Rika died like she lived: standing, bleeding, and cursing someone.
The sky was a violent, unnatural shade of purple, choked with ash and burning debris that drifted down like poisoned snow. Lightning cracked through sulfurous clouds, illuminating the ruins of a city that had once been a thriving fortress of steel and glass. Now it was a graveyard of twisted buildings, overturned vehicles, and smoldering craters. The air tasted like metal and rot. It burned her lungs every time she breathed.
Somewhere behind her, something howled. Rika didn't turn around. She stood barely five foot four, compact and unassuming at first glance, the kind of woman people underestimated until they noticed how she stood—feet planted, weight balanced, body always ready to move. Every inch of her carried tension, not fear, but readiness. Like a drawn bow that had forgotten how to relax. Her attention was locked on the last evacuation shuttle. It screamed as it lifted into the clouds, engines flaring bright white, scattering dust and rubble across the shattered landing pad. The hatch was still half-open. She could see silhouettes inside—her people—pressed against the viewport. Captain Ives. Medic Liora. Twin snipers Kade and Kira. Little Tomas, who used to bring her contraband candy bars like they were sacred offerings. They were alive. They were leaving. She was not on it.
A mutated creature lunged at her from the rubble with a wet, gurgling shriek. Rika pivoted and drove her blade straight up into its skull. Bone cracked. Thick, tar-black ichor sprayed across her visor, matting the deep, rusted red strands of her hair that had already escaped their tie. She yanked the sword free with a snarl and spun just in time to decapitate another creature that had crawled out of a collapsed bus. Its head rolled across the pavement, still screaming.
Her arms trembled. Not from fear. From exhaustion. Her left shoulder was torn open, blood soaking through the shredded fabric of her once-off-white dress. A deep claw mark ran from her ribs to her hip, barely sealed by a flickering med-gel patch. Every step on the split leather of her right boot, worn down to stitched hide and desperation, sent fire up her leg where a shard of shrapnel was still lodged in her calf. She should've collapsed ten minutes ago. She refused.
Her comm crackled at her ear. "Queen—Rika—please, you have to get on the shuttle—" It was Ives. His voice was shaking. She slashed through a third mutant and kicked its body away before answering. "Go," she growled. "If you turn around, I will personally haunt you."
"Rika—"
"You have civilians on board. Kids. Wounded. Scientists. You have my people." She wiped blood from her mouth with the back of her glove. "You leave. Now."
There was a beat of silence. Then quiet sobbing. Then static. Then nothing. The blue-white shuttle tilted upward and vanished into the clouds. Good.
The Queen of Blades staggered back and leaned against a shattered concrete pillar. Her breastplate, cracked near the ribs and hastily welded so many times the metal looked scarred rather than broken, scraped against the stone. Blood dripped from her fingertips and pooled at her feet, mixing with ash and black ichor.
More mutated creatures were emerging from the smoke. Dozens. Maybe hundreds. They poured out like a living tide—howling, shrieking, dragging broken limbs and fused bodies across the ruins. The things that came for Rika had once been human. Now they were a mockery of it, a walking plague of flesh and bone that had forgotten its original shape. They were not a single species, but a gallery of horrors, each unique in its suffering and violence.
Some were towering things of warped muscle and jagged bone, their skin split open in places to reveal pulsing black veins that oozed tar-black ichor. Too many eyes, clouded and milky, clustered along their skulls or sprouted from fleshy stalks, swiveling independently to track movement. Their mouths opened far too wide, lined with mismatched teeth and something that looked disturbingly like a second, prehensile tongue that flickered in the sulfurous air.
Others were low and fast, their bodies bent in ways that shouldn't be possible. They crawled on too many arms, their hands fused into hardened claws that scraped against the pavement. Some slithered on boneless torsos, leaving trails of viscous fluid behind them. One enormous thing reared up in the distance, its spine split open like a grotesque flower, shrieking with a voice that rattled the air and vibrated in Rika's bones.
Their skin was a canvas of decay—blotchy, grayish, and stretched taut over misshapen limbs. In some places, it was translucent, revealing the writhing mass of mutated organs beneath. In others, it was covered in a chitinous armor that had grown in jagged, painful-looking plates. They moved with a horrifying blend of jerky, unnatural spasms and terrifyingly fluid grace, their bodies contorting and snapping as they closed in.
The sounds they made were a symphony of agony. Wet, gurgling shrieks escaped their throats, punctuated by the clicks of mismatched teeth and the wet slap of flesh on stone. Even when decapitated, a head could roll across the pavement, still screaming, its clouded, milky eyes flaring with a final, sickly green light before dimming to nothing. They were the city's ghosts, given flesh and driven by a single, mindless hunger.
Rika tightened her grip on her sword. The horizon burned. The world was ending. No regrets. …Except one. She'd wanted a stupid peaceful life. A small house somewhere that didn't explode. A garden that grew actual flowers instead of fungus. Tea in the mornings. Maybe someone who loved her enough to argue over dumb things like whose turn it was to cook. She laughed weakly. Figures.
A creature slammed into her from the side. She went down hard, coughing as the air was knocked from her lungs. Claws raked across her bare, scarred left shoulder. Pain exploded behind her eyes. Rika snarled and stabbed blindly upward. The thing screamed and collapsed on top of her. She shoved its body off and forced herself to her knees.
Rika forced herself to stand. Her legs were shaking now. Blood soaked through her mismatched armor—the dented, scorched armored boot on her left foot anchoring her stance, the ruined leather on her right offering no protection. Her left arm hung useless at her side, numb from a deep bite wound that had gone septic hours ago. Every breath burned like fire. Still, she reached into the pouch at her waist. Her fingers closed around a small, battered metal device. The last-resort bomb. High-yield. Short range. Absolutely not survivable.
She looked once more at the sky where the shuttle had vanished. "Live," she whispered. "All of you. Live stupid, long, boring lives."
A creature lunged at her. She smiled. "Sorry, ugly. Party's over." She thumbed the arming switch. The device began to hum. A soft, rising whine.
The monsters froze. The air vibrated. Rika planted her feet, straightened her back, and lifted her chin like she was about to accept a medal instead of total annihilation. Her vision blurred. The sounds of battle faded into a distant ringing. She looked up at the sky where the shuttle had disappeared. She exhaled slowly. "Next life better be a rom-com."
The bomb detonated. White light swallowed everything. The shockwave tore through the ruins, vaporizing mutated flesh, collapsing buildings, and carving a blazing crater into the earth. Fire roared into the sky like a second sun. There was no pain. No fear. Just silence. Then— Nothing.