George Wellington approaches from the other side of the glade, his rifle balanced over one shoulder. One of the girls from his hunting group walks at his back, her eyes red and her expression feral. Ellie. Her sword is decorated with a rainbow of blood. Azo, their small lightning wizard, joins us, looking tired. Wellington stares around at the bodies spread across the glade, and his shoulders bow like a burden settles across them. He meets my gaze, eyes shining with unshed tears.

  I don’t let myself look.

  “Good work, lass,” he says, nodding towards the empty suits of armor. “Saved my ass. That bastard had some kind of shield that blocked my shots.”

  “Sure. Where are the rest of your people?”

  When Ellie flinches, I wince.

  Tactless, Sam. Great job.

  The girl with the sword growls through gritted teeth.

  “I’ll fucking kill them,” she hisses, her eyes wild at the edges. She lifts a finger and points it at me. It almost feels like she wishes it was a sword itself so she could stab me, too. “Don’t get in my way, you little bitch. I don’t care who you think your friends are. I’ll put you down to get to any xeno trash I can.”

  When I don’t respond, she spins and stalks into the darkness, muttering under her breath. I hear her moving towards the hallway I entered from. There are half a dozen others leading out like spokes of a wheel, but that one leads to the entrance. If she’s looking for aliens to kill, she’s definitely headed the right direction.

  “They had intel,” Wellingtons says after a moment. “They knew where we slept. Ellie woke up to her scream, but it was too late.”

  “Fuck,” I say, with feeling. “Did someone come for you? And the big guy?”

  “Yes. Luckily I’m not sleeping much these days. I felt the protections fall. As for Miguel… no word.” His gaze doesn’t waver as he stares at me. “But he can take care of himself.”

  “Hey, man, there’s something in how you’re looking at me that I don’t exactly like,” I say softly. I’m suddenly watching him through a haze of purple, Strengthen a hairsbreadth from slamming him to the ground. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but I don’t question my instincts. “What gives?”

  “Tell me the leak wasn’t you,” he says, voice trembling slightly. “We know what… company you keep.”

  “What? Wait, seriously?” The accusation is like lightning from an empty sky. The thought of betraying humanity never once occurred to me. Never once. “You think… you think I told aliens where you slept so they could come and kill you? Why on fucking Earth would I do that?”

  “I don’t know,” Wellington says, not relaxing a hair. “You tell me.”

  “You’re shitting me.” He doesn’t move. “I just saved your life from that Ekinor warcaster. If I wanted you dead, why would I do that?”

  “I…” he falters when the thin man puts a hand on his shoulder.

  “George, you aren’t thinking straight,” Azo says, his voice soft but firm. “We’re all human here.”

  “Tell me,” Wellington says, his teeth gritted. He shakes the other man’s hand off his shoulder. His knuckles go white on his rifle stock. The barrel floats dangerously in my direction. “Tell me it wasn’t you.”

  “It wasn’t me,” I say, opening my hands and spreading my arms. “I wouldn’t betray humanity, regardless of what you think.”

  He stares at me, searching. Azo crosses his arms, and the movement seems to wake Wellington up again. He passes a hand over his eyes and takes a shuddering breath. When he looks back up at me, he’s in control again.

  “This isn’t over. You want to prove your loyalty?”

  No, asshole, I don’t think I need to.

  “Sure.”

  “Clear the halls. I’m sure there are others prowling the rooms, looking for more victims. Find them. Help them.”

  “Who’s going to guard them?” I say, gesturing to a milling crowd of refugees that has swelled to nearly three dozen, none of them over level 5.

  “I am.” He chambers a round. “Azo? Go with her. Watch her back.”

  There was a little hesitation between the ‘her’ and the ‘back.’ Cute. We both know what you really meant, Georgie. I give Azo a pained look. He shrugs minutely and steps closer to me.

  “Shall we?” he says, pointing on towards the hallway Wellington was sniping from.

  “Deeper, you think?” I say, glancing back the way I came in. “Shouldn’t we be worried about the entrance?”

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  “You want to run into Ellie in the dark right now?” he says, looking at me under raised eyebrows.

  “Fair. Deeper it is.”

  The hallway remains dark and silent as we ghost between its walls. There are signs of combat, but old, corpses left to lie where they fell. Letting my senses guide me, my active brain turns contemplative. They had intel, Wellington said. They were targeting the strongest of us. Why, then, didn’t anyone come for me?

  That’s pretty arrogant, Sam.

  Part of me agrees, but I shrug off the doubt. That’s the voice of Sam Foreman, Cowardly Lit Major, not Sam Foreman, Singularity. It isn’t arrogant if it’s true, and there’s no denying that I’m up there in levels these days.

  So was it a tip from the Seventh, or just chance that let them get Sarah? My heart always wants to blame the spiteful little shit in charge, but this doesn’t feel like Dickhead’s work. They targeted the hunters. The information, if it was given, was from the inside, someone who doesn’t know or doesn’t realize how strong I’ve become. One of the concubines, or…

  A whisper of noise ahead. I place a hand on Azo’s arm. When he shoots me a questioning look, I motion towards the left door up ahead. Nodding, his fingers twitching, he stalks forward. Graceful as a damn panther. There’s no sign of lightning or anything else to hint at what he’s capable of. What is a Boltcaster?

  He glances into the doorway and freezes.

  Bodies. A lot of bodies. Ten. Twenty. My mind refuses to keep counting.

  Not torn, not eaten.

  Executed. A knife to the base of the skull.

  Why are they all here? Were they dragged here? Slept here?

  A humming voice comes from the closed door of the bathroom. Humming, like we’re out on a lark in a fucking meadow. My skin crawls at the sound. It’s almost like there are two voices in one, a high and a low, close together but… off.

  Discord, not harmony.

  Azo seems to be hesitating. Judging by his eyes, he can’t see well. Man needs to train his perception. I get his attention and nod towards the bathroom. His fingers dance, and a small ring of metal appears in his hand like a street magician. Or, considering the circumstances, an actual magician.

  The door opens, the revolting hum filling the too-quiet room. A man enters, a human man, his face pleasant and attractive and familiar. Even through the splatters of drying blood. He freezes when he sees us. His face twists with frustration, then as suddenly contorts into terror.

  Identification: Orn, Bui Knifewalker (Brody Fenworth)

  Level: 35 (4)

  Strengths: Agility, Intelligence

  Weaknesses: Strength

  The Bui are the Competitor species of the Ninth. Born as little more than intent and hunger, the Bui grow in strength by joining with a host body and, over time, completely absorbing the host’s soul. Once joined, their true bodies are nearly impossible to extricate from their host without destroying both.

  My Identification glitches, wavering for a moment, and then the words shift.

  Identification: Brody Fenworth, Human of the United States

  Level: 4 (35)

  What the fuck?

  Brody falls on his knees, sobs wrenching his body, his hands trembling before his face.

  “My God, they killed them all,” he cries, voice shaking. He crawls on his knees towards us. “You must have scared them away! Thank you! I locked myself in that bathroom, and the xenos kept trying to get in to… to…” He glances at the bodies and shudders to a horrified stop.

  My spine contracts in uncanny fear. The double voice is gone, the facial expressions immaculate. The performance is fucking Oscar-worthy. If I didn’t have my Perception to see his face in the dark, or my Identification to see what he—it—really is, I’d trust his humanity like I trust my heart to beat. Seeing his terrified eyes, knowing what I know, my stomach lurches. I taste bile.

  My focus doesn’t stop my perception from taking in again the bodies laid about the room. So many people, people who trusted “Brody” and welcomed him as one of their own.

  And he hummed a happy tune after he murdered them in cold blood.

  My power surges and I let it come.

  The man flies backwards, shocked, and crunches into the wall. His shoulder separates and a bone in his calf snaps. His cry of pain may be the first genuine sound he’s made.

  “What—?” Azo shouts, spinning smoothly towards me, hand up like Iron Man without the suit. He looks frantic, afraid. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “He’s not… It’s not what it appears to be,” I say through gritted teeth. My soul drops precipitously. The thing against the wall shifts against its own heaviness, resisting my power. An inch, two, moving towards the edge of the field. “Whoever he was before, he isn’t human now. Help me, Azo. I can’t hold it long.”

  “What the hell are you talking about, Foreman?” His hand doesn’t waver. His eyes are wide, panicked. God, I thought he was steadier than this. Energy, invisible but wavering like heat over asphalt, begins to build around the ring. “Drop him. Brody’s one of us. He’s been here since the beginning. Put him down. Now.”

  “He isn’t,” I groan, frustrated. He doesn’t trust me; none of the hunters do. I’m the xeno-lover in their eyes. Besides, no one else has Skills like I have. How do I… Maybe honesty? “Listen, I have a Skill. It lets me identify things, people. Learn more about them. Everyone’s been wondering where the Ninth’s Competitors are, right? Their number goes down like everyone else’s, but no one’s ever seen them. Well, they’re here. They’re parasites. They look like us.”

  “Like… us?” He glances at the thing fighting me on the wall, then snaps his gaze back to me. “I know Brody. I know him. He isn’t… he wouldn’t.”

  Oh, shit. They ‘know’ each other. Did Azo catch feelings for him? For it? The Bui seems to remember itself at the same moment. Through the blood decorating its teeth, it smiles at me over Azo’s shoulder.

  “Azo, help me, please! Love… don’t let her hurt me!”

  “Don’t listen to it, Azo…” I say, pushing a bit more power into Strengthen. My soul energy is at double digits and falling fast. I force myself to meet the Boltcaster’s eyes. “Where did all these bodies come from? Where did that humming come from? Think, man. Not with your heart, but with your brain.”

  “She’s going to kill me!” the thing cries.

  I feel myself fading. What’s left of my soul drains through my fingers like sand through a sieve. The thing on the wall seems to sense it, tensing, getting ready to spring. Azo will die before he understands his mistake, and I’ll follow him a second later.

  “Azo, please…”

  The field flickers and dies. 1/385. I’ve got nothing left to give.

  I drop to my knees as it launches itself through the air. Gone is the humanity, gone is the performance. Its eyes are pools of hate, its face a rictus of savage glee.

  Damn, Kora. I’m sorry. Better luck next time.