Lucian woke to the sound of water dripping. Not the slow, steady kind you get from a leaky faucet — this was heavier, like rain pooling in a ruined ceiling. But when his eyes finally focused, the ceiling above him was perfectly intact.
He sat up in bed, groggy, heart thudding harder than it should. Same room. Same beat-up dresser. Same cheap clock flashing 3:17 a.m. The sound was gone now, but his throat was dry, and his stomach turned like it knew something he didn't.
It wasn't the first time he'd woken like this — heart racing, ears straining, brain replaying something he couldn't fully remember. Fire, or maybe an earthquake. Screams buried under static. And always that same feeling, like someone was watching just out of frame.
Lucian swung his legs off the bed and froze. His laptop, closed on the desk across the room, had its screen lit up. No sound, no boot chime, just pale light spilling into the dark.
On the screen was a eye, unblinking, unmoving, just staring.
Lucian rubbed his eyes hard enough to see sparks, then looked back at the laptop. The screen was dark again. Probably a dream. Probably.
He shut the thought down before it could go anywhere — paranoia was a luxury for people who didn't have overdue rent. By morning, the uneasy feeling had dulled into the usual fog of exhaustion.
The sun was already punching through the blinds when he finally rolled out of bed. His phone buzzed with three missed calls and a single text from his manager at the coffee shop:
"Don't bother coming in. We're cutting hours."
Lucian stared at it, unblinking. That made job number… what? Six this year? Seven? He'd stopped counting. He just shoved on a wrinkled hoodie, grabbed his keys, and left the apartment without eating.
The streets outside were loud and alive, the kind of city noise that felt more like static than music. He wove through the crowd like he'd done a thousand times, hands in pockets, eyes scanning for "Help Wanted" signs out of habit. He didn't get attached to jobs, but he didn't like being broke either.
By noon, Lucian had already been turned down twice. Once by a construction foreman who barely looked up from his clipboard, and once by a delivery service that wanted someone "with their own wheels." Lucian didn't even bother explaining that he got around just fine on foot.
He didn't waste time sulking. Sulking didn't pay rent. When one door slammed shut, Lucian didn't knock — he picked another lock.
On his way down 8th Street, he spotted a food vendor cursing over a jammed cart wheel. Lucian didn't bother offering help until the man muttered, "This thing's gonna cost me a hundred bucks to fix…"
That got his attention. Lucian crouched, popped the wheel off, and wedged it back into place with a flattened soda can he'd stepped on earlier. Not perfect, but it rolled.
The vendor blinked. "You some kinda mechanic?"
Lucian gave a half-smile. "Depends. You paying?"
The man hesitated, then slipped him twenty. Lucian tucked it away without another word and kept moving.
Later, outside a hardware store, he overheard a clerk struggling to explain something to an old woman who didn't speak English. Lucian spoke up — not because he cared, but because the clerk looked desperate enough to offer something in return. He translated quick and sloppy, just good enough to make the sale. The clerk muttered thanks and said he'd "put in a good word" if Lucian needed work.
By sunset, Lucian had a handful of half-promises and maybes. No guarantees, but better than nothing. He'd take scraps over starving.
The streets were thinning out as the sky bruised purple. Lucian cut through an alley to shave five minutes off the walk home, stepping over old flyers and cracked beer bottles. The air smelled faintly of rain, though the forecast had been clear all week.
Halfway through, he stopped.
A payphone was ringing.
Lucian hadn't seen one of those actually work in years. The booth stood in the corner, glass cracked, the receiver swaying slightly as it rang. He glanced around — no one else in sight.
Curiosity tugged at him, but instinct shoved harder. Keep moving. Nothing good ever came free.
On the next block, a TV in a pawn shop window caught his eye. The screen was snowy static, no power cord in sight, no reflection of the neon sign above it. Just static. And for a split second — maybe less — he could've sworn it spelled out something. Letters, maybe a word. But when he blinked, it was gone.
By the time he reached his apartment, the payphone and the TV were already filed away in the back of his head under weird, but not my problem. He had bigger things to worry about — like dinner, or rent, or whether his phone would buzz tomorrow with an actual job.
Lucian's day bled into night without much to show for it. A few dollars, a few promises, nothing solid. By the time he dragged himself home, the city felt too loud, too close, like it was pressing in on him. He didn't bother with dinner. He kicked off his shoes, collapsed on the mattress, and let exhaustion pull him under.
Sleep didn't come gently.
He was back in his childhood home — or something wearing its skin. The walls stretched unnaturally, the paint dripped like wet ink, and the air shimmered as if seen through boiling water. His mother's voice called to him, faint and urgent, but every step he took stretched the hall longer, pulling her further away.
Heat rose under his feet. The floor glowed red, splintering like coals before collapsing beneath him. He fell into a dark void, weightless, surrounded by writhing shadows. In the black, things moved: wings the size of houses, talons scraping sparks in the dark, his father's hand reaching out — before disintegrating into static.
And then a whisper, too close, too human:
"Wake."
Lucian jolted upright in bed, sweat slicking his skin. His phone buzzed on the nightstand.
One message. No sender.
"Work available. Two hours. $500. Address attached."
Lucian stared at it, jaw tight. No company name, no details — but five hundred dollars was five hundred dollars. He'd done shadier work for less. He grabbed his jacket.