NOVEL NEXT Chapter 245: The Stray's Bargain
I touched down softly on the cracked sidewalk, the jacket's systems diffusing the last of my momentum until it felt like stepping off a curb instead of plummeting forty floors. The Miami night wrapped around me, thick and wet—humid air reeking of exhaust, sweat, and fried food from a late-night vendor half a block away.
Distant sirens wailed, bass-heavy music throbbed from some rooftop club, and beneath it all pulsed the restless hum of a city that refused to sleep.
That's when I saw her.
A lone figure, curled against a chain-link fence like a discarded secret. She looked up as I landed, and for a split second my brain blue-screened.
Eighteen, maybe nineteen. Asian features sharpened by hunger and fear, intelligent dark eyes reflecting the streetlight like polished obsidian. Her long black hair was a mess, strands clinging to her damp skin, but even disheveled it framed her face like art. Her clothes told the story—ripped and smeared with city grime.
A girl from God knows where, thrown into a night she wasn't built for.
And then her expression shifted.
She didn't scream. She didn't run. She recognized me. Or at least, she recognized the thing I was. Her gaze traveled over my jacket, my features, my very presence, and what I saw there wasn't just awe—it was reverence, like she was staring at a myth she'd been told as a child and suddenly realized was real.
"You…" she whispered in accented English, her finger trembling as she pointed at me. Then, as if words weren't enough, she stood, spread her arms wide, and tilted her head back toward the towering Setai behind me.
"You fall from…"
She gestured upward, both hands tracing a long, swooping arc down through the night sky, punctuated by a soft whistling sound that somehow captured exactly how my near-death looked from the ground.
"…very high," she said, eyes wide, her breath catching. "Like bird with broken wing."
Then she crouched, fingertips brushing the cracked concrete with a kind of ceremonial grace, before she looked up at me again, movements oddly theatrical but strangely sincere.
"But you land like… like feather. Soft." She mimed it—arms drifting down slow, hair falling over her face as she floated her palms toward the sidewalk. Despite her exhaustion, the motion was beautiful.
"Yeah, that happened," I admitted, glancing up at the tower. From her vantage point, she probably just watched a guy turn suicide-by-gravity into a casual step down. "You saw the whole thing?"
She nodded hard, like a kid confirming Santa Claus was real. Then she raised her hand to her brow in a makeshift salute, scanning the street left and right before whipping her gaze back to me. "I watch for danger men," she said carefully, her words halting but precise. "Then I see you…"
She repeated the falling gesture, more animated now, her face scrunched in dramatic concern.
"First I think—oh no, man will die! Very sad!" Then, just as quickly, she brightened, her hands fluttering down gracefully. "But then you… magic man."
I sighed and reached into my pocket, pulling out a crisp hundred-dollar bill. Money was the universal solvent—it didn't fix everything, but it solved enough. Whatever problem she represented, I didn't have time for it.
Margaret was still out there, and every second wasted meant the kidnappers had more ground.
"Here," I said, holding it out. "Get somewhere safe."
She looked at the bill like it was both salvation and insult, her hands trembling as she accepted it with a kind of ceremony. Not snatching, not greedy. Careful. She held it in both palms as if it might dissolve in the humid air, then bowed—an automatic, ingrained motion.
"Thank you, but…" Her voice cracked. She looked up, biting her lower lip, hesitation and shame mixing in her eyes. "…money not fix big problem."
That made me pause.
I studied her—clothes, posture, tone, the subtle bruise half-hidden under her sleeve, the faint tremor in her shoulders. She wasn't just some random lost girl. She was a loose thread dangling from the same tapestry I'd just ripped apart upstairs.
"What's your name?" I asked, my voice sharper than I intended.
Her lips parted. She hesitated, like the syllables themselves might drag me deeper into something I wasn't supposed to touch.
"Soo-Jin Park."
She said it clean, like the words had been rehearsed, then slowed it down when my expression gave me away.
"Soo-Jin. Like… 'Sue,' but softer. More…" She puckered her lips into an exaggerated 'ooo,' then smiled despite herself. "From Busan. You know Busan?"
"I know of it." I crossed my arms. "What's the big problem money can't fix?"
Her face tightened. The nervous girl act cracked just enough to show me the iron underneath. She darted a glance down the street, then stepped closer, lowering her voice like the shadows were listening.
"Bad men chase me. Very bad men." She raised three fingers. "Three years they—" She mimed snapping cuffs onto her wrists, then forced the word out. "Make me work. Not good work."
I frowned, not following. She tried again. Pointed to herself. Made a gesture like counting money. Pointed to an imaginary man, repeated the gesture. My stomach dropped.
"They sell… me." She tapped her chest. "To other men. Many men."
The pieces snapped together. "Trafficking."
Her eyes widened in relief. "Yes! Yes." The word tumbled out, a mixture of shame and triumph that I understood. "They bring me from Korea with lies. Say I work in restaurant, learn English, make money. Big lies."
"Master," ARIA's voice slid into my skull, clinical and cold, "she's telling the truth. Facial recognition confirms: Soo-Jin Park. Reported missing from Busan, three years ago. Entered the U.S. on forged documents under a defunct visa program."
I clenched my jaw. "Why not go to the police?"
Soo-Jin's expression soured like I'd asked if water was wet. She mimed handing something over, then made an X across her eyes. "Police here take money. They see nothing." She tapped her temple. "I listen when bad men talk business. Police help them sometimes."
That hit harder than I wanted it to. Miami wasn't Gotham, but it was close enough.
She glanced back up at the Setai tower, then at me—like my freefall had been some divine audition tape. "But you are different. You fall from sky like… like movie hero." She pressed her palms together in a tiny clap of awe. "You have power they don't."
Wrong, girl, I am no hero, far from that absurd word and reality actually.
I turned toward the Maybach waiting at the curb, unwilling to let this spiral. Margaret's clock was still ticking, and I wasn't about to let one broken girl derail the rescue.
"Please." The word came out broken, and suddenly all her composure cracked. "Please, I beg you. Not agencies. They send me back to Korea with nothing... I accept to come here to change life... Or they put me in system where bad men find me again."
She dropped to her knees on the dirty sidewalk, and fuck me, this was exactly the kind of emotional ejaculation I didn't have time for.
"I don't want revenge," she continued, tears starting to flow. "I don't want to make trouble for you. I just want place to sleep where I don't listen for footsteps at night. Place where I don't have to sell my body to eat."
She looked up at me with those dark eyes swimming with tears, and Jesus Christ, she knew exactly what she was doing. "You have power. I see you fall from sky and land perfect. You are different from other men. Maybe you are only man who can really protect someone like me."
The street was quiet except for distant traffic and her ragged breathing. This girl had survived three years of hell and was smart enough to recognize supernatural ability when she saw it.
But more than that, something about her reminded me of myself before the system—desperate, powerless, looking for someone strong enough to change everything.
"I promise. I just want chance to live normal life. Work for living, not for survival."
"Look, Soo-Jin. I'm sorry about your situation, but I've got my own mess to clean tonight. There are groups who—"
"Wait!" Her voice cracked like glass. She hurried forward, heels clicking against the sidewalk. "Please. I… I can help you."
[DING! SAVE A STRAY BEAUTY DETECTED]