Permafrost wasteland, forty degrees below zero.
Amy has been tracking a snow leopard hybrid for three days and nights.
Lying prone on an icy cliff, she freezes at what she sees through her scope:
The monster is gently wiping the glass of a cryogenic pod with its mutated claws.
Inside lies a man who has been asleep for twenty years.
The monster turns around. Two words rasp from its throat: “...Si... Si...”
The pod pops open, and the man grabs Amy by the ankle. “Where’s Zero?”
Only later does she learn that this man, named Sima Si, carries within him the evolutionary code of Earth’s four billion years.
The monster guarding him was once a human named Lin Feng.
And the fate of the entire world rests on whether he can hold on to the last of his humanity.
The Mother Nest whispers in his ear: “Become a god, or remain human?”
Amy wraps her arms around him as he loses control and kisses him fiercely. “Stay human for me!”
My cells betray me every minute. Loving you is the only code at my core.
