novelraw Chapter 445: Let’s See What You Can Do
Chapter 445: Let’s See What You Can Do
The scarred man did not answer.
A second scream followed, this one lower... more strangled. The sound twisted through Sera’s nerves in a way that made her creature lean forward with interest.
"Not a zombie," Aerenyx said slowly. "Not a standard infection. The cadence is wrong. The breath is wrong. It is trying to speak or copy speech."
Alexei’s jaw set. "And it is hungry."
The scarred man finally looked up to meet Sera’s eyes again.
"You don’t understand," he said. "CDC tried to quarantine this whole area. We kept them out. We don’t let their people in. We don’t let their rules in. We handle our own."
"You are not handling it," she pointed out, a slight smile on her lips.
Another impact shook the far side of the barn. The boards groaned. The chains strained. Dust drifted down in a visible cloud.
The man with the shotgun snapped, "Just turn around. This is our mess."
Her creature flared, annoyed. They are keeping prey from us. They are wasting meat. They are letting a broken thing play in our territory.
Sera took one step closer to the gate.
She didn’t raise her voice. She didn’t sharpen it. She just let the words fall out of her mouth in their normal tone.
"I’m hungry," she said. "I want to see what you caught."
Lachlan’s mouth pulled into a half-smile despite the tension. "And there it is."
Zubair didn’t smile. He didn’t need to. The slight shift of his shoulders told her that he had already decided that if she went forward, he was going with her.
The rifle carriers looked between each other. One’s knuckles had gone white around the grip. The other’s breathing had sped up just slightly.
Psycho rose in Alexei’s eyes like frost. They are going to shoot. Let them try. I want to see the expression on their faces when they realize that we don’t die.
The scarred man dragged in a breath and exhaled slowly.
"You don’t want what’s in there," he said. "It came in on its own. It tore through three of my people just getting into the barn. We sealed the doors. We left it. It’s a plague of its own. It doesn’t bite. It doesn’t act right. It eats and then it screams."
Sera didn’t blink.
"That sounds interesting," she purred, taking another step forward.
She put her hand on the edge of the metal sheet that acted as the gate and pushed.
The man jerked as if to stop her, but Zubair shifted slightly, and the warning in his eyes froze the man where he stood.
The gate moved enough for her to slip through. The others followed in her wake.
No orders. No plan spoken.
They moved because she moved.
Inside the perimeter, the air smelled thicker. Sweat. Old blood. Fire. Chemicals. Under all that, something sharper and stranger—an infection pattern she didn’t recognize yet.
Her creature inhaled through her senses. New. This one is new. Not frog. Not crawler. Not Hydra lab leftovers. It is wild. It is wrong. I want to crack it open and see how it moves.
They crossed the packed dirt yard. A few empty chicken coops sat open, doors hanging loose. A trough near one fence held water that had turned cloudy and green. Flies gathered in a dense ring and rose lazily when the pack approached.
The barn loomed ahead.
Red paint peeled from its walls. The doors had been closed and latched with more effort than the structure deserved: heavy chains, padlocks, wooden beams nailed across the planks. The wood itself bulged inward slightly, as if something inside had been pushing.
Now it was quiet.
Sera felt her heartbeat settle into a slower rhythm. The creature’s presence smoothed along with it, no longer bright with glee, but precise.
Lachlan murmured, "It stopped screaming."
"For now," Alexei said.
"There are still heartbeats inside," Aerenyx said. "One weak. One frantic. One... wrong."
The last word landed with weight.
Sera stepped up to the door.
Behind her, she heard the clink of the homesteaders’ weapons as they fidgeted.
"Last chance," one of them said. "Walk away."
She reached out and put her palm against the wood.
It was warm.
Her creature pressed against her skin, ready. Open it. If what is inside is prey, we eat. If it is a mistake, we end it. If it is both, we enjoy ourselves.
She smiled.
"I want to see it," she repeated. Then she curled her fingers around the chain and pulled.
Wood groaned. Metal protested. The padlock held for a second and then snapped under the strain. The chain dropped in a heavy loop to the ground.
Dust spilled from the gaps between the doors.
Something moved inside.
A slow, dragging shuffle, then a sudden, fast scramble across the floorboards.
Sera pushed one of the barn doors inward.
Darkness waited on the other side. The only light came from thin cracks in the roof and the open doorway behind her.
She stepped across the threshold.
The smell hit her first.
Not standard rot. Not a typical zombie stench. Not a fresh kill. A blend of infection, adrenaline, and something chemical. A taste of metal and bile.
Her creature recoiled for half a second. Spoiled. Corrupted. Cheap. Then it adjusted. Still edible. If we are not picky. And I hate to admit that I am hungry enough to eat it.
Shapes moved in the shadows.
Something dragged itself into the thin line of light.
Whatever it was had been human.
Once.
Now it was stretched too long in some places and swollen in others. The torso bulged with something moving just under the skin. The eyes were gone, sockets sealed over with pale tissue. The jaw hung wider than it should have, teeth cracked and stained.
It turned its head toward the door.
It did not hiss.
It did not moan.
It laughed.
The sound came out wrong. Choked. Wet. Broken. But it was laughter, and it aimed straight at her.
Sera’s creature went perfectly still. This one thinks it is clever. Good. I am hungry.
Sera smiled back.
"Hello," she purred as she took one step forward. "Let’s see what you can do."
Outside, they could still hear the homesteaders breathing.
Inside, Sera took another step forward.