Carl rides north alone after midnight on Christmas morning. The highway is unnervingly empty of mobs and traffic, though memory-ghost vehicles remain dangerous. He stops at a closed gas station for a map, confirms the Homestead shelter is nearby, and reflects on Donut partying safely with the others while he hides how far away he has gone.

Waiting in the gas station, Carl thinks about the previous Christmas, Bea, Donut, Asher, and the isolated people from his old building. The memories make Carl recognize that his current loneliness hurts because he no longer wants to be alone. He notices a sleeping memory-ghost bloodhound named Lightning Lou, left as a guard dog, and speaks gently to it before leaving.

Carl reaches the graffiti-covered Homestead shelter around 4 a.m. After finding no threats, traps, mobs, or crawlers, Carl circles the building and discovers a message hidden among the graffiti: instructions to look for someone at breakfast who wears a red hat with flaps. The message is written in Syndicate Standard, proving it is meant for someone like Carl, so he breaks in and waits among the sleeping men.

Carl wakes at 6 a.m. to Christmas music and checks his messages. Donut is drunk but safe, Mordecai and Katia are worried, Louis reports Zev has spoken with them, and Zev explains that the AI is preventing interference with Carl’s feed. Zev says the situation likely involves the Residuals but refuses to define the term because Zev is forbidden to tell Carl.

As the shelter residents prepare for breakfast, Carl spots an elderly Asian man wearing the red trapper hat. The man collects sugar packets from his taped storage bin, enters the coffee line, and returns with a cup. Carl takes the man’s bin into his inventory, but before Carl can inspect it, the man looks directly at Carl, speaks in English, and greets Carl as a crawler.