(PARASYTE X WORM) CHAPTER FIVE

Taylor tried to act like nothing had happened.

It didn’t work.

She made it through school the same way she always did, head down, attention split between where she was going and who might be watching, but everything felt… off. It wasn't obvious, nothing she could point to if someone asked. Just a feeling of wrongness that sat under everything else.

Her right hand didn’t help.

It stayed still. It rested on her desk, held her pen, and brushed against paper like it always had. If anyone had looked at it, they wouldn’t have seen anything strange. She knew better.

Every so often, she’d catch herself staring at it instead of whatever the teacher was writing on the board, waiting for it to move on its own, to split open again and prove she hadn’t imagined it. It never did. It just… stayed there, ordinary in a way that felt almost intentional.

By the time the final bell rang, her head hurt. She left quickly, slipping out with the rest of the students and then away from them, taking turns without really thinking about where they led. The walk home blurred together, more habit than decision.

Her dad was in the kitchen when she got back.

He looked up immediately, like he’d been waiting for the sound of the door.

“Taylor,” he said as soon as she stepped inside, something careful in his voice. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

She didn’t stop, didn’t give him the chance to ask anything that might require more than that. She could feel his attention follow her as she moved past, and could almost hear the questions lining up behind it. She kept going anyway, heading straight for the stairs.

“Taylor—”

“I’m fine,” she said, a little too fast, already halfway up. “Just tired.”

And it wasn’t even a lie.

He didn’t answer right away, and she didn’t wait to see if he would.

Her room felt the same as she’d left it. Messy in small, familiar ways. Safe, if she didn’t think too hard about what that meant anymore. She shut the door behind her and let her bag slide off her shoulder, not bothering to aim as she tossed it aside. It hit the floor with a dull thud somewhere in the corner and stayed there.

For a second, she just stood there. Then she sighed and crossed the distance to her bed.

The mattress creaked softly under her weight as she sat, back pressing against the wall, legs drawn up slightly without her thinking about it, putting distance between her and the rest of the room. Or at least it felt like it did, giving her some sense of control.

Slowly, Taylor raised her right hand.

It looked normal, exactly the same as it always had. Pale skin, faint lines across her palm, and the small marks and imperfections she usually paid attention to in the mirror.

Her fingers curled, then straightened, and she turned her hand slightly, watching the way the light hit it, searching for anything out of place.

There was nothing.

She flexed her hand again, staring at it like she could force something to happen just by refusing to look away. After all, she knew what she had seen.

That hadn’t been a dream. It hadn’t faded the way dreams did when you tried to hold onto them. It had stayed vivid in a way that made it impossible to dismiss completely, no matter how much she might have wanted to.

Taylor swallowed, her throat dry.

“I know you’re there,” she said, her voice quieter than she intended. It still sounded too loud in the room, strange even. “What are you?”

Nothing.

Doubt crept in. Maybe that was it. That maybe it wouldn’t happen again. That maybe—

Her skin shifted.

It started small, almost subtle, a ripple beneath the surface that might have gone unnoticed if she hadn’t been staring directly at it. Then it spread, her hand moving in a way that had nothing to do with muscles or joints, the shape of it loosening and reforming as something pushed outward.

Taylor’s breath hitched.

The back of her hand split without any blood, a smooth, almost natural and quick parting that she couldn’t really track. An eye formed first, glossy and dark, blinking once as if adjusting to the light.

Her stomach dropped, but she didn't look away.

She couldn’t.

A mouth followed, forming along the back of her palm, stretching slightly as if testing itself. One of her fingers elongated, thinning and bending until it resembled a smaller hand, twitching once before settling.

It was the same thing she had seen before.

Her vision wavered, a wave of dizziness threatening to pull her under, but she held on, her focus locked onto it with a kind of stubborn insistence. If she passed out, she would wake up to it anyway. So it was better to see it. 

The thing finished… forming, for lack of a better word. It stilled after that, the eye turning toward her, the mouth widening once before settling into something almost neutral. 

Taylor swallowed again. The thing was actually looking at her. 

She forced air into her lungs, her chest tight with the effort.

“Hello,” her hand said.