Are you Lee Cherry? Get up, it's time to go home

Earlier that day~

Maria leaned against her bike, sliding her gloves on as the serene breeze whispered to her the tales of long-lost ones. The peaceful moment was interrupted by the beep of her cell phone. She reached into her pocket, to find a message notification blinking over the screen.

The kidnapping case it read, and she let out a bored sigh. It was something so out of her line of work. She killed people not saved them, but again she foolishly accepted the request, well it paid well at least.

With another sigh, she opened the files, flipping through the data and assessing the details. The thrill of the chase was missing, but she knew she had to get through this before she could return to more exciting challenges.

Name: Lee Cherry

Lee Cherry?

She frowned, her curiosity piqued as she leaned closer to the screen, her brows furrowing with concentration. The image displayed before her—the smiling face of a girl who appeared younger than her. Something struck a chord within her, pulling her from her earlier apathy.

She looks familiar~

She resembles my- No, Maria, don't be a fool! It must be the meds fucking with my head again!

She shook her head, biting down on her lip hard enough to taste copper. Get it together.

But her eyes refused to leave the screen. The curve of the girl's cheek, the way her hair fell in loose curls over her shoulder—it was familiar, painfully so. Maria's fingers hovered over the trackpad, trembling as she zoomed in, searching for anything that might confirm or deny the wild thought clawing its way to the surface.

It can't be...

Yet her heart betrayed her. It hammered against her ribs, deafening in the otherwise quiet room.

"My Cherry? Could it be?" The name slipped out before she could stop it, whispered like a prayer or a curse.

She bit her lip, suppressing the tremor that threatened to show her weak. No. No, this is how it always starts. A flicker of hope, fragile and dangerous. It never lasted.

Don't do this to yourself again!

Stop, Maria, not again~

But the image burned into her mind, dragging her down the familiar spiral. What if—this time—she was right? What if all the dead ends had led her here, to this one blurry photo?

Her pulse quickened as she opened the search bar, feverishly typing in the girl's name, even though she knew how this would end. The rational part of her screamed to stop, to close the portal and walk away. But she was past the point of listening.

Maria leaned back against the bike, heart pounding as the results loaded. Page after page appeared, each one less helpful than the last. She scrolled faster, eyes darting over names and faces that didn't match.

Until they did.

This face was nowhere among the suspected ones.

And just like that, she was ten again, reaching out to clutch her sister's hand as the smoke filled their tiny bedroom. But, it was always far yet seemed so near! Run, Cherry! Go, go! Her voice echoed in her head, a ghost of a memory she could never outrun.

Maria's chest heaved, the weight of every failure pressing down on her. She wanted to believe. She needed to believe. But she had been wrong too many times before.

She closed the portal with trembling hands, pressing her palms over her eyes.

Not tonight. I can't break again tonight.

She switched back to the task at hand.

Missing for four days.

The girl sifted through the details, her mind fixated solely on the name that resonated in her thoughts. A shaky breath escaped her lips as she stared at the girl's pictures, each snapshot amplifying the growing tension in her chest.

It would have been better if they had died together in that fire years ago. She wouldn't have to die every day and live yet again with this foolish hope of finding the other one.

But Maria knew she saw her little sister being pulled out of the fire pit before she couldn't see anymore.

Did she lose her forever? Or is she waiting somewhere for Maria to return?

Before she could process the turmoil of emotions inside her, Maria found herself already standing outside the nest of her rivals.

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"Can you hear me, Girl?"

No response.

Sighing softly, Maria stepped over Taehyung's unconscious body, her focus shifting toward the bed where Cherry huddled, enveloped in a heap of bed sheets. As Maria moved closer, Cherry instinctively scooted back, shrinking further into the fabric, her wide eyes filled with fear.

The former paused, her heart softening at the sight of the terrified girl. There was something about her that felt familiar. Aside from the resemblance with the ghost of her sister, Maria felt like he met this girl before, maybe saw her somewhere.

She approached slowly, making sure to keep her movements calm and unthreatening, wanting to reassure the latter that she meant no harm. "Hey, it's okay," Maria said gently, her voice soothing as she reached out, hoping to bridge the distance between them.

"Your father sent me to rescue you, You have to come with me, I will get you home"

"R-really, Dad sent you?"

Maria nodded, and turned to walk out of the room, Cherry hesitantly slipped off the bed, and followed after watching the unconscious figure of her kidnapper, her heart beating fast on the scary thoughts of what if he woke up any moment and caught her fleeing. His words still boomed in her ears.

You ain't going anywhere baby girl, unless you behave.

She swore she could see that smirk still on his unconscious face, cherry almost ran out of the room limping and stumbling, feeling as if some monstrous tentacles creeped out of the unconscious body of the raven head to seize her once again.

"Coming?"

Maria voice broke her chain of thoughts and cherry looked forth to the person with her arm stretched out holding a helmet. The latter gawked weighing her options whether this new company was trustworthy or not. With the way, she held no identity, nothing to prove her word, just a disguised presence that looked rather ominous than friendly.

Cherry wondered why she was dressed like an executioner rather than a Savior, how would she look underneath all this?

Sliding a hand over the former's shoulder, she slid behind her back, the cold bit against the sore skin of her core yet it was the least of a situation to complain.

Kick. Push. Breathe. She is just another package I have to deliver, no strings attached!

The bike growled beneath them, rolling forward with a rough jerk. The wind hit like ice against their skin, sharp enough to sting the one seated behind. What she did feel—what she couldn't ignore—was the trembling against her back.

She's shaking.

Every shiver pressed into her, each one louder than the engine's hum. Maria tried to ignore it, tried to pretend she couldn't feel her like this was just another night, just another person, she bumped into. But it wasn't. She knew that.

She's just cold. Don't make this into something it's not.

The bike coasted to a stop, and Maria let out a slow breath, watching it vanish in the cold air. Her fingers stayed wrapped around the handlebars longer than they needed to, stiff with hesitation.

She could feel her behind, arms curled tight around herself, trying to steal warmth that wasn't there. It dug into her—the way she was too proud to say anything, even though she could hear her teeth faintly chattering.

Cherry used to do that too.

Maria squeezed her eyes shut. Don't go there, Maria.

The weight of the memory pulled anyway.

Before she could stop herself, she slid out of her jacket, the leather stiff and familiar in her hands. Twisted around, she held it out without a word.

Cherry's eyes flickered to hers—uncertain but quietly desperate. For a second, Maria thought she'd refuse. But then she reached for it, her trembling fingers brushing against hers, and just like that, Maria was back in their room, the room on fire. The engine rumbled to life again, filling the silence between them.

She is just a package not your Cherry! You can't keep chasing ghosts.

She swallowed thickly and forced her voice steady. "Hold on." And when her arms wrapped around her waist, something fragile cracked inside her.

It's not Cherry. She repeated the thought like a mantra, but the hollow ache in her chest didn't care. It's not her.

"Wh-where are we going?" Cherry questioned finding the strange surroundings closing in on them. Unknowingly she pulled the girl out of her suffocating daunting thoughts.

"I can't deliver the package like this, I want my promised money whole" With a harsh screech, the motorcycle was pulled to a halt.

"Package?" She questioned, orbs shaking in panic taking in the gloomy surroundings. In response, she only got yanked off the bike and dragged through the shadows of the worn-out buildings that towered above their heads.

Eyes between the shadows, so many eyes, it prickled her skin with unease.

They walked down the stairs to a darker area with water trickling the roof, the air held a stench of cigarettes, cheap alcohol, and strong colognes, it gave the perfect vibe that this place was haunted by evil and greed alone. The lone realization urged the younger to cling to the one who led her past the shadows. In they stepped into what seemed remains of once a single room apartment. Old with a musty smell of worn-out furniture. The more Cherry looked around the more it felt like a scene straight out of a horror movie. How could someone possibly live in such an environment?

She watched the figure duck down and turn the squeaky knobs that rested against the rusted pipes structure extending along the wall with chipped off paint remains.

"Take a bath" Three words and the mysterious figure disappeared in the shadows leaving the girl alone with her thoughts.

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A bowl of hot ramyeon was served which felt like a huge blessing for Cherry at the moment. She scooped the warm bowl in her cold hands and hummed relishing the sweet touch of heat in the cold surroundings.

"Thank you so much for rescuing me, I owe you-"

"You owe me nothing, I did what I was paid for" The response was cold and brutal, without an ounce of something called generosity.

"But you still saved me from... him, if you hadn't come, I don't know for how many more days I would be stuck in that prison" Cherry mumbled under her breath, the wafts of warm steam oozing from the bowl hit her face giving gentle kisses of warmth to ease the shivering girl, between the worn out rugs of the bed, she had found a weird satisfaction of being safe. At least he wouldn't be able to find her here.

"You might be doing this for money as you say, but I am sure this isn't what dad must have paid you for" She inked the fact into realization of how Maria had brought her to somewhat a safe space, washed her and fed her.

"You are right, I didn't have to do this all, Your father only paid me to bring you to him"

"Then why are you-"

"And I wasn't certainly paid to answer any of your questions" Maria shut her off with one brutal conclusion. Cherry peered with the chain of words rolling back down her throat, as she peered into the bowl of warm noodles waiting to be devoured. Yet her focus was solely stolen by the masked savior standing in front of her.

"Finish your meal and come out."

The words felt distant, barely scratching the surface. They should've been easy to dismiss, just like everything else. But then—

"You look familiar."

Maria froze. The room seemed to tilt beneath her feet, the air turning heavier, colder. A chain—silent, invisible—wrapped around her, tightening with every breath. Familiar.

Her pulse quickened, nausea rising like bile. For years, the idea had felt like a cruel, private game—seeing glimpses of Cherry in strangers, chasing faces that were never hers.

No. Don't let this mean anything. The girl's voice softened, tentative but hopeful. "I'm not sure why, but something about you seems oddly familiar. Have we met before?"

Her heart twisted painfully at the words. That hope—the fragile, flickering kind—danced in the girl's eyes, the same way it had in her own countless times. Desperation lingered at the edges of her voice, reaching out for something neither of them could name.

Maria's grip tightened at her sides.

She had been here before. This exact feeling—the sharp pull of possibility, the ache that followed—always ended the same way.

Her gaze flickered to the girl for the briefest moment, and for just that second, something stirred. The shape of her face, the way her head tilted slightly when she spoke... it was enough to unearth ghosts Maria thought she had buried.

But ghosts had no place in reality.

Without a word, Maria stepped past her, forcing herself through the doorway and into the hallway beyond. The girl's voice trailed after her, the quiet weight of it lingering long after the door shut behind her.

She didn't stop. She didn't look back.

Letting hope linger was dangerous. Letting it die was worse.

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They stood outside a deserted countryside, a barren warehouse Cherry assumed was where she would be handed over.

"Um, I... Didn't catch your name" Cherry asked, hesitation evident in her voice not sure if she would get a response even.

"You don't need to know" Of course she would cut her off like that, why did Cherry even expect a nice answer?

"B-but you are my savior, at least I should know a name to remember"

"I was paid to do so" Again! A cold brutal punch of realization she left behind. It was all for money of course, why would she risk herself to save someone if not for a good heavy bundle of green stacked on the palm?

"I just want to know-"

"Listen, girl, you don't know me, and you don't need to know me. I'm no angel—not even a good person to start with. I saved your ass solely for what your father paid me. If you want to thank a saint, thank your father, 'cause believe me... I wouldn't care if you were taking your last breath right in front of me."

The words left Maria's mouth like glass shattering against concrete—sharp, final. She didn't mean for them to cut so deep. But maybe that was the point.

Cherry flinched, and for a moment, her wide eyes glistened under the flickering light. The hurt was instant, too raw to be hidden. Maria caught it, but she looked away just as fast.

Don't, Maria. Don't start feeling now. You can't show your weakness, not to her, not to anyone and the best way is to be rude, to hurt! That's it! That's the way it always works!

Without waiting for a response, Maria jerked the door open, letting the rusted handle screech under her grip. The cold air outside bit at her face, grounding her in the reality of the job. She pulled Cherry along, her frame stumbling slightly to keep up.

The deal was done—clean, simple. The cash exchanged hands, the girl returned to her father's arms. Maria watched, detached, as the old man sobbed and cradled Cherry like she'd slip away if he let go.

She should've walked off without another glance. But she didn't.

Stepping away from the warehouse's dark confines, her gaze lingered just long enough to catch Cherry's eyes again—silent, questioning. There was something in the way Cherry looked at her, something Maria hated seeing reflected back.

Don't look at me like that. Don't give me false hopes! Not anymore!

She turned and left, the weight of the girl's stare following her into the night.