The island of Patch was awash with activity the past few weeks, ever since the fall of Beacon. Refugees continued to pour in by the boatload. Huntsmen and huntresses flocked towards the town hall, which served as a forward operating base. Crime rates skyrocketed as conditions worsened, and tensions rose between the local populous and the refugees. The air was heavy with fear and discontent.

But in the house off the beaten path, the mood was less tense than it was somber. The two story home looked like the typical holiday home, bright and colorful, as if the doors would open themselves up to anyone who would approach. And yet, one could sense that something felt… wrong, about the home. That there was a sense that something was missing. Indeed, something was missing from the idyllic home.

But there was nothing that could be done to rectify this absence. So the inhabitants the home continued to live their lives, albeit sullenly and without the usual energy that drove them beforehand.

And so, fate saw to it that Yang Xiao Long sat in her bed once more, a look of absolute indifference on her face as she absentmindedly stirred the dish of alphabet soup her father had prepared for her with her remaining hand. The spoon moved in clumsy circles, and often caught along the radius of the bowl, or was dragged along the bottom forcefully.

"So… what's it say?" A voice asked.

"What's what say?" Yang said, not even taking her eyes off her meal to look at the source of the voice.

"The soup. It's alphabet, isn't it?"

Yang scrunched her eyes in confusion. What kind of person asks about the type of soup another is eating?

"So what if it is? It's just soup." She turned to look at her fellow conversationalist. In her window still squatted a man, his lower face obscured by a black facemask, which made seeing his facial features impossible, and greying hair long enough to start falling over his thick, black eyebrows and squinted-shut eyes, which curved rather pleasantly, as if their owner were smiling. Around his neck was woolen, string necklace, with a cross between an X and a P which hung off the end. The man was dressed in a loose, light grey hoodie, the sleeves far too puffed up to match their owner's actual size, which was further illustrated by the slender fit of the man's dark, polyfiber gloves, and cargo pants of a darker shade. Thankfully, the man did not appear to be armed. Yang narrowed her eyes, and just for a moment the usual lilac colored irises flashed red.

"Ah, but it's fun soup. Ordinary soup merely fulfills a person's digestive needs. But with alphabet soup, you satisfy a craving for not only sustenance, but also for creativity. I should know." The man threw a thumb towards himself. "I buy it for my daughter all the time, and she loves it. So much so that its hard to buy a different type of soup." The man started to scratch his chin in contemplation. "I must admit, having the same thing over and over again can be real tiring, which really says a lot coming from me." The man ended his musings with a snap of his gloved fingers.

"Ah, how rude of me to begin a conversation without introducing myself. I am… " The man began to introduce himself, but seemed to hesitate. He scratched the back of his head.

"Uh… is there something wrong?" Yang asked, rather put off by the… floaty nature of her uninvited guest. Aforementioned guest waved off her concern.

"No, no. I just… " the man scrunched his face in concentration, and Yang could see the stress wrinkles that blemished the otherwise healthy skin around the man's eyes. Then, the soldier seemed to stop straining, and without opening his eyes, looked towards Yang.

"I'll give you a Gee and a Bee."

"Wha-"

"You can use that to call me whatever you want to. But that's all I'm giving you, so think carefully, alright?"

Yang was going to ask the masked man something, but before she could get a word out, the man leaned back and fell from the open window. She could do nothing but look at the open window with confusion and a growing sense of dread. After a few minutes of open mouth gaping, she put her bowl of soup to the side, walked over to her window, and peered down.

There were no footprints leading to and from her house. Yang felt a shiver go down her spine, so she shut the window and laid back on her bed. She had a feeling that her mysterious visitor would return.