“Sam, wait! I thought I heard something!”

The words sliced through the morning noise like a blade.

Samuel froze instantly. Not because his partner was prone to panic—he wasn’t—but because of the tone. It wasn’t casual. It wasn’t uncertain. It was fear, sharp and immediate.

Samuel slowly withdrew his hand from the lever.

And then he heard it too.

At first, it was almost indistinguishable from the city’s background noise—the creak of metal, the distant hum of traffic, the wind slipping between buildings. But then it came again.

A sound so small it barely seemed real.

A thin, piercing wail.

Not the angry cry of a stray animal. Not the rustle of something shifting in the trash. It was fragile. Desperate. Human in a way that made Samuel’s entire body go still.

His blood turned cold.

“Did you hear that?” his partner whispered, already moving toward the nearest container.

Samuel didn’t answer. He was already running.

Continued on the next page