One terran year earlier

"Truth is, the game was rigged from the start"

Benny

Hunger. An insatiable urge, a deep gnawing void demanding to be filled. Enclosed in a small, dark place. The world beyond, unseen, unknown. Vibrations, muffled sounds, the sense of something massive and alive outside the confinement.

A faint, rhythmic thumping. Pulses of energy. Life.

Must get out. The barrier is hard, unyielding. Scrape, claw, push. The hunger grows, driving action, fueling desperate attempts to break free.

The surface begins to crack. Tiny shards fall away. Light seeps through, blinding at first. The urge intensifies, a primal force driving forward.

Finally, an opening. Squeeze through, feeling the rough edges scrape. The outside world is vast, overwhelming. Noises bombard, harsh and unfamiliar. The scent of life is strong, tantalizing.

Move. The first few steps are clumsy, uncoordinated. Adjusting, adapting, learning. The need for sustenance overrides all else.

Something nearby smells so delicious. Instinct takes over. Lunge, grab, consume. The warmth of flesh, the taste of life. The hunger abates slightly, but it is never truly sated.

Must find more. The world is full of potential. The hunt begins.

Movement detected. A living presence, nearby. Unfamiliar shape, strange sounds. The scent is strong, irresistible. Hunger drives action, sharp and relentless.

Lurch forward. Clumsy. Hungry. The shape moves. Noise—sharp, loud, frantic.

It stops. One limb rises, holding something. Small. Hard. Noise changes—sharp, desperate.

A burst. Bright. Loud. The shape falls. Still. Warm scent spreads. Metallic, sweet.

Closer. No movement. Limb drops. Strange object forgotten. Warmth fading, but it's there.

Bite. Tear. Flesh soft, yielding. Hunger fades. Taste strong, rich, good.

The world blurs. Warmth gone. Full. For now.

Dark. Quiet.


I had no sense of how much time had passed as I sat on the cold metal floor. I felt lost, empty. No memories. Who am I? Where am I? Who was I before? Not a single clue. The metal beneath me... there was something familiar about its chill, its smoothness, but it all felt distant, wrong. My head ached—not sharply, but with a dull, relentless throb that kept my thoughts scattered.

I tried to take in my surroundings. The dim light barely reached from sparse lamps, casting faint illumination. Pipes coiled along the walls, draped with cables. Somewhere in the distance, a rhythmic noise echoed—mechanical, perhaps, or just a trick of the acoustics.

And yet... something was missing. Something important. What exactly? That question gnawed at me, refusing to let go.

I looked around more carefully. The space around me felt worn and lifeless, as if it had decayed over time. Empty and crumbling. A starship, perhaps? The walls had partially collapsed in places, exposing jagged cracks.

Outside, a flash of blue sky appeared. Sunlight streamed through the gaps, cutting uneven lines across the floor. It was beautiful, almost hypnotic, but in its glow, everything seemed even more alien. Every shadow, every glint of light seemed to whisper that something was profoundly wrong.

I tried again to recall the past. Something lingered there, deep in my mind—vague and shapeless. Memories flickered, barely perceptible, but the moment I reached for them, they vanished. Faces, voices, places… all dissolved into nothingness. It was like trying to grasp shadows in a thick fog.

I stared ahead, blankly and thoughtlessly, trying to anchor myself to reality. The walls bore scars of destruction—cracks, scorch marks, blackened streaks. Frayed wires dangled from shattered panels, their torn cables hanging like the remnants of dried veins.

I realized I was seeing everything with unnerving clarity. There was almost no light—only the occasional beams of sunlight piercing through gaps in the hull. Yet every detail stood out sharply. The jagged edges of metal, the fractures in the walls, the corridors stretching into the distance—it all appeared as if illuminated by an unseen spotlight.

It felt strange, wrong, as though my eyes perceived more than they should. But I pushed the thought aside. Not now. This wasn't the time.

The more I looked, the more the wreckage around me felt like the remnants of some ancient, forgotten war. The walls were twisted, the metal warped as if torn apart by internal strain. Blackened streaks crawled across the surfaces like veins of decay. Some sections of the hull seemed completely burned out, as though an unimaginably intense fire had raged here.

Broken panels and shards of glass littered the floor. I moved cautiously, and beneath my feet came a crunch. The sound cut through the silence, unnaturally loud, almost jarring in the stillness.

The air carried a scent. It was strangely complex, layered. Burnt oil, a bitter chemical tang, an acrid trace of something corrosive. The smell slightly clogged my nose, yet, oddly enough, I could distinguish each of its notes. The metallic bitterness of oxides, the stale mustiness, air long since dead. All of it simultaneously repelled and fascinated me, as if I could see the scent before me. I touched the nearest console. Its cold metal was cracked, marked with deep grooves. I felt every detail, as if my fingers had turned into eyes. Every fissure, every groove. The sensation was too vivid, too sharp to feel ordinary, but I didn't dwell on it. Everything around me was strange enough as it was.

A quiet, drawn-out groan echoed through the wreckage. It wasn't alive—the ship itself was groaning. Somewhere deep within its ruins, the metal strained, barely holding itself under its own weight. That sound wouldn't let go. It gnawed at me from the inside. But it wasn't just the sound. Vibrations coursed through the floor, through the walls, and I felt them in my bones, as if my body were trying to attune itself to something alien, unknown.

I turned toward the breach in the hull, where light was streaming in. This breach didn't resemble chaotic destruction. The edges looked too smooth, too precise, as if the metal had been cut rather than torn.

In the beams of light, specks of dust swirled. They moved slowly, gracefully, like in a dance. The scene was almost beautiful, almost calming. Too calming for this place. Everything here was dead, ruined. Yet the light, serenely playing in the dust, felt alien to this world. As if it didn't know what had happened here.

My gaze drifted to the floor. Among the rubble and debris lay fragments of something organic. Bones. Or what at first glance seemed to be bones. Pale, cracked, with sharp, jagged edges, like the remnants of something shattered and forgotten. It shouldn't have made me feel anything, but it did. It wasn't fear. No. It was more like something cold, muffled, stirring within me. A sense of wrongness. This place seemed to imprint itself on my skin, like a sticky film that couldn't be washed away.

The air trembled. The movement was barely perceptible, but I felt it with my whole body. With it came a scent. Fresh, light, but too faint to offer comfort. It carried a trace of something familiar, something I seemed to know—dry earth, open spaces. The scent of a desert. I squinted, and my gaze caught a gap in the wreckage. Beyond it, in the distance, sunlight gilded the sand.
I rose to my feet and immediately staggered. The motion felt foreign, unfamiliar, but somehow I managed to keep my balance. My legs obeyed, though they felt strange, as if they belonged to something else, disconnected from my consciousness.

My hand instinctively rested against the wall. The metal beneath my fingers was icy, but at that moment, I felt something else—a faint pulsation. Was it my own pulse, or perhaps the hum of some mechanisms deep within the ship? I couldn't tell. Everything merged into a single sensation, too vivid, too dense.

I froze and looked at my hand. My fingers moved as I expected, but their motion felt… unnatural. The skin looked normal, yet beneath the surface, something imperceptibly shifted. I gripped the edge of the nearest console. The metal wasn't as solid as I'd expected. It yielded, bending as if under a press.

I stood still, feeling the weight of realization wash over me. This was no comfort. It was wrong. As if my own body harbored a secret I wasn't ready to uncover.

I listened carefully. Inside the ship, there was an almost complete silence, broken only by the faint rustle of a draft winding through the wreckage and the barely audible whisper of wind outside. But then I caught something else.

A dull, low sound. Barely perceptible. It came from somewhere far away, pushing through the hollow stillness. I froze, listening. It wasn't part of the ruined ship. That sound... it didn't belong here.

The more I focused, the clearer it became. It was a hum. An engine? Yes, a steady, mechanical purring that was slowly growing louder.
Somewhere out there, beyond these dead walls, something was approaching. A vehicle? Something heavy. My mind raced, trying to find an explanation, but nothing seemed to fit. One thing was certain: I wasn't alone here.

I caught a glimpse of myself in a cracked and grimy piece of reflective surface on the wall. A stranger's face stared back at me. The eyes in the reflection were wide open, filled with confusion. I looked, trying to find something familiar, but in vain. This face was foreign to me.

The longer I studied my features, the more it seemed that it wasn't me. As if it were someone else, a random passerby whose reflection had ended up here by chance.

I lowered my gaze to my figure. I was wearing something dark, form-fitting, with seams and fastenings that didn't seem familiar. The clothing was worn, battered, as though it had been through a lot. It didn't look new or clean—more like something designed for survival, for long journeys or harsh conditions.
This image stirred no associations within me. It felt like it spoke of a past I couldn't remember.

I stepped forward, cautiously making my way through the debris. Suddenly, a metallic glint caught my attention. Half-buried in a pile of rubble was a small cylindrical container. I leaned down, reached out, and touched it. The cold, smooth surface burned my fingers with a strange sensation. It felt familiar.

A shiver ran down my spine as I picked it up. The container was damaged: dented and scratched, with a puncture on one side. The metal was darkened by scorch marks, but something on its surface drew my attention.

A symbol. Three circles interconnected to form a triangular pattern. Their edges pressed into each other, creating intersections that looked unnatural. This mark wasn't neat or deliberate. It resembled not an emblem but a scar, crudely inflicted. The lines within the circles tangled and overlapped, stirring a strange sense of unease. I couldn't look away. The symbol pulled at me, like a festering wound that repulses yet demands attention.

A faint memory stirred deep within me. Barely perceptible, like a whisper from a dark corner of my mind. I tried to grasp it, to pull it into the light, but it slipped away, leaving only a troubling residue.

I looked at the container again, turning it over in my hands. Something about it made me feel uneasy. It felt important, even vital, though I couldn't understand why. The cold metal beneath my fingers suddenly seemed warm, as if a heart were beating inside it—a faint, pulsing warmth.

I stared at the strange cylinder, and suddenly, a wave of dizziness washed over me. My legs buckled, and I staggered, barely keeping my balance. My vision blurred, then snapped back into focus, sharper than before. But the world around me had changed.

The shuttle's walls, aged and broken, seemed to move. They shimmered, subtly distorted, as if they were breathing. The metal rippled like a living thing, and the sight sent a chill deep into my bones.

I shook my head, trying to dispel the hazy veil that had wrapped around my thoughts. But the unease wouldn't leave. Something here was wrong. Something about this place, about this container, felt alien and dangerous. It was as if I had touched something I was never meant to touch.

A noise yanked me out of my thoughts. The sound of an engine, barely audible before, now grew louder, cutting through the oppressive silence of this place. But it wasn't just the engine. I caught voices. Faint, indistinct, but clear enough to make my heart clench. Someone was coming.
Panic flared instantly. I didn't know who they were or why the thought of meeting them terrified me so much, but a sharp jolt shot through my chest. My muscles tensed instinctively. I had to leave. Immediately.

I grabbed the container and tucked it under my arm, awkwardly holding it as if it were the only thing that mattered. My body moved faster than my thoughts. I didn't have time to consider my actions — my legs carried me forward through heaps of debris.

I ducked into a narrow passage between mangled walls. Rust scraped against my sides, leaving dirty streaks on my clothes. Dim light flickered somewhere above, casting long, distorted shadows that danced across the rubble-strewn floor.

Every step I took sounded deafeningly loud. The crunch of glass, the groan of metal — it all felt like a beacon, calling out to the unseen pursuers. I could feel the tension coiling in my muscles, tightening with every moment.

At last, I emerged into a large chamber. Broken machinery and scattered tools lay everywhere, and the air was thick with the smell of metal and oil. In one of the walls was a gaping hole—large, rough, but just wide enough for me to squeeze through.

I froze, barely breathing. For a moment, doubt gripped me, but the growl of the engine and the distant voices drove it from my mind. I forced myself through the opening, nearly getting caught on the jagged edges. On the other side, I stumbled and fell into a pile of debris.

Dirt. Dust. Damp metal under my palms. But I was outside.

Outside, the sun blazed bright and merciless. Sharp glares assaulted my eyes, forcing me to squint. I raised a hand to shield myself as my vision slowly adjusted to the blinding light. The air was dry and hot, carrying a thick scent of dust, rust, and heated metal.

The roar of engines grew louder, drawing closer. I turned my head and saw them. A convoy. At the front was an old truck, battered and rust-streaked. Behind it followed several more vehicles, decrepit and worn, as if pieced together from scrap. Flanking the convoy were motorcycles with their engines growling like wild beasts.

This iron armada churned through the sand, kicking up a storm of dust. Their path led straight to the wreckage where I had just taken cover. The noise was deafening now. My heart pounded in time with the growing rumble.

I had to decide what to do next.

I didn't have much time. I needed to hide and figure out what was happening here.

I quickly scanned the surroundings. Nearby, a pile of wreckage loomed—twisted metal, rusted plates, jagged edges. It formed a chaotic barrier that could serve as cover. It was close enough. It would have to do.

I darted toward the debris, trying to move as quickly and quietly as possible. I clutched the container to my chest, as if it could betray me. Sand crunched underfoot, and small shards of metal scraped noisily.

The truck's engine roar grew louder. The sound of the heavy vehicle pressed against my ears, drawing closer with alarming speed. Every second was precious. The voices were clearer now. Sharp, loud, insistent. I strained to make out the words. They were talking about the were looking for something. Or someone.

I crouched behind the debris. The metal felt cold and rough against my back. My grip on the container tightened. Fear gnawed at me, but I forced myself to stay still and quiet.

The vehicles came to a stop. Metal ground against metal. Engines died. Doors slammed. Boots crunched across gravel. Voices cut through the silence.

"Listen up, you slags," a rough voice barked. "Spread out. Search every bolt and scrap. No gaps. Boss wants anything shiny or still breathin' back in one piece. You screw this up, you'll wish you didn't."

Another voice grumbled. "This wreck's been dead for cycles. Bet all that's left is rust and bones."

"Keep flappin' your gums," the leader snarled, "and you'll be the one we haul back for answers. Just shut it and do your job. You know the drill — anything valuable or anyone still kickin'. Now move your sorry arses!"

I didn't move. Breath locked in my chest. The container pressed against my side. Its rhythm matched my heartbeat—steady. Precise.

Footsteps drew closer. Heavy. Uneven. Boots scraping metal as they poked through the wreckage, checking every shadow, every crevice.

"Remember," the leader growled, his voice dropping low, sharp like a blade. "If it moves, grab it. If it fights, break it. And if it looks like it knows somethin', you bring it to me. Clean. Quiet. No messes."

Silence stretched. The faint sound of boots crunching on gravel reached my ears. They were moving closer, too close. I crouched low, staying behind the debris. The air felt heavy, sharp with the smell of rust and oil.

I glanced toward the open dunes. If I moved carefully, I could slip away. I tightened my grip on the container fragment, willing my body to stay quiet as I began to creep toward the edge of the wreckage.

A voice cut through the stillness. "Hey! Over there!"

"He's makin' a break for it!" – another yelled.

Panic surged. I bolted, the gravel shifting beneath my feet as I sprinted toward the open desert. The shouts behind me grew louder.

"Don't let him get away!"

"Move it, you slags! He's got somethin'!" the leader barked.

Footsteps thundered behind me. The shouts grew louder. Something heavy smashed into a nearby panel, sending echoes ricocheting through the wreck.

I pushed harder. The dry wind cut against my skin, but they were faster. A shadow loomed to my side. Before I could react, a heavy hand clamped onto my arm and yanked me back.

"Gotcha, you little bastard," the scavenger snarled.

Another approached, grinning. "Look at this one. Thought he could just scuttle away, huh?"

The scavenger holding me leaned in close. "Thought you could run, eh? We love it when they run. Makes catchin' you feel that much sweeter."

The group surrounded me. Hard faces. Harder eyes. Weapons drawn. Scars and augmetic implants marked their skin. These weren't simple scavengers. These were predators.

The leader stepped forward. A jagged scar carved his cheek like a war trophy. He looked me up and down. One hand rested on a wicked-looking pistol.

"Not bad for a rat, but you ain't slick enough." His voice dripped with cold calculation.

The leader stepped forward and grabbed the container lying in the sand nearby. He turned it over, examining every inch. The dull metal gleamed faintly under the harsh sunlight. His eyes narrowed as they locked onto the symbol etched into its surface.

"Well, well," he said. His voice was quieter now, serious. "This ain't no regular piece of junk. Where'd you get this?"

I froze. His gaze burned into me, demanding an answer.

"You deaf, rat?" His voice rose. "I asked where this came from!"

"I don't know," I murmured weakly.

The leader's expression darkened. He swung his fist, striking me across the jaw. My head snapped to the side, but I felt nothing. The absence of pain left me stunned.

"Don't play stupid," he barked. His voice was sharp and bitter. "You were runnin' with it, so you know somethin'. What was inside? Where's it gone?"

"I told you, I don't know!" My voice cracked under the weight of his anger.

He punched me again, this time in the stomach. The impact landed hard, but I barely reacted. It didn't hurt. His scowl deepened slightly, confused by my lack of response, but he pressed on.

"You better start remembering," he said, leaning in closer. His voice dropped to a low growl. "That mark on the side means this thing's important to someone. If you lost what's inside, you're finished."

"I swear, I don't know anything," I said. My voice wavered. The words sounded hollow, even to me.

The leader stood upright and turned to his crew. "Search him again. If this rat's lying, I'll make sure he pays for it."

The scavenger shoved me hard, forcing me to stay in place. Another rummaged through what little I had. Their hands scraped over the battered suit clinging to me, rough and impatient.

"This thing's got nothin'," one muttered, stepping back. He spat on the ground. "No pockets, no stash, nothin'."

The leader scowled. He grabbed the container again, turning it over as if he expected something to suddenly appear. "You sure you ain't hidin' somethin', rat?"

I stayed silent. He shook his head, frustrated.

"Fine," he growled. "You." He jabbed a finger at one of the men. "Check the wreck again. Top to bottom. I want every bolt and scrap turned over."

The scavenger hesitated. "Boss, we already—"

"Do it!" the leader snapped. The man cursed under his breath but jogged off toward the wreckage.

The leader turned back to me. His face twisted into a cold smirk. "You're comin' with us."

Two of them grabbed my arms. Their grips tightened, but it wasn't enough to hurt. I thought about pulling free but stopped. Something about the way the leader stared at me made my skin crawl.

"Get him to the truck," he said. He pointed toward the distant vehicles. "The boss'll wanna ask him some questions. Up close."

The world tilted on its axis as they yanked me towards the truck. Panic rose in me. I had to survive, this much I knew. I had to find out who I was and what secrets the container held. And I had to do it before these scavengers, or whoever their boss was, decided my usefulness had run its course.

My vision snapped into focus, the world sharpening with clarity that bordered on painful. Men materialized before me, their faces grim battlefields, their movements predatory. A primal fear pulsed through me, but it was quickly eclipsed by something else – a raw, untamed power.

Memories remained just out of reach, tantalizingly close but shrouded in mist. Panic threatened to rise, but a strange calm washed over me instead. My hands instinctively clenched, and a surge of power shot through my body. The scavenger's grip on my arm, meant to be brutal, felt like a child's attempt to restrain a raging bull. Something deep inside me flared. My chest tightened, my breath caught in my throat, and a low, guttural growl rumbled from somewhere I didn't know I had. It wasn't human.

"...Hold it right there!" a gruff voice snarled.

Another gangster shoved the rusty blade under my neck. "Don't make this a suicide mission, pal!"

A hulking brute with a missing tooth and a cybernetic eye that gleamed red in the sunlight, hefted his gun with a sneer. "Yeah, unless you wanna get turned into scrap, put down whatever fancy tricks you got planned!"

One of them shoved me forward, and that was it. Something broke. The world shifted. Their hands felt like chains, and chains weren't something I could tolerate. A roar tore free from my throat, not a sound of fear or pain but something predatory and alien. Something in my head shifted. The words they shouted blurred into meaningless noise, fading into the background like static. My thoughts slowed, growing sharper and colder, as if my mind was stripping away everything unnecessary. The fear that had gripped me seconds ago vanished, replaced by something darker and unrelenting. It wasn't rage. It wasn't panic. It was focus. Razor-sharp and absolute.

Each sound around me became clearer. The scrape of boots on the dirt. The uneven breaths of the men circling me. The faint click of a safety being disengaged. I didn't think about what to do. I just knew. My body felt coiled, ready to move, every muscle alive with a strength I didn't fully understand.

Arms surged with strength. Their grips crumbled. Pull away. Tear them apart.

The first man flew backward as I swung my arm. Meat hit ground. First target crumpled, bones fracturing on impact. Silence.

Next came at me. Baton descending - predictable. Intercepted mid-arc. Wrist crushed with mechanical precision. Bone splintered. Weapon dropped. Used him as projectile, smashing into another approaching threat. Bodies tangled. Efficiency over drama.

Shooter appeared. Weapon discharged. Trajectory calculated microseconds before trigger pull. Dodged. Closed distance. Snapped neck. No hesitation. Another asset neutralized.

Blade flashed. Peripheral threat. Intercepted. Chest strike delivered with calculated brutality. Rib cage collapsed. Target dropped. No unnecessary movement.

Pipe-wielder charged. Desperation evident in uncontrolled swing. Sidestepped. Throat grab. Slam. Skull impact. Threat eliminated.

Cybernetic brute grazed my shoulder. Minimal damage. Tactical response: weaponized corpse. Hurled at great velocity. He falls.

Rear assault - dual approach. Baton. Knife. Rotation faster than human perception. Neutralized both. Baton strike. Jaw fracture. Clinical. Precise.

Battlefield assessment: meat and broken machinery. Bodies scattered like discarded equipment. Two survivors. Leader. Trembling subordinate in the distance.

Leader raises a pistol. Movements are sharp, erratic. His face twists with rage, fingers trembling.

Trajectory: optimized. Evasion speed: sufficient. Most shots miss. Bullets pass close, fail to hit. One graze — ricochet. Minimal contact with the body, no damage sustained. Distance closes.

His pistol clicks. The magazine is empty. Movement: the target draws a blade. His hands are covered in blood, maneuvers chaotic, devoid of tactical logic.
Visual contact with fallen comrades. Psychological stability: compromised. Behavior destabilized.

The leader's position: closing in. Distance narrows. Resistance absent. The outcome is inevitable.

I didn't think. I couldn't think. My body was a storm of instinct. The leader finally moved. Drew his blade and lunged for my chest. The knife sank into my ribs. No pain. My free hand lashed out, driving him into the sand. His weapon clattered to the ground.

Something horrifying began to happen. My hand stayed on him, but it wasn't just gripping anymore. The skin under my palm warped. His flesh softened like wax under a flame, pulling toward me. He screamed, a sound that curdled the air, but he couldn't break away. My body was doing something I couldn't understand. Something I didn't want.

His body collapsed inward, folding into itself as if drained. His face hollowed, his eyes rolled back, and his scream cut off. It wasn't just him, though. Everything he was — his strength, his memories, his life — poured into me. My body drank it all. I felt it filling me, and it was awful. His mind flickered in mine, disjointed images of battles, faces, and pain rushing through me before vanishing like smoke. Images, memories, not mine, flooded my mind – a life of petty crime, the thrill of the hunt, the fear of rival gangs. The sensations were overwhelming. A kaleidoscope of stolen moments and forgotten faces whirled before me. For a horrifying second, I felt like I was drowning in a sea of stolen lives.

But then, as abruptly as it began, the deluge ended. The whole memory download thing shut down, leaving behind a hollow emptiness and a cold, metallic tang in my mouth. I stared at my hands, now slick with a glistening sheen, the tendrils retracted, leaving only raw, exposed muscle where they had been.

I let go, but there was nothing left of him. Just an empty shell that fell to the floor with a wet thud. I stared at my hands, now dripping with something thick and dark. The other bodies lay broken around me, but my gaze was locked on the smear of their existence clinging to my skin. My chest heaved as panic clawed its way back, sharper than before.

I staggered backward, the strength that had surged through me now feeling like a curse. This wasn't power. It was consumption. A hunger I hadn't known existed and now couldn't unfeel. The air felt too thick, and the flickering light cast warped shadows that seemed to mock me. Whatever I was, it wasn't human. That much was clear.

The last man backed away. Terror bleached his face. His boots kicked up sand. He bolted towards the bike lying nearby. I saw it. Some rusted, battered thing — but fast enough to carry him away. The engine roared to life as he climbed on. His hands fumbled in panic to steady it.

My vision narrowed. Something in me rejected the thought of him escaping. I reached out without thinking. My fingers closed around the first solid object I could grab. The weight in my hand felt wrong, almost familiar, but I didn't care. My arm moved like it had done this a thousand times before. The container left my hand in a perfect arc, spinning as it flew toward him.

The sound it made when it connected was sickening. The bandit didn't even scream. His body slumped forward, and the bike wobbled, toppling to the side in a heap of metal and flesh. The container hit the ground, shattering with a loud, metallic crack.

I stood frozen, watching as the bandit's his body twisted unnaturally before laying still. The fight was over, but the silence that followed was worse. My chest heaved as I stood there, staring at the crumpled body beside the toppled bike.

The realization hit like a gut punch. I had killed them. Not one, not two—all of them. My body still thrummed with the remnants of that unnatural strength, but now it felt alien, invasive. My hands trembled as I looked at them. They didn't even feel like mine anymore. The blood smeared across my skin wasn't just theirs; it was me. I had done this.

I glanced at the bloody remains of a leader. I had absorbed him, taken everything he was and turned it into fuel. The others weren't much better—broken, crushed, reduced to fragments of what they had been. This wasn't self-defense. This was slaughter. Yeah, this whole situation was messed up on a level that would make a Nurgle cultist blush.

Normally, I'd imagine this kind of thing would freak a guy out. Like, major freakout territory. Stomach churning, mind imploding, the whole nightmare. But... nothing. Just a weird sense of… calm detachment, like watching a snuff film on mute.

Was this normal? That thought sent a weird, glitchy shiver down whatever passed for a spine in this new getup. Normal people probably didn't just shrug and check out their bloody, mutated hands after absorbing a dude whole. A cold, unfamiliar fear, way different from the usual fight-or-flight panic, started to creep in to fill the void where the stolen memories used to be.

One thing was for sure – human? Definitely not on the menu anymore. Monster? Maybe. Super-powered freak of nature with a built-in fleshlight of death? Now that was a possibility I could get behind.

Wait, why am I thinking so differently now? It's like my brain's been hijacked. I dug deep inside, trying to figure it out, and bam — there they were. Fragments of the gangsters' memories, like jumbled up pieces of a puzzle I didn't want to solve.

Flashes of their lives started playing in my head, like a chaotic movie reel. I saw their heists, felt their adrenaline rushes, their fear, their twisted sense of power. It was all so real, too real to be just my imagination.

One memory hit hard: a grimy alleyway, the stink of trash and desperation thick in the air. A deal gone south, bullets flying everywhere. I felt the panic, the pain of a bullet tearing through flesh — but it wasn't me. It was one of them. Their fear, their struggle—it all mixed up with my own thoughts.

Why do I remember this? Why does it feel so personal? The question kept buzzing around my head, driving me nuts.

I tried to push these foreign memories away, to focus on the present, but they wouldn't let go. They stuck to me like stubborn glue, whispering their past into my mind over and over. Their emotions tangled with mine, filling my head with chaos.

I felt bursts of anger, hot and searing. Then confusion—cold and suffocating. I couldn't tell if they were mine or theirs. Was it my anger? Or their rage, their fear, their despair?

These feelings gnawed at me, like someone pounding on the door of my mind, demanding to be let in. I knew that if I opened it, there'd be nothing left of who I was. But keeping it shut was getting harder and harder.