The bull snorted, steam curling from its flared nostrils in the cool night air. It pawed the ground once, twice—hooves churning up dirt as it stood silhouetted against the burning ranch house. The massive animal's eyes reflected the dancing flames as it turned around heading back to its herd, harrumphing in victory over the crumpled body of its enemy.
Arthur's hands remained frozen above his keyboard. The adrenaline that had surged through him moments ago still buzzed in his fingertips, his heart hammering against his ribs
The creature's limbs splayed at impossible angles, its oversized head partially caved in where the bull's horn had connected. Iridescent blue fluid pooled beneath it, gleaming with an internal phosphorescence that cast eerie shadows across the ground.
It looked dead. Really dead.
Arthur exhaled slowly. "Holy shit." The words escaped as barely more than a whisper.
His eyes tracked to Javier, who knelt in the dirt beside his brother's body, the weapon abandoned on the side. The young man's shoulders shook with silent sobs, one hand clutching Jonathan's limp fingers, the other pulling what was left of his head in an embrace.
The scene rendered with a disturbing realism that crawled under Arthur's skin. The way Javier's tears cut clean tracks through the grime and blood on his face. The unnatural stillness of Jonathan's body. The spatter pattern of dark fluid across the packed earth. Even the sound—Javier's ragged breathing punctuated by choked sobs, the distant crackle of the burning house, the soft pinging of cooling metal from the rifle's barrel.
Too real. Too detailed for comfort.
"Jesus, this game doesn't pull any punches," Arthur muttered, rubbing his eyes.
Javier gently closed his brother's eyes, his touch impossibly tender. He leaned forward, pressing his forehead against Jonathan's, whispering something Arthur couldn't make out. The intimacy of the moment made Arthur want to look away, to give them privacy, despite knowing they were just characters in a game.
"I'm sorry," Arthur said quietly to his screen, not knowing why, they were just npcs after all, it's not like they had families or feelings, this was just 3d models programmed to move a certain way.
So why did his chest hurt?
Before he could dwell on it further, the camera feed abruptly cut off, replaced by a full-screen notification:
[MISSION SUCCESSFUL]
Arthur felt a wave of relief wash over him. Success, despite everything. He'd beaten the mission, but he couldn't help feeling a twinge of annoyance that Jonathan had died. If he could reload the mission saving the two brothers, he would, but alas, this game didn't allow to do so.
The notification expanded to reveal the rewards screen:
[REWARDS ACQUIRED]
+200 Credits
+3 INTEL Points
ITEMS COLLECTED:
Infiltrator Fragments (4) - [Alien Corpse Parts]
Cephalod Specimen (1) - [Intact Alien Corpse]
SPECIAL: Neural Inhibitor Technology [Partial Blueprint]
[ITEMS WILL BE ADDED TO THE NEAREST SAFEHOUSE]
"Not bad," Arthur said, leaning back in his chair with a yawn. He checked the time in the corner of his screen—almost 2 AM. He'd been playing this strange new game for hours without even realizing it.
The mission report faded, returning him to the global command view. The mission marker in Texas had disappeared, replaced by a small icon indicating a "secured asset." Dozens of other missions continued to blink across the map, their timers counting down with merciless precision.
"Hmm, that NPC is going to be recruitable, I guess," Arthur mused, noting how Javier was now listed as a potential team member once his "Mental Stability" rating improved from "Critical."
"Interesting game mechanic... though they could've handled that death scene better. Bit over the top for my taste." He frowned, clicking through the interface to explore what else had been unlocked.
He navigated to what appeared to be a base management screen, finding tabs for Research, Engineering, Personnel, and Global Strategy. Under the Research tab, the items collected from his "successful" mission were catalogued with "impressive" detail:
[INFILTRATOR FRAGMENTS]
Classification: Alien Construct
Description: Biological components combined with synthetic materials
Preliminary Analysis: (?)
Research Potential: (?)
[CEPHALOD SPECIMEN]
Classification: Alien Entity (Psionic)
Description: Humanoid with enlarged cranial capacity
Preliminary Analysis: (?)
Research Potential: (?)
"Wow, really went all out with the descriptions," Arthur said ironically.
A tooltip informed him that full analysis would require a functioning research facility in his safehouse—which wouldn't be completed for another ten hours according to the timer at the bottom of the screen.
Arthur rubbed his face with both hands, suddenly aware of the burning dryness in his eyes. The fatigue hit him all at once, his body catching up to the late hour. Despite his curiosity about those alien creatures—the Infiltrators with their wrong faces and the Cephalod with its terrifying mind control—his eyelids were growing heavier by the second.
That Cephalod had been something else entirely. The way it forced Javier to shoot his own brother...Arthur shuddered. Gaming had its dark moments, but this crossed a line he wasn't used to seeing. Too real. Too cruel in its execution.
And those Infiltrators—those not-quite-humans who seemed to melt away rather than leave evidence behind. Their jerky movements, their inhuman strength, the way they coordinated their attacks. The game designers had created genuinely unsettling enemies.
"What kind of sick mind came up with this?" he wondered aloud.
The question lingered uncomfortably as he stared at the global map. Red mission markers pulsed at various locations, each representing some poor NPC about to be hunted down by those creatures. The game wanted him to save them all, clearly an impossible task. A design choice meant to force hard decisions about which missions to prioritize.
Arthur yawned, his jaw cracking with the force of it. As fascinating as this game was, with its unusual mechanics and disturbing enemies, his body was demanding sleep. He had a stream scheduled for tomorrow—technically later today—and his viewers would notice if he was off his game.
He searched for a save button but found none. Not unusual for modern games with automatic saving, but still annoying. He settled for turning off the screen, making a mental note to explore the research system after he'd slept.
"Definitely an interesting game," he murmured as he shuffled toward his bedroom. "Though the developers could have toned down the darkness a bit."
Arthur collapsed onto his bed without bothering to change. Within minutes, he was asleep, his mind still processing the strange new game that had appeared on his computer and the challenges it presented.
In his dreams, he saw the Cephalod again, its needle-teeth grinning as it forced players—not characters, but actual gamers—to destroy what they loved most. He tossed and turned, unable to escape the image of its bulbous head and those empty black eyes that reflected the blood it gingerly shed.
----------------------------------------
Emily's hands wouldn't stop shaking.
Hours of questioning in the harsh fluorescent light of the police station had left her drained. Her throat was raw from repeating the same story over and over: mysterious voice, warning her about intruders, men with wrong faces coming after her. With each retelling, the officers' expressions grew more skeptical, their questions more pointed.
"And you're certain you can't identify who spoke to you?" Officer Dubois asked for what felt like the twentieth time, pen hovering over his notepad.
"No," Emily said, exhaustion dulling her voice. "It just... came through my computer somehow. Like an emergency system."
The officer exchanged glances with his partner. Emily didn't need her PhD to interpret that look. They thought she was crazy. Or high. Or both.
"What about the security guards?" she pressed. "They saw those... people. They chased them into the stairwell."
Officer Dubois tapped his pen against his notepad. "Yes, and according to their statements, when they entered the stairwell, no one was there. Like they vanished into thin air."
"Because they did," Emily insisted, then caught herself. Even to her own ears, it sounded crazy.
"Ms. Chen, the security cameras in that stairwell went offline at exactly 2:16 AM. Convenient timing, wouldn't you say?" His tone made it clear he suspected tampering, not supernatural events. "We have no footage of these individuals, no evidence they were ever in the building except the testimony of two guards and yourself."
Emily's shoulders slumped. The guards had seen them—that much was true. But they couldn't explain where the pursuers had gone any more than she could.
"So what happens now?" she asked.
Officer Dubois closed his notepad with a snap. "We'll file a report. Investigate the security breach. But honestly? Without evidence, there's not much we can do."
By 4 AM, they finally let her go. A junior officer offered her a ride home, more out of protocol than concern. No one believed there was any real threat—just a late-night scare and a security system failure.
Emily slid into the back seat of the patrol car, exhaustion settling into her bones. As they pulled away from the station, her phone buzzed.
Unknown number. A text message with a set of coordinates and no signature. But somehow she knew what had sent it.
Emily stared at the message. Logic told her to ignore it, to find a hotel, to call her sister. But logic had gone out the window hours ago when men with faces like melted wax had tried to abduct her.
And that voice—the one that had warned her, guided her, saved her—it had felt trustworthy in a way she couldn't explain.
She hailed a cab.
-----------
Forty minutes later, she stood before a warehouse in an industrial district that had seen better days decades ago. Graffiti-covered walls, chain-link fences topped with rusted barbed wire, and not another soul in sight. The address matched, but there was nothing about this place that suggested safety.
The warehouse itself was a concrete monstrosity, its windows either boarded up or broken. A faded sign read "TDCJ Storage Facility" above a loading dock where weeds pushed through cracked cement.
The main door stood slightly ajar.
Emily hesitated, hand clutching her phone like a lifeline. This had to be a mistake. Or a trap. But as she turned to leave, a flicker of movement caught her eye. Someone watching from inside.
"Hello?" she called, immediately regretting drawing attention to herself.
No answer.
She reached for the handle and paused. There, almost invisible against the weathered metal: a small embedded scanner. On impulse, she held her phone against it. A soft beep, and the door unlocked completely.
Inside, the warehouse was nothing like its exterior suggested. Clean. Organized. The cement floor freshly swept. Metal shelving units lined the walls, mostly empty but clearly new. In the center of the vast space sat a cluster of portable modules—the kind used as temporary offices at construction sites—wired together to form a makeshift command center.
And sitting on the hood of a dusty pickup truck parked by the modules, a young Hispanic man in blood-stained clothes stared at her with hollow eyes.
---------------------------
"Collect alien samples. Go to these coordinates. Transportation behind barn."
The message arrived minutes after the invisible voice disappeared, leaving Javier alone with his brother's body and a shattered alien corpse. His phone, which had been in his pocket the whole time, somehow received it despite the lack of signal out here.
His first instinct was to ignore it. To bury his brother. To burn the alien thing. To turn the rifle on himself.
Yet, despite being numb with grief and shock, Javier found himself following the instructions. What did it matter? Jonathan was gone. The ranch was ablaze. Nothing made sense anymore.
He stumbled toward the alien corpse, its blue blood still glowing faintly in the darkness. The bull had done a number on it, but the head—that massive, bulbous head with its cracked helmet—remained mostly intact. He grabbed a tarp from the barn and wrapped the thing in it, trying not to touch the iridescent fluid that leaked from its wounds.
Next, he searched the burning house. Three of the weird guys had rushed in, pursuing them. All three had been caught in the explosion. Their remains were scattered, twisted parts that looked both human and not—fragments of synthetic skin wriggling, circuitry embedded in what might have been muscle tissue, yet no blood.
Javier collected what he could, shoving the least-damaged pieces into a feed bucket.
Behind the barn, he found what the message had promised: transportation. Not his truck—that was still with the herd—but Old Man Figueroa's pickup. His neighbors were away visiting family in Kentucky. The keys sat in the driver's side vanity mirror. This should have surprised him, but after everything else tonight, it barely registered.
He loaded his grisly cargo into the truck bed and covered it with a second tarp. Jonathan's body...
Javier stood frozen, torn between impossible choices.
He wiped a tear from his face and turned away from his brother, there was nothing he could do.
Javier climbed into the cab, knuckles white on the steering wheel. The coordinates led to a location two hours east, deeper into Texas. As he pulled away from the ranch, flames still licking at the roofline of his childhood home, Javier felt something inside him harden. The grief was still there, a crushing weight on his chest, but beside it grew something else.
Rage. Cold and focused.
The things that forced him to kill his brother were still out there. And he was going to make them pay.
------------
The warehouse appeared shortly after 4 AM, a dark shape against the lightening pre-dawn sky. Javier parked outside, studying the building for signs of a trap. Nothing moved. Nothing suggested danger.
He didn't care. Let them come. Let them try to take him too.
He dragged the wrapped alien body from the truck bed, its weight surprisingly light for its size. The feed bucket of fragments came next, clutched in his other hand.
The door opened before he reached it. Inside, the space was sterile and organized—nothing like the abandoned warehouse it appeared to be from outside. Javier dropped his burden on the concrete floor with a wet thud.
"Wait in the car" another message arrived, Javier, with no other options followed without complaints, the moment the door closed, a sense of extreme tiredness rose inside and he fell asleep.
When he awoke almost nine hours later, a makeshift command center had appeared inside the warehouse. Javier's jaw slackened. He'd been asleep in a car twenty feet away. How had they built all this without him hearing a single sound?
But truly, he didn't care, the only thing left in his mind was revenge.