Chapter 15: The One Who Left the Door Open
Linh didn't sleep.
The cassette player sat on her desk, still smelling faintly of melted plastic and rain. The photo was face-down, but its memory kept flashing behind her eyes: the shaved head, the number carved into skin, the voice asking not for rescue, but for remembrance.
By 3 a.m., she stood by the window.
She kept telling herself it was a trick. A staged cry. A shadow her mind had turned into urgency.
But then she saw the cloth again—the black-stitched version of Aunt Mai's pattern—and realized:
It wasn't a memory anymore.
It was a message.
At 6:17, she left.
No phone. Just the tape. The photo. The cloth.
She didn't walk quickly. She stopped twice.
Once, just to breathe.
Once, to turn back—before she didn't.
The café hadn't changed.
Still smelled like wet books, old wood, overburnt coffee.
She picked the corner table. Always the one closest to the wall.
At 6:35, he entered.
Gray coat. Limp on the right leg. A face that looked like it hadn't slept in years.
He sat across from her without a word.
They stared at each other.
Finally, she asked, "Why now?"
He didn't answer. Just opened a worn leather folder and slid the tape back toward her.
"I didn't send it."
She didn't blink. "But you knew it would come."
A pause. "Yes."
She leaned in. "You used to help. You had names. Paths. Refuge points. What changed?"
He met her eyes.
"You did."
She frowned.
"You were supposed to disappear like the rest," he said. "Speak once. Fade quietly. But you didn't. You kept walking. And someone noticed."
Linh looked down. "Someone like who?"
He pulled something from his coat pocket. A metal pin—shaped like a bird mid-flight.
Etched beneath the wing:
Y-01.
She froze.
"We found this on a girl rescued last year," he continued. "She had no name. Just a code. She didn't speak for days. But when she saw a photo of your book cover… she said one word."
A beat.
"Linh."
Her breath shortened.
"They're not just selling people anymore," he said. "They erase them. Reprogram them. Series codes. Y-units. S-units. Trained for labor, obedience, or worse."
Her voice, when it came, was quiet but sharp.
"And you just sat on this?"
"I reported it. No one listened. So I vanished. Sometimes, to help a fire burn, you need to step out of its light."
She didn't agree. But she understood.
He reached into the folder again. Slid out a page with markings—case numbers, faded transcripts, names scratched through.
At the center: three capital letters.
M.A.I.
He didn't explain.
He didn't need to.
Linh whispered, "Is it her?"
He looked exhausted.
"We don't know. It appears on procurement logs, transport codes, even ID tags. Could be a person. Could be a system. Could be… both."
The rain outside had started again.
She clenched the photo in her hand.
Looked down at the carved number on the girl's wrist.
Then at the bird pin.
"She wasn't crying," Linh said softly. "She was waiting."
She stood.
And this time, she didn't hesitate.