The rain hadn't stopped for three days.
It poured in sheets across the shattered windows of the half-fallen hospital where Aerin's group had taken temporary shelter. Thunder cracked like the snapping bones of the world itself, and lightning danced on the horizon, illuminating the warped cityscape—twisted metal, collapsed skyscrapers, and vines overtaking stone.
Inside the hospital, silence reigned—but it was not peaceful.
Everyone was on edge.
Eliah sat near the boarded-up entrance, clutching his weapon like it was part of him. His eyes darted every time the wind shifted. Even the howling air sounded unnatural now, too sharp, too aware.
Aerin paced the hallway, boots creaking against the ruined linoleum floor. Her mind spun in overdrive. They'd lost two people during the last relocation. Theo was missing—likely taken by one of the new variants. She hadn't said it out loud, but everyone knew.
She stopped by a cracked window, watching rain streak down like melting glass. Her hand tightened on her blade.
Behind her, Quinn approached silently, carrying a dented thermos and a blanket.
"You haven't rested in thirty hours," Quinn said gently. "You'll burn out before we make it through this storm."
Aerin didn't look at her. "Sleep can wait. Something's coming."
Quinn's voice lowered. "Something always is."
But Aerin was already moving again, drawn by the strange rhythm in her chest—the same instinct that had saved them time and time again. A pulse. A pull. Not fear. Premonition.
Down the corridor, Eden sat cross-legged, tuning the old comms device they salvaged from the Ranger outpost. Wires dangled like spider legs, and static hissed through the broken speaker.
"Any luck?" Aerin asked as she stepped in.
Eden looked up, exhausted. "Some… maybe. I caught something weird earlier. Not a distress signal. More like... music."
Aerin blinked. "Music?"
"Old. Like—pre-Fall broadcast. Real instruments. Could've been interference, but... it had rhythm. Harmony. Someone's transmitting."
"From where?"
Eden shrugged, hair tangled and wild. "Signal bounces off the clouds during the storm. I'm triangulating, but it's messy."
Aerin's heart beat faster. Music meant power. Power meant infrastructure. Infrastructure meant survivors. Civilization. Maybe even answers about the Crimson Bloom—the first plague that broke the world.
"Keep trying," she said. "If someone's still broadcasting… they want to be found."
Later that night, when most had dozed off in corners and under makeshift tents, the music returned.
Clear this time.
A violin, haunting and slow, dripping sorrow into the airwaves like tears falling into still water.
Then a voice—female, soft, echoing with distant static:
"To those still breathing... keep walking. The Garden remembers you."
The room froze.
Aerin stared at the comms device, unsure if it was a trick of the storm. Quinn turned the volume up, but the message didn't repeat.
Only silence returned.
Then, Eliah's voice from the hall: "We've got movement!"
Aerin bolted from the room, sword already drawn. Outside the entrance, shadows shifted in the rain—large, unnatural.
Not zombies. Not humans.
They were something else.
Slick, sinewy forms crawling low across the road like corrupted panthers. Their skin shimmered like wet obsidian, reflecting flashes of lightning.
"Variants," Eliah growled.
"No," Aerin whispered. "These are new."
The creatures paused just outside the beam of light, sniffing the air. Then one stepped forward—upright, humanoid, too tall.
Its face wasn't a face. It was a mask of pulsing red light.
Aeris's blood turned to ice.
Red-masked Reapers—rumored scouts of something greater, something buried under the bloom.
No one had ever seen one and lived.
"Back!" Aerin shouted. "Fall back and prepare to move! Eden, grab the comms!"
The creature tilted its head, mimicking the motion like a curious child.
Then it spoke.
A dry, metallic voice echoed across the street.
"Protocol breach detected. Subject Aerin Kael—confirmed."
Gasps erupted behind her. Her name. The thing knew her name.
"Move!" she roared.
Gunfire erupted, but the bullets passed through the creature like vapor. It raised a hand and the nearest wall melted, disintegrating in a wave of scarlet static.
No one needed further convincing.
They ran.
Through back corridors and down stairwells slick with rain and mold. Aerin led them through tunnels only she had mapped, lungs burning, heart pounding.
Behind them, the creature didn't chase.
It waited.
Watching.
Like a predator studying its prey before the real hunt.
They emerged two hours later in a drainage tunnel by the river's edge. The storm still howled, but the city here was quieter—more dead.
Quinn leaned against the wall, coughing. Eliah checked their gear.
Aerin looked at Eden. "Where did that transmission come from?"
Eden hesitated, then pulled out a hand-drawn map. "Based on the echo pattern… somewhere beyond the southern ridge. Near the old botanical zones."
Aerin felt the word click into place.
Garden.
The voice on the radio said, "The Garden remembers you."
Could it be? A sanctuary? A trap? Or worse—part of the Bloom itself?
She didn't know. But she had to find out.
"We move at dawn," Aerin said. "No more hiding. No more running. We follow the music."
Behind her, lightning split the sky.
And in the distance… a new sound.
Not thunder.
Not creatures.
But a voice, again—soft, like a lullaby carried by wind:
"Come home, lost children. The soil still remembers your names."