You wander the derelict city. It is, as far as you can tell, bereft of life. Not a human, nor even an animal, stirs in Seattle's dead streets. A surge of relief washes over you when at last you spot a small spider scuttling into a hole in a broken wall.
And yet, is the city truly deserted? From time to time you hear a chittering insect noise, first from one direction and then another. The cause of this noise remains out of sight. So you walk on, directionless, wary, the tedium and isolation grinding away at your morale.
"Help me…"
In the stillness of the city, this sudden cry makes you jump. It is a man's voice, and it is followed by a long moan of pain. Lacking any other firm route, you move toward this voice.
You find its owner lying slumped against a broken wall. He is young, even handsome—yet he is also in evident agony. He seems to be in mid-transformation; a chitinous black carapace has sprouted over parts of his body and one side of his face. As you approach, he screams out in pain—and with a sickening crunch, his left elbow dislocates and stretches out, the arm elongating a good two and a half inches. The fingers on that hand become knife-like claws. Then he notices you nearby. "Please…you have to help me…" As he speaks his right leg, gashed open and bloody, seems to fade away and then reappear.