I ran, not because I knew where I was going, but because whatever had been inside my apartment had made stopping feel like a terrible idea.
The stairwell door slammed against the wall as I pushed through it, and my injured shoulder nearly gave way when I caught the railing. Pain shot down my arm, followed by another heavy impact from above that sent a metallic vibration through the building. I didn’t look back.
I forced myself down the stairs, my ribs protesting whenever I breathed too deeply while the strange sensation beneath my right arm pulsed faintly, almost like a second heartbeat. None of it mattered as much as Nyelle being somewhere across the city without me.
Her messages kept returning to me.
Don’t come looking for me.
Our building.
Something is inside.
Nyelle complained when she was annoyed. She argued when she was angry. When she was genuinely afraid, she stopped wasting words.
I reached the fourth-floor landing and slowed when something scraped against the concrete below.
Another scrape followed.
I leaned over the railing.
"Hello?"
Nothing answered.
Then a woman whispered, "Don’t come down."
Every muscle in my body tightened.
"Are you hurt?"
Silence.
"Where are you?"
"Third floor."
"Can you get outside?"
"No."
"Why?"
Something shifted below us.
The woman sucked in a breath.
"It’s watching."
A faint tapping sound came from beneath us.
"What is?"
"I don’t know."
Another tap.
Closer.
"It knows when you’re afraid."
The stairwell door below us shook violently.
The woman screamed.
I ran.
Something scraped against the railing behind me, metal dragging over metal, and the door below burst open as I shoved through the exit and stumbled into the street.
Cold air struck my face.
For one brief second, relief loosened something inside my chest.
Then I looked back.
Nothing had followed.
That should have made me feel better.
Instead, I wondered why it hadn’t.
The lobby looked as though a fight had happened inside it. Cracked glass covered the floor, a security chair lay overturned, and the reception desk had been shoved sideways beneath a television displaying static.
Then I noticed the paper coffee cup beside the desk.
Steam was still rising from it.
Someone had been here recently.
The security guard was gone.
His coffee wasn’t.
I forced myself outside.
The city was worse than I had imagined.
Sirens screamed from several directions, people shouted over one another, car horns blared without rhythm, and smoke rose between buildings that had looked normal less than an hour earlier. A woman cried into a phone that clearly wasn’t working while a barefoot man ran past her as though something were chasing him.
The city hadn’t collapsed completely.
That would have been easier to understand.
Instead, it was functioning in fragments. Cars moved where roads remained clear, people tried calling family members, and strangers demanded answers from anyone who looked as though they might have them.
Nobody could.
A bloodied man stumbled from a vehicle nearby and grabbed a stranger.
"My wife. She was in the car. She was right there."
The stranger pulled free.
"I don’t know."
The man turned toward the burning vehicle and ran toward it.
I almost followed.
Then Nyelle’s messages returned to me.
Our building.
Something is inside.
I pulled out my phone and called her.
The call failed.
I tried again.
Nothing.
"Come on, Nyelle."
I looked down the road.
Six streets.
Normally, fifteen minutes.
Now every street looked like a place where something could happen.
I continued.
A bus had crashed through a clothing store, people climbed through broken windows, and someone carried an injured man toward the sidewalk while another person shouted that the hospital wasn’t accepting anyone.
"How can a hospital be closed?"
The man looked at me.
"You think I know?"
Fair enough.
I kept moving, then caught myself looking at the sky.
The pale lines I had noticed earlier were brighter now, enormous branches stretching across the blue. The longer I stared, the stronger the pressure became behind my eyes.
I looked down.
It disappeared.
I looked up.
It returned.
At the next intersection, a fallen tree blocked the sidewalk. I climbed over it, then stopped.
Thin silver light moved beneath the bark.
It wasn’t reflected sunlight.
It was coming from inside the tree.
Lines of pale illumination travelled through the wood as though something had replaced the sap.
A man nearby was watching me.
"Did you see that?"
"The light?"
He nodded.
"Is it radiation?"
"I don’t know."
"Aliens?"
"I don’t know."
"Military?"
I looked down at my blood-covered shirt and knife.
"Do I look like I know?"
He shook his head.
"Then we’re making progress."
Something moved above us.
We both looked up.
A bird dropped onto the pavement.
Four wings unfolded from its body.
Neither of us spoke.
The bird tilted its head, then launched itself between two buildings with unnatural speed.
"What the hell was that?"
"I was hoping you knew."
"I don’t know what’s happening anymore."
"Neither do I."
"I’m going home."
"Is your family there?"
He nodded.
"Then go."
He left.
I continued toward Nyelle.
The farther I went, the harder it became to pretend the city would recover by lunchtime. Abandoned vehicles filled the roads, smoke gathered between buildings, and people moved with the cautious uncertainty of animals that sensed danger without understanding it.
Then I heard a child crying.
A woman was on her knees beside an overturned car, desperately reaching beneath it.
"Please!"
"My daughter."
A small hand appeared beneath the vehicle.
"Mummy?"
"I’m here."
The woman looked at me.
"Please."
I glanced toward the road.
Nyelle was still six streets away.
Every practical part of my mind told me to keep going.
Then the girl whimpered.
"Mummy, it hurts."
I crouched beside the vehicle.
"Can you pull her from that side?"
"I tried. I can’t get enough room."
"Move back."
"You’ll get hurt."
"I know."
I placed both hands beneath the edge of the vehicle and pushed.
Pain exploded through my injured shoulder. My ribs tightened, but I pushed again.
The vehicle moved a few inches.
"I can reach her!"
"Now."
The woman grabbed her daughter’s hand and pulled.
The girl slid free.
The vehicle crashed back down.
I stumbled away while the woman gathered her daughter into her arms.
"You’re okay. You’re okay."
Then a low growl rolled through the intersection.
The woman stopped.
The creature stood across the road.
It wasn’t the same one from my apartment. This one was smaller, almost canine in shape, with overlapping black plates along its spine and a pale horn rising from its forehead.
The creature’s pale eyes shifted toward the woman and child.
I stepped between them.
The woman grabbed the back of my shirt.
"Don’t."
"Stay behind me."
"What is that?"
"I don’t know."
"Can you fight it?"
I glanced at the broken metal pipe beside the overturned car.
"I’ve had better mornings."
The creature lunged.
I grabbed the pipe and swung. The blow caught its shoulder, but it barely reacted.
It charged again.
I backed around the wrecked vehicle, keeping the car between us while the woman stumbled away with her daughter.
Something about the creature bothered me.
It wasn’t simply chasing me.
It was watching me.
Every time I changed direction, it adjusted before I finished moving.
I slowed.
It slowed.
I shifted left.
It shifted left.
I stopped.
It stopped.
The creature tilted its head.
"You’re learning."
Its lips pulled back, revealing rows of teeth.
Then it charged.
I waited until the last moment and stepped aside. Its horn scraped across my shirt, and I swung the pipe into its ribs before running between two abandoned cars.
Its armored body caught against the metal.
For one second, it was trapped.
I raised the pipe.
Then I hesitated.
It wasn’t panicking.
It was waiting.
The creature twisted free and lunged again.
Then a flash of silver crossed the sky.
The creature stopped.
Its head lifted, pale eyes following the silver light above us.
It took one step backward.
Then another.
The creature turned and disappeared between the buildings.
For several seconds, nobody moved.
The woman finally stepped closer.
"What was that?"
"I don’t know."
My right arm suddenly grew warm.
Then my phone vibrated.
One bar of signal.
An unknown number.
IF YOU CAN SEE THE LIGHT, DON’T FOLLOW IT.
Another message arrived.
IT ISN’T LEADING YOU TO SAFETY.
I looked toward the sky.
The silver lines had changed direction.
They were bending toward the same point.
Nyelle’s building.
My phone vibrated again.
IT IS WAKING UP.
I read the message twice.
Then my right arm went cold.
Every hair along my arm rose as I stared at my hand. For the first time since the System had appeared, I had the distinct impression that whatever was inside me wasn’t reacting to the message.
It was recognizing it.
I looked toward Nyelle’s building.
She had told me not to come.
Something was inside.
The creature had stopped because of the light.
The light was moving toward her.
And someone I had never met knew enough about it to warn me.
I could stay where I was and wait for another message, or convince myself that reaching Nyelle was exactly what the warning wanted me to do.
None of those options felt safe.
But standing still had stopped feeling like an option the moment I heard the fear in Nyelle’s messages.
So I started toward her building.
This time, I wasn’t running from what was happening.
I was going toward it.