3:17 AM.
Unit 1418, Shore Residence 3.
The bedroom was dark except for the pale rectangle of his phone screen casting his face in cold blue-white, the AC humming at full blast while 33°C pressed against the walls like a fever that would not break, Manila in April breathing heat through concrete even at three in the morning.
Jae-min lay on his back with the phone held above his face, his mother's contact glowing on the screen.
Mom ❤️.
Her profile picture was a selfie from last Christmas, her and Dad in front of the fountain at Portofino Alabang, both of them smiling and alive with the white pillars of the mansion visible behind them.
His thumb hovered over the call button, one inch between him and the sound of her voice.
'What would I even say? Mom, cancel your flight, the plane is going to crash into a mountain.' Jae-min agonized, a deep, bitter helplessness crushing his chest as he stared at her smiling face. 'Because I watched you die in another life.'
He put the phone down and the screen went black and the room plunged into darkness, the void inside his chest pulsing once, hungry and impatient.
'I can't call her yet. Not without proof. Not without something she can hold in her hands and believe.' Jae-min resolved, a cold strategic determination hardening beneath the helplessness as he stared at the ceiling.
He picked the phone up again and opened his notes and typed.
[Jae-min]: CALL MOM. NEED PROOF FIRST.
He set the phone on the nightstand and lay still for exactly twelve seconds, then got up.
The shower ran scalding and the suit went on like armor, black and crisp with each button a small act of war, the Rolex clicking onto his wrist and the leather shoes shining under the bathroom light.
By 5:30 AM he was in the GT-R pulling out of Shore Residence 3 into the pre-dawn dark, the twin-turbo V6 growling through empty EDSA while Manila still slept and the streetlights cast long orange streaks across the pearl white hood.
'No proof, no evidence, just a shaking voice and a story that sounds like psychosis.' Jae-min calculated, a cold lethal determination calcifying his core as the GT-R's headlights cut through the early morning haze. 'But money, money they understand.'
Makati rose in the distance, glass towers catching the first orange bleed of dawn.
— • • • —
8:00 AM.
BPI, Makati flagship branch. 36°C.
The morning sun hit the glass facade like a spotlight and flooded the marble-floored lobby with harsh white light that made every polished surface gleam, the air conditioning humming at a low steady drone while it fought a losing battle against the Manila heat bleeding through the automatic glass doors.
The lobby smelled of floor wax and fresh currency and the faint chemical bite of hand sanitizer from the security checkpoint, a queue of customers shuffling toward the teller windows.
Jae-min sat across from a loan officer named Gerald, middle-aged with a receding hairline and a half-empty cup of instant coffee on his desk with a ring of brown residue staining the ceramic.
"I need a personal loan." Jae-min declared, his voice carrying the absolute command of a man who was not asking.
Gerald adjusted his glasses and the professional smile clicked into place with fifteen years of muscle memory operating behind glazed eyes.
"Of course, Mr. Del Rosario." Gerald offered, a rehearsed enthusiasm warming his voice as his pen poised over a fresh application form. "How much were you thinking?"
"Five million." Jae-min stated, the number dropping like a guillotine blade.
Gerald's pen stopped mid-stroke and the professional smile fractured down the center like cheap plaster.
"I'm sorry?" Gerald choked, the word barely escaping his throat.
"Five million pesos, unsecured." Jae-min repeated, his voice carrying the same dead flat cadence of a man reading a grocery list instead of requesting the equivalent of a small house.
The air in the small glass-walled office seemed to thicken while Gerald's half-empty coffee sat untouched and going cold, the fluorescent light overhead buzzing with a faint electric tick that suddenly sounded very loud.
"Sir, that's, for an unsecured personal loan, that amount would require extensive background—" Gerald stammered, his smile fully disassembled now and scattered somewhere beneath the desk along with his composure.
Jae-min slid a thick manila folder across the table, his payslips from the last three years and his tax returns and bank statements showing a clean flawless credit history and the Del Rosario family assets listed in Portofino Alabang, land and property and investments.
Gerald opened the folder and flipped through the pages with his eyebrows rising like two caterpillars trying to escape his forehead.
"You're a warehouse manager at—" Gerald started, the words catching in his throat.
"The largest logistics hub in Southeast Asia, Pasay." Jae-min cut in, his dark eyes flat and unblinking and assessing.
"Yes, I see that, but five million is—" Gerald tried, his voice climbing.
"I also want to open three credit cards, maximum limit on all of them." Jae-min demanded, his tone leaving no room for negotiation.
Gerald stared at him over the rims of his glasses with the smile gone and fear taking its place.
"Mr. Del Rosario, are you in some kind of trouble?" Gerald asked, leaning forward with genuine alarm.
"No." Jae-min answered, a steel door slamming shut.
"Then why do you need this much capital so suddenly?" Gerald pressed, his voice cracking at the edges.
Jae-min leaned forward and the leather chair creaked beneath him as he met Gerald's eyes with a stare so hollow and impossibly dark that Gerald felt his soul leave his body for a brief but memorable moment.
"Business investment." Jae-min growled, each word landing with the weight of a judge's gavel. "I'm not here to negotiate, Gerald, I'm here to get approved. Can you do that, or do I need to speak to your branch manager?"
Gerald swallowed hard and his finger hovered trembling over a button on his desk phone before pressing it.
[Gerald]: "Ma'am?" Gerald mumbled, the fight draining from his body as he slumped in his chair. "Can I get a signature override for a five-million personal loan? Yes, right now."
— • • • —
Across the street from BPI Makati a black Grab sedan idled at the curb, 36°C with the engine ticking in the morning heat and the air conditioner struggling against the humidity pressing against the windows like a warm damp towel.
Kiara Valdez sat in the back seat with her designer sunglasses pushed up into her hair, scrolling through Jae-min's Instagram with aggressive speed, her burgundy nails tapping against the phone screen with the impatient rhythm of a woman who was not accustomed to waiting.
Her designer dress, a deep burgundy slip, hugged every curve and caught the sunlight filtering through the tinted window.
Jennifer Avante sat beside her and clutched her handbag like a life raft while she stared out the window at the BPI entrance, her icy-blue hair falling straight past her shoulders and catching the light with a faint almost metallic sheen, a simple cream blouse and a navy skirt completing the look of a woman who would rather be anywhere else.
'Kiara banged on my unit's door at 7 AM like the building was on fire.' Jennifer endured, an exhausted resignation weighing down her shoulders as she pressed her back against the seat. 'I should still be in bed.'
"He's been in there for forty minutes." Kiara snarled, jabbing her finger at the glass doors with a possessive fury sharpening each syllable. "Forty minutes for a bank visit. What is he doing in there, buying the bank?"
"M-Maybe he's just, banking?" Jennifer offered, her eyes dropping submissively as her voice thinned.
"Jae-min doesn't 'just bank,' Jen." Kiara hissed, her green eyes narrowing to dangerous slits with a predatory suspicion tightening her jaw. "Jae-min buys tapsilog at the carinderia and complains about the government. He doesn't spend forty minutes inside a BPI branch unless something is very, very wrong."
'I wish I could go inside and find him.' Jennifer yearned, a desperate longing aching in her chest as she watched the glass doors. 'I would kneel at his feet if he asked.'
"Okay, he's coming out." Kiara shrieked, grabbing Jennifer's arm with a grip that would leave bruises. "Go, go, go, tell the driver to follow him!"
"Kiara, this is literally stalking." Jennifer protested, her voice thin and reluctant.
"It's not stalking if he's your ex and you're concerned." Kiara spat with defensive venom.
"That's literally the definition of stalking." Jennifer countered, shrinking back with nervous defiance.
"TELL THE DRIVER TO FOLLOW HIM." Kiara roared, any pretense of composure shattered.
The Grab driver, a long-suffering man named Roger, slowly turned around.
"Ma'am, I have a dashboard camera and I will not hesitate to use it." Roger warned, a deadpan authority born from years of Metro Manila traffic settling over his face.
"Just follow the white car." Kiara barked, her patience a smoking crater.
"What white car?" Roger asked, genuine confusion creasing his brow.
"That one." Kiara said, pointing toward the street with a stabbing urgency.
A pearl white Nissan GT-R Nismo growled out of the underground parking across the street, the twin-turbo V6 barking twice as Jae-min reversed out of the spot with the exhaust note echoing off the marble buildings like a controlled explosion.
Every head on the sidewalk turned and a security guard nearly dropped his coffee and a stray cat flattened itself against a planter box.
Roger stared at the car with his jaw slackening.
"Ma'am, that's a Nissan GT-R Nismo." Roger breathed, a reverent awe transforming his face.
"I know what it is." Kiara snapped, her jaw tight with dismissive fury.
"That car costs twelve million pesos." Roger said, an awe-struck disbelief tightening his grip on the steering wheel.
"I KNOW what it is, FOLLOW IT." Kiara screamed, her composure obliterated by frustration.
Roger followed it.
— • • • —
9:30 AM.
BDO, Ayala Avenue. 35°C.
The branch was busier than BPI with a long queue of customers snaking toward the teller windows, the hum of voices and clicking keyboards filling the air-conditioned space with a low anxious drone while fluorescent lights buzzed overhead and someone's phone rang with a pop song no one wanted to hear.
Jae-min walked past the queue and past the greeter and straight to the loan desk.
"Two million, unsecured." Jae-min demanded, before he'd even sat down, his voice carrying a cold command that filled the small space.
The loan officer, a young woman named Clarisse with a neat ponytail, blinked at him.
"Sir, our maximum unsecured loan for a single applicant is—" Clarisse started, her professional training colliding with reality.
"I have a co-borrower, my uncle." Jae-min fired back, his mind running the numbers instantly. "Retired Colonel Ricardo Abadia Del Rosario, thirty years of military service, Camp Aquino, Villamor Air Base."
'Ricardo Abadia Del Rosario, PMA Class of 1989.' Jae-min calculated, a strategic precision running the variables behind his eyes. 'The same class that produced two generals and a senator. He chose the infantry track. His instructors called it wasted potential. He called it honest work.'
"A retired colonel?" Clarisse asked, her optimism taking its first real hit as her bewilderment grew. "Does he know—"
"He already signed the documents." Jae-min cut in, a final authority closing the conversation.
He slid the papers across the desk with Rico's signature, perfect and authentic, every loop and stroke and angle flawless, forged ten minutes ago in the GT-R using a practice signature pad from his glovebox while stuck in EDSA traffic.
The forgery was so clean it could have been notarized by God Himself.
'Forgive me, Uncle.' Jae-min winced, a bitter guilt flashing behind his eyes as he watched Clarisse examine the signature. 'I'll tell you the truth tomorrow. You'll understand. You always understand.'
— • • • —
Outside BDO the Grab sedan idled at the curb, 36°C with the engine ticking and the heat pressing against the windows.
Kiara had been inside the lobby for exactly ninety seconds before the security guard, a stocky man with a shaved head and absolutely zero patience, politely and then less politely asked her to leave, something about loitering and this is a bank not a café ma'am and I will call the police.
She was now standing on the sidewalk in her five-inch heels typing on her phone with vicious intensity, her face flushed, while Jennifer watched from the back seat of the Grab with a bottled water.
"Get out, Jen, we're moving." Kiara said, yanking the car door open with a sharp command.
Jennifer took a long slow sip of water, then another, the cold condensation dripping onto her fingers.
"Kiara, I d-don't think—" Jennifer started, her blue eyes darting with nervous hesitation.
"NOW, Jennifer." Kiara seethed, a commanding fury cracking through her teeth.
Jennifer got out and the Manila heat hit her like a physical wall, 36°C with humidity at ninety percent, the air thick and wet and heavy in her lungs, her cream blouse starting to cling to her back like a second skin within seconds.
They walked with Kiara in front and her heels clicking against the sun-baked pavement and her burgundy dress swishing with each aggressive stride, Jennifer behind her already sweating through her deodorant with her handbag pressing uncomfortably against her hip.
Then it happened.
Kiara stepped on something soft and squishy that yielded beneath her five-inch Louboutin heel with a wet sickening schluck that traveled up through the sole and into her soul like a tiny electric shock of pure disgust.
She looked down.
Dog shit, fresh and still steaming in the Manila heat, a perfect cylindrical specimen mashed artfully across the bottom of her pump like a brown flag of surrender.
"No." Kiara gasped, a visceral horror seizing her throat.
"Yes." Jennifer confirmed, looking down at Kiara's shoe with an expression of profound luminous neutrality.
"No no no no NO." Kiara shrieked, her face contorting with revulsion as she lifted her foot and a long brown smear connected the sidewalk to her shoe like a terrible bridge.
"Is that, is that DOG SHIT?" Kiara screamed, pure disgust ripping the words from her mouth.
"It appears to be, y-yes." Jennifer confirmed, the calm cadence of a scientist observing a lab experiment.
"ON MY LOUBOUTINS." Kiara howled, devastation cracking her voice.
"Those are v-very nice shoes." Jennifer said, taking another sip of water with a polite composure.
"JENNIFER, THIS IS NOT FUNNY." Kiara roared, fury shaking her entire frame.
"I d-didn't say it was funny." Jennifer replied, the faintest ghost of a smile tugging at the corner of her lips. "I said they were nice shoes. There's a difference."
Kiara stomped her foot against the curb trying to scrape the offense off, but it didn't work, it smeared and spread and somehow got worse, the warm soft texture pushing deeper into the ridges of the Louboutin sole with each desperate scrape.
She grabbed a napkin from her purse and crouched down gingerly in her tight burgundy dress with her knees pressing against the hot concrete to wipe the shoe, but the napkin disintegrated on contact and the smell hit her like a freight train made of regret and intestinal bacteria.
"Oh my God, oh my GOD." Kiara gagged, lurching backward with the napkin trailing brown wreckage from her fingers.
"Would you l-like my water?" Jennifer offered, an angelic sincerity softening her voice, the innocence of a woman who was absolutely and categorically enjoying every single second of this.
"I want you to shut up." Kiara hissed through clenched teeth, venom dripping from every syllable.
Jennifer sipped her water and the ice cubes clinked softly against the glass.
— • • • —
11:00 AM.
Security Bank, Bonifacio Global City. 35°C.
The branch was sleek and modern with glass and steel and muted lighting designed to make wealthy clients feel important, and through the floor-to-ceiling windows the BGC skyline gleamed under the midday sun, towers of glass and chrome standing like sentinels over immaculate streets.
'In twenty-six days, ten meters of snow will reduce those towers to dark stumps poking from an ocean of ice.' Jae-min reflected, a clinical certainty settling behind his eyes as he stared through the glass.
A water feature gurgled softly near the entrance and the air smelled of leather furniture and expensive perfume.
Jae-min walked up to the counter and dropped his documents without sitting down.
"Three new credit cards, maximum limit." Jae-min ordered, a clipped command leaving no room for hesitation.
The banker, a sharply dressed man with a crooked tie and the expression of someone who had been having a good day until approximately three seconds ago, adjusted his tie.
"Sir, you already have two active cards with us—" the banker frowned, confusion battling protocol.
"Cancel them, open three new ones." Jae-min commanded with an absolute authority that left no room for hesitation.
"May I ask why?" the banker pressed, a nervous persistence carrying the question as a bead of sweat formed at his temple.
"No." Jae-min refused, a cold detachment making the word absolute.
"Sir, policy requires—" the banker started, protocol warring with the growing dread in his gut.
Jae-min placed his phone on the counter and opened his BPI app and showed the approved five-million loan, then the BDO app showing two million approved.
The banker's eyes went wide and then wider and then wide enough to qualify as a medical condition, the color draining from his face like someone had pulled the plug.
"I'm a premium client, process the cards." Jae-min demanded, his voice leaving no room for argument.
The banker looked at the glowing screens then at Jae-min's dead unblinking eyes then back at the screens, then at his tie which he adjusted one final time with the trembling fingers of a man who had just realized his entire career had been a warm-up act for this exact moment.
"Yes sir, right away sir." the banker stammered, nearly tripping over his own feet rushing to the printer.
— • • • —
Back on the streets of BGC, 36°C, the Grab sedan crawling through midday traffic.
Kiara had wrapped her ruined Louboutin in a plastic bag she'd begged from a 7-Eleven cashier, a transaction that had involved her hissing through her teeth while the cashier stared at her shoe with open-mouthed horror.
She was now walking with a pronounced limp, one heel dragging behind her like a wounded soldier, her face contorted into a mask that could have melted steel, her hair starting to frizz in the humidity with tendrils escaping from behind her ears and clinging to the back of her neck.
The plastic bag around her shoe crinkled loudly with every step, announcing her presence like a tiny pathetic trumpet.
Jennifer walked beside her, hydrated and watching.
"Jae-min just came out of Security Bank." Kiara muttered through clenched teeth, squinting across the plaza at the white GT-R pulling out of the parking structure with a feverish suspicion tightening her focus. "He was in there for twenty minutes. Who spends twenty minutes at Security Bank?"
"Someone opening three c-credit cards?" Jennifer guessed, testing the water with tentative hope.
Kiara stopped dead and her green eyes narrowed to razor-thin slits.
"He's preparing." Kiara declared, a predatory calculation firing behind her eyes. "He's getting cash, a lot of cash. But why?"
"M-Maybe he's starting a business." Jennifer offered, her voice small and careful.
"Jae-min doesn't start businesses." Kiara snarled with bitter dismissiveness. "Jae-min complains about traffic and eats tapsilog."
'He looked at that wagyu last night like a man trying to memorize the taste of something he knew he'd never have again.' Jennifer recalled, an intense submissive heat pooling in her stomach as she watched the GT-R's taillights. 'I would let him do anything he wanted to me if he just looked at me that way.'
"People don't change, Jen." Kiara snapped with a dismissive finality.
They followed Jae-min on foot toward the parking structure under a midday sun that was brutal and white-hot, a hammer pounding down on the concrete and turning the plaza into an oven.
Kiara was limping with her burgundy dress wrinkled and clinging to her in all the wrong places, the plastic bag on her shoe making a sound like a dying accordion.
She looked down at her ruined shoe, then at Jae-min's retreating figure across the plaza with the GT-R's white body catching the sunlight, then at the curb where a massive rainwater puddle stretched from one end of the sidewalk to the other, blocking her path like a moat.
"Of course." Kiara groaned with a bitter resignation.
She looked left where a concrete planter boxed her in, then right where a tall hedge blocked the way, then forward at a twelve-foot-wide puddle of murky Manila street water that was dark and oily and probably home to at least three undiscovered diseases and an entire civilization of mosquito larvae.
She stepped carefully with one foot forward testing the water, which was deeper than it looked and swallowed the toe of her good shoe immediately, sending a cold shock up through her ankle.
She committed and limped forward with arms out for balance, her plastic-wrapped shoe dragging behind her like a sad little anchor.
A motorcycle courier came flying down the street and hit the puddle at full speed without slowing down or swerving, and the wave was enormous, a wall of brown murky Manila street water erupting from the puddle like a miniature tsunami.
A curving majestic arc of filth caught the sunlight for one terrible second before it came crashing down directly on Kiara Valdez, from head to toe, her hair and her face and her designer burgundy dress and the plastic bag around her shoe, everything.
The water was warm, the kind of warm that made it worse, because it meant it had been sitting on the asphalt baking in the sun and absorbing every disgusting molecule the Manila streets had to offer.
The motorcycle courier didn't even look back and was already three blocks away weaving through traffic with the cold indifferent efficiency of a man who had places to be.
Kiara stood frozen with water dripping from her eyelashes and from the tips of her orange hair now plastered to her skull in wet dark ribbons, and from the hem of her dress which clung to her legs like a wet tissue while a tiny stream of murky water ran down her nose and dripped off her chin.
Jennifer stood three feet behind her, completely dry, the puddle having missed her by exactly the width of one person.
'The universe has a sense of humor, and it is targeting Kiara Valdez with surgical precision.' Jennifer contained, a suppressed exhilaration aching in her ribs from the effort of holding it in.
"That…" Kiara breathed, her voice thin and cracked like old paper with a shattered disbelief. "That just happened."
"It d-did." Jennifer confirmed, her expression one of deep thoughtful contemplation.
"A motorcycle just, splashed me." Kiara said, processing the horror in real time.
"With a v-very impressive wave, yes." Jennifer confirmed, the suppressed vibration of a woman holding back a laugh with every ounce of willpower she possessed.
"JENNIFER." Kiara roared.
"I'm s-sorry, that must have been terrible for you." Jennifer offered, a theatrical sincerity dripping with fake concern.
Kiara looked down at herself, soaked and ruined and smelling like a combination of Manila street water and dog shit and shattered dignity, one Louboutin submerged in puddle water up to the ankle and the other wrapped in plastic and still smelling like feces, having gone from magazine cover to garbage disposal in the span of forty-five minutes.
Then the sky, which had been partly cloudy all morning with soft white cumulus drifting lazily over the Makati skyline, opened up without warning.
It started as a drizzle of fine misting specks landing on her bare shoulders, then a shower, then a full-on downpour of the kind Manila was famous for, sudden and violent and absolutely merciless, the rain hammering the pavement so hard it bounced back up in tiny splashes and turned the plaza into a shallow reflective lake within seconds.
Jennifer pulled a small folding umbrella from her handbag, compact and navy blue, and popped it open with a smooth practiced click and stood under it bone dry.
Kiara stood in the downpour soaked to the bone with her ruined dress plastered to her body and the fabric now so transparent it left absolutely nothing to the imagination, her mascara, waterproof because Kiara Valdez did not compromise, finally losing its battle and running down her cheeks in two dark streaks that made her look like a raccoon who had lost a fight.
Her hair was flattened against her skull like a wet cat put through a washing machine, and she looked up at the sky with her mouth open and eyes wide and rain streaming down her face.
"WHY." Kiara shrieked at the clouds with an absolute despair.
The clouds did not answer and just dumped more rain on her.
She tilted her face upward and closed her eyes against the downpour and let the rain wash away the street water and the smell and the humiliation, and then something warm and wet and distinctly not rain landed directly on her open mouth.
Kiara froze with every muscle in her body locked, time stopped, the rain continued, the city continued, but Kiara Valdez stood perfectly and absolutely still.
She opened her eyes and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and looked at her fingers, white and paste-y and slightly warm, then looked up.
A pigeon sat on the ledge of the building above her and stared down at her with the cold dead black-dot eyes of an assassin who had just completed a flawless contract kill, its head tilting as it cooed once, then spread its wings and flew away unbothered, a tiny gray smudge disappearing into the gray sky.
Jennifer stood silently from under her perfectly dry umbrella.
"Did a bird just—" Kiara croaked, her entire body shaking with a trembling rage.
"Yes." Jennifer confirmed, the careful neutrality of a diplomat.
"In my MOUTH?" Kiara screamed, horror shattering the rain.
"Yes." Jennifer repeated, something fragile underneath the composure.
"A PIGEON pooped in my MOUTH?" Kiara asked with a sweet venom coating each word.
"The evidence strongly supports that conclusion." Jennifer confirmed, her lips pressed together so tightly they had turned white because if she laughed, if she let even one single sound escape, she would lose her best friend forever, and she was not emotionally prepared for that, even though it was without question the single funniest thing she had ever witnessed in her entire thirty-three years of existence.
Kiara stood there for a full ten seconds with rain pouring down on her and dog shit on one shoe and puddle water soaking her dress and bird poop in her mouth and mascara running like war paint down her cheeks.
She looked at Jennifer and Jennifer looked back.
"Don't you dare." Kiara warned, her finger trembling as she pointed at Jennifer with a venomous threat.
"I d-didn't say anything." Jennifer replied, her blue eyes dropping to the wet pavement with a submissive restraint.
"You're THINKING it, I can see it on your face." Kiara seethed with a venomous accusation.
"I'm thinking that you should p-probably rinse your mouth." Jennifer offered, a helpful composure masking the barely restrained glee. "M-Maybe with the rain water, since you're already standing in it?"
"JENNIFER." Kiara roared.
Kiara opened her mouth and closed it and opened it again, then let out a sound that wasn't quite a scream and wasn't quite a sob but something in between, a raw primal noise that came from the deepest most broken part of her soul, the sound of a woman who had been systematically destroyed by the universe in the span of forty-five minutes and had absolutely nothing left to give.
She spat and wiped her mouth again and looked down at her ruined shoes and her ruined dress and her ruined hair and her ruined everything, then looked across the plaza where Jae-min's GT-R was just pulling out of the parking structure and disappearing into traffic, utterly and completely unaware that he had been followed all day by the two most wretched women in Metro Manila.
"I'm done." Kiara said, her voice cracking and turning to dust with a shattered surrender.
"Are you s-sure?" Jennifer asked with a gentle concern.
"I am DONE." Kiara sobbed, her voice breaking completely with a raw despair. "I have dog shit on my Louboutins, a motorcycle splashed me with street water, it rained on me, a PIGEON pooped in my MOUTH, in the Philippines, in MANILA, where everything is already trying to kill you, and for WHAT?"
"To find out what Jae-min is doing?" Jennifer asked with a cautious prompt, her voice thin.
"I DON'T CARE ANYMORE." Kiara sobbed, tears mixing with rain, mascara, and bird poop.
"That's, p-probably for the best." Jennifer agreed with a careful agreement.
Kiara turned and limped away with her plastic bag dragging behind her and leaving a faint brown trail on the wet sidewalk, not looking back, her shoulders shaking with each step.
Jennifer watched her go, then looked at the GT-R's taillights disappearing in the distance, two red dots fading into the gray curtain of rain.
'Watching his car disappear into the city while Kiara got demolished by the universe was the most alive I've felt in three years.' Jennifer confessed, a private, honest yearning pressing against her ribs as she lowered her umbrella.
The rain had stopped just like that, the clouds parting as a shaft of golden sunlight broke through and hit the wet pavement and turned the plaza into a shimmering mirror.
Jennifer walked to the curb and flagged down a new Grab and got in with the leather seat cool against her legs.
"Where to, ma'am?" the driver asked with professional authority.
"Shangri-La at the Fort, p-please." Jennifer said with a subdued restraint, her voice thin.
She settled into the back seat and pulled out her phone and opened her notes app.
[Jennifer]: He's doing something big. I don't know what yet. But I'm going to find out.
She paused, deleted it, typed something else.
[Jennifer]: I hope he's okay. I would give anything to be by his side.
She stared at that for a long time with the words glowing on the screen.
'I want to bear his children.' Jennifer ached, a desperate devotion clenching her heart as she pressed the phone against her chest. 'I want him to claim me.'
— • • • —
12:30 PM.
Metrobank, Paseo de Roxas. 36°C.
The branch was older than the others, with wood-paneled walls and brass fixtures and the smell of old paper and leather polish clinging to the air like a grandfather's cologne, the queue short and the tellers moving with the mechanical efficiency of people who had done this ten thousand times.
Jae-min walked to the counter and dropped his folder without smiling.
"Four million." Jae-min said, his voice steady with a calm certainty.
The teller opened her mouth.
"Unsecured, I know." Jae-min cut in, sliding the heavy manila folder across the marble counter with a preemptive authority. "Here are my documents."
The teller flipped through the pages with increasing speed, and her eyes widened at each new document, approved.
'Walk in, drop documents, watch the banking professional's soul leave their body, walk out with millions.' Jae-min reflected, a dark cynical satisfaction curling his mouth. 'Repeat.'
The GT-R's fuel gauge was mocking him from the dashboard; he'd filled up that morning with ₱4,800 of premium gasoline, and he was already down to a quarter tank, this car consuming fuel the way a forest fire consumed oxygen, aggressively and relentlessly and with a total disregard for the consequences.
'Sixteen million in loans and I'm still going to go bankrupt from gasoline alone.' Jae-min irritated, a dark humorless irritation biting at his focus as he pulled out of the Metrobank parking lot with the V6 snarling as he merged into Paseo de Roxas traffic.
A short, humorless laugh escaped him.
— • • • —
2:00 PM.
Union Bank, Makati Avenue. 35°C.
The officer at Union Bank was the first one all day who seemed to have an actual spine, young and maybe late twenties with a sharp jaw and a hard stare, and he stared at his monitor frowning before looking at Jae-min with an expression that suggested he had just uncovered something deeply unsettling.
"Sir, our system is flagging multiple inquiries across different banks in the last six hours." the officer warned, his fingers hovering over the keyboard with a professional alarm.
"System error, fix it." Jae-min ordered, his eyes narrowing with a cold authority.
"Sir, I can't just—" the officer stammered, his confidence cracking at the edges with defiant resistance.
"Then get me someone who can." Jae-min growled, his voice dripping with a commanding dominance.
The officer stared at him, and Jae-min stared back, two predators locked in a silent standoff across a laminate desk, and the officer blinked first with a single, almost imperceptible flutter of his eyelids that conceded the entire battle.
He stood up and disappeared into a back office and returned three minutes later with the branch manager, a tall woman named Grace who had the kind of smile that meant business and the kind of posture that said she did not get paid enough for this.
Grace looked at Jae-min, Jae-min looked at Grace, Grace looked at the loan documents, Jae-min looked at Grace, and Grace looked at the ceiling.
"Mr. Del Rosario, I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience." Grace announced, a tight professional authority hiding what appeared to be a minor existential crisis behind her smile. "We'll process everything immediately."
Approved.
— • • • —
3:30 PM.
PNB, Escolta. 34°C.
The branch was the oldest of them all, a heritage building with high ceilings and ornate columns and the faded grandeur of a bank that had seen empires rise and fall, the air inside cool and still and carrying the scent of old wood and brass polish and the faint dusty aroma of documents that had been filed and forgotten decades ago.
Jae-min sat across from Ernesto, an old man who looked like he should have been retired ten years ago, with his reading glasses sitting on the tip of his nose and his hands trembling slightly as he flipped through Jae-min's documents.
"Three million." Jae-min said, his voice steady with something resolute behind his eyes.
"Sir, this is highly irregular." Ernesto stammered, peering over his glasses with a worried alarm.
"Is it illegal?" Jae-min pressed, his tone cutting with a razor-sharp challenge.
"No, but—" Ernesto tried, his voice small with an uncertain protest.
"Then process it." Jae-min commanded with an absolute authority that left no room for argument.
Ernesto processed it and also gave Jae-min a complimentary pen and a calendar with photos of Philippine landmarks, and Jae-min took both.
'Small absurd trophies from each bank I've conquered.' Jae-min mused, a dark ironic satisfaction settling over him as he tucked the calendar under his arm. 'They feel right.'
— • • • —
5:00 PM.
EastWest Bank, Ortigas. 33°C.
The loan officer was a young guy, maybe twenty-five, fresh out of some banking training program with an enthusiasm that died approximately four seconds into the conversation.
"Two credit cards, max limit." Jae-min said, a controlled command delivered the way a man holds a wound closed.
"Sir, you've opened nine credit cards across seven banks in one day." the officer warned with a desperate urgency, the voice of a man trying to save someone from a terrible mistake. "This will destroy your credit score."
Jae-min smiled, and it didn't reach his eyes; nothing reached his eyes anymore.
"In thirty days, credit scores won't exist." Jae-min murmured, something far away in his voice like wind howling through an empty building, a haunted certainty carrying the words.
The officer stared at Jae-min with a chill crawling up his spine.
"What?" the officer asked, a cold fear creeping up his spine.
"Process the cards." Jae-min ordered, his voice leaving no room for argument.
The officer processed the cards with his hands shaking by the time he slid them across the counter.
'Either the most brilliant financial maneuver in Philippine history or the opening act of something far, far worse.' the officer dreaded, a creeping existential dread settling into his gut as he watched Jae-min walk away. 'I need to update my resume.'
— • • • —
7:00 PM.
GT-R. Parking lot of a 7-Eleven, Pasay. 31°C.
The engine was off, and the cabin was stuffy and close, smelling of leather and premium Japanese car freshener and the faint stale aroma of a breakfast long past, the fluorescent lights of the 7-Eleven buzzing through the windshield and casting Jae-min's face in a sickly blue-white glow.
His phone burned in his hand as he opened his notes and scrolled through the list with the numbers glowing on the screen like a countdown.
[Jae-min]: BPI: ₱5,000,000
[Jae-min]: BDO: ₱2,000,000
[Jae-min]: Security Bank: 3 credit cards (₱300,000 limit each)
[Jae-min]: Metrobank: ₱4,000,000
[Jae-min]: Union Bank: ₱1,000,000 + 2 credit cards (₱250,000 each)
[Jae-min]: PNB: ₱3,000,000
[Jae-min]: EastWest: 2 credit cards (₱200,000 each)
[Jae-min]: Total cash loans: ₱15,000,000
[Jae-min]: Total credit limit: ₱1,800,000
[Jae-min]: Grand total: ₱16,800,000
Sixteen point eight million pesos in one day.
"In the old world, this would have taken three lifetimes." Jae-min murmured, a raw hollow conviction echoing in the silence of the car. "In this world, it took seven banks and a forged signature."
He glanced at the fuel gauge, which was nearly empty again, his second fill-up of the day with another ₱4,800 gone, burned into the Manila sky by a twin-turbo V6 that treated premium gasoline like a suggestion and a challenge simultaneously.
'If the apocalypse doesn't kill me, this car's fuel consumption will.' Jae-min groused, a dark humorless irritation settling behind his eyes as he leaned back against the headrest.
The leather creaked, and he closed his eyes, and the memory came unbidden, screaming and punching the wall until his knuckles bled and the skin split and the bone showed and the frozen plaster crumbled beneath his fists while nobody came because everyone else was dying too.
'Now I have sixteen point eight million pesos and a hole in reality.' Jae-min ached, a hollow inadequacy gnawing at his core as he opened his eyes. 'It still doesn't feel like enough. It will never be enough.'
He opened a new note and typed rapidly with his thumbs jabbing at the screen.
[Jae-min]: DAY 3 COMPLETE.
[Jae-min]: TOTAL: ₱16.8M
[Jae-min]: FOOD: 200 MEALS (800 MORE IN 3 DAYS)
[Jae-min]: NEXT: GUNS. AMMO. BUNKER SUPPLIES.
He stared at the glowing screen with his reflection staring back, hollow eyes and sharp jaw and a face that looked like it had aged ten years in two days, then added one more line.
[Jae-min]: CALL MOM AND DAD. TELL THEM THE TRUTH.
'They won't believe me, I know that.' Jae-min resolved, a bitter, desperate determination hardening his will as he gripped the phone. 'But I can't let them get on that plane without hearing my voice. Without at least trying.'
He started the GT-R and the deep guttural rumble of the engine vibrated through his bones and through the seat and through the steering wheel, a living thing beneath him that was hungry and powerful and utterly indifferent to the suffering of his bank account.
He pulled out of the 7-Eleven parking lot with the headlights sweeping across the wet pavement, the rain having left the streets slick and reflective with city lights smearing across the asphalt like oil on water, and the void inside him pulsed, expanding and hungry and always hungry.
'Tonight I call my parents.' Jae-min determined, a cold, lethal resolve hardening his core as he gripped the wheel. 'Tomorrow I show Uncle the impossible.'
— • • • —
8:15 PM.
Shore Residence 3. 29°C.
The basement parking was quiet with fluorescent tubes buzzing overhead and casting the concrete pillars in flat sterile white, the smell of exhaust and damp concrete filling the air as Jae-min parked the pearl white GT-R in its spot.
She sat low on her suspension and gleaming under the fluorescent lights, a predator at rest, and he stepped out and walked toward the elevator of Building B with his boots echoing heavily in the underground space.
The sound bounced off the walls and came back to him in fragmented echoes like the building was repeating his footsteps in a language he didn't understand.
He pressed the up button and waited while the elevator hummed, distant and getting closer, then dinged, the stainless steel doors sliding open with a soft pneumatic hiss.
It was empty, but on the floor of the elevator car someone had dropped a crumpled piece of paper, a flyer, the kind of thing that gets tucked under windshield wipers and immediately discarded.
But this one was different.
Jae-min frowned and stepped inside and picked it up, the paper thick and heavier than normal, official, and he ran his thumb across the surface and felt the raised texture of an embossed watermark, a government seal, the kind of paper that didn't come from a printer but from a printing press, the kind used for things that matter.
He unfolded it and found a military-grade dispatch notice dated three days from now, the header reading CLASSIFIED, AFP JOINT OPERATIONS COMMAND, the text brief and clinical and written in the kind of bureaucratic language designed to carry orders without carrying emotion.
MANDATORY WITHDRAWAL OF ALL AFP FORCES FROM SOUTHERN LUZON. EFFECTIVE DATE: THREE DAYS FROM ISSUANCE. ALL UNITS TO RETREAT TO DESIGNATED NORTHERN STAGING AREAS. DO NOT ENGAGE. OBSERVE AND REPORT ONLY.
Jae-min's blood ran cold, and the paper felt like dry ice in his fingertips, a freezing burn that crawled up his fingers and settled in the pit of his stomach like a stone.
'Three days.' Jae-min realized, a cold creeping dread icing his spine as his grip tightened on the paper and the edges crumpled and his knuckles went white. 'The military is pulling out of Southern Luzon in three days. What is coming out of the south that the government is already running from?'
The elevator doors began to close, and he stepped through at the last second, the fourteenth-floor hallway quiet with his boots echoing against the tile as he walked to Unit 1418 and unlocked the door and stepped inside.
The AC hit him cool and indifferent, and he didn't turn on the lights but walked through the dark living room past the kitchen into the bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed with his phone in hand, the screen lighting up his face in cold blue-white.
Mom's contact, Mom ❤️, the same selfie from last Christmas with her and Dad smiling and alive and the white pillars of Portofino Alabang behind them.
His thumb hovered over the call button, the same one inch it had been at 3:17 AM, but the money was real now, the credit cards were real, and the forged signature was real; none of it proof, and none of it would make a plane crash sound believable.
'It doesn't matter.' Jae-min resolved, a desperate determination fracturing through the exhaustion as he pressed his thumb against the side of the phone. 'I can't wait anymore. I have to call her. Even if they think I've lost my mind.'
He pressed the call button.