The apartment was quiet in the way only places touched by violence ever were.

  Zawisza sat on the edge of the couch, shoulders hunched, elbows resting on his knees. The living room light was off; only the amber glow from the kitchen bled faintly into the space. Rain ticked against the window in a steady, patient rhythm.

  Beside him, the home phone dangled off the low table, the receiver half-slipped from his fingers. The coiled cord stretched taut, swaying slightly, as if undecided whether to fall or stay.

  On the floor, Janssen lay wrapped in towels and torn fabric, pale and trembling. His breathing was shallow but steady—for now. Kazou knelt beside him, one hand pressed firmly against the bandage at his shoulder, the other at his thigh, eyes fixed, calculating, unblinking.

  Zawisza stared at the phone.

  “You ready?” Kazou asked quietly.

  Zawisza nodded once, then hesitated. His thumb hovered over the buttons.

  “This is the line,” he said softly. “Once we do this, there’s no undoing it.”

  Kazou didn’t look up.

  “There already wasn’t.”

  A weak sound escaped Janssen’s throat, not quite a word, not quite a sob.

  Zawisza swallowed, then finally dialed.

  Each number sounded obscenely loud in the silence.

  Click. Click. Click.

  A pause.

  Then a calm, distant voice.

  “Ambulance services. What is your emergency?”

  Zawisza closed his eyes.

  “Yes,” he said, steady, composed, as if calling about a burst pipe. “We have a male, early twenties. Multiple gunshot wounds. Heavy blood loss. Conscious but fading.”

  The dispatcher asked for an address.

  Zawisza gave it. Clearly. Precisely.

  Kazou’s jaw tightened. He adjusted pressure as Janssen whimpered, murmuring reassurances in Japanese under his breath, words meant more for himself than anyone else.

  “Are the assailants still on scene?” the dispatcher asked.

  Zawisza opened his eyes.

  “No,” he said. “They left.”

  That wasn’t entirely a lie.

  “Stay with the patient. Help is on the way. 6-8 minutes.”

  Zawisza nodded, even though she couldn’t see it.

  “Yes,” he said. “We will.”

  He placed the receiver gently back on the table—but didn’t hang it up. Instead, he let it slip from his fingers.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  The phone dangled there, alive, breathing faint static into the room.

  Kazou looked up at him.

  “How long?” he asked.

  “Six to eight minutes,” Zawisza replied. “Maybe less.”

  Kazou exhaled.

  “That’s cutting it close.”

  “That’s the point.”

  They worked fast after that.

  Zawisza moved through the apartment with quiet efficiency, grabbing keys, stuffing papers into a bag, wiping down surfaces he’d touched without thinking about it. Muscle memory. Old habits. Not panic, preparation.

  Kazou kept talking to Janssen, low and constant.

  “You’re going to hear sirens,” he said gently. “When you do, you hold on. Understand? You don’t let go.”

  Janssen’s eyes fluttered open.

  “Y-you… leaving me?” he whispered.

  Zawisza paused at the doorway.

  He looked back.

  “No,” he said quietly. “We’re making sure you live.”

  Janssen swallowed, tears slipping sideways into his hair.

  “I didn’t… kill them,” he whispered. “I swear—”

  “I know,” Zawisza said immediately. No hesitation. No doubt. “That’s why you’re still breathing.”

  The distant wail of sirens cut through the rain.

  Kazou stiffened.

  “That’s them.”

  Zawisza crossed the room in three long strides. He knelt beside Janssen one last time and placed two fingers briefly against his wrist—steady, weak, but there.

  “Listen to me,” Zawisza said softly. “When they ask, you tell them the truth. All of it. Even if they don’t want to hear it. Tell them you are innocent."

  Janssen nodded weakly.

  “And if they say your name like it already belongs to a grave,” Zawisza continued, voice low, almost kind, “you keep breathing anyway. That’s how you win.”

  The sirens were close now.

  Zawisza stood.

  Kazou rose with him. They exchanged a look, no words, no questions.

  They moved toward the window.

  As they slipped out into the rain-soaked alley, the first ambulance turned the corner, red lights washing over the brick walls in violent pulses.

  Inside the apartment, the phone still dangled off the table.

  The line is still open.

  Zawisza shoved the window up the rest of the way, the old frame protesting with a dry groan. Cold rain rushed in, sharp and metallic. Somewhere below, tires hissed against wet pavement—sirens swelling, multiplying.

  “Now,” Kazou said.

  They moved.

  Zawisza went first, already shrugging into his coat as he swung one leg over the sill. The hoodie followed, hood pulled up, shoulders disappearing into shadow. He didn’t look back. He never did at moments like this. Looking back was how people froze.

  Kazou followed, nimble despite the tension locked in his spine. He landed on the fire escape with a soft clang, fingers white around the railing. For a split second, he listened—doors slamming inside the building, boots on stairs, voices overlapping.

  They ran down the fire escape, metal slick with rain, feet pounding in uneven rhythm. Zawisza took the steps two at a time, laughing once under his breath—not joy, not hysteria, just the absurd release of momentum.

  “Left!” he hissed.

  They hit the alley hard, splashing through puddles, coats flaring behind them like broken wings. Red and blue light flashed briefly at the alley mouth, then vanished as they cut right, then left again, swallowed by the backstreets.

  The city closed around them.

  Trash bins. Locked service doors. Flickering sodium lamps. The smell of damp concrete and old oil. Zawisza slowed only long enough to yank his hood lower, to tuck his chin, to become another tall shadow in motion.

  Kazou matched his pace, breath controlled, eyes scanning reflections in windows, in puddles, in the chrome of parked bicycles.

  “No tails,” Kazou murmured.

  “Give it a block,” Zawisza replied. “Amsterdam loves surprises.”

  They crossed a narrow street just as an ambulance screamed past the far end, lights strobing. Zawisza didn’t look at it—but his jaw tightened.

  Rain soaked through their sleeves.

  They ducked into a covered passage between buildings and slowed to a fast walk. Zawisza pressed a hand to his ribs, not from pain—grounding. Counting breaths.

  “One,” he said quietly.

  “Two,” Kazou answered.

  “Three.”

  By the time they reached the canal road, they were just two men walking briskly, collars up, faces turned down against the weather. No one looked twice. No one ever did.

  Zawisza exhaled, long and tired.

  “Well,” he said, adjusting his hood, voice light again, almost cheerful, “that went about as well as it could’ve without someone dying on us.”

  Kazou shot him a look.

  “You call that well?”

  “I call that Tuesday.”

  They kept moving, footsteps echoing softly as they disappeared into the maze of streets—leaving behind sirens, blood, and a dangling phone line that would tell the story for them.