Chapter 72: Milk & Blood
Chapter 72: Milk & Blood
Morning — Selene's POV
The generator's low hum pulsed beneath their boots like a second heartbeat — faint, steady, mechanical. It echoed off the concrete walls of the abandoned dairy factory, blending with the rhythmic drip of condensation and the occasional creak of ancient beams overhead. Pale morning light spilled through the shattered upper windows, catching on motes of dust that floated like ash in a dead sky.
Inside the refrigerated storage room, the air bit like frost — sharp and still, heavy with the lingering scent of metal and spoiled cream. The space felt untouched by time. Rows of steel shelves lined with sealed crates still stood at attention, unlooted and waiting, as if some quiet miracle had passed through and chosen to preserve it.
Aira stepped into the aisle first, boots scuffing faint trails through the frost-laced dust. Her breath curled in the chill like smoke. The silence pressed in — not lifeless, but expectant.
Behind her, Selene exhaled, low and pleased. "Intact. That's rare."
Aira didn't reply at first. Her eyes swept the racks — cartons of oat milk, tins of powdered formula, vacuum - sealed cheeses, even a small cooler humming softly in defiance of the world's end. More food than they'd seen in weeks. Enough to last them a full season, if rationed right.
Selene could feel her hesitation. The weight of hunger and disbelief. Then Aira's fingers lifted slightly, and the air around her shimmered with silver-blue light.
The rift responded — quick, clean, no drag on her spirit this time. A breath opened between dimensions. No backlash. No tears at her inner seams. Her control was stabilizing, and Selene noted it with quiet satisfaction.
Crates lifted effortlessly from the shelves and vanished midair into the nothingness she carried within. Aira's expression didn't change, but her movements grew more confident with each container — fluid, efficient, controlled. Like the space was becoming an extension of her body.
Selene watched from the far end, alert and silent. She made no move to help. This part belonged to Aira. Let her test herself. Let her trust the hunger.
"You're getting faster," she murmured once the aisle stood empty.
Aira nodded, lips pale with cold. "It's adapting to me. Or maybe I'm adapting to it."
"You're learning." Selene's voice was soft. "That's enough."
She brushed past, her long coat trailing behind her like smoke. The scent of her — ice, pine, a hint of copper — brushed Aira's senses in her wake. Always close, always quiet. Selene moved like a predator built for silence, her senses sweeping through the factory before her feet even touched ground.
They searched the remaining chambers in silence — broken equipment, rusted piping, forgotten lockers. No nests. No rotters. Only shadows and dust.
Eventually, Selene stopped outside a side office. "Here."
It was small — once a manager's room, judging by the decayed whiteboard and stack of old shipping invoices. The window had bars. The door, a lock that still clicked firm when turned. Selene reinforced it with a filing cabinet and stacked crates.
Aira hesitated. She wasn't afraid. Not really. Just… hesitant.
She stepped inside.
Her body was buzzing — still from the cold, partly from the drain of power, and partly from the phantom heat that still clung to her skin. Her dreams hadn't left her. Not entirely.
She didn't need to look at Selene to feel her presence, the quiet weight of her gaze, like a hand never quite touching her spine.
Selene dropped a folded blanket in her lap without comment.
"Use it. Your lips are blue."
Aira wrapped it around herself quickly, grateful even as her fingers trembled. The warmth sank into her limbs with aching slowness. She realized she hadn't stopped shaking since she woke up.
Selene sat in the corner opposite her, knees drawn up, methodically cleaning a small blade with an old cloth. Every motion was precise, quiet. Her calm was surgical. Icy. She was always like that after mornings like this — detached, watching. Reading the air between words.
Aira studied her from under the blanket.
Her lips parted. "Why do you always watch the door?"
Selene's hands didn't pause. "Because something always comes."
"Even when we're safe?"
Selene's head tilted slightly. "Especially then."
The answer was immediate, too fluid to be rehearsed, too honest to be cruel. It sank into Aira like a stone dropped into water. Cold. Final.
She looked away, clutching the blanket tighter around her shoulders. "Do you ever sleep?"
"When I have to," Selene said. "But not here. Not now."
"Because of me?"
Selene didn't reply.
She moved instead — quiet and fluid — reaching into her pack and pulling out another shirt. She tossed it to Aira without fanfare. It landed in her lap, soft and warm, smelling faintly of skin and citrus.
Selene's.
"Change. You're freezing."
Aira obeyed without protest. She didn't care anymore that her skin was flushed, that her breath caught as she pulled off the shirt she'd slept in, damp with the remnants of heat and shame. She didn't ask if Selene had watched. She didn't need to.
The shirt slipped over her shoulders like a balm. Too big. Too warm.
She sank into the wall beside Selene, the blanket around her again, Selene's shirt clinging to her skin like a secret she wasn't ready to name.
"You don't have to stay up," Aira said after a long stretch of silence.
"I do," Selene replied. Her voice was too quiet to be stern. "You don't know what sleep looks like after your first kill."
Aira stiffened. Her jaw tensed, throat catching.
"I don't want to think about it," she whispered.
"You won't," Selene said. "Not yet. Not until the quiet gets too loud."
Aira closed her eyes. The hum of the generator filled the space between them, rhythmic and faintly soothing. She hated how right Selene always was. How easily she saw through the surface, how ruthlessly she stripped away everything Aira wasn't ready to admit.
She curled deeper into the blanket.
Selene didn't speak again. Didn't touch her. Just sat there, spine straight, eyes still on the door. Guarding. Not just the room. Not just the perimeter.
Her.
Selene watched her.
The realization struck Aira somewhere between fear and warmth. It pulsed through her like a second heartbeat — something animal, something aching.
Her body hadn't calmed. Not completely. That hunger still thrummed under her skin. The dream clung to her like spider silk, threads of phantom sensation dancing beneath Selene's shirt. And Selene… smelled the same as she had in the dream. Cold and clean and devastating.
She turned her face away, ashamed.
"Sleep if you can," Selene said at last, her voice like nightfall. "I'll watch until it breaks."
It was more than a promise. It was a vow. Quiet and terrifying in its certainty.
And it broke something in Aira.
She allowed herself to breathe again. To lean into the cold that wasn't biting anymore. To let her body loosen beneath the warm cotton and wool. She let the generator's hum lull her, let Selene's presence cradle the edges of her frayed mind.
Her eyes closed.
Outside, the wind brushed broken glass.
Inside, two heartbeats remained.
One full of hunger.
One full of restraint.
Both waiting for the other to move first.