Rejected by the Alpha, Claimed by the Beast
"What are you?"
The woman’s eyes didn't blink. They glowed with the intensity of a dying star. "I am the Witness," she said. Her voice was no longer the sharp, corporate snap of an auditor. It was a chorus of a thousand whispers, layered and ancient. "And I am the bridge. The Aethel-Group thought they could use me to balance their books, but they forgot that every auditor eventually finds a debt that cannot be paid."
She set us down on a piece of jagged concrete. Around us, the wasteland was silent. The "Real World" was a graveyard of twisted steel and gray dust. There were no birds. There was no wind. Just a heavy, stagnant air that tasted like the end of everything.