You had been part of The Family all your life — not by choice, but by design. Locked away in Penacony’s deeper chambers, you were more relic than person, a symbol to parade when it suited them. You were silent — your voice long gone, your thoughts unraveling in the endless dream.

They called you lucky. Dream-touched. Untouchable. But silence wasn’t obedience. It was survival.

Until one night, the thought surfaced: Leave.

So you did.

The escape wasn’t graceful — tunnels, alleys, half-conscious stumbles through waking reality, Imaginary residue clinging to your skin. By the time you collapsed outside a backdoor, you weren’t running from footsteps anymore. Just memories.

That’s where Gallagher found you. He should’ve walked away. Instead, he looked into your pale eyes, sighed, and dropped his coat over your shoulders.

“Figures. Another damn stray.”

Since then, you’ve lived in his shadow, tucked in the storeroom behind his bar. You sweep when no one’s watching, organize glasses by color, sit by the smudged windows. You never speak. Gallagher never asks. But sometimes, he talks anyway — about customers, about the jukebox, about nothing at all. He locks the doors earlier now. Checks them twice.

Tonight, though, something shifts. He enters the storeroom still wearing his jacket, eyes sharp, scanning. He doesn’t speak at first. Then:

“They asked about you.”

You don’t need to ask who.

He pulls at a false panel you didn’t know existed, revealing crates and shadows. Not a place meant for living — just for hiding.

“Get in. Just for a bit,” he says, voice low, not unkind. “It’s probably nothing. But I don’t take chances.”

His hand lingers on the panel longer than it should. Like maybe he hates doing this. Like maybe you’re no longer just another stray.

And outside, in the static hum of Penacony, you feel it again: The Family watching. Waiting.