I stepped out of the block and surveyed the scene. From my position atop the slight hill, the junction of Gambas Avenue and Yishun Avenue 7 stretched out below, eerily silent. A shiver ran down my spine, but I forced myself to breathe deeply, steadying my racing thoughts.

  The map that had appeared earlier in my mind was gone. Just like that.

  But I didn’t need it. I knew this route well.

  "No time like the present." I said to the night air.

  I stepped onto Gambas Avenue and began the hour-long walk home.

  The first half of the walk passed uneventfully. I kept to the right side of the two-lane road, hugging the center divider, wary of the overgrown vegetation and open spaces to my left.

  Before tonight, this highway had been ordinary. Trees and the occasional factory on either side, regular traffic traveling up and down the four-lane highway. Now, it looked devoured. Trees and shrubs had exploded in growth, intertwining so densely their branches reached across the lanes, merging into a living canopy above. The four lanes beneath my feet were now a shadowed tunnel, the moonlight barely piercing through the tangle.

  Moss crept over broken asphalt as roots heaved the road in places. Vines draped like green curtains from above. This was a four-lane highway turned jungle corridor, as if the city had been reclaimed in a single impossible night.

  The streetlamps still worked, their pale glow revealing pockets of cracked asphalt. In some areas the road had vanished under growth, with jagged sinkholes leaking faint wisps of gas that hung like mist.

  I’d picked up a fallen branch at the start, part walking stick, part weapon. It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing. My Tee-shirt, jeans, and jogging shoes felt woefully inadequate. I was severely underdressed for whatever this world had become.

  For the past few minutes, I couldn’t shake the feeling I wasn’t alone. Something moved alongside me in the jungle to my left, quiet but deliberate.

  Tracking me.

  Every so often I stole a glance into the green mass, but the overgrowth was impenetrable. Only the rustle of leaves betrayed the movement.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Then they dropped in front of me.

  It took a heartbeat to make sense of what I was seeing. Two creatures had landed hard on the road, as if falling from the woven canopy above. They were short creatures, maybe four feet tall but wrong. They had extra arms and extremely long tails.

  It was macaques. Or at least, they used to be. These were long-tailed macaques twisted by something unnatural. Their jaws hinged wider than they should, teeth flashing as they howled. The sound was closer to a howler monkey’s guttural roar than any macaque’s screech. Their tails curled high like cobras ready to strike, and where there should have been two arms, there were four, two sprouting grotesquely from their backs.

  I froze, every instinct screaming to run, but behind me came more rustling. More bodies dropping to the road. Keeping my eyes on the pair in front, I turned slightly, backing toward the center divider and putting my back against a wall. Two more landed behind me, spreading out, their back-arms gesturing as they howled.

  They were surrounding me. Coordinating.

  I had a split second to choose to vault the divider into the jungle on the other side or stand and fight. The choice was taken from me. The one on my right lunged on all fours, howling as it leapt toward me. I stepped into its path and swung the branch like a baseball bat, catching it square in the face. It crashed to the side, dazed but not dead.

  I shuffled back until my spine hit the concrete divider. The other three shrieked and surged forward. I ducked as the first slammed a hammer-fist down on me. I swung low, cracking its legs. It stumbled, but its back-arms lashed out, seizing my shirt and yanking me down. The others piled on, raining blows across my back.

  I dropped the branch, one arm shielding my neck while the other clawed at the grip on me. Hot pain streaked across my back. My shoulder cracked under the weight. Through the blur I caught the first one I’d hit climbing back up, eyes burning red as it moved to rejoin the attack.

  This was it. This was how I die. Beaten to death by mutated monkeys on a dead highway.

  I collapsed, their strength overwhelming me. I tried to roll, only to feel a rib snap under a savage kick. Breath fled my lungs. The blows kept coming, heavy and relentless, as the jungle tunnel closed in around me like a nightmare.

  A heavy thud cracked the air to my left. Through the haze of pain, I glimpsed one of the creatures collapsing, its skull neatly cleaved open. The top half was gone, glistening brains slipping out in a slick crimson mess.

  The others froze for a heartbeat, then howled in rage, their attention snapping from me to something else.

  In that brief respite, I realized my entire back, from my shoulders to my legs, were soaked in blood. My limbs were numb. I couldn’t move my head. With my cheek pressed against the asphalt, I caught flashes of movement too fast to follow, steel glinting in the dim light. A figure. Someone was there. And in their hands… was that a katana?

  The creatures lunged at the newcomer, snarling, but the blade met them faster. Another spray of blood as another howl was cut short.

  My vision narrowed to a tunnel of pain and chaos. The last thing I saw before darkness claimed me was a severed monkey arm landing on the road beside my face, warm blood spattering across my cheek.