At first glance, the hall looked empty and lifeless… but as the butcher’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, he sensed movement. He was not alone.

Shadows crawled across the cracked concrete floor and along the broken walls. Long, distorted, silent shapes. They didn’t resemble animals, yet they weren’t human either. Their movements were too irregular, too unnatural, as if the creatures controlling them didn’t fully understand how their bodies worked.

Then he saw them clearly.

Out of the darkness appeared dozens of small, glowing red eyes. Motionless, unblinking. They stared directly at him. Those eerie eyes belonged to thin, crooked beings with elongated, fragile limbs that looked like twisted bones wrapped in yellowish, translucent skin. Their bodies trembled with every step, as if fighting against their own existence.

Bones were scattered on the floor—some old and dry, others disturbingly fresh. Bits of flesh, dark stains, and moist smears covered the ground. This wasn’t a hideout. It was a feeding place. A lair.

And then, in the far corner, he noticed something even more disturbing.

A tiny, makeshift hut built from broken wooden boards. On its walls, taped with pieces of old adhesive, were children’s drawings—houses, sun, trees, smiling faces. Under them, nailed to the wood, hung a small sign written in shaky, childish handwriting:

“NO ONE BRINGS US FOOD. THAT WOMAN SAVES US.”

The butcher froze. His breath caught in his throat. His mind refused to accept what his eyes were showing him.

A faint, muffled sound broke the silence—a soft cry. Like a child trying not to be heard.

From behind a pile of rusted metal crawled a small figure. A child. But not entirely human. Half of its face looked normal, young and frightened. The other half was covered in that same translucent yellow skin. One eye was human. The other was glowing red.

The child looked straight at him.

— “She brings us food…” it whispered, with a voice that sounded doubled, as if two beings were speaking from the same throat. “If she stops… we’ll die. They… they need meat…”

The butcher felt the ground disappear beneath him. These weren’t monsters. They were people—survivors. Survivors of something horrific. Survivors of the chemical disaster that was rumored to have happened in this factory ten years ago. Children, workers, ordinary people… all trapped, mutated, abandoned.

And only one woman had discovered the truth.

Only she had the courage to return to this place every day, risking her life to feed them. To calm them. To keep them alive when the world had already discarded them.

The butcher turned to leave, but the old woman stood behind him. Her eyes were tired, heavy, filled with a sadness that no words could describe.

— “Now you know,” she said softly. “You know why I keep silent. If anyone finds out… they will kill them. They tried once. I won’t let it happen again.”

He wanted to respond, but then a terrifying realization struck him.

The creatures were approaching. Emerging from the shadows, drawn by the tension, by the fear. Their movements became faster, hungrier, more instinctive.

The woman lifted her hands.

— “STOP! He is not an enemy!” she shouted.

But outside, through the broken windows, sirens were already echoing.

Police.

Someone must have reported her. Someone had seen her enter the factory too many times. Someone had decided she needed to be “helped.”

But the police would not understand.

The butcher knew they would open fire.

And the creatures—frightened, starving, unpredictable—would fight back.

That night, the secret buried for ten long years would finally burst into the open.

And the city…
would never be the same again.