Bobby stepped into the dimly lit interior of the house, his heart pounding in his chest. The musty smell of abandonment mixed with a metallic tang that he recognised as blood. But it was too overpowering to be just from the wound he had given her. He held his pistol at the ready, eyes darting around the cluttered living room.

Rem's voice echoed in his mind, tinged with concern.

"So do I," Bobby muttered under his breath, carefully picking his way through the debris-strewn floor.

A trail of blood droplets led towards a hallway on the right. Bobby followed it, every creak of the floorboards setting his nerves on edge. The house seemed to groan around him, as if protesting this intrusion into its forgotten spaces.

As he reached the hallway, a sudden crash from upstairs made him jump. The raider was still here, and from the sound of it, she was in a hurry.

"Hello?" Bobby called out, surprising himself with his own boldness. "Look, I just want to talk. I'm not here to hurt you."

Silence answered him, broken only by the faint sound of laboured breathing from above.

Rem urged.

Bobby hesitated at the foot of the stairs, torn between Rem's logic and his desperate need for human contact. "I have to try," he whispered. "She might know something about what's happening."

Taking a deep breath, Bobby climbed the stairs, each step bringing him closer to a confrontation he wasn't sure he was prepared for. The wood creaked ominously beneath his feet, and he winced at each sound, knowing it gave away his position.

As he reached the top of the stairs, a voice called out from behind a closed door at the end of the hallway. It was strained with pain but still filled with defiance.

"Stay back, you fucking idiot! I've got more tricks up my sleeve, and I won't hesitate to use them!"

Bobby paused, his gun trained on the door. "I told you, I just want to talk. You're the first person I've seen since... since everything changed. Please, I have questions."

There was a moment of tense silence before the raider's voice came again, softer this time, but no less hostile. "Questions? You shot me, and now you want to chat? You're either insane or stupid. Probably both."

Bobby took a tentative step forward. "Maybe I am. But I'm also alone and scared, just like you are. We don't have to be enemies. Not in this new world."

As he approached the door, Bobby's mind raced. What the fuck are you doing? Rem’s right, she tried to kill you. He told himself, but the thought of turning away, of losing this chance at a connection, was unbearable.

His hand reached for the doorknob, and he hesitated for a moment.

Rem's voice was urgent in his mind.

Taking a deep breath, Bobby turned the knob and pushed the door open, stepping into whatever awaited him on the other side.

As the door swung open, Bobby was hit by the overwhelming stench of blood and decay. The room beyond was lit by a single, flickering light bulb, casting eerie shadows across the walls.

The raider stood in the far corner, her back pressed against the wall. Her left hand clutched her wounded shoulder, blood seeping between her fingers. In her right hand, she held what looked like another of those metallic spider-bots, ready to deploy.

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"Not another step," she hissed through clenched teeth.

As Bobby's eyes adjusted to the dim light, he noticed a metallic collar around the raider's neck, pulsing with a faint blue light. His gaze was drawn to the bodies on the floor, and he realised with horror that they weren't just corpses. Parts were missing, as if they'd been harvested.

"What... what is this?" Bobby choked out, his gun wavering between the raider and the gruesome scene.

The woman's eyes narrowed. "This? This is survival, you naïve fool. You think you can just walk around, asking questions, making friends? This is what the world is now."

As she spoke, Bobby noticed movement behind her. Something was stirring in the shadows.

Rem's urgency was palpable.

The raider's eyes widened, a mix of fear and resignation crossing her face. "Shit, you've woken him up."

From the darkness, a grotesque form emerged. It was vaguely human-shaped, but twisted and malformed, with mismatched limbs and multiple faces fused into its torso. Around its neck was a collar identical to the raiders.

"Mike?" Bobby heard the woman whisper, her voice a mixture of terror and longing.

The creature - Mike - lurched forward, letting out a guttural moan. Bobby could see that parts of it were rotting, while others looked freshly attached.

"What… Do you know him?" Bobby asked, feeling sick.

The raider nodded, her earlier bravado crumbling. "Yeah, he’s my boyfriend. The collars... they changed us. Mike more than me. He needs to feed, to replace the rotting parts. I... I've been helping him."

Rem insisted.

But before Bobby could move, the raider's demeanour changed. Her eyes hardened as she looked at Bobby, then at Mike.

"I'm sorry," she said, not sounding sorry at all. "But Mike needs to eat, and I need to level up."

Bobby stumbled backwards, his eyes darting between the raider and the monstrosity that was once Mike. "Stay back!" he yelled, his voice cracking with fear.

The raider's lips curled into a cruel smile as she deployed the spider-bot. It skittered across the floor, its legs extending to an impossible length. Before Bobby could react, the metallic limbs wrapped around his torso, pinning his arms to his sides.

In a moment of desperate clarity, Bobby squeezed off a shot at Mike. The bullet struck the creature's shoulder, tearing off a piece of rotting flesh, but it hardly seemed to notice.

The spider-bot's grip tightened, sending waves of pain through Bobby's body. He cried out; the pistol slipping from his fingers and clattering to the floor.

With a swift move, the raider shoved Bobby down onto the pile of mutilated bodies. The stench of decay overwhelmed him, and he fought the urge to vomit.

"Mike, dinner's ready," the raider called out, but Bobby caught the tremor in her voice. As she turned to face her boyfriend, he saw a flicker of fear in her eyes. Whatever love she once had for Mike was now overshadowed by the terror of what he'd become.

Bobby squirmed, trying to wriggle away from the gruesome scene. His movements dislodged him from the pile of corpses, and he found himself on the blood-stained floor.

"Help!" Bobby shouted, his voice echoing through the house. "Somebody, please!"

Mike shuffled towards him, letting out guttural moans that sounded almost... hungry. The creature's mismatched eyes focused on Bobby, and a twisted tongue lolled out from between its mangled lips. As Bobby stared in horror, Mike’s status flashed up.

Malformed Mike (corrupted)

Level 24

Rem's voice was frantic in his mind.

As Mike drew closer, Bobby's struggles grew more frantic. The spider-bot's legs dug painfully into his flesh, but the fear of what awaited him was far worse than any physical discomfort.

The raider watched from the corner, her face a mask of conflicting emotions - guilt, fear, and a desperate need for survival battling for dominance.

Rem shouted in his mind, a note of desperate hope in his voice.

Seconds later, the door exploded inward in a shower of wood splinters. The sudden noise startled everyone in the room, even Mike pausing in his shambling approach.

"No!" the raider screamed, her eyes wide with fear and shock.

In the doorway stood a small figure, barely reaching waist height on a normal human. In its hands was a strange-looking device, so complex and covered in various attachments that it hardly seemed possible to be a weapon. Yet the figure wielded it with practiced ease.

Before anyone could react, the mysterious newcomer raised the device. With a soft pfft, something that looked like a tranquilliser dart shot out, striking the raider in the neck. She stumbled, her hand reaching for the dart before her eyes rolled back and she collapsed to the floor.

The figure didn't hesitate. Swinging the bizarre weapon towards Mike, it fired again. This time, a brilliant arc of blue-white energy erupted from the device, striking the monstrous creature. Mike let out an inhuman shriek as the energy coursed over his misshapen body, the smell of burning flesh filling the air.

Bobby lay on the floor, still wrapped in the spider-bot's grip, watching in stunned silence as the scene unfolded before him. The figure stepped further into the room, its attention now turning to Bobby.

"Well," a surprisingly deep voice came from the diminutive rescuer, "you not going to get up then, at least?"