Special Entity Zero-One liked the cramped dark.

She had shed most of the meat she had accumulated in recent days. She was small, lithe, empty.

[ ...haTe... ]

The word popped like a bubble amidst her lonesome black. Because the worm was too powerful, and the worm coveted Special Entity Zero-One's treasure.

Blurb would have to find another. There was so much man-meat to be found. Perhaps she would even return to the man-thing's tower of stone. That was where she had found the first. Surely another could be found. Surely another would suffice...

And the thought produced such a wave of revulsion that Blurb spilled out, without thought, from the small crevice they had stuffed their black mass into. Unwilling tendrils formed and rippled with a violent confusion.

Because Blurb had changed, had grown. Even if the worm had evolved faster, Special Entity Zero-One scarcely recognized themselves anymore. And it was all because of that human.

[ wiLl noT... loooOooSe ]

The words roiled from the blackened slime of her flesh and filled the air with a noisome threat.

"What the..."

Blurb pounced on the noise. In fear and cowardice she had mindlessly slunk away. She hid within the chipped cracks of a wall like some middling insect, but now her purpose was clear. She would not be overwhelmed.

The human became loud and then quiet as Special Entity Zero-One took their meat. It filled her with a familiar strength. How could she have fled from the worm without-

But that [ waS wRoNg ]! The worm was powerful, too powerful. She could not make combat with them.

Blurb took the last of the human's meat, and then observed the room. She saw the open window she must have slid mindlessly in through. An apartment not much unlike the human's, and it filled her with a strangeness.

She found a small boy-child in one of the other rooms. Blurb took its meat and slid towards the windows with a new weight and a fresh purpose.

Much was still and silent below on the cobbled ways. No metal carriage neighed or roared with smoking black. No human skipped and sang into their small noisy blocks. But there was movement in the tower across from Blurb.

She had been seen. She could taste the red emotion that roiled off the distant human. More than one human pointed their hands and their small rectangles at Blurb from afar. How could she have been so careless? Because of the strangeness that rippled and thawed within her breast? She did not want to be seen. She did not know why she avoided their sight [ tHe maN-thiNgS aRe soO frAgiLe and wEt ], but still she-

And a rush of white elation filled the black of her tendrils. Because she knew what to do. Because she knew how to win back her treasure from that wretched worm.

A trail of black pus followed after Blurb as she fled from the human warriors. She filled the air with a pitiful wail, and delighted.

The warriors wore black robes and masks, the same dress as the ones that had tried to steal her treasure earlier. It had been easy enough to summon their black chariots of war. She had thrown a few humans out of their stone tower and their red flowers had called the warriors to their defense.

All she had to do now was lead them to the stench of that red-headed worm.

Blurb could have destroyed the warriors. They were so weak and their fire so tepid. But Blurb and the worm were not unlike one another. Neither wanted to be noticed by the man-things. As though pushed by an invisible hand, Blurb had spent much of her time in the shadows away from the human stare, and it had to be the same for that worm. It had to be even more so for that wretch who looked so horribly human.

The worm had somehow found peace amidst the humans, and Blurb would shatter it with the black tendrils of her hate.