Like it knows me.
A hand clamps over my mouth.
I bite down and drive my elbow back. Solid impact. A grunt. I wrench free and stumble forward, almost slamming into another runner.
A girl. Younger than me. Eyes wide. Blood streaking down her calf.
We stare at each other for half a second like two idiots who thought they could outrun this place.
“Don’t—” she starts.
Something drops from above.
A man lands between us, silent as a thought. He moves fast but not frantic, arms locking around her middle as she kicks and screams. Another man steps out of the dark behind him, already pulling restraints from his pocket and moving toward her.
Efficient. Controlled.
I back away, heart slamming, skin buzzing. Her scream climbs until it scrapes my nerves raw, then cuts off when the strap cinches tight.
They’re not here for me, it seems. Neither man looks at me.
They don’t need to. She’s their catch, not me.
I turn and run.
The hallway ahead is darker, the lights completely dead. I take the route anyway. The Rot doesn’t reward safe choices. My shoulder clips a column where holiday lights once flickered, and pain flares, hot and grounding.
Good.
Pain means I’m still alive.
Something shifts behind me—not footsteps this time.
Awareness.
I slow without meaning to. The hair on my arms lifts. It feels like standing on the edge of a drop, that moment when your body knows you’re about to fall before your brain catches up.
I don’t see him. I feel him. Close enough that the air changes. Warmth at my back. A presence that doesn’t rush, doesn’t grab.
It follows.
My stomach clenches, low and sharp and traitorous. It repulses me instantly, my body for reacting before fear, before rage. I shove the feeling down and sprint again.
No. Not this. Not here.
The mall opens into another atrium. Skylights above are fractured and opaque with grime, exterior light bleeding through in dull sheets. Dust swirls as I pass, glittering for half a second like some kind of sick tease.
For a heartbeat, it’s almost beautiful.
Then someone laughs.
Low. Amused. Close enough to promise, far enough to warn.
I don’t look back.
I run harder, lungs screaming, legs shaking, every sense stretched thin. The Rot watches. I know it now. Not the way people watch but the way places remember.
And it remembers everyone who ever thought they could beat the Rotter Hunt.
