13. Jillian
JILLIAN
The food stores are lower than they should be.
No one says it out loud, but it’s clear in the way Darwin double-checks inventory with a furrowed brow, or how the meal rations have quietly slimmed from “enough” to “barely.” I hear Grady cursing under his breath near the comms array, slamming metal panels like it’s the system’s fault the supply ships haven’t made orbit in a week.
No one talks about it. No one dares. But I see the tension winding tighter each day—like a cable about to snap.
And that’s not the worst of it.
The water tastes different.
It hits me first thing in the morning—sitting in the mess, sipping from my tin cup while trying to review lab logs. I pause mid-drink and frown. It’s subtle, like the ghost of a flavor, but it’s wrong. Flat. Metallic. Like someone dragged a rusted nail across my tongue.
I swirl the water around in my mouth, then spit a little back into the cup.
Darwin’s sitting across from me, poking at his rehydrated eggs like they personally offended him.
“You taste that?” I ask, voice low.
He shrugs. “Taste what?”
I lift the cup. “The water. Something’s off.”
He narrows his eyes, then takes a sip from his own.
“Just your imagination, Jill. You’ve been on edge.”
I stare at him. “That’s your answer to everything lately.”
“Maybe because you’ve got a theory for everything lately,” he snaps back. “Conspiracies, data tampering, shadow monsters—”
“I didn’t say monster,” I hiss, leaning in, “I said unknown. There’s a difference.”
He exhales and looks away. “Whatever. It’s water. We filter it. We test it. We drink it. That’s the job.”
But it shouldn’t taste like this.
Later, I slip into the lab when no one’s watching.
Not Ciampa, not the techs, not even the lingering drone that buzzes near the observation window.
I dig through the sample vault until I find what I’m looking for—a vial from the well I discovered weeks ago.
The one I’d kept quiet. Hidden. Just in case.
I run a comparison between it and the current filtered supply.
And what I find doesn’t make sense.
The base elements are there. Hydrogen, oxygen. Trace sediment. Fluoride within expected ranges. But the composition—the mineral distribution—is different. The well sample has these faint calcium spikes, magnesium variances, and something else. Something I can’t identify right away.
I isolate the anomaly, filter it out, and run a neural simulation based on exposure.
My throat goes dry.
The compound in the well water… it’s affecting neural chemistry. Subtle, slow, but real. Calming stress responses, enhancing memory retention. Not enough to drug someone—but enough to change how they think.
I label it “Variant Mineral #17” in the log and encrypt the results.
I don’t trust anyone with this. Not yet.
Definitely not Darwin. And not Ciampa, whose shadow seems longer each time he slinks past my workstation like a vulture sniffing for weakness.
I slip the vial back into its hiding place in my satchel.
But that’s not the only thing weighing on my mind.
The trails are changing.
There’s one route near the cliffs I always avoided—too unstable, too exposed. But now… now there’s a line of small stones stacked deliberately near the bend, and when I take the path, the gravel is packed down, scuffed with claw marks that don’t match any local fauna.
And another spot—near the canyon spring, where the ground steams in the early morning—someone’s carved a crescent into the sand. I would’ve missed it if I wasn’t watching closely. Just a shallow arc with a dot in the center. A warning symbol? A landmark?
Whatever it is, it wasn’t there before.
Someone’s clearing paths.
Not for the team. Not for the marines.
For me.
And I think I know who.
But the idea alone makes my chest go tight.
Because if I’m right, it means he’s still watching. Still listening. Still… helping.
And worse?
I want him to. Which my behavior bears out. I return to the ledge again.
Every night now, like clockwork. No one notices.
Or if they do, they’re too caught up in their own unraveling to ask.
That’s the thing about fear—it makes people small, folded into themselves.
The camp’s dying by inches. I feel it in the hollow clang of the mess hall trays, in the way Darwin won’t meet my eyes anymore, in the silence between the perimeter drones as they flicker and hum and slowly degrade.
But out here? On this wind-chiseled ledge where the sand carves grooves through obsidian and the stars look close enough to kiss?
I can breathe.
There’s no cookie in my hand tonight. No offering. I stopped bringing them after Carson died, after the tension in my chest turned from grief to something quieter. Something I still don’t have a name for.
Now, I bring questions.
Soft ones, so the wind won’t carry them to ears that shouldn’t hear.
"Why are you helping me?"
The silence after is dense, like the whole world’s holding its breath.
"What’s your name?"
The cliff doesn’t answer. The canyon doesn’t echo. Just the distant hiss of steam vents bleeding off pressure and the high metallic chirr of insects nesting in the cracks.
"What do you want from us?"
That one feels heavier. Like it lands somewhere. I don’t know why.
I sit on the cold stone, wrapping my arms around my knees. The chill bites through my pants, cuts into bone. I let it. Maybe I deserve a little suffering.
But then—on the third night—I find it.
A pelt.
It’s draped across the rocks exactly where I always sit. Not haphazard, not thrown. Placed. Like someone considered the shape of me, the edge of the stone, the wind’s direction.
It smells… alive.
Like sun-warmed hide, coppery blood, the scorched dust of the plains. It’s thick, the kind of fur you’d take off a creature that doesn’t mind the cold but still respects it. There are faint claw marks on the edge. Too big to be human.
My heart punches once, hard.
He left this.
I don’t know how I know, I just do.
I run trembling fingers across the fur, then lower myself onto it like I’m afraid it might vanish if I move too fast. It welcomes me. Warmer than it should be, still radiating heat from something recently dead or freshly alive.
I can’t help it.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
And then, after a beat, I do something I hadn’t meant to.
I tell the truth.
“My name’s Jill.”
It slips out, uncoiled from someplace deep. Not “Jillian,” not “Field Technician C.3.” Just Jill. The name no one here uses. The name my mom used when I was five and scared of thunder.
I sit with it. Let it echo.
The wind shifts. Just a whisper, a sideways current brushing the hair at my temple. I imagine something listening. Not judging. Not afraid. Just… there.
I wait. Longer than usual. Long enough that my legs go numb and the stars begin to arc low over the canyon.
Still no reply.
But when I finally rise, stretching sore limbs and brushing off my pants, I feel the world change.
Not in some dramatic, lightning-struck way.
Just a breath. A hush.
And from the cliff above, a shape shifts.
Massive. Silent.
Watching.
And suddenly I’m not cold anymore.
Not even a little.