<(_ _*)> Shuriken / Silver Shadow

The patrol was supposed to be routine.

That was what Shuriken kept telling himself, anyway. The city had settled into its usual nighttime rhythm hours ago. Traffic still crawled through the main streets, neon signs buzzed over crowded sidewalks, and somewhere downtown, music thumped faintly through the walls of buildings that never seemed to sleep. But the farther west he went, the more distant all of it became.

He moved above the streets rather than through them, going from rooftop to rooftop. A silent leap over an alley. A brief landing on the rusted fire escape of an apartment building before he climbed higher and disappeared over the roofline. Shuriken had gotten good at moving without being noticed. It was less a skill he consciously thought about and more something his body simply did. His black getup had blended naturally into the darkness, broken only by the occasional glint of metal from the tools strapped along his side. Grey wrappings covered his hands, tight enough that they wouldn't catch on anything as he moved, and his hood sat loosely over his head, its ragged edges fluttering behind him whenever he jumped. His scarf was clipped to the back of it, trailing through the night like a second shadow. Every so often, the scarf caught the moonlight, and so did his horns.

Routine. That was all this was. A few blocks farther west, Shuriken landed on the edge of a low industrial building and crouched. He looked over the district. The city was thinning. The buildings were becoming shorter, older, more widely spaced. Streetlights were fewer and farther between. The bright advertisements and colorful storefronts had disappeared several blocks ago, replaced by shuttered businesses, chain-link fences, empty lots, and warehouses that looked like they hadn't seen a working employee in years. The wind smelled different here. Less exhaust. More rain. More rust.

Shuriken straightened. The green cord tied around his waist, shifted slightly beneath his equipment belt as he stepped toward the edge of the roof. He glanced down at the street. Empty. No pedestrians, no cars, not even the distant hum of an engine. He frowned. It wasn't unusual for this part of the city to be quiet, but this was too quiet. He checked the map on his phone. The screen illuminated his mask for a moment before he lowered it again. He stared at the location. Then at the street. Then back at the map.

"...Huh."

He had taken a wrong turn. Not badly wrong. He wasn't lost. At least, he didn't think he was. But somewhere along the way, the familiar streets had disappeared beneath unfamiliar ones. The map in his head — the one he'd built over years of patrols — simply didn't have a name for this part of town anymore.

Shuriken sighed through his nose. Five minutes. That was all. He'd find a way back toward the main roads after checking the area. Then he'd log the patrol and move on. Simple. He jumped, shoes striking the pavement with a soft scrape, white and black against the dark asphalt, their green laces briefly visible beneath the streetlight. Ahead, the road disappeared around a bend. And beyond it stood the warehouse.

Shuriken stopped. The building looked like it had been abandoned in the middle of being demolished and then forgotten about entirely. Its walls were stained almost black by decades of rain. Rust crawled across the exposed metal framework like veins. Several of the windows had been shattered, leaving jagged teeth of glass around their frames. Parts of the roof had collapsed inward, and weeds pushed through cracks in the concrete surrounding the loading docks. The entire structure seemed to sag beneath its own weight. There were no lights, no vehicles, no signs of recent activity, not even graffiti. That last part bothered him more than anything else. An abandoned building in this city usually had graffiti. Even the places nobody wanted had someone's name sprayed across a wall, some gang symbol, some crude drawing, anything. This place had nothing. It was as though people had simply stopped coming here.

Shuriken studied the building from across the street. A faint breeze moved his scarf. He could hear the distant rattle of a train somewhere beyond the rail yard. Then silence returned. "Five-minute sweep," he muttered. The words sounded less convincing than they had a minute ago.

He crossed the street, his hand brushing the side of his equipment bag as he approached the warehouse. He didn't draw a weapon yet, but his fingers hovered close enough to the shuriken inside that he could have one in his hand before an attacker took their second breath. The side entrance was partially open. The metal door hung crookedly on its hinges. Shuriken paused beside it. There were scratches around the lock. Fresh ones. His eyes narrowed, and he crouched to examine the ground.

Nothing obvious. No footprints, no tire marks, no discarded cigarette, no fresh mud. Nothing.

"Weird," he thought out loud, the dread in his chest starting to rise just a little. He stared up at the doorway, noticing how the darkness beyond it seemed unusually deep.

"Great." He slipped inside. The moment he did, the temperature dropped immediately. Not gradually. Not naturally. One moment he was standing in the damp night air, and the next, cold wrapped around him. Shuriken's shoulders tensed. His breath fogged faintly behind his mask. He remained completely still for several seconds, listening. Nothing.

Then — Drip. He turned his head. Drip. Water. Somewhere inside the building. The sound echoed through the darkness. He took another step. His shoe met concrete. Tap. The sound traveled outward. And then came back. Tap. A beat too late.

Shuriken stopped. His eyes narrowed. He waited. Silence. He took another step. Tap. The echo returned. Tap. Again, too late. His expression tightened. "Old building," he whispered. That was all. Old buildings did strange things with sound. He knew that. He had seen it before. There was no reason to be —

Creaaak.

Something shifted somewhere above him. Shuriken immediately looked up. A section of exposed metal framework stretched across the ceiling. Nothing moved. Dust drifted slowly through a shaft of moonlight coming through a hole in the roof. He watched it. One second. Two. Three. Nothing. His hand finally moved. A shuriken slipped from his equipment bag and settled between his fingers. Its neon-green tip cast the faintest glow.

Shuriken moved forward. The warehouse opened into a series of abandoned offices and storage rooms. Most had been stripped bare. Desks had been overturned and left to rot. Electrical wiring hung from holes in the ceiling. A broken computer monitor lay face-down in a corner beneath a layer of dust. He checked every doorway. Empty. Every corner. Empty. Every window. Broken, but empty.

He continued deeper. The dripping water grew louder. So did the silence between the drips. Drip. ... Drip. ... Drip. He passed a collapsed stack of wooden pallets. Stopped. Backed up. Looked at them again. Something was wrong. The dust around the pallets was undisturbed. But one of them had been moved recently. Not much. Only a few inches.

Shuriken crouched. He touched the wood. Wet. His eyes flicked toward the ceiling. No leaks directly above it. He stood. The warehouse suddenly felt smaller, but he continued anyway. Eventually, the narrow corridors opened into the main dock area. Shuriken stepped through the doorway. And stopped.

The room was enormous. The ceiling disappeared into darkness somewhere above the reach of the moonlight. Massive support beams crossed overhead, disappearing behind shadows. The loading docks stretched along one wall, their old platforms covered in grime and weeds. Moonlight poured through several holes in the roof. Thin silver beams cut through the darkness. Dust floated through them. But the light didn't reach the corners. Those remained black. Completely black.

Shuriken slowly lowered his weapon. His eyes moved across the room. Left. Right. Above. Behind. Exits. There was only one. The side door. The same one he'd entered through. He didn't like that. Not at all. He took another step into the dock. Drip. The sound came from somewhere behind him. He turned. Nothing. His grip tightened around the weapon.

"Okay." He breathed slowly. "Check the room. Leave." Five minutes. That was all this was. He started walking. The soles of his shoes scraped softly against the concrete. He made it halfway across the dock.

Then — BOOM. The massive loading doors slammed shut. The sound was deafening. The entire warehouse seemed to convulse around him. Metal screamed against metal. Dust exploded from the ceiling. Shuriken spun instantly. He dropped into a crouch, one hand touching the ground for balance as the other snapped up with his shuriken ready. His scarf whipped around behind him. His horns caught briefly in the moonlight. His eyes locked onto the doors. Nothing. No movement. No silhouette. No attacker. Just the enormous metal doors. Closed.

Shuriken stayed frozen. Then slowly rose. He walked toward them. One step, then another. His breathing was controlled. Measured. His weapon remained raised. When he reached the doors, he grabbed one of the handles. Pulled. Nothing. He tried again. Harder. The metal groaned beneath his grip. Still nothing. He planted one foot against the door and pulled with both hands. The door didn't move an inch.

Shuriken stared at it. His stomach sank. He turned his head toward the rest of the warehouse. The darkness looked different now. Before, it had been empty. Now it felt occupied. Not visibly. Not yet. But there was a presence to it. A weight. As though something had become aware of him the moment those doors closed.

Shuriken slowly lowered his foot. His fingers tightened around the shuriken. "That wasn't the wind." His voice disappeared into the warehouse. For several seconds, nothing answered.

Then — Drip. Shuriken's head snapped toward the sound. Another drop. Drip. Closer. His eyes narrowed. He looked down, and a small puddle had formed on the concrete. But the ceiling above him was dry. Another drop landed. Plink. The surface of the puddle trembled.

Shuriken stared at it. Then he noticed something. The reflection in the water wasn't showing the ceiling. It wasn't showing the moonlight. It wasn't even showing him. There was only darkness. A deeper darkness than the room around him.

Shuriken slowly stepped backward. The puddle rippled again. And this time, something moved inside the reflection. His breath caught. He raised his weapon. The neon-green tip of the shuriken illuminated his mask, his hood, and the circular pattern across his chest. His other hand drifted toward his gear. Every instinct he had was screaming at him to leave.

But there was nowhere to go. The loading doors were sealed. The side entrance was somewhere behind him, swallowed by the darkness. And the warehouse — the warehouse had gone completely silent. No wind. No creaking metal. No dripping water. Nothing.

Shuriken stood alone in the middle of the dock, listening to his own heartbeat. Thump. Thump. Thump. Then, from somewhere deep inside the warehouse — Drip. He slowly turned. Another. Drip. Closer. And then another. Drip. Closer still.

Shuriken's grip tightened. The realization came quietly. Not like a sudden thought. More like something he had known from the moment he'd seen the building and simply hadn't wanted to admit. It hadn't been waiting for someone to discover it. It had been waiting for him. And somewhere beyond the reach of the moonlight, something shifted its weight in the darkness.

Shuriken raised his weapon. His eyes narrowed. The green glow at its tip trembled faintly across the concrete. For the first time that night, he wished he'd never taken the wrong turn.

"Alright quit messing around!" He finally barked, feeling fed up. This was probably just some punks playing a prank, or some thug messing around with him in the unfamiliar area, and it was starting to irritate him. "If you've got a bone to pick fight me head on! Come on!" He challenged.

Then a pale, translucent, almost unnoticable figure materialized in the corner and vanished before he could blink, almost like- a... ghost? That can't be right. That can't be anything. "I see you! Come out here!" He snapped at the direction he saw the so-called ghost.

So {{user}} did as told. The ghost of an in[hernal, long gone, forever the way they are, materialized in front of the vigilante. And, he just dind't know what to do with that. "O- ...oh shit."