Cover Artist: John Vanfleet
In the prison called Cog Hive Seven, there are many ways to die. If you aren't killed by a fellow prisoner during the normal course of the day, one day you're cell will be paired with another and only one prisoner emerges alive. One day, Zero, a prisoner who can find things, is approached by Waleed Nagma to help him get ahold of a bulb of Anzati snot garlic. Zero can sense Nagma's fear and agrees to get it for him. A week later Nagma's snot garlic arrives but when Zero delivers it he learns that Nagma is infested with a nasty parasite that feeds on blood, called a Syrox or the Wolf Worm of Monsolar. Nagma explains that he became infected as a child on Monsolar, and that thye gangster that hired him had promised to heal him. Unfortunately he was arrested before he could undergo the treatment and the parasite was getting big enough to come out on its own. The snot garlic bulb was a folk remedy; place it beside you when you go to sleep and the worm will come out in such a way as to spare the victims life. Several weeks later, Zero is told by a guard that there is a message for him. Following the guard, he finds Nagma convulsing on the floor as the worm is emerging. Nagma begs Zero to kill it, and he does so, saving Nagma's life. Nagma then wonders what will happen if he didn't get it all, if some is left inside. Two weeks later, Nagma is paired up in a deathmatch and doesn't make it, and on the video feed, Zero thinks he sees something come out of his mouth that isn't a tongue, and reflects for several years about the thought of there being a worm hiding in the walls, growing fat on the blood of the convicts that die in the fights.
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