Vera Sandstorm's Arc

Chapter 2 of 4

Vera uncorks the vial and tilts it toward the stranger's mouth. His lips are cold but still soft. The liquid catches the light from the streetlamp overhead, copper-bright and thick as honey. She steadies his jaw with one hand and pours. The formula slides down his throat. His chest rises once, twice. Then the fox goes rigid. Its fur stands on end and its body starts to shake. The stranger's hand drops away from it but the animal doesn't move. White fur darkens to gray, then black. Its eyes snap open, wild and wrong. Foam flecks its mouth. The fox lunges at her and Vera jerks back, hitting the warehouse wall. The animal tears past her into the alley and disappears. The stranger's breathing steadies. His color returns. The wound at his side has stopped bleeding. Vera stares at the empty perfume bottle in her hand, the one she'd repurposed to hold a larger dose. The formula worked. It reversed death in living tissue. But it didn't touch him at all. It went into something else. Something that was already alive.