Scene 1: Crimson Chapel (Present)
Moonlight bled through shattered stained glass, casting sainted eyes weeping blood on pews. Alyssa's severed finger twitched on the altar, oozing blood contested by mechanical maggots. She clutched the stolen pocket watch from Layne's lab—its inner lid engraved with the Kane family crest from three centuries past, gear fragments spilling with each tick.
"Louder than my heartbeat, this ticking." She gnashed the casing with fangs. The metal's vibration projected holograms: 15-year-old Layne knelt at the same altar, pre-mechanical spine, a priest's silver dagger at his fresh vampire brand.
"So you were sacrificial stock too." She crushed a maggot crawling into her wound, its azurite-dust corpse spelling 73 in proto-wolf numerals midair.
The altar flipped, revealing metal stairs entwined with umbilical cables. Each seventh step hung glass jars containing cloned Alyssa brains at various ages. The lowest jar bore bloodscript: Chrysalis Chamber - 73,000th Iteration.
Scene 2: Immortality Lab (Past - Layne's POV)
Oil lamps pinned adolescent Layne's shadow to sigil-covered walls like a speared bat. His silver manacles oozed pus, the priest's verdict echoing: "Vampire spawn fuel immortality engines."
In the corner, a copper incubation vat hummed. Through murky fluid, Wolf Mother's fetal specimen blinked at him—its missing pinky wrapped in metallic scales identical to Alyssa's.
"Old fool erred twice." Layne licked blood on manacles, gears first swirling in pupils. "First, silver can't kill me; second..." His spine clicked with mechanical grafts as chains snapped. "...vessels deserve tastier contents."
When he drowned the priest's head in the vat, fluid boiled. The fetus's eyes morphed into eclipse patterns. The wall clock chimed, its pendulum dropping a silver ring—the very one Alyssa would wear centuries later.
Scene 3: Memory Corridor (Timestream)
Alyssa collided with 20-year-younger Kane skinning a wolf. His flensing knife turned toward her: "Another replica?"
"Spare the act. You saw me in labs at ten." She flashed the watch reflecting Kane's mother being modified by Layne. "Playing righteous avenger?"
Memory collapsed. Alyssa plunged into incubation fluid, syncing senses with Wolf Mother's ancient fetus. She heard Layne's laughter outside, saw Kane's ancestor stuffing the watch into Wolf Mother's womb—its gears smelted from Alyssa's lanugo.
"Time's an ouroboros." Layne's present-day mechanical face emerged from fluid. "Gnawing its tail while..." His fingers pierced liquid to grip her newborn mechanical heart. "...feeding my game."
Scene 4: Chrysalis Core (Present/Past Collision)
Alyssa grasped umbilical cables in asphyxia, yanking a brainstem-connected metal chrysalis. Its surface showed Kane's alternate-timeline atrocity—injecting Moonflare into a Silverfang womb, "73" tattoo blooming on the fetus.
"Care package." Layne's voice leaked from chrysalis with recorder static. "Think he finds you by chance?" The pod split, spilling yellowed parchment: Specimen 73,000 Adoption Pact - Signed: K. Shadowclaw.
Moonflare raged not as phoenix but pocket watch. Alyssa lashed the pod with fiery chains, hearing Wolf Mother's ancient screams sync with Kane's present arrows. As the chrysalis melted, iron blood flooded her tongue—Layne's inaugural embrace droplet from her birth.