The Box

The rain hadn’t stopped in hours. It drummed against the windows of Clara Morgan’s house like impatient fingers. She was curled up on the couch with a book when the doorbell rang—once, sharp and quick.

She glanced at the clock. 7:14 p.m.

Odd. Clara never received deliveries this late; they usually came in the morning.

She padded to the door, peeked through the peephole, and saw no one. Just a tiny brown box on the porch, already soaked from the storm. No truck. No vehicle is driving away. No one was in sight.

She grabbed the baseball bat standing upright next to the coat rack, slowly opened the door, and pulled the package inside.

Clara sat on the floor, cradling the bat as she examined the box. No return address. No postage stamp. Just a label:

“To M. Caldwell. 426 Wren Hollow Lane.”

Clara frowned. That wasn’t her name, and it definitely wasn’t her address. She lived at 428 Wren Hollow Lane—just a few houses down.

But curiosity had already taken hold. The box was light and taped tight. Clara knew she shouldn’t open it. But she also knew 426 had been empty since the fire last fall.

The Caldwell family had been through a string of tragedies before they vanished—burglary, a car accident, even their dog being poisoned. Rumours swirled, but nothing concrete. Then, one night, they disappeared. No forwarding address. No goodbye.

The house stood silent ever since.

Still...

She grabbed scissors.

Inside was a flash drive wrapped in tissue paper and a single handwritten note on aged, yellowing paper:

“If found, destroy.”

No explanation. No signature.

Clara’s pulse quickened. Who sent this? What was on the drive? Was the Caldwells' misfortune related to it?

She sat there frozen, the flash drive in one hand, the note in the other, when—

Three sharp knocks at the door.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

She jumped.

A shadow shifted behind the obscure glass that framed the front door—tall, broad-shouldered, and wearing a dark hood.

Clara crouched low, tightening her grip on the bat.

Bang. Bang.

Then silence.

A voice came through the door—calm, too calm.

“The package you just received was delivered in error. Please return it. Now.”

Her heartbeat thundered in her ears.

She didn’t answer. The shadow disappeared.

She bolted upstairs and snatched her phone—no signal. The storm must’ve taken down the tower again.

Clara locked herself in her home office and plugged the flash drive into her old laptop, which had not been connected to the Internet in years.

The folder opened instantly. One video file:

“Project Verdant - Evidence 1”

Clara hesitated… then clicked. “I've come this far,” she whispered.

The grainy footage began. The timestamp is six days ago. The camera wobbled, then steadied on rows of metal cages. Inside were animals—twitching, some foaming, some completely still. Syringes, charts, and laptop screens glow with red data.

Then, a man stepped into the frame. He was elderly and thin, wearing a white lab coat and dark glasses. His voice was tremulous but urgent.

“If you’re watching this, Mr. Caldwell, I’m probably dead. They’ve created something… something alive. It’s not a virus. It adapts. It learns. They plan to release it. The trial run starts in Wren Hollow. Destroy this before they find you. Or expose them. But don’t let them take it back.”

The screen cut to black.

Clara slammed the laptop shut.

Two car doors slammed outside.

She rushed to the window and peeked through the blinds. A black SUV was parked across the street, engine running, headlights off. Two men stood outside it, one scanning the neighbourhood, the other opening the trunk.

They didn’t look familiar. Broad-shouldered, built-like enforcers—definitely not the type you wanted knocking at your door.

Clara knew that look. She’d seen it in movies. These men weren’t here to talk.

She looked back at the flash drive.

The note said to destroy it.

The video begged her to expose it.

She had only seconds to choose.

She opened the desk drawer and pulled out a blank USB thumb drive. She slid it into her other laptop and started copying the video file.

She left the original flash drive in the old computer. A decoy.

Then she typed out a quick message in her email app:

"Project Verdant. Watch this."

She attached the copied video and sent it to her best friend. There was no signal yet, but when the towers came back, it would go through.

Bang. Bang.

“Miss Morgan,” one of the men called out too sweetly. “We really need to speak with you. Please don’t make this difficult.”

Clara grabbed her work bag. Her wallet, keys, and ID were already inside from an earlier meeting. She opened the closet safe and shoved in cash, her passport, and essential documents.

The front door groaned under pressure.

Thud. Thud.

They were trying to force their way in.

Her adrenaline kicked in, taking over where fear left off. She ran to the bedroom, opened the back window, and climbed down the trellis, vanishing into the storm.

The Next Morning

The house was empty when police arrived. The front door was hanging off its hinges.

The flash drive left behind had been wiped clean.

But a few days later, a grainy video surfaced online. Then it spread. Journalists received anonymous tips, unmarked envelopes, photos, and coordinates. A full investigative report followed.

The name Project Verdant became national news.

Government officials denied everything, but the Wren Hollow neighborhood was evacuated within 48 hours, citing “chemical contamination.”

No one has seen Clara Morgan since that night. Her disappearance was swift and silent, like the closing of a book mid-sentence. Friends filed missing persons reports. Investigators searched nearby woods and bus stations. But Clara had vanished, leaving only a storm-soaked street and a trail of unanswered questions.

Whispers circulate on encrypted forums, deep in the corners of the dark web, where journalists, whistleblowers, and digital ghosts trade secrets. A user known only as VerdantGhost has been leaking more footage—disturbing videos, classified blueprints, satellite images, and internal documents that point to a sprawling conspiracy. No one knows who they are or where they're posting from, but each leak comes with a warning: 'This is just the beginning.' Some believe it's Clara. Others think it's someone continuing her work. Either way, the truth is spreading—and whoever is behind it stays one step ahead of those trying to silence it.

One message appeared last night, just two words:

“Still fighting.”