A nightmare.
Alena stood in a room so dark that it seemed to be breathing. Watching. The ambience pressed against her skin. Damp or maybe cold or maybe both, like the inside of a lung.
"Where am I----" Her voice didn't echo; it got dissolved into the darkness.
At the center of that void sat a man at a grand piano. The instrument loomed massive, and on its surface, Alena could see her reflection - distorted. She looked at the man. Scars from unimaginable battles marred all over his face. Burned deep into his left cheek, she noticed, were the numbers 312, blackened and raised like a brand.
His fingers moved across the black keys - not the white. Only the black. They danced with unnatural precision, weaving a melody that felt -
"The melody's off," she mumbled. Yeah wrong. The notes crawled under her skin, tugged at memories she didn't remember living. Yet, she couldn't stop listening.
She realized then - the room wasn't empty.
Her eyes suddenly caught movement in the far-left corner. A girl crouched there, folded into herself like a broken insect. She had long hair and matted strands over her face, and in her hand, she gripped a hammer. Burned into her forearm were the numbers 405.
Slowly, the girl stood up. She approached the piano. Her steps made no sound at all, yet that floor seemed to shudder beneath her weight. She stopped behind the man with the piano and raised the hammer high above her head.
Then-
It came down.
Crashed onto the instrument's surface. The haunting melody cut off instantly. The sharp clang reverberated through the room like a drumbeat.
And then she struck again.
And again.
Clang. Clang.
The sound echoed in Alena's skull. She leaned forward and saw the truth. The hammer wasn't just striking the piano.
It was hitting something soft. Something that bled.
A hand.
A pale hand without its body. It rested on the piano's edge. Its fingers twitched with each strike, blood spilling over the black-and-white keys.
It looked like witchcraft to Alena. The man smiled. And then, without hesitation, he began to play again, faster this time, louder this time. Mixing the hammer's brutal rhythm into his melody, he looked as if he were dancing. So graceful. And on the other hand, Alena felt like her head was about to burst.
"Stop it." She clutched her head and muttered, "Please stop it."
The 405 girl froze mid-swing.
Her head turned to Alena slowly. Not her full body, just the head. Within two or maybe three seconds, shadows cloaked her face, leaving it obscured. No more could Alena see her features... just the faint outline.
"Who is she?" Alena murmured.
Then her gaze shifted, drawn to another corner of the room. A woman, middle-aged woman stood there rigidly. Suddenly, without any prior warning, the woman raised her hand.
Slap.
A child knelt beneath her, silent and unmoving, as if resigned to the blows. Alena was disgusted by seeing such behavior towards a child. She felt sad... or maybe that whole scene felt too familiar to her.
"Is that… me? Or…" She couldn't tell. As she stepped closer, dread clawed at her chest.
Neither the woman nor the child had a face. Where eyes and mouths should have been was only smooth skin, stretched tight, as if something underneath was trying to push out.
Then she heard some heavy breathing. It came from the walls themselves, pulsating as if alive. And from above, a dark liquid began to drip. Thick. Sluggish like blood. It splattered onto the floor in twisted patterns. Patterns that, to her horror, resembled something like -
Screaming faces.
Open mouths frozen in agony.
The man's playing grew frantic, violent. His fingers were now impossibly fast. His melody grew louder, overpowering the room, suffocating Alena, and then.....
And then he sang.
"Oh, the skate died ~
He saw how the world might ~
be boring, black and white…"
The voice felt so... distorted, as if it didn't just come from that man. It was coming from multiple vocals. After he sang one line, he started laughing. That laughter, it wasn't joy - it was recognition. It was the kind of laughter that could stop a heart.
405 joined in again, hammering the piano harder. Blood sprayed with each strike, feeding the melody's madness.
"Nooo... NOOOO..." Alena screamed, but her voice drowned in the cacophony. She turned away and ran - desperate to escape, only to face.....
HER.
In the far-left corner stood another girl, covered in shadow. Something primal pulled Alena forward to her.
"Who are you?" she begged, "Why's nobody answering me? I don't get it. What's up with these numbers? Talk.."
The man's laughter erupted again, before twisting back into his song.
"But you see, a man's eyes ~
saw some gray wings psssst…
Phhha ha haha! A man's eyes. Hahaha..."
The laugh fractured into a scream - a sound stretched beyond sanity. Alena looked back to the mysterious girl. Burned into the girl's throat were the numbers 101.
And then....perhaps....yeah, perhaps it was a trick of the shadows.... or perhaps the dark was lying. But she saw it. Alena could swear on her life.
That girl was smiling.
——————-——————-——————-——————-——————-——————-————
"Alena...wake up....wake up! Alena!"
Kostas's voice pulled her out of that grotesque nightmare. Alena jolted awake, gasping for air. She tried to blink her eyes to focus on Kostas's silhouette that hovered over her.
Kostas kept shouting, "Alena... where's Kate?"
Her mind lagged behind his words... she was still trying to process what was going on.
"I asked you - where's Kate?" This time, the voice went harsher.
"What- what do you mean?" she stammered. "She's in her room!"
Kostas snapped immediately, "No, she isn't there. Isn't she your responsibility? What the fuck were you doing sleeping here so calmly?"
Alena's fear curdled into anger. "Calmly? What do you mean calmly? I was fucking terrified-"
"Just shut that mouth up. Stop trying to justify everything," he cut in coldly. "No one asked. Go check the room."
She hated him, every fiber of his existence. But an instinct... unyielding or maybe motherly... forced her legs to move. And, She ran.
Kate's door swung open-
Kostas was right. The bed was empty.
"No, no, no, no..." The words stumbled from her lips, her voice cracking under the weight of panic. "It... it can't... Kate!"
"Fuckkk!" she screamed.
Kostas was already tearing through the house, searching for any clue or maybe even Kate. His movements were sharp with urgency.
Alena stood frozen, her mind a storm of fragmented thoughts. Her eyes quickly darted to the clock.
11:00.
Each tick sounded like a thunderclap, loud... really loud. Then, something caught her eye. The hammer. It leaned against the bed, glowing faintly in the light.
"Why... why is it here?" Her voice wavered, "It was with me a while ago. Why-"
The wheelchair Kate used was lurking in the corner. Dark stains streaked the seat.... blood it is. Another scream escaped from Alena's throat, shattering every trace of silence in the house.
Meanwhile, somewhere not too far away, under a sky choked with industrial smog, a bus rumbled through Sector 21.
That bus's radio was playing a soft yet warped melody. The tune felt wrong for the hour, wrong for the road. Passengers sat stiff in their seats, no one speaking. Their eyes unfocused as if listening without knowing why.
Suddenly, the bus screeched. The passengers lurched forward as the driver slammed the brake. A bunch of jeeps were blocking the road ahead.
The driver swallowed hard. "It's the troopers," he muttered. "What are these psychopaths doing here?"
One by one, the troopers took position in front of the bus, forming a giant horde. Freddie emerged from that crowd and led Harry and Pasha to the bus. His eyes scanned the passengers as he approached.
Kamala sat on the hood of a jeep, legs crossed, watching it all unfold like a performance she'd already seen too many times, "This is going to be good."
Freddie, with fast steps, climbed onto the bus as Harry and Pasha waited by the bus, watching closely. He leaned toward the driver. "Where's this bus going?"
"Sector 11," the driver answered instantly.
Harry exhaled sharply and glanced at Freddie. "Yeah… that's the border to the next country. That motherfucker wants to leave. Kostas's information was right. He's in here, Freddie."
Freddie didn't even look back. "You don't have to tell me shit, Harry. Shut your mouth and watch."
Then, louder to the passengers - "Listen up!"
Every passenger shrank. They knew how dangerous the Troopers could be.
"There's an intruder among all of you. A dangerous guy. Real danger. We're looking for him. No need to panic. And Lobo-" His lips curled. "I would suggest not trying to hide. Daddy's gonna catch you."
Harry sighed in a low voice, "Corny guy."
Freddie's inches from his pistol, thumb brushing the grip, "So if you want to be presented alive in front of central, get out of your seats. Now."
The bus felt smaller. Hotter. Claustrophobic.
Freddie tilted his head, "Look, you're only gonna make things worse for yourselves. I'm the good guy here. These guys outside?" He gestured toward the troopers outside, "They're brutal. They won't care. They'll kill all of you without hesitation. Even the innocents just want a single clue. So please, get out of the crowd-- "
Before he could finish, a man in the back of the bus stood up.
Slowly. His eyes were wide- not afraid, not angry, just excited. His mouth twitched, fighting a grin. And then, he lunged at Freddie. A shot rang out from Freddie's pistol.
Freddie was barely able to register the movement before that guy could knock him out. That bullet somehow pierced the right side of his chest.
The man stumbled back, clutching his bleeding chest. He collapsed against the seats. The bus fell into silence. And, Harry knew immediately who he was. His lips barely moved, but still a whisper managed to escape his throat, "Lobo."
Lobo grinned as he stepped backward, blood dripping from his fingers. Then, without any warning, he kicked Freddie square in the chest. Freddie flew.
Glass exploded as his body was hurled out of the bus, crashing onto the pavement below. Shards rained down like ice. The rest of the troopers made no move to intervene. Not yet.
Freddie groaned in pain, gasping, struggling to push himself to his knees.
Inside the bus, Lobo reached up calmly and ripped the radio disc out of its slot. He turned to the driver with a smile that looked mocking,
"I like this song."
Pasha and Harry quickly drew their weapons out and tried to get on the bus to fight. But Lobo, with a quick motion, slipped past them and leapt out of the bus. The moment his feet hit the ground, his body started to break.
Bones cracked loud enough to be heard over the engines. His spine arched unnaturally as limbs twisted, muscles tearing and reforming. Skin split as the fur burst outward.
In seconds-
Something else stood there. Something that possibly couldn't belong in this world.....Massive and monstrous.
A werewolf.
The troopers surged forward, shouting orders as they raised weapons aiming -
but Lobo was already gone.
Faster than they could react. A true blur of motion. Then nothing.
Kamala sighed and slid off the jeep, approaching Freddie. "Are you okay?"
Freddie, still on the ground, winced in pain. "You all didn't even come to help. Fuck you."
Kamala raised an eyebrow, "You got overconfident and didn't even use your axis. Fucking tried to shoot him with some gun like he's some human. Don't hold that against us." She smirked, "Now get up already. We have to chase him."
She looked toward the driver through the broken glass, and her tone went more direct, "What did he take from you?"
The driver hesitated, still dazed by the chaos. "A music disc."
Kamala was confused, "A disc?"
The driver kept looking at Kamala, "Yeah." And then he looked at the shattered glass of his bus and started singing, "Oh, the skate died... he saw how the world might... be boring, black and white…
But you see, a man's eyes... saw some gray wings... running by..."