The second the gate shut behind them, the world had been loud with terror.
Now it was silent.
Frankie woke to a quiet so thick it felt like being buried. Not just the absence of noise, but the absence of everything. Grey light leaked through cracked shutters, painting the room in sickly silver. Dust drifted lazily in the air. Somewhere, stone groaned as part of the ruin finally gave up and settled.
She took inventory. Bruised ribs. Throat like sandpaper. Legs stiff. Her hand cramped around her dagger. She hadn't slept—just flickered out.
Luca stirred beside her.
"You awake?"
Frankie nodded. They stayed still, listening for claws. For wet tearing. For anything.
Nothing.
She pushed herself up. The floorboard screamed beneath her boot. She froze. Outside, the street lay under grey dust. Bodies where they'd fallen. Some whole. Some not. The scavengers had fed.
"They're gone," Luca whispered.
"No," Frankie said. "They're resting."
They packed without speaking. Dry rations. Chalk-tasting. Water like rust. They passed crooked portraits whose painted eyes followed them.
In the entry hall, dust glittered in thin shafts of light. Frankie reached for the door handle.
And froze.
A shape stood in the doorway.
Tall. White. Wrong.
A scavenger. Wounded. One leg dragging. Plating torn open across its torso. One arm twitching like a snapped wire. Its smooth, faceless head turned toward them with slow precision.
A broken predator.
"Frankie…" Luca's voice shook.
She lifted a hand. Wait.
The thing tremored, sensing them. Then it moved.
Not running. Blurring.
Frankie shoved Luca aside as the scavenger slammed into the wall behind them. Stone exploded. She rolled, came up with dagger raised, heart battering her ribs.
She slashed at its damaged leg.
Sparks. The blade skidded off plating like butter against steel.
The scavenger swung.
Pain detonated across Frankie's ribs. She flew into a pillar. Air left her lungs. The room tilted.
Luca grabbed a chair and smashed it against the creature's head. Wood shattered. The thing didn't even flinch. It turned toward him.
Luca's eyes went wide.
Something in Frankie snapped. Not courage. Not heroism. Refusal.
She charged. Stabbed. Anywhere. Joints. Cracks. Neck. The creature's hand shot out and closed around her wrist.
Cold. Crushing.
Bone strained. The dagger slipped from her fingers and clattered away. The scavenger lifted her like she weighed nothing.
Luca rammed a broken table leg into the tear in its chest.
The creature shrieked—a vibration that turned Frankie's vision to static. It flung Luca aside. He hit the wall and went still.
Darkness crept into Frankie's sight. Her wrist screamed. Above her, a ceiling beam hung cracked and splintered.
Her free hand scraped the floor. Found the fallen dagger.
She drove it upward into the beam's support.
Wood gave way.
The beam crashed down, pinning the scavenger. Its grip loosened. Frankie tore free, climbed atop the trapped creature, and drove the blade down.
Again.
Her arm shook.
Again.
The hilt snapped. She kept going, shoving broken steel into cracks with bare hands, blood slicking her palms.
The air began to hum. Deep. Resonant. Her teeth buzzed.
Silver light spilled from the creature's chest fissures. Heat washed over her face. The scavenger went rigid—then dissolved into drifting white dust that vanished before touching the floor.
Silence returned.
Frankie fell back, gasping. Luca groaned from the corner.
"I'm… alive," he croaked.
She laughed once. Then vomited. Hard.
They sat in the ruins for a long time, just breathing.
"Frankie," Luca whispered. "We killed it."
She nodded—but her attention was elsewhere. A steady warmth pressed against her chest. She pulled the amulet from beneath her shirt.
It pulsed.
Not warmth.
A heartbeat.
Slow. Heavy. Matching her own.
The symbol etched into its metal looked deeper now. Hungrier.
"Frankie…" Luca stared. "It wasn't doing that before."
Outside, a scavenger cried out—long, hollow, searching.
Frankie closed her fist around the amulet.
She didn't know how she knew.
But the thing they'd killed hadn't just died.
Something had passed into her.
The Death Zone had tried to swallow her.
Instead, she'd taken a bite back.