Kazou walked with his shoulders slightly hunched, his blue chore coat fluttering at the edges in the sharp wind. Beneath it, a white shirt clung to him with the sweat of nerves. His shoes clicked against the cracked pavement of the alley behind the Marriott.

  Everything here reeked of secrets.

  Only a block away, the hotel’s polished marble and neon signs of the clubs beside it caught the last of the evening light. But this street belonged to another world, forgotten, rotting. Paint peeled from the brick like scabbed skin. Most windows above were dark; the few lit ones glowed behind yellow curtains where silhouettes shifted. A cheap, warbled melody leaked from a broken speaker overhead—something Polish, maybe from the ’80s.

  Kazou passed two women sitting on the curb. One chewed gum, slow and mechanical, eyes bloodshot. The other’s gaze followed him, cutting cold up

  his spine.

  They always stared. Everyone did at the 'Foreigner'.

  A prostitute leaned against a lamppost, heavy makeup cracking under the heat. Smoke curled from the cigarette in her hand. Her eyes followed him, too.

  “You looking for someone?” she asked, switching to English when she caught his face.

  Kazou didn’t answer. His eyes were on the far end of the street. Toward the Marriott, where an adult club sat, right beside it.

  There—faint gold lettering on a rusted black door.

  KLUB PALENIA — The Burn Club.

  He moved toward it, slow and measured. The hairs on his neck stood. The letter had named this place, and it matched. But it was too easy. Too quiet.

  The prostitute called after him again. “You don’t belong here, Scientist.”

  Kazou stopped. How did she know that?

  The street seemed to hold its breath. A pigeon dropped from a roof, landing beside a trash bin with a soft flutter.

  He turned his head slightly. “…What did you say?” His voice was quiet, but there was strength in it.

  She smirked, tapping ash to the ground.“You’re not the first lost man chasing ghosts,” she said in Polish. “I see it in your eyes—you’re not here for company. You’re looking for something that should stay buried.”

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  Kazou’s breath tightened in his chest.

  Her gaze flicked toward the Klub Palenia in the distance. “It’s open. But remember—some places don’t let you leave the way you came.”

  He said nothing, walking past her. The alley narrowed, the walls leaning in like they’d been listening. His coat whispered against his sides.

  Then—

  “Wait—please—don’t go there!"

  The voice cracked—female, desperate. It came from behind a stack of bins.

  Kazou stopped, scanning.

  A young woman stumbled into view—barely twenty. Curly black hair twisted into a high, messy bun. Brown oily skin. Her thin red dress clung awkwardly to her frame; one heel was missing. Mascara ran in streaks down her face. Glitter clung to her collarbone like scattered glass.

  When she saw him, her eyes widened with horror.

  “Don’t go there!” she cried, running at him. “They’ll kill you—people like you—they’ll kill you! Please, please don’t go down there! They don't like people like us! He hates us! He beat me because I was Dominican!"

  Kazou stiffened. His left hand hovered near his pocket as she crashed into him, arms locking around his waist. She was trembling, sobbing into his shirt, clinging like a drowning victim to driftwood.

  “You don’t know what this place is,” she choked out. “He hates Asians. They’ll skin you alive—please listen to me—please.”

  Kazou’s eyes lifted past her. No shadows moved. No footsteps followed.

  Kazou blinked, startled, his mind racing. He held her arms gently, trying to make sense of the panic pouring out of her. “What do you mean?” he asked softly, in Polish. “Who’s inside? Why—?”

  But she collapsed at his feet suddenly, trembling on the filthy concrete, her shoulders shaking with grief or terror—or both. Her hair veiled her eyes.

  Kazou crouched down, his hand hovering over her back.

  “Miss—are you alright?”

  No answer.

  Then—

  A shift.

  Just a flicker.

  Kazou saw it: a curl of her lips beneath the curtain of hair.

  A smile.

  Wrong. Wrong.

  His heart seized.

  “…Wait—” he started, but it was too late.

  The woman suddenly tore herself free from Kazou’s grasp, her movements sharp and panicked, as if some unseen terror had burst into the alley behind them. Her heels scraped against the damp pavement as she bolted forward, the sound echoing between the brick walls.

  She darted into the narrow spine of the alley, her shadow stretching long in the dim yellow glow of a flickering streetlamp. Halfway down, her foot caught on something—a jagged crack in the asphalt or perhaps a stray bottle—and her body pitched forward.

  She went down hard, slamming onto her stomach with a muffled thud. The impact knocked a startled cry from her throat, raw and desperate, the kind of scream that cut straight through rational thought.

  Kazou’s instincts overrode everything else—caution, suspicion, even the unease that had been gnawing at him since the moment they’d crossed paths. Without thinking, he lunged forward, his shoes splashing through a shallow puddle as he closed the distance.

  Her hair spilled forward in a tangled curtain, hiding her face as she lay half-curled on the freezing pavement. Each breath came in shallow, jagged bursts, misting in the night air. The alley reeked of rust, wet concrete, and old rain.

  Kazou dropped to one knee beside her, heart pounding, the sharp wind cutting through his coat. “Hey—are you hurt? Can you move? S-shit…” His voice faltered. "I can help you."

  The girl whimpered softly, body trembling. Stray strands of hair clung to her damp cheeks.

  Then—movement.

  Through a narrow break in the strands, Kazou caught the glint of an eye. Her breathing evened. The trembling stopped. Her lips curved upward in the faintest, most unsettling smirk.

  “Tricked you,” she breathed, her accent curling around the Japanese words, making them sound almost sweet.

  The pain in her face vanished like it had never been there at all. Her grin bloomed—wide, almost childish, but wrong. “You’re him… aren’t you?”

  Kazou blinked. “W—what?”

  The sound hit them first—rubber shrieking against wet asphalt.

  He looked up just as a black sedan came flying around the corner, headlights blazing white into the darkness.

  No license plate.

  Kazou shifted his weight to move out of the path of the sedan.

  —but the girl’s palm pressed lightly against his chest. A deceptively gentle shove.

  It wasn’t enough to hurt him. But it was enough to move him back into the way of the sedan on it's way.

  His foot slid back on the slick pavement.

  He staggered—

  Right into the path of the car.

  The girl ran.

  BOOM.