Patter. Patter. Patter.
Small, quick steps echoed from behind the door. Uneven. Light—but fast.
Getting closer.
Myers shifted slightly, taking a small step back from the door as if already expecting what was about to come through it.
Seventeen didn't notice.
The sound kept building.
Closer.
Closer.
Faster.
Right as the knob began to turn
Seventeen was suddenly yanked backward by his collar, the collar biting into the front of his neck as his body jerked off balance.
The door burst open.
BANG.
"Huff-Huff-Huff… Doc-COUGH-COUGH-Doc-tor… finally… you're here…"
The figure stumbled forward, bent slightly at the waist as they struggled to breathe, chest rising and falling violently as if their lungs were scraping for air.
Seventeen barely felt the sting at his neck anymore.
His attention locked onto the figure in front of him.
A Beastman.
No—
A Rabbitman.
Up close, it was unmistakable.
Their hair was matted, thick strands of dull brown clinging together with sweat and dirt, sticking unevenly to their face and neck. Their body was tall but stretched thin, like something that had grown too fast without enough to sustain it. Muscles lined their limbs both long and defined, but there was a hollowness beneath it, a sharpness in the bones that pressed just under the skin.
Malnourished.
But not weak.
Not even close.
Their legs were what stood out next.
Long. Built wrong for walking.
The joints bent deeper than they should have, angled in a way that made it clear that they weren't meant for standing still. They were meant to launch.
The four large toes pressed into the ground, wide and thick with worn pads, bruised and darkened from constant impact. Each toe flexed slightly, gripping the floor unconsciously, like they were always preparing to push off.
But the ears
The ears were impossible to ignore.
Two long, towering ears rose from the top of their head, easily the length of their forearm. They weren't still. Not for a second.
They twitched.
Folded.
Shifted in sharp, precise angles.
One tilted toward Myers.
The other turned slightly toward Seventeen.
Then both adjusted again, independently, constantly moving like they were sorting through every sound in the space. Every breath. Every shift. Every heartbeat.
They weren't just hearing.
They were tracking.
The Rabbitman finally steadied their breathing.
Slowly
They noticed him.
The ears stopped.
Just for a moment.
Then
A sharp twitch.
Their head snapped toward Seventeen.
Their eyes widened.
Pupils expanding instantly.
Their nose began twitching rapidly, pulling in the air in short, sharp breaths.
Reading him.
Measuring him.
Deciding.
Seventeen didn't move.
But something inside him did.
A cold, immediate certainty.
If he didn't act
He would die.
The Rabbitman's legs bent slowly.
Lower.
The pads of their toes spread wider against the ground, pressing down, anchoring.
Coiling.
Every muscle tightened at once.
The air felt heavier.
Time stretched thin.
Seventeen could hear his breathing. Loud. Uneven. Too loud.
Nothing else mattered.
Not Myers.
Not the door.
Just this moment.
He blinked.
Just once.
And when his eyes opened
The space between them was gone.
Not crossed.
Not traveled.
Gone.
One moment they stood across from him
The next
Their legs were already unfolding in front of him, muscles snapping forward with explosive force, the ground cracking slightly beneath the pressure of their push off.
There was no blur.
No warning.
Just movement that his body couldn't understand fast enough to react to.
Faster than his thoughts.
Faster than his eyes.
Faster than he could even feel fear.
BANG!
A translucent blue wall shattered into existence between them.
Cracks spread instantly across its surface like glass under pressure.
FWOOM.
The force of the impact exploded outward.
Air rushed past Seventeen violently, his hair whipping backward as his body stumbled, barely catching himself.
"Morgan. Stop."
Myers voice cut clean through everything.
The Rabbitman twisted mid motion, landing lightly, almost silently, before spinning toward him.
"MYERS WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!"
Her voice snapped. Sharp, aggressive, raw.
Before Seventeen could even track her movement
She vanished.
Then
She was in front of Myers.
"YOU PROMISED ME YOU WOULDN'T BRING ANYONE HERE! SO WHO IN THE REDEEMER IS THAT?!"
Her arm shot out.
Finger extended.
Pointing straight at Seventeen.
No
Not him.
His chest.
His heart.
At least that's what Seventeen thought.
"He's my new student," Myers said simply. "Seventeen."
"YOU PROMIS-"
She stopped.
Mid word.
Slowly
She turned her head back toward Seventeen.
Her eyes dragged across him.
Taking in everything.
The thin frame.
The scar.
The uneven posture.
The weakness.
She looked back at Myers.
Then back again.
"Student?"
A pause.
"You?"
She walked toward him.
Slow. Deliberate.
Seventeen tensed.
Too slow.
Her hand snapped forward
And grabbed his wrist.
Before he could even think of pulling away
She already had him.
Squeeze.
Her grip tightened instantly.
The rough pads of her fingers pressed deep into his skin, the texture uneven and calloused, built from constant impact and strain. There was no adjustment. No testing.
Just control.
Absolute.
There was no slipping.
No adjusting.
Just pressure.
Unmoving.
Unbreakable.
His entire body lifted.
Effortlessly.
His arm stretched upward as his feet left the ground, his body dangling beneath her grip like he weighed nothing.
"THIS KID?" she barked. "THIS is your student?"
She shook him.
Violently.
Like he weighed nothing.
"I could snap his wrist and his neck before he even hits the ground!"
Pain shot up his arm.
Sharp.
Hot.
But something else burned hotter.
Humiliation.
Seventeen's jaw clenched.
Enough.
He lifted his leg, aiming to drive it into her back
From the corner of his eye
He saw Myers.
Looking up.
Tired.
Almost annoyed.
Like this was expected.
Before Seventeen could process it
Something hit him.
Not like a punch.
It didn't feel like impact.
It felt like something pierced through him
And stayed there.
His chest collapsed inward around it.
The skin on his chest tightened together.
Like the space inside him had been crushed into a single point.
Then
Heat.
Violent.
Explosive.
It spread outward instantly, tearing through muscle, burning along his ribs, crawling under his skin as if something inside him was trying to force its way out through flesh.
His body locked.
Every muscle seized at once.
His breath vanished.
Then
BOOM.
His body was thrown.
His back slammed into the wall with crushing force.
The impact rattled through his bones, shaking him to his core as his arm dropped uselessly to his side.
Blood poured instantly.
Warm.
Thick.
Running from his head, over his face, down his chin, dripping in uneven streams.
But none of it mattered.
Not compared to his chest.
It still felt like something was there.
Still pressing.
Still inside him.
He didn't want to look.
Didn't want to see.
But he did.
Slowly
He lowered his head.
Blood poured out faster.
Darkening his new clothes.
Spreading across his grey pants as they splotched all over them.
Then
He saw it.
A hole.
Small.
Too small.
Barely the size of a finger.
But the blood.
It poured from it endlessly.
Like something deeper had been opened.
Like something had gone through him clean
And left everything behind to spill out.
He looked up.
Morgan stood there.
Watching.
Unmoved.
Uncaring.
Like it didn't matter.
Like he didn't matter.
Like it didn't matter if he lived.
Or died.
And that
That was what broke him.
From the corner of his eye, Myers walked calmly towards him.
But Seventeen didn't care.
His eyes locked onto Morgan.
The darkness crept in again.
Slow.
Cold.
Familiar.
He forced his mouth open.
Nothing came out at first.
His chest refused to move, breath catching somewhere deep inside him, trapped behind the weight pressing into his lungs. He forced it anyway, dragging what little air he had left upward.
It scraped through him.
Slow. Painful. Barely there.
His lips moved before the sound did.
His eyes never left hers.
Even now.
Even like this.
What came out wasn't a voice, just a thin, broken thread of breath, so faint it should've died the moment it left him. Something no one else should have heard.
But he didn't say it for anyone else.
"…bitch."
Her pupils widened instantly.
Her ears snapped forward.
Not a twitch.
A lock.
Both of them aligned at once, rigid, unmoving. Like the sound had been seized and pinned in place.
For a fraction of a second
Everything about her stilled.
Then
Her pupils blew wide.
All restraint vanished.
Her body dropped lower, muscles tightening in sharp, visible lines beneath her skin as something violent and instinctual surged through her all at once. The air around her seemed to shift, like it had been forced aside by the sudden weight of her presence.
Her lips pulled back slightly.
Not a smile.
Not even a snarl.
Something worse.
Her eyes burned into him.
No hesitation.
No doubt.
Only intent.
As his vision blurred
He saw it.
Wrath.
Raw.
Immediate.
Alive.
She moved.
Not fast.
Not quick.
Gone.
The space between them collapsed as if it had never existed.
Myers moved too
Reaching.
Trying to intercept.
He was being rushed at by two different people for two completely different reasons.
Seventeen felt the corner of his lips lift.
Just slightly.
Then
Everything went dark.