The bridge spat her onto the island like a cork from a bottle. Wind hit harder here, unsheltered, pulling at her jacket, trying to slide the bike sideways across wet tarmac. The box shifted against her back; the straps creaked but held. Below, the harbor boiled black, waves chewing themselves into white.
She kept low, chin tucked, throttle steady. Patrol beacons winked red along the guardrails, each one smeared to bleeding by rain. No other vehicles. No pedestrians. The world had thinned to her, the bike, and the storm's relentless bites.
Halfway across, the AR overlay collapsed in a burst of noise. The maps flickered into nonsense sigils, lines bending back on themselves. Then: nothing. Just the raw world, unmediated. She grinned behind her visor. Some riders hated the blackouts in densely aetheric areas like this, but for Iris it was nothing new. Just road and rain and the whisper of wards in the metal bones.
She cleared the far ramp and dropped onto Lantau proper. The jungle rose to meet her, dark mass against stormlight, trees swaying like giants. The road was a narrow scar between walls of green. Rain fell harder here, each leaf shedding buckets onto the tarmac.
Her visor smeared AR hardlight reflections from lights far ahead. Tiny roadside shelters hunched every few bends, paper lanterns bobbing wildly. Their smoke trails wove into the rain, tugging at her senses in strange ways. The bike hummed steady until she crossed the first of them.
Then it bucked.
A cough in the engine, a hiccup in the electrics. She swore, downshifted, but the bike shuddered as though the storm had reached inside and grabbed fistful of wires.
"Don't you dare." She coaxed the throttle, knees gripping the tank. The machine limped forward, coughing again, almost stalled. The air felt thick, syrupy, charged with that old wrongness that clung to wards.
She coasted under a banyan that leaned across the road like a guard. Water poured off its branches in sheets on both sides, leaving only dry spot right under. She killed the engine, rolled to a stop, boots splashing down. The rain hit harder without the bike's hum to distract her — a thousand needles on metal, skin, leaves.
She popped her visor. The smell hit her first: incense and copper. Then she realized it wasn't the air. It was the box. It was moving.
Her gut tightened. She twisted in the saddle, unbuckled the rig with clumsy wet gloves. The box shivered in her hands, a faint thump against the lid.
"Cho, you absolute bastard," she muttered.
The latch gave under her thumb. She opened the lid.
Inside: not paperwork, not drugs, not samples, not cash. A kitten.
Black fur plastered wet, tiny ribs shuddering with breath. Around it, shards of shell — not fragile white, but thick, scaled and opalescent. An egg, cracked apart from the inside. The kitten mewled weakly, eyes barely open, a sound far too small for the storm around them.
Iris just stared. Rain drummed on the box, pooled in her lap.
"You've got to be kidding me."
She reached in anyway, lifted the little body out. It was warm, impossibly warm for something so small. It clawed at her jacket, desperate for heat. She tucked it inside, against her chest. The tiny thing pressed close, heartbeat a frantic tick against her sternum. Didn't even think twice.
Her visor fogged from her own breath. She sat there a long moment, rain hammering around, listening to that small, insistent life.
Then she looked back at the box. At the shards.
They pulsed faintly. Edges glowing at the sharp edges. She hesitated, then reached in. She set one piece against another. The glow brightened, threads of light knitting across the crack until the seam vanished.
Her pulse skipped. She set another, then another. The fragments slid into place as if guided, reassembling themselves under her hands. Each click of contact hummed through her palms. In minutes she held not debris, but an egg again — whole, scaled, faintly luminous.
It shouldn't have been possible. But it was.
"Alright," she said to the storm. "That's new."
The egg sat solid in the box, faint warmth radiating. Tiny kitten tried to meow, and the bike, as if satisfied, gave a single spark through the console — a purr returning to its throat. She blinked, rain running down her nose.
"You only run when the egg's together. Cute."
The kitten squirmed under her jacket, claws hooking fabric. She rubbed its tiny skull with one finger. It sneezed, a spark of static jumping her glove. The hair on her arm prickled. The lamp of the roadside shrine flickered in answer, sputtering, then steadied.
"Yeah," she whispered. "You're trouble."
She set the egg back in the box, strapped it tight. The weight felt different now. She swung her leg, thumbed the starter. The bike roared awake, smooth as silk. No cough, no protest.
The jungle road stretched ahead, talismans dripping, trees bowing under storm weight. Her path bent upward toward the monastery. The wards would keep fighting her, but she had momentum now.
She lowered her visor. The kitten shifted against her chest, a tiny heat.
"Alright, kid," she said, rolling out. "Let's go find your monks."
The bike leapt forward, carving through rain and shadow, the storm chasing her taillight into the hills. The rain came in walls now, sweeping across the asphalt in sheets. Each bend tightened around her like the coils of some patient beast, branches rattling overhead, talismans slapping wet against their strings. The bike hummed steady under her, unbothered now, but every nerve in her body stayed coiled.
She leaned into a switchback. The headlamp caught a shrine built into the cliff wall, red paint peeling, candles guttering in puddles. Two carved guardians flanked its door, moss slick on their jaws. As she passed, their eyes glimmered faintly with waterlight, a trick of reflection—or not.
The kitten stirred under her jacket, pressing against her ribs. Warmth spread through her chest, uncanny against the storm's bite. She gritted her teeth and throttled harder.
The monastery gates appeared without warning, rising from the fog like a ship's prow. Lanterns lined the path, flames bowed nearly sideways by wind. The great bronze doors were already open, as if the monks had known her route.
A figure waited under the arch: robes plastered to his body, rain streaming off shaved scalp, face calm as still water. He held his hands folded, and when she skidded to a stop before him, he inclined his head once, as in surprise.
"You are expected," he said, his eyes undeniably trapped by humming beast between her feet.
"Lucky me." She killed the engine, boots splashing down. The egg-box sat heavy on the rig, humming faintly, as though eager to be passed on. She unclipped it, felt the warmth bleed into her gloves.
The monk extended his hands. Before taking the box, he bowed once — not to her, but to the storm behind her, like it had delivered her instead of the bike. She gave him the box.
"You did not look inside?" he asked, though his tone was not warning but ritual.
"Wouldn't dream of it."
He turned, carrying it into the shadow of the monastery. For a moment the storm cleared in her sightline, and she saw past the doors: the great Buddha of Lantau, vast and calm, shoulders gleaming wet, lanterns swaying at his feet. The statue seemed to breathe with the storm.
Then the doors closed.
Her comm pinged against her jaw. Bank transfer. Lots of zeroes. Cho kept his word, for once.
She blew out a long breath, water dripping off her visor. "Well. That's dinner for a month."
The kitten mewed faintly under her jacket, as if to argue the point.
The ride back down was a blur of water and stone. The jungle road spilled her downward in switchbacks, tires hissing, egg strapped tight, kitten warm against her chest. Rain fell sideways, blown off the ridgeline in sheets. Every shrine she passed flickered its lamps as she went by, as though checking her twice before letting her pass.
The Tsing Ma Bridge roared around her, lightning turning its cables into a harp of fire for a heartbeat, then back to iron. She shot through the Lantau tunnel before the flood warnings caught up.
The kitten shifted under her jacket, claws flexing. She muttered, "Easy, kid," but her voice was lost in the roar.
Central shimmered under stormlight, towers humming with wards while incense burned in buckets at patrol posts. Even Wan Chai was silent, neon luck-signs shorting out into blackness. Hong Kong itself felt drowned.
She turned into the garage, killed the engine, and sat a moment with helmet on, listening to the tick of cooling metal under the drum of rain.
Her flat smelled of damp tape and stale gin. She shed her jacket, and the kitten tumbled out, shook itself once, then sneezed. A spark jumped its nose, making lamp flicker. Its shadow lagged half a beat behind on the wall, then caught up.
"Brilliant," Iris muttered. "A storm in miniature."
She poured milk into a chipped bowl. The kitten fell on it, lapping like it hadn't eaten in days. Iris leaned against the counter, lit a stick, violet ember flaring. The smoke curled metallic-sweet, mixing with the smell of wet fur.
Her comm buzzed. Cho again, text only: THANK YOU. DON'T ASK.
She snorted. ALREADY DID NEXT TIME PAY MORE, she thumbed back, then tossed the device onto the couch.
The storm battered her taped windows, white Xs glowing faint against neon. She smoked, slow, watching water streak the glass.
"Cat hatched from an egg. Sure. Totally normal. Next time, I'm charging hazard pay."
The kitten finished its milk, sat back, and yawned. The lamp dimmed and flared as though in sympathy. Iris sighed, rubbed her temple, cracked the gin bottle open. She drank long, set the glass down, and crouched to scratch the little thing behind the ears. Its purr was tiny thunder.
The kitten sneezed; the taped wards flickered like blinking eyes. Across the harbor, a strip of neon strobed into a hexagram.Iris listened to the tiny thunder in her jacket.
"Alright," she said quietly. "You can stay. Just don't eat my sofa."