NEXT DAY…
I've been sitting in Chief Donnelly's office for nearly an hour now. The air's stale, the blinds are half-closed, and the only sound is the quiet scribble of a pen and the occasional sip of cold coffee.
We've barely finished building my fake identity.
Kazuki Noah.
Twenty-one years old.
Only child.
College dropout.
Former professional gamer.
Apparently, I had a short but promising career in eSports, until burnout and controversy forced me off the scene. Now, I'm just some aimless kid trying to start fresh in a shitty apartment on the top floor of a building where people keep vanishing.
Perfect.
"You're not smiling," Donnelly says without looking up.
"Should I be?" I ask.
He snorts. "You're getting everything you wanted: a new case, new identity, full autonomy."
"Yeah. I also get to live in a haunted house." I glance down at the file in front of me. "You sure this gamer backstory's gonna hold up?"
"Better than ex-cop with PTSD," he mutters, flipping to the next page. "Besides, no one in that building knows Kazuki Noah. He can be whoever we need him to be."
I lean back in the chair, arms folded. "And who do we need him to be?"
He looks up finally, and for a brief moment, the mask slips. There's no hard-nosed chief behind that desk, just a tired man sending someone into a place even he doesn't fully understand.
"A naïve young man," he says, "without any sense of self-worth."
I blink. "So… you want me to be myself, just a few years earlier. Great. I can do that."
I glance at the age on the file again, twenty-one.
"Why'd you make me younger?" I ask. "I could've passed for twenty-four. Still believable for a retired pro gamer."
"Nobody would buy that," he replies flatly, without missing a beat.
I raise an eyebrow. "You serious?"
He sets his pen down and folds his arms, leveling a look at me. "Do you look in the mirror often, Tomozaki? Baby face, clear skin, high cheekbones. I still think you picked the wrong profession. You could've been a model."
I stare at him for a beat. "Thanks, but I'm into women."
He doesn't laugh. Just shakes his head and mutters, "Smart ass."
I grin, but it fades quickly. "I do have a question," I say, my tone shifting. No hesitation now. "Am I allowed any weapons?"
Donnelly's eyes narrow just slightly, like he's measuring how serious I am. The playful air between us vanishes. He leans forward, elbows on the desk.
"You're going in as a civilian. No badge, no backup, and definitely no gun. You're not a detective in that building, you're just some washed-up gamer trying to start over. Walk in with a weapon and you're already blown."
I nod slowly, letting that sink in. "So if something happens…"
He exhales through his nose, slow and deliberate. "Then you improvise. Run, hide, talk your way out. This isn't the kind of op where you get to shoot your way through."
I stare at him. "So I'm supposed to just go in there… with nothing to protect myself?"
"Yeah," he says without flinching.
I throw my hands up. "Great. That's just fantastic. What could possibly go wrong?"
Donnelly doesn't react. Not even a twitch. Just waits for me to be done.
"…Can I continue now?" he asks dryly, like he's been through this a hundred times before.
I sigh. "Go ahead, Chief."
He leans back in his chair and clasps his hands together. "This operation doesn't have a time limit. You're not going in with a clock ticking over your head. No deadlines, no pressure to force a report. You observe, blend in, and wait for something, anything to break the pattern. When it does, you act. Until then, you keep your head down."
I nod slowly, the reality of it all settling over me like a second skin. "So I'm just… living there."
"You're not 'just' living there," he says. "You are Kazuki Noah. That's your name, your life. Make friends if you have to, get close to people. But remember, your job is to notice what no one else has. Whatever's happening in that building, it's subtle. It's calculated. You need to be the crack in their system."
I glance at the file in front of me again. The ID stares back up, me, but not me. A stranger with my face.
"You really think I'm the right person for this?"
Donnelly meets my eyes. "You're the only person I trust to do this and still come back in one piece."
There's no pride in his voice, no encouragement. Just fact.
"Lucky me," I mutter, and stand.
He doesn't stop me. Just says, "You move in tomorrow."
…
NEXT DAY…
The cab pulls up to the curb, but I don't get out right away. I just sit there, staring at the building through the cracked windshield.
It's taller than I expected: five stories of bland, beige concrete and lifeless windows. No balconies. No kids running around. No signs of life. The kind of building that doesn't try to be anything more than what it is: a box where people vanish.
The driver clears his throat. "Uh, buddy? We're here."
I nod, hand him a few bills, and grab the duffel bag from the seat beside me, minimal clothes, a cheap laptop, the burner phone, and the fake ID. Everything I need to be someone else.
As I step out, the air feels heavier. It's probably just the humidity or maybe the six missing persons haunting this place.
Apartment 25. Top floor. My new life.
The lobby is as depressing as the exterior: cracked tiles, a couple dead plants in the corner, and an elevator that hums like it's contemplating suicide. I press the button.
Ding.
The doors slide open, revealing the metal box of doom. I step inside, and for a brief second, the silence is absolute.
Then I look up.
There it is, just like Smith described. A small, hand-carved number scratched into the corner of the elevator ceiling.
6.
I frown. That can't be right. Chief told me the last recorded number was 7. Did it reset? Was it changed? Or is this elevator messing with more than just physics?
I take note of it. Mentally. Visually. Every detail matters now.
The elevator jerks slightly before continuing. I reach the top floor faster than I'd like, faster than I'm ready for. My pulse is tapping a nervous rhythm against my neck. I haven't been this jumpy since my first bust.
The doors open.
Dim hallway. Beige walls. Same ugly carpet.
I step out and immediately catch it, apartment 22, door cracked halfway open… but it's on my right.
Shouldn't it be 21?
Before I can piece it together, the door swings wider from the inside. A man steps out.
Correction: A wall with arms steps out.
He's massive. At least six-foot-five. Thick muscles stretch beneath a white tank top like they're trying to escape his skin. Dark-skinned, bald, face clean-shaven, but nothing about his expression is clean. He looks like he just smelled something rotten. And unfortunately, that something seems to be me.
"Who the hell are you supposed to be?" he asks, voice low and full of warning.
I force a smile. The cheerful, awkward kind that used to come naturally, back when I actually was the guy I'm pretending to be now.
"I'm Noah," I say, lifting my duffel bag a little to show I'm not a threat. "Just moved in. Apartment 25. Looks like we're gonna be—"
"I don't care," he cuts in, stepping closer. His voice drops deeper. "Get the fuck outta my face."
I pause, just for a second. Long enough to weigh my options. Instinct tells me to push back, but i need to keep my head down, fighting would do the opposite. Still, old habits die hard.
"No need to be rude," I say flatly. Not backing down, just… shifting. "Whatever."
I turn to walk away.
"Pussy," he mutters.
My jaw tightens.
My fists follow.
It would take less than three seconds to turn around and shut his mouth for him. One solid punch to that smug jaw. Maybe a knee to the ribs for good measure. But I stop myself.
Because I'm not Kou Tomozaki right now.
I'm Kazuki Noah, quiet, aimless, no backbone. And punching this guy would only prove I don't belong here.
I take a breath through my nose, slow and controlled. Keep walking.
Let it slide.
My boots echo dully against the thin hallway carpet as I pass two more doors, none of them marked wrong, but they all feel off somehow. Like the numbers are just paint over something older, something that doesn't want to be seen.
Finally, I reach it.
25.
The metal numbers are crooked, like someone put them up in a hurry or maybe tried to tear them off at some point. The door itself is unremarkable, plain, scratched wood with a rusty peephole and peeling edges. But what makes me stop isn't the door.
It's what's lying right in front of it.
A doll.
Small, plastic, and worn. Its face is a little faded, one glass eye missing. The other stares blankly at me. It's wearing a pink dress, dusty and frayed at the edges like it's been here a while, yet there's no grime on it, no sign it's been stepped over.
Like someone put it here. Recently.
I crouch down and pick it up slowly, turning it over in my hand. It's light. Cheaper than cheap. The kind you'd find in a corner store. But it feels… wrong. Like it doesn't belong. Or maybe I don't.
I glance down the hall.
No one.
No footsteps.
No whispers.
Just that thick, quiet tension that seems to cling to the air in this building.
I tuck the doll into my bag without thinking and slide the key into the lock.
Click.
The door opens with a groan, like it's annoyed to be disturbed.
I step inside.
My new home.
For weeks?
Months?
I don't know.
The air smells stale. Not rotten, just lived-in, abandoned, and rearranged all at once. Dust floats in the beams of dying afternoon light that slip in through the single window across the room. The place is small, barely enough space to pace. Kitchenette to the left, a worn couch dead center, a single bed tucked into the corner like an afterthought.
The furniture looks like it came with the place, and probably with the last tenant, too.
I shut the door behind me.
Lock it.
Double lock it.
This is my new life now.