As much as Darina wanted to see how she could benefit from her new companions, her curiosity towards their new surroundings overwhelmed her senses. There were literally smells here that she couldn’t recognize, perhaps from all the odds and ends that people from many different parts of this city and on the surface had brought here to trade or to simply live off of. The low drone of town life bounced around them, buzzing in Darina’s ears. The Underbelly was such a stark contrast to the claustrophobic tunnels and to the dead world above them that it gave her the impression that life on Earth, in an unconscious drive for self-preservation, began to grow downward rather than up to avoid the demons and the corruption they had brought with them.<br/><br/>For once, her bandit’s instinct to see everything as an opportunity was overridden by untainted awe at how bright it was here. Though she had some fond memories of the now-destroyed town she had grown up in, this place was the warmest place she had encountered. Without being aware of it, Darina hung back from the group, her eyes following what her ears and nose were taking in. Even the air felt different, aside from the fact that they were underground. It had a character to it, no doubt from all the particles contributing to it.<br/><br/>Her body, however, pulled her out of her reverie: as her stomach growled, her senses gained a kind of tunnel vision. Her ears focused on the painfully slow, labored breathing of the dying man in the behemoth’s arms, the taste of his cold sweat, the dried blood on him and on the mutant carrying him. Shocked into stillness, Darina looked around, sniffed at the air, for something, anything else, that had fresh blood in it. This was a lively town, surely they would have food stores somewhere. Her stomach seemed to have a mind of its own and continued to tug at the invisible string in her mind, telling her that the meat she wanted wasn’t anywhere else but ahead of them, being carried to the harvesters’ outpost for the pale girl to minister to his dying body.<br/>Gulping, Darina followed, torn between asserting her logical mind over this horrible need to feed and putting that same mind to use to figure out how she was going to sate it. She couldn’t understand. Was it that long ago since they had seen the dead harvesters and her last raw meal? Never before had she felt that pang of Hunger, and felt it so intensely for a human being. Could she be<span style="font-style: italic">changing</span>at a faster rate than before? She went in after the large man set his patient down. Maybe she could offer her help, then, when everyone else was tired, she could volunteer to watch him. He didn’t look like he had much fight in him anymore; if she told everyone that he died in the night, nobody would be too surprised. Or, she could just as easily excuse herself, find a way out, find<span style="font-style: italic">meat</span>, but she knew that, given the presence of guards around the township, she wouldn’t be able to get far if she stole something. Darina wasn’t prepared to trade anything she had on her for meat.<br/><br/>“Need, uh,” Darina cleared her throat, “need any help?”