Page 144 of Tapeworld Induction

Dylan stepped away for a moment with a sigh.

He focused on trying to keep his mind from spiralling. They had a job to do here. He needed to—

He took a punch to the face from a large shadow that appeared out of nowhere. The new sleptigrade unleashed a flurry of blows at him. He cried out, but lost track of Dylan in the commotion.

“Stop!” He blocked the blows with his arms, as the shadow attacked him relentlessly. Then he finally got a proper look at it.

“Wait! I recognise her face!” he blurted out.

“It’s Jewel!” Dylan shouted, from somewhere several metres away.

Jewel snapped her head towards Dylan’s voice, reacting to the noise like a predator, her rippling muscles weaving through her shape’s translucency. She let out a threatening roar. From her open mouth, impossible teeth grew in all directions, a cacophony of splintering bones. She was twice as big as she was IRL, and now she was running towards Dylan like an act of nature.

Isaak summoned the Gunkatana and, gritting his teeth, he swung the blade at Jewel’s arm. Its red aura collided with the dark shape, sparks and electricity jolting into the air.

“What?” Jewel snarled.

“She can talk?” Dylan raised her fists, ready to take Jewel head on.

Jewel looked back to Isaak, who’d caught her attention with the swing. The attack had pierced her skin, and a dim light shone from within. “You…” Her voice was a song of pain, heavy and tired, teeth bared, muscles bloated.

Dylan ran to them.

He holstered the Gunkatana and hooked it to his belt. Jewel might have worked for Astrid, but she wasn’t like her. He didn’t want to kill her.

She swung a fist at him. He tried to dodge, but the full force of her punch hit him in the face. As he fell to the floor, dazed, a red tape-portal opened below him. He reached out desperately, trying to grab on to anything that would stop him falling through it.

But the portal pulled him in, and the hospital beds, laden with kidnapped teachers, police officers, firemen, cooks, binmen, programmers, hackers, corporate slaves, sex workers, late-shift radio hosts, musicians, painters, poets, and gamers were all gone. Dylan was nowhere to be seen.

Adrenaline flooded his veins, accreting in mass, fighting the fear chemicals released by his amygdala at what he knew must be coming.

There was a sound.

It was music.

Orchestral. There was flavour to the harmony… No, a taste. Metallic. Bloody. Horns and piano in a dissonant hymn to bloodlust and carnage.

To its notes, she descended from the dark sky above him.

Bare feet, legs wrapped with strands of black tape, applied erratically over a tattooed garden of decorative branches and leaves. The way the tape was placed, it was like Astrid was trying to hide her tattoos, but they were still visible, and Isaak already knew they were there. Her arms and feet were slick with liquid, blackish and revolting. She wore a tight black dress and hovered a few inches off the floor. Like Christ on the cross, she held her arms out, eyes white, mouth open.

Astrid.

A vision from hell.

Like a man possessed, Isaak ran and vaulted towards her before her feet even touched the ground.

Astrid waved a hand. “No.”

And Isaak flew backwards to the floor.

51

Blood

Isaak

“We are sleepwalking into the future, Isaak. We’ve grown complacent. Tender. Soft. I intend to run into humanity’s next stage with my eyes fully open. Thus, my beautiful sleptigrades. Proud volunteers, pioneers of a new chapter of human evolution.”