Samira clutched the handful of wood dust, her palm feeling like holding a small handful of cooled stardust. She expected the ash to scatter in the wind, but instead, it gathered tighter, coalescing along the grooves of her fingerprints into a thin line, as if someone were writing on her skin with a charred pen. Lena reached out to brush it away, but the moment her fingertip touched the layer of ash, the entire line instantly retracted into Samira's blood vessels, leaving behind a faint, almost invisible red mark.
"This isn't right," Lena's voice was dry, stripped of all moisture. "We need to find a doctor—"
"It's not sickness," Samira cut her off, her voice low but firm. She raised her hand; the red mark shimmered faintly in the sunlight, like an ultra-fine filament. "Karim is showing the way."
Lena started to protest but was interrupted by a commotion in the distance. The camp's broadcast speakers hissed, followed by a man's voice shouting alternately in English and Arabic: *Emergency roll call. Everyone return to your tents immediately.* The crowd began to move uneasily, like disturbed ants. Samira pulled her hood back up, revealing only her dark eyes, which burned with a fire more urgent than the broadcast.
They moved against the flow of people towards the edge of the camp. Near the wire fence, several guards in fluorescent vests were replacing number plates—the container originally marked "D-7" was being painted over with "Under Maintenance." Samira spotted a small fragment of the brass lock on the ground, its cut edge smooth, as if sliced cleanly by something incredibly sharp. She crouched down, and the moment her fingertip touched the metal, her brother's voice erupted in her ear, this time with a distinct echo:
"The key is in the left pocket of the grey trench coat."
Lena crouched beside her, voice hushed to a whisper. "You heard that?"
Samira nodded, pointing to a spot behind her ear—a small, almost hidden scar beneath her hair, left during a "medical check-up" three months ago. She hadn't told Lena that the nurse who drew her blood that day had a silver, elongated ear badge hidden in her cuff.
"We need to find that trench coat," Samira said.
The grey trench coat wasn't hard to find. It hung on the wire fence of the temporary parking lot outside the camp, like an abandoned flag. Its owner—the tall man—was bent over inspecting the tires of the van, his back to them. His movements were slow, deliberate, as if counting every pebble in the tread. Samira held her breath, approaching from the shadows on the other side of the coat. Her fingers slipped into the pocket, touching cold metal—not a key, but a badge smaller than the brass lock, engraved on the back with a fine line of numbers: *E-17-β*.
The instant the badge left the pocket, the van emitted a sharp, piercing alarm, like a cat whose tail had been stepped on. The man whirled around, his grey eyes narrowing to pinpricks beneath his cap brim. Samira had no time to retreat; Lena was already grabbing her wrist, pulling her into a sprint. The alarm chased them like a pack of invisible hounds. They weaved through gaps between tents, leaped over drying blankets, and finally ducked into a temporary passage covered by a plastic tarp. The alarm cut off abruptly, replaced by the man's voice booming from the broadcast again, this time unnervingly close, as if just on the other side of the plastic:
"Target confirmed. E-17-β activated."
A second before the plastic tarp was yanked aside, Samira pressed the badge into the red mark on her palm. Ash met metal with a faint *hiss*, like snow landing on hot coals. The badge vanished. The red mark, however, ignited, transforming into a thread-fine line of light. It snaked up the inside of her arm, finally stopping below her collarbone, solidifying into an orange pinpoint of light, no larger than a grain of rice.
Outside the tarp, the man's footsteps halted. He seemed to be listening for something. Then, he turned and walked away. The plastic tarp fell back into place, slicing the light into fragments that danced on Samira's face like flowing fire.
Lena slid down against the cold container wall, gasping for air. "What *was* that?"
Samira looked down. The pinpoint of light pulsed faintly below her collarbone, in time with her heartbeat. She thought of Karim hunched in the fiery doorway, of the ash coalescing into a line, of the cold numbers on the badge. An answer formed in her throat, burning too hot to voice.
"It's a beacon," she finally whispered, her voice seeming to come from far away. "Karim… he's leaving me markers. In his own way."
Outside the container, the broadcast sounded a third time. Now it was a woman's voice, unnervingly gentle: *All minors, please report immediately to the central tent for health screenings.*
Samira and Lena locked eyes. They both knew the central tent held no real doctors, only people in grey trench coats. The light beneath Samira's skin flickered, like responding to a distant call.
Lena reached out, her fingertip lightly brushing the pinpoint of light. "Then let's go. Before they take him."
Samira nodded, zipping her hoodie all the way up to cover the faint glow below her collarbone. As they slipped out from under the plastic tarp, the setting sun bled across the wire fence like a river of fire. The woman's voice from the camp broadcast repeated its gentle, patient call, like a mother coaxing a child to sleep with lies. Samira wiped the last traces of ash onto her lips, tasting rust and orange blossom. It was Karim's cipher, left for her. And in the darkness she was about to enter, it was the only light.