Merrin watched over Chuck from afar so as to not alert the government drone of his existence. From the drone’s perspective, she had been making random loops around the water purification plant for the last day.

  In that time, she had made sure to call out for Chuck as if she was hoping to find him there. The team that had tried to escort her back had not confronted her yet, so there was a good chance they were on orders to watch her movements until further notice.

  Merrin extended her life pulse's sense range and cursed her limited resonance with the Hypnosite. She had to be within ten yards of Chuck in order to watch him. That was far too close for comfort.

  Right now, Chuck was beside the dumpster outside of the water plant. He’d recently awoken from his Chrysalis and started eating as much as the Changed Raccoon’s brain as he could manage.

  Merrin shivered at the feel of Chuck’s active life pulse. Nobody else felt so focused, so coldly passionate about the goal in front of them. Only Chuck gave his full attention to his goals, even in such a diminished mental state, he was still the most incredible person.

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  Chuck finished off the brains and returned to his Chrysalis state, still inside of the raccoon’s head.

  Merrin needed to find more nutrition for Chuck; Preferably some sort of grey matter that would help him regain intelligence and his memories. Merrin shied away from the act of killing something directly. It was one thing to manipulate others into killing someone, but she shuddered at the thought of using her own hands to do it. She peeked over at the drone and wondered if she could get them to kill some Changed if she made an act of running away from some. All she needed was a human brain to help boost Chuck’s development.

  That was when it hit her. She was going to kill two birds with one stone. Merrin knew where to find a human brain that was perfectly intact and wouldn’t fight back. She darted into the Water Plant and back into the lab where she knew her old human body was lying. It was probably dying of thirst with nobody tending to it, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was the brain still being intact.

  Merrin set to dragging her human body to the dumpster and made a show of cursing it out and throwing it inside the dumpster which was not hard. She hated her old body.

  She would call it a prison, but by feeding it to Chuck, she felt like it was now a gift. A connection that would deepen their love for each other. The next time Chuck emerged and feasted, Merrin would forever be a part of him.