You ever get the feeling someone just walked over your grave?
Funny thing is — I don't have one.
Yet that's exactly how I felt when the door creaked open upstairs.
Not a normal creak.
No — this was a storybook creak. The kind that announces the arrival of someone wearing black boots, bad intentions, and a gun that doesn't miss.
I froze.
Victor, the rat, jumped off my shoulder and scurried under a desk. Smart guy.
Me? I stood there like an idiot, caught between curiosity and the overwhelming urge to run away despite not technically having functioning knees.
Then I heard it:
Click. Clack. Click.
Not footsteps. Metal against wood. A cane, maybe? Or something... worse.
Dr. Vale's voice came next.
"Mister Z—hide."
That was all he said before a loud crash shook the ceiling. Something heavy hitting the floor. A struggle. A scream—Lia's.
That did it.
I ran.
Yes. Me. Running.
Like some twisted Olympic corpse with a mission.
I barreled up the basement stairs, tore open the door — and saw him.
Tall. Clean suit. Polished shoes. Skin like marble dipped in acid. And eyes... burning silver.
He wasn't human. At least not anymore. Maybe not ever.
Vale lay unconscious. Lia stood frozen, clutching a wrench. And the silver-eyed man?
He turned to me and grinned.
"There you are. Subject Zero. The Prototype."
I didn't reply. I just stared at him — and for the first time since I rose from the dirt, I felt fear. Not the kind that makes you scream, but the kind that makes even your dead bones want to shiver.
He stepped closer.
"You're early. You weren't supposed to wake up yet."
"Sorry," I said. "I got bored lying in a grave for ten years."
He chuckled. Chuckled.
"Still got that wit, huh? They didn't burn it out of you completely."
I tilted my head. "Who's they?"
"Oh, Zane," he said. "You forgot everything, didn't you? You're not just an accident. You're a weapon. You're my design."
He tapped his temple.
"I built you."
Lia screamed and swung the wrench at his skull. He caught it with one hand.
She didn't even have time to blink before he backhanded her across the room like she weighed nothing.
That was it.
I didn't think. I moved.
Faster than before.
Stronger than ever.
I slammed into him with all my rotten strength — and we crashed through the wall into the hallway, books and plaster raining down like confetti at a haunted wedding.
He grinned as he rose. Not a scratch on him.
"You're waking up, Zane," he whispered. "And once you do — once you fully remember — you'll thank me for killing you."
Then he vanished.
Just like that. Gone.
Now Vale's bleeding, Lia's unconscious, and I'm left alone with a name, a past that wants to murder me, and a rat who keeps stealing my pens.
But one thing's clear:
This story isn't about survival anymore.
It's about revenge.