"Open your eyes and see the truth."
The voice pulled him out of sleep like a hook through his chest. Lucian blinked blearily at the dim room, his barricaded apartment exactly as he had left it. The cold can of soup from last night still sat on the table.
But the laptop hummed.
Its black screen glowed faintly before white text began to crawl across it.
"Good morning, player."
Lucian sat up slowly, rubbing grit from his eyes, pulse already beginning to climb. "You again. Don't you ever shut up?"
"A god needs no rest."
"You're not a god." He reached for the pipe leaning against the couch, as if holding it would make his words sharper. "You're just some freak hiding behind a keyboard."
"Yet you keep listening."
Lucian's jaw clenched. He hated how the bastard could twist every word back at him, force him to hear his own helplessness spoken aloud. "Because I don't have a choice."
"Good. Admitting that puts you ahead of most."
The text pulsed once before sliding down the screen.
"Now. We play a game."
His gut sank. "Another one of your pets?"
"Not yet. This game is tag."
The screen flickered. An image replaced the words: a carved stone idol wrapped in vines, its hollow eyes glowing faintly blue.
"This is a totem. Place it in your home and the monsters will Ignore it. Not forever. But long enough to matter."
Lucian stared, jaw tight. The glowing idol stared back at him from the screen, vines curling around its stone body like frozen snakes.
Lucian stared at the idol. "So what, you're giving me a freebie now?"
"A reward. A motivator. You'd be surprised how quickly hope keeps a body moving."
"You dress it up with pretty words, but it'll always be the same. Dangle something shiny, watch me run."
"And yet you run."
Lucian's lips pressed thin. "Maybe one day I won't."
The cursor blinked for a long moment before the next line slid into place.
"Then one day, you die."
The words sat there, stark and final. Something about their bluntness chilled him more than the rest.
"Better than being your wind-up toy forever."
"No toy. Player. Toys break. Players struggle. And struggle entertains."
Lucian felt his stomach twist. "You're sick."
"Thank you."
The screen flickered once, the image of the idol pulsing brighter.
"Believe what you like. The jungle has grown within your city. The totem is inside. Find it. Bring it back. Don't lose it."
His mouth felt dry. "And if something in there decides I'm lunch?"
"Then you run faster. Tag is only fun if something chases."
The screen went black.
Lucian sat there for a long moment, reflection faint in the glass. His grip tightened around the pipe. He wanted to smash the laptop into a hundred pieces. But he didn't. He couldn't. He'd seen too much already to think defiance would change anything.
The rules were set. He was already playing.
If he was going into a jungle that didn't exist yesterday, he'd need more than what he had.
Lucian pulled his bag over his shoulder and started down the stairwell. The air in the building was stale, heavy with dust and the faint sour stink of food just beginning to turn. His boots creaked against the warped steps as he tried door after door, pipe ready in his grip.
The first apartment yielded a coil of heavy rope shoved into the back of a closet, frayed but solid. He slung it over his shoulder, knotting it quick.
In another, he scavenged a battered lighter from a kitchen drawer, its flame weak but steady when coaxed. "Good enough," he muttered, pocketing it. The freezer coughed open to reveal two frosted bottles of vodka, untouched. He packed them carefully — multipurpose, whether for burning, disinfecting, or drinking himself numb if things got too bad.
One floor down, he kicked through the wreck of an apartment that looked like it had already been picked over. Drawers overturned, couch on its side, cupboards gutted. He almost left — until he saw the glint beneath the sofa.
Dropping to one knee, he reached under and dragged out a combat knife in a cracked leather sheath. The grip was worn smooth, the steel dulled from use, but when he slid the blade free, it caught the light.
Not sharp enough to cut clean. But more than enough to stab.
He gave it a test thrust into the armrest of the couch. The wood splintered. He slid the knife back into its sheath, looping it onto his belt. "Better than nothing."
By the time he returned to the stairwell, his bag felt heavier, but so did his conviction to live.
Lucian kept moving, boots crunching over the cracked asphalt, pipe steady in his grip. The closer he drew to the jungle wall, the heavier the air grew — not just humid, but alive with the drone of insects. The sound prickled his skin. He imagined clouds of mosquitoes waiting inside, ready to bleed him dry before anything bigger got the chance.
"Perfect," he muttered. "As if monsters weren't enough."
Bug spray. It sounded laughable, absurd in a world where shadow-things tore people in half. But a thousand tiny bites could do what claws didn't: weaken him, wear him down, leave him miserable and slow. He couldn't afford slow.
He veered off, spotting the collapsed shell of a pharmacy at the corner. The front windows were shattered, glass glittering across the pavement. Inside, the shelves leaned like drunks, most of the medicine and food already swept away by looters or desperation.
Lucian stepped carefully, the smell of dust and faint rot choking the air. He searched aisle after aisle, pushing aside boxes and plastic. Nothing but broken pill bottles, moldy bandages, and a family of cockroaches scuttling away from the beam of light that filtered through the cracks.
Then, crouched behind a fallen display, he saw them — two dented metal cans lying on their sides. Bright green labels faded but unmistakable: insect repellent.
"Jackpot."
He picked them up, shaking each. One rattled light, probably half-empty, but the other sloshed with promise. He stuffed both into his bag. Ridiculous or not, it felt like armor.
When he stepped back onto the street, the buzzing outside seemed louder, as if mocking him. He patted the bag. "Not today, bloodsuckers."
A block later, he stopped dead.
The smell hit first — sweet, cloying rot, thick enough to coat his throat. Then the flies, buzzing in a frantic halo. And then the body.
Or what was left of it.
The lower half lay sprawled across the pavement, jeans shredded, belt twisted. The torso ended in a jagged mess of torn flesh and snapped bone. No head. No arms. Just the suggestion of what once was.
Lucian's stomach lurched. He forced his eyes away — only to notice the boots. Thick, heavy-duty rain boots, caked with dirt but intact.
He froze, bile hot at the back of his throat. Every instinct screamed to keep walking. But then he looked past the corpse, at the distant tangle of vines and trees that clawed into the sky. Jungle mud. Swamps. Insects.
He clenched his teeth. Survival didn't care about dignity.
"Sorry," he muttered, voice hoarse. "You won't be needing them."
The boots clung stubbornly, flesh tugging, but finally slid free with a sickening sound. He gagged, nearly dropped them, but forced himself to pull them on. A little big, but solid. The thick soles thudded against the pavement with grim finality.
It felt wrong — desecration, theft. But it also felt necessary.
Better him than whatever tore that person apart.
Lucian kept walking, each step toward the jungle heavier, louder in his ears. Rope over his shoulder, knife at his belt, pipe in hand. Bug spray, vodka, lighter, boots. He was weighed down, armed, armored in scraps.
But the closer he came, the smaller he felt.
The city ended abruptly — skyscrapers and traffic lights swallowed by a wall of green that pulsed with shadow. Trees thicker than lampposts, vines coiled like snakes, roots cracking through concrete. The canopy swallowed the skyline whole.
He stopped at the edge, sweat cold on his back despite the heat. His breath came shallow.
"Tag, huh?" His voice sounded thin.
No answer came. Just the jungle breathing.
He lifted the pipe, tightened his grip, and stepped forward.
"Fine," he muttered. "Let's play."