The wind pressed soft against his coat, long and silent like it didn't want to be noticed. The night wasn't cold, just still. A streetlamp blinked somewhere behind him, sputtering faint electrical protest before it steadied again.
He stood over the city, one boot resting on the edge of the rooftop. From here, the lights below looked like a half-functioning nerve system, twitching, dull, confused.
He'd waited long enough.
A small screen flickered to life in the air in front of him, framed in pale gold.
[Mae – Displacement Status: Stable]
[Dion – Displacement Status: Stable]
[Target Location: Origin World – Type D-874]
He didn't say anything. Just blinked slowly.
'Took longer than I thought to stabilize them.'
Mae's data flicked by. Emotional fragmentation, reality bleed, imprint instability. She'd been slipping for days, just well-contained enough no one noticed. Dion was cleaner, but not built to last in this branch of reality.
Neither of them belonged here.
