After the final bell rang, Leander merged with the sea of students flooding out of the main gates. The air was thick with the smell of wet asphalt and cheap snacks from street vendors, but Leander's internal compass was fixed on a much more annoying signal.
Walker was still glued to his side, his face tight with a mixture of frustration and genuine concern. "Leander, seriously. You're giving me nothing. Do you have any idea how weird it is for Mike to just... stop existing for two days? Something's coming. I feel like you're walking into a buzzsaw and you're just whistling a tune."
"I like tunes, Walker. They keep life rhythmic," Leander replied, his voice airy and dismissive.
"By the way," Leander added, pausing at a street corner where a group of freshmen were congregating. He reached out and gave Walker's shoulder a friendly, firm squeeze—a gesture that looked like a goodbye. In that split second, his fingers brushed against the small of Walker's backpack. He felt the familiar, tiny bulge of a micro-bug. With a dexterity that defied human sight, he peeled the sticker-sized transmitter away and casually slapped it onto the jacket of a loud, boisterous boy walking past them toward a video game lounge.
"See ya," Leander said with a wave.
"Wait—!" Walker started, but Leander was already across the street.
Leander shook his head, a ghost of a smile touching his lips. 'Where does that guy get such an appetite for other people's business?' Now, Walker would be treated to three hours of teenage boys arguing over high-scores and pizza toppings.
But the smile didn't last long. As Leander began his walk toward Chinatown, he felt a much colder, sharper presence behind him.
Across the street, the man from the café stood up. He picked up his slim, reinforced briefcase and adjusted his black sun hat. He hadn't touched a drop of his coffee. Zost didn't follow directly; he stayed forty meters back, utilizing the crowd, the shadows of shop awnings, and the rhythm of the traffic lights to remain a ghost.
Leander slowed his pace. He didn't look back, but the hairs on his arms stood up. This wasn't a clumsy high schooler or a loud thug. This was a professional. He could feel the weight of the man's gaze—it wasn't just observation; it was a calculation.
Leander changed his route. He was originally going to visit Uncle Li and Li Qian, but he wasn't about to lead a professional killer to their doorstep. He turned toward his own neighborhood, taking a series of winding detours through residential blocks.
Zost followed, his expression unchanging. 'Clever kid. He knows how to play hide-and-seek. He's taking the long way home to see if I'm still there. Most kids his age would have panicked and run.'
Leander arrived at a thirteen-story apartment building two blocks away from his home. He didn't go into his house; instead, he entered the lobby and stepped into the elevator. He pressed the button for the roof.
Outside, Zost stopped. He stood at the base of the building, checking the floor indicators. He pulled a slim, high-powered tablet from his jacket. His fingers flew across the screen, accessing the building's registry and the floor plans.
Leander, standing on the edge of the rooftop thirteen stories up, looked down. His eyes, enhanced by the magnetic fields he could now manipulate, focused through the concrete and steel. He watched the digital data flowing on Zost's screen.
'Checking the residents... looking for names like Ammon, Hannick, Danzi... looking for a connection to me,' Leander thought.
Zost frowned at the tablet. The top floor was a cluster of high-rent units with no children listed. Something didn't add up. He looked up at the roofline, his instincts screaming that he had been played. He snapped the tablet shut, gripped his briefcase—which Leander knew contained a modular sniper assembly and a collection of localized explosives—and walked away.
'What a cautious snake,' Leander thought, amused.
Without using the elevator, Leander stepped off the edge of the roof. He didn't fall; he glided, the air around him shimmering with a faint, golden distortion as he countered gravity. He landed silently in an alleyway just as Zost was rounding the corner.
Leander stepped out of the shadows, blocking the hitman's path.
"Are you looking for me? Or are you just lost?"
Zost stopped dead. His pupils dilated—the physiological signature of a massive adrenaline spike. His right hand, which held the briefcase, tightened until his knuckles went white.
"I'm sorry, kid. I think you've got the wrong guy," Zost said, his voice a practiced, neutral baritone. He even managed a thin, convincing smile. But his left hand had already slipped into his jacket pocket, his fingers wrapping around the hilt of a ceramic dagger.
Inside, Zost was reeling. 'How? How is he here? I watched the elevator. I watched the windows. There is no physical way he got down here before me.'
Leander chuckled, looking Zost right in the eye. "If you say so! Then I guess I'll be on my way. Have a nice evening, Mister... Office Worker."
Leander turned and walked away, his backpack swinging casually. He didn't look back once.
Zost stood paralyzed. A single drop of sweat rolled down his temple. He switched his briefcase to his left hand and reached for the pistol in his waistband. He stared at Leander's retreating back. The target was wide open. One shot. But his hand wouldn't move. That strange, knowing smile Leander had given him... it felt like looking into the eyes of something that wasn't human.
"F***," Zost whispered, his heart hammering against his ribs. He let go of the gun. He didn't fire. He watched until Leander disappeared around a corner, then he turned and walked toward the neon signs of central Queens—straight toward Mike's Fast Food.
Leander entered his home with a bright, practiced smile. "Aunt Jenny! I'm home!"
"Oh, Leander! George is stuck at the office, so dinner is going to be a bit later tonight. But hey, May called. Peter and Ned are coming over with a movie. You should go get the TV ready."
"Sure thing. I'll just go drop my stuff off."
Leander went to his room and locked the door. He pulled his glasses out. During the brief encounter in the alley, he had used a micro-magnetic pulse to flick a sub-miniature tracker onto the brim of Zost's hat.
"Jarvis, ping the tracker. Give me a live feed."
"Tracking established," Jarvis replied. "The target is 5.3 kilometers away. Current location: Mike's Fast Food Restaurant, central Queens. Initiating audio relay."
"Warning: Power at 12%. Audio monitoring will fail in seventeen minutes."
"That's enough," Leander said. "Turn it on."
The speakers in the glasses crackled to life.
"...Abandon the mission? Are you insane, Zost? It's a fourteen-year-old kid! I'm paying you thirty thousand for a morning's work!" The voice was Mike Ian—rough, gravelly, and full of the arrogance of a man used to buying life and death.
"The kid isn't simple, Ian. You're playing with something you don't understand," Zost's voice came through, sounding uncharacteristically shaken. "Something is very wrong with that target. I saw things... I felt things. I'm out. Keep your money."
"Bullshit! When did you become a coward? Get out of here then. I'll handle it myself. If he's such a 'threat,' I'll just plant a pipe bomb under his porch and blow his whole fing family to hell. F* the 'clean' kill."*
"Ian, this is my final warning. Stay away from that boy."
"GET OUT!"
The sound of a door slamming followed, then the heavy, wet sound of Mike Ian spitting on the floor.
Leander took off his glasses. The golden light in his eyes flared, the pupils narrowing into sharp, metallic slits. The threat to himself was one thing. A threat to Aunt Jenny and Uncle George was a death warrant.
"Leander! We're here! Ned got the Star Wars Episode VI disc! Let's watch it!" Peter's voice boomed from the stairs, followed by the sound of two pairs of sneakers pounding up the steps.
In a blink, the golden light vanished. Leander's face softened. He opened the door just as Peter and Ned burst in.
"I've already got the TV on!" Leander laughed, throwing his arm around Peter's shoulder. "Did you bring the popcorn, or are we starving?"
For the next three hours, Leander was just a boy. He laughed at the movie, debated the physics of lightsabers with Ned, and shared a pizza with his friends. He was the perfect host, the perfect nephew, and the perfect friend.
But beneath the laughter, he was counting the minutes.
At nine o'clock, after the movie finished and the pizza boxes were empty, Leander walked Peter and Ned to the door.
"See ya tomorrow, Leander!" Peter waved.
"Count on it," Leander replied.
He watched them walk away, then he turned back to the house. He waited until Aunt Jenny went to bed, her light clicking off at 10:30 PM.
The house fell silent.
Leander didn't use the door. He opened his window and stepped out into the cool night air of Queens. He didn't wear his school clothes. He pulled a dark, reinforced hoodie over his head.
"Jarvis, status on Mike's Fast Food."
"The restaurant is closed to the public. Thermal sensors indicate three individuals in the back office. Mike Ian and two guards."
Leander's feet left the ledge. He didn't fly fast; he moved like a predator, low across the rooftops, his shadow a flickering ghost against the bricks.
'You wanted to see how strong I am, Mike?' Leander thought as the neon sign of the restaurant appeared in the distance. 'Tonight, I'm giving you a front-row seat.'