"He's dead."
Layla's voice cut through the thick, pressurized air like a serrated blade—flat, jagged, wrong.
I didn't move. I couldn't.
My knuckles were split open, skin torn into raw, weeping ribbons. Blood slid down my fingers, pooled at my fingertips, then fell in slow, heavy drops.
DRIP
DRIP
DRIP
A steady rhythm—the only clock left in the world.
Each drop sounded louder than it should have, like everything else had gone silent just to make room for it.
The smell came in waves—rotting, thick and metallic. It clung to the back of my throat, coated my tongue, crawled into my sinuses and refused to leave. I swallowed, but it only spread deeper.
Flies buzzed in restless clouds, their wings drilling into my skull, filling the silence with something alive and hungry.
A wet tearing sound cut through it.
Slow. Deliberate.
A mangy dog crept from the tower's shadow, ribs pressing sharply against its skin, fur patchy and dark with old filth. Its eyes flickered toward me for a moment—then away, uninterested.
Its jaws sank into a corpse.
Hide peeled from muscle with a soft, sickening rip. Bone cracked between its teeth, sharp and final. The dog didn't growl or hesitate—it just chewed, steady and rhythmic, like this was nothing new.
Like this was normal.
THUD
My fist slammed down again, a dull shock running up my arm and settling deep into my shoulder. The skin split further, but the pain barely registered.
It felt distant. Muted. Like it belonged to someone else.
These hands—this body—they didn't feel like mine. Just tools. Something I was using…
or something that was using me.
"Hey—cut that out—"
Layla rushed forward, boots scraping against grit, fabric shifting as she moved. Her hand closed tightly around my arm.
Cold.
Too cold.
Like she didn't belong in this heat. Like she was the only real thing left in a world that had gone hollow.
…
I stared at what used to be his face—or where it had been.
Everything felt distant, like I was underwater, sound bending and shapes blurring at the edges.
"You kill too."
My voice came out flat. It was empty—something that wasn't mine.
"So why stop me now?"
"I—"
She froze. Her breath hitched, and her grip tightened, fingers digging into my skin like she was trying to anchor me—or herself.
I looked down.
Her knuckles had gone pale. They were shaking.
"That's… not who you are," she whispered.
The words echoed in the hollow space around me.
Not who you are...? I let out a slow breath.
"You said you'd judge them," she muttered, her voice was barely holding on.
"You promised that to yourself."
Something flickered in her eyes—guilt? Fear?
Or maybe both.
The flies seemed louder now, or maybe everything else was fading away.
"This… isn't you."
Her knees hit the dirt softly, like something in her had given way.
"I tried to stop him," Dan said from behind us, his voice low and rough. "He's been at it a while. Just… didn't stop."
Another wet crunch echoed in the background.
Dan exhaled sharply. "Ugh… his face is barely—"
"Dan." Layla snapped.
"…Sorry."
Silence followed, heavy and suffocating. It pressed down on my chest, filled my lungs, made it harder to breathe.
I pushed myself to my feet.
My hand trembled—not from pain, but from something deeper. Something colder.
"I lost… control."
The words felt wrong the moment they left my mouth. Too small. Too clean.
Dan let out a dry, humorless laugh. "Yeah," he said. "That's one way to put it."
He nudged a body with his boot. It shifted slightly, loose and broken.
"Lost control doesn't usually look like that—"
"You don't get it—they captured Luna!"
The scream tore out of me before I could stop it, raw and jagged, scraping my throat on the way out.
For a moment, everything snapped into focus.
Her face.
Her voice.
The way she looked at me.
Gone.
"Lad… who's Luna?"
…
Right.
They don't know.
They weren't there. They didn't hear her scream or see the way she reached out.
They didn't see me hesitate.
My throat tightened as the memory clawed its way up, sharp and merciless. I tried to speak, but nothing came out—just air, just silence.
"…Wash yourself," Layla said quietly. "You're covered in blood."
She didn't look at me anymore.
I followed her gaze anyway.
Down to my hands.
Drip. Drip. Drip.
It wouldn't stop. No matter how tightly I clenched my fists, the blood slipped through my fingers like it didn't belong there—like it refused to stay.
I'm one of them now…
The thought came uninvited.
Unwelcome.
True.
No—
My eyes snapped back to the corpse, to what was left of him. The torn flesh, the ruined shape.
I already was.
A shallow, uneven breath left my chest.
…a long time ago.
I turned toward the basin.
My boots echoed against the stone with each step, too sharp, too loud, like I was walking through a hollow shell of a world.
The air felt colder here. Still. Waiting.
I reached the basin and plunged my hands into the water.
Freezing.
The shock shot up my arms, biting into bone, dragging something back to the surface—or trying to.
The water trembled as blood unraveled from my skin, spreading in slow, dark ribbons. It curled and bloomed, turning the clear surface into something murky.
Something alive.
I scrubbed harder.
Again.
Again.
Skin against skin. Bone against bone.
It didn't matter.
The red stayed.
It seeped deeper.
For a moment, in the trembling reflection,
I didn't see a boy—I didn't see a man.
The face staring back at me was hollow, eyes too dark, too still—like something had been carved out from behind them, leaving only the shape behind.
A shell.
No—
A vessel.
Something meant to hold.
To carry.
To fill.
And behind that hollow surface, something moved.
Not a thought. Not a feeling...
The water stilled. The ripples faded. The reflection sharpened.
I jerked back, breath catching as water spilled over the edge of the basin and splashed against the stone.
The cold clung to my skin, but it wasn't enough. It didn't reach deep enough. It didn't clean anything that mattered.
Behind me, the flies still buzzed.
The dog still chewed.
The world hadn't changed.
Only I had.
I looked down at my hands one last time.
Cleaner.
But not clean.
Never clean...
A slow breath filled my lungs—steady, controlled, empty.
I flexed my fingers.
The basin water had turned completely red.
And when I looked again, my reflection didn't look away.
It stared back.
Because it knew something I didn't want to admit.
The vessel wasn't almost full.
It never would be.
It didn't have a limit.
And whatever was filling it—
had only just begun.