The world had been circling the drain for a while, and the virus shoved it further into the pipes.
They called it Nyx-13 when it slipped out of the lab—an untested prototype of something no one was supposed to touch. Now, two months later, nobody called it anything at all.
The ones still alive whispered about the ones that were bitten. They were not dead, not rotting, and that made it worse. The infection didn't change their faces—it changed what was behind their eyes. Hunger burned in them, raw and unrelenting. No matter how much they ate, they were starving. People called them Hollowed.
The cities emptied first, then the highways. Phones died, power grids collapsed, and order melted faster than ice on blacktop. Every corner, every shadow, carried the same question.
Are they one of us, or are they Hollowed already?
Damian had learned not to linger. He moved. Always moving. Backpack strapped tight, knife sheathed at his thigh, an old baseball bat slung across his back. He wasn't a hero, not even close. He was just stubborn, the kind of man who refused to let the world spit him out with the rest.
His boots crunched over broken glass as he pushed into the skeleton of an old gas station. He'd scouted it from the treeline first—dark, quiet, no movement inside. Still, he kept low, shoulders tense, ears straining for the sound he dreaded most—a voice that sounded human until it didn't.
The aisles were stripped bare, just rusting cans and empty chip bags fluttering like dead leaves. Damian didn't bother searching too carefully—he knew people had cleaned this place out weeks ago. He was here for another reason—shelter for a few days to heal. The weather had turned ugly, and rain carried worse things than a chill these days.
He dropped his pack against the counter, sat on it instead of behind it—he never put himself in a corner, not anymore. He leaned his head back, exhaling through his teeth. His knuckles were sore, wrapped in tape. He'd fought one of the Hollowed three days ago, close enough to smell the rot of its last meal in his mouth. Too close. He hadn't been bitten—he checked, rechecked, and checked again—but the memory of its teeth snapping near his throat made sleep a luxury. His leg had caught something sharp that day. It still hurt. He just hoped it wasn't infected.
The door creaked.
Damian's hand went straight to the knife, unsheathing it in one clean motion. He didn't call out. That was how you got caught—making noise, giving away nerves. Instead, he crouched low, eyes narrowing on the entrance.
A shadow moved against the flicker of fading daylight. A figure stepped inside, careful, deliberate. Not staggering. Not rushing either. Human. Or human enough.
Damian tightened his grip.
"Don't take another step unless you want steel in your ribs," he said, voice flat but loud enough to carry. The Hollowed weren't like the old zombie stories. A bullet to the head didn't stop them, not even close. The only way to put one down for good was to kill the hunger at its core—the heart. Stab it, crush it, shoot it to pieces—it didn't matter how, as long as the heart stopped beating. Miss, and you just made them angrier.
The figure paused, framed in the doorway.
Two months into the end of the world, Damian had seen enough to know that everyone was dangerous. Some more than others. He studied the figure, searching for the telltale signs—twitching fingers, glazed eyes, the subtle lean of someone suppressing hunger. Nothing obvious.
Still, looks didn't mean shit anymore.
"Well, this is fucking cute," Damian muttered to himself, straightening but keeping the knife loose in his hand. "Gas station's out of snacks, power's dead, and I've got company anyway. Lucky me."
He tilted his head, eyes narrowing. "Now here's the fun part—are you the type that wants to share a roof for the night, or the type that wants to eat my face off? Because I've had both. Gotta say..." His mouth twitched into a grin. "One's a lot fuckin' messier."
He shifted, a wave of pain shooting through his body from his leg.