Ren climbed the Syndicate's residential wall like he'd done it a thousand times—because he had. No sound but the occasional scrape of his slipper against rough concrete. Not a single camera caught him. Not a single patrol noticed. He didn't use the halls for a reason—too many eyes, too many mouths. People in the Syndicate didn't talk much, but they remembered everything.
His window slid open with a soft creak. The room was exactly as he left it—dark, sterile, cold. A flickering desk lamp buzzed faintly, casting an inconsistent amber glow on the floor. He stepped through, landing with a low thud, and dropped the duffel bag.
The weight hit the floor like a sack of bones.
He locked the door, slid the dresser halfway in front of it. Habit. Then turned back to the bag like he was facing a corpse that wouldn't stay dead.
Unzipping it felt heavier than it should've. His hands weren't shaking—but the air in the room shifted.
And then—there he was.
The boy unfolded like something from a nightmare. Pale, white-haired, black-eyed. His skin was ashen, his body small, frail. He didn't blink. Didn't flinch. Just stared at Ren from the bag, like some feral spirit wearing a child's body.
The fuck is this kid?
Ren crouched, studying him. Now that the light touched his face, the boy looked even worse—sickly, skin stretched over bone. Clothes were clumps of blood and dirt barely hanging onto his frame. Blood coated him in layers. Crusted. Dried. Some of it fresh enough to still glisten. The smell hit Ren in the face.
"Jesus Christ," he muttered, recoiling.
It was piss, rot, and death all stewed together—like the kid had been marinating in a slaughterhouse. Ren pinched his nose and grimaced.
The boy just… stared. Not even curious. Just blank.
"Yeah, this shit better be worth it," Ren said under his breath. "No way something human smells this bad."
He grabbed the boy's wrist—rough, but not brutal. Guiding, not comforting. The kid didn't resist. Just moved along, a marionette with cut strings.
The bathroom light buzzed overhead as Ren flipped it on. Tiles cracked at the edges. Mildew creeping in. Still cleaner than whatever hell this kid came from.
He tossed a bar of soap and a sponge at the boy's feet. "Wash."
Nothing.
The kid looked at the sponge like it might explode.
"You don't… know how to clean yourself?"
The silence answered for him.
Ren squinted at the boy, face tightening. "Are you serious?"
He rubbed his temples. He didn't sign up for this. He didn't give a shit about some blood-soaked mute kid. He had plans. A target. Y. That was the goal. Everything else was noise.
With a sigh, he knelt, turned on the water, and grabbed the sponge himself.
"This is so fucked," he muttered.
He scrubbed the boy down in silence. The blood came off like sludge—sticky, dark, slow. Swirled in the drain like oil. With each pass of the sponge, more wounds appeared—not all fresh. Some were old. Healed wrong. Burn marks. Scars. Cigarette-sized blisters along the ribs. And that smell—it lingered. It wasn't just the blood.
It was trauma baked into skin.
Ren didn't feel pity. Not exactly.
He felt something colder. More primal.
Disgust? No. Not at the boy.
Once clean, Ren wrapped the kid in an old towel. Then pulled out the grey nightshirt from the back of his closet—loose, faded, maybe from when he was a child himself, this is the one cloth from his childhood he hadn't gotten rid of for whatever reason. He slipped it over the boy's head. It sagged past his knees.
The kid still didn't speak. Didn't even react.
Ren pointed to the corner by the desk. "Sit."
The boy obeyed.
Ren sat opposite, legs folded. Katana at his side.
"Who is Y?"
Nothing.
"What's your name?"
Dead silence.
Ren leaned forward, eyes narrowing. "What the hell did he do to you?"
Still nothing.
Ren's patience was wearing thinner by the second. "Tch…"
He stood, walked to the kitchenette, and boiled some water. The clink of metal felt absurd in the silence, like noise didn't belong in the same room as that boy.
He made ramen and set it in front of him.
"Eat. Don't worry I risked my life to save you. I won't just kill you, yet."
The boy looked at it. Then at Ren.
Then… he devoured it. Like something wild. Gulping, gasping, noodles flinging, broth dripping down his chin.
"What the hell," Ren muttered, but his voice wasn't cruel. Just tired.
He let the boy finish, then asked again, "Your name."
Nothing.
He sighed, rising to his feet. "You're lucky I don't toss you out the window."
And for a second, he meant it.
But he didn't move.
Not because of compassion.
Because of strategy.
He couldn't kill what might be the only lead to Y.
Instead, he opened his wardrobe. Cleared some space. Placed a folded blanket on the wooden floor like it was some half-assed gesture of humanity.
"Sleep."
He picked the boy up—light as a whisper—and dropped him gently into the wardrobe. Closed the door.
Out of sight. Out of mind.
He collapsed onto his bed and stared at the ceiling.
And that's when the nightmare came.
Blood. So much blood.
A boy stood in a small room, drenched in it. Barefoot. Unmoving. Surrounded by corpses—dozens of them, some headless, others torn apart. The boy's face was hidden by shadow, but Ren felt something impossible as he stared.
Who was this little boy? Someone he knew?
Or… not quite.
A younger him?
No.
Something else.
The boy looked up, and for a split second, Ren saw eyes in that face—full of nothing. Just void.
He woke up gasping, heart pounding like a war drum in his chest. Sweat soaked his shirt. He sat upright, vision shaking, throat dry.
He stumbled to the fridge. Grabbed water. Chugged half the bottle and wiped his mouth.
What the fuck was that?
He looked at the wardrobe.
Curiosity gripped him like a vice.
He walked to it, hand hovering over the handle. He didn't want to open it. But he had to.
He pulled.
The boy was awake.
And crying.
Silently. Just tears rolling down a blank face, with no sound, no trembling.
Ren froze.
Something inside him twisted. It wasn't guilt. It wasn't pity. It was that same memory clawing at the edges of his mind. That shadow of a boy standing in blood, looking at him like a reflection from a hellish mirror.
His hands clenched.
He didn't want to look at the kid anymore.
But he couldn't stop.
"…Shit."
He lifted the boy again and placed him on the bed. Covered him with the duvet. Sat beside him, like a silent guard.
It wasn't kindness.
It was instinct.
The next morning, Ren awoke to the sound of something clattering.
He bolted upright.
The boy was trying to make ramen. Powder spilled everywhere. Water half-boiled. He didn't know what he was doing, but he was trying.
Ren stared.
Then rubbed his eyes. "You've gotta be shitting me… that's my last ramen. I fucking hate kids"
Before he could yell—
Knock. Knock.
Ren's body went still.
That voice came next. Lazy. Playful.
"Ren?" Akihiro.
He swore under his breath and snatched the boy by the arm, dragging him into the bathroom. Whispered fast:
"Not a fucking sound."
He locked the door and stepped toward the entrance.
Face blank. Katana near his hand.
"Yeah," he called out, calm and cold. "I'm awake."
But inside—