CHAPTER 285: A FACE AT THE EDGE

I didn’t expect to find anything. Not really.

The kind of person who watched children through windows and smiled without blinking wasn’t careless. He wouldn’t stroll into frame, wave to the camera, and pose for identification. Still, if there was even a sliver of a chance—something subtle, something missed—I had to check.

It was a weekday. The school would still be open. And if this figure had been watching Lea from a distance... maybe, just maybe, they’d made a mistake.

I took the subway to the district edge, switching lines once. My coat collar was pulled high, the Mr. Dust outfit toned down to avoid panic or spectacle. I still felt the weight of eyes on me, though whether it was suspicion or reverence, I couldn’t tell. The whispers followed.

They always do now.

When I arrived at the school, it looked exactly as I remembered schools being. Fenced-in. Plain brick. A cheerful mural near the entrance that was probably meant to inspire hope but only reminded me of peeling paint and forced smiles. Children’s laughter echoed faintly through the windows—an echo of something normal.

I pressed the buzzer beside the gate.

"This is Reynard Vale," I said, voice flat. "I need to speak with your principal. It’s a police matter."

There was a pause. Then a buzz. The lock clicked open.

The front hallway was clean and overly bright. Whiteboards with announcements. Posters about kindness and fire drills. The faint scent of disinfectant and crayons lingered in the air.

When I pushed open the main office door, two sets of eyes widened.

The secretary—a woman in her late forties with a mug half-raised to her lips—froze. The principal, standing behind her, dropped the pen he was holding.

"You’re... Mr. Vale," the secretary said.

"Yes," I replied.

The principal stepped forward, smoothing his tie instinctively. "Forgive us, sir, we weren’t expecting—"

"I understand," I said. "I wouldn’t be here unless it was important."

They nodded quickly. The principal gestured toward a side hallway. "Let’s talk somewhere more private."

We entered a small meeting room, and I laid the situation out as clearly and quickly as I could—no theatrics, no speculation, just facts.

A young girl named Lea, part of a current protection case, had recently told me that she’d seen a suspicious individual watching her outside the school. This person might have been surveilling her home for months, possibly entering it, and could be connected to other disappearances in low-income neighborhoods.

"I’m hoping your security cameras might’ve picked something up. Even a glimpse."

The principal’s brow furrowed. "Of course. I’ll take you to our security room."

I followed him deeper into the building, past rows of classrooms and bulletin boards covered in glitter glue. The students inside didn’t see me—didn’t need to. I wasn’t here for them.

We reached a locked door beside the janitor’s supply room. The principal knocked once, then entered a code. The security room was dimly lit, with four monitors mounted to a central rig and a man seated at the desk, sorting through playback files.

"Ray," the principal said, "this is Mr. Vale. He’s investigating something regarding a student."

Ray turned, blinked, and stood up so fast he knocked over his chair.

"I—I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize—" He caught himself, breath flustered. "I mean, what do you need, sir?"

I nodded. "It’s alright. I just need to go through some footage."

The principal explained further, and Ray led me through the system. They had seven outdoor cameras. One facing the front gate. One near the staff lot. Several angled at the sidewalks and playground.

I asked to review footage from the end of the school day—pickups—starting two weeks back.

Ray queued it up.

And so it began.

The footage ran at 3x speed. We watched rows of parents show up, cluster at the gate, and scatter again with their children. I spotted Jacob on most days—always early, always alone. Lea ran to him with that hesitant half-step children take when they’re still watching the world out of the corners of their eyes.

But nothing else.

Nothing obvious.

No pale faces. No long-haired figures. No one lingering in the background.

I moved through seven days in less than an hour. I kept my eyes on the frame edges. The corners. The spaces no one designs cameras to capture.

Ray glanced at me during a pause. "If someone was there, I should’ve seen it. I really should’ve—"

"You couldn’t have known," I said, voice low. "He was inside the family’s attic. For weeks. Maybe months. Didn’t leave fingerprints. Didn’t get caught on building cameras. You’re not at fault."

Ray nodded, but the guilt didn’t leave his face.

I returned to the screen. "Let’s try eight days ago."

He cued it up.

The screen lit again. Afternoon sun. Shadows stretched long across the sidewalk. Kids flooding out in messy waves. Jacob stood near the fence, his posture like a border guard. Lea ran to him, clutching her bag.

My eyes drifted to the far left of the frame—an alley beside the schoolyard fence. A sliver of it was visible. I had checked it before.

But this time, something shifted.

A movement. Barely a blur.

I paused the footage and reversed.

Frame-by-frame, the blur returned. Someone—big—stepped into the visible edge of the alley for just a second. Not fully in frame. Just... present. A flash of skin. Relatively clean hair that hung over one side of their face. They were angled toward the fence, watching the children.

Watching Lea.

Then, in the next frame, they turned and vanished.

I leaned closer.

No uniform. No student bag. No reason to be there.

And the smile—barely visible, warped by pixelation—was too wide.

"That’s not someone who matches the description, but it seems too convenient that another suspicious individual would also be present." I whispered.

Ray said nothing. Neither did the principal.

I stood slowly.

"Can I get a copy of this clip?"

"Yes," Ray said immediately, reaching for the drive.

As he transferred it, I looked back at the screen. The freeze-frame caught the figure mid-turn. It was a girl that’s for sure. You could only see part of her face. But something about it—

She wasn’t just smiling at the children.

She looked like she was enjoying seeing them all.

That chilled me more than anything else.

The transfer completed. Ray handed me the drive like it weighed more than it should.

"I need to cross-reference this," I said. "With missing persons. With reports from nearby neighborhoods."

The principal nodded. "If there’s anything else we can do—"

"There is," I said. "Don’t talk about this to the students. Not yet. And make sure Lea’s name doesn’t spread around. She’s under protective watch. If this man hears we’re on to him, he may try to move faster."

"We’ll keep it quiet," he promised.

As I stepped out of the security room and back into the fluorescent hum of the hallway, I took one last look over my shoulder.

The screen behind me still showed the paused image.

A big girl, caught in a corner.

Smiling just like how our suspect was described.