"Secrets don’t stay buried forever—

  Not when the dead keep whispering them back."

  — Ren Hoshino

  I couldn’t sleep.

  Not after the look in Yuki’s eyes.

  Not after the tears that didn’t make sense.

  That wasn’t shocking. It was recognition.

  She knew something.

  She knew me.

  But how?

  I didn’t go to school the next day.

  Instead, I sat on the rooftop of our apartment complex, headphones in, hood up, lungs steady. I stared out over the city like I was waiting for the sky to fall.

  It didn’t.

  Yuki did.

  Literally.

  She climbed the last rung of the fire escape like she had every right to invade my silence.

  “I thought I’d find you here,” she said.

  I pulled my hood lower. “Shouldn’t you be at school?”

  She sat beside me, legs swinging over the edge. “You shouldn’t be alive.”

  I froze.

  No one ever said it like that. Not even me.

  “…How long have you known?” I asked.

  Yuki didn’t answer right away. She took a breath, long and controlled—like she was matching me.

  “Since the river,” she said softly. “Since we were kids.”

  So it was her. The girl on the bank. The one who didn’t scream.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “You were watching me,” I muttered.

  “I was trying to figure out if you were even real.”

  Fair.

  Silence stretched between us like a thread ready to snap.

  Then she reached into her bag.

  A flash drive.

  A photo.

  A name: NOX.

  My blood went cold.

  “Where did you get that?” I asked, already knowing.

  “My father worked for them,” she said. “Until he disappeared.”

  I stared at the photo. My mother stood beside Yuki’s father, both in white lab coats. Young. Proud. Oblivious.

  “You knew my mom?”

  “She helped build you.”

  The world tilted. I forgot to breathe—and I didn’t even activate my power.

  “They called you Subject Zero,” Yuki continued. “An experimental hybrid. Designed to cheat death by manipulating oxygen deprivation. Pain suppression, cellular resistance… regeneration.”

  I wanted to deny it.

  But deep down, something clicked.

  The blackouts. The dreams. The voice in my head when I was on the edge of breath.

  “You’re not the only one,” Yuki whispered. “They made others. But you were the first. The only one who survived.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” I asked.

  Her eyes locked on mine.

  “Because they’re coming for you, Ren.”

  And then the world exploded.

  Glass shattered from the building below.

  A van screeched into the alleyway. Black-suited figures in gas masks spilled out like shadows.

  Yuki grabbed my wrist. “MOVE!”

  Adrenaline surged. I ran with her down the fire escape, heart pounding. Bullets tore through the air above.

  Too slow.

  I turned the corner—dead end.

  Yuki pressed her back to the wall. “Now would be a great time for your power to kick in.”

  I looked at her. At the fear. The faith.

  And I did something I hadn’t done since I was six.

  I stopped breathing on purpose.

  The transformation was instant.

  Blood went silent. Pain evaporated.

  I stepped into invincibility.

  And I smiled.

  Because this time, I wasn’t just going to survive.

  I was going to fight back.