In the middle of the night, in a desolate park, a cradle stood unmoving beneath a flickering lamplight.
---
Colhoun arrived within the hour. No backup. No time to waste. He searched the park for another hour, his instincts gnawing at him. Then, finally, a lead—his assistant's last known location.
An abandoned factory.
Six kilometers away.
Tracking something for that distance was hard. But tracking something that spread out, listening through hidden channels, weaving itself into the city's unnoticed spaces? That was worse. The kind of thing that slithered rather than walked. But the god of probability had given him a sliver of favor, and Colhoun followed it.
Still, he took no chances. Before stepping inside, he radioed in his position, then moved through a concealed entrance in the warehouse-like building.
He muttered, half to himself, half to the silent dark
—
"Should've lost a bit more weight... cave-diving's getting harder these days."
Then, behind him—
A deep, grinding rumble.
His way out was gone.
Colhoun's breath came slow, steady, controlled. He pressed against the cold metal shelving, his fingers tightening around his revolver.
Something was wrong.
The air was thick. Heavy. Charged like a coming storm.
The warehouse stretched into darkness, a vast hollow space lined with rusted machinery and crumbling crates. Moonlight cut jagged lines through broken skylights, barely reaching the ground. The scent of decay curled at the edges of his senses.
Then—movement.
Soft. Measured. Something shifting across the concrete floor.
He swept his flashlight over the space between the rusted pillars. Empty. But a noise—soft, clicking, tapping—echoed from the shadows.
Like talons against stone.
Colhoun swallowed hard. His grip tightened on the gun.
He took a step forward.
A rush of air—behind!
He twisted, just as something huge passed within inches of him, faster than thought.
CRASH!
Wood exploded. Metal shrieked. Something had cleaved through a stack of crates like they were made of paper.
Colhoun stumbled, rolling onto the cold floor, gun snapping up—
Nothing.
Only the dark.
Only silence.
His pulse hammered in his ears. He had seen something—just a glimpse. A limb, bent wrong. A joint that twisted where it shouldn't. The gleam of something razor-sharp.
His instincts screamed: Run.
But instincts weren't enough. He needed answers.
A new sound. Wet. Dripping.
Colhoun's flashlight flickered upward.
And he saw.
A body. Hung in the center of the warehouse.
Or what was left of it.
The ribcage was torn open, splayed outward like some grotesque, rotting flower. Flesh peeled in strips, dangling from the beams. The floor beneath was littered with curling, discarded slivers of skin, soaked through.
Something had been feeding.
Or worse—playing.
Bile rose in his throat. Then—
Breathing.
Right behind him.
Colhoun dove aside as something lunged. A blur of teeth and motion, a body that did not move like a human—or any animal should.
A slicing pain tore through his side as he hit the ground, a sharp edge catching beneath his ribs. He gasped, rolling onto his back, gun scrambling for purchase—
Nothing.
The thing had already retreated. Watching. Testing.
Colhoun pressed a hand to his side—warm blood. It wasn't deep. But deep enough.
He crawled behind a fallen workbench, forcing his breath to steady. His fingers fumbled over the ground, searching, finding—
A rusted metal pipe.
From the dark, a voice echoed.
Not a growl. Not a snarl.
A whisper.
His own voice.
Distorted. Warped. A perfect mimicry of something he had said earlier that night:
"Who's there?"
A chill crawled up his spine.
It was learning.
A rustle above.
A shadow shifting in the rafters.
It was everywhere.
Then—moonlight caught something moving. A tail, bristling with spines, curling like a living whip.
Colhoun swung the pipe as it lashed toward him. A sharp crack echoed as metal met flesh. The creature reeled, its tail snapping against a stack of barrels.
One tipped.
A scent filled the air.
Gasoline.
The creature circled, slower now, cautious. It had been hurt.
Colhoun barely registered the blood soaking his shirt. His eyes were locked on the barrels.
A desperate idea.
He lunged for his revolver. The creature moved.
Colhoun rolled, gun snapping up, pulling the trigger—
The shot missed watever was attacking him.
But not the gasoline.
WHOOMPH.
A firestorm ripped through the air.
Flames roared outward, licking up rusted walls, twisting metal with unbearable heat.
The creature screamed.
Not like an animal. Not like a person.
Like a dozen voices, layered and writhing.
Colhoun ran.
Behind him, the warehouse went up in flames.
The inferno spread fast, consuming crates, swallowing steel. The walls groaned, metal beams warping in the heat.
Then—
BOOM.
The blast threw him forward, sending him sprawling into the cold night.
The warehouse shuddered.
Another explosion—smaller, deeper—ripped through its core. Something inside had ignited. Oil drums, maybe. Machinery. Maybe something worse.
Colhoun lay on the pavement, gasping.
Behind him, the warehouse burned.
He didn't know if the thing had died.
Didn't know if it could.
But as the steel buckled, as the flames howled, as the walls collapsed into the fire, he heard something beneath the roar—
A whisper.
His own.
And then—
The warehouse crumbled.
Colhoun exhaled.
Half a laugh. Half a sigh.
"Isn't the queue to impersonate me getting a little long?" he muttered.
The sirens were getting closer.