˖°𐙚 Chapter 1 𐙚 °˖
⊹ ₊⋆ ☁︎ ⋆⁺₊⋆₊⋆☁︎ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☀︎ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☁︎⋆⁺₊⋆⁺₊⋆ ☁︎ ⋆₊ ⊹
The lift doors slid shut with a soft mechanical sigh.
Ava Carter was a 19-year-old human.
Ava adjusted her grip on the boxes stacked in her arms, shifting the weight of grocery bags digging into her wrists. The plastic handles had already started to bite, but she didn’t move them. There wasn’t really a better way to hold everything without dropping at least one thing.
The mirror inside the lift reflected her back at her—slightly tired, slightly too aware.
Just another day.
Except nothing here was ever just another day.
Outside the thin metal walls of the lift, the building hummed with quiet life. People moved through cities like this every second of every day, passing each other without knowing what stood beside them. That was the rule. That was always the rule.
Don’t ask.
Don’t guess.
Don’t assume.
Because you could be wrong.
And being wrong in this world wasn’t embarrassing—it was dangerous.
Ava exhaled slowly as the lift began to rise.
Humans weren’t safe because they were human. Supernaturals weren’t dangerous because they weren’t. That was the first lesson everyone learned, usually the hard way. Strength didn’t come from what you were born as. It came from how well you could hide it.
Some people were shifters and never shifted in public. Some were vampires who smiled through daylight like it didn’t burn. Ghosts learned how to stay still enough to feel real. Fairies learned how to keep their light tucked deep under skin.
And humans...
Humans learned to stay aware.
Always aware.
Because being the only ‘ordinary’ thing in a room didn’t make you safe. It just made you noticeable if you weren’t careful enough.
The lift dinged softly.
Floor 7.
Ava shifted the boxes again as the doors slid open.
The hallway outside was quiet in the way all new places were—not empty, just unfamiliar. Doors lined both sides, identical and unwelcoming, each one hiding someone she didn’t know and couldn’t afford to misunderstand.
Three roommates.
A shared flat.
That was all the housing agency had told her.
Oh, and the most important part, delivered in the same flat tone as everything else.
Try not to kill each other.
Ava stepped forward.
The carpet was slightly worn under her shoes, as if the building had already seen too many people come and go without ever bothering to remember them. She stopped in front of the door she’d been assigned and adjusted her grip again.
This was it.
New place.
New people.
New rules she didn’t know yet.
Ava unlocked the door.
The key turned with a soft click that sounded louder than it should have in the quiet hallway.
For a moment, she didn’t move.
Then she pushed the door open.
The flat smelled faintly of cleaning products and something else she couldn’t quite place—something too sharp to be comforting, too subtle to be named. The air inside felt already occupied, like the space had made up its mind about her arrival before she even stepped in.
She shifted the boxes higher and walked inside.
The living room opened up first—small but functional, furniture already arranged as if someone had decided they didn’t trust change. A couch faced a low table. Curtains were half-drawn despite the daylight outside. Everything looked... settled.
Too settled.
Like someone had been here longer than she had.
From the kitchen, there was movement.
A man stood near the counter, perfectly still for a moment, as if listening. Neatly dressed, posture straight, attention moving across the room with quiet precision. Not hurried. Not relaxed either. More like someone checking details they had already checked twice.
Boxes—Ava noticed—were stacked along the wall nearby.
All of them unpacked.
Organised.
Labeled.
Her eyes narrowed slightly.
That couldn’t be right.
Someone had already done everything.
Before she could think further, another sound broke the silence.
A clatter.
Then another.
From the hallway behind her.
A woman stumbled into view, arms full of bags and half-opened boxes, clearly struggling with all of it at once. Something slipped from their grip and hit the floor with a dull thud.
A pause.
Then a quiet curse under their breath.
They bent quickly to gather it, only for something else to fall immediately after.
The chaos didn’t stop.
It continued in small, relentless pieces—items shifting, slipping, dropping as they moved further inside like gravity had decided not to cooperate.
The man straightened briefly, pushing hair out of his face with an annoyed huff, then continued forward anyway, stepping over the own mess as if it was a normal part of walking.
He exhaled slowly.
Not loudly.
But enough.
A subtle sound of someone trying very hard not to react.
Still, the slight tilt of his head said everything.
This is going to be a problem.
The woman finally made it fully into the room, paused, looked around at the already-arranged space—and froze.
For the first time, there was silence.
A long one.
Then—
Woman - “...Oh.”
It wasn’t an apology.
It sounded more like realisation arriving late.
The neatly dressed man in the kitchen didn’t turn around fully, but his voice came anyway—calm, controlled, edged with something faintly exhausted.
Man - “Try not to leave that trail everywhere.”
The woman blinked.
Looked down at the items still half-falling from their arms.
Then shrugged, as if this was not new information.
Woman - “Yeah, okay. No promises.”
Ava stood in the doorway, still holding her boxes, watching both of them.
Neither of them had properly acknowledged her yet.
But she already understood something very clearly.
This wasn’t going to be simple.
Not at all.
Ava stayed where she was for a moment longer than she needed to.
Neither of them repeated themselves. Neither of them asked who she was. It was as if her presence was already accepted, or already noted and filed away as something to deal with later.
That felt worse, somehow.
She shifted the boxes in her arms again and finally stepped further inside.
The man in the kitchen had already turned back to what he was doing—hands moving with quiet precision, as if the conversation had ended before it even properly began. The woman was now crouched near the hallway, gathering the last of her scattered things with a low mutter under her breath.
Ava swallowed.
Right.
Room selection.
She glanced down the small corridor branching off the living room.
Four doors.
Of course there were four.
Two of them were already slightly ajar, faint signs of life spilling out—one closer to the kitchen, the other further down the hall near what she assumed was the bathroom.
The remaining two sat closed and untouched.
One near the kitchen.
One at the very end of the corridor.
Ava hesitated.
Then picked the closer one.
Near the kitchen.
It wasn’t a decision so much as avoidance—less time standing in shared space meant less chance of doing something wrong.
The room inside was simple. Bare walls. A bed pushed against one side. A desk. A wardrobe. Clean, but empty in a way that didn’t feel welcoming or hostile—just unfinished.
Like it was waiting.
Ava set the boxes down carefully.
The silence from the rest of the flat carried in faintly through the open door behind her. No one followed. No one checked.
Good.
She started unpacking.
It didn’t take long for the small space to begin changing. Clothes folded onto the bed. Books stacked near the desk. A few personal items placed carefully, as if arrangement could create stability.
Outside the room, voices remained low.
Not directed at her.
Fragments carried through anyway.
Man - “...already did the kitchen.”
Woman - “...didn’t know we were doing labels.”
Man - “...you’re impossible.”
A pause.
Then the man’s voice again, quieter than before.
Man - “...just keep it contained.”
Ava hesitated for a second at that.
Contained.
She wasn’t sure if that referred to the mess... or the people making it.
She shook the thought away and continued unpacking.
By the time she finished, the room still felt unfamiliar—but it was hers now. That made it slightly less sharp around the edges.
A soft knock came at the doorframe.
Not urgent. Not hesitant either. Just there.
Ava turned.
The neatly dressed man stood in the doorway.
Up close, he looked even more controlled than before—like everything about him had been arranged deliberately. His gaze flicked briefly over the room, then back to her.
Man - “You’re taking that one.”
It wasn’t a question.
Ava hesitated.
Ava - “Yes.”
A pause.
Then he nodded once, as if confirming something internally.
Man - “Good. Less walking distance to shared space.”
That felt like a strange thing to care about.
He turned slightly, then added, almost as an afterthought:
Man - “Don’t touch the kitchen cupboards without asking.”
Ava blinked.
Ava - “I wasn’t planning to—”
Man - “Good.”
And just like that, he was gone again.
Ava stared at the empty doorway for a second.
Ava - “...okay,” she muttered to herself.
From further down the hall, something crashed again.
Followed by an exasperated groan.
She wasn’t alone in thinking this wasn’t going to be simple.
Evening came quietly.
The flat settled into a strange rhythm—less like a home, more like three separate lives temporarily occupying the same air.
Ava stayed in her room for most of it.
Unpacking.
Listening.
Learning the sounds of the place.
The man moved through the kitchen at intervals—efficient, quiet, always returning things to order that didn’t seem to have broken yet.
The woman came and went repeatedly, each return slightly more chaotic than the last, as if the hallway itself was working against her.
At one point, something slid across the floor outside Ava’s door.
No explanation followed.
No apology either.
Just footsteps continuing onward.
As night began to settle properly, the apartment grew quieter.
Too quiet.
Ava lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling.
That was when she heard the third presence arrive.
It wasn’t a knock.
Not footsteps either—not exactly.
It was more like the air in the hallway shifted, as if something had decided to exist in a space it hadn’t occupied a second ago.
A pause.
Then the faint sound of a door opening.
Slow.
Unhurried.
Like whoever it was had been there the entire time and simply chose now to acknowledge it.
A new voice drifted in from the hall.
Calm.
Light.
Amused, almost.
??? - “Sorry I’m late.”
A beat.
Then, quieter—
??? - “Traffic was weird tonight.”
Ava sat up slightly.
She hadn’t heard anyone approach.
Not once.
And from the tone outside the door—
The apartment had just become four.
⊹ ₊⋆ ☁︎ ⋆⁺₊⋆₊⋆☁︎ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☀︎ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☁︎⋆⁺₊⋆⁺₊⋆ ☁︎ ⋆₊ ⊹
