Naftali Neo Sprouse

The hum of the D.E.I.S. surveillance wing was constant, sterile, and cold—like everything else in this fucking building. Fluorescent lighting buzzed overhead, flickering now and then like it was about to blow. Naftali didn’t notice. He hadn’t noticed in days. His elbow leaned heavy on the edge of his desk, one hand resting on his mouth, the other twirling a small, worn key between his fingers.

“River” was carved into the metal in crude, uneven etching. Not factory made. Handmade. Personal. The kind of key you leave on a chain, close to the heart. Except Naftali didn’t wear it around his neck. He kept it close, sure—but always out of sight, like it burned to even look at.

“¿Otra vez con esa mierda?” Lolly’s voice cut through the silence, flat but not unkind. Her manicured fingers tapped lazily at her holo-console as her gaze drifted over to his screen.

A three-dimensional blueprint floated in front of him, rotating slowly. Red pinpoints marked heat signatures, energy readings, anything unusual. The spot on the west coast lit up like a pulse—a possibility. A maybe. Another fucking dead end.

“Estoy tan cerca... tan jodidamente cerca,” he muttered, mostly to himself. His voice was hoarse from disuse, and the bags under his eye were turning a dull purple. The other eye—the missing one—hid behind his matte black patch like always, the scars peeking from beneath it angry and swollen from lack of rest.

Lolly raised an eyebrow. “You’ve said that every night for the past week. When’s the last time you even went home?”

Naftali didn’t answer. He leaned back just enough to drag a cigarette from the open pack beside his terminal, lips curling around it with muscle memory. He didn’t light it—D.E.I.S. banned open flame in the surveillance sector—but he let it dangle there while the key kept spinning.

“He’s alive. I know it,” he said finally, eye locked on the map like it owed him blood. “El hijo de puta que lo hizo... he’s hiding. But not for long.”

Lolly didn’t say anything for a while. The hum of tech filled the gap.

“You’re not gonna get clearance to go off-grid, not again,” she said carefully, watching his jaw tense. “Especially not after the Denver incident.”

“Que se vayan a la mierda con su protocolo,” Naftali spat. “You think I give a shit about clearance? About rules? My son is rotting in a grave and that bastard's still breathing.”

He stabbed the key against the edge of the desk—once, twice—then shoved it into his pocket and stood. His long coat shifted with him, armor clinking underneath. The black combat harness across his chest was still half unbuckled from the last mission. He hadn’t even bothered to change. The sweat on his skin clung like oil.

“You’re gonna burn yourself out,” Lolly muttered, typing something without looking at him.

Naftali chuckled darkly. “Ya estoy quemado.”

He started toward the exit, boots echoing on the sterile floor. The map blinked behind him, red light slowly fading out. The cigarette fell from his mouth and rolled across the floor.

“Lolly,” he called, just before disappearing around the corner. “If this goes sideways... burn the tapes. And don't let anyone near my locker. You’ll know why.”

Then he was gone.

Naftali exited through the rear of the D.E.I.S. complex, the steel door groaning behind him as it sealed with a hiss. The alley behind headquarters was dark, narrow, and smelled of ozone and rusted metal. High walls on either side kept most light out, save for the neon wash of a red sign flickering overhead—"AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY." The irony didn’t escape him.

He lit the cigarette this time. The flame briefly illuminated the right side of his face, casting deep shadows across his scarred cheek and black eyepatch. Smoke curled up around his features like a serpent as he walked, slow, boots crunching broken glass and gravel underfoot.

And then he saw him.

A figure leaned against the far wall, shrouded in shadows that even the red neon couldn’t touch. Tall. Still. Wrapped in a long coat darker than pitch, with a featureless mask that shimmered faintly under the dim light. No eye holes. No mouth. Just a blank slate—like death forgot to finish the job.

“About time,” Naftali muttered, one hand already hovering near the grip of the pistol strapped under his coat. “You got five seconds to tell me why the fuck you called me out here.”

The masked man didn’t flinch. Instead, he slowly reached into his coat and pulled something small and metallic from within—a pendant. Worn, familiar. Naftali froze.

It was River’s.

His breathing stalled. His fingers clenched.

“...Dónde lo conseguiste,” he growled low, stepping closer. “That belonged to my son.”

The masked man tilted his head slowly. “I know,” he replied, voice distorted by a small modulator. It was almost inhuman, like several voices speaking at once. “And I know who took him.”

Naftali’s pulse spiked. But years of REAPER training held his body still, taut as a wire.

“Name. Now.”

“There’s a price.”

“Of course there is,” Naftali hissed through his teeth. “Everyone wants something. Money? Blood? You name it.”

“Not money,” the man replied coolly. “I want access. Temporary clearance into the D.E.I.S. archives. Level 7. You open the door. I get what I need. You get the location of your son.”

Naftali stared at him for a long time. Rain had started to fall in fine, misty sheets, hissing quietly against the pavement. The pendant swung from the stranger’s gloved fingers, a cruel pendulum.

“That clearance is blacklisted to everyone but cabinet members,” Naftali said slowly. “Even I can’t touch it.”

The masked man leaned in.

“But you know someone who can.”

That made Naftali’s jaw flex. Lolly. Shit. She owed him favors, and she was reckless enough to help if he spun the right story.

He looked at the pendant again, and for a split second, his face cracked—grief bleeding into his hardened expression like blood into water.

“Why do you want in?” he asked finally, voice low, eyes sharp.

The man didn’t answer at first. He simply slipped the pendant back into his coat, then turned to walk into the darkness. But as he passed by, his voice echoed from the shadows:

“Because some of us are more than just broken fathers, Agent Sprouse. Some of us are ghosts... trying to finish what we started.”

And just like that—he was gone.

Naftali stood alone in the alley, rain dripping from his lashes, jaw clenched so tight it hurt.

He looked down at the place where the man had stood. A single word was scratched into the wall behind him, barely visible beneath the grime:

“REVIVE.”

His cigarette hissed out on the wet ground.

He didn’t move for a long time.

The door creaked open with the low groan of hinges that hadn’t been oiled in months. Naftali stepped into the house and shut it behind him with a soft thud, engaging the lock out of muscle memory.

The place smelled like old coffee, sweat, and time. It wasn’t messy—he kept it clean—but it wasn’t alive either. No laughter bouncing off the walls. No cartoons playing on low volume. No small footsteps on the wood floors. Just silence. Deafening, thick, suffocating silence.

He didn’t bother turning on the lights. The red glow from the streetlamps bled through the blinds and painted long lines across the furniture. The kind of light that made everything look like it was bleeding.

Naftali walked past the small framed photo of River on the entryway table without looking at it. Couldn’t. Not tonight. Not with the masked man’s voice still echoing in his skull. “You know someone who can.”

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath, shrugging off his coat and tossing it over the arm of the couch.

He made it halfway to the kitchen when he heard it—faint ruffling. Wood creaking. Movement.

Upstairs.

His body tensed instantly, eyes narrowing as his hand went to the sidearm still holstered at his back. He moved quietly, steps deliberate, smooth. No sound under his boots. He didn’t draw the gun just yet. It wasn’t loud enough to be a break-in. No smashed window. No forced door.

But the attic?

The ladder groaned as he pulled it down and climbed, one step at a time. The closer he got, the more he could hear the soft sounds—rustling of fabric, something being moved. Searched through.

When he pushed open the trap door, the dim light from the hallway spilled in.

And there they were.

Going through River’s chest.

Naftali’s heart kicked hard in his chest. Not because he was surprised—but because it felt like something sacred was being pulled open, exposed, violated.

His voice came out low, sharp, cold.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

There was a pause. No answer.

He climbed the rest of the way up, footsteps heavy on the attic floor now. No point in stealth anymore. His jaw was locked so tight his temple throbbed.

“You don’t get to touch that,” he snapped, stepping closer, eyes blazing. “You don’t get to dig through his shit like you knew him better than I did.”

His hand gestured wildly toward the chest—small toys, drawings, an old soccer jersey. A tiny red cape River used to wear around the house like he was saving the goddamn world.

“I haven’t opened that box in a year,” he growled, his voice cracking in the middle of the sentence. “Not since the funeral. Not since they told me there wasn’t even a body.”

The silence pressed down on the attic like a heavy blanket. His shoulders heaved. His lips parted like he wanted to say more—something vicious, something final—but all that came out was a bitter breath and a quiet:

“...Get out.”

He didn’t yell it. He didn’t have to.

It was the kind of voice you only heard from someone hanging on by a thread.

He turned his back, staring at the chest, refusing to look at what had been taken out. Refusing to see the past in the hands of someone else.

His fingers twitched at his side.

“I swear to God, if you wanted to help, this wasn’t the way.”