I didn't turn at first.
The hum pressed into my spine like a warning, and the glowing word at my feet—RUN—did not feel like a suggestion. It felt like an order.
But fear has its own gravity. Against every survival instinct, I twisted my head just enough to see.
Something was standing at the edge of the overpass.
No—not standing. It was unfolding.
The figure had no outline. Its shape shifted like ink spilled in water, stretching, collapsing, bending into limbs that weren't quite limbs. A thousand faceless masks blinked in and out across its surface, mouths opening and closing silently as though rehearsing the idea of speech.
Every time the wind moved, the thing bent closer.
And I finally understood the hum wasn't the world.
It was the sound the creature made when it breathed.
The letters flickered furiously.
"RUN. RUN. RUN."
My legs obeyed before my mind did. I stumbled forward, shoving through the crowd. To them, I must have looked insane—just another madman sprinting down the overpass with panic in his eyes. They didn't see the faceless tide collapsing after me, devouring the air as it came.
The streets warped as I ran. Streetlights bled into the sky. Storefronts melted into mirrors, each one showing me not as I was but as I could have been—Kael the student, Kael the lover, Kael the coward, Kael the corpse. My chest heaved, each reflection heavier than the last.
The creature didn't follow the streets. It poured across walls, ceilings, reflections, cutting distance as though space itself was paper to be folded.
Then, suddenly—silence.
I stopped. My lungs burned. I turned a corner, pressed against a brick wall, and realized I couldn't hear the hum anymore. For the first time since the sky went blank, there was only the sound of my own breathing.
The letters flickered one last time before fading into the cracks of the pavement.
"Too late."
And from the wall I leaned against, a hand—my hand—reached out and grabbed me.