The rain came down in sheets, cold and acidic, carving rivulets through the grime that coated the streets of the Slums. Neon signs buzzed and flickered overhead, their garish colors smeared into streaks of light on the wet pavement. Shadows darted between the crooked alleyways, where the city’s forgotten crowded together beneath makeshift awnings, hoping to avoid the downpour and the hungry eyes of the ever-patrolling drones.
Ryker leaned against the cold metal of a rusting barricade, his hood pulled low, masking his face in darkness. Even under layers of drenched synth fabric, he felt the sharp bite of the rain on his skin. He let it sting, his lips curling into a slight sneer. The slight pain kept him grounded, kept him from drowning in the noise of the Slums—the relentless hum of generators, the distant sirens, and the muttered curses of desperate souls who'd been left behind by the glittering towers of NeoNexus above.
He pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket, along with a cigarette he lazily plucked into his mouth. His fingers, calloused from years of navigating this grimy underworld, unfolded the paper as he gave the cigarette a quick tap against the worn zippo in his other hand. The flame flared briefly, illuminating the rain-slick streets around him as he lit the cigarette and took a slow, deliberate drag.
The paper was a contract, worn at the edges from being shoved in and out of his pockets. The image it held was simple but striking—an unmistakable photograph of a young Asian woman with sharp, unforgiving eyes that practically stabbed through the page. Her irises were hot pink, an unnatural and unforgettable color that immediately marked her as someone living outside the law’s reach. A walking neon flag in a city that valued anonymity.
Her name: Cheong Eun-seo.
He scanned the contract again, as if expecting new details to materialize. But no, it was as barebones as it had been when he first received it. No background, no history, just her name and that face—cute, if he were in the mood for that kind of thinking. The kind that could get a man into serious trouble. He took a deep huff of the cigarette, the smoke trailing lazily into the air like the fleeting hope of this job leading somewhere easy.
"Mmph," he muttered, stuffing the paper back into his pocket. "Someone really doesn’t like you, Ms. Eun-seo. Not if they gave me this little bit to go on. And let me tell you, the people you pissed off aren’t very nice to those they contract, either."
The wind picked up, carrying the distant hum of hovercars and the occasional yell from the nearby market district. He glanced around, taking another pull from his cigarette before flicking the ash onto the grimy pavement. It wasn’t just the lack of information that bothered him—it was the fact that whoever she’d crossed wanted her found so badly they were willing to put someone like him on the case. The kind of someone who didn’t ask questions and didn’t care much for morality.
He spent hours bouncing around the lower end of the Slums, weaving through the tight-knit alleys where the air reeked of burning plastic and stale sweat. Asking questions, dropping Eun-seo’s name to the usual contacts. Most shrugged her off, claiming not to know her. The few who did know something weren’t offering much—just a vague rumor here, a fleeting sighting there. The trail was thin, barely more than whispers.
Every time he hit a dead end, he'd remind himself: it wasn’t about her being good or bad. He didn’t care. His job was to find her. That’s where his responsibility ended. But something about this one felt different, and he wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was the fact she had been wiped clean from most databases. Whoever Eun-seo was, she wasn’t just another face in the crowd. She was on the run, off the grid, hidden deep enough that even his usual methods were struggling to keep up.
"Hiding like this means you're scared of something," he thought as he stubbed out his cigarette on a nearby wall, smearing the last embers into the concrete. He grimaced at the thought of tracking her any deeper into the Slums, where filth and desperation dripped from every corner. The fact that someone this buried still had a bounty on her head told him all he needed to know—she was bad news. Dangerous, likely. Not the kind of person who made her living playing nice.
"Great," he muttered under his breath, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets. "I get to chat with another scummy bottom-feeder. And this deep in the shithole? She can’t be worth much."
But he knew better than to trust his gut on this one. Contracts like these didn’t come cheap, and they didn’t come easy. Someone out there wanted Cheong Eun-seo found badly enough to put a substantial price on her, and that was enough to keep him moving. Whether she was worth it or not, he'd find out soon enough.
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After hours of dead ends and vague leads, his patience was wearing thin. The Slums had a way of grinding people down, and even for a man used to its gritty underbelly, this place was relentless. His feet ached from walking the rain-soaked streets, his cigarette pack was running low, and he was no closer to finding Cheong Eun-seo. Until he ducked into a small, dingy diner wedged between two collapsing buildings, looking for a brief respite from the rain—and maybe, just maybe, another lead.
The neon sign outside flickered, sputtering the word "FOOD" in several different languages. Inside, the smell of frying oil and cheap soy broth filled the air. An old Asian woman stood behind the counter, her face a roadmap of wrinkles and years spent scraping by in the Slums. She eyed him cautiously as he took a seat at one of the chipped, plastic tables.
Without a word, she slid a laminated menu in his direction, though her sharp eyes lingered on him longer than was comfortable.
He pulled out the crumpled photo of Cheong Eun-seo and held it up for her to see. “Seen this girl around?”
The old woman’s hands froze mid-reach, her expression tightening for the briefest second before she went back to wiping the counter. “I see lots of faces,” she muttered, her voice rough and tired. “People come and go here all the time.”
"Yeah, sure they do." He lit another cigarette, the glow from the tip cutting through the dim light of the diner. "But this one’s different. Pink eyes. Black hair. Sharp as a blade. People say she's been hiding around here."
The woman paused again, but this time she didn’t speak. She seemed to be weighing something, her fingers tapping the countertop in thought.
Finally, she leaned closer, speaking in a hushed tone, like she didn’t want the walls to hear. “People call her the junkyard ghost. Shows up sometimes, lurking around the old scrapyard out by the city's edge. Comes in, disappears. Always alone.”
“The junkyard?” He exhaled a cloud of smoke, narrowing his eyes. “You’ve seen her there?”
The old woman nodded, her gaze shifting to the photo again. “A couple times. Just passing through. But people talk. Say she haunts the place like a spirit. Comes in quiet. Never stays long.”
He tapped the ashes from his cigarette, pocketing the photo. "Anything else I should know?"
The woman hesitated, then added, "If you're smart, you'll leave her be. That girl… she's not the kind you want to find."
He smirked, taking another drag. "I don’t have the luxury of leaving her alone."
Without another word, he tossed a few crumpled credits onto the counter and made his way out, the rain hitting him again as he stepped back onto the soaked street. A junkyard ghost. It figured. Hiding out in a scrapyard was exactly the kind of move someone who was wiped clean would pull. It was off the grid, tucked away, and easy to disappear into.
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Hours later, he found himself at the edge of the Slums, staring at the rusted, tangled mess of steel and forgotten tech that made up the scrapyard. It stretched out like a graveyard for machines, piles of discarded parts towering into the sky. Old hovercars lay in heaps, their frames picked clean, leaving only their skeletons to rust. The rain had finally stopped, but the air was thick with the metallic stench of old oil and decaying metal.
The place was eerily quiet, save for the occasional groan of shifting scrap as the wind blew through the twisted ruins. If she was here, she was hiding deep.
He stepped inside, his boots crunching over broken glass and bits of jagged steel. The further he went, the more oppressive the silence became. The shadows seemed to stretch out, swallowing the weak glow of the city’s distant lights. He kept his hand near his jacket, fingers brushing the handle of the gun holstered there. It wasn’t the ghosts of the Slums he was afraid of—it was whoever might be waiting for him among the wreckage.
“Cheong Eun-seo,” he muttered to himself, as if saying her name would conjure her from the scrap.
As he ventured deeper into the heart of the junkyard, something moved in the corner of his eye—a flicker of motion, too quick to be a trick of the light. He turned sharply, his instincts on edge, his other hand now fully gripping the gun beneath his jacket.
A figure darted between the scrap piles, barely visible in the darkness.
"Ghost or not, I’ve got a job to do," he growled under his breath, his voice low. He began moving faster, weaving between the rusted heaps of metal. Whoever it was, they were fast, slipping in and out of sight like a phantom.
Finally, he rounded a corner, his eyes locking onto her—Cheong Eun-seo. She stood atop a pile of old machinery, her pink eyes glowing faintly in the darkness, piercing through the gloom like twin lasers. Her expression was cold, unreadable, and she moved with the fluid grace of someone who had spent a lifetime dodging threats.
“You’ve been looking for me.” Her voice was calm, almost detached, as if this was just another routine encounter.
He didn’t draw his gun yet, but his fingers tightened around it. "Got a contract to find you. Nothing personal."
Her lips curved into a faint, almost mocking smile. “It never is.”
For a moment, they stood there in silence, the junkyard creaking around them like the ghost of a forgotten world. And in that moment, he realized the old woman had been right—this wasn’t someone he wanted to find.
But it was too late to turn back now.