a/n 

chapter two! any honest feedback would be much appreciated :)

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sending all my love,

krissy

♙

h i j a c k e d

LIN SHUTS DOWN the moment I crash through the window of my apartment.

Details blur as my body hits the carpeted floor with exhaustion, chest heaving. Barely a moment passes before the contacts burn. Hissing a breath through my teeth, I peel them off and dump them in the charging solution by the mirror.

The world dissolves into darkness. Black silhouettes turn slate-blue from the glow of elevated monorail tracks outside.

In the evening hours, I don't see my apartment as much as I memorize it. The space is a hundred and twenty square feet. My window faces north. Gas stove, water boiler, and fridge all pressed up against the western wall. Bathroom two steps south, holding a toilet with weak plumbing and a shower stall with a loose shower head. My dark mattress and the off-black blanket my mother wove for me. A low table stacked with plastic ramen bowls, broken chopsticks, and empty cans of iced tea.

Nestled against television on the eastern wall is my father's cajon, a little cracked, collecting dust. It's my most expensive possession. There's even a cajon brush on it. I played it once after he died, but the landlady yelled at me to shut it up, so now it's as useless as wall decor.

Crackling stirs the air. Lin's voice is flickering back to life, reinvigorated by the charging solution in my contacts case.

That's the thing about these contacts, too. The charging solution itself runs out of energy and costs two hundred fifty notes. Being a bounty hunter for money keeps me restocking every month. The price is half of what I collect in that time. The other half keeps me alive.

In other words, it's impossible to save and move upward. But with the money from catching Ren...

"Hina." The solution glows cool gray, like moonlight, flaring with the breath of Lin's voice. "Are you alright?"

I stare uselessly at the ceiling from my spot on the floor. "Just fine."

A beat of silence passes. In the past, my father, or otousan, would guide me home from the doctor's office, and at the first turn of the doorknob, the aroma of miso would flow through my nostrils and fill my body with warmth. My mother, my okaasan, would stand at the stove in a plastic apron, chewing her lip eagerly, white rice already steaming hot on the table. The lanterns would be lit. The walls would be warm. Otousan would poke his nose in close for a sniff, and almost instantly okaasan would protest and push his shoulder away, raising a spoon to his lips instead.

The solution flares silver. "Battery will reach full charge in six hours."

"Okay," I answer. "Thanks, Lin."

"Alternatively, if you deactivate my artificial intelligence system, you may reach full charge in three. Deactivate?"

I open my mouth to say yes.

Blue light flickers as a train passes outside. A cold draft of wind blows through the open window. Suddenly, a feeling of coldness flows through me. Through my chest, through my veins, right up to my heart, pressing up against the red wing imprinted in my blood.

I'm abruptly aware of how empty this room is.

"No." I close my eyes, voice lowering. "Don't deactivate, Lin."

A pause. I imagine if she's wondering why. If she can wonder.

But as always, she obeys. Her presence remains, her silver glow endlessly patient for my next command.

"As you wish."

♙

I SEE RED.

My first instinct tells me it's my contacts. I blink my eyes hard—once, then twice, to no avail. And then I fumble through the dark to realize that I'm using the silver glow below my mirror as a guiding light. Which means my contacts are charging, and Lin is dormant.

An alarm outside begins to screech.

The moment I put in my contacts, a thousand veins of light trickle into a sharp picture, wiping me free of the frosted-glass filter that is my 20/200 vision.

"Lin," I whisper, tapping my ear quickly. "What's going on?"

She stays silent.

"Lin?"

Her response is delayed. "Searching, Hina."

My apartment is dark as death. After collapsing through my window, I'd fallen asleep right on the floor. Now, quick holographic numbers spin into meaning near my peripheral vision.

It's two in the morning. The medicine shipment arrives in sixty minutes.

"Well, shit," I mutter. I spin to fish for my handgun—

And freeze.

Usually, the view from my window goes like this: glowing signs wrought in ink flooding ivory-white walls, sea flags of stone blue and deep auburn, fogged-up windows, a streak of blue from the elevated monorail. Pretty enough to look like a gaudy lantern show when my contacts aren't in.

Tonight, the signs sleep in the dark. The flags lie still. The monorail train glows bright, alarming red. In fact—

I push aside my window and crane my head out.

People.

Thousands of them. Rivers of people trickling from their shops out onto the street, carrying red lanterns suspended on long poles. They're dressed in different shades of white. Loose clothing, like canvas, the color of mourning.

I'm staring at a funeral progression.

"Lin." My voice trembles. "You got that search for me yet?"

"I believe this will be best understood if you turn on the television, Hina."

A frown flickers on my brows. I tear my eyes away from the sea of tear-stricken faces below and switch on the television.

"...reports of the five thousand are trickling in steadily...officials from the Minami Medicine Tower have identified a common component of the hallucinogen—the compound has been recently titled white wing after the widely known red wing phantom responsible for Osaka's third and deadliest mass murder—"

My eyes drink in the bolded words. Flashing images.

MASS MURDER OF TENSHI ORPHANAGE EVACUEES

Ice chills my blood as a camera sweeps over the orphanage.

White tape seals off the entire perimeter. Officials dressed in white uniforms stand guard. Heads bowed. Every inch of rich greenery on the grounds has rotted to brown. There's a strange white mist lingering over the leaves, wrapping around the stems like fingers. The steel doors are barred shut.

A helicopter sweeps a giant spotlight across the rooftops, which are empty.

Empty.

My mind flashes to the figure crouched on the shingles. The black mask.

"Red wing," I breathe.

"That is correct, Hina." Even Lin sounds grim, if that's possible. "I've scanned statistics from a recent article, if you'd like."

A woman with grief-stricken eyes reports live from the street of the orphanage, which is swarmed with medics and officials. Bodies being carried out on stretchers. The start of the funeral progression, with citizens dressed in white brandishing lanterns like weapons of revenge, countering shadows fiercely with light.

"How many?" my mouth says.

"Five thousand, four hundred and two."

The number sucks the air from my lungs. "Five thousand?"

"That is correct."

Something sparks in my mind. "Five thousand, four hundred and two. At the brawlery seven years ago, there were four hundred and two bodies."

"Additionally," adds Lin calmly, "the second mass murder two years ago that Tenshi Orphanage first sustained had forty-two bodies. Officials are identifying a pattern."

"Any suspects?"

As if on cue, the television news roll flickers to another picture. One caught by a black-and-white CCTV camera, gritty and blurred, of a boy striding on the outskirts of a crowd. Lean, narrow-shouldered, angular jaw. Battered police cap shielding his eyes. His left hand wipes the corner of his mouth as if smearing away blood or dirt.

My mind flashes to the man on the roof. Broad-shouldered and tall. Dressed in black. Similar cap, but—

"That's not him," I murmur.

"The headcount after evacuees were safely inside was five thousand, four hundred and three," Lin reports. "A boy was caught sneaking out the back door with what appears to be a playing card in his hand."

"A playing card?" I echo.

"Yes," she replies. "The card is visible between his fingers in the few seconds he was caught on CCTV."

I narrow my eyes at the television screen. Just before the picture of the boy disappears, I see it—a hint of white poking out between the fingers of his left hand, as if the card is curled into his palm. Away from sight, but not...quite.

My fingers drift absently toward the card in my inner pocket. Responsible or not, the boy in the photo has information about the red wing that I don't.

"Do they have a name on him?" I ask.

"No. He is unidentifiable and matches no records. However," Lin continues, "his face matches one facial recognition scan in your search history."

A tickle of victory touches my chest. "Which scan?"

"Your most recent one," she tells me. "Ren-shu Ko."

♙

WITH NEARLY OSAKA'S entire population participating in the funeral progression, Osaka Port is abandoned.

Only a few teams of men are helping monitor incoming cargo. I lay low on the elevated tracks of a disused monorail line, doing a sweep of the area, tracking patrols. On my left, the swath of gray sea runs south. The horizon holds no cargo ships. A maze of cranes and storage shipping containers sprawls to the east. It's lit purely by white streetlights.

Directly below the monorail tracks is an empty slab of concrete branded with fading kanji. A runway.

The holographic numbers overlaying my vision read 02:52.

With a great sigh, I relax, stretch my fingers, and scan the empty port. "Lin, are there any articles on the port's security protocol?"

"Running search," says Lin faithfully.

"Also, what's my battery life looking like?"

"Battery at fifty percent."

"Good." I lean my head back and close my eyes as I wait for Lin to complete her search. My stomach growls. "You think I'll have enough time to stop by a convenience store on my way back?"

She pauses as if puzzled. "I'm sorry, Hina. I cannot provide hypothetical information."

A faint smile of disappointment touches my face. "Just a thought, I guess."

My eyes drift to my right. I'm startled by how different Osaka looks, as if the buildings and streets itself are bowed in mourning. Usually, from the rooftops, the city is a breathtaking sight. Gold lanterns, sea flags the color of desert flowers, monorail tracks swirling in and out of grayish mist. Today, the city glows red, the tracks like crimson ribbons entangling around white funeral banners.

"Search complete," reports Lin proudly. "Activity spotted six hundred feet away."

"Very nice," I murmur, tearing my eyes away from the city.

Below me, small cars with long platformed trunks pass beneath the steel supports of my monorail tracks. Like a line of faithful ants, they circle the perimeter of the runway, then loop around shipment containers to a faint blue glow in the distance.

I tilt my head. "Lin, is that—"

"Yes, Hina. That is Osaka Port Station."

I pause. "How did you know what I was going to say?"

"I'm very clever."

"Lin—"

"I am programmed to make predictions based on our interactions, Hina. Would you like me to disclose the results of the search you requested?"

I stretch my fingers as crew members dressed in navy trickle toward the waterfront. "Shoot."

She short-circuits. "I'm sorry?"

"It means yes, Lin. You wanna log that in your dictionary?"

"Definition logged," she answers, relaxed. "My search has detected ten crew members assigned to guard the medicine shipment. My facial recognition scans have identified them as highly trained security officials—"

"Fun," I mutter.

"—while ten highly-ranked port staff operate transportation measures."

Five crew members take their positions along the perimeter of the runway. Five others draw out white-lit traffic sticks, scanning the misty horizon at the ready.

A soft whir breaks the air. The holographic numbers switch from 02:55 to 02:56 just as the same line of platformed cars pass beneath the monorail tracks, looping back toward the station.

I narrow my eyes. One driver and two crew members on the platform.

"Looks like the car passes the tracks every four minutes. They're gonna put the shipment on that thing and take it to the Port Station, huh?"

"That appears to be correct."

"So Ren will be after it."

"Yes."

The time reads 02:57. A fleck of deep grey disturbs the fog. "Any sign of him?"

"I was unable to detect external activity—"

"You think he's disguised?"

"No facial recognition scans match Ren-shu Ko."

I swear under my breath. "Thank you, Lin," I hum, rising to my feet. The fleck enlarges.

02:59. The airship is sweeping in.

As crew members raise their traffic sticks, I race down the monorail tracks toward the blue glow. If Ren isn't here, and he intends to collect his medicine shipment, there's no doubt he'll be at the Port Station.

The Station is an elevated glass-walled tunnel with open arches, its underbelly pulsing a faithful blue. A bullet train waits inside, doors wide open. I have the abrupt impression of a dragon breathing slow, waiting for its rider.

"Battery life at forty percent," reports Lin.

"As long as it's not ten."

In the distance, the loud whoosh of an engine slices through the air. Wind pelts the faces of crew members in the distance—I see white traffic sticks waving, officials disguised as crew members moving protectively. My feet hit crackling gravel as I peer off the edge of the disused tracks.

A stack of shipping containers lies between me and the underbelly of the Station.

"There goes my knees," I mutter.

Lin's voice is firm. "One life signal detected on the ceiling of Osaka Port Station."

"Perfect—" My words cut off as I take a running leap off the tracks. Momentum propels me from the shipping containers up to the Station, where my fingers catch a rusted metal beam below a stripe of blue light. A grunt works its way up my throat as my muscles scream their effort, dragging me upward.

The time is 03:02. Distant voices join a soft whir in the distance.

"Keep your eyes on it," says a muffled voice. "The people need a little hope right now, yeah?"

"Well, sir. I have to keep my eyes on the road."

I hear a scowl in his voice. "Cheeky little bastard..."

My heartbeat spikes in panic as the whir approaches. I reach up and take hold of tangled cable wires—the whole bundle of them extends up into an open arch. As body scrambles upward toward safety, I glimpse the white flash of the platformed car, catch the sharp edge of a steel crate.

I have a flash of my mother, bedridden, her eyes covered with frosty white film, the tears leaking down her face. So pale. So hollow compared to the full warmth in those evenings when she stood with care over pots of broth.

Where are you, I remember asking myself, as if the invincible mother that cradled me to sleep would reappear. As if she would wake up from beneath this new corn husk and save me, as if that woman existed, as if my mother hadn't been sick my entire life.

I would ask the same thing of my otousan. Scream at him years later, too, where were you? And he would tell me, over and over, I was searching for a cure.

As if he didn't return weeks after she died with bundles of rotten cash.

The whirring stops just as I climb through an open arch. My forearms rest against the train station platform, which is guarded from the arch by a low glass fence. Beyond, the train rests in perfect stillness on newly-polished tracks. Bullet-head gleaming. Swathed in electric blue, curling away into the distance.

A pair of armed and masked guards stand to attention at the southern side of the train.

Lin speaks into my ear.

"One life signal detected on the ceiling of Osaka Port Station," she repeats. "Moving west. Facial recognition scan complete. Name—Ren-shu Ko."

My heart stops. I rise to my feet and raise my eyes.

Narrow steel supports crisscross the curved glass ceiling. Crouched on one of them is a familiar, narrow-shouldered figure. Angular jaw. Skinny nose beneath a battered police cap. He's dressed in a puffed jacket with an emblem that vaguely resembles a vintage police badge. His head is tilted—he's observing.

I set my jaw. The bounty instructions flash in my memory.

REN-SHU KO. ONE MILLION AND TWO NOTES. DELIVERED UNCONSCIOUS TO UMEDA STATION.

Talk about sketchy, huh? But there's no other way to get enough money for the damn prototypes.

Commotion stirs between the masked guards.

"Shipment's here!" hisses an excited voice.

"Lower your voice!" the other barks.

"You lower your voice," he shoots back. "Man, just listen to yourself waking up the whole neighborhood barking orders like that—"

"Thanks to me, the whole neighborhood is already wide awake for their fancy death parade, isn't it?"

Thanks to me?

Metal rattles. Above, Ren uses the rattling to drop soundlessly from the beam to the roof of the train, pressing himself down flat on the northern side so the swell of the roof hides him.

I hear amusement. "Can you push that thing any slower, Yun?"

"Shut the hell up."

"Do you plan to drive this train just as slowly, too?"

A grunt of effort. "Very funny."

The crate stops rattling, and the door slides shut. The big guard pauses, then leaves, and Yun rounds the end of the train to the northern side of the platform, where I suppose the entrance to the driver's compartment must be. A second later, the door slides shut.

Ren creeps onto the swell of the roof and draws out a long, laser-edged stick.

The train begins to whir.

Time to move.

Ren points the laser at the glass. It burns and fizzles into a neat, expanding cut. In seconds, I take my handgun, slip down onto the tracks, and scale the side of the train up to the roof. Metal vibrates, cold beneath my skin. I crouch low.

But it's too late. Yards away, Ren turns.

His eyes meet mine.

I'm not sure what I expect. Yellowed eyes? Cruel, cunning eyes? A thug's greedy gaze?

Ren, to my surprise, has none of them. In fact, his eyes widen with the bewilderment of a boy who can't be much older than I am, resembling a schoolchild who's realized what trouble he's gotten into. An oh, shit kind of moment, if you will. In his surprise, I catch the line of a wicked scar across his nose and cheeks. I'm stunned into stillness.

Just as quickly, however, the moment passes. Bewilderment vanishes from his face, replaced by a film of stone. He tugs out a knife, lifts his arm in warning, and works the laser faster.

I take aim.

A shot to the knee should do it.

The train roars to life. I fire.

The world slides backward as the bullet whistles toward him. Ren dodges and slides off the side of the train. A hiss of pain leaves his gritted teeth as his fingers hook onto searing glass. I launch myself toward him—the full weight of my body plummets into his, slamming us both off the train and onto the platform with such force the air leaves my lungs.

Windows flash before my eyes as the train gains speed.

Ren swears under his breath and tries to leap, but I tackle him before he can. Limbs lash out at me. Grip my shoulders, neck, ribs. A fist slams into my jaw.

The train screams its way forward. Wind whips my face.

And then, just like that, the train is gone.

In the wake of its absence, I pin Ren to the floor, tear off his cap, and jam the barrel on instinct toward his skin.

Delivered unconscious to Umeda Station.

I swallow. My arm shakes. The barrel falters.

Murderer, my mind breathes. But that's not who I am. I've never murdered before. In fact, the plan, from the beginning, was always to disarm and disable.

Still, it should take barely a thought to jam the butt of his gun to his temple. But his cap is gone, and with the full blue light of the station baring the humanity of his face, it's difficult to be cruel. In that moment of hesitation, I see brows drawn tight, dark eye-bags, scarred skin. Fierce dark eyes that mirror the desperate determination in mine.

Despite everything, a flash of guilt lances through my chest. Was the medicine your bounty?

He stares, hard, into my eyes. "You're making a mistake."

A memory of myself hours ago flashes through my mind. My panic propelling me through my open window as the contacts shut down. My frosted-glass vision. Lin's silver glow, my only guiding light, keeping me company in the blurred dark.

I'm trembling, but the answer is painfully clear. "No, I'm not."

But before I can make the final blow, a voice interrupts.

"I knew something was going on here," it teases.

I've barely turned when red mist explodes in my face.