442 A.R. – 8:26 A.M. (Past Timeline)
The sunlight spilling through the kitchen window should have felt warm. Comforting. Instead, Rei sat at the table, his untouched plate growing cold, his thoughts replaying the night over and over like a broken reel.
Five minutes.
That was all it took to unhinge his certainty. Five minutes that shouldn't exist. Five minutes that whispered: the future is no longer the same.
Mira sat across from him, half-asleep, stirring her tea with a spoon she'd long forgotten to sip from. Their parents talked quietly nearby, pretending to focus on chores, pretending not to notice that Rei hadn't spoken since breakfast.
But they noticed. They always did.
Elias was the first to break the silence. "Son," he said, voice steady but cautious, "you've been staring at that wall for half an hour. Either you've developed a crush on it, or something's eating you alive."
Rei blinked, as if waking from a trance. "Sorry. Just… thinking."
"About Mira's awakening?" Liora asked gently, setting aside her dish towel.
Rei hesitated. "Yeah. About… everything, really."
The images kept replaying. Mira floating, light bursting from her like a newborn star. The clock. The numbers that didn't line up. The impossible shift in time.
Five minutes early.
Like the card game in Velbrax. Like replacing Mikael Strand and still watching the same outcomes unfold. Patterns that refused to break no matter how hard he pushed, until suddenly, they did.
Was this another loop stabilizing around him? Or did his return, the very act of existing where he shouldn't, bend the pattern itself?
He exhaled shakily. "It's strange," he murmured. "Last time… when she awakened, I remember feeling… angry. Angry at her. At myself. At everything."
Mira looked up, frowning. "Angry? At me?"
Rei forced a small smile. "Not at you. Never really at you. Just at… the reminder that I couldn't be what you were."
He stared down at his hands. "That night, I told myself I'd change. That I'd do something, anything, to prove I wasn't worthless. But all I did was break everything that mattered."
Silence hung over the table.
In his previous life, after Mira's awakening, that anger had hollowed him out. He'd stopped talking to her. Stopped joining them for dinner. Started disappearing into long shifts and empty nights.
He remembered the way his mother's eyes dimmed a little more each time he left without saying goodbye. How his father's quiet disappointment stung more than any insult. How Mira had stopped knocking on his door after the fifth unanswered attempt.
And then the fire. The screams. The man on the bridge.
Rei's hand tightened around his cup until the ceramic creaked.
He'd lost everything, not because he was powerless, but because he'd let his resentment control him.
"I was pathetic," he said quietly. "So obsessed with what I didn't have that I stopped seeing what I did. And by the time I realized it…" He trailed off. "…it was too late."
Liora moved closer, her voice soft but steady. "You're not that boy anymore, Rei."
He gave her a small, strained smile. "I'm trying not to be."
"You're doing more than trying," Elias said, setting a heavy hand on his son's shoulder. "Whatever happened before doesn't define you now. You've been working harder than anyone I've ever seen. I don't know what's driving you, but… keep going. Just don't lose yourself to it again."
Rei looked up, meeting his father's steel-gray eyes. For the first time, the old military weight behind them didn't feel like judgment. It felt like faith.
Mira leaned forward, resting her chin on her hands. "Well, for what it's worth," she said lightly, "you're definitely less of a brooding gremlin than usual."
He blinked. "Brooding gremlin?"
She grinned. "Yeah. You used to sulk so hard that plants died when you walked by."
Liora stifled a laugh behind her hand. Elias cleared his throat to hide his own.
Rei stared at his sister in mock disbelief. "Did you just call me a houseplant killer?"
"I'm saying it's an improvement," Mira said, eyes twinkling. "At least now you're talking."
Her smile, bright, teasing, alive, cut through the haze in his mind like sunlight through storm clouds.
He realized, slowly, that this time… he hadn't snapped. He hadn't shut down. He hadn't looked at his sister's awakening and seen a mirror of his own failure.
He'd seen her.
And for the first time in two lifetimes, that was enough.
"I'm proud of you, you know," Liora said softly, her hand brushing his. "You always cared more than you let anyone see. I can tell it's different this time."
Rei nodded faintly. "It has to be."
Elias straightened, glancing toward the window. "The ceremony's in three hours. You should both get ready."
Rei froze.
In the previous timeline, he hadn't gone. He'd locked himself in his room, consumed by bitterness, while Mira walked the stage alone. She'd looked for him in the crowd. He'd never been there.
This time, he would be.
Liora caught the change in his expression and smiled knowingly. "You're going this time, aren't you?"
He nodded. "Yeah. I'm not missing it again."
"Good," Elias said simply, adjusting his coat. "Then best of luck, to both of you."
Mira smirked. "Luck's for people who need it. I've got talent."
Rei flicked a crumb at her. "And I've got patience."
She ducked, laughing. "That's a lie."
Their mother shook her head fondly. "You two haven't changed at all."
As the laughter faded into the quiet hum of morning, Rei found himself watching them, his family, like someone trying to memorize a dream he didn't want to lose.
Five minutes. That was all it took to change the story once. Maybe this time, it could change again.