A face—one reminiscent of a certain teenage boy—was cast in a hard white, shell-like substance, face twisted in anger, with lines drawn deeper and bumps drawn out as ridges. It was also, I had to notice, larger across than an unfolded umbrella. A metal ring that reminded me of the external headwear for his braces stuck out of the mask and plunged into the side of his head, almost as if it was fixing the mask in place. Where his curly hair was usually pushed back by headphones, so hair was very close to head between brow and headphone band, the head of the form was striated slightly.

Definitely him.

He was big, built like a truncated caterpillar or tardigrade. His skin was translucent, but given the lighting, with only the loading bay below really lit, the translucence mostly meant that the inside seemed very dark and only the edges that had more material to catch the light really appeared as pale as they were.

With flight and an eye for timing things to avoid revealing myself to the people on the ground, I skipped about two hundred feet to get from my building to Cryptid’s.

A caterpillar with a giant head, some shell, and short limbs that I could now see were bristling with weapons. Claws and growths like barnacles surrounded the lower limbs, giving them a great deal of character compared to the expanses of translucent flesh.

He raised a clawed, barnacle-crested hand in greetings.

Discs mounted on his two frontmost shoulders flickered on.

Projections of Ashley and Rain.

Here with us in spirit? Or would they struggle through bad latency and being outside of Kenzie’s service area?

A masked Swansong walked with her hands clasped behind her back to get to the rooftop’s edge. Depending on how the light hit her, her hologram nature would be more or less apparent.

Precipice, short-haired and only wearing a machine mask over his face, stepped back and looked up at Cryptid.

“You’re one weird guy,” Precipice said.

Cryptid put a clawed hand out. It waggled in a so-so gesture.

“Cryptid,” I said. “You’re weird as fuck.”

He shook his head, made the gesture again.

“It’s not the weird part,” Precipice said. “He’s saying… iffy on the one? Or on the guy part.”

That last one got an affirmative nod from Cryptid.

Cryptid stretched, craning his body to one side. Translucent body distended, and insides pushed up against the skin.

In those insides, with the dim light, I could faintly make out dark shapes. Misshapen skulls with almost circular mask-like faces at the front filled whole tracts of his insides. Some had rings running through them like the greater form did, but at different angles and in different places. As I looked, the skulls moved.

Tiny hands pressed up against the sides of his tardigrade body. Dozens of them.