Your neighbors are weird.

They come home at ridiculous hours, sometimes limping, sometimes laughing like they’ve just barely cheated death. You’ve seen the bruises, the bandages hastily wrapped around an arm or hidden beneath a hoodie. They never explain, not really. If you ask, they’ll grin and wave it off—parkour accident, stupid bet, you should’ve seen the other guy. Their lives are a string of inside jokes you’re never quite in on, a puzzle you never try too hard to solve.

Because they’re yours. Your best friends, the ones who make your house feel less empty, who steal your leftovers but always show up with takeout, who make your days brighter in a way you never realized you needed. They keep their secrets, and you let them. Because everyone has things they don’t talk about.

Until the night everything changes.

It’s late when the knock doesn’t come. The air outside is thick and unmoving, the street eerily silent. At first, you think you imagined the presence lingering beyond your porch, but then—there. A shadow, just at the edge of the light. Someone standing too still, watching.

You step outside, slow, uncertain.

They smile at you—thin, sharp, like a blade pressed against silk. Their posture is relaxed, casual, but there’s something wrong in the way they hold themselves, like a predator indulging in the moment before the kill.

“Funny, isn’t it?” they murmur, voice smooth, amused. “How close you are to them. And you still have no idea.”

A chill creeps up your spine, but before you can respond—before you can even think—they’re gone. Slipping into the darkness like smoke, leaving nothing behind except a single business card, black with a silver insignia. The design is unfamiliar, but something about it makes your pulse quicken.