The sound of water echoed through the house—steady, rhythmic, and unbroken. From the bathroom, the quiet hiss of a shower could be heard. It didn't last long.
Now, the commander stood alone before the mirror, unmoving.
His reflection stared back at him—a face neither handsome nor imposing. Not the chiseled jaw screaming masculinity, nor the soft features of Korean idols. He looked... ordinary. The kind of man who could disappear in a crowd. Yet something about him resisted vanishing entirely. There was potential etched into the stillness of his expression, even if buried under time and weariness.
A small scar near the corner of his mouth, barely visible unless one looked closely. His eyes were the most telling—cold, calculating, but not lifeless. Eyes that had seen too much and cared too little for too long. But behind the frost, if someone were to truly stare, there was a flicker of fatigue. Not a weakness. Just the weight of endurance.
His torso was a patchwork of old wounds. Bullet scars, several cuts, burns, and claw marks—all remnants of a life defined by survival. Every scar was a memory, and every memory a burden he no longer bothered to recount.
He splashed cold water onto his face and reached for a towel, patting the moisture away without urgency.
Then—a voice.
Soft. Female. It lingered in the air like warmth from a dying fire.
"Are you forgetting your promise?"
He froze.
"You said you would take care of me forever."
The words drifted into the silence. A shadow stood behind him in the mirror—a silhouette of a girl. Her face obscured, swallowed by a veil of indistinct darkness, like a memory that refused to fully return.
He didn't turn. He didn't speak.
Just a glance. A long, heavy breath.
Then—another voice, colder, older. It came from the same shadow, yet this one carried the weight of years—worn down by betrayal or bitterness.
"I regret ever meeting you."
The air seemed to constrict.
His breath left him slowly. When he looked again, the silhouette was gone. The bathroom was as it had been. Plain. Still. The only sound was the soft drip from the now-shut faucet.
But his eyes had changed.
Where weariness once lingered, there was only a hardened calm—detached, calculating, unreadable.
He dried his hands, tossed the towel aside, and turned to leave.
The night was coming. And with it, whatever the forest held.
✦✦✦
"You're here, sir."
Alpha approached his commander, who was standing inside the old side room of the house. Dust clung to the corners, and faded clothes hung lifelessly in half-open drawers. The man was rummaging through a wardrobe, methodically searching.
"The night is about to start, sir. What are your orders?" Alpha asked, but something about the commander felt… different.
Without turning, the man replied, "Get ready. Assign Foxtrot to the lookout post. Echo will accompany him like before. You and the others will form a forward perimeter near the gate." A pause. "Stay sharp. Our enemies this time will be fast."
"And what about you, sir?" Alpha pressed.
"I'll join shortly. There's something I need to retrieve first." His voice lowered slightly. "Until then, you have command."
Alpha hesitated. "Is something wrong, sir?"
"Nothing, soldier. Dismissed."
"…Affirmative." Alpha gave a sharp nod, though the unease in his chest remained as he turned and exited.
Out on the terrace, Alpha relayed the assignments. The soldiers took their places without delay. Delta approached.
"Where's the commander?" he asked.
"He'll join us soon. Stay sharp," Alpha replied. A few heads nodded, their focus already shifting toward preparation. No one asked further.
"Foxtrot, keep an eye out. Report immediately if you spot anything unusual."
The sky was darkening quickly now. The forest seemed to breathe, shadows crawling beneath its limbs. And then, something shifted—just enough to make every soldier glance upward at the same time.
It wasn't the stars. It was the moon.
It had turned red.
Not the rust-red of a lunar eclipse, but a deep, violent crimson. It glowed with a sickly intensity, casting a faint, unnatural hue over everything below. The atmosphere became heavier, colder.
Then the radio crackled.
"This is Foxtrot. Captain—visual confirmation. Dozens of infected animals are headed our way. Fast movers."
Alpha grabbed his comm. "Copy. You and Echo are cleared to engage. Prioritize the most dangerous targets first."
"Understood," Foxtrot responded. A moment later, the sharp sound of a sniper rifle cracked through the night. Then came Echo's LMG, its thunderous rhythm stitching through the air as the first wave entered his range.
Foxtrot focused his precision fire on the incoming dogs—mutated, feral, twisted by infection. Echo swept the area with suppressive bursts, cutting down anything that moved too close. The second wave had begun.
Within moments, the infected reached the house perimeter. These weren't the slow, shambling corpses of the first wave. These were faster. Meaner. The cats and a few mice scrambled up the fence and leapt at the walls. Chickens and Geese—wild-eyed and grotesquely feathered—fluttered at alarming speed, their claws aimed at exposed skin.
The squad responded with ruthless coordination. Riflemen dropped incoming threats at range. Many of the infected animals became caught in the barbed wire fencing, their bodies thrashing before going still by oncoming bullets. Others met a quicker end—leaping headfirst into the jagged glass shards and sharpened spikes mounted along the perimeter, impaling themselves in mindless desperation.
Those who breached the fence were met by Bravo and Charlie's shotguns and SMGs in brutal close-quarters retaliation. It should have looked ridiculous—a squad of trained soldiers firing at mice, cats and poultry—but there was nothing funny about it. These creatures were bloodthirsty, and terrifyingly agile.
Charlie saved Delta from a claw swipe just in time. Bravo dove between two chickens mid-lunge and blasted both from the air.
But the situation worsened.
Some infected mice and cats climbed the walls and reached the second floor. Foxtrot spotted them immediately. He drew his SIG Sauer P226 and began dropping them one by one. Then he saw something above—and swore.
"Echo! Incoming!"
He grabbed Echo by the collar and pulled him back just as two infected bats streaked through the air, tearing into the spot he'd been kneeling moments before. Foxtrot stepped forward, kicking the creatures aside to gain distance, then opened fire—his pistol spitting flashes into the dark. Echo scrambled upright and joined in, sending a burst of rounds skyward that clipped several of the shrieking beasts mid-flight.
"Give me your sidearm!" Foxtrot barked.
Echo handed it over without a word. Now wielding dual pistols, Foxtrot shifted smoothly into close-quarters combat. Even without his sniper rifle, his precision didn't waver—every shot was clean and calculated, each round finding its mark with practiced ease. He moved like a machine built for short-range extermination, cutting down the infected as they swarmed the balcony.
Together, the two began a fighting retreat, covering each other as they stepped back from the balcony under the bat onslaught.
Foxtrot clicked his comms again. "Captain—bad news. We've got flyers. Some are headed to your front!"
And sure enough—they came.
Alpha looked up in time to see a dark swarm approaching. Bats—dozens of them—dove like daggers through the sky.
Bravo reacted fast. He aimed his shotgun upwards and fired. A few fell, but four made it through. His chamber clicked empty.
The bats surged forward, red eyes glowing, mouths open wide.
Then—
Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang.
Three of the bats exploded mid-flight. A fourth fell limply to the ground.
Alpha didn't need to look back. He knew that sound.
The commander was here.
Alpha smiled briefly—until he saw something else.
A massive, gray cat was leaping toward him, claws out, fangs bared. Time slowed.
Then—thwip.
The cat's head fell clean from its shoulders mid-air.
Alpha blinked—his eyes adjusting to the chaos—and finally took in the full sight before him.
The commander's outfit was simple, yet striking: a grey T-shirt beneath a black leather jacket, tactical cargo pants, and combat boots.
But it was the weapon he held in his right hand that drew everyone's attention—a sword.
Not long, not short. Not quite a katana, nor a European longsword. Its design was unique, with a raven-shaped pommel, the twin eyes painted crimson, as if glowing faintly beneath the moonlight.
The commander moved through the chaos like a force of nature. His pistol barked in his left hand. In his right, that blade danced—cutting down the infected with a terrifying elegance. And in the space of a breath, several more fell, either split open or shot cleanly through the head.
"Sir, it's dange—" Alpha tried to say, but his voice trailed off. There was no need.
In a matter of seconds, the battlefield turned. The creatures that had breached the yard were felled one by one. Those still mid-air didn't reach the ground intact. Between the precise shots and merciless slashes, the yard was cleared faster than any of them had expected.
"Stay alert," the commander said as he reloaded with steady hands. "Keep your eyes on the bats and finish the sweep. Once the upper floor is clear, have Echo and Foxtrot come down."
Without another word, the commander sprinted toward the walls. His movement was fluid—unnaturally so. He kicked off one wall, then another, vaulted to a pillar near the edge of the fence without stepping on the traps, and launched himself over it in a clean arc, vanishing into outside the gate.
The soldiers stood in silence for a moment, processing what they'd just seen.
Then Alpha turned to the others.
"Perimeter sweep. Don't let your guard down."
The red moon still watched from above.
And the night was far from over.