There was an unwritten rule in Adrián Vega’s life: if something could go stupidly wrong, it would go stupidly wrong. And if it could go wrong in a way that was worse than stupid, that too.
He thought this as he stared up at the night sky from the ground of an alleyway, the smell of old garbage mixing with something metallic and warm that he knew was his own blood.
He had a hole the size of a fist in his chest.
It should hurt more, honestly. He should be screaming. Instead, what he felt was a kind of drowsy resignation, like when you fall asleep on the couch watching a boring movie. Except the movie was his life and apparently they’d already reached the closing credits.
Above him, the figure who’d put the hole in him crouched slightly, and ridiculously large black wings folded with a whisper of feathers against the back of a girl who, under any other circumstances, Adrián would have tried to ask out for coffee with very little success.
Long black hair with purplish highlights. Yellow eyes like a hawk’s. A black silk blouse that clung to her body in a way his dying brain insisted on registering as important.
"I’m sorry," she said. And she sounded genuine, which somehow made it worse. "It’s nothing personal. I detected something in you, something..." she frowned, searching for the word. "Dormant. Dangerous. It’s my job to eliminate it before it manifests."
Adrián opened his mouth. Blood came out. He closed it.
"I know you don’t understand," she continued, adjusting a black glove. "And I know I probably seem cruel to you. But I’m not. I promise."
Oh, good, Adrián thought. She’s not cruel. She just kills me. That’s very reassuring.
He wanted to say it out loud. He would have liked to die with one last sarcastic line. But his lungs were busy with other priorities, like for example stopping working, so all that came out was a wet gurgle.
She looked at him one more second. Her yellow eyes softened.
"That’s human life," she said, almost to herself. "Short. Fragile. Unfair."
Then she turned on her heels—high heels, in an alley, to come murder him, which Adrián registered as the most insulting detail of the entire night—and walked away. The black wings dissolved into the air with a violet flash.
And Adrián was left alone. With his hole. And his thoughts.
Wow. So this is how it ends.
All of it. All the years. All the searching. All the corkboards full of photos of his sister, all the sleepless nights, all the lies to therapists when they asked if he "still believed he’d seen something with wings."
Yes, Doctor. And it turns out I was right. How funny.
The sky started to darken at the edges. Or maybe that was his eyes. Hard to tell.
And then, as Adrián prepared himself for absolute nothingness, his brain decided to do what it always did at the worst moments: go off on a tangent and start remembering just how the hell he’d ended up here.
---
Three weeks earlier.
"Son, do you have everything?"
His father’s voice on the other end of the line sounded as always: professional, courteous, distant. Like he was talking to a new employee instead of his only living child.
"Yeah, Dad." Adrián dragged a suitcase down the sidewalk with one hand and held the phone with the other. The sun hit him square in the face. "I’m already outside the building."
"Good. The transfer went through this morning. You should have enough for the first two months."
"Dad, you sent me like five times more than I need."
"I’d rather have too much than not enough."
Silence. The kind of silence that had defined their relationship since Elena disappeared.
"Adrián."
"Yeah?"
"Focus on your studies. And on billiards. And..." a pause, like his father was choosing his words with surgical tweezers. "Don’t get involved in things that aren’t your business. In Kuoh, I mean. No... investigating."
Adrián clenched his jaw. Forced himself to unclench it. Smiled at the void like his father could see him.
"I’m just going to study, Dad. Relax."
"Good. Take care of yourself."
"You too."
The call ended before either of them had to say anything more awkward.
Adrián stood for a few seconds staring at the dark screen of his phone. Kuoh University’s library had one of the most complete criminal archives in the country. Cold cases, disappearances, documents the police had already forgotten. He’d spent three years preparing to get into that library. He’d faked interest in majors he didn’t care about, maintained a decent GPA while not sleeping, let his father believe he was accepting the enrollment as a gesture of reconciliation.
Sorry, Dad. I’m a terrible liar.
He put the phone in his hoodie pocket and walked toward the building entrance.
His new apartment was in a pretty decent university area. Not luxury—he’d insisted on that—but clean. A studio on the fourth floor with a window facing the street. A building with a bored doorman, an elevator that worked half the time, and a convenience store two blocks away that he’d already identified as logistically essential.
He took the stairs because the elevator was in its "I’m not working today" phase.
When he reached the fourth floor, he found something on his door.
A container.
A pink plastic container, with a note stuck on top written in round, careful handwriting.
Adri:
I saw you moving in from the window but I didn’t come down because you were on the phone. I left you some onigiri. The tuna ones are the ones you like. Don’t leave them out too long or they’ll go bad. Eat.
— Yuki
Adrián stared at the container.
Then he dropped his head and laughed quietly, once, almost soundlessly.
Yuki Amasawa. His friend since age eight. The reason he’d chosen Kuoh over three farther universities. She lived half a block away, in the house above her parents’ bakery. Short, with bangs that always covered her eyebrows, and with the habit—since age ten—of bringing him food like Adrián was a stray cat she’d adopted without permission.
He crouched down, picked up the container, and opened the door to his apartment.
The interior was almost empty. A bed without sheets yet, a desk, boxes stacked against the wall. On the desk, the first thing he’d unpacked: a one-by-one-meter corkboard.
On the board, a photo in the center.
Elena Vega, 22 years old, smiling from a music festival that had happened three and a half years ago. Dark brown hair like Adrián’s. Identical green eyes. A small scar on her left eyebrow—Adrián had gotten his own afterward, trying to recreate it, though he never told anyone.
Around the photo, newspaper clippings. Maps. Notes written in red marker. Dates. Names. And in the top right corner, in large letters underlined three times:
"Black wings. Alleyway. Mercier Street. May 3. Witness: Adrián V. (14)."
Adrián set the container on the desk.
He stood in front of the board for a long time.
"I’m here, sis," he said, quietly. "Let’s see what we find."
---
The first day of classes was, to no one’s surprise, a logistical disaster.
Kuoh University was enormous. Four main buildings, interconnected gardens, a mixed architecture that seemed unable to decide between European castle and Japanese temple. The female enrollment was overwhelmingly larger—a legacy of when the place had been an all-girls high school before becoming co-ed—something Adrián had read in the brochures and considered "an interesting anecdote."
Now, walking through the central courtyard, with approximately sixty girls looking at him curiously because he was a new face, he updated his mental classification of the information:
"Interesting anecdote" was underselling it. This is a complete ecosystem.
He adjusted his backpack. Lowered his gaze. Tried to walk with the universal attitude of "I’m nobody interesting, go about your lives."
"Adri!"
Oh, crap.
Yuki came running from a corner of the courtyard, her gym uniform a mess—a white short-sleeved shirt two sizes too big, black shorts, a headband already slipping off—and her cheeks red from running.
And with another container in her hands.
"I was looking for you! You forgot to eat breakfast! I know because I passed by your building and saw your kitchen light was off, and you always turn the kitchen light on when you eat breakfast, so I dedu—"
"Yuki."
"What?"
"Breathe."
Yuki breathed. Three times. Extended the container to him with both hands, like she was presenting a ceremonial offering.
"Sandwiches. Ham and cheese. And there’s one with jam in case you want something sweet."
Adrián took it. Looked at her.
Yuki came up to his chest. Literally. She had to tilt her head back to look at his face, which, combined with the sweater she did have on over her shirt—because she was always cold—a cream-colored knitted sweater that was way too big and hung off one shoulder, revealing the strap of the shirt underneath, created a visual effect that...
Don’t think about it. Don’t say it. Shut up. Shut up, Adrián.
"Thanks," he said instead, with all the dignity he could muster.
Yuki smiled and her cheeks got even redder.
"You’re welcome. See you at break, okay? At the usual bench."
"There’s no ’usual bench’ yet. It’s the first day."
"There will be. I decide. The one next to the big tree. Bye."
She ran off before he could respond.
Adrián stood there for a few seconds, container in hand, watching her leave.
She’s exactly the same as at age ten, he thought. Just with... other details.
He shook his head to dislodge the thought and kept walking.
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