Story: 'Running With The Dead' Prologue.

The prologue to a story. What's more dead than a graveyard? A pack of degenerates.

"Still breathing?" Akira kicked Rin's boot, sending a clump of dried mud flying. Rin didn't flinch. He slumped against a crumbling granite headstone, eyes half-open and vacant, silver irises reflecting the overcast sky. His black hair tangled with damp grass where it touched the ground. He looked less like a person and more like a discarded mannequin someone propped up in the cemetery.

Alex traced the scars on his forearm through his dark red hoodie sleeve, watching Kota crouch beside Zion. Zion was meticulously arranging stolen prescription bottles into neat rows atop a cracked grave marker. "Doc upped my dosage," Zion muttered, dreadlocks brushing the cold stone as he sorted pills. "Said I seemed agitated." Kota snorted, adjusting his leather jacket. "Agitated? You nearly ripped that cop's throat out last week." Zion just grinned, flashing sharp canines.

Kota’s eyes flicked toward Rin. "He’s worse today." The stillness radiating from Rin felt heavier than the damp earth beneath them. No rise and fall of his chest, no twitch of his silver-chain belt in the wind. Only the faint scent of decay clung to him, masked poorly by wet soil and ozone. Akira nudged Rin’s boot again. "C’mon, corpse boy. We got business." Rin’s head lolled sideways, exposing the jagged bite mark beneath his jawline—old, deep, and unnervingly precise.

Alex crouched, pulling a switchblade from his ripped jeans pocket. He sliced his own palm open without flinching, letting thick blood well up. "Dinner’s served," he murmured, pressing the wound against Rin’s pale lips. Rin’s eyelids fluttered. A low, guttural swallow echoed in the silence as he drank, his hollow eyes flickering with something predatory and ravenous. Zion watched, blue eyes sharp. "Careful, Alex. You’re not on his menu *yet*."

Kota kicked aside a rotting bouquet. "We need to move. Cops are sniffing around the morgue thefts." He jerked his chin toward Rin. "And *he’s* the walking evidence." Rin’s silver chains jingled softly as he finally pushed himself upright, wiping Alex’s blood from his chin with a slow, deliberate swipe of his thumb. His movements were unnervingly fluid now, like a puppet jerked to life. "They won’t find anything," Rin whispered, voice like dry leaves scraping stone. "I buried the bones deep."

Akira’s wolf ears flattened against his messy red hair. "Deep ain’t deep enough if that new detective keeps poking." He pulled out a crumpled flyer – a grainy photo of a missing homeless man circled in red marker. Zion snatched it, his blue eyes narrowing. "This guy? Saw him near the train yard last night." He crumpled the paper. "Too late now."

Alex wrapped his bleeding hand in a strip torn from his hoodie sleeve, the dark fabric soaking through crimson. "Rin’s right." His voice was low, strained. "They got no proof. Just bodies that ain’t stayin’ buried." Rin tilted his head, a predator assessing prey. His silver eyes locked onto Kota. "You smell it too," Rin rasped. "Rot. Not earth. *New* rot." Kota’s nostrils flared. Beneath the damp soil and stolen pills, the faint, sweet stench of decomposition drifted from the woods bordering the cemetery.

Akira’s ears twitched violently. "Shit. That ain't right." He sniffed the air, hackles rising beneath his crop top. "Too fresh. Too... close." Zion crushed the stolen pill bottle in his fist, blue eyes scanning the treeline where the scent thickened—a cloying sweetness mixed with wet earth and something metallic. Kota shifted silently, one hand drifting toward the hunting knife hidden inside his leather jacket. "Not animal," he murmured. "Human decay. Recent."

Rin moved without sound. His spine-hoodie rustled faintly as he stood, silver chains clicking like teeth. He drifted toward the woods, drawn like a compass needle to true north. His steps left no imprint in the mud. *Asa.* The name echoed in his hollowed-out mind—a ghost of warmth in the cold static. Impossible. He’d buried Asa himself last winter beneath the weeping willow, deep where roots cradled bone. Yet the scent coiled around him, intimate as a lover’s whisper. Rotting jasmine and copper. His.

Akira lunged, grabbing Rin’s hoodie sleeve. "Stop, you idiot!" Rin didn’t turn. His silver eyes stayed fixed on the dripping pines. Zion hissed, "That smell’s bait, Rin. Tastes like trap." Alex flexed his bandaged hand, fresh blood blooming through the dark fabric. "Let him go. Whatever’s out there…" He bared his teeth. "It’s playing with *our* dead."

Rin slipped free like smoke. Mud didn’t cling to his boots. Branches didn’t snag his hair. He moved through the undergrowth soundless, drawn deeper by the sweet-rot perfume—jasmin and iron, unmistakably Asa’s. *Buried you,* he thought, the words brittle in his mind. *Beneath willow roots, wrapped in your red scarf.* Yet the scent thickened, pooling in hollows where last winter’s ice still lingered in shadowed pockets. His fingers brushed a carved symbol on an oak trunk—a crude wolf howling at a crescent moon. Asa’s mark. Fresh sap wept from the cuts.

Akira cursed, crashing after him. "Rin, stop! It’s a goddamn setup!" Zion flanked left, dreadlocks whipping as he vaulted a mossy tombstone, blue eyes scanning the tangled brush. Kota drew his knife silently, the leather of his jacket creaking. Alex pressed his bleeding hand against his hoodie, scenting the air—rot, jasmine, and beneath it all, the sharp sting of bleach. Wrong. All wrong.

There Asa was. It wasn't a trap after all. Not in the way they’d feared. Rin froze at the edge of a shallow ditch where rainwater pooled, reflecting the bruised sky. Asa lay half-submerged in the murk, propped against a rotting log. His skin was waxen gray, lips blue, but unnervingly intact. Someone had dressed him in clean clothes—the same red flannel Rin remembered burying him in. His eyes were open, milky and sightless, fixed on the canopy above. A single white jasmine blossom rested on his chest. Fresh.

Akira skidded to a halt behind Rin, breath ragged. "Holy hell." Zion crouched, dreadlocks brushing wet ferns as he sniffed. "No decomp. None." His voice cracked. "That ain't natural." Rin knelt in the muck, spine-hoodie pooling around him like spilled ink. His pale fingers trembled as they hovered above Asa's cheek—cold as river stone beneath the drizzle. "Wake up," Rin whispered, the words barely audible over the dripping leaves. Silver chains slithered against granite as he leaned closer, nostrils flaring at the jasmine-choked rot. "Asa. *Wake.*"

Alex shoved past Kota, bandaged hand dripping crimson onto moss. "Get back!" He yanked Rin's hoodie hard enough to tear the fabric. Rin didn't resist. His silver eyes stayed locked on Asa's waxy face, on the blossom's petals trembling in the wind. "He's... waiting," Rin murmured, head tilting like a confused hound catching a distant scent. Zion snatched the jasmine stem, crushing it. "Waiting for *what*, genius? His damn funeral part two?" Beneath the flower's stem, a puncture mark glistened on Asa's throat—tiny, precise, ringed in bruised purple. Fresh.

Kota crouched, knife tip tracing the puncture without touching skin. "No bite. Injection." His nostrils flared, catching the bleach beneath decay. "Someone dressed him. Planted him." Akira kicked the rotting log, sending splinters flying. "Who the fuck digs up corpses to play dollhouse?" Rin's pale fingers brushed Asa's frozen cheekbone, ignoring them. He curled against the corpse's side, spine-hoodie soaking up ditch water as he rested his head on Asa's stiff shoulder. Silver chains pooled in the mud like discarded entrails. "Wake... up," he breathed into the dead man's collar, the scent of jasmine and embalming fluid thick in his throat. His eyelids drifted shut, lashes clumped with rain. Comfort settled over him like grave dirt—warmth leaching from imagined breath into his hollow bones.

Zion grabbed Rin's hair, wrenching him backward. "Snap out of it!" Rin's head cracked against a root, silver eyes flashing open—ravenous and vacant. Alex slammed Zion against a pine trunk, forearm crushing his windpipe. "Touch him again," Alex snarled, bandaged hand dripping fresh blood onto Zion's white sleeveless shirt, "and I'll feed you to him piece by fucking piece." Zion choked, clawing at Alex's arm, blue eyes wide with fury. Pills scattered from his torn pocket, dissolving in the mud. The scent of rot and violence thickened, metallic as Alex's wound.

Rin rose like smoke. Mud slid off his spine-hoodie as he turned those hollow silver eyes on Zion. Unblinking. Waiting. Akira shoved between them, wolf ears flattened against his messy red hair. "Cool it! Both of you!" He jabbed a finger at Zion. "He's not your chew toy." Then at Rin, voice dropping low: "Stand down." Rin didn't move. His gaze stayed locked on Zion's throat—pulse hammering beneath brown skin. Akira knew that look. Rin would tear Zion apart if he whispered the word. One breath. One command.

Kota knelt beside Asa's corpse, ignoring the standoff. His knife tip lifted the red flannel collar, revealing neat stitches along the collarbone—too clean for grave dirt. "Someone opened him up," he murmured. "Emptied him out." Beneath the jasmine rot, the sharp chemical tang of formaldehyde clung to the fabric. Alex wiped his bleeding palm across his ripped jeans, eyes flickering between Rin's stillness and the corpse. "Why plant him here? For us to find?" Zion spat blood onto the moss, glaring at Alex. "Or for *him*?" He jerked his chin toward Rin, still statue-still. "Fresh bait for the hungry dog."

Rin's silver chains chimed softly as he took a step toward Asa. Not toward Zion, not toward conflict—back to the dead. His fingers twitched, craving the cold wax of that familiar skin. "Not bait," Rin breathed, the sound like wind through dry reeds. "Message." He crouched, spine-hoodie dragging in the mud, and plucked something small and metallic from beneath Asa's stiffened jaw—a surgical clamp, glinting silver against rot-gray skin. Someone had been inside him. Someone precise.

Kota's knife stilled. "What message?" Rin didn't answer. His pale thumb brushed the puncture wound on Asa's throat, smearing embalming fluid. Then his fingers traced lower, along the taut line of the dead man's neck. Beneath the collar's shadow, carved deep into cold flesh, were words. Cyrillic letters, stark and raw against waxy skin. Rin's breath hitched—a wet, rattling sound. His lips moved silently, forming the shapes.

He leaned closer, silver hair falling like a curtain. When he spoke, his voice was thick, the Ukrainian-British accent rougher than usual, vowels dragged low and consonants sharp as broken glass. "***'Знайди мене перш ніж я знову вмру.'***" The words hung heavy in the damp air. Zion froze mid-snarl. Alex’s bleeding hand clenched. Akira’s wolf ears swiveled forward. Even Kota looked up, dark eyes narrowed.

"Find me before I die again," Rin translated, the English flat and cold. His thumb traced the carved letters, smearing embalming fluid like ink. The Cyrillic cuts were deep, deliberate strokes beneath Asa’s jaw—not the jagged frenzy of a predator, but the steady hand of a surgeon. Or a butcher. The surgical clamp fell from Rin’s fingers into the mud with a soft *plink*.

He didn’t hesitate. Rin slid his arms beneath Asa’s stiff shoulders and limp waist, spine-hoodie soaking up ditch water as he pulled the corpse against his chest. The embrace was unnervingly tender—chin resting on Asa’s damp, lifeless hair, pale fingers splayed across the red flannel back. Rin’s eyes drifted shut, silver lashes brushing cold skin. He inhaled deeply, the scent of rotting jasmine and formaldehyde filling his lungs like poison. A low, shuddering sigh escaped him, almost a whimper. Comfort. This was comfort.

Akira’s breath hitched. "Jesus Christ, Rin—" Alex grabbed Akira’s arm, silencing him with a sharp shake of his head. Zion stared, blue eyes wide with disgusted fascination. Kota stayed crouched, knife loose in his grip, watching Rin’s face. The stillness stretched, broken only by the drip of rain from pine needles and the ragged rhythm of Rin’s breathing against dead flesh. Mud seeped into Rin’s jeans, cold and thick, but he didn’t shift. He held Asa like something precious salvaged from ruin.