Chapter 3: The Things That Walk at Night
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The city was rotting.
I could feel it, smell it—like something long dead, left in the sun too long. The air was thick, heavy, wrong. Buildings loomed like hollowed-out corpses, their windows gaping like empty eye sockets. The streets stretched endlessly, twisting, shifting when I wasn't looking.
The man pulling me forward didn't seem to notice. Or maybe he did, and just didn't care.
"Keep moving," he muttered, his grip on my wrist like iron.
Behind us, the Hollowed Ones followed.
Their footsteps were soft, wet. Slow, patient. They didn't need to run. They knew we would stop eventually.
They knew that in the end, everyone stops.
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We turned into an alleyway. Narrow, claustrophobic, the walls pressing too close. My breath hitched as I stumbled over something soft. I looked down.
A body.
Or at least, what used to be one.
Its skin was paper-thin, stretched too tight over brittle bones. Its face was frozen in a silent scream, its lips peeled back to reveal blackened gums. And its eyes—
They were missing.
Gouged out. Hollow. Like someone had scooped them clean.
I choked back bile. The man beside me didn't react.
"You're wasting time," he said. "Come on."
I hesitated. "Who are you?"
He didn't answer. Just kept walking.
I forced myself to follow.
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The alley opened into a street. The Hollowed Ones had stopped at the entrance, standing just beyond the shadows, smiling.
Waiting.
I felt something cold slither up my spine.
"They don't like the dark," the man murmured.
I glanced at him. "Why?"
He turned to me, and in the dim light, I saw his eyes.
They were just like mine.
Black. Shifting. Moving.
I staggered back.
"You're—"
"Like you?" He tilted his head. "Yeah. But I've been like this longer."
A chill ran through me.
"How—" My voice cracked. "What's happening to me?"
He exhaled, slow and tired. "You're changing."
I grabbed his sleeve. "Into what?"
He looked past me, at the Hollowed Ones still waiting at the alley's edge.
"…Something worse."
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A scream tore through the air.
Not human. Not animal. Something else.
My body reacted before my mind did. My muscles locked. My heart lurched. Something primal, something deep inside me recognized that sound.
Predator.
The man's jaw tightened. "Shit."
A shadow moved across the rooftops.
Not a man. Not a Hollowed One. Something in between.
I barely caught a glimpse—long limbs, too many joints, fingers ending in hooked claws. A face that wasn't a face. Just a void, blacker than the night around it.
And then it dropped.
Right into the middle of the street.
It turned its head toward us.
No eyes. No mouth. Just shifting darkness where a face should be.
It took a step forward.
The Hollowed Ones, those empty, grinning things that had hunted me through the city—
They moved away.
Even they feared it.
The man beside me tensed. "Run."
I didn't need to be told twice.
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We sprinted through the darkened streets. The world blurred around me, my legs burning, my breath coming in ragged gasps. The thing behind us didn't run.
It glided.
Soundless. Effortless. It didn't need to hurry. It knew the city. It knew every alley, every dead end.
And it knew we were already dead.
My chest ached. The air was too thick, pressing against my ribs, suffocating me. My vision blurred.
No.
No, no, no, I can't die here—
The man grabbed my arm and yanked me sideways into a building. The door slammed shut behind us.
Darkness swallowed everything.
I collapsed onto the cold floor, gasping. My whole body shook. I could still hear it outside—its footsteps, slow, patient.
It wasn't leaving.
It was waiting.
My breathing was too loud. My heartbeat pounded in my skull.
Then—
A sound.
Not outside.
Inside.
I lifted my head, my eyes adjusting to the dark.
Something was here with us.
I felt it before I saw it. The way the shadows shifted, the way the air grew colder.
Then—movement.
A figure stood in the far corner of the room.
Tall. Thin. Head tilted at an unnatural angle.
And when I blinked—
It was closer.
Right in front of me.
A voice slithered into my ears. Not words. Not sound. Just something wrong.
It knew me.
It had always known me.
I opened my mouth to scream—
And then its hand reached inside my chest.
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Pain. Raw. Blinding. Endless.
I couldn't breathe. My vision fractured. My body wasn't mine anymore.
It was taking something.
Something deep.
Something important.
The man beside me moved. A flash of silver—a knife, gleaming in the dark. He slashed at the figure, the blade cutting through its form like smoke.
It shrieked.
The world lurched.
And then—
Silence.
I gasped, collapsing onto the floor. My whole body convulsed. Something was missing.
Something vital.
I lifted a trembling hand to my chest. My skin was cold. Wrong. Hollow.
The man knelt beside me, his face unreadable.
"Yeah," he murmured. "You're definitely not human anymore."
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TO BE CONTINUED...