Maya ran until the blue sky ran out.
The alleyway didn't end in a street. It ended in a wall of grey fog. The bricks here weren't solid; they were blurry, like a photograph taken by a shaking hand.
The air smelled of burning plastic.
"Johnny!" she screamed, her voice echoing strangely, as if the acoustics were wrong. "I saw you!"
There was no answer. Just the low, digital hum of the fog.
Maya looked at the compass in her hand. The needle was vibrating, pointing frantically at a dumpster overflowing with what looked like shredded paper, but on closer inspection, the paper was filled with binary code.
"You can't hide from me," Maya whispered. "Not here."
She walked toward the dumpster. She reached out.
A hand shot out from the shadows, rough, scarred, and warm.
It grabbed her wrist
