**Chapter 64: Metal, Blood, and Old Names**
The blood sky no longer bothered to pulse.
It simply watched.
---
**Coastal Highway – Cyprus**
Jordan Pitas never saw the Beast of Gévaudan until it was already on him.
One moment the road was empty under the red light. The next, a massive wolf-shaped thing of black fur, burning eyes, and too many teeth tore out of the treeline. It hit the car like a truck. Metal screamed. Jordan was dragged halfway out of the driver's seat before he could draw his weapon.
The Beast tore his arms off at the shoulders.
Then his legs.
Then it opened his throat with one casual swipe.
Rodriguez Hernandez, still standing beside the stolen tank, vanished.
Complete invisibility. No shimmer. No outline. Just absence.
Jordan's blood soaked the asphalt. His necklace — a dull, forgotten Glimmer shard he had worn since childhood — flared with sudden white light. The light screamed for metal.
Old car parts, broken guardrails, rusted engine blocks, and shattered chassis tore themselves free from the roadside and the wrecked vehicle. They slammed into the stumps of Jordan's limbs and the open wound at his neck, fusing with wet, mechanical finality. Sparks and blood mixed. When the light faded, Jordan Pitas rose on hydraulic legs of scavenged steel, arms of pistons and twisted chrome, a reinforced metal collar sealing his throat. One optic glowed red. The other remained human and furious.
The Cyborg Policeman looked at the Beast of Gévaudan and spoke in a voice that ground like gears.
"You're under arrest."
He charged.
---
**Safehouse – Industrial District**
Jackson and Bangu had turned the place upside down twice.
Sally was gone.
No blood trail. No signs of struggle. Just an empty cot and the lingering smell of iron. Jackson's mist curled in tight, frustrated loops. Bangu punched a wall hard enough to leave a crater.
"She's not running," Bangu said. "Something took her."
Jackson didn't answer. He was already scrolling the satellite feeds Bane had shared, looking for any new signature that felt like Sally's blackouts.
---
**Abandoned Subway Platform – Aftermath**
Kevin and the others had barely begun to stabilise Zayelle when her eyes snapped open again — pure white, no pupil.
She did not transform this time.
She simply exhaled.
A wave of cold, invisible force rolled outward. Every Guardian still standing felt it hit their bones like frostbite. Muscles locked. Joints screamed. Kevin's Matrix flared in panic as something inside his body tried to rewrite itself. Wyatt dropped the broken pipe and clutched his chest. Hercules went to one knee, bronze light flickering. Blessing's Magitech circuits shorted in painful sparks. Neo and Zane collapsed, coughing blood. Steve blurred three steps and then face-planted as his speed turned against him.
Zayelle's voice came out layered and distant.
"Bodies are just messages. I'm editing the text."
Then she slumped again, unconscious, leaving them all on the floor, bodies wrong, systems failing, still alive only because the messenger had decided not to finish the sentence yet.
Bangu and Jackson arrived two minutes later to find the entire strike team broken and twitching on the tiles.
---
**Guardians Headquarters – Arrival Bay**
Koa and Lucifer Jr. were still debriefing when the air pressure changed.
R. Dogder stepped through a side door like he owned the building. Messy brown hair. Same sharp face. A massive blaster fused directly into the veins of his right arm, pulsing with his heartbeat, blood and energy feeding the weapon in a continuous loop.
Koa's animal spirits exploded outward. The True Beast form started to rise with a roar that shook the bay.
Mieczysław Piezyrc, the Guardsman, moved faster than anyone expected. He planted himself directly in front of Koa, one hand raised.
"No. He is an ally."
Koa's many eyes glared. "He tried to end the world."
The Guardsman's accent stayed calm. "I went to the Gate of Hell after Ivan escaped. I found him there. He knows how to kill the Beast of Gévaudan. And he brought information we need."
R. Dogder smiled without warmth. "Also, the Hellhound Tobias is alive. And so is Gabriel — your cousin, Junior. They're both moving under the red sky."
Lucifer Jr.'s expression went very still.
---
**Willowbrook High – Counselor's Office**
Ignis and Lancelot watched the school counselor's eyes change mid-sentence.
Jennifer the body jumper had found a new home. The previous host — the janitor — dropped like a puppet with cut strings, completely empty.
Lancelot moved without hesitation, dragging the dead janitor's body into a side room.
Ignis stared. "Are you crazy?"
Lancelot didn't look up. "No. I'm mentally ill, dumbass. There's a difference." He checked the corpse. "Zero blood left. She's not just jumping. She's feeding. Draining them dry when she leaves."
Ignis's flames flickered. "Then we need the genes from her previous bodies. If we can map whatever she's doing—"
"We're not geneticists."
"Then we find one."
---
**Northern Forest → Headquarters**
Nathan, Vera, Bane, and Thor arrived at base with the unconscious green alien floating between them in a containment field. The moment they stepped into the bay and saw R. Dogder, Bane's hand went to a weapon.
"Easy," Thor said, already grinning. "If we're killing the clone bastard again I want front-row seats."
Bane's voice was ice. "He doesn't get to walk in here."
Before the argument could finish, the scene cut back to the nest.
Grug, Korg, and Lovelady had stayed behind. Lovelady sat very still, golden eyes distant.
"I feel them," the Frogman said softly. "All the seeds. The ones still sleeping. The ones that are afraid. The ones that are hungry."
Grug's head tilted. Deep beneath the soil came the faint sound of gears turning.
They followed it.
A hidden lab opened under the nest — rows of glass wombs, each containing a human body fused with growing Monster Seeds. Some hosts were still breathing. Most were not. Korg floated closer, tentacles recoiling.
"This… is not good."
---
**Carpathian Threshold – Cave**
Hemostro crawled.
He did not get far.
The real Dracula — the White Vampire — stood over him with Ri Kwon Jae and Lupin at his sides. Dracula reached down, lifted the imposter by the throat, and bit deep. He drank until Hemostro's body sagged, the Blood Amulet clattering uselessly to the stone.
Lupin stepped in before the final swallow. "We might need this fool."
Dracula's crimson eyes narrowed, but he released the half-drained body.
Lupin crouched. "Where is Keisha?"
Hemostro's voice was a wet rattle. "She has… Mr. Dudley… Ahhhh… she will… open… the gate… I…"
He passed out.
---
**Multiple Fronts**
On the coastal road, the newly forged Cyborg Policeman Jordan Pitas slammed into the Beast of Gévaudan with metal limbs and borrowed rage, chasing the ancient wolf under the blood sky.
At headquarters, R. Dogder spoke while medics worked on the broken strike team.
"The Beast of Gévaudan started as a normal animal in the 1700s. Something old and hungry wore it like a coat. The blood sky has given that coat back. It can be killed — but only with the right kind of ending."
In a different dark place, Ivan and his resurrected crew (plus Lycer in husky form) stood over a singing cage that held the original Lucifer. Ivan's voice was soft.
"First we kill the Rampager boy. Then we decide what to do with the rest of the board."
From inside the cage, Lucifer's voice drifted out, dry and venomous.
"You always did sing better than you thought, little Siren. Shame the only song you know is failure."
The blood sky listened to every conversation at once and, for the first time, seemed to smile.
**End of Chapter 64**