1. The Weight of the Sun
The blackness lifted not with a jolt, but with a slow, creeping infiltration of light. It wasn't the searing violet of the Nexus, nor the dim, reflective glow of Veyruhn City's perpetual night. This was the gentle, insistent warmth of morning sun, cutting through the gap in his curtains. Lucas blinked, his eyelids feeling impossibly heavy, as if weighted by a thousand unlived seconds. He heard it then: the distant, cheerful chirping of sparrows, the faint hum of a refrigerator in the kitchen downstairs. Sounds that belonged to a world he had long ago given up on.
He was in his bed. His familiar, worn sheets. The same slightly warped wooden headboard. The posters on his wall, peeling at the corners, exactly as he remembered them. He sat bolt upright, heart hammering against his ribs, his breath catching in his throat. No pain. No blood. No cold concrete. Just the soft give of his mattress beneath him.
His gaze snapped to his left palm. The broken gear was still there, a faint, angry red mark etched into his skin, a stark tattoo against the soft flesh. It wasn't bleeding, but it throbbed with a dull, persistent ache, a ghost of the Chronos Nexus's dying pulse. He clenched his fist, digging his nails into the phantom wound, needing to feel something real, something concrete.
It wasn't a dream. The horrifying truth settled over him like a shroud, suffocating him in the idyllic light of dawn.
2. The First Test: Daryl
He swung his legs out of bed, the familiar squeak of the floorboards a jarring sound in his hypersensitive state. Every shadow in his room seemed to hold a flicker of the 'other' Eira, every pattern in the wood grain twisted into the geometries of the Nexus. He had to know. Had to see.
He crept down the hallway, each step deliberate, the quiet of the house amplifying his thundering heartbeat. The door to Daryl's room was slightly ajar. Lucas pushed it open, his hand trembling.
Daryl was there. Asleep. His face relaxed, a slight snore rumbling in his chest. No gaunt, ashen skin. No vacant, accusing eyes. Just his foster brother, sprawled carelessly across the bed, bathed in the soft morning light.
Lucas stood there for a long moment, simply watching him breathe. A fragile wave of relief washed over him, so intense it almost buckled his knees. But beneath it, a chilling dread coiled. Daryl was alive. But did he remember? Would he still turn?
"Lucas? You up early?" Daryl's voice was thick with sleep, his eyes blinking open. He looked at Lucas, slightly groggy, but otherwise normal. There was no flicker of accusation, no recognition of past violence. Just mundane annoyance.
Lucas forced a weak smile. "Just... thirsty." He backed away, closing the door gently. Daryl didn't remember. None of them did.
3. The Silence of the World
The kitchen smelled of coffee and toast. His foster father, Mr. Harrison, was at the table, engrossed in the morning newspaper, while Mrs. Harrison hummed softly as she poured cereal. A perfect, ordinary morning. So perfect it was unsettling.
"Morning, sleepyhead," Mrs. Harrison chirped, offering him a bowl. "You nearly missed breakfast."
Lucas managed a nod, taking the bowl. He glanced at the newspaper. The date: the 13th. The day before it happened. The explosion. The fire. The day before Daryl's rage. He was back. Or a version of "back."
He ate mechanically, the food tasting like ash in his mouth. Every word they spoke, every casual gesture, felt rehearsed, like a play he had already seen countless times. He wanted to scream. To tell them. To grab them and shake them, to warn them of the fragile reality they inhabited. But the words died in his throat. How could he explain the Chronos Nexus, the Custodian, the bleeding Clock Tower, and the ghostly Eira? They would think he was mad. He was mad.
4. The Echo of the Chronos Nexus
The school halls were a kaleidoscope of familiar faces, familiar sounds. Laughter. Locker doors slamming. The droning voice of Mr. Evans from the chemistry lab. All normal. All screamingly, terrifyingly normal.
Lucas moved through it like a phantom. He saw Elian, at his locker, chatting animatedly with a group of friends. His best friend. Alive. Lucas felt a surge of protectiveness, a desperate need to keep him safe from the unseen forces now lurking beneath the surface of this pristine reality.
But then, as Elian turned and flashed his usual wide grin, Lucas saw it. Just for a fraction of a second. A flicker behind Elian's eyes. A momentary shift in the color of his shirt. An image of Elian, lying still in the rain, blood blooming around him. The echo. The residue of a timeline Lucas had discarded.
He stumbled, bumping into someone. "Hey, watch it, Virel."
Lucas mumbled an apology, his vision blurring. The world wasn't perfectly reset. It was laminated. His memories of the fractured timelines were bleeding through, overlaying the present, creating a jarring, terrifying double exposure.
5. The Ghost in the Clock Tower
After school, he couldn't stop himself. He walked to the Clock Tower. It stood majestic and whole against the pale afternoon sky, its gears a steady, rhythmic tick-tock. The sound was normal, reassuring.
He touched its cold stone base. No hum. No vibration. No dark, viscous blood. It was just a building. A monument.
But then, he saw it.
Etched almost imperceptibly into the ancient stone, barely visible unless you knew to look, was a faint, almost invisible symbol. A broken gear. The same symbol burned onto his palm.
And beneath it, scrawled in what looked like faded red chalk, a single word, shimmering faintly, just for Lucas to see:
WATCH.
He stared, his blood running cold. An invisible hand seemed to reach out from the stone, wrapping around his heart. The Chronos Nexus was gone. The chaos had receded. But its mark remained. And someone, or something, was still watching.
TO BE CONTINUED...