Exhaustion clung to the apartment like dust in the corners. Mugs gathered like forgotten sentries on the windowsill and in the sink. Ash lingering over half-burnt herbs in ashtrays. The boots by the door were crusted in the dried breath of last week's rain.
The leather duster molded to his frame—its weighted shoulders bearing hidden armor steeped in history and habit. The enchantments thrummed faintly, stitched into the seams with deliberate care.
She billed him for the warding runes, but her stitches trembled with quiet dread—glyphs sewn in like whispered prayers, the kind one doesn't admit to speaking.
Four micro-cameras blinked in corners like artificial flies, recording every twitch and breath with cold optics. One perched above the front door, staring down with digital indifference, cataloguing every blink and step with silent judgment. Another blinked red in the corner, a sentinel over Liam's tools and blades, guarding secrets as much as assets. Two more crouched like scavengers camouflaged against brick and shadow.
Thermal pulses and infrared fed into a black-box recorder beneath his ammo bench—a digital heart thudding in the dark. A ghost-stream of encrypted data whispered constantly to Liam's phone, a tether between his instincts and the cold facts. He checked the feed. Empty corridor. Just Ms. Jackson's slippers and that new couple arguing again. No shadows paused at his door.
The door groaned as it sealed, muting the wind's howl and smothering the breath of whatever hunted beyond. Inside, the air hung heavy with ozone and silence, as if the walls themselves braced for a burst of sudden violence.
The workbench stood like a war altar scorched with the marks of old fights, the wood steeped in smoke and memory, its scars speaking of prayers offered through violence. Tools lay in reverent order, silent steel ready to serve. Under the lamp's amber glow, spent casings lay like fallen teeth. Unlabeled vials glinted under the lamp, contents gleaming like venom under skin. LEDs hummed, casting jagged silhouettes across walls lined with steel, silver, and bones whispering finality.
A second bench bore the chaos of creation—silver etching tools, blood-smudged chalk, and bullets cooling like bread fresh from the oven. He didn't pause. Heat shimmered from fresh rounds like breath from wounds. Seraphine's work held strong; now his glyphs curled beside hers, entwined and evolving.
His fingertips traced the grooves of the reloading frame—metal cold, worn like a worry stone, its edges telling stories his hands remembered better than his mind. Muscle memory met memory. "Factory rounds jam. Monsters don't," she had muttered once, silver smearing her fingers.
She taught him glyph-work with a soldier's hand and a teacher's patience, etching lessons with blade and grit—ritual as intent carved into bullet skins. "You don't need magic," she'd said. "It helps. You always need conviction."
The dining table bore no dinners—only blades, runes, and silence: A war altar made from what used to be home. Blades, blessed and cursed, lay paired like dancers awaiting music. Each blade hummed differently against his fingers, as if he had coaxed them to remember his heartbeat. Back Blade: Silvered steel, rune-etched, enchanted for sharpness and lightness. Hip Blade: Cold iron, likewise enchanted by Seraphine.
Seraphine sparked like struck steel—never soft, never cruel, just heat and edge, the promise of fire when it mattered. Her hands didn't soothe—they healed his wounds and shielded. She gave him up-armored jackets and dusters not out of pity, but because she knew what awaited him.
She fought the dark, buried comrades—and parts of herself. The enchantments attuned to him, set like a second spine. The collar still carried a scent of cedar smoke, burnt herbs, and sharp grief woven in. Every stitched glyph, every lined duster declared: I know what's out there. Come back safe.
Black leather gloves hugged his fists, knuckles armored in silver and cold iron. Every strike declared: Human or not, you stay down. He never said thank you. He didn't need to. Every worn seam, every silent step in her crafted gear was the thank you—etched in silver, whispered in every returned breath.
He could still feel the ghost of her fingertip trailing runes along his ribs, hear her whisper pressed to his shoulder—not a plea, but a command: "Come back." Their rhythm—silent trust, spoken in steel and spells. Now, "love" drifted up like a splinter through skin. He blinked. When did that start?
He holstered the Glock with practiced ease—silver, iron, fire in every round. Not just a weapon—a warning and a promise: Cross me and end. He press-checked the weapon, sights, and optics.
His breath slowed. The tenderness of earlier moments burned off, leaving only the cold edge of purpose. He adjusted his collar, the ghost of her perfume brushing past—ignored, but not forgotten. The feed flickered—just neighbors in the corridor. He moved; boots hit the fire escape with a groan.
In the dark, something hunted, owning the silence between heartbeats. But tonight, Liam Duskwood wasn't prey—he was the hunting blade.
The city bled neon across rain-pitted streets, each drop peeling back the skin of something restless underneath. Glass towers loomed, mirrored faces blinking city lights like indifferent gods. Liam had waited for the full moon like a soldier awaits a call to arms.
The city exhaled in steam and sirens, always watching. It was past midnight, yet the city pulsed with an insomniac rhythm—cars cutting the dark, neon flickering above diners, sirens wailing beneath a hum of voices and steps.
He moved, senses tuned to every shadow and flicker beyond buzzing neon. Midnight cloaked the streets. The city hummed like a sleepless animal—lights flickering, whispers riding the air. Down here, stories weren't told—they were swallowed by the business district's polished veneer.
The city never slept. It just blinked—one eye open, always waiting to see who didn't make it to morning. Dark and restless, pulsing with life. Somewhere in this urban sprawl, the creature was hunting. And he was going to find it.
Crooked brick skeletons loomed, whispering forgotten sins, their narrow alleyways swallowed in thick shadows. Streetlights buzzed and flickered, fighting a losing battle against the dark. The pavement was cracked, littered with cigarette butts and the occasional glint of broken glass.
The air bit—gasoline sharp, fried oil warm, rot curling under rain-soaked concrete. Somewhere in the distance, a siren wailed, the sound stretching thin before vanishing beneath the city's usual din.
Here, in the forgotten quarter of the city, it was quieter. Not peaceful. Just... empty. Even the shadows recoiled, wary of what ruled this silence..Predators didn't skulk here. Silence bowed to those who wore skin with claws, or otherwise walked in stolen human skin.
Years of chasing nightmares had taught Liam where real monsters hid. The monster he was tracking had chosen its hunting ground well: The industrial zone abandoned by business, but not by the homeless, the desperate and degenerate.
The industrial graveyard loomed—factories hunched like rusted beasts long since bled dry, windows gaping like shattered ribs, remnants of a time when this part of the city had been alive with machinery and sweat. Now, they were nothing more than forgotten tombs, hollowed spaces where shadows moved unseen.
Someone bled out while he played house, laughed too long, and listened too little. The signs had been there, crawling like ants beneath his skin, and he'd brushed them off. He'd let himself get distracted and ignored the creeping signs that something was wrong until it was too late. And now, because of that, more people were potentially in danger.
Rain on asphalt soured the air, carrying the city's aftertaste of hot oil from a late-night street vendor, the faint sting of gasoline, the damp musk of garbage tucked away in an alley.
His fingers curled around familiar hilts, the ritual of readiness steadying his pulse, like old comrades meeting in silence before a war. The handgun loaded with custom rounds beneath his coat sang a song, promising justice and vengeance.
His eyes flicked between the towering buildings and the narrow alleyways that cut through them like veins. This part of town had been abandoned long before the creature had made it its hunting ground. Steel bones groaned—the heartbeat of a place long dead but not at rest. Their skeletons of steel and concrete loomed around him, casting long, angular shadows against the damp pavement.
Beneath a rusted stairwell, a slick of blood curled beneath a pink sneaker, its cartoon fox still smiling up at nothing. Too clean, too cheerful for where it lay. This was the last place the beast fed.. He wasn't losing this thing again. Liam would kill it here.
The reports were panic-blurred gasps, red eyes, shattered mirrors. But Liam knew real fear didn't exaggerate: It distorted. Panic blurred details, but something real had clawed through their fear. A presence that sent animals into a panic. Some witnesses swore it had glowing red eyes, but Liam knew better: Fear had a way of exaggerating details.
Liam pressed to the gravel roof, breath shallow, city wind tugging at his coat as he watched the sleeping block below. A few blocks away stood a dark patch of supposed green in an industrial wasteland where the streetlights didn't quite reach. The park would be the perfect place for something that shouldn't exist to nest.
He flowed across the rooftops, leaping ledge to ledge like shadow given weight, barely stirring dust. He slipped between rooftops, dust silent beneath his boots. Magic whispered behind him, trailing like frost in moonlight. As he approached, the sounds of the city faded - No cars, no footsteps, no stray dogs rummaging through trash. A silence sculpted to be too thick, too still, like something was holding its breath.
Silence coiled taut and ready to snap. Something waited. Something listening. Liam's muscles tensed but he didn't react immediately. Didn't flinch or reach for his weapon. Instead, he let the sound settle and let his instincts tune in to the presence watching him.
Metal whispered faintly, deliberately under dreadful claws.
His breath fogged in front of him, curling like a ghost before vanishing into the still air. The air was heavy with the scent of rust and stagnant rainwater, thick with a lingering bestial and wrong musk. The stench hit like a memory. Wet fur soured with rot, undercut by the iron kiss of blood. It was a primal hunger made scent.
The factory's broken spine clawed at the sky, moonlight spilling through shattered ribs of glass and rust, cutting the dark into jagged shards across concrete. The air was thick with the scent of old metal, mildew, and something else, something wrong.
Reports of torn-up bodies, deep claw marks, and eyewitness accounts of a tall, shadowy figure prowling the edges of town had led him here. He clenched his jaw at the thought, irritation simmering beneath his focus. "Of course," he muttered. "Had to wreck the weekend too." Never mind what else it had done, that was its greatest crime tonight.
He'd tried for normal. Of course, the thing had to show up. At least Seraphine understood and that was why he was engaged in a game of cat-and-mouse, where neither was sure who was the cat.
Somewhere inside, a faint scraping, barely audible, that didn't belong. Blade in one hand, Glock in the other as ritual and wrath always went hand in hand.
There.
Liam shifted his weight, muscles tensing, as he stepped forward, the old floor groaning beneath his boots.
The shadows erupted. A blur snapping fangs, flashing claws, to feed a ravenous hunger.
Liam spun, heart syncing to instinct. Something hurtled at him, a blur of muscle and malice. He rolled aside just as a heavy weight slammed down where he'd been standing. Steel shrieked as claws raked across a rusted slide. Sparks flew.
He pivoted.
Reality warped: The alley buckling as the thing stepped forward, more nightmare than beast. Limbs spidered too far, jaw dangling like it had forgotten how to be human and eyes gleaming with something feral and almost knowing. Its wet sharp fangs shimmered eagerly, catching the low light like a promise, saliva dripping onto the cracked pavement.
For a breathless second, it only stared.
Then it lunged.
Liam dove—instinct over thought—just dodging the claws that hissed through the space where his chest had been. The impact of the swipe sent rusted debris clattering against the concrete walls.
Another strike came fast, arcing for his throat. He ducked, the wind of it whispering death across his skin. His gun was already up—reflex. He squeezed the trigger. Muzzle flare split the shadows, the staccato burst chewing into the creature's shoulder. It barely reacted.
A guttural snarl and it was on him again. Liam stepped back, but it moved faster than anything that size should. Claws lashed out, cutting leather, the ceramic and steel layers. The runes and glyphs flared and burned out. Pain flared hot beneath the shredded fabric.
"Too many dumplings," he grunted, breath hitching—humor a thin bandage over real pain.
The creature lunged low, shoulder ramming his midsection. It felt like a runway freight train hit him. Steel wailed as his body crashed into it. The breath left his lungs in a stunned gasp as his back collided with the hood of an abandoned car. The metal groaned under his weight, windshield shards biting into his palm as he caught himself.
It moved like a fever dream: Sharp, invasive, impossible to pin down. Claws split air as it lunged again.
Muscle memory took over. Liam ducked, swept low, his boot cracking bone as it connected with the creature's ankle. Liam didn't waste the opening. He raised his gun. The creature twisted mid-fall, spine bending in ways no human should move. It was on him again. Claws met flesh.
Fire raced through Liam's side as he twisted free, talons raking through skin. He bit down on a curse. Blood flowed in messy ribbons, slicking his shirt, heat bleeding into the cold. Vision blurred. That's bad. Real bad.
The creature lunged again, jaws snapping inches from his face. Liam didn't aim. He didn't need to. He pulled the trigger.
His gun roared—splitting night and flesh with brutal finality—ripping the night in half, muzzle flash slicing shadows into jagged, desperate shapes. The creature's skull snapped back, black blood spraying like oil from a ruptured tank. It staggered, snarling turned to a broken rasp, limbs twitching as it crumpled like a marionette with its strings cut.
Liam hit the ground hard, rolling off its twitching body, chest heaving. The concrete scraped cold against his palms, the stench of copper and spent powder burning in his nose.
Then stillness and silence. A silence that stalked, heavy and tooth-bared. Liam pressed a hand to his ribs, wincing as pain surged sharp and deep. He crouched, half from habit, half from necessity, watching the collapsed form twitch one final time.
Only it didn't stay dead. It died, further.
The air shifted. Not just the silence of death. Something deeper. A wrongness unraveling. Bones caved with soft cracks, fur curling into smoke, limbs folding inward like paper burned too long. Shrinking. Twisting. It's fur dissolving like smoke. Limbs curling inward. Bones realigning with muffled cracks. Liam didn't move. Couldn't. His breath held hostage in his throat.
When the transformation ended, she lay there. Her green eyes stared glassy and wrongly sightless, yet accusing. Her hair, once soft, now lay haloed in a pool of cooling blackened blood. No breath. No snarl. Just her.
Isla.
The woman he'd once shared wine and small talk with. The one who laughed and tried to like him, who leaned in instead of away. She'd walked out on him because he couldn't focus on her, on them. That was… seven weeks or two months and change ago. "What, the fuck?" he breathed.
The pavement beneath her was scorched, spiderwebbed with cracks from whatever force had birthed the thing she became.
Liam pushed himself upright, ribs aflame, breath catching on regret. He sighed, dragging a bloodied hand down his face. "Yeah," he said hoarsely. "That tracks."
The factory air pressed in around him, thick with gunpowder and grief. The scorched concrete beneath her was the only evidence something inhuman had been here at all.
He pulled out his phone and crouched beside the body. The camera flash cast cold light across Isla's eerily still face. He snapped photos of her face, the twisted burns on the ground, the rest of the battlefield. The close ups of her marred flesh: Burns. Scars. Scabbed.
Even before the phone unlocked, Seraphine's voice echoed in his mind, sharp, familiar, unavoidable. This conversation was going to be a nightmare.