They had been moving for hours—away from the battlefield, away from Billy and Blob's dead body, away from everything. Max was limping, his side bruised, while Scarlett was clutching her hands, still trembling from the shock of teleporting them so far and Billy's attack. At first it was hard to make out, half-buried beneath vines and moss, but as they drew closer, they could see the shape of a ruined structure jutting from the hillside. Twisted steel and crumbling concrete framed a half-collapsed doorway. A faded emblem was still visible on the rusted wall: M.C.G. Facility 01. Scarlett wiped her hand across the letters. "What is this place?" "Some sort of old lab," Max replied, his tone uneasy. "Must've been sealed off after the first War, maybe." Elena nodded, her breath fogging in the cold air. "either way, it'll do. Let's rest inside for a bit." The air within the facility was thick with decay. Every step echoed down metal corridors, and every sound made them flinch. Their torchlights caught flashes of shattered glass, rusted instruments, and scattered notes clinging to the walls like brittle leaves. Fin trailed behind, eyes darting at every creak and hum. "I don't like horror story's," he muttered. "You don't have to," Scarlett whispered, keeping close to Elena. "Just stay awake." she snorted. They reached what looked like a control room. Old monitors flickered faintly as Max brushed dust from a console. To their surprise, one still responded, screen crackling to life. Strings of half-corrupted data scrolled down in green letters. Elena leaned over his shoulder. "Can you pull anything useful from it?" "I'll try," Max said, fingers tapping quickly. He got to the corrupted logs, piecing together fragments until words began to appear—names, project codes, and something else. "M.C.G._MantiCore-Guild" The words made them all fall silent. Scarlett frowned. "Shit!..., The MantiCore Guild? That's just a rumour… isn't it?" "No," Max said flatly. "They were real. My father used to speak about them—said they were defeated in the war years ago. But if this data's still here…" He scrolled further. A line of text appeared, clearer than the rest: > Operation Telepathy ability compromised. Officer Bj Greywolf interference—subject retrieval incomplete. Status: MIA. Elena froze. Her father's name glowed faintly on the dusty monitor. Her mouth went dry. "My dad… he—he was targeted even back then." Max turned to her, eyes softening. "Elena, this doesn't mean—" "It means he was probably taken, like my mother thought" she snapped, voice trembling. "The Guild more than likely had something to do with it. I bet they know what happened." Scarlett knelt beside her, resting a hand on her shoulder. "We'll find out what this all means. I promise." Before anyone could speak again, a faint sound echoed through the corridor—a soft, rhythmic scraping, like claws on metal. Fin stiffened. "Please tell me that's the wind." Max shook his head, raising his needles. "That's no wind."
They didn't chase the sound.
Not at first.
Fear had a way of exhausting itself when you carried it long enough, and eventually the scraping faded into the background hum of the facility—just another ghost in a place full of them.
They barricaded the control room as best they could with a fallen cabinet and sheets of bent metal, then settled into a rough circle on the cold floor.
Rain drummed faintly above them. The world outside felt impossibly far away.
Elena sat with her back against the wall, knees drawn up, staring at nothing.
Scarlett stayed close, shoulder pressed against hers, their silence saying more than words ever could.
Max worked quietly, wrapping his own bruises and playing with his bag of needles with slow, deliberate care.
Fin sat cross-legged near the doorway, trying—and failing—to look brave.
"Well we made it to shelter," Scarlett said eventually, voice low. "That counts for something."
Max gave a tired huff. "Barely."
Elena finally spoke, her voice thin but steady. "My dad used to say places like this didn't just hold data. They held intent. People poured themselves into these walls."
Fin glanced around. "Great. Haunted and cursed."
Despite everything, Scarlett snorted softly. The tension eased, just a fraction.
They talked then—quietly, honestly. About fear. About how close they'd come to dying. About Billy, and how loss never really got easier, only heavier in different places.
Max admitted he didn't know how much longer his body would hold out. Scarlett confessed when she crashed into Fin, the teleport had nearly torn her apart. Elena spoke of her father, of the ache that never left, no matter how many days passed.
Fin listened more than he spoke, but when he did, it mattered.
"You lot… you don't give up," he said. "That's got to mean something too."
"I mean, I'd be brown bread right now if you guys gave up". Fin chuckled
Elena looked to the three "As long as we stick together we should be ok, If not we may all end up like Billy"
Those words hung heavy till eventually exhaustion won.
They took shifts without really deciding to. Max dozed sitting up.
Elena drifted off against Scarlett's shoulder. Fin curled up near the wall where the floor was driest, his jacket folded beneath his head.
The scraping came back once.
Soft.
Patient.
No one stirred.
Scarlett woke in the grey, dead quiet of false morning.
For a moment, she didn't know what was wrong—only that something was.
She turned her head, eyes unfocused, instinctively checking the room.
Fin's spot was empty just his neatly folded jacket.
She frowned, rubbing sleep from her eyes.
"Fin?" she whispered.
Nothing.
Arsehole bet he is taking a massive shit, she thought dully. I hope he has gone far enough so we don't eat it. She snorted a little then with a yawn, she settled back down, telling herself not to panic over nothing.
When she woke again, the facility lights hadn't changed—but time had.
Elena was sitting up now. Max was on his feet.
Fin still hadn't come back.
Scarlett's stomach dropped. "have you two seen fin since you woke."
Elen turned to Scarlett noticing the worried look on her face "what's wrong."
Max walked over to were Fin was laid.
He found it almost immediately.
A thin sheen of webbing clung to the floor where Fin had been sleeping—silvery, translucent, stretched tight like it had been pulled away in a hurry.
It disappeared through a broken vent in the wall, leading deeper into the facility.
"No," Scarlett breathed. "This is my fault I knew something was wrong last night."
"How could you have known he was taken." Elena spoke. "This is not your fault, You can't blame yourself."
Max crouched, touching the strands with the tip of a needle. "This is fresh."
Elena's jaw set. "Then we have to move. Now."
The lower level was worse.
The air grew warmer. Thicker. The walls were coated in old containment warnings and clawed scrape marks that hadn't been there on the upper floor.
The webbing increased the deeper in they went—ropes of it, layered and reinforced, stretched between pillars and across ceilings.
Then they heard it.
A low chittering echoing through the dark.
Max swore under his breath. "I Fucking hate spiders."
As the thing dropped from the ceiling without warning.
It was larger than the dogs, broader in the thorax, its limbs ending in hooked points that bit into steel like it was nothing.
Eight glistening eyes reflected their torch light. A low, guttural hiss reverberated through the hall as the creature unfolded itself from the shadows—a massive spider, each leg as long as a man, its body glistening in the light.
In the cold Void behind, fractured patterns, shadows moving, terrifying mirrored eyes.
A second shape shifted in the shadows.
Scarlett barely had time to look up before she saw him.
"Fin!". Scarlett shouted
Wrapped tight in thick webbing, cocooned and suspended from the ceiling above the chamber, unconscious but breathing—dangling just out of reach.
Elena's heart slammed against her ribs. "Fuck."
The spiders reacted instantly.
And the hunt began. The facility had grown darker and silent. The air hung thick with the smell of rotten flesh.
The beast lunged first, its massive body crashing through the corridor. They scattered, Scarlett blinking a few feet to the side, barely avoiding a snapping leg. Elena fired an arrow that exploded against the spider's armour, leaving only a shallow dent.
"Keep it moving!" Elena shouted. "Don't let them trap us!"
Fin hung suspended from the ceiling starting to stir awake. Max hurled a flurry of needles guided by his telekinesis, piercing the spider's eyes, but it only shrieked louder, spewing silver webbing in every direction.
Scarlett blinked forward to cut Fin free but was struck back by debris as the spider's leg smashed through the ceiling.
"Elena!" Max called out.
Elena focused, her bow trembling in her grip. "Come on, come on…" she muttered. She concentrated and loosed an arrow, glowing slightly brighter this time, It hit true—right between the beast's eyes.
The spider screamed, flailing wildly. The entire corridor shook as rubble fell around them. Scarlett managed to teleport Elena aside just before a steel beam crashed where she had stood.
"Finish it, then we can move on to the next one!" Scarlett shouted.
Elena raised her bow and it started to glow unlike it ever had before. Like unlocking something in the weapon. Its energy gathered, forming an arrow of blue shimmering light that hummed in the air. With one final step forward, she hurled it straight into the creature's head.
The light pierced through, sinking deep before fading. The spider let out a final screech, green ooze squirting over the floor and walls, before collapsing into the wreckage, its legs twitching, then falling still.
None of them being able to catch a breather as there was another spider bigger and more aggressive heading straight toward them.
The second spider didn't skulk.
It charged.
The ceiling buckled as it moved, heavier than the first — its abdomen scarred with old burns and hardened plates, legs slamming into the floor with bone-rattling force.
The impact threw dust and loose debris into the air, torchlight cutting through clouds of grey as its mandibles clicked wetly.
Scarlett swore loudly. "Oh fuck off — that one's massive."
The creature hissed, a sound like steam forced through meat, and surged forward.
"Move!" Max barked.
They scattered again.
The spider slammed one leg down where Elena had been standing a heartbeat earlier, the steel floor crumpling inward like thin foil.
She rolled, came up on one knee, bow already raised — but the web came first.
It hit her mid-draw.
Thick, silver strands wrapped around her arm and torso, yanking her sideways hard enough to wrench the bow from her grip. She hit the wall with a sharp cry, breath knocked clean out of her lungs.
"Elena!" Max shouted.
Scarlett blinked toward her without thinking — too close.
A hooked leg clipped her after teleporting, throwing her bodily across the room.
She hit the floor hard, skidding through bone, grime and shattered glass.
"Right," she coughed, rolling onto her back. "How rude."
The spider reared, lifting its bulk high — and that's when Finn groaned above them.
"Scar…?" His voice was thick, confused. "Why am I… upside down?"
Scarlett looked up.
Saw him.
Still cocooned. Still hanging. Right above the spider's reach.
Her stomach twisted violently.
"Oh you absolute plum," she spoke softly, then shouted to him. "I leave you asleep for five minutes and you get yourself kidnapped by the local wildlife?"
The spider lunged upward, jaws snapping inches below Finn's head.
"Nope!" Scarlett shouted, scrambling to her feet. "Not happening, you eight-legged freak."
She blinked upward — misjudged it — reappeared halfway through a hanging cable, sparks exploding as she tumbled, swearing violently.
Max raised both hands, veins standing out along his neck.
Everything moved.
Debris tore free from the walls — panels, broken rails, chunks of concrete — all slamming into the spider's flank in a relentless barrage.
The beast shrieked, staggering, ooze splattering the floor in thick green ropes.
But it didn't fall.
Instead, it turned on Max.
Fast.
A leg speared toward him. He barely threw up a telekinesis shield in time — the impact crushed him backward, his body slamming into a console with a sickening crack.
"Max!" Elena gasped.
The webbing around her arms began to glow.
Not bright. Not explosive.
Controlled.
She sucked in a breath, pain screaming through her ribs, and pulled.
The web burned away in a flash of blue-white heat. She tore free, staggered — then locked eyes with the spider.
"get the fuck away from him," she said quietly.
Her bow flew back into her hand.
Scarlett didn't question it anymore.
"Oi!" she shouted, throwing one of her daggers at it, hitting its mandibles, handle first, bouncing off, drawing the spider's attention. "You Ugly! Mother fucker! ,Over here!"
It turned, mandibles spreading.
Scarlett grinned viciously. "Yeah. That's right. Come and get it."
She blinked again — this time clean — reappearing beside Finn. One slash, then another, dagger cutting through webbing in quick sweeps and arcs.
"Hold still!" she snapped.
Finn blinked at her. "Are You an angel."
"Shut up. You muppet"
The web gave way.
Finn dropped.
Scarlett caught him mid-fall — barely — both of them slamming to the floor in a tangle of limbs and curses.
"Ow! Fuck!" Finn groaned.
She hauled him upright, shaking him once. "You do not get kidnapped again, you nob. I am not rescuing you twice in one day."
He winced. "In my defence—"
"Shut it."
The spider turned eyes burning.
Elena loosed.
The arrow hit dead centre in the thorax, energy punching through armour and flesh alike.
The force blew the creature backward, rupturing its abdomen in a wet, catastrophic burst.
Green fluid sprayed the walls and Fin.
Scarlett couldn't help herself falling to the floor in stitches at the site of him.
The spider collapsed — thrashing, legs gouging deep trenches into the floor — then went still.
Silence rushed in, broken only by dripping blood and heavy breathing.
Finn stared at himself then the corpse. "Fuck Sakes…That's disgusting."
Scarlett shoved him lightly and some were not covered in green claret. "You're welcome. Shrek" she cackled.
He coughed, then laughed weakly. "Did I miss anything, other than getting covered in shit?"
She stared at him, eyes wild, blood streaked across her face. "You missed everything again, you useless green bastard."
Max dragged himself upright, grimacing. "Everyone alive?"
"Define alive," Scarlett said. Staring at Fin smiling.
Elena lowered her bow slowly, hands shaking again — but she was standing. Still standing.
Finn leaned against the wall, after cleaning himself up, finally steady on his feet.
He looked at Scarlett, then at the wreckage.
"…You didn't have to come back for me."
She froze.
Then turned, jabbing a finger into his chest. "Don't you ever say that shit. Not again. Not to me."
He met her gaze, soft but serious. "Okay."
She exhaled sharply, then smacked the side of his head. "Pleb."
"Ow."
Elena let out a shaky breath — half laugh, half sob — and Max huffed quietly.
They regrouped, bloodied but intact, standing amid wreckage and corpses — together.
And deeper in the shadows, something else shifted.
Watching.
Waiting.
Silence returned at last.
Elena stumbled forward, exhaustion hitting her all at once. Her hand brushed against the creature's shattered shell—and there, embedded deep in the thorax, pulsed a faint Green Beast Heart.
"Is that…" Scarlett began.
Elena nodded weakly. "It's the Heart."
She reached out, touching the oozing Heart. It pulsed once, then the glow seeped over into her hand, spreading warmth through her veins. For a moment, the pain and fatigue melted away—replaced by something fierce, powerful, alive.
Max stared at her. "What the actual fuck, You absorbed it."
"I didn't mean to," she said quietly, her voice trembling. "It just… happened."
Fin, still catching his breath, chuckled weakly. "I wish it was horror story, now we got Venom on our team."
They laughed, but it was short-lived. Outside, thunder rolled across the forest, and the ruined lab groaned as if sighing in its sleep.
Elena looked around at the destruction, then at the dark corridor beyond. "We'll rest here for a bit," she said, voice steady. "Then we move on. This place has answers… and I cant leaving without them."
The others nodded, gathering their strength as the rain poured harder outside. The flicker of torchlight danced across the web-strewn walls.
For now, they were alive.
And for the first time, Elena Greywolf felt the stirrings of destiny in her blood.