The girl got away after she caught him off-guard and darted into the labyrinth of alleyways.

Casen didn’t go home like usual.

Instead, he sat at the edge of the fountain in Ghost Square, legs drawn up, arms draped over his knees. The crowd had dispersed minutes after the dead vanished, leaving only the usual drifting petals, burnt incense, and empty offerings.

He held the girl’s coat in his hands.

She’d dropped it when she fled. Or maybe she’d left it on purpose.

Either way, it was his now.

He turned it over. Too big for her frame. Inside the collar was a tag: 412B-KNR. Government coding—Sector 4, housing block 12B, apartment KNR. Old coding system, phased out years ago. No one lived there now. That sector was a reclamation zone.

Abandoned.

Just like her.

Milo plopped down beside him, slurping on a melting iced drink with zero shame. “You’re still thinking about her, huh?”

Casen didn’t answer.

Milo glanced at the coat, then back at Casen. “You know the law. We don’t chase the dead. We don’t talk to the anomalies. We deliver and leave. That’s what Runners do.”

“She wasn’t dead,” Casen muttered.

“Did she vanish at one o’clock?”

Casen shook his head.

“Then she wasn’t part of the Event,” Milo said. “Which makes her worse.”

Casen looked at him.

“It means she’s real. And real people who break ghost rules tend to disappear real fast.”

Casen turned back to the fountain. Water spilled silently over the stone hands of the memorial statue—an old man holding a child, both staring at the sky. The plaque below read: They return so we remember.

Casen whispered, “But what if remembering is what breaks everything?”

Milo sighed. “Philosophy hour is over. You got another delivery. Priority tier.”

Casen blinked. “Already?”

“Yup. Came through my band while you were chasing ghost girls. High pay. No sender ID. Destination… Sector 4.”

Casen froze.

Milo raised an eyebrow. “You going or not?”

Casen stood. “Send me the details.”

He stuffed the girl’s coat in his backpack and walked toward his bike. The streets ahead were gray and cracked. Buildings leaned like tired men. No cameras. No crowds. Just silence.

Sector 4 waited.

And somewhere in its ruins, a girl who shouldn’t exist might be waiting, too.

He arrived an hour later, after weaving through tunnels and bypassing two broken checkpoints. His bike hummed quietly until he powered it down just outside 412B.

A collapsed dome, stripped of all modernity.

The apartment block was a skeleton—shattered windows, vines in the lobby, faded murals of children playing with paper ghosts. Casen climbed five flights of rusted stairs before he found the door labeled “KNR.”

It was slightly open.

He knocked anyway. “Delivery.”

No answer.

He stepped inside.

Dust floated like ghosts in the air. But the room wasn’t empty.

Someone had been living here.

A cracked monitor on the table flickered with ghost recordings—footage from different sectors, showing the dead emerging at noon. But they weren’t the public feeds. These were private. Illegal. Recorded from impossible angles.

And in every one of them, the girl was visible. Standing in the crowd. Watching Casen.

Every day.

He took a step back.

The floor creaked.

“Casen,” a voice whispered.

He turned. She was there.

Elian.

Her coat gone, her hair tangled, eyes burning with urgency.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she said.

He stared. “You’ve been following me.”

“I had to.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re the only one who remembers me.”

Casen’s mind raced. She had appeared here, not hidden. This place—it was her home. He had found her.

Before he could respond, the wall behind her rippled—not because the next Return had begun (it wasn’t anywhere near noon), but because something far more dangerous was breaching through. This wasn’t part of the noon phenomenon. This was something else entirely. An anomaly.

A ghost stepped through. But not like the others. Not shivering or silent. This one had eyes that moved. Lips that smiled.

And it spoke.

“Found you.”

Elian screamed. Casen reached for her, but the room twisted.

And everything went black.