The Incursion

Episode 3

The crowd lost it. Clawing, shoving, scrambling up the ladder — I went with them, up and out of the cellar. The second I hit the barroom floor, the cold hit me. Wind roaring through the door, my hood snapping like a flag. Outside, the whole street was drowned in black fog, thick as paste. Couldn't even make out the eaves on the far side. The people who'd charged out first — they dove into it one after another, swallowed whole, gone in a blink.

I looked at the front door. The fog there was the worst — thick enough to go black, like something alive, packed in the doorway. Step through that and you're dead.

"...This way."

A voice, barely a breath, behind me. I turned. The blond kid. He'd made it up too, somewhere along the way, standing by the bar, chin jerking toward the kitchen.

I followed his look. Jack and the bartender — Bamboo Pole — hunched low, one behind the other, slipping through the kitchen door. I fell in after them. As I passed the bar, the kid slid up beside me, easy as anything. I glanced at him. His eyes said: follow.

The kitchen was narrow and dark, stacked with liquor crates and oil drums, stinking of mold. I hugged the wall and worked my way in. Three corners. At the back, a busted iron door stood open, gray fog-light bleeding through the crack. Jack and Bamboo Pole were long gone. The door hadn't latched — creaking, swaying.

Out the back: an alley squeezed between buildings. Fog was thinner here, but thickening by the second. The alley ran out onto a cross street at the far end, and Jack and Bamboo Pole were already swallowed up in it. I stayed low, kept to the wall, ran. The blond kid trailed me the whole way. Not a sound.

Across the street, Jack and Bamboo Pole came wheezing up to the corner. Jack was a heavy man — he ran like a busted bellows, every breath a leak. He stopped at the turn, one hand braced on the wall, half-crouched, gulping air. Bamboo Pole stood beside him, stamping his feet, tugging at his arm. "Get up! Jack, get up! We're not safe yet!"

"Enough... enough." Jack waved him off, wheezing like a punctured bellows. "Three streets out. We're fine now. Just—let me catch my breath."

The words didn't finish.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

Footsteps, out of the fog behind them. One at a time. Slow. Unhurried. Like someone out for a stroll — strolling straight toward Jack and Bamboo Pole.

Jack snapped upright, gun up, muzzle into the fog, voice hard. "Who's there?! Stay back! One more step and I shoot!"

The footsteps didn't stop. Thud. Thud. Thud.

"s**t!"

BAM! BAM! BAM!

The shots cracked through the fog — and the footsteps never even paused. Bullets into that black, gone like stones dropped in water. Then, without warning, the figure in the fog — wrapped in black — launched off the ground. Like a cannonball. Straight at Jack.

Jack stood frozen, gun up, muzzle still smoking. He never got a second trigger pull. A strand of black fog coiled around his neck and hoisted him off his feet.

His boots left the ground. Both hands clawed at his throat — fingers sliced through the black fog, found nothing but his own skin. His face went scarlet, veins popping, a rattling wheeze forced out of his throat. He stretched one hand toward Bamboo Pole, knuckles white.

"Save... me..."

Bamboo Pole was nailed to the spot, crotch soaked, face white as paper. He watched Jack's plump forehead start to cave in — then the sockets, the cheeks, the jaw. Top to bottom, like an invisible hand peeling the water and the life off his face, layer by layer. Skin pulled tight over the skull. Cheekbones jutting. Lips cracked and curling back. The whole face collapsed into a sheet of dried skin.

"Ah—!" The scream finally tore out of him. He staggered back two steps, slammed into the wall — then turned and scrambled into the fog like a man possessed. Lost a shoe. Never looked back.

The black fog kept its grip on Jack's neck. Only when he was a dried corpse did it let go — his bulging eyes still open, staring dead ahead.

The strand finally loosened. Jack's body dropped out of the air and hit the street with a dull thump. A discarded rag doll. Everything went quiet. Only the fog, moving slow.

I ran. Sand under my boots, slipping every step — slow going. I stayed low, hugged the wall, tried not to make a sound. The fog pressed against my face like a wet quilt; every breath tasted of dirt.

People poured out of the fog in waves, cutting past me, crossing my path. Someone clipped my shoulder. No apology. No one looked back. They all ran one way, like something was driving them.

I didn't follow. Couldn't have said why. The fog was so thick I couldn't see a thing — but something told me which way was safe, like a voice in my head. Right now it told me the way the crowd was running was dangerous. No. Worse than dangerous. A dead end.

I didn't hesitate. At the second junction I cut into another street. A flash of gold behind me — the kid, keeping up.

Around the third street, a wave of people surged in from the side and split us apart. When the fog closed back in, he was gone. I looked back twice. Nothing. Fine. His life, his death — none of my business.

The fog kept thickening. Signs gone. Rooflines gone. Couldn't even see the flagstones under my feet. I stopped, turned a full circle. Every direction the same. Grey on grey.

"Damn. Lost."

Only way out of the fog was out of the town. But the fog had drowned every landmark — I could feel which way was safe, which way was danger, just not which way led out. Running blind like this was too risky.

I was about to crouch against the wall when more footsteps came pounding toward me — a pack of them. Seven, eight. Bursting out of the fog. All in Inner City guard gear, and at the center, protected, a man in silk, hands so pale they nearly glowed, hemmed in by four armed guards, running hard and running scared.

Inner City people. Bamboo Pole's words came back to me: the Inner City lords are the law.

I didn't want a closer look. I stepped aside, dropped my head, shrank into the wall.

A hand slammed into my chest. Shoved.

"Move it! Out of the way!"

I staggered two steps, back hitting the wall. My hood slipped off — and I felt it. The look. The pack kept running, curses rising and falling through the fog, but that gaze landed on my face and stuck there, like it couldn't pull away. I'd seen that look too many times today. First the face — sizing it up like a piece of goods. Then the price.

I looked down, fixed my hood, turned to walk.

"Wait."

The voice wasn't loud. Steady. The calm of a man who rarely heard no. "You there — hold."

I didn't stop. Walked faster.

"Seize him."

He said it to the men at his side.

A hand like a steel claw clamped my arm — hard enough to creak bone. I pulled once. Didn't budge. The guard was huge. Strong as a machine.

"Let go."

The guard didn't answer. Just held me locked down. The noble had walked up by then, two paces off, looking me over top to bottom. His eyes moved inch by inch. Face. Waist. Back up to the face. Like he was weighing a piece of goods. He smiled. A polite smile.

"A piece like you doesn't belong in the Outer City." He took half a step forward, voice low. "Come with me, young man."

I looked at him. In the distance, a scream cut through the fog — swallowed up fast. The two guards behind him watched the street, alert.

"I'm not merchandise," I said.

The noble's smile deepened. "Here, if I say you are, you are."

He tilted his head. "Take him."