The apartment felt too small for four people who weren’t technically people. My table bowed under the weight of Styrofoam containers, curry, and half a pizza, because the best way to fight an eldritch bureaucracy was family-style takeout, apparently.

  Lily sat cross-legged on the counter, still wearing ‘the dress.’ I was hyperaware of looking anywhere except at the length of legs she was showing off... She was already on her third dumpling and making bad jokes at everyone’s expense.

  “So let me get this straight—” she said through a mouthful of pork. “You’ve got a plant that works like a romantic grenade, Elly’s moonlighting as a gardener, Eury’s on silent murder watch, and Danny-boy’s just… bleeding recreationally?”

  “Not recreationally,” I muttered.

  Elly smirked, but her arms were folded tight. “Tin Can says we’re lucky you didn’t end up fertilizer.”

  That pulled me back. “Wait—Tin Can? The aluminum hat guy who spies on me from the bus stop? How would he know anything about what we’ve been doing if he never leaves the alley except for trips to the quick stop or the park port-a-potties? Does he have spies?”

  “He doesn’t spy. He observes,” Elly corrected. “He’s a Sensate. He can feel supernatural ripples, like you’d feel waves in a pond. He’s harmless.”

  “Harmless,” I repeated with a snort. “He once tried to trade me homemade conspiracy pamphlets for half a cigarette, and I don’t smoke.”

  “Why did he think you were a smoker?” Lily asked.

  “I had a rolled-up Post-It notes. He thought it was a cigarette.”

  “Honest mistake, or an attempt to start a conversation with the neighborhood null? Eury wondered aloud.

  Elly spoke again, cool and precise, cutting through Lily’s giggles. “He’s not harmless. He’s useful. He’s paired with a Ratspeaker now.”

  “A what?” I asked.

  Elly leaned forward, tapping the table. “Half-breed Ratborne. Child of Reeva the Rat Queen. They can command swarms and share senses with them. This Ratspeaker has been feeding info from the gutters straight to Tin Can.”

  “Hold up.” I raised a hand. “We’re trusting a guy whose official name might as well be ‘Willard’?”

  “Don’t call him that,” Elly warned.

  I grinned. “Willard.”

  Lily nearly fell off the counter laughing. “Oh my god, yes! Do they make him a little cape? A cheese crown?”

  Elly rubbed her temples. “You two are insufferable.”

  But the thread pulled. “Tin Can,” Lily said, still giggling. “That guy’s wild. Did I ever tell you he once tried to share sunflower seeds with me at the bus stop? Said pigeons were our mutual guardians. Dead serious.”

  Eury tilted her head. “He fed birds with me once also. Silent. No rambling. Just… content.”

  My turn. “Yeah, I gave him a buy-one-get-one coupon for a Baja Blast. He tried to pay me back with pocket change, like exact nickels and dimes, except they were all Canadian. When did he find time to go to Canada?”

  That cracked Lily up again. “He’s wholesome, in a kind of unwashed raccoon way.”

  Elly’s mouth twitched despite herself. “Don’t underestimate him. He’s seen more than you think. And he says the Collectors are active. The rats have been watching.”

  That sobered us. The laughter drained quick.

  Eury leaned forward, steepling her fingers. “If the Collectors are marking people, then every ally in Daniel’s orbit is at risk. We need to move carefully.”

  Lily tapped her chopsticks against the carton, restless. “So, what’s the plan?”

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I swallowed hard, because the truth was, plans never survived contact with reality.

  The food sat forgotten as the weight of it settled on the table: Collectors. Always watching, always writing.

  Eury broke the silence first. “We can’t fight shadows. If we’re going to deal with them, we need to see a collection happen or find out more about their methods...”

  “That sounds like volunteering for trauma,” I said.

  Her gold eyes cut to me, sharp. “Better to watch someone else vanish than let it be you.”

  Lily winced, pushing her carton aside. “You’re saying we… what, stake out a target? Just wait until one of those mailbox freaks drags someone away?”

  “Not drags,” Elly corrected. “That’s not their style. They tag. They mark. Then their prey… disappears. Sometimes instantly. Sometimes days later. Always with precision.”

  “And then? Where do they go?” I asked, even though I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer.

  “No one knows,” Elly said softly. “Probably not even Tin Can. The rats lose the trail, but I think he knows more than he’s letting on.”

  That earned a low curse from me. “We need to see the curtain pull back. Find the being behind it all.”

  They all nodded, as if Wizard of Oz references were the norm.

  “Exactly.” Eury agreed. “That means surveillance. Controlled observations. We find someone on their list before the Collectors strike. We follow the threads.”

  I drummed my fingers on the table. “That assumes we know who’s next.”

  Elly’s gaze flicked to me. “Tin Can might. If they’ve been tracking movements, they may have seen patterns in where the Collectors appear.”

  Lily leaned in, eyes bright despite the tension. “Okay but—tell me you’re not seriously suggesting we use Tin Can as bait.”

  “Not bait,” Eury said evenly. “But if he’s in danger, we could turn his misfortune into an opportunity.”

  “That’s literally what being bait means,” I muttered.

  Lily jabbed a finger at me. “Danny, don’t even think about it. We’re not letting conspiracy raccoon man get dragged to hell just to scratch our curiosity itch.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about it,” I lied, badly. Better him than me, right?

  Elly indicated the Hoardlink phone on the table. Jade’s leash on us. “Meanwhile, our leash-tugger has three more weeks to play with us. She’ll send another task soon.”

  The reminder made my stomach knot. “Three weeks. Three more requests. Great. Because nothing says stable footing like doing chores for a dragon while eldritch tax collectors stalk the streets.”

  “She’s not random,” Elly said. “Whatever she’s asking, it connects. We need to decode the pattern before she cashes in her favors. Somehow, it’ll tie into the tree.”

  Eury’s voice was calm, but her words landed like hammer blows. “Collectors circling. Jade maneuvering. Your clients in danger. It’s all pressure, Dan. Something will break if we don’t get ahead of it.”

  “Yeah.” I rubbed my face, suddenly tired. “And somehow I’m still the least qualified person at this table.”

  Lily reached across and stole the last slice of pizza. “Correction: you’re the only one they’re all circling around. So—congrats. You’re the prize pig at the fair.”

  “Thanks,” I muttered. “That helps.”

  She winked, biting into the crust. “It’s my job.”

  Elly eyed me after the others had gone to sleep—or entered torpor, or whatever Alterkind did. I ignored it at first, concentrating on memes on my phone. But she kept doing it.

  “What already?” I hissed quietly, flicking my thumbs grumpily. Carb crash, crankiness, existential dread—this was my holy trinity of post-battle recovery.

  “That went well, all things considered,” Elly said, watching me over the top of her mug.

  I snorted. “That’s because you didn’t have to sit through the punishment dinner at the Thai place.”

  “The one with the good Massaman Curry?”

  “The same.”

  “Lily screenshotted the dress she was wearing and sent it to me afterward.” She whistled low. “Mercy… she had me rethinking my hair color choices for the next century.”

  “I know, right?” I sighed.

  Elly tilted her head, smirking. “So, what was it like—trying to make small talk while she was serving main character energy?”

  “Like trying to breathe through a fire alarm.”

  She grinned. “I bet the waitress nearly offered her some extra sauce.”

  I blinked. “What kind of sauce?”

  Elly snorted, wicked grin widening. “You know. Oyster.”

  I groaned, throwing a napkin at her. “That’s awful.”

  She laughed so hard she nearly spilled her drink. “Oh, come on! You walked right into it!”

  “Yeah, well, she told the whole street afterward that I make her laugh, I’m lousy in bed, and I make good bagel bites.”

  Elly wheezed, clutching her sides. “Please—please tell me you have video.”

  “No. I was too busy dying inside.”

  Her laughter filled the room—real, bright, contagious. For a few minutes, it almost felt like the world wasn’t trying to kill us.

  “What are you two laughing at out there?” Eury demanded from the bedroom doorway, frowning in a way that made even silk pajamas look like armor.

  “Oysters,” Elly said immediately.

  Eury stared, unimpressed. “...Talk about seafood later. Some of us are trying to sleep.”

  She disappeared back down the hall. I could hear Lily’s muffled giggle from the room. Of course she was listening.

  When the laughter finally faded, we sat in the quiet hum of the city, empty takeout boxes glowing faintly under the fridge light.

  Elly’s voice was softer when she spoke again. “You really do care about us, don’t you?”

  “I keep telling you, I’m not a total disaster.”

  “You are,” she said, smiling. “You’re just our disaster.”

  She gave my shoulder a quick pat and padded off toward the dark hallway.

  I sat there for a while longer, staring at the mess we’d made—the curry cartons, the pizza box, the half-finished drinks—and felt something strange in my chest.

  Not the usual anxiety, or the exhaustion. Something almost like peace.

  I sighed. “Oysters,” I muttered to myself, shaking my head.