For a moment, no one moved.
Theo's hand hovered just inches above the strange girl's shoulder, the echo of her voice still ringing in the air like a bell. Nova stood behind him, tense, her fingers resting near the hilt of her blade.
The girl didn't blink. She simply stared at Theo with eyes that looked too knowing, too ancient for someone so young.
"You said… 'Origin,'" Theo murmured.
She nodded slowly. Her voice was soft, raw, like it hadn't been used in years. "It's inside you."
Theo lowered his hand, heart pounding. "How do you know that?"
"I remember," she whispered. "I wasn't supposed to. But I do."
Nova stepped forward cautiously. "Who are you?"
The girl blinked once, then said in a tone so calm it felt rehearsed, "My name is Ayen. I was part of the Third Fold Initiative. Prototype Witness Class, Sequence-V."
Theo's mind reeled. He remembered the term buried in a classified dossier: Witnesses—humans connected to fate threads, living records designed to see timelines without affecting them.
"You're a living node," he muttered. "You weren't supposed to survive the reset."
"I didn't," Ayen said flatly. "But this thread… pulled me back."
Nova glanced at Theo. "That mean anything to you?"
"It means we're in deep," he replied. "Someone or something restored her. And it wasn't the system. This is way beyond any core protocol."
Ayen's golden eyes locked on him again. "You're different. Not just a Resetter. You're… bleeding."
Theo stiffened. "What?"
"You've got more than one timeline in you. You're fraying."
Nova swore under her breath. "That possible?"
Theo didn't answer. He already knew it was. The vault, the ghosts, the visions — they weren't just fragments of his past lives. They were conflicting versions. Overlapping realities, all trying to coexist inside him.
"I don't have time to fray," he said, standing up. "We need answers."
Ayen looked away. "There's a place. Beyond the fracture point. A memory that wasn't deleted during the last collapse. I saw it before I was… locked away."
"What is it?" Nova asked.
"A memory of the First Origin."
Theo's breath caught. "That shouldn't be possible. The First Origin was erased at the quantum level."
"It wasn't," Ayen whispered. "It was hidden. Buried in a false death point."
Nova scowled. "Where?"
Ayen pointed slowly, her thin arm trembling as she lifted it toward the west.
"The Cradle of Threads."
Theo's expression hardened. He'd heard that name once before — in a corrupted log from his first reset attempt. It was supposed to be myth. A core point where all fate lines converged. Where the original Threadkeeper had first unraveled time.
"Is it stable?" he asked.
Ayen shook her head. "No. It's tearing. And if you don't reach it before the next surge…"
She didn't finish.
Theo understood anyway.
Then there won't be a next timeline.