The stale air of the violated apartment clung to Ethan like a shroud. The lingering smells of fear, spilled tea, and the sharp tang of uncle Bo's blood intensified his simmering rage. He glanced down at the shattered whiskey bottle in his grip, its jagged base catching the dim light filtering through the grimy window. A crude implement. Beneath me. The thought was pure One-Earth Chen, a relic of his celestial past. But here, now, drowning in the filth of Johnny Tsang's petty tyranny? It was perfect.
His nascent Stardust core, that impossibly forged 0.1% anchor, pulsed cold and steady at his center. He could feel its subtle influence – a faint current of icy energy reinforcing his resolve, pushing back the bone-deep ache from his ribs, sharpening the edges of his senses. Not celestial power, not yet. But predatory focus honed by cosmic desperation. He focused inward, a silent command:
**> <｜place▁holder▁no▁0｜> Sensory Enhancement: Primary Target - Olfactory Tracking. Filter parameters: Blood (Human, O-Positive), Gun Oil Residue (Commercial Grade, Generic), Cheap Fabric Softener (Brand: 'Sunny Breeze'). Secondary Target - Auditory Refinement.**
The Stardust veins sputtered in fractured pathways. Data streamed – faint, corrupted, but navigable.
Processing...
Filter Applied. The complex tapestry of apartment odors simplified, irrelevant scents fading. Target Signatures Detected:
· Human Blood (O-Positive): Trace residue leading to apartment entrance/stairwell. Primary concentration near kitchen threshold. Secondary trace: Bo Chen.
· Gun Oil (Generic Commercial): Heavier concentration near main entry point? Inconsistent dispersion. Suspect wiped hands. Faint residue exiting towards stairwell.
· Fabric Softener ('Sunny Breeze'): Distinct scent trail. Source unknown. Leads out of apartment > stairwell > street level (Mott St. exit). Strength fading down Mott heading north-east.
Chase the cheap laundry, Ethan thought with grim certainty. Blood and fear were common here. But Sunny Breeze? That was personal. Likely the fabric softener one of the "rats" used. Maybe one too stupid to realize it left a trail.
He moved silently back down the stairs. The street was marginally busier now. Neon signs cast garish reflections on wet pavement. A patrol car idled at a distant corner – useless, as predicted. He followed the faint, sweet scent of laundered cheapness. His Stardust-enhanced senses acted like a divining rod for mediocrity. It led him away from the main strip, deeper into the warren of narrow alleys behind the tenements, places where dumpsters overflowed and rats held domain. The scent grew stronger near a low cinderblock building partially hidden under the rusting skeleton of an old elevated railway track. A flickering sign proclaimed it "Tommy's Spot - Laundry & Dry Cleaning." Bingo.
Ethan ducked into the shadows beside a overflowing dumpster, its stench momentarily overwhelming even his filtered senses. Inside Tommy's Spot, through the grimy plate glass window, he saw a lone figure – skinny, wearing a cheap bomber jacket over a faded band T-shirt. Benny Rat-Face. He was shoving damp clothes into a plastic laundry basket. Benny's face was tight with annoyance, but Ethan saw the lingering edge of panic from earlier at the river – the eyes darting towards the door, hands fumbling.
Just one? Ethan scanned the immediate area. Empty. Benny clearly thought the job was done – the courier drowned, the family warned, message delivered. Time for him to pick up his laundry.
Benny slammed the lid of the dryer he was loading, cursing under his breath. He grabbed the basket and headed for the exit. Ethan melted deeper into the alley shadows beside the dumpster, the broken bottle held low and tight along his thigh. His Stardust core surged slightly, feeding icy energy into his muscles – not speed, but focused anticipation. Patience like a coiled star viper.
Benny stepped out into the alley, the basket balanced on his hip. He paused, lighting a cigarette with shaky hands. Ethan could smell the cheap tobacco cutting through the detergent and trash. Benny took a long drag, blowing smoke upwards nervously.
Now.
Ethan moved. Not with blinding speed, but with brutal, silent efficiency amplified by the core's intense focus. There was no wasted motion. One step out of the shadows. Benny sensed movement, started to turn, eyes widening in dawning horror – Chen?! How?! Ethan's left hand clamped over Benny's mouth, stifling any cry. Simultaneously, his right arm, powered by a micro-burst of cold energy channeled into tendons already screaming, drove the jagged base of the whiskey bottle deep into Benny's side, just below the ribs.
Shhhhk!
The sound wasn't loud, wet and tearing. Benny's body convulsed violently against him, a choked scream muffled by Ethan's palm. The cigarette tumbled from his lips, sizzling on the wet concrete. The laundry basket hit the ground with a plastic clatter. Warmth bloomed against Ethan's arm – Benny's blood.
Ethan wrenched the bottle free, a hideous sucking sound accompanying it. He spun Benny, slamming him face-first into the cold, wet bricks beside the laundromat door. Benny gasped, blood bubbling at his lips where they pressed against the stone. Ethan pressed his own body weight into him, pinning him immobile, the shard of glass now hovering near Benny's eye socket. The cold fury radiating from Ethan seemed to leech the warmth from the air.
"You scream, you lose the eye," Ethan whispered, his voice devoid of emotion, colder than the river depths. "Then the other. Then the tongue. Nod if you understand."
Benny whimpered, a strangled, terrified sound. He nodded frantically against the brickwork, tears mixing with grime.
"You were at my apartment," Ethan stated flatly. "Who gave the order? Mad Dog Tsang?"
Another frantic nod. "Y-yes! Johnny! It was Johnny's word! He... he said you had to learn!"
"What 'package'? What did Tsang think I took?" Ethan pressed the glass point closer. Benny flinched, a fresh tear tracing a path through the dirt.
"I-I don't know the details! Swear to God!" Benny babbled. "Johnny just... just screamed you were dead weight! Said you screwed the last pickup! Said the package from the docks locker wasn't delivered! Said you must'a stashed it or sold it! He... he wanted it found! Wanted to make an example!" Panic sharpened his words. "We just followed orders! Hit the place! Scare 'em! Make 'em tell where you were or where you hid it!" His breath hitched on a sob. "Johnny figures... figures you ran... hid it... planned to double-cross him..."
The docks locker. The courier pickup. Ethan's fragmented memories offered only snapshots – damp concrete, the roar of a container ship, a numbered padlock. Had he made the pickup? Had he completed the delivery? The memory was a dark blur, perhaps overwritten by the trauma of death and rebirth. But Tsang believed he stole it. That belief had put blood on his uncle's floor.
"And the others who were with you?" Ethan demanded, his voice like flint scraping rock. "The ones who kicked the old man? The kid?"
"Mikey 'Hacksaw' Malone! Lazy Larry Higgins!" Benny spat the names out quickly, hoping information would buy mercy. "Mikey lives over the butcher shop on Bayard, second floor back. Larry... Larry sleeps under the bridge near the fish market when he ain't on a job! That's it! That's all I know! Please!" Blood trickled steadily down his side onto the pavement.
Ethan held him there a moment longer, absorbing the names, the locations. Benny's whimpers were the only sound in the alley besides the distant city hum and the frantic buzzing of a fly near the dumpster. This pathetic creature represented everything that had violated his space, harmed his family. The shard of glass felt heavy and light at the same time. Ending him here would be trivial. Cathartic.
But the Stardust core, cold and indifferent, pulsed like a metronome. Not efficient. Wasteful. Benny was a broken tool. Leaving him to crawl back to Tsang, maimed and terrified... that was a message. A stronger message.
Slowly, deliberately, Ethan pulled the bottle away from Benny's eye. He didn't sheath it. Instead, he raised it high, the jagged edges catching the garish neon reflected in a filthy puddle nearby.
Thock!
He brought the thick glass base down hard onto the crown of Benny Rat-Face's skull. Not enough to kill. Enough to shatter the bottle, showering glass fragments, and drive Benny face-first into utter unconsciousness with a sickening thud against the bricks.
Benny slid down the wall like a discarded sack, leaving a smear of blood and grime. The remnants of the whiskey bottle clattered onto the pavement beside him.
Ethan stepped back, breathing hard, the rush of adrenaline amplified, not diminished, by the cold pulse within him. He looked down at his hand – coated in Benny's blood, tiny glass shards glittering in the creases like morbid stars. His knuckles throbbed from the impact.
The sound of someone clearing their throat, dry and deliberate, came from behind him.
Ethan spun, instinctively crouching, scanning the shadows. Backlit by the grimy fluorescents spilling from Tommy's Spot stood McNamara. The old bartender leaned against the opposite wall, near the alley mouth, fedora pulled low. He hadn't been there a second ago.
"Messy work," McNamara observed, his voice flat. His eyes were fixed on the crumpled form of Benny Rat-Face, dripping crimson onto the cracked concrete. He took a slow drag from his ever-present cigarette, the ember flaring. He didn't look scared. More... disturbingly, he looked interrogative. His sharp gaze shifted from Benny to Ethan, lingering on the bloody shards of glass scattered on the ground near Ethan's feet, and then up to meet Ethan's eyes. "Floats downstream one minute... pays his respects with broken glass the next. Takes a special kinda resilience. Or somethin' else." He paused, letting the implication hang thick in the alley stink. His eyes dropped pointedly to the crimson staining Ethan's hand. "You find what they were lookin' for? That phantom package?"
Ethan straightened, his bruised body protesting. He met McNamara's searching gaze levelly. The bartender saw too much. But Ethan saw nothing to gain by denial here. "Not yet," he stated, his voice raw from exertion but cold as before. He flexed his bloody hand. "Just the rat who delivered the invitation." He nudged Benny's limp foot with his boot. "Invitation accepted."
McNamara didn't smile. He took another slow drag, exhaling smoke like a dragon assessing a new threat. "Phantoms, kid," he rasped, the words ghostly in the damp darkness. "Only ghosts chase 'em. Or make 'em." He pushed off the wall, turning to walk away down the alley towards the main street, his silhouette melting into the gloom. His final words drifted back, echoing slightly off the close walls. "Blood washes off. What Tsang thinks you took... that kinda ghost sticks to the bones."
Ethan watched him disappear, McNamara's words settling like cold ash. He looked down at the unconscious Benny, then at his own bloody hand. The docks locker. The phantom package. Mad Dog Tsang's fury wasn't over. Tonight was just the opening salvo.
He kicked a piece of broken bottle away from Benny's head. The hunt was far from over. It was just getting bloody.