Brad didn’t ask how she knew. The question was obsolete. In a world where a fairy could be in five places at once, "where" had lost all meaning.

  Then, reality stuttered.

  It wasn't a sound or a movement. It was a fundamental wrongness, a lurch in the pit of his soul. The world bent around him, the hallway stretching into a smear of impossible colors as a dizzying rush of light poured into the void. For a single, nauseating heartbeat, he felt his own atoms strain against the violation.

  Then, just as suddenly, it was over. The chaos was gone, swallowed whole by the sudden, sterile warmth of his new room.

  Brad staggered, catching himself against the dresser. Blur winked out like a popped lightbulb.

  The numbers haunted him.

  Butter could crush his skull like a grape between her thumb and forefinger, with ease, and she ranked just above a brainwashed preschooler. Lóng burned hotter than napalm. Winter outran light itself. And Yume... Yume was what happened when the universe got bored and made a mistake.

  A name flickered at the edge of his thoughts, a ghost in the machine of his mind. Paris Moon. The file marked "Deceased?" Elizabeth Paris. The connection snapped into place with the cold clarity of a firing pin. Lóng Yán’s gravelly voice echoed in his memory: "Little Moon."

  The question formed, perfect and lethal: Was he her brother? Her father?

  He could ask. It would be so easy. One question, a single key turned in a lock. And the whole fragile illusion of safety, the warm room, the clean clothes, the full stomach—would shatter, revealing the gilded cage for what it was. Some doors, once opened, showed you things you could never unsee. Some doors had teeth.

  Brad exhaled, a sharp, controlled vent of pressure through his nose. The thought was caged, dismantled, and discarded.

  Not your business. Survivors don't poke sleeping dragons. They don't even breathe in their direction.

  Better to play dumb. Better to stay useful. Some doors, once opened, didn’t close, and he couldn’t afford to be the one left outside when they slammed shut.

  His mind, ever the traitor, was already running the numbers, and the results were apocalyptic. Lóng Yán has 350x human strength. His arm shattered when it met Pest's punch. The force required for that wasn't just double or triple; it was an order of magnitude greater. And Winter... her Mach forty kick. Brad’s mind sketched the equation: 500x human strength, focused into a point impacting at 13,600 m/s. The kinetic energy was in the terajoules, enough to vaporize a battleship. Pest had partially flickered away, but it had still survived the initial transfer. For its body to not be instantly converted into subatomic particles, its durability had to be monstrous, operating on a level that defied material science. And Butter... her seventh recursive kick was 64x her 150x baseline strength. A final impact force of 9,600 times a peak human. That was the level of power required just to vaporize its arm. To actually kill it... the numbers spiraled into the absurd. What the hell was this thing's strength level? Continental? Planetary? The calculations were a cold hand closing around his heart.

  And the most terrifying variable wasn't its static durability, but its dynamic escalation. It was learning, adapting, evolving in real-time. At the start of the fight, he could track its movements. Then, without the flickers, it became a blur. His mind, re-calibrating from the data, delivered a final, chilling estimate: by the end, before Lucien arrived, its raw physicality was approaching 25,000x human strength and a conservative Mach fifty in speed. It wasn't just a monster; it was an equation that solved for its own victory, its power climbing an exponential curve that would inevitably surpass anything they could throw at it. They weren't fighting a creature; they were trying to outrun a geometric progression towards their own annihilation. The only reason they were still alive was because it had been more interested in playing with its food.

  A new, more immediate horror dawned on him. How did Lóng Yán survive a direct hit from that? Winter was too agile, Butter had Sonata... but Lóng Yán took a punch that shattered his arm and broke his neck. The force behind a punch from a being like pest was a localized nuclear detonation. It should have vaporized him, atomized his very being into a cloud of plasma. But it didn't. The answer clicked into place with the cold clarity of a final, unshakeable truth: the Soulfire. It wasn't just for regeneration. It was a shield. An active, spiritual barrier that protected him on a fundamental level, making his durability not just a matter of dense bone and muscle, but a function of his soul's resilience. The flames didn't just heal his body; they actively defended it, dispersing or absorbing energies that would unmake anything else. He wasn't just tough; his very existence was fortified.

  But one thought rose above the terrifying stats, cold and clear. Why did Blur show me?

  It replayed in his mind. The fairy’s razor-edged grin. "Yume’s orders." But that made no sense. Yume had just tried to vaporize him for asking the wrong question. Why would she then authorize a full intelligence briefing on her family’s most dangerous secrets?

  Unless it wasn’t authorized.

  The thought was a jolt of ice water. Blur moved faster than thought, existed in multiple places at once. It could have shown him anything in the seconds it had alone with him. It could have fabricated the whole thing.

  But the data felt too real, too perfectly aligned with the shattered skyscraper and the frozen time.

  So if it was real, then Blur had acted on its own. And it had done it for a reason.

  A shiver traced his spine. The fairy wasn’t just a messenger or a shackle. It was a player. And it had just handed him the rulebook to a game he never knew he was playing.

  The question wasn’t what he’d seen. It was why he’d been meant to see it. And what he was supposed to do next.

  He was still turning the thought over when a soft knock came at his door.

  Butter stood in the doorway, backlit by the hallway’s soft glow. Her snow-white curls were mussed from the wind, cheeks flushed from the cold.

  For a heartbeat, they just looked at each other. Then her face lit up.

  "Brad!"

  All the tension in his chest unraveled at the sound of her voice. He couldn’t help it, he grinned.

  "Hey, Butter."

  She crossed the room in two quick strides, her prosthetic leg clicking softly against the hardwood.

  "You’ll never believe what happened," she started, already reaching for his hand...

  ...then paused.

  Her head tilted. Pink eyes narrowed.

  "Why are you so cold?"

  Brad stuttered trying to come up with a lie, he didn't even know if he should lie, I mean Yume did know about he and Blur's little adventure.

  "You can close the windows if that you're that chilly," she suddenly blurted, walking towards the curtains.

  Brad heaved a sigh of relief, rubbing the back of his head. Butter turned around from closing the curtains, hands on her hips, looking him up and down.

  "Nice umm... clothes."

  Brad looked down like he just realized he was wearing them, face turning red, "thank you, they're very comfortable."

  A memory flashed.

  The alleyway. The fight. Butter’s Aria tucked into his coat pocket, the one she’d “dropped” when they first met.

  “Why was your sketchbook in my pocket?”

  Butter’s pink eyes went wide.

  For a second, she just stared at him, lips parted like a startled rabbit. Then her hand shot out, clamping over his mouth.

  Her palm was warm, slightly sticky from the sour candy she’d been eating. She leaned in, so close he could see the faint freckles dusting her nose.

  “Shh! You-you can’t just... nobody can know.”

  Her grip was too tight. The slightest mistake from her and she would crush him like a bug.

  Her gaze darted left, then right, as if expecting Winter or Lucien to materialize from the shadows.

  Brad blinked. Slowly, he nodded against her fingers.

  She exhaled, pulling her hand back like she’d been burned. Her cheeks flushed the same pale pink as her eyes.

  A beat of silence.

  Mumbling and staring at the floor, she admitted, "I... put it there. On purpose."

  Brad raised an eyebrow. Butter rushing now, words tumbling out

  “I mean, if you had it, they’d have to bring you here to get the magic residue off you. And then.. we could... y’know. Hang out.”

  Her voice shrank to a squeak on the last words.

  "And maybe..." A beat. Then, softer: "And maybe I needed someone to find me, too."

  Brad stared at her. Then he grinned.

  “You staged a magic sketchbook crisis to get me here?”

  Butter’s face burned. She fidgeted with the hem of her hoodie, shoulders hunched.

  “...I guess.”

  Brad’s chest did something weird, something warm and light.

  Grinning even wider he continued, “You’re terrible at being sneaky, Butter.”

  Butter peeked up at him, then, just for a second, smiled back.

  ///

  The hallway to Butter’s room smelled like sugar and ozone, like a bakery wired to a stormcloud. Brad’s new shoes, stupidly expensive, stupidly comfortable, made no sound on the polished floors as she dragged him by the wrist, her fingers warm and slightly sticky from the sour gummy worms she’d been chewing.

  “Okay, okay, close your eyes,” she demanded, spinning to face him so fast her snowy curls bounced.

  Brad smirked. “Why? You hiding a dragon in there?”

  “Brad.” She puffed her cheeks, pink eyes narrowing. “Just—just do it, okay?”

  He obeyed. Darkness. The scent of her, cotton candy and graphite, closer now. Her breath hitched, nervous. A click. A hum. The air changed, warmer, softer.

  “Okay. Now.”

  Her room was chaos.

  Plushies avalanched off the bed, a three-eyed axolotl, a bunny with fangs, something that might’ve been a squid in a top hat. The walls were papered in sketches: dragons mid-roar, cities floating on clouds, a detailed blueprint of a very illegal-looking candy dispenser. A neon frog-shaped beanie dangled from the ceiling fan.

  The door clicked shut behind them, and Butter promptly forgot how doors worked.

  She stood frozen, back pressed against the wood like it was the only thing keeping her upright, fingers twisting in her oversized hoodie sleeves.

  She lunged for the bed, tripped over a discarded sock and faceplanted into a pile of neon throw pillows. A single fuzzy axolotl plushie tumbled to the floor in silent judgment.

  If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

  Brad bit his lip. Don’t laugh. Do not laugh. But god, she was adorable.

  Sunset bled through the curtains, painting her snowy curls gold at the edges. The way she chewed her lower lip when nervous, the faint dusting of freckles across her nose like someone had shaken a pencil eraser at her face. Even the smudge of blue ink on her earlobe from where she’d absently tucked her hair behind her ear mid-sketch.

  She’s beautiful, he realized, with the same clinical detachment he’d use to identify a ticking bomb. And I’m so screwed.

  Butter resurfaced, pink-cheeked and clutching a dented cookie tin like a shield. "Candy?" she squeaked, shoving it toward him. "I have, um. Gummy worms. Sour strips. Some Swedish fish that might be fused together? Also these weird chocolate things Lucien got me that taste like peanut butter and lime—"

  Brad took the tin. Their fingers brushed.

  Butter yanked her hand back like she’d been shocked.

  The motion was pure instinct, a jolt of muscle memory from a different room entirely: Lucien’s sterile white training hall. A holographic display, cold and precise, flashing the numbers after her first punch. 25 million newtons. The second strike, 50 million. The third? It had just kept multiplying, a terrifying, exponential curve of her own making. She didn't need a display now. She knew. Her baseline now was a casual five hundred thousand newtons on a first strike. A touch too hard, a moment of lost focus, and she wouldn't just break Brad's wrist. She would rip his entire arm from its socket like pulling a petal from a flower. The thought was a bucket of ice water. She had to be careful. She always had to be careful.

  Silence.

  The air conditioner kicked on, ruffling the pages of an open sketchbook on her desk. Brad caught a glimpse of something familiar, a chubby dragon with sherbet scales. The one from the sketchbook she’d left him.

  He pointed. "You redrew it."

  Butter made a noise like a deflating balloon. "I. Uh. Maybe?"

  As he stepped closer to admire the sketch, his foot bumped something under the bed. Metal clattered.

  Curious, he knelt and pulled out-

  -a neon pink nunchaku that immediately flopped like overcooked spaghetti.

  A "sword" that was just a ruler with glitter glue.

  A teddy bear with a poorly stitched jetpack (one button eye dangling by a thread).

  "What are these?" Brad grinned, holding up a so-called "shield" that was clearly a trash can lid painted gold.

  Butter's face burned crimson. She lunged, snatching the failed constructs to her chest. "P-put them back! They're just... my early tries. The ones that didn't work." Her voice dropped to a mumble. "I couldn't throw them away." The spaghetti nunchaku oozed through her fingers like sad taffy.

  Brad's chest did that warm thing again. "You kept your rejects?"

  "Shut up," she whined, kicking a half-deflated whoopee cushion further under the bed. "Harmony took months to get right."

  Brad plucked the drooping nunchaku from her arms. "I dunno. Floppy weapons could be a style."

  Butter groaned, but her lips twitched. "You're the worst."

  Brad's grin faded slightly as his mind, ever-calculating, spun through the implications of her power. If she could turn sketches into reality, and tweak their properties post-creation, then the "failures" weren’t dead ends. They were data points.

  His brain reverse-engineered the possibilities:

  Phased Constructs - A dragon sketched with eraser-smudged edges might phase through walls.

  Symbiotic Gear - Armor that leeched kinetic energy from hits to fuel Butter’s magic.

  The math was elegant. Her limits weren’t imagination, they were energy. And if they could crack that...

  His eyes suddenly fell unto her ameythyst amulet. "Wait-I saw this shatter against Winter. How's it-"

  Butter looked down at the glowing violet stone, her nose scrunching. "Yeahhh, it... fixed itself. Didn't design it that way." She poked it like it might bite. "Kinda creepy, honestly."

  Brad's eyes lit up. "Designed? So your sketchbook, you can just assign powers to stuff?"

  A shy nod. Her pinky finger traced the amulet's edges. "Still testing limits. Some sketches take so much energy..." She mimed a dramatic collapse, complete with tongue lolling. "Zzzzt. Gone."

  Brad grinned. "So what you're saying is your magic has a battery life."

  "Shut up." She swatted at him with the spaghetti nunchaku, which wrapped limply around his wrist like a sad party streamer.

  Brad examined the noodle-weapon coiled around his arm. "Okay but... what if the floppiness is the power? Imagine the enemy's face when..."

  Butter's eyes widened. "...When it suddenly goes rigid mid-swing."

  They stared at each other for one glorious second before dissolving into giggles.

  "Nice stickers," he said softly, nodding at the glow-in-the-dark stars peeling off her ceiling.

  "Yeah. That one’s, um. Orion. The hunter. He’s got a belt. Three stars. Very... belt-like."

  Brad bit back a smile. "Fascinating."

  "Shut up."

  A beat. Then Butter sighed, arm flopping over her eyes. "I’m so bad at this."

  "At what?"

  "Talking. To people. To you." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Especially you."

  Brad’s chest did something alarming.

  He nudged her knee with his. "I like it."

  "You like me being a disaster?"

  "Yeah. Makes me feel less like one."

  Butter peeked out from under her arm. Her nose scrunched. "That’s the dumbest nice thing anyone’s ever said to me."

  "Good."

  The playlist she’d queued up, some lo-fi indie nonsense with too many banjos, flickered to the next track. Something slower. Something that made the space between them feel smaller.

  Butter sat up abruptly. "Music!" she announced, like she’d just remembered oxygen existed. "We should music. Listen. To it."

  She scrambled for her ancient MP3 player, thumbs jamming buttons with desperate intensity. The speakers hissed static.

  Brad watched her, the way her brows furrowed in concentration, the way her hair caught the light like spun sugar. The exact moment she realized Stairway to Heaven was not, in fact, the vibe.

  "No no no-"

  He caught her wrist mid-panic. "Butter."

  She froze.

  "Breathe, Pretty Moth."

  She breathed.

  Their hands stayed like that, his thumb brushing the delicate bones of her wrist, her pulse fluttering wild and rabbit-fast against his skin.

  The next song started. Something sweet and simple. Something that didn’t need explaining.

  Butter exhaled. "...Hi."

  Brad smiled. "Hello."

  And just like that, between the bad music and the half-melted candy and the way she finally smiled back.

  Oh, Brad thought. This is how it starts.

  ///

  A soft, insistent buzz cut through the lo-fi melody.

  Brad’s head turned. The sound was alien in this plush-filled sanctuary. "You have a phone?"

  Butter nodded, diving a hand into the belly of a giant, three-eyed axolotl plushie and pulling out a sleek, black device. "Uncle Yán got it for me." Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper, her pink eyes darting around the room, scanning the seams between walls and the dark eyes of her plushies. "Lucien doesn't know. Or... maybe he does." She shrugged, a gesture of helpless defiance. "I dunno."

  Just as quickly, the paranoia vanished, replaced by a childlike glee as she bounced back onto the bed, her thumbs flying across the screen. Her brow was furrowed in a stern, comical look of concentration, which then melted into a sudden, airy giggle. She shoved the phone toward Brad, the screen filled with a video of a fluffy kitten tumbling head over heels in a sunbeam.

  "Uncle Yán got it for me," she repeated, her voice softer now, the truth slipping out on a sigh. "...because I'm always lonely."

  Brad’s breath caught. He didn't say a word. There were no words for that kind of confession. Instead, he just relaxed his shoulder against hers, a silent solidarity as they fell into a comfortable rhythm, scrolling through the harmless, happy corners of the internet.

  They scrolled through a cascade of dancing hamsters and skateboarding fails, the algorithm a heartless curator of chaos, until it served them a video titled: 'GHOST GIRL vs GOTH FELINE - URBAN SHOWDOWN.'

  The footage was grainy, shaky, from a bystander's phone from the third floor of a building. It wasn't the recent battle with Pest. It was from the beginning. The first day he'd met her.

  A cold spike of logic pierced through Brad's initial shock. How is this online? He knew there were witnesses, of course. But the Syndicate erased men from existence for throwing a punch. They should have scrubbed this clip, and its poster, from the internet before the dust had even settled. So why was it here? Did they only care about covering up their own operations, treating Lucien's team as a rival to be exposed? Or, a more chilling thought, did Lucien know it was here? Was this, too, a part of some larger game?

  He saw a blur of black and gold, Winter's braids like dark whips, the brief, shimmering dome of Butter's shield deflecting a blow that would have leveled a building.

  Butter’s thumb hovered over the comments icon, a little red devil promising pain.

  Brad’s hand was there first, covering hers. "Don't," he said, his voice low and firm. "It's not worth it."

  She frowned, a stubborn set to her jaw, and gently but firmly took her arm back. "I want to see.

  She tapped the icon.

  The words were a digital gut-punch, a cascade of cruelty rendered in stark, pixelated text.

  · "What a creep, white rat. I hope the goth feline wins, she's hot."

  ·"lmao who still uses nunchaku? seriously? And she's cheating too, using weapons and a shield against someone who just has claws. weak."

  ·"Bro the ghost girl is getting absolutely clapped. It's not even a fight it's a violation."

  ·"Can someone edit this with the coffin dance meme when the white hair one gets slammed?"

  ·"Goth feline is literally barefoot. She's so real for that."

  She scrolled, her movements becoming jerky, her thumb a frantic metronome against the glass as she searched for a lifeline, for just one person who saw what was really happening.

  She found one, a single, kind comment buried in the algorithmic filth:

  ·"Ghost girl's really pretty, looks like a fairy from a fantasy movie. She's trying her best :("

  But her heart barely had time to lift before it was immediately crushed by the reply underneath:

  ·Reply: "Goth feline mogs her to oblivion though. It's over."

  The hope shattered. The next comment was cold, clinical, and final:

  ·"Goth feline low-diffs that tomboy fraud, lil bro."

  The phone clattered onto the duvet as if it had burned her. Butter wrapped her arms around herself, pulling her knees to her chest. A single, hot tear escaped, tracing a path through the faint freckles on her cheek before dropping onto the fabric of her shorts.

  "Brad?" her voice was small, shattered. "Am I ugly?"

  The question hung in the air, so profoundly wrong it was almost blasphemous.

  Gently, with a meticulous care he didn't know he possessed, Brad reached out and cupped her face. His thumbs brushed away the tears, his touch an anchor.

  "Look at me," he whispered, his voice unwavering. "Of course not. Never."

  "Then why?" she pleaded, her pink eyes swimming with confusion and hurt. "Why are they so mean?"

  "Because the internet is a crowded room where the loudest, cruelest voices get heard," he said, his gaze never leaving hers. "They're just... noise. Most of them are just kids trying to be edgy. They don't know you. They see a five-second clip and think they know the whole story. They only care about what looks 'cool,' and Winter... Winter looks cool. It's an aesthetic."

  He leaned in a little closer, making sure she heard every word. "But I do know you. And if they knew you—if they knew you were funny, and kind, and so damn smart—they wouldn't be talking about who 'mogs' who. They'd be begging to be your friend."

  A fragile hope flickered in her eyes. "You... you think so?"

  "I know so," he said, his voice softening into a warm, genuine smile. "And for the record? You smell really good. Like sugar and morning flowers."

  A fresh blush bloomed across Butter's cheeks, brighter than her hair. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, a small, shaky smile finally breaking through. "Thanks, Brad."

  He didn't let go of her face, not yet. He just smiled back, holding the shattered pieces of her moment together until they felt solid again. The phone, dark and silent on the bed, had lost all its power.

  ***

  The guilt clung to Yume like the scent of scorched fabric still lingering in her nose; that and the memory of Brad’s wide, wounded eyes when she’d almost vaporized him. So she walked, letting the city’s noise drown out the echo of knitting needles and the too-loud absence of Paris’ playful voice telling her, ‘Easy, Blue.’

  A car roared past, bass thumping, windows down.

  Girls. Three of them.

  One hanging halfway out the passenger window, her hair a riot of pink streaks whipping in the wind. Another in the back, tipping a soda can to her lips, laughing so hard it foamed over her chin. The driver, smiling, carefree, drummed her fingers on the steering wheel to the music.

  For a heartbeat, Yume stopped breathing.

  Paris would’ve loved them. The memory hit like a stray bullet:

  His apartment, decades ago. The walls vibrating from terrible music. Paris balanced on the kitchen counter, pouring something neon and volatile into shot glasses, his laugh louder than the speakers. "C’mon, Blue!" he’d shouted, tossing her a sparkler. "Light it UP!"

  She had. The whole damn building had.

  Now, the car’s taillights blurred into the distance, leaving behind only the scent of exhaust and the ghost of a melody.

  Yume’s fingers twitched at her sides.

  She could still feel it, the weight of a sparkler in her palm, the sizzle as it caught, the way Paris’ eyes had glowed in the dark, brighter than any flame.

  The golden collar at her throat pulsed, cool against her skin.

  A reminder. A chain. She walked on.

  The yarn store’s bell chimed like a funeral dirge as Yume pushed through the door.

  She moved through the aisles like a ghost in a gown too elegant for daylight, silk the color of drowned violets, boots clicking softly against worn hardwood. The jacket draped over her shoulders was tailored for someone who still cared how they looked, its silver embroidery catching the fluorescent lights in fleeting winks.

  The store smelled of cedar shelves and lavender sachets, with the faintest undercurrent of mothballs, like a grandmother’s attic, while the rustle of yarn skeins tumbling against each other whispered like dry leaves in a slow autumn wind.

  Her fingers trailed absently over skeins of merino wool. Too rough. Alpaca blend. Too warm. She needed something that wouldn’t remind her of Paris’ old sweaters.

  A moth-eaten sigh escaped her. The golden collar at her throat pulsed once, a warning.

  "OHMYGOSH!"

  Yume turned. A hurricane in a sundress stood six inches away, round wire-framed glasses magnifying eyes the size of saucers. The girl’s dress was a riot of embroidered peonies, combat boots laced with neon pink strings. A koala backpack clung to her shoulders like a drunk toddler. Strawberry earrings swung wildly as she vibrated in place.

  "Are you uh... dress-upping a Stomp Assassin?!?!"

  Yume blinked. The girl’s manicured nails, each painted with tiny frogs, rabbits, and one suspiciously deranged bear, fluttered excitedly.

  "...Sutōmu Assassin, yes." The lie tasted like ash.

  "SO COOL!" The girl did a little hop, sending her braided locs bouncing. "Okay okay, fav'rate one: Valeria, Orchid, or S?"

  "Rhancies."

  The girl’s gasp could’ve sucked the oxygen from the room. "NO WAY! She's the... the sparkly one!" She leaned in conspiratorially, smelling of bubblegum. "Where'd all the Storm 'Sassins go?"

  Yume’s fingers tightened around a skein of silk-blend. "No monsters left to kill in this realm." The 'l's in 'left' and 'realm' softened into 'r's.

  "Ohhh." The girl nodded, her head bobbing with exaggerated seriousness. "Because... the Gloom-dwebber got them, right?"

  Gloom-dweller?

  A muscle jumped in Yume’s jaw. "...Is that what they call him now?"

  Paris would hate that title.

  "Uh-huh! Daddy says he was super scary. Like, he could make a whole city go poof!" She twirled a loc around one finger. "Is it true there used to be... a bazillion people?"

  "Yes. Eleven billion." Yume said drily.

  "And now there’s only... a little bit?" Mango continued, completely oblivious to the way the air crackled. "Daddy says the Big Mean War took the rest. Four... No nine billion... A whole bunch of people, wow. Did you know them? The Storm 'Sassins from the story?"

  Yume’s collar flared blue. "I knew all of them."

  "WOAH. You knew everyone." The girl’s nose scrunched. "You're the best fan."

  Yume studied her, the unmarred brown skin, the manicured nails, the way she stood with her weight slightly forward, like a child expecting candy. "You remind me of someone."

  The girl beamed. "Thanks! Are... Uh... Are you Chinese?"

  "... Japanese. How old are you?"

  "Three!" She puffed her chest out like it was a Nobel Prize, radiating pure, unearned pride.

  Yume’s blood went cold.

  Three? She looked sixteen, but was three? ...mentally. A Syndicate experiment.

  "Mango."

  A voice like a honey laced with poison.

  He stood framed in the doorway like a marble statue come to life, skin so pale it seemed to glow with its own moonlight, hair like freshly fallen snow cascading in artful disarray. But it was his eyes that froze Yume's breath in her lungs: violet irises so deep they appeared almost bruised, the color of twilight just before it surrenders to night.

  Those eyes. They were Crook's eyes.