Next Day.
On the street of the particular apartment complex where Kenji lived, the morning arrived with the crisp, unremarkable quality of a Tuesday.
The air was cool. The light was flat.
A white van, unmarked and unremarkable, idled near the corner of the block. The engine was off, but the three men inside were not. They sat in the dim interior, watching the entrance of the building with the specific, focused intensity of men who had spent the night convincing each other that they were predators rather than prey.
At 7:15 AM, the front door of the complex opened.
Kenji stepped out.
He looked exactly the way he always looked — unassuming, lean, wearing a light jacket over his training clothes, carrying his gym bag with the easy, unbothered posture of a man who had no idea he was a variable in someone else's math.
An older woman — his neighbor, carrying a small bag of groceries — was walking up the path as he came down.
