Shadow 2

Chapter 2 – Colour Bleeding Into The Dark

Cass’s breath misted in front of her as she stepped back from the wall, the entire underpass trembling with the roar of the trains above. The concrete pillar rose in front of her like a reluctant giant, its surface rough, scored with decades of grime and tags from kids who’d left their names here long before she had dreams of leaving hers.

The mural was the brightest thing in this forgotten stretch of East Maris—fierce, untamed colour in strokes she couldn’t afford but had stolen from discount bins and abandoned art classrooms. Vivid copper flames curled around a figure whose sharp silhouette suggested defiance more than danger. She wasn’t done yet. The lines were still loose. The story still breathing. But the wall was waking up.

Cass wiped paint from her wrist with the back of her glove, half-smearing ochre across her skin. The wind funnelled through the underpass, scattering leaves and wrappers like restless spirits. The city muttered above her—steel grinding, trams shrieking, the low thunder of trucks rumbling over seams in the asphalt.

She liked it here.
The noise, the concrete, the in-between-ness of it all.
Places no one cared about were the places where art could happen without apology.

She stepped forward again, lifting the spray can.

That’s when she heard Rook before she saw her.

Boots slapping pavement. A breathless, “Cass! Jesus—Cass!” echoing under the bridge.

Cass didn’t turn. “If you smudge this line, I’m making you repaint it with your toothbrush.”

Rook skidded to a stop beside her anyway, bundled in layers of mismatched jackets, hair stuffed beneath a beanie dyed a colour Cass suspected was accidental.

“You hear it?” Rook asked, eyes too wide, too bright.

“Hear what?” Cass kept working, letting the hiss of aerosol drown most of Rook’s panic.

“Trouble. Near the train line.” Rook’s voice cracked with the kind of energy that always preceded either gossip or danger. “People said cops are crawling all over the east viaduct. Blocking off access. Something big.”

Cass finished the curve she was shaping, pulled off her glove with her teeth, and finally looked at her friend. “Cops are always near the train line. Drunks, fights, someone slipping on the stairs. Not breaking news.”

“No.” Rook stepped closer, breath visible in the cold. “This is different. Boyle said they closed the pedestrian ramps. Closed. You ever seen them close anything around here? Nah. Something’s wrong.”

Cass’s stomach tightened—not fear, exactly, but that subtle shift in the air when a storm is sliding in sideways, unseen.

Still, she shrugged. “Whatever it is, it’s not our business.”

“Everything in this neighbourhood is our business,” Rook shot back.

Cass ignored that and turned back to the wall, shaking the can just to shut out the conversation. Rook buzzed with nervous energy beside her, pacing in a tight circle, hands flapping.

“Telling you, Cass—the streets know before people do.” Rook paused, eyes darting east. “And right now? They’re freaking out.”

Cass didn’t answer.
Not because she didn’t care—she cared too much—but because caring came at a cost she wasn’t ready to pay today.

She lifted the can to finish a line of burnt orange—

Blue light flashed against the concrete.

Police.

It washed over her mural, turning warm tones cold, scattering colour into something fractured.

Cass froze.

Rook cursed. “See? Told you.”

Across the underpass, a patrol car rolled slowly past the entrance, its lights flickering across the tunnel mouth like a warning. Officers weren’t usually this far in unless someone had called in a body. Or a fire. Or something worse.

Cass felt that unease again, crawling up the back of her neck, but forced her arm to steady. “They’re not here for us.”

“But what if—”

“Rook,” she said quietly, “go home.”

Rook opened their mouth to argue, then closed it again. “Fine. But you call me if—”

“I will.”

“Seriously, Cass, don’t be a hero or whatever.”

Cass didn’t make promises she couldn’t keep.
She just watched Rook jog back into the street, swallowed by the rolling mist and the hum of traffic.

The police car didn’t stop. It disappeared around the curve of the road.

Cass exhaled slowly, shook her hands out, and tried to return to the mural. She’d only lifted the can halfway before movement caught her eye—quick, sharp, and out of place in the sluggish morning.

A woman walking fast beneath the viaduct.

Camera bag slung over her shoulder.

Not the confident stride of someone chasing light or angles, but the uneven gait of someone trying to outrun the echo of something they’d just seen.

Cass lowered the spray can.

The woman didn’t notice her. Too pale. Too tense. Her shoulders were tight, almost curled inward, her hand gripping her bag strap hard enough that Cass wondered if she even felt the pressure of her own fingers.

Cass stepped back into the shadow of a pylon, just enough to watch without being watched.

Police lights flashed again—farther down the road—and the woman flinched, barely, but unmistakably. Whatever had rattled her wasn’t small.

Cass’s curiosity unfurled, slow and instinctive.
Not recognition.
Not familiarity.
Just the prickling knowledge that something had shifted under the bridge.

People walked through this neighbourhood with their armour on. Only something significant stripped it away.

Cass didn’t call out.
Didn’t ask if she was okay.
Didn’t step forward into a story that wasn’t hers.

She just watched the woman disappear into the waking city, swallowed by mist and traffic and the restless pulse of East Maris.

Behind her, the mural glared back—fierce and bright—but suddenly the colours looked like a warning she didn’t remember choosing.