They didn't make it two blocks.
The air thickened first—subtle, like humidity pressing against the lungs. Then sound warped. Footsteps echoed too long. Distant traffic stretched into low, distorted groans.
Ethan slowed.
"Maya," he said quietly. "Something's wrong."
"I know," she replied, already scanning the street.
The city around them looked normal enough—brick storefronts, parked cars, flickering streetlamps—but there was a wrongness to it, like a stage set built a fraction too wide. Shadows leaned where they shouldn't. Reflections lagged a heartbeat behind movement.
Then the streetlight ahead went out.
Not flickered.
Snuffed.
A ripple passed through the darkness.
Ethan's breath caught. The bag against his back went cold.
"Don't run," Maya murmured. "It wants panic."
The temperature dropped sharply. Frost crept across the asphalt in delicate, branching patterns. Windows along the block fogged over from the inside out.
From the far end of the street, something unfolded.
It did not step into view so much as resolve itself from absence—a tall, impossibly thin silhouette peeling free from the dark. Its shape suggested a person only because the human mind demanded familiar anchors. Arms too long. Legs bent at wrong angles. Its head tilted as if listening to a sound only it could hear.
When it spoke, it did not use its mouth.
Artifact detected, the voice said inside Ethan's skull.
Designation: Impossible-Class. Wielder: Uncatalogued.
Ethan staggered, clutching his head.
Maya swore under her breath. "It's already keyed to you."
The thing drifted closer. Each movement left a smear of darkness behind it that slowly pulled itself back together.
Compliance recommended, it continued.
Surrender the vessel. Biological termination unnecessary.
Ethan forced himself to breathe. "It's… talking in my head."
"Yes," Maya said. "Don't answer it."
The creature stopped ten feet away.
It raised one elongated hand. The air around its fingers bent inward, space itself stretching like soft rubber.
Ethan felt a tug—not on the bag, but on his chest. On the hollow place the miracle had carved earlier.
He gasped.
"No," Maya snapped. Light flared around her as the seraphim armor erupted into being, radiant plates locking into place. Wings of controlled fire unfurled behind her.
The collector recoiled slightly.
Unauthorized intervention, it stated flatly.
Seraphim-class agent detected.
Maya stepped in front of Ethan, her wings casting long shadows across the frozen street.
"You don't get him," she said. "Not tonight."
The creature tilted its head.
Artifact possession is non-negotiable.
Maya clenched her fists. "Then you should've brought reinforcements."
She struck first.
A lance of concentrated light tore across the street, slamming into the collector's chest. The impact shattered windows and sent a shockwave rippling outward.
The thing staggered—but did not fall.
Instead, it split.
Its silhouette tore down the center, peeling apart into two identical forms that reassembled themselves with sickening fluidity.
Ethan's stomach lurched.
Maya cursed. "Multiplicity response. Of course."
Both entities turned their attention back to Ethan.
The pull intensified.
Ethan dropped to one knee, clutching the bag's strap with white-knuckled desperation. It felt like something was reaching through him, using his absence as a handle.
"Maya!" he shouted.
She slammed one of the collectors into the side of a building, pinning it there with a burning sigil. The other slipped past her guard, gliding closer.
Ethan didn't think.
He reacted.
He swung the bag around and shoved his hand inside.
The darkness surged up his arm like ice water.
He imagined distance.
He imagined separation.
He imagined the thing not being here.
The bag answered.
A concussive wave erupted outward, invisible but absolute. The street buckled. Parked cars lifted off the ground and crashed back down. The collector was hurled backward as if struck by a god's palm, smashing through three storefronts before vanishing into the dark beyond.
The other entity shrieked—not in sound, but in pressure—and dissolved into a smear of shadow that evaporated like smoke.
Silence crashed down.
Ethan collapsed forward, gasping.
The ache in his chest flared violently, sharper than before. His vision blurred, stars bursting behind his eyes.
Maya was beside him instantly, gripping his shoulders. "Ethan. Stay with me."
"I—" He swallowed hard. "What did it take this time?"
Maya closed her eyes.
"Memory," she said quietly. "Short-term. Contextual."
He frowned weakly. "What does that mean?"
She searched his face.
"Tell me what you did," she said.
Ethan opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
His brow furrowed. "I… I reached into the bag."
"And then?"
His throat tightened.
"I don't know," he whispered. "I know it worked. I know it mattered. But the how—it's gone."
Maya exhaled slowly, pain flickering across her expression. "That's the cost. You saved us. But you won't remember how you did it."
Ethan laughed softly, hollow and exhausted. "That's… inconvenient."
"Yes," she agreed. "That's how it keeps you from becoming omnipotent."
She helped him sit up. The frozen street was already thawing, reality snapping back into place like a rubber band.
"What was that thing?" Ethan asked.
Maya looked down the street where the collector had vanished.
"A procurement entity," she said. "Older than angels. Not evil. Not good."
She met his gaze.
"Just hungry for order."
Ethan stared at the bag.
"So that's what hunts me now."
Maya nodded. "One of many."
He swallowed.
The city lights flickered back on around them. Somewhere, a car alarm started wailing. The world pretended nothing had happened.
Ethan pushed himself to his feet, shaky but determined.
"Then we can't keep reacting," he said. "We need to be ahead of it."
Maya studied him for a long moment.
"Careful," she said. "That's how people stop being victims."
He met her gaze.
"I'm tired of being hunted."
The bag rested against his back, silent and patient.
Somewhere beyond sight, something had learned his name.
And it would not forget it.