Levi slowed as he approached the corrugated metal prefab-style warehouse. He checked over his shoulder and slowed some more, approaching a crawl as he watched the man walk away. At last, the man turned the corner.

The second the man left his line of sight, Levi turned away from the warehouse. Kneeling down, he kicked off the ground with the full force of his SPD and burst into the air, propelling himself onto the top of a nearby container. From there, he climbed up to the second level, then the third. Up high, he paused and took a deep breath of the salty sea air.

“Here we go! I’m inside the gang’s territory, and it took the opposite of effort! Didn’t even have to jump the fence. Nope! All I had to do was get mistaken for a homeless man,” Levi said, puffing his chest and putting his hands on his hips. A moment later, he deflated a little, plucking at the tracksuit. “Does it look that bad on me…?”

Clicking his tongue, he set off along the top of his row of shipping crates. To his left and right, the rows were stacked four, five, even six high, looming tall above him. Ahead, the crates stair-stepped up, all the way to five high. He climbed his way up, casually traversing the steel boxes.

Below, shaded walkways stretched between the containers. No one walked the paths, the dock completely empty to Levi’s eyes. He frowned, peering down at the dock below. “Where’re the guys I’m supposed to watch out for, then? Was that guy just lying?”

Levi shook his head. He clicked his tongue. “Lying? To me? I can’t believe it. Who would do that? I’m such an honest guy.”

On the edge of the dock, something lurched. Levi turned and stared, waiting for the motion to come again. Across the walkway and nearer to the dock, a few containers sat one-level-high, on their lonesome. One of them jolted, the metal thumping as something struck it from the inside.

“What’s in those? Monsters? Weird hobby, shipping monsters around,” Levi mused. He glanced over his shoulder at the building he’d been pointed towards, then back at the shipping crate.

Crouching, he put a hand on his chin. “The kid, who warned us about the Acolytes, which led me to Old Town. The gang, who took a picture of the kid, that I found, which led me here. The monsters the Acolytes set loose on the concert…the Acolytes, opening the Gate in Old Town.”

He frowned at the ground for a few beats, then stood with a sigh. “Goddamn precogs. If you’re trying to tell me something, just say it. All this hinting is too much work for my poor tired brain. Still…if half of what I’m guessing at is true, it doesn’t paint a pretty picture.”

Levi turned, gazing at the building behind him. After a moment, he chuckled. “Well, alright. I’ll play your game. Let’s see where you’re leading me.”

Hopping down the crates one at a time, Levi landed back on solid ground and walked directly to the building, no longer wandering the vast space.

The cheap plastic door creaked open, unoiled hinges protesting his entry. He stepped into a simple, grimy space. Grease and dirt stained worn tracks in the linoleum floor. From a short entrance hallway, the space opened up into a simple sitting area, where other unkempt people sat around on plastic folding chairs at cheap tables. Most of them stared at their hands or the ground, or a thousand yards away, but one or two glanced Levi’s way as he entered. Likewise, for the most part, the people within appeared ordinary. Grimy, but normal. A few, though, stood out plain as day. In a rear corner, a slender man with pale green skin wilted, hair replaced with what looked like flower petals that drooped against a withered face. It was hard to tell his age past the withering, but he looked young, in his teens. Beside him, a human-sized hand wrapped in tarps and bedsheets crouched, ‘sitting’ on its wrist stump, bare fingertips pressed to the ground. It turned toward Levi as he entered, scuttling on its black-painted nails, and dark, round eyes not unlike a spider’s glimmered at him from the depths of the nooks between its fingers. In the opposite corner, a low hood obscured almost the entire face of the person sitting there, but failed to obscure their lion-like snout.

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“When it comes it skills, you can’t win them all,” Levi observed to himself, eyeing the three misfits.

The hand jolted. It flopped onto its back and lifted its middle finger to him. Its back faced him, but he still caught a glimpse of its fingers curling around a massive, round mouth in the center of its palm.

“Yikes,” Levi muttered.

Without another second’s hesitation, he walked over to the hand’s side. It shied away slightly, rolling back onto its fingertips to eye him warily from its finger nooks.

Sliding in between it and the plant man, he nodded at it. “So, what happened? When you Awakened. Like, did you feel it all? Where did your head go?”

The hand hesitated, then bobbed up and down. A strange moaning grumble came from its palm.

“Man. You really have it rough, huh.”

From the opposite side of him, a trembling voice said, “It was this or the sanatorium.”

Levi turned. The plant man sat on the floor, knees curled to his chest, head resting against his knees, arms wrapped around his legs. Listless eyes gazed at nothing, and he spoke without emotion.

“You can understand it?” he asked.

“Her,” the plant man corrected, without moving his eyes or any part of him, save his mouth.

“Oh! I guess that explains the polish. M’lady.” Levi tipped an imaginary hat at the hand.

The hand rolled onto her side and drew back its forefinger, threatening to flick him.

Laughing, he put his hands up. “A joke, it’s a joke. You two live together?”

The hand bobbed up and down.

Looking at the plant, then the hand, Levi squinted. He lifted a hand and extended a finger. “How’s that work? Between a hand and a plant.”

“I’m a plant. I don’t have genitals,” the plant man said blearily.

“Oh! Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Unless you count this,” he added, pointing at the fluffy white flower on his head.

Levi froze. His eyes darted between the plant and the hand. “You both have it rough, don’t you.”

The hand bobbed again. The plant man sighed, still motionless.

“Sooo…how’d you two meet?” Levi asked.

Grumbling, the hand gestured, leaning onto her side to make clearer motions.

The plant man translated. “We both got kicked out of our homes at about the same time. Ran into each other on the streets, trying to figure things out. Figured we’d be stronger together, me and Handel.”

“Handel…” Levi pointed between the plant man and the hand.

Curling into a fist, the hand pointed at the plant. She grumbled again, then curled her finger back toward herself.

“That’s Handel. My name’s Rose,” the plant man translated.

Levi snorted. “That’s not confusing at all. Rose the hand and Handel the plant.”

“Tell me about it,” the plant man said.

Levi glanced at the far wall, where two windows beamed narrow rectangles of sunshine on the ground, then looked back at the withered plant man. “You, uh, you need some sunlight? Water?”

Handel stared at him, the first motion he’d made the whole time, then turned his head away. To the wall, he muttered, “Don’t want it.”

“Are you sure? You look like you want it,” Levi said.

Silence. Levi looked at Rose. She reared up on her wrist and waved her hand, a little panicked.

“A sore subject, huh,” Levi guessed.

Rose dropped down to her fingertips again and nodded.

At the far end of the room, a door opened. Five robed people emerged from the door, wearing the masks of heroes long gone. They ushered in a group of men and women in scrubs, leading them toward the tables waiting at the room’s far end.

Levi perked up. He grinned. “Oh, now we’re cooking. I’m putting the pieces together, Ethan. Evan? E-man. Putting them together. Picking up the breadcrumbs.”