Petre had been shot.

He had smiled and waved. He had offered a hearty hello, and men with long rifles had shot him over and over. His arms felt leaden, and his heart ached with the c̸r̵u̸e̷l̸t̶y of man.

"I suppose we should restrain him," his bearded assailant said from over him.

"Restrain a corpse?" another man said in answer. "You don't really believe what those KSC goons said."

"Just help me with his legs," the bearded man said, and he knelt over Petre. "And yes. I do believe what that those Kurtsk blackcoats said."

"Unforg̴i̴v̵a̷b̶l̶e," Manya hissed from within Petre's right eye. "To hurt big brOotHer."

"Eh?"

The world was a red haze as Petre watched Manya emerged from her roost. The bearded man stumbled out of his sight, but Petre still heard the wet squelch as she took a bite. He felt the red rush of nutrients fill and heal him.

"Fiiiinally!" Manya cried out, and a terrible strength coursed through Petre's body like a drug as she feasted.

The other man cried out (He sounded like a thirteen-year-old girl who saw an icky spider), and Petre's body jerked towards him from the weight of Manya's attack.

Distant cracks filled the air, and Petre felt the bullets explode into his body. But he did not fall. Manya, a rope of flesh dimly connected to his right eye, chewed and chewed, and with each mouthful Petre's body seemed to harden.

"Pesky little rats," Manya said as one of the car windows beside them shattered from a stray bullet. She was a mass of teeth connected to a tendril of red flesh. "Cuz? Are you awake, cuz?"

"A-awake?" Petre was distracted by the two lumps of flesh at his feet (Not much unlike the hamburger one bought at the butcher). They had been human once. He had watched their transformation, and it tickled some distant part of his thoughts.

"Ugh!" Manya's noise was full of derision.

Once more his body was yanked away. She pulled him towards the cover of a vehicle. She had bit down on its metal and reeled him towards her like a fish while the bullets continued to ring out around them.

The haze over his thoughts vanished as Manya bit down hard on his leg.

"H-hey!" Petre cried, and he felt his cuz retreat back into his right eye.

"They're trying to kill you," Manya said. "I need you to get me closer to them. You don't have to do anything. I just need you to get me close to them, and I'll do the rest."

"So you can e-eat them?" His eyes wandered over to the two bearded men. Dead now.

"So that I can protect you," Manya hissed, and he felt her crawl impatiently from within his right eye. "So we... we can protect those little wretches of yours."

The words hit Petre with a physical weight. He had left Blurb and the children farther back, safe in their distance. He tried to look for them, but Kharyov was surrounded by rolling hills and trees.

"Yes," Manya said, her voice suddenly strange. "Those men. They want to destroy the incubator. They want to set her on fire and watch her burn. And they're going to unless- "

"I won't let them!" Petre said in a mad panic. Because Blurb was his treasure. He could not allow anyone to harm her. And the children. They were not human, but they deserved a mother all the same.

[ t̸h̶E̸n̶ ̵g̴e̶E̴t̶ ̶m̵e̸E̴ ̸c̷L̵O̴o̴o̸s̷e ]

Manya's words dripped with hunger, but Petre could not deny her.

He rose from the cover of the car and a distant crack announced another bullet. Manya burst from his eye and caught the murderous metal between her teeth centimeters away from his forehead.

"Go!" she shouted, and Petre started to run.

The road outside Kharyov was full of abandoned cars, and he struggled to weave between them. They made a small maze (Made all the harder because of the gunmen aiming for his head).

Two SUVs blocked his path, and Petre's impatience flared.

With a strength and athleticism unknown to him, Petre felt his calves swell with strength and then he leapt over the would-be barricade. He had offered no thought to the landing, however, and soon tasted the metallic tang of another car's back bumper. His face left a small dent, but the pain soon flashed away.

"Don't stop!" Manya said. "Get closer!"

Petre followed the noise of gunfire, his body awash with a nervous sweat, and soon arrived at the first set of buildings. He saw men and women both, some with rifles and pistols and some without, but he offered them little attention.

Manya erupted from his eye, a thread of muscled flesh and swollen teeth, and she bit into the brick wall of the three-story building in-front of them. Petre's mind went blank as he felt her whip him into the air, and then his feet were flailing and the world spun beneath him.

Another crunch and Manya continued to bite into the brick wall. Petre's stomach cried out in distress as he almost crashed through a closed window (Instead he was just smashed into the hard brick beside the window). Manya showed no concern for his aches. She whipped him even further up the building, and then he saw the gunmen.

There were three atop the building's flat roof. They cradled enormous rifles whose barrels smoked with murderous hate. The three men turned to one another in complete shock, and then Petre started to fall.

The gunmen tried to flee towards a distant stairwell entrance, but Manya was too fast. She shot out from Petre's right eye like an arrow, and he was reeled towards the closest of the three men.

Petre slammed into the husky man, and he flew off the rooftop in a mangled scream.

The two other men had reached the stairwell door, but in their panic could not open it.

Petre closed his left eye as Manya dragged him across the roof, her teeth full of slather. He felt a rush of life fill his stomach as she reached their assailants. His aches burned away as the rooftop filled with the cries of man and the delightful hunger of a monster.