The howling cut through the air like a serrated blade, closer now. Much closer.
"Move, move!" Mira hissed, shoving salvaged components into her pack with practiced efficiency. Her movements were sharp, economical—the kind of desperate speed that came from years of running from things that wanted to kill you.
Kael tried to stand and immediately regretted it. The world tilted sideways, a kaleidoscope of overlapping possibilities bleeding through his vision. For a moment, he saw three different versions of the collapsed ceiling above them, each one slightly offset from the others. The threads were still there, ghostly and persistent, turning reality into a confusing maze of what-ifs.
'Fantastic. Just what I needed.'
"What the hell happened back there?" Mira's voice carried an edge he'd never heard before—part concern, part accusation. "You were... different. Your eyes went completely black."
Another howl echoed from the ruins behind them, followed by the scrape of claws on concrete. Whatever was making those sounds definitely wasn't human. The noise sent ice crawling down Kael's spine, primitive fear overriding the disorientation.
"Questions later," he managed, gripping the wall for support. "Running now."
Mira shot him a look that promised this conversation wasn't over, then shouldered both their packs. The weight should have staggered her, but she moved with the fluid grace of someone who'd learned to carry everything she owned at a moment's notice.
They stumbled out of the department store into the wasteland beyond the Middle Wall. The landscape stretched before them like a fever dream—twisted metal and crumbling concrete, all of it bathed in the sickly light of Bastion's artificial suns. Kael's vision kept fracturing, showing him multiple paths through the debris field, each one slightly different from the last.
'Pick one,' he told himself desperately. 'Just pick one and stick with it.'
The howling came again, closer now. Multiple voices joining in a chorus that made his teeth ache.
"This way," Mira said, grabbing his arm and steering him toward what looked like a relatively clear path through the rubble. "Stay with me, Kael. Whatever's wrong with you, we'll figure it out later."
He nodded, focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. The headache was getting worse, a pounding rhythm that matched his heartbeat. Each step sent fresh waves of pain through his skull, and the thread-visions kept overlapping reality like double-exposed photographs.
Behind them, something massive crashed through the ruins of the store. The sound of splintering concrete and twisted metal filled the air, followed by a snuffling noise that suggested whatever was hunting them had found their scent.
"Faster," Mira whispered, though she was already half-carrying him.
Kael gritted his teeth and tried to ignore the way the world kept shifting around him. They had maybe a few minutes before whatever was behind them caught up.
Time to see if they could make those minutes count.
The subway entrance gaped before them like a wound in the earth, its mouth half-choked with debris and rusted metal. Kael stumbled down the concrete steps, his vision still fracturing at the edges, showing him glimpses of what the tunnels had looked like before the Collapse—gleaming tiles and rushing crowds, electric lights cutting through the darkness.
'Focus,' he told himself. 'The past won't keep you alive.'
Mira guided him deeper into the shadows, past a turnstile that had been twisted into abstract art by some long-ago explosion. The air grew cooler as they descended, carrying the musty scent of stagnant water and decay. Above them, the howling continued, but it sounded more distant now. Whatever was hunting them hadn't figured out where they'd gone.
Yet.
"Here," Mira said, pulling him toward an alcove where a service door hung open on broken hinges. The space beyond was cramped but defensible—a maintenance room with thick concrete walls and only one entrance. She eased him down onto a pile of old canvas tarps, then crouched beside him.
Her hands were surprisingly gentle as she tilted his head toward what little light filtered down from above. Kael tried not to flinch as she examined his face, her fingers cool against his fevered skin.
"Your eyes," she said quietly. "They're bloodshot to hell. And your hands..." She caught one of his wrists, studying the way his fingers trembled. "When did this start?"
"When I saw the threads."
The words came out before he could stop them. Mira's grip tightened on his wrist.
"What threads?"
Kael closed his eyes, trying to find words for something that defied explanation. How did you describe seeing the fundamental structure of reality? How did you explain that everything—every person, every object, every moment—was connected by invisible lines that pulsed with their own alien logic?
"I don't know how to..." He opened his eyes, meeting her stare. "When that thing was about to kill you, I could see... possibilities. Like threads stretching out from every choice, every action. I pulled on one of them, changed what was going to happen."
Mira stared at him for a long moment. Then she sat back on her heels, reaching for the water bottle clipped to her belt.
"That's impossible," she said, but her voice lacked conviction. She'd felt it too—that moment when reality had bent around them, when death had become survival through nothing more than Kael's desperate will.
She handed him the bottle, then dug a protein bar from her pack. They ate in silence, the weight of their near-death experience settling between them like a physical presence. Outside their makeshift shelter, the tunnels stretched into darkness, filled with the whispered promises of things best left undisturbed.
Kael took a sip of water, tasting metal and fear.
The threads were still there, writhing at the edges of his perception. Waiting.
The trembling in Kael's hands had mostly subsided by the time he felt ready to test his vision again. The protein bar sat like cardboard in his mouth, but he forced himself to chew, to swallow, to maintain some semblance of normalcy while his world tilted on its axis.
'Just look. See what's still there.'
He lifted his head slowly, focusing on Mira as she checked her equipment with methodical precision. For a moment, nothing—just her familiar profile outlined against the tunnel wall, the steady rhythm of her breathing, the careful way she inventoried their remaining supplies.
Then he saw them.
Golden threads, gossamer-thin and flickering like dying candlelight, stretched between them. Fainter than before, barely visible even when he concentrated, but undeniably present. They pulsed with each heartbeat, each shared glance, mapping the invisible connections that bound them together in this moment of mutual survival.
'So it wasn't a hallucination after all.'
"How are you feeling?" Mira asked without looking up from her pack.
"Better." The lie came easily. In truth, exhaustion weighed on him like a physical burden, settling deep in his bones. "Ready to move when you are."
She nodded, then paused, her attention caught by something behind him. "There's a mirror back there. Broken, but... you might want to see."
Kael turned, following her gaze to where a fragment of reflective metal hung from the tunnel wall—probably salvaged from some long-dead maintenance station. He approached it cautiously, not sure what to expect.
The face that stared back at him was his own, but... wrong. The changes were subtle but unmistakable. Lines around his eyes that hadn't been there this morning. A hollowness to his cheeks, a grayness to his skin that spoke of something vital being drained away. His dark hair seemed duller, streaked with premature silver at the temples.
'What did I do to myself?'
He touched his reflection, watching the stranger in the mirror mirror the motion. The golden threads flickered at the edge of his vision, and he understood with cold certainty that power always came with a price. The universe didn't give gifts—it made trades.
"Kael?" Mira's voice carried a note of concern.
He turned away from the mirror, forcing his expression into something resembling calm. "Just checking for injuries."
But Mira wasn't fooled. She studied his face with the same intensity she brought to examining potential salvage, cataloging every detail. Whatever she saw there made her frown.
"My sister's sick," she said suddenly, the words cutting through the tunnel's oppressive silence. "Has been for months. The treatments... they cost more than I make in a year, even with the scavenging runs."
Kael blinked, surprised by the unexpected confession. "I didn't know you had family."
"Most people don't." She shouldered her pack, checking the seals one final time. "She's all I have left. Everything I do out here, every risk I take—it's for her."
The golden threads between them pulsed brighter for just a moment, responding to shared desperation, shared love, shared fear of losing what mattered most.
'We're more alike than I thought.'
But as they prepared to venture deeper into the darkness, Kael couldn't shake the image of his aged reflection, or the growing certainty that each use of his newfound ability was costing him something irreplaceable.
The tunnel's mouth gaped before them like a wound in the earth, daylight filtering down through decades of accumulated grime and rust. Kael squinted against the harsh glare, his body protesting every movement as they prepared to ascend.
"Checkpoint's two blocks north," Mira whispered, consulting the cracked screen of her navigation device. "Straight shot if we keep to the main thoroughfare."
'If we don't collapse first.' Kael's legs felt like they belonged to someone else—someone much older and infinitely more fragile. The golden threads still flickered at the edges of his vision, a constant reminder of the price he'd paid for their survival.
Mira started up the rusted ladder, her movements efficient despite the weight of their salvaged haul. Halfway up, she froze.
"Kael." Her voice dropped to barely a whisper. "Look at this."
He climbed slowly, each rung a minor victory against his protesting muscles. When he reached her position, his blood turned to ice water.
Fresh claw marks scored the concrete around the tunnel entrance—deep gouges that hadn't been there when they'd descended hours ago. Worse still, a viscous black substance clung to the metal grating, still wet and reeking of ozone and decay.
"They followed us," Mira breathed. "The bastards actually *followed* us."
'Intelligent. Persistent. Wonderful.' Kael examined the residue more closely, noting how it seemed to shift and writhe even in the still air. "This isn't random predator behavior. They're hunting us specifically."
A distant screech echoed from somewhere in the wasteland beyond—not close, but not nearly far enough away for comfort.
"Move. Now." Mira hauled herself through the grating with desperate urgency.
The sprint to the Middle Wall became a nightmare of burning lungs and failing coordination. Kael stumbled twice in the first block, his vision graying at the edges as the golden threads pulsed erratically. Behind them, more screeches joined the first—a chorus of hunger and malevolent intelligence.
"Come on!" Mira had stopped, torn between safety and loyalty. The checkpoint's lights blazed ahead, salvation measured in mere yards.
'Leave me,' he wanted to say, but pride and stubbornness kept the words locked in his throat. Instead, he forced his legs to carry him those final, crucial steps.
The guards at the checkpoint raised their weapons as two blood-stained, exhausted figures stumbled into their perimeter. Standard protocol for anyone emerging from the wasteland.
"State your business," the sergeant barked, his rifle steady despite the tremor in his voice. "And explain why you look like you've been wrestling with the damned."
Mira straightened, adopting the neutral expression of a professional scavenger. "Routine salvage run. Encountered some... difficulties."
But Kael could see the suspicion in the guards' eyes, the way they cataloged every detail of their appearance. His reflection from the mirror haunted him—had the changes become visible to others?
'How much did that power cost me? And how much more will I have to pay?'