Rain tastes like rust.
It beads on the cracked pavement of Clockless City, sliding into the shallow gutters where broken mirrors lie face-down like dead fish. The air hums — not with electricity, but with something older, thicker, a pressure that sits behind the ribs and makes every breath feel borrowed.
Sirens are already wailing.
They don't howl. They bleed.
Ivante Heart stands beneath a flickering streetlamp that should have burned out years ago.
Sixteen years old, five-foot-nine, long two-strand braids hanging over his shoulders, black hair tipped faint brown at the ends. Light skin that looks gray in this rain, hazel eyes rimmed with sleepless red. His jacket is too big, his jeans scuffed, one sleeve torn at the elbow where fabric caught on broken glass earlier and he didn't even notice.
His chest rises fast. Too fast.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
He keeps touching his sternum like he can feel the wrongness there.
"Don't move."
The voice cuts through the sirens.
Sister Lena stands ten paces away inside a trembling ring of gold candles. Tall. Severe. White streaks running through her hair like lightning scars. Her palms hover inches above the wax, fingers trembling as light bends around her like a living veil.
Beyond the circle, the street looks… hungry.
Windows are dark. Curtains pulled tight. A single blue wick burns on a distant balcony, wavering in wind that shouldn't exist. The asphalt glistens, slick with rain — and something darker that clings in threads.
Ivante swallows.
He doesn't want to be here.
He doesn't want to die.
He doesn't want to die.
He doesn't want to die—
A wet crash explodes from the alley.
Brick crumbles outward like teeth knocked loose. A silhouette bursts through, bending light around it, dragging itself into the open with a sound like meat tearing from bone.
A Light Creeper.
A Gorger.
Eight feet tall at the shoulder and still rising as it pulls free, its spine jutting up in crooked ridges under slick, glistening skin. Its head is wrong — too small, stretched sideways, a jaw split in three directions that opens like a broken gate.
Rain slides off it in oily sheets.
Ivante freezes.
His hands shake so badly his knuckles ache.
Across the street, a boy no older than twelve drops his umbrella. Little Benny. Chalk dust still smeared on his fingers. He stares at the Gorger like he's seeing the end of the world wearing teeth.
"Back!" Lena shouts. "Behind the gold!"
Mario Torres moves first.
He plants both boots on the wet pavement and steps in front of Ivante without looking back. Broad shoulders, cropped hair, face set like stone. His jacket bears a strip of gold-thread along the left seam — a Quiet Wall in training.
"Hold your breath," Mario says, low. "Don't scream."
The Gorger lurches.
It doesn't run — it flows. Shoulders dipping, spine rolling, every step cracking the street like brittle ice. Its claws rake sparks off a parked car and peel steel like foil.
Ivante's vision tunnels.
He can hear his heartbeat louder than the sirens now.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
The Gorger snaps forward.
Mario slams his forearms together, shoulders locking, weight dropping. The monster hits him head-on.
Impact.
Concrete shatters.
Mario's boots slide a foot, then another, his face contorting as the Gorger's weight presses him back. Muscles bulge under his sleeves, veins standing out along his neck. His jaw grits so hard Ivante hears teeth grind.
For a second — just a second — the creature stalls.
Then its jaw splits wider.
Three sets of teeth bite down.
Snap.
Mario's left forearm bends the wrong way with a sickening crack, bone pushing against skin like it wants out. Blood sprays, hot and bright, streaking across the gold candle light.
Ivante screams.
He doesn't mean to. It rips out of him raw, ugly, useless.
The Gorger jerks its head and Mario is yanked forward, feet leaving the ground. His body slams against the monster's chest. Teeth close around his shoulder with a wet crunch.
More blood.
More cracking.
Lena moves — but the circle shudders, candles guttering, blue flame licking gold.
"Don't break formation!" she barks.
Little Benny runs.
He sprints toward the chaos like his legs forgot how fear works.
Ivante sees him too late.
The Gorger releases Mario just enough to swipe.
Claw meets child.
Benny's body flips in the air like a rag doll, chalk scattering from his pockets in a pale cloud. He hits the pavement hard, limbs twisting at impossible angles.
Silence slams down.
Not real silence — just the kind that crushes sound flat.
Ivante's world narrows to that small, broken shape in the rain.
Benny's eyes are open.
They don't move.
The Gorger rears back, blood dripping from its teeth, ready to lunge again.
Mario drags himself upright on one arm, shoulder hanging wrong, breath rasping.
Lena's candles sputter.
The sirens scream.
Ivante can't breathe.
His chest tightens like a fist squeezing his heart.
He looks at Mario. At Benny. At the Gorger.
Then at his own hands, trembling, empty, useless.
"Move, kid!" Mario roars, blood pouring down his side.
Ivante doesn't.
His feet feel bolted to the street.
The Gorger lunges.
Time stutters.
Ivante feels it before he sees it — a split-second hitch, like the world hiccuped.
The monster's jaws slam around him.
Pain explodes.
Teeth punch through his torso, ribs snapping, spine grinding. His body lifts off the ground. Rain blurs into streaks of gray. The smell of rot floods his nose, copper thick in his mouth.
He hears himself choke.
His heart slams once.
Twice.
Then—
Stop.
Dark.
Cold.
Weightless.
—
He wakes up standing beneath the same streetlamp.
Rain on his face.
Sirens bleeding in the distance.
His hands are whole. His jacket torn at the elbow. His chest tight — but alive.
Two minutes earlier.
His breath stutters.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Across the street, Little Benny still holds his umbrella.
Mario hasn't moved yet.
Sister Lena's candles burn steady.
Ivante looks down at his palms, trembling, slick with rain but not blood.
He remembers teeth.
He remembers bone.
He remembers Benny's eyes.
The alley rumbles.
Brick cracks.
A shape pushes through dust.
Ivante's throat tightens.
"I don't want to die," he whispers, barely sound, rain stealing the words. "I don't want to die. I don't want to die."
The Gorger steps into the open.
Bigger than before — or maybe it isn't.
Maybe his fear just made it that way.
Mario plants his boots.
"Hold your breath," he says again.
Ivante looks at Benny.
Then at Mario.
Then at the monster's open jaws.
His heartbeat thunders.
He takes one shaking step forward.
The rain falls straight down.
The sirens stretch thin.
The Gorger lunges—
—and the world tilts toward teeth.