The gym smelled like sweat, desperation, and the citrusy tang of industrial-grade floor cleaner. Every muscle in my body screamed in a language I was becoming far too fluent in: the dialect of a thousand repeated back handsprings. Coach Johnson had kept us three hours late, his obsession with nailing the new championship routine bordering on maniacal. Now, at almost midnight, my bones felt like they’d been replaced with half-set Jell-O.

  I pushed open the steel doors of the training facility, the cool night air a welcome slap to my flushed face. The rest of the squad had already scattered, disappearing into the sleek, waiting hover-cabs their parents had sent. My ride wasn't due for another twenty minutes, a lifetime when all you want is your bed and a week-long coma.

  My apartment was a fifteen-minute walk. Twenty, with my current Jell-O bone situation. Or… seven, if I took the shortcut.

  The mouth of the service alley yawned between the gym and a neighboring corporate block. It was a dark, jagged slash in the otherwise pristine, glowing face of the city. A "Warning: Restricted Access" sign flickered beside it, one of its neon tubes buzzing like a dying insect. My dad’s voice echoed in my head, a memory from a dozen different lectures: Stick to the main thoroughfares, Nikki. There are cameras there. It’s safer.

  Yeah, well, Dad wasn’t the one whose hamstrings were currently threatening to secede from the union.

  It’s just an alley, I told myself, shifting the weight of my gym bag on my shoulder. What’s the worst that could happen? I get accosted by an overly aggressive garbage drone?

  Decision made. I glanced up and down the brightly lit street one last time, then plunged into the darkness.

  One step and the city vanished. The multi-layered hum sliced away. The silence pressed in, so thick my ears felt like they needed to pop. The only sound was the drip... drip... drip of a leaky pipe and the sudden, too-loud rasp of my breathing.

  The air itself was different here. It was thick and cold, carrying the stench of rotting refuse and something metallic and chemical, like burnt wiring. The neon glow of the cityscape reduced to thin, colorful slicks on the wet ground, reflecting off puddles of indeterminate origin. The walls of the alley rose on either side of me, sheer cliffs of grimy brick and rusted metal that blocked out the sky. I felt small.

  Trapped.

  My heart started doing a nervous little tap dance against my ribs. The bravado that had seemed so logical out on the brightly lit street felt stupid in here. Brave face, shaky knees. I gripped the strap of my gym bag tighter, my knuckles white. Just keep moving, Nova. It’s a hundred yards, tops.

  A clatter from the shadows up ahead. My muscles locked, every instinct screaming to run but my feet glued to the pavement. My eyes strained, trying to pierce the gloom. It was probably just a mutant rat, one of the big, ugly ones that feasted on discarded tech in the lower sectors.

  “Hello?” My voice came out as a squeak. Great. Terrific. Announce your presence to the weird shadow monster, you idiot.

  Silence. The dripping continued its steady, maddening rhythm.

  I took another tentative step, my sneakers making a wet, sticky sound. I was halfway through. Almost there. Just a little further and I’d be back in the light, back in my world.

  Then a shape detached itself from the deepest blackness ahead.

  It wasn't a rat. It wasn't a garbage drone. It wasn't human.

  My first impression was just… big. It was a hulking silhouette, a mountain of shadow that seemed to suck the light out of the air. It rose on two legs, its form humanoid but twisted, elongated, wrong. It was eight feet tall, a nightmare of corded muscle packed onto a frame that was too lean, too predatory.

  Then it moved into a sliver of blue light filtering down from a skyscraper-ad, and my brain struggled to process what I was seeing. Brown, matted fur, streaked with something dark and wet. Shoulders impossibly broad. Long arms that ended in hands… no, not hands. Claws. Elongated and sharp, like surgical knives.

  My throat closed up. Can't move. Can't breathe. Every late-night horror movie I'd ever half-watched was suddenly playing in my head, and I was the idiot who went into the alley. Classic.

  Then its head lifted, and I saw its eyes.

  They glowed. A sickly, buggy, neon-yellow light, radiating a feral hunger so intense it felt like a physical force. There was no intelligence in them, no recognition. Just a bottomless, ravenous appetite. Its crooked jaw has lined long teeth, too sharp, some of them glinting with the unmistakable sheen of metallic plating.

  This was the creature from the news. The ‘unusually savage animal attack.’ My casual, dismissive words from the smoothie shop came screaming back at me.

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  The thing let out a low, rattling growl from deep in its chest. It wasn’t the sound of an animal. It was the sound of scraping metal and tearing flesh, a growl that felt engineered, synthesized.

  Broken.

  My cheerleader training, the thousands of hours of drilling my body to react without thinking, took over. My mind was just white noise, a static scream of terror, but my body knew what to do.

  Flee.

  I spun around, but it was already moving. It didn't run. It launched itself across the alley, covering the distance in a single, terrifying bound. The air warped around its speed. I had a split-second impression of a brown blur, the glint of those horrible yellow eyes, and the stench of wet fur and decay washing over me.

  I threw myself to the side, my athletic instincts saving my life. Claws sliced through the air right where my head had been, scraping against the brick wall with a shriek of metal on stone. Sparks flew, illuminating the alley in a brief, hellish flash.

  I scrambled backward on my hands and feet, my gym bag bumping uselessly against my back. My palms scraped against the rough, gritty pavement.

  The creature landed with a heavy thud, its claws digging into the concrete. It turned its head, those buggy eyes locking onto me again. It hadn't been expecting me to move. A flicker of something—frustration?

  Cunning?—crossed its face before being swallowed by the raw, feral hunger.

  It lunged again.

  This time, I was ready. I kicked out with all my strength, a move from a self-defense seminar my mom made me take years ago. My sneaker connected with its chest. It was like kicking a solid steel wall. There was no give, no reaction at all, other than a low snarl that vibrated up my leg.

  Its clawed hand shot out and swiped at my ankle. Claws tore through my leggings like paper. A sharp, electric fire shot up my leg from my ankle. I screamed, the sound raw and thin in the dead air.

  I rolled away, clutching my leg. Blood welled up, hot and sticky against my fingers. The pain was dizzying, but the fear was worse: I was going to die here, in this filthy, forgotten alley, torn apart by something that shouldn't even exist.

  I pushed myself up, my injured leg screaming in protest, and swung my gym bag in a desperate arc. It connected with the side of the creature's head with a thud. The thing barely flinched. It just shook its massive head, those yellow eyes narrowing.

  This wasn't a fight. I was a cheerleader trying to punch a freight train. All that training, all that strength? It was a joke. Great plan, Nova. Just great.

  It stalked toward me now, savoring the moment. It seemed to enjoy my terror. I backed against the brick wall, my hand sliding against the cold, damp surface, searching for a weapon, a rock, anything. My fingers found nothing but grime and loose mortar. Nowhere to run.

  The monster loomed over me, its shadow engulfing me. I could see the individual muscles rippling under its brown fur. I could smell its breath, a foul mix of spoiled meat and antiseptic chemicals. Up close, I could see the scars crisscrossing its body, the telltale lines of surgical alteration, of metal fused to bone.

  A weapon.

  And I was its target.

  It raised its arm, claws glinting in the dim light, ready for the final, killing blow. I squeezed my eyes shut, a choked sob escaping my lips. Mom. Dad.

  Then it stopped. Its arm froze mid-air. A low, confused whine escaped its throat. Its head tilted, as if listening to a sound I couldn't hear.

  My eyes snapped open. Its attention was no longer on me. It was looking past me, down the alley toward the street. It took a half-step back, its body coiling with a new tension. Not aggression. Something else.

  Hesitation.

  I didn't waste the moment. I didn't question it. I just reacted. I shoved myself off the wall and tried to bolt past it.

  It was a stupid, desperate move. Its reflexes were inhuman. A massive arm shot out and slammed me back against the wall. The impact knocked the wind out of me. My head cracked against the brick, and the alley swam in a dizzying smear of light and shadow.

  It pinned me there with one forearm across my chest, its claws digging into the brick just inches from my face. I struggled, but it was like trying to push over a building. Its face was right in front of mine, those glowing yellow eyes boring into me. Its jaws opened, revealing rows of those unnaturally long, sharp teeth.

  Then it lunged forward, not at my throat, but at my arm.

  The pain was beyond anything I had ever imagined. A clean, sharp, electrifying agony as its teeth, both flesh and metal, tore through my jacket, through my skin, through my muscle. I screamed, a high, piercing shriek that seemed to go on forever.

  The world dissolved into a white-hot haze. I was aware of the pressure, the tearing, the wet, fiery feeling of my blood flooding the wound.

  And then it was over.

  It released me. I crumpled to the ground, a useless heap of pain. Through the swimming blur of my vision, I saw it turn and bound away, vanishing back into the deepest shadows of the alley as silently as it had appeared.

  For a long moment, I just lay there, the universe comprising nothing but the filthy concrete beneath me and the all-consuming, throbbing fire in my arm. My breath came in ragged, shallow gasps. My whole body shook.

  Slowly, painfully, I pushed myself into a sitting position, my back scraping against the rough wall. I looked down at my arm.

  My jacket sleeve was shredded, soaked in a dark, spreading stain of blood. I peeled back the tattered fabric, my stomach churning. The wound was deep, a ragged semi-circle of puncture marks where its unnatural teeth had sunk into my flesh. It was bleeding; the blood looking black in the dim light.

  But that wasn’t what made a fresh wave of horror wash over me, a horror even colder and deeper than the fear of the creature itself.

  The wound was glowing.

  A sick green pulsed from the punctures, lighting my blood from within. Something was inside me.

  Something was wrong.

  I stared at the glowing, bleeding wound on my arm. My life, the perfect, self-contained bubble of popularity and fleeting teenage drama, has ended.