequencies. Lily grabbed my hand. So my sister is bait. We both are, Ethan said quietly. The trap needs us at the center, fully connected to draw the entity in. Once it's feeding on us, the circuit activates and theoretically destroys it. Theoretically, I laughed, but it came out shaky. What happens to us? Marcus exchanged a look with Ethan unknown. The trap's never been successfully activated because no one's been stupid enough to try, because no one's had a connection

strong enough to survive it. I felt Ethan's fear through our bond, but underneath it was determination. He'd already decided he would do this with or without me. When I asked, Halloween night, midnight, when the veil is thinnest and the entity is strongest, four days, Lily said, we have four days to figure out how to keep you alive while using you as supernatural bait. That's when I noticed someone watching us, a woman at the candy Apple booth. Her

movements too smooth, too synchronized. When she turned, I gasped. It was Rebecca Torres, but not her features were right, but her electromagnetic signature was wrong, empty, like a photocopy of a person. Ethan, I whispered, he saw her too through our connection. I felt his horror and rage. It's wearing them, he said, the entity. It's wearing the women. It took Rebecca, not Rebecca smiled and waved, then disappeared

into the crowd. But there were others. I could see them now, Emma Martinez at the fortune Teller's tent, Sarah Kim helping with decorations, all the missing women walking around Salem like nothing had happened. We need to get out of here, Marcus said, already packing up his maps. But when we turned to leave, Lily was gone. Lily. I spun around, panic, rising Lily through the crowd, I saw her walking toward the Haunted House attraction, her movements puppet smooth.

Marcus ran after her, but she disappeared inside before he could reach her. It's taking her, I said, right now, in broad daylight, it's taking her. Ethan grabbed my hand and the full connection blazed to life between us. Through it, I could feel Lily faint, fading, being pulled apart, one frequency at a time. We can't wait for Halloween, I said, we have to do something now. If we activate the trap early, I don't care. That's my sister. He looked at me, and I felt his decision through our bond.

Then we go get her. The Haunted House was closed, still being assembled for Halloween. We broke in through a service door, following the electromagnetic trail. Lily left behind inside was a maze of half built scares and exposed wiring. She's here, I said, feeling for her frequency, but she's scattered. That's when the lights went out. In the darkness, I could see them, all, the missing women, glowing with stolen

electromagnetic energy. They moved in perfect synchronization, surrounding us. Mara Chen, they said in unison, their voices creating harmonics that made my bones ache. We've been waiting for you. Let my sister go. She's already gone, dispersed, absorbed like you will be. No. The word came from Ethan, and with it a surge of power through our connection the empty women, and stepped back. You're going to fight, they laughed, with Rebecca's mouth, Emma's throat,

Sarah's lungs. You can't fight what you are, electromagnetic energy, seeking unity, fighting entropy, fighting isolation. We are what you'll become, perfect connection without the burden of self. That's not connection, I said, that's a rature.

then pulled me against him and kissed me. The moment our lips met, the entity surged toward us, drawn by the electromagnetic explosion of our connection. But instead of resisting, we opened ourselves to it, Let it in, let it feed. It was agony ecstasy. I felt myself fragmenting, my electromagnetic signature scattering, but I also felt Ethan holding me together, using his energy to maintain my pattern. We were merging, truly merging, our frequencies, aligning into something new. The entity

realized too late what we were doing. By feeding on us, it had created a conduit, and through that conduit we could reach the scattered pieces of the women it had taken. Lily, I called through the electromagnetic field, come back. I felt her distant and fading, but still there, still my sister. I pulled, using the connection the entity had created, and suddenly she was gasping on the floor. Beside us, the empty women screamed, their stolen forms flickering the trap. Marcus's

voice came from the doorway. He was bleeding from a head wound, but holding something that looked like a jerry rigged electromagnetic pulse device. If you can hold it for thirty seconds, I can activate a localized version. Thirty seconds, it might as well have been thirty years. Ethan's arms tightened around me. Together together, we opened ourselves completely, no barriers, no resistance, every thought, every feeling, every cell of our beings aligned. I couldn't tell where I ended and he began.

We were one electromagnetic signature, blazing like a sun. The entity couldn't resist. It poured into us, trying to scatter us, to add us to its collection. But we held. We held each other, held ourselves, held a pattern of who we were, even as everything tried to tear us apart. I felt the missing women, Rebecca, Emma, Sarah, dozens of others stretching back decades, all trapped in the entity's hunger. Through our connection, we gave them something to anchor to. Now, Marcus,

the pulse hit and the world went white. When I came to I was on the floor of the haunted house. Ethan's body curved around mine. We were still connected, but the invasive presence was gone. The entity had been dispersed, its hold on the missing women broken, but they were still gone, Rebecca, Emma, Sarah. Their electromagnetic signatures had been scattered too completely to recover. Only Lily had been saved, pulled back before the point of no return, Mara. Lily's

voice weak but real. I reached for her, and Ethan moved with me. Our bodies still synchronized. We couldn't seem to separate, couldn't find where one ended and the other began. The merge Marcus said quietly, permanent, isn't it? I felt the truth of it through every cell. Ethan and I were one electromagnetic field. Now we could probably learn to function separately to create the illusion of independence, but we would always be connected. Every thought, every feeling, every sensation

shared forever. Are you okay with this? Ethan asked, though he already knew the answer. He could feel my mind as clearly as his own. Ask me again in fifty years, I said, He laughed, and I felt it resonate through both our bodies. The entity Lily asked. Dispersed, Marcus said, the pulse scattered it, but he looked at the electromagnetic reader. It's not gone, just spread thin. It'll reform eventually, maybe not for decades, but but it'll come back, I finished,

and we'll be ready. Ethan helped me stand. Our movements perfectly coordinated. Now I could feel everything, his exhaustion, his relief, his love. That last one stopped me cold. You love me, I said, since the moment you walked into that Victorian house, glowing with power, you didn't understand. He touched my face and it felt like touching myself. The connection just made it impossible to hide. I love you too, I said, though the words were unnecessary. He could feel it, had

probably felt it for days. This is beautiful and disturbing in equal measure. Lily said, can you not share everything like when you use the bathroom. We'll figure it out, I said, though I had no idea how. Marcus helped Lily stand. The festival still needs to happen. The entity is weak now, but the full trap on Halloween will make sure it can't reform for generations. So we still have to be bait. I asked. No, Ethan said, Now

you are the trap. Your merged signature is like electromagnetic flypaper. Any piece of the entity that comes near you will stick and burn out. Four days until Halloween. Four days to learn how to exist as one electromagnetic being in two bodies. Four days to figure out if love could survive the complete absence of privacy. At least the sex will be interesting, Lily, said Lily, But she wasn't wrong.

I could already feel it through our connection. When we finally gave in to the physical side of our merge, it would be unlike anything either of us had experienced, feeling everything from both sides. Pleasure doubled and reflected back infinitely. If we survived Halloween, the entity was wounded, but not dead, and we were no longer two people who could barely touch without consequences. We were something new, something powerful, something that had four days to figure out how to exist

before the final test. Ready to go home, Ethan asked home his apartment, our apartment. Now I supposed our life together, I asked, though it was a joke. Now we couldn't be anything but together always, he said, and kissed me. The world exploded with sensation. His mouth on mine, my mouth on his, The taste of ourselves, the perfect circuit of desire and connection. Maybe losing my self in October wasn't the worst thing after all. Maybe it was the only way to truly be found.