Just the rain.
Just the hollow thud of my heartbeat echoing in an apartment that suddenly feels too big, too quiet, too wrong.
I move on instinct—search the rooms, the closets, under the bed. Each empty space slices me open a little more. The walls seem to close in; every sound is amplified—the tick of the clock, the hum of the fridge, my own ragged breathing.
My mind starts filling in the blanks with every horror it can imagine.
Who took him?
Was it the Nine? The League? Some nobody trying to cash in on the chaos?
And Jav—was the photo real, or a lie meant to pull me apart before they finish the job?
I grab Ben’s blanket from his bed—it still smells like him, like vanilla soap and glue sticks—and clutch it to my chest. The fabric is damp at the corners from my shaking hands.
My compad pings again.
Another message.
He won’t scream if you stay quiet.
I drop the blanket. My whole body goes numb.
For a heartbeat, I can’t breathe.
Then something inside me snaps into focus.
I don’t remember leaving the apartment. Only the sound of my footsteps pounding down the stairs, the elevator alarm blaring as I shove past the closing doors, the voice of some neighbor calling after me. None of it matters.
The city swallows me whole.
Rain starts again, hard this time, drumming against metal awnings and glass. It slicks my hair to my face, chills my bones, blurs the lights. But I keep moving—toward the only place I know Jav would run if everything fell apart.
Back to the Redscale network.
Back to where it started.
Because if they’ve taken my son, they’ve made the mistake of thinking I’m just a mother.
They’ve forgotten that I’m also his.
The air tastes of ozone and rage as I reach the edge of the under-tunnels again. My reflection stares back from a puddle—eyes wide, soaked hair plastered to my cheeks, mouth set in something that looks like determination’s darker cousin.
Somewhere below me, someone knows where Jav is.
And where Ben isn’t.
I take one last steadying breath. The rain washes down the steps like tears over stone.
Then I descend.
And the city closes over me like a lid.
CHAPTER 36
JAV
Iwake up to the smell of sterilizer and copper.
