Rebirth looked different from above.
From the ledge, the Hatcheries weren't just a location; they were an ecosystem of misery. Thousands of translucent sacks hung from the tower walls like grapes in a vineyard designed by a madman. Each one glowed with a sickly, bioluminescent blue. Each one held a curled, drowning silhouette.
Thirty meters down, a sack popped.
A small figure tumbled out—maybe a child—screaming as it fell into the mist. Discussions of gravity ended abruptly in the wet dark below.
'A river of lungs,' Grigor thought, the sound of the collective drowning washing over him. It wasn't wind. It was the echo of a million people gasping for air they would never get.
He looked at his hands. Pale. Wrinkled. Shaking.
'I survived.'
The thought should have brought relief. It brought only a cold, chemical assessment.
'This isn't an afterlife. This is a factory.'
His palm throbbed. The phantom weight of the silver cat was still there, seared into his nerves—a ghost limb of ownership. He closed his fist around the emptiness.
'Anchor. I still have an anchor.'
For now.
---
Movement was agony. Stillness was death.
Grigor forced his legs to work. The ledge connected to a rusted metal walkway that wound around the tower—a service vein for the hive. The rain hammered his naked skin, smelling of sulfur and rot.
'Shelter. Heat. Clothing.'
The survival calculus was simple. He had nothing. He needed everything.
The walkway was slick with a paste of amniotic fluid and ash that squished obscenely between his toes. He moved carefully, hand on the wall, scanning for threats.
The sacks pulsed. Synchronized. The tower wasn't just holding them; it was feeding them. Or feeding on them.
He rounded a corner.
Three figures crouched ten meters away, huddled over a pile of rags.
'People. Civilization.'
The instinct was instant. Other humans meant allies. Safety in numbers.
"Hey!" He raised a hand, his voice raspy. "I need help. I don't know where—"
They turned.
Grigor stopped.
There were two men and a woman. The men wore rags stitched from leather that didn't match any animal he knew—patchwork greys and browns. Their skin was the color of old mushrooms.
The woman was worse.
Built wide and low, she had the shoulders of a linebacker and a jaw that looked like it could crush cinderblocks. A missing ear. A milky eye. She smelled of fermentation—sour, yeasty rot that the rain couldn't wash away.
"I'll give you my liver for a good mating," she said to the wiry man beside her. Her voice was wet gravel. "Just this once."
The wiry man spat. "My rod would rot."
The woman laughed—a gargling, drowning sound. Then she saw Grigor.
All three heads locked onto him. Not his face. His body. His thighs. His ribs. The soft, unhardened fat of his stomach.
"Fresh one," the woman crooned. A gap-toothed smile split her face. "Look at him. Still got fat. Dibs on the kidneys."
The wiry man shifted. He held a length of rusted rebar bent into a hook.
'That's not a rescuer. That's a diner.'
Grigor ran.
---
Running was stupid. The floor was slick. His feet had no traction.
Running was also the only option.
He sprinted down the walkway, slipping, catching himself, slipping again. Behind him, no shouts. No threats. Just the wet slap-slap-slap of pursuit.
'They're not rushing. They're herding me.'
The walkway opened into a corridor between sack clusters. Faces pressed against the membranes on either side—mouths open in silent screams, eyes tracking his flight with desperate hope.
He didn't look.
His foot hit a puddle of slime. He went down hard, sliding into a stone pillar that knocked the wind out of him.
'Get up.'
His hand closed around a jagged bone on the floor.
'Weapon.'
A shadow detached itself from the darkness ahead.
A boy. Twelve years old. Dead eyes.
He swung a sharpened femur at Grigor's legs.
'Tendons,' Grigor's brain screamed. 'He's grounding the meat.'
Grigor twisted. The bone grazed his calf—pain, bright and clarifying.
'KILL THE SMALL ONE.'
He swung his own weapon for the throat.
He missed. The blow hit the boy's shoulder. The child absorbed it, rolled, and came up snarling. This wasn't a child. This was a predator that had stopped aging.
Heavy footsteps behind. The woman was humming.
'No time.'
Grigor kicked the boy square in the chest, sending him crashing into a sack. It burst, spraying foul liquid. The boy scrambled back, head tilted, watching.
'Calculating. Learning.'
Grigor ran, again.
Three steps.
The boy's hook caught the back of his knee. Not a strike—a pull.
Grigor's leg folded like wet cardboard.
He hit the stone face-first. Teeth loosened. Blood filled his mouth.
He tried to push up. His leg didn't respond. The hamstring was gone. He could feel the muscle bunching uselessly near his hip.
'Mobility: zero.'
Heavy footsteps stopped above him.
Grigor rolled over.
The wiry man stood there, silhouetted against the blue glow. He held the rebar hook loosely. His expression was flat. Bored.
"Good cut, Boy," he said. Nebraska accent. Flat. "Clean through the string. You're getting better."
The woman loomed over him, grinning. "Dibs on the kidneys. You promised, Kiv."
"Take what you want. Leave the calves. The Boy earned those."
Grigor clawed at the stone.
"Wait." Blood bubbled on his lips. "I can—I have—"
Kiv looked down.
"They all say that." He raised the hook. "Right before."