The sound echoed like a gunshot in his ears.
Snap.
Then the deliberate crunch of glass.
Slow. Heavy.
Eli didn't dare move.
He clung to the scaffold pipe, suspended above three stories of open air, every muscle screaming in protest. The wind pressed against him, cold and sour with the stench of burning chemicals—and something worse.
Rot.
Another step behind him.
Scrape. Drag.
His thoughts spiraled into noise.
It's here. It followed me.
No—someone else…
The memory surged up, raw and ugly. That stairwell. That scream. That final bang as he slammed the rooftop door shut.
He had told himself it was just panic. Echoes. Fear playing tricks.
But now—
There had been a hand.A voice."Wait—!"
His breath hitched.
I locked someone out.
The realization hit like a punch to the ribs.
The door hadn't been jammed shut to keep something out.It had trapped someone in.
And now that someone was gone.
Taken. Devoured.
And the thing that had taken them—was here.
Denied its first prey, it had climbed higher. maybe following heat, noise, or Instinct.
And now it was behind him.
The pipe trembled—not from the wind this time, but from the force of his own shaking limbs.
Eli clenched his jaw, swallowing bile and guilt.
There'd be time to fall apart later—if he survived the next sixty seconds.
Assess.The rooftop was no longer safe.Diagnose.Immediate threat: unknown entity. Hostile. High aggression. High mobility.Plan.Get across. Secure balcony. Block entry. Hide. Observe.
He bit back the scream rising in his throat and began inching forward again, faster now. Each shuffle a prayer.
Behind him, the sounds changed.
Not just steps.
Breathing.
Wrong. Wet. Guttural.
Like something trying to mimic a human breath through a shredded throat.
Eli's fingers slipped briefly on rusted metal. Panic lit up every nerve in his spine.
He didn't look back.Couldn't.
Just a little more—
The wind shoved him sideways. Like a child tipping a chair. Cold. Random. Dangerous.
Sniffing.
Fast. Sharp.
Then a low growl. Frustrated. Not intelligent.
Instinctive.
It hadn't seen him.
Not yet.
The thing paced. Claws scratched against concrete. It was searching.
Not smart. Not strategic.
Just hungry.
He reached the balcony. Swung one leg over.
Almost there—
His boot slipped.
Metal shrieked. His knee slammed against the edge. Pain flashed white-hot.
The pipe rattled.
Too loud.
Everything went still.
Then—
A screech.
Not animal.Not human.
Something in between.
Raw fury. Denied hunger.
It knew now.
It had heard him.
Eli hurled himself over the railing and crashed onto the balcony. His hip hit glass. Elbow cracked tile. The world spun.
Didn't matter.
He was across.
But not safe.
Not yet.
He scrambled to his feet, grabbed the mop shaft and baton, and dove through shattered glass into the dark hospital room beyond.
Dust and rot swallowed him. Curtains fluttered like shrouds. The air stank of mildew and old blood.
He turned and slammed the balcony door shut, jamming a bent chair under the broken handle just as footsteps pounded across the rooftop above.
Searching.
Frustrated.
But it didn't jump.Didn't climb.
Not yet.
It didn't know how.
Eli collapsed against the wall, chest heaving. His ribs ached. His hands were bleeding. The cold floor bit into his back.
Alive.
For now.
He whispered through cracked lips:
"Time to move, Navarro. Cry later."
His gaze drifted upward—and there, on the far wall, half-burned and flaking with mildew, hung a faded evacuation map.
Not much.
But enough.
His next move was waiting.
But first, he had to survive this one.
Eli ducked low and crept deeper into the ruined hospital room, careful to avoid the glass. His breath came shallow, every exhale controlled. It was darker here, shadows creeping along the walls like stains. Moonlight struggled through a broken corner window, silvering old IV poles and an overturned med cart.
He passed a rusted bedframe, the mattress half-charred and caved inward. Blood had dried like oil across the sheets, soaked into the floor beneath.
Not old blood.
Still tacky under his fingertips.
Still fresh.
He flinched back, wiping his hand on his pants before forcing himself forward. One step at a time.
He found a storage cabinet in the far corner—half-collapsed, but hollow enough to crawl behind. The scent hit him first.
Sweat. Metal. Old plastic and copper wiring.
And something else.
Decay.
He pulled the mop shaft tight against his chest and ducked inside anyway, curling into the dark like an afterthought. Shallow, cold, close. His knees jammed against his ribs. His breath fogged the inside of the cabinet wall.
Above him, the rooftop creaked again.
Then—
A thump.
Directly overhead.
The creature hadn't moved on.
It was waiting.
Pacing.
A predator whose prey had slipped out of reach.
A hiss seeped through the cracks in the walls, like steam escaping pressure.
Eli shut his eyes. His pulse thundered in his skull.
More sounds now. Not just above—but below.
Somewhere distant, a door slammed.
Another survivor?
Or just another thing?
He didn't know.
He barely knew his own name.
But instincts kicked in. He scanned the room again with quick, darting eyes, searching for anything—anything he could use.
Then he saw it.
Near the base of the wall: a bloody handprint. Dragged downward. Fingernails torn. A second mark beside it—barely visible.
A boot scuff.
Small. Narrow. Lighter than his own.
That survivor had made it this far.
Maybe even into this very room.
And then—
Gone.
He didn't need to see the rest to know what happened.
The trail ended at the window. Broken. Wide enough to leap from, if someone was desperate.
Or cornered.
A faint smear of red streaked the bottom edge of the glass.
Eli pressed his forehead to the inside of the cabinet, biting down the scream rising in his chest.
He had locked the door.
He had trapped them in.
The pipe. The climb. The balcony. It should've been him.
He stayed in the cabinet longer than he should've, listening to the roof, to the halls, to the weight of his guilt echoing louder than anything else.
But eventually, the sounds faded.
The rooftop groans stopped.
The creature had moved on.
Or at least, it wasn't right above him anymore.
Eli uncurled himself with stiff, reluctant limbs and crawled out, scanning the room one last time.
There was nothing left to help him here.
Only reminders.
And blood.
He crossed back to the wall, stood in front of the evacuation map, and stared.
It was blurry with grime. Some halls had burned through. Some floors were crossed out in red marker—triage zones long since collapsed.
But there it was.
A stairwell two floors down. Emergency access to the sub-basement. Tunnels, maybe. He remembered janitors talking about them. Places not on most blueprints.
A way out—or at least, a place to disappear.
He straightened up, wiped his hands, and adjusted the grip on his baton.
Time to move again.
No more hiding.
Not yet.
Not while that thing was still learning.
Still hunting.
And now, it knew his scent.