The pull was stronger now, no longer a vague pressure at the edge of his awareness but something he could track with intent.
Subtle shifts guiding him through turns and intersections as he moved deeper into the collapsing edges of the city, the viable location still ahead but no longer the only objective occupying his focus.
He wasn't just passing through anymore, he was hunting.
The ute rolled to a controlled stop near the edge of a small intersection where movement had already begun to break down into scattered incidents.
Not full collapse yet but enough to create pockets of instability that most people were either avoiding or misreading entirely, the kind of environment where hesitation got you killed and decisiveness created opportunity.
Arty stepped out with the wrench already in hand, his movements efficient and deliberate, his attention locked onto the source of the pull just ahead where a figure stumbled near a parked car.
This one wasn't fully turned yet far enough along that there was no hesitation left in him.
He closed the distance quickly, his footing steady, his breathing controlled, his focus narrowing to the single action that mattered.
The first strike landed clean, the second confirmed it, the body dropped and stayed down.
Arty crouched immediately, his hand moving toward the head with none of the hesitation from before.
Pushing through resistance with practiced intent as he extracted the crystal in one smooth motion, the sensation already familiar, already expected, already part of the process.
One more.
Not enough.
Never enough.
The pull shifted again, subtle but clear now that he understood it, guiding him toward another source nearby.
He stood, turned, and moved without delay.
A second figure.
Handled the same way.
Then a third.
Each one faster than the last, his movements tightening into something efficient and repeatable, the rhythm building into a loop that no longer relied on instinct but on execution.
Strike.
Confirm.
Extract.
Move.
There was no panic in it now, no hesitation driven by uncertainty, just process, clean and controlled, the kind of repetition that turned survival into something closer to strategy.
And that was when he heard it.
"HEY!"
The shout cut through everything sharply, human in a way that stood out against the growing noise of collapse.
Not panicked or confused but commanding, structured, something that belonged to a world that hadn't fully accepted what was happening yet.
Arty turned.
A police vehicle had pulled up at the edge of the intersection, lights flashing without a siren, two officers already stepping out.
Their posture tense but controlled as they took in the scene in front of them, bodies on the ground, Arty standing over one of them, wrench in hand, blood where it shouldn't be.
From their perspective, there was no context.
"Drop it and put your hands up where we can see them!" one of them called out, his hand already resting on his weapon, his stance firm but not yet escalated to full engagement.
Arty didn't move immediately, not out of defiance but out of calculation, because this hadn't happened before, not like this, not at this point in the loop, and that meant it mattered.
"You don't understand," he said, his voice level, controlled, not raising it or stepping forward, just holding position as the situation balanced on a knife edge between order and collapse.
"Drop the weapon!" the officer repeated, sharper now, the second already shifting slightly to the side to create an angle, their training taking over even as the environment around them began to unravel.
"They're not people anymore," Arty said, gesturing briefly toward the bodies without breaking eye contact. "You need to leave."
"That's not your call," the first officer snapped. "Drop the weapon get on your knee's and put your hands up."
Movement flickered behind them, not subtle and not slow, one of the bodies they hadn't fully registered beginning to move again, not fully down, not fully stable, but enough.
Arty saw it immediately.
They didn't.
"Behind you," he said.
"On the ground!" the officer barked.
Too late.
The figure lunged, fast and uncontrolled, closing the distance in a way that broke the structure of the interaction instantly.
The second officer reacted first, turning just in time to intercept, but the engagement wasn't clean, wasn't controlled, the struggle immediate and messy as the situation collapsed from procedure into chaos.
"Jesus—!"
Arty moved.
Not toward the officers.
Toward the problem.
The wrench came down hard and precise, ending the movement before it could escalate further, the body dropping fully this time as the officer stumbled back, breathing hard, his composure cracking as reality caught up with him.
For a moment, everything held.
Arty's eyes dropped briefly to the body at his feet, not out of curiosity but recognition, the same pull still present, faint but unmistakable, even now, even here, even with a weapon trained on him.
The crystal was still inside it.
He hesitated, not because he didn't know what to do rather because he knew exactly how it would look.
"Don't even think about it," the officer said, catching the shift in his posture, the warning immediate, sharp, and very real.
Arty didn't look up, didn't argue, didn't bother to explain, because explaining didn't matter, time was all that mattered.
The pull didn't fade, it strengthened, with that decided he moved.
Fast.
Not aggressive.
Not toward them.
Down.
His hand drove into the skull with practiced precision, ignoring the reaction behind him as he forced through resistance, found the point, and pulled.
"HEY—!"
Too late.
The crystal came free.
Small.
Dull.
Real.
Arty stood immediately, stepping back before the officers could close the distance, his expression unchanged as he held their gaze, the object already gone from sight.
"You're wasting time," he said.
Then the first officer's weapon came fully up.
"DON'T MOVE!"
Arty froze, not because he was afraid, but because he understood exactly how this looked and exactly how it would be interpreted.
"You just saw it," he said, keeping his voice steady. "That's what's happening everywhere."
The officers didn't respond immediately, their world still catching up, still trying to reconcile what they had just seen with what they believed should be happening.
"What the hell are they?" the second officer said, his voice shaken, his focus split between the body and Arty.
The radio on the officer's shoulder crackled suddenly, loud enough to cut through the moment, distorted voices bleeding through in fragments that carried more urgency than clarity.
"—multiple reports—"
"—attacks—unconfirmed—"
"—units respond—no, DO NOT—"
"—they're biting—Jesus Christ—"
The officer flinched slightly, his attention splitting for the first time as the structure he relied on began to fracture in real time, the chain of command dissolving into noise and contradiction.
"…what the hell is going on," he muttered, more to himself than anyone else.
Arty didn't answer.
Because the system already had.
"Infected," Arty said. "Or something like it. It doesn't matter. What matters is that you can't handle it like normal."
"That's enough," the first officer cut in, but the certainty was gone now, replaced with hesitation that hadn't been there before.
Arty shifted slightly, not forward, not aggressive, just enough to reposition, the pull still present, still guiding, still reminding him that time was moving whether they acted or not.
"I'm not your problem," he said. "This is."
Another scream echoed from further down the street, followed by another, closer this time, the sound carrying enough urgency to fracture the moment completely.
The second officer glanced toward it, then back at Arty, then at the body on the ground, his hesitation deepening as the situation expanded beyond what they could control.
That was enough.
Arty stepped back once, slow and deliberate, then turned and moved, not running, not rushing, just leaving.
The officers didn't stop him, not because they trusted him, but because they didn't have the capacity to decide what he was yet, and that uncertainty was the only thing keeping him out of cuffs.
He reached the ute and got in without looking back, the engine turning over smoothly as he pulled away.
The intersection already breaking apart behind him as more movement spread, more noise, more signs that whatever order remained wasn't going to hold for much longer.
He drove in silence for several seconds, the weight of what had just happened settling in without needing to be processed immediately.
"That's going to be a problem," he said.
[Confirmed]
The road stretched ahead of him again, but it didn't feel the same as it had minutes earlier, the interaction replaying in the back of his mind not as regret but as analysis, every decision broken down, every outcome weighed against what he had gained and what it had cost him.
He hadn't been wrong.
That much was clear.
But he also hadn't been invisible anymore.
And that changed things.
He tightened his grip slightly on the wheel.
"Not just them."
[Confirmed]
[Human threat variables increasing]
Arty's eyes flicked slightly, not surprised, just confirming what he had already started to suspect.
"Define."
[Non-system individuals may display unpredictable behaviour under stress conditions]
[System users may prioritise progression over cooperation]
He absorbed that quietly, the implication settling in without needing to be spelled out further.
"So I'm not the only one thinking like this."
[Confirmed]
That didn't feel like reassurance.
Of course not.
Because if law enforcement was still active now, then so were other people, and not all of them were going to hesitate the way those officers just had.
Arty exhaled slowly.
"Good," he muttered.
Because pressure meant one thing, he wasn't the only one adapting and that meant this wasn't going to stay simple for long.