Chapter 1

Edinburgh

17^th September, 17:43

The black and white machine released its dull steam into the air.

Its warmth sucked into her nostrils as she stared at the display that flashed.

Dispensing…

A quiet line of other people queued behind her shoulders, but she never looked back. Their empty, muted eyes reflected on the sterilized glass of the vending machine right beside her.

So similar to hers.

The noise of each drop of liquid resounded in her ears, the loudest thing to stimulate her brain.

Drink ready for collection—the display flickered.

The cold air stiffened her fingers as she reached for the cup, grabbed her caffeinated water. Its warmth released some mobility in her hands, as the liquid bubbled inside the recycled paper, softening its edges.

She turned back, gazing right in front of her.

Not a word, not a breath out of place. She walked, strolled with steady pace alongside the pavement, passing by the orderly cars stuck in traffic. Worker ants following each other.

Not a single piece of rubbish around her feet as she descended down Leith Walk and entered Pilrig Park, completely indifferent to the stronger hues of black that enveloped the area. The persisting wind thrashed the branches of the high trees with its irregular gusts. Until raucous yelps replaced the roaring air, but she didn’t stop, didn’t alter her pace. She kept walking, stomping her boots against the pavement. The hoots grew to barks and squeals. A stray dog zoomed out of thick bushes, a rotten piece of meat dangling from its serrated jaws. Two more long-legged dogs chased the first one, cornered it and snapped at its body with their decaying teeth. The sound of ravenous barks and breaking bones replaced the wind and fallen leaves rubbing against the pathway. The biting continued until the first dog dropped the piece of meat on the ground and the other two scurried away with it, jumping at each other as they disappeared into the vegetation bordering the park. Limping, the wounded dog advanced towards her and slowly rested its chin on her boots, whining and murmuring. Its black fur was splashed with irregular, streaking patches that dripped down—they were liquid, but…

It wasn’t black.

It wasn’t white.

Or grey.

It was imbued with viscous tones that she had never seen before. The dog wiggled its tail in the air, its eyes shining, its breathing slowing down. Its head suddenly turned cold, still pressed against her solid feet.

She reached for her backpack, dragged some paper tissue from one of the pockets and crouched. Her black trousers were stained with that unusually coloured liquid, and she tried to wipe most of it away the best she could, like she always did to clean a spillage on her tiled kitchen floor. With a nudge of her foot she moved away the still animal from her path and resumed her walk home.

Her stomach rumbled.

Not long after, she reached her flat, where she immediately put her nutritious pre-packed meal in the microwave. She set the time and gazed at the rotating plate inside until it dinged and the light inside vanished. She snatched the foil container and sat on the couch, her body starting to crave energy after the long walk home. The TV news revolved on every channel as she mechanically chew the flat and squishy food that ran down her mouth with its revitalising proteins.

The fork slipped from her hands, dropping on the spotless carpet.

She lurched forward, moving her fringe out of the way as she reached for the cutlery on the ground.

Her gaze fell on her trousers—and her body froze.

The dark and sticky liquid that the dog had spread all over her legs clung to her trousers like a second skin. Its wide and shining pupils flashed behind her own eyelids, its marred and broken body revived in her memory.

Her chest constricted.

An unfamiliar drubbing spread within her body and overloaded her brain, pulsing within her sweating forehead: for the first time, she acknowledged the soundless muscle in her chest called heart.

Had the dog… died? Why had she just… watched?

She struggled to breathe, foaming at the mouth as she fought for much needed oxygen. Every object around her throbbed with eerie life, breaking through the black and white that had dominated her life with overwhelming tints. The marks on her trousers were not the only thing that looked different, now. She grabbed her long plait, its colour so similar to what she still fought to wash away from the textile on her legs by pouring her glass of water on it. The light point above her head now blinded her eyes, now blurred as they started leaking as never before. Hot, stinging, transparent: the liquid carved river lines on her pale cheeks, lingered on her lips. She dampened her fingertips and tasted them again and again with the tip of her tongue, unable to decide whether she liked it or not. The first thing to ever feel different in her mouth.

Her wrist pounded under the palpitations that spread through her body, burning thoughts marked her temples as her entire life until that night replayed itself.

A black plate on a familiar dark blue office door flashed through her vision, five letters radiated through the blur.

“Karen.”

Merely a word, a practical label. Or was it something more than just that? She whispered her name again and again until it lost all meaning or gained a new one. She couldn’t tell which.

“What if… it had been me?” Karen whispered, her memory going back to the dying dog.

The crush of that idea repulsed her, releasing a violent zapping through her abdomen that twirled her stomach, switched off her brain. She collapsed on the morbid carpet, slamming her face against it.

Her glued eyes reopened; her sense of time completely shattered. Karen struggled back onto her knees, wild twitches hunting her body. She staggered to her feet only to tumble back down, crouching on the floor, clutching her head with rigid hands. Itching to tear the hair off her scalp. Karen screamed and cried as the flat walls constricted her. She wobbled towards the kitchen, searching for something she couldn’t name herself. All she wanted was to end the roaring pain.

In a frantic rapture, she grabbed a shiny knife from the tidy oak counter and tightened her grip, squeezing the frigid handle against her fingerbones. She pointed its ridged end against her throat as the disarrayed memories of the earlier hours finally pieced together and the trenchant teeth pressed her jugular vein, ready to slit across it. The choking pressure made Karen linger a heartbeat too long. Her hand squeezed the handle one last time, before letting it go. The blade crashed on the laminate hard floor with a deafening thud. Her dinner surged up her oesophagus with no warning signs, eager to flood out of her mouth, carrying something else with it—an unrecognisable and irresistible hunger that had been asleep within her numb core. Karen didn’t understand why, but she sensed that the only thing that would have kept her alive through the night was another person’s touch. A realisation deeper than any other she had ever known. Perhaps it would have washed the pain away, released the tension in her chest, dried the cold sweat chilling her back. Calmed her heartbeat. Made her stable once again. And she didn’t know how, or why.

The harsh truth resurfaced once more, as the outcries in her head plunged into the purest silence. Her deep gasps were the only sound keeping her aware of her own presence—yet not even those could fill the hollowness inside her.

She needed someone. Someone she didn’t have.

This is an excerpt from “The Regressors” by Marco Zampilli. All rights reserved. Date of publishing for the full novel is TBD.

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