12
ARMEN
They’reloud before they’re visible.
Boots on tile, uneven and rushed. Voices low but not low enough, the kind of careless noise that comes from men who think numbers make them safe. Four of them, spread wide across the corridor, closing on the same junction where she just disappeared.
Different group than before. These ones wear mismatched gear—one in a torn leather jacket, another with a lame-ass bandana pulled over his face like this is a heist instead of a Hunt. No coordination. No signals. Just momentum and bad judgment.
Amateurs.
I track their angle from above, calculating the intersection point.
Ten seconds before they reach her corridor.
She doesn’t know they’re coming.
She’s crouched low behind an overturned vending machine, catching her breath, checking the bandage on her knee again. The fabric’s soaked through now, dark and wet. She needs to stop moving. Needs to elevate it, let the bleeding slow. She won’t. I can see it in the way her hands stay busy instead of still. She’s not resting. She’splanning.
The rival group hits the junction.
One of them spots the blood trail immediately, those faint smears she’s been leaving without realizing. He points, grinning under the bandana, and the others adjust their path without a word. Following her.
My hand moves before I think about it. I tap once against the support beam beside me. Metal hums, the vibration traveling down through the infrastructure, bleeding into the walls and floor. Not loud. Not obvious.
But Rogue feels it. I know because the corridor ahead of the rival group goeswrong. Not dramatically. Not in a way they’ll see coming.
The emergency lights flicker once and go out. Not all of them. Just the strip that marks the path forward, the one that would lead them straight to her. The darkness swallows ten feet of corridor in an instant.
The group hesitates.
The one in the leather jacket swears, pulling up short. Another one laughs, nervous, like this is still funny. Like the Rot isn’t paying attention.
It is.
Iam.
I move along the catwalk, silent, positioning myself directly above them. From here, I can see their hesitation,the way they’re second-guessing the route. One of them taps against the wall, testing, maybe signaling. No one answers.
Because this corridor isn’t neutral anymore.
It’sclaimed.
Rogue steps into view. Not ahead of them. From behind. He doesn’t announce himself. Doesn’t make noise. He’s justthere, a shadow that solidifies into something solid and present, standing in the space they just passed through like he’s been waiting the whole time.
The group doesn’t notice immediately. But one of them glances back. Freezes.
The others turn, slow and uncertain, and I watch the moment land—the realization that they’re not alone, that someone’s been watching, that the route they thought was open just closed behind them.
Rogue doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. He doesn’t need to. His mask catches what little light there is, that bone-white surface, smooth and deliberate, the kind of thing you can’t look away from once you’ve seen it. He tilts his head, just slightly, and the grin carved into the mask shifts with the motion.
Waiting.
The leather jacket guy takes a step back. Then another.
“We’re just—” he starts.
Rogue lifts one hand. Palm out. Steady. The universal signal forstop.
