Night wind slipped through the cracked window. The outer pane was already lined with fine fractures. The Arcadia-6 housing block looked like a row of old metal ribs left to rot. It was quiet, dull, and smelled of damp. Corridor lights flickered, throwing long shadows that seemed to move on their own along the walls. In a place like this, even the smallest sound felt oddly distant.
Ryu stood in the narrow living room, motionless as a statue. His eyes watched the bloodstain on the floor, nearly dry. The stain stretched outward, as if someone had tried to reach the wall before collapsing. He did not cry. He did not tremble. He did not scream. None of the reactions anyone would expect from a thirteen year old.
Yet his face was pale. Far too pale. When someone shows no emotion at all, it is not a sign of strength. It is a sign that they have held themselves back so often they have become mechanical.
Outside the building, the city police sirens of the Dominion of Astryx echoed from the distance. Their sound bounced off the north side of district B-29 and drew closer, pressing on the chests of those who heard it. Neighbors gathered in the corridor. Some held phones. Others simply stared at Ryu's apartment door with equal parts curiosity and fear.
They knew him. Ryu was always polite. Always greeted people. Always lowered his gaze when he spoke. Politeness and silence, however, never stopped the neighborhood from making their own conclusions.
"I saw that boy come home alone this afternoon," a heavyset woman whispered.
"They say he's a genius. But sometimes genius kids are… odd," a man in a gray jacket added.
"There was a kid like that at the northern center once. Smart, quiet. Then suddenly he.."
The story went unfinished because heavy footsteps began climbing the stairs. Thud. Thud. Thud. Each boot hit the floor like a hammer against the wall.
District police arrived first. Three officers. They entered with the posture of people ready to detain whoever they had to.
"All residents step back," the lead female officer ordered. "We will secure the scene first."
They pushed the door open and found Ryu standing near his father's body. The officers' eyes widened, not from surprise at the corpse, but at the wound pattern. It was not the kind of wound an ordinary person would make.
"Did the boy do this?" one officer muttered.
Ryu turned his head. His gaze was empty but too precise, as if he were reading each person's movement one by one.
"I did not kill my father," Ryu said, calmly.
Too calm. That made the officers more alert.
The female officer stepped forward, her hand on the grip of her pistol. "Do not move, kid. We just need to know what happened."
"Father was shot through the window," Ryu said in the same flat tone. "The projectile entered at a thirty eight degree angle. The shooter was two buildings away. The weapon is not civilian grade."
The officers exchanged looks. A thirteen year old should not speak like that.
"Did you see the shooter?" one asked.
"Too fast," Ryu answered. "But Father managed to say something before he died."
"What did he say?" the officer demanded, voice sharp.
Ryu looked down at the floor. Not with sorrow, but as if holding back something that must not be spoken.
"He said, 'Protocol D-3. Do not open that door.'"
The female officer keyed an emergency channel on her radio. Protocol D-3 was not a term meant for public use. Not something a child should know.
"Forensics unit to B-29. Possible protocol link," she said.
Another officer whispered in a panic, "If it is D-3, we pull back. This involves high level military. We cannot touch.."
He did not finish. A mechanical click sounded from the far end of the hallway.
Everyone turned. Four people in black, wearing silver wing emblems, appeared. They did not carry ordinary sidearms. Their weapons were wave compression units, technology reserved for top secret facilities.
"Step back, district police," the tallest man said. His voice was flat and final. "We are taking over."
"By whose authority?" the female officer protested.
The man raised a hexagonal badge with blue black coding. A cold pressure swept the corridor. The neighbors fell silent.
"Vasena Protocol Division," he said. "Case priority: Alpha."
The officers moved aside automatically. They knew Vasena only intervened for one reason. An abnormal genius listed under D-3.
And that child stood before them.
The fourth Vasena agent knelt and scanned the body for five seconds. His eyes hardened.
"Clean execution. Sniper from outside low-income housing. Target was an adult male. Child likely a secondary target."
"I was not the target," Ryu said, suddenly.
All four agents turned. For the first time the leader's expression shifted. There was something in Ryu's pupils that was not common in ordinary people.
"I was a witness," Ryu added. "Not the target."
The leader stepped closer, closing the distance to one meter.
"Do you know what Protocol D-3 is?" he asked.
"No," Ryu replied. "Father never explained."
The leader studied Ryu for several seconds, as if matching his face to something in memory. He produced a small object, a thin black disc, half transparent.
"Ryu," he said slowly, "you are now under Vasena protection. You will be taken to our facility for evaluation."
"My father hasn't..."
"We will handle it," he cut in. "Come with us now. Do not resist."
Ryu stared at the agent. The agent did not know that Ryu's mind was working, not from fear, but from pattern. He analyzed movements, voice pressure, the gaps between breaths. All of it recorded automatically, beneath conscious thought.
Ryu knew one fact. His father had not merely been killed. The killer was not an ordinary criminal. And these agents were not there to protect him.
They were here because he was an anomaly.
Neighbors whispered.
"Look, Vasena is involved."
"So the rumors were true. The boy is not normal."
"Stand back. We will be questioned."
Ryu heard it all. He stayed mute.
The agent snapped magnetic cuffs open.
"For protocol," he said. "It will not hurt."
"I will not resist," Ryu answered.
The agent's eyes betrayed a strange interest. "Kids your age usually cry."
Ryu did not reply.
"They usually shake," the man added.
Ryu remained silent.
The leader frowned. "Aren't you afraid?"
Ryu held his gaze for two full seconds. "I am learning how not to be," he said.
That was enough to close the agent's mouth.
They walked down the service stairs. The lift in Arcadia-6 rarely worked. The agents' boots struck the steps in steady rhythm. Ryu's steps were lighter, almost soundless. From the outside, the complex looked like a portion of the city the government had been happy to forget.
A black unmarked vehicle waited below. Its windows were dark and its body nonstandard. When the door opened, a bank of panels and monitors glowed inside, streaming sensor readouts.
A woman in a white coat sat there, cold and authoritative. She was clearly used to handling high risk living subjects.
"D-3 subject?" she asked.
"Ryu," the leading agent replied. "Initial protocol."
She nodded, activating a retinal scanner. "Full name?"
"Ryu."
"Father?"
"Deceased."
Her fingers moved over the display. "D-3 confirmed."
Ryu raised an eyebrow. "What is D-3?"
She looked at him and offered a short answer. "The reason you are still alive."
The vehicle moved. Ryu watched Arcadia-6 shrink and disappear into the night haze of the Dominion of Astryx.
For the first time in his life he felt something at the base of his skull. A subtle pressure, not a voice and not a shadow, but the sense that someone was observing the contents of his mind.
He closed his eyes. It was too quick, too faint, yet real.
As if something inside him wanted to speak.
When the car passed the district gate, the true shape of Astryx revealed itself. Megastructures rose along the horizon, towers and massive neon screens lighting the night. Five hundred million people filled the nation, yet within that density there were places that never appeared on any public map.
One such place was their destination. The Vasena Facility, National Anomaly Engineering Intelligence Division.
This was not a school. Not an ordinary lab. Not a prison.
It was where gifted children were forged into state tools. Ryu would become part of it before he fully understood himself.
The car stopped before a massive metal gate, the same silver wing emblem gleaming above. Biometric sensors swept light across Ryu's face.
"Identity accepted," an AI voice announced.
"Status: Potential Anomaly. Intake protocol opening."
The gate parted, metal grinding.
White light spilled down the corridor.
An agent ushered Ryu forward.
With his first step over that threshold, Ryu felt, faint and certain, that his life no longer belonged to him.
It was the beginning of everything.
The beginning of a resonance not yet awake.
The beginning of secrets that could swallow a nation.
Something whispered in his head.
Ryu opened his eyes wide. The corridor's sensors shifted. A thin vibration tickled the edge of his awareness. The voice was soft and unmistakable.
"We begin here."
Not a human voice. Not outside.
Something within him had already woken.
That marked the start of a long road.
The road of a boy not made into an anomaly, but born a true anomaly.