The rain had turned heavy, a steady roar on the rooftops that drowned out the distant hum of the city. Jonas sat on the cold curb, hunched over, breathing like he'd run a marathon. His fists were raw, knuckles split, skin stinging from where they'd slammed into Rourke's jaw — except Rourke wasn't supposed to be able to vanish like that.
The bastard had walked backward into the alley wall and simply… dissolved. Not smoke. Not a trick of the shadows. He'd become part of the bricks, like paint soaking into plaster, until he was gone completely.
Now there was nothing but the rain.
Two EMTs had arrived in a silent ambulance, their lights strobing red and blue across wet pavement. Jonas tried to focus on them, but their voices came muffled, garbled, as if he were listening through a wall of water.
"Sir, can you hear me? Sir, stay with me—"
Jonas blinked. His vision wavered, the world bending at its edges. The EMT's mouth didn't match the words he heard. And then… it wasn't a mouth at all. His stomach dropped.
The EMT's face was smooth, like clay before the sculptor's touch. No eyes. No mouth. No nose. Just blank, pale skin.
Jonas recoiled, falling backward onto his hands. "What the hell—"
When he blinked again, their features snapped back into place. Concerned eyes. Rain dripping from their visors. Human.
"You're in shock," one of them said, kneeling beside him.
No. That wasn't shock. He'd seen things like this before — just flashes, shapes moving in mirrors, shadows where there shouldn't be any. But never this clear. Never this real.
The rain shimmered unnaturally in the light, every droplet stretching mid-fall, freezing, then splashing all at once. Streetlamps arched unnaturally tall, bending toward him like molten steel being drawn by gravity. A bus drove past with no driver, the windows filled with staring faces — all identical, all his own.
Jonas staggered to his feet. "Stay away from me."
From the corner of his mind, something stirred — a voice that felt older than language, curling through his thoughts.
You're slipping, Jonas.
He gritted his teeth. "Get out of my head."
It's not what I want from you, the voice said, almost amused. It's what you already are.
Jonas's breathing quickened. The rain wasn't hitting his skin anymore. The street wasn't under his feet.
When he looked down, the puddle by his boot no longer reflected the street around him. Instead, it showed a skyline of jagged black spires against a red sky. Towering, alien shapes moved between the spires — wrong shapes, with too many joints and limbs that bent the wrong way.
A flicker in the reflection made him look up. Someone was standing at the far end of the alley.
No… not standing. Hovering.
The figure wore a long, tattered coat that seemed to move on its own, even against the wind. Where the head should have been, there was only shadow, but deep in that darkness, something faintly glowed — like two coals smoldering in the dark.
Jonas's pulse pounded in his ears. "Rourke?"
The figure drifted forward, each step pulling the world tighter, darker. Jonas's chest ached like the air had thickened into tar. The voice came again, but not from the figure — from inside him.
Strike now. It's your enemy.
His hands clenched into fists. He could feel the urge, hot and primal, surging up from somewhere deep inside. A predator's instinct. He wanted — needed — to kill whatever was in front of him.
He charged.
The distance between them collapsed in an instant. Jonas swung hard, his fist connecting with something warm, solid—
And then the world snapped back.
The figure wasn't Rourke. It wasn't some shadow-draped monster. It was a man. A young man, wide-eyed, rain plastering his hair to his forehead. Blood ran from his nose where Jonas had struck him.
He was holding a grocery bag. Eggs smashed at their feet.
"Oh… God," Jonas whispered, stumbling back. "I— I thought—"
The young man didn't wait to hear more. He scrambled up and ran, glancing back only once with a look of pure fear.
Jonas dropped to his knees, hands shaking. His chest hurt. His head felt like it was being pried open from the inside.
You hesitate, the voice whispered. You'll regret it.
"Leave me alone!" Jonas roared, slamming his fists into the wet pavement.
Somewhere above, the streetlamps flickered and went out. All of them.
The darkness wasn't normal. It was thick, pressing in like velvet over his skin. Something moved in it. Slowly. Closer.
Jonas didn't run this time. He stood, heart hammering, fists ready.
From the dark came a whisper, but it wasn't the Sleeper this time.
It was Rourke.
"Found you."