Episode Five
1203 Words
Episode Five: Midnight Has Teeth
The warehouse had been abandoned long enough for the city to forget it, but not long enough for the past to loosen its grip.
Midnight settled heavy over the Eastside, the air thick with oil, rust, and old echoes. Malik parked two blocks away and walked the rest, hood up, hands empty. The building loomed ahead windows shattered, metal doors scarred with graffiti layered over graffiti, each tag a reminder that time didn’t erase anything. It only piled on top.
This was where it had happened.
Five years ago, this place had been loud voices, engines, gunshots that cracked the night open. Tonight, it was silent in a way that felt intentional.
Malik stepped inside.
His footsteps echoed too loudly. He hated that. Hated how memory rushed in, uninvited. He saw flashes of himself younger, angrier, desperate enough to make stupid decisions. He smelled blood before he remembered seeing it.
“You came,” Marcus’s voice said from the shadows.
Malik stopped.
Marcus stepped into the light, hands open, smile sharp. He looked older, heavier around the eyes, but the same confidence clung to him like armor. The kind of man who never believed consequences applied to him.
“You always were predictable,” Marcus continued. “Still think you’re the good guy, huh?”
“I’m not here for this,” Malik said. “You said you wanted to talk.”
Marcus laughed. “This is talking.”
Malik scanned the space. No one else. At least not yet.
“You brought my name to her door,” Malik said. “That wasn’t part of whatever this is.”
Marcus shrugged. “Collateral. Happens.”
Something dark flared in Malik’s chest. “You leave her out of it.”
“Then stop pretending you don’t owe me.”
“I paid my debt.”
“No,” Marcus said calmly. “You ran.”
The word hit harder than Marcus knew.
“You left me holding the mess,” Marcus continued. “The cops, the heat, the silence. And now you’re driving strangers around like you found religion.”
Malik stepped closer. “I didn’t snitch.”
“I know,” Marcus said. “That’s the only reason you’re still breathing.”
Silence stretched between them.
“You want money?” Malik asked. “Say it.”
Marcus shook his head. “I want leverage.”
Malik’s jaw tightened. “She’s not leverage.”
Marcus smiled slowly. “Everything’s leverage when time’s short.”
Arielle shouldn’t have been there.
She knew that. Every instinct screamed it as she parked across from the warehouse, camera bag heavy against her side. But fear didn’t paralyze her it focused her. Malik had stopped answering again. Marcus’s name burned in her thoughts like a warning she couldn’t ignore.
She stayed in the car at first, engine off, watching the entrance.
Then she saw Malik walk inside.
Her breath caught.
He looked smaller somehow, swallowed by the building. Vulnerable in a way she’d never seen him before.
Minutes passed. Then more.
She grabbed her camera.
“Just document,” she whispered to herself. “Just in case.”
The door creaked as she slipped inside, staying near the wall, heart pounding so loud she was sure they’d hear it.
Inside, Marcus circled Malik slowly.
“You really care about her,” Marcus said. “That’s new.”
“She’s not part of this.”
Marcus stopped. “You keep saying that like it matters.”
Malik stepped closer, voice low. “I’ll disappear again. Leave the city. You’ll never see me.”
Marcus laughed. “And do this all over again in five years? Nah.”
He leaned in. “You’re going to help me move something.”
“No.”
“You don’t get to say no.”
Malik clenched his fists. “I’m not that guy anymore.”
Marcus’s eyes hardened. “Funny thing about who you are—doesn’t matter who you want to be.”
A soft click echoed behind them.
Both men turned.
Arielle stood near the doorway, camera raised.
“Don’t move,” she said, voice shaking but firm.
Malik’s blood ran cold. “Arielle what are you doing here?”
“Finding the truth,” she said.
Marcus laughed. “This keeps getting better.”
“You should leave,” Malik said urgently.
“Not until someone explains why I’m being hunted like a side character in someone else’s mess,” she snapped.
Marcus tilted his head. “You take pretty pictures, right? Capture moments?”
She didn’t answer.
“Careful,” Marcus continued. “Moments like this have consequences.”
Arielle lifted the camera anyway. The shutter clicked, loud as a gunshot in the empty space.
Malik moved instinctively, stepping in front of her.
“Don’t,” Marcus warned.
Another click.
“Delete that,” Marcus said, calm gone now.
“No,” Arielle said.
Everything happened at once.
Marcus lunged. Malik shoved Arielle back, the camera slipping from her hands and hitting the floor with a crack. A shout echoed. Footsteps. Someone else was there Malik hadn’t been wrong.
A fist connected with Malik’s jaw. He stumbled, tasted blood.
“Arielle, run!” he yelled.
She didn’t.
She grabbed the camera and bolted toward the door, heart racing, lungs burning. Behind her, voices rose, anger sharp and ugly.
She burst outside into the cold night, stumbling across the pavement. She didn’t stop until she reached her car, hands shaking as she locked the doors.
Inside the warehouse, Malik hit the ground hard.
Marcus stood over him, breathing heavy. “I warned you.”
Malik wiped blood from his mouth. “You touch her, I swear ”
“You already lost,” Marcus said. “She’s seen too much.”
Sirens wailed in the distance.
Marcus cursed. “We’re done for tonight.”
He leaned down, voice low. “But this isn’t over. You belong to this, Malik. Always have.”
Then he was gone.
Arielle drove until her vision blurred.
She pulled over near the river, chest heaving, hands still shaking. She checked the camera lens cracked, but the memory card intact.
She stared at the photos.
Blurry. Dark. But unmistakable.
Malik. Marcus. The warehouse.
Proof.
Her phone rang.
Malik.
She answered, tears finally spilling. “You’re bleeding.”
“I’m fine,” he said, breathless. “Are you safe?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Silence followed, heavy and raw.
“You lied to me,” she said softly.
“I know.”
“You didn’t just run from something. You survived it.”
“Yes.”
“And now it’s back.”
“Yes.”
She closed her eyes. “I don’t know what this means for us.”
Malik leaned against the warehouse wall, pain pulsing through him. “I never meant to pull you into my borrowed time.”
Her voice softened. “Then stop treating me like a countdown.”
Another siren screamed closer now.
“Come home,” she said. “We’ll figure this out together.”
Malik hesitated.
Then: “Okay.”
Borrowed time didn’t end all at once.
Sometimes it dared you to choose.
- Writer
