Rafael hovered over the gate control like it might bite.
Lina paced the main bay once, eyes sweeping the exits, the shadows, the corners where panic liked to pool. "We go through the front," she said. "No sneaking. No sprinting. You walk like you belong on this block."
Trev gave a short, humorless laugh. Lina didn't look at him.
Kael stood close enough to Rafael to feel the man's breath stutter. The faint glow at Rafael's cuffs came and went like a bad signal.
"Employee," Kael reminded him, low.
Rafael blinked, latched onto it. "Right. Policy."
"Order," Lina said, pointing. "Marta and Nina first. Mara with them. Jae, Al. Kael in the middle. Trev last."
"Why last?" Trev snapped.
"Because you keep trying to trade people," Lina said, flat. "If you bolt, I want you bolting away from us."
The gate rattled once—polite taps from outside.
Rafael pressed the button.
Metal whined up, slow. Cold air spilled in, along with the street's noise: a car alarm cycling, someone yelling from a window, sirens that never got closer.
Kael saw him as the opening widened—the calm man in a dark coat, hands in his pockets, standing near the curb like he'd been waiting for a friend to finish shopping. Two others lingered behind him at a distance: the tense woman and a younger man whose hands couldn't stop shaking.
Rafael's thumb faltered.
Lina leaned in, barely moving her lips. "Don't feed him."
They stepped out in a line.
Lina first, posture easy. Marta next with Nina tucked tight to her side. Mara hunched but moving. Jae helped Al, who looked like he'd forgotten how legs worked. Kael kept his pace normal.
The calm man's eyes found him instantly anyway.
"Rafael," the man called, voice warm enough to sound neighborly. "Open late."
"We're closing," Kael said before Rafael could answer.
The man's gaze flicked to Kael. "Ah."
He began walking with them—matching their pace from the curb without closing distance, like an escort no one asked for.
"You should name it," he said conversationally. "Names make systems behave."
Kael didn't answer. Lina's silence was a warning.
At the corner, a cluster of adults argued under a blinking traffic light that had given up. One man's throat glowed faintly as if words were burning there. Another woman kept rubbing her hands together; tiny sparks jumped between her fingers. A third person sat on the curb, rocking, whispering, "I'm not ready," over and over.
Mara's glow stirred in response.
Lina steered them along the curb instead of crossing. "No crowds," she murmured.
The calm man hummed, pleased. "Good. Crowds become collapses."
Trev suddenly broke formation—two quick steps toward the curb.
Lina snapped Thread out and yanked him back by the elbow.
Trev twisted, eyes wet and furious. "We're going to die anyway!"
The calm man stopped. The street's attention tightened, hungry.
"You want to trade?" the man asked softly.
Trev's chest heaved. "Yes. He—he's the one you want. I'll tell you—"
"Call him," the man said, almost gentle.
Kael went cold.
Trev's eyes flicked to Kael. "Kael—"
The name hit the air like a flare. Echo felt the Loom's weave tighten around it—attention snapping into place. Kael's sternum hummed in reflex, and he hated that it did.
The tense woman near the curb lifted her palm.
Air cinched around Trev's throat.
Trev gagged, hands flying up. His face reddened fast, panic turning to animal terror. Lina's Thread loosened without her meaning to—shock.
The pressure released just before Trev dropped. He collapsed to the curb, coughing until he retched.
The calm man didn't look at him again. He looked at Kael.
"Receipts," he said, mild. "Names are receipts."
Kael's hands went numb. "Leave us alone."
"I will," the man said pleasantly, "when you stop pretending you're not a node."
A scream tore down the block.
Kael's head snapped.
The person on the curb—the one whispering—had stood. His hands blazed clean white, climbing his arms like a tide. He laughed once, broken, then folded inward.
He vanished.
A Fragment hovered where he'd been—bright and pulsing, the air around it hissing like feedback.
People screamed.
Then they surged forward anyway.
Kael felt the Fragment's instability like a toothache in his bones. Too many eyes. Too much hunger. It would blow if someone grabbed it wrong.
Infinite space stirred behind his sternum—ready.
Kael refused it.
He pushed Echo into the crowd instead, smearing their focus. Not enough to stop them, just enough to make their rush stutter.
A man lunged with both hands out. Kael grabbed his wrist and yanked him back hard enough to spin him. "Don't."
The man snarled, eyes locked on the glow. "Move!"
Lina snapped a thin tripline of Thread across the sidewalk. Two people hit it and went down, cursing. The stampede broke into a stumble.
Still, someone else reached for the Fragment—a woman with a knife, eyes bright with starvation.
Her hand touched the light.
For one breath, the world held.
Then her fingers blackened, the burn racing up her arm as if the Fragment was eating her from the inside. Her mouth opened—no sound—and she dissolved in place, leaving a drift of ash.
The Fragment pulsed heavier after, hotter, like it had gained weight.
The crowd's fear turned into a roar.
Kael tasted copper. If it collapsed here, it would take the street with it.
He and Lina moved without speaking. Lina laid Thread under the Fragment like a sling without touching it. Kael caught the tension point with Echo, dragging the glow sideways, away from the crowd's center.
It fought. It wanted witnesses.
They hauled it toward an alley mouth, footsteps slipping on wet concrete.
Kael's vision blurred at the edges. Pain stabbed behind his sternum with every shove of Echo.
Halfway down the alley, the air changed—cooler, heavier, like stepping into a room where yelling got tired.
A recessed doorway held a candle shrine: a glass jar of melted wax, a taped icon, a cheap rosary looped on a nail. Nothing grand. Still, the noise of the street seemed to lose its teeth here, and the pressure in Kael's sternum eased by a hair.
Lina noticed it the same way he did—by the way her shoulders lowered without permission.
"Here," she breathed.
They guided the Fragment into the recess, not touching it directly, coaxing it like an angry animal into a corner. The hiss softened—not gone, but muffled.
People slowed at the alley mouth, staring. Their rush faltered. Even the bold ones hesitated, eyes flicking between the light and the cheap shrine.
The calm man remained at the curb. He didn't step into the alley.
"Good," he called, voice thoughtful. "You found an anchor."
Lina's jaw tightened. She didn't repeat the word like she owned it. She just planted herself between the recess and the street, daring anyone to reach past her.
Kael leaned into the brick and forced air into his lungs. He didn't understand why it worked; he only knew it did.
The calm man's voice carried again, gentle as instruction. "You moved a Fragment into an anchor. That's not instinct."
Kael stared at him.
"That's governance," the man said, satisfied. "That's how gods become real."
Kael's stomach tightened. He pictured phones raised, eyes wide, mouths forming his name like it meant something.
"And now," the calm man continued, "the people who saw you will decide what you are. They will route to you without your consent."
Behind the dumpster, Nina made a small sound like she was trying not to cry.
Lina's hand hit Kael's sleeve—hard, urgent. "Move."
Kael pushed off the wall. His legs shook but held.
They didn't stop until the alley spat them onto a narrower service street behind a row of closed storefronts.
Back here the city sounded smaller. The main road's yelling turned into a distant roar, muffled by brick and metal shutters. Water dripped somewhere steady. A delivery truck sat abandoned with its back door yawning open, cardboard boxes split like the world had been searched in a hurry.
Lina listened, then moved them in short bursts—two blocks, pause, listen, move again. No straight lines. No rhythm anyone could predict. When she stopped, her eyes went up to windows, down to corners, then to Kael.
Kael's chest ached where Echo had been forced too hard. The pain wasn't dramatic. It was worse—dull, insistent, the kind that reminded him his body still mattered even if the thing behind his sternum didn't. The hum underneath it kept trying to rise whenever anyone's attention snagged on him.
Marta held Nina close and murmured in Spanish near her ear—short, steady phrases, like counting breaths. Nina clung to it, but her eyes kept sliding toward Kael, quick and guilty, like she was looking at a fire she'd been told not to touch.
Mara walked with her hands shoved into her sleeves. The glow didn't show, but Echo felt it shivering under the skin, waiting for permission. Jae half-carried Al, whose face stayed gray and unfocused, as if his body was still arguing with itself about whether to keep going.
Rafael whispered constantly. "Policy… closing… employee…" He didn't sound religious. He sounded like a man trying to hold one rule in his teeth so he didn't bite down on panic.
Trev trailed at the back, breathing hard, eyes darting. He waited until Lina paused under an awning and lifted two fingers—listen—before he swung.
"You almost got me killed," he said, voice raw.
Jae whipped around. "You called his name!"
Trev's eyes flashed. "And he crushed my throat!"
"That wasn't him," Lina said. Her voice was quiet in a way that made it sharper. "That was a warning. You just volunteered to be the example."
Trev laughed once, ugly. "So what? You want me to apologize for trying to live?"
"You weren't trying to live," Lina said. "You were trying to buy time by selling someone else."
Marta's jaw tightened. "Stop."
Trev ignored her. His eyes stayed on Kael, resentful and hungry. "He wants you. He's not hunting random people. He's hunting you."
Kael felt his stomach twist—not because Trev was wrong, but because Trev had said it out loud like it made it true.
Lina stepped closer until Trev had to look at her instead of Kael. "Next time you do that," she said, "you're not with us."
Trev blinked, disbelief cracking his anger for half a second. "You can't just—"
"I can," Lina said. "And I will."
Kael felt Echo catch the pattern in Trev anyway—the way his gaze kept flicking toward the main road, toward lights, toward the idea of bargaining again. Trev wasn't loyal. He was calculating.
"He'll run," Kael said softly, before he could stop himself.
Trev's face went tight. "You don't know me."
"I do," Lina said, and turned away like the conversation was done.
A faint vibration tickled Kael's thigh. His phone, dead a minute ago, flickered a single bar of service like a dying pulse.
Hope hit fast enough to hurt.
He pulled it out. No calls. No texts. Nothing loaded. The bar vanished again.
Kael shoved it back into his pocket before the empty promise could sink its teeth in.
Kael followed Echo outward and caught motion—multiple footsteps, loud voices, moving fast somewhere around the corner. Not the calm man's measured pace. A pack. A hunting party or a mob.
Lina angled them away. "We need somewhere to take the edge off," she said. "Somewhere that makes… whatever he's doing harder."
"Harder how?" Marta asked.
Lina shook her head once. "I don't know. I just know it's real."
They passed a small storefront with a faded cross and a hand-written sign taped to the glass: NO SERVICE TONIGHT. The street felt slightly different near it—not safer, not warm—just quieter, like panic had less echo.
Kael slowed a fraction. Lina saw it.
"You felt it too," she said.
Kael nodded.
"We don't stay," Lina said. "We go in, breathe, and get out. If he's tracking us by whatever you feel in your chest, this might smear it."
Inside, the space smelled like old carpet and dust. Folding chairs faced a cheap lectern. Someone had left a Bible open there, pages curled. A few votive candles sat by the wall. The air carried that same dull heaviness as the alley shrine.
Al sagged into a chair, eyes closing. Jae stayed standing, scanning the windows. Mara's shoulders dropped a fraction, as if the room gave her hands permission not to glow.
Rafael's cuffs dimmed too. His whisper slowed. "Policy…," he breathed, and it sounded less like a chant and more like a man remembering he still had choices.
Lina stared at the candles like she didn't want to admit she was relieved. "He called it an anchor," she said quietly—not a definition, just a label she'd stolen. "Whatever this is."
Kael swallowed. He didn't argue. He didn't understand it either. He just felt the difference, and tonight that was enough.
Trev hovered near the door, arms crossed, face hard. He looked like he hated the chairs, the stillness, the fact that the room didn't care about his fear.
"We stay ten minutes," Lina said. "Not more."
"And then?" Marta asked.
Lina's eyes went to Rafael. "Your Civic. Keys?"
Rafael swallowed. "Back lot."
"Good," Lina said. "We get out before dawn crowds learn Fragments are money and start hunting in daylight."
Kael's gaze drifted to the open Bible, then away. He didn't want meaning tonight. Meaning was how names became hooks.
A small voice came from behind a chair back. "Kael?"
Nina. Her eyes were wet but steady.
Kael kept his face neutral. "What?"
Her fingers worried her sleeve. "When you said don't say your name like a prayer… is that real?"
Kael inhaled. He could lie. He could soften it. He didn't.
"I don't know," he said. "But I felt something try to connect when you did."
Nina stared at him, thinking. "So if people believe in you… you get stronger."
Kael's sternum hummed faintly, as if the system liked hearing its own rules spoken aloud.
Marta's voice cut. "Nina. Stop."
Nina swallowed and nodded, but her eyes stayed on Kael like he was a flashlight in a dark room. Kael looked away first, because looking back felt like accepting.
Outside, the pack of footsteps passed, voices loud, then faded.
Lina counted silently on her fingers. When she hit ten, she stood. "Up. We move."
They filed out through the side door into the back lot.
The Civic sat under a weak security light, dusted with grime. Rafael's hands shook as he fumbled for the keys.
Kael sent Echo outward again, tasting the main road.
The steady, patient footsteps were back—returning.
Not close yet.
But coming.
Kael's chest hummed anyway, the same quiet hunger as before, as if the city had learned his name and was trying it out on its tongue.
Rafael's first turn of the key gave them nothing but a click.
"Come on," he whispered, turning again. Click. The dash lights flickered once and died.
Jae swore under his breath. "Battery?"
Rafael's face crumpled. "I didn't— I didn't drive it all week."
Lina's eyes went to the lot entrance. "No time."
She grabbed the trunk edge and nodded at Jae. "Push."
Jae and Kael put their shoulders to the Civic's rear. The metal was icy through Kael's hoodie. The car rolled grudgingly, tires crunching over gravel. Al tried to help and almost went down; Marta shoved him back into the passenger seat.
Trev hovered at the driver's side, useless and jittering, eyes flicking toward the alley mouth like he was measuring his chances. Lina caught it and said, without looking at him, "Try it and you die alone."
Trev's mouth tightened. He stayed.
"Rafael," Lina said. "Second gear. Drop it when we hit the slope."
Rafael nodded too fast, climbed in, hands shaking as he worked the stick like it was unfamiliar. The Civic rolled toward the lot's slight decline.
Kael pushed Echo outward, not as a shield—more like smearing their presence along the walls, turning sharp edges into blur.
At the lot entrance, a shadow paused. Someone leaned in to look.
Kael's stomach clenched—
But the shadow moved on, footsteps quick, voice loud with someone else, absorbed by the hunt elsewhere.
The Civic picked up speed. Rafael popped the clutch.
The engine coughed. Once. Twice.
Then, with a rough gasp, it caught.