The freshman's name was Evan Morales.
Ren learned that only because Jian made him stop right outside the stairwell, shielding his notebook from the flow of traffic, and write it down.
"Write it clearly," Jian instructed, his voice low and urgent. "Block letters. Don't smudge the ink."
"Why?" Ren whispered, glancing around nervously.
The hallway was a river of noise. Students streamed past them, laughing, arguing, shoving books into lockers. They walked right through the invisible space where Evan had vanished just seconds ago. No one looked at the floor. No one shivered.
"No one even remembers him," Ren said, a cold knot tightening in his stomach. "It's like he never existed."
"That's exactly why we have to write it down," Jian said. He tapped the paper with his finger. "The Fracture corrects the narrative, Ren. It edits out the glitches to keep the Normals sane. In ten minutes, his parents will forget they had a son. In an hour, his school records will smudge. If reality forgets someone, the paperwork is the only thing tethering them to existence."
Ren stared at the name on the page. EVAN MORALES. The ink looked too dark, absorbing the light around it.
"That's... terrifying," Ren whispered.
"That's the job," Jian corrected. He shoved the notebook into Ren's chest. "Hold this. And don't let anyone see the cover."
Ren looked down. The notebook was thick—too thick for a high school semester. The leather cover was battered and stained with things that looked alarmingly like dried tea and old blood. It smelled of ozone and dust.
"How many of these have you filled?" Ren asked, weighing the heavy book in his hands.
Jian didn't answer. He just adjusted his backpack straps, looking exhausted. "Inside. Now."
They slipped into the East Wing stairwell. The heavy fire door shut behind them with a metallic clang, instantly muting the roar of the school.
The silence here was different. It wasn't just quiet; it was heavy. The air felt stale, unmoving, as if the stairwell had been sealed off from the rest of the world for decades. The fluorescent light above them buzzed with a sickly, yellow flicker.
Jian didn't waste time. He sat on the concrete steps, snatched the notebook back, and clicked a pen.
At least, Ren thought it was a pen. The barrel was made of a dark, porous wood, and the ink inside the clear reservoir shimmered faintly, shifting from black to green like oil on water.
"State the incident," Jian said, his posture shifting. The lazy gamer slouch was gone. In its place was the rigid, unhappy posture of a bureaucrat working overtime.
Ren swallowed, leaning against the cold railing. "He crossed the distortion. There was a sound lag—echoes looping before he spoke. Then a visual ripple, like heat haze. He walked through it and... nothing. Just gone."
"Time?"
Ren checked his phone. The screen was glitching, pixels dancing around the edges. "8:17 AM."
Jian wrote quickly, the pen scratching loud in the silence. "Witnesses?"
"Me. You."
Jian paused, the pen hovering over the paper. "Primary anomaly?"
Ren hesitated. He looked at his hands—the hands that had blown a smoke monster off a roof yesterday. The hands that were currently shaking.
"...Me," Ren whispered.
Jian nodded grimly and wrote it down without comment. That somehow felt worse than if he had yelled. It was a confirmation. Guilty.
"Classification?" Ren asked, dreading the answer.
Jian exhaled through his nose, a long, tired sound. "Unscheduled Spatial Consumption. Tier C."
Ren's stomach dropped. "That sounds bad."
"Tier C means 'someone important will notice,'" Jian corrected, flipping a page. "Tier D is a lost cat. Tier A is 'the sky is screaming.' We're in the middle. It's salvageable, but expensive."
"Expensive how?"
"Processing fees," Jian muttered. "And bribes."
Ren ran his hand through his damp hair. "So what happens now? Do we go get him?"
"We?" Jian laughed, a dry, humorless sound. "No. We are not Retrievers. We are janitors. We file the ticket, and we pray the Recovery Team gets here before Evan dissolves into raw mana."
Jian tore the page out of the notebook.
The paper did not rip cleanly. It didn't sound like paper tearing. It made a wet, squelching sound, like skin separating from flesh.
Ren winced, taking a step back. "Please tell me that's not—"
"Recycled," Jian cut him off. "Mostly."
He folded the damp, fleshy page carefully into a tight triangle. Then, he reached into the inner pocket of his jacket. He pulled out a small brass whistle.
It was old. Ancient. The metal was dull, pitted with age, and had no markings. It looked like something dug up from a trench in World War I.
"You're summoning someone?" Ren asked, eyeing the whistle.
"Submitting," Jian corrected. "And cover your ears. This frequency isn't meant for the living."
Jian raised the whistle to his lips and blew.
Ren braced himself for a shriek.
But no sound came out.
Instead, the air buckled.
The pressure in the stairwell dropped instantly. Ren's ears popped painfully. The yellow light above them flickered—once, twice—and then turned a deep, bruising purple for a split second before returning to normal.
Then came the sound.
Coo.
Ren stiffened. "Was that a—"
Flap. Flap. Flap.
Something fluttered down from the shadows of the upper landing. It descended awkwardly, wings beating hard against the stagnant air. It landed on the metal railing between them, feathers puffed up, claws scratching against the paint.
It was a pigeon.
Or at least, it was wearing a pigeon suit.
It was larger than a normal bird, its chest puffed out unnaturally. Its feathers were greasy and matted. But it was the eyes that made Ren's blood run cold. They weren't the black, beady eyes of a bird.
They were blue. Human blue. And they were staring directly at Jian with a mix of intelligence and pure, unadulterated rage.
Coo.
The sound vibrated in Ren's teeth.
Jian didn't flinch. He held out the folded, fleshy paper triangle.
The pigeon didn't peck it. It snatched the paper in its beak with a violent snap, threw its head back, and swallowed the report whole. You could see the bulge of the paper sliding down its throat.
Ren stared, horrified. "Did that pigeon just eat a missing person report?"
"Yes," Jian said, wiping his hands on his jeans. "And now it's going to be very upset about the taste."
The pigeon puffed itself up further, looking like it was about to explode. Then, its beak opened wide—too wide.
It spoke.
"UNREGISTERED EVENT," it croaked.
The voice didn't sound like it came from a throat. It sounded like gravel being dragged across a pane of glass. It was scratchy, distorted, and layered with static.
"UNAUTHORIZED DISTORTION. INVALID FILING TIME."
Ren's blood went cold. He backed up until his spine hit the concrete wall.
"You are late," the pigeon continued, hopping closer to Jian. "You are always late, Custodian."
Jian grimaced, looking like a student caught without homework. "Traffic was bad. The distortion loop blocked the signal."
The pigeon's head snapped toward Ren. The movement was mechanical, instant. Those human blue eyes locked onto Ren's face.
"ANOMALY PRESENT," it hissed. "SOURCE CONFIRMED."
WHAM.
Ren felt a physical pressure slam into his chest, like invisible hands pressing inward. His lungs seized. His ears rang with a high-pitched whine. At his feet, his shadow began to writhe, detaching itself from his heels and clawing at the floor.
"Hey!" Jian snapped, stepping in front of Ren. "You can't audit him without notice! Read the bylaws!"
The pigeon laughed.
It was not a bird sound. It was a dry, rattling wheeze that smelled of old tombs.
"NOTICE WAS GIVEN," it croaked. "TWO THOUSAND YEARS AGO."
Ren's vision swam. The stairwell felt smaller, the walls closing in. He could hear his own heartbeat echoing out of sync—thump... thump...—lagging behind reality.
"Take it up with your supervisor," Jian said sharply, his voice cutting through the pressure. "This one's under provisional observation. Ticket filed. Now get out."
The pigeon clicked its beak. It stared at Ren for one long, terrifying second.
Then, abruptly, it turned away.
"REPORT ACCEPTED," it said coldly. "ESCALATION PENDING."
It hopped to the small frosted window of the stairwell. It didn't open it. It simply slammed into the glass—
Thump.
And vanished. It didn't break the glass; it dissolved into the reflection, rippling away like a stone thrown into a pond.
The lights steadied. The pressure lifted instantly.
Ren slumped against the wall, gasping for air. "What... what the hell was that?"
"Courier," Jian corrected, pocketing the whistle. "Unit 74. We call him Gary. He's a jerk."
"He looked at me," Ren whispered, rubbing his chest where the pressure had been. "He knew me."
"He recognized your energy signature," Jian said. "Auditors don't come in person, Ren. Be thankful it was just a courier."
Ren laughed weakly, wiping sweat from his forehead. "That's not reassuring."
Jian looked at the empty window, and for the first time, his mask of boredom cracked completely. He looked worried.
"Yeah," Jian said softly. "It shouldn't be."
RIIING.
The bell rang outside the stairwell door. Perfectly synced. Loud. Normal.
The period had started.
Class was in session. Somewhere in the building, a teacher was calling roll, and Evan Morales wasn't there to answer.
Ren stared at the empty stairwell window, the image of those human eyes burned into his mind.
"How many reports until someone comes for me?" Ren asked. "Real auditors. Not pigeons."
Jian hoisted his backpack, his face grim.
"Depends," he said, opening the heavy metal door. "How many more rules do you plan to break today?"