The hospital room smelled like bleach, stale air, and quiet death.
Machines hummed steadily around Kai Archer, their screens glowing with numbers he no longer bothered to interpret. The oxygen tube pressed against his nose, the plastic cold and irritating, but he didn't lift a finger to adjust it. He hadn't lifted much of anything in months. His strength had long since drained away, leaving only a body that refused to give up even though he desperately wanted it to.
Death felt like a polite guest in the room—waiting, patient, and increasingly familiar.
He stared at the ceiling, its white tiles blurring into one another. It was hard to breathe. Not just because of the illness eating at him, but because of the weight sitting on his chest. Heavy. Crushing. Years of regret compacted into something physical.
I wasted it.
His throat tightened.
I wasted my entire fucking life.
He blinked slowly, eyelids heavy.
Thirty-eight years.
Thirty-eight years of drifting.
When he was a kid, teachers told him he was smart. Coaches told him he had talent. His mother—Mira—told him he could be anything. But Kai never cared enough to believe them. He never cared enough about anything. He coasted through school, letting bullies shove him into lockers, letting group partners take credit for projects, letting teachers assume he didn't try because he was lazy rather than because he simply… didn't give a damn.
It was easier that way.
Life was easier when nothing mattered.
Until it wasn't.
Kai swallowed, throat dry, eyes burning.
A cough clawed its way out of him, sharp and painful. He reached weakly for the water cup on the tray beside the bed, but his fingers trembled uncontrollably. The cup slipped from his grip and hit the floor with a soft, anticlimactic thud.
He stared at it.
He didn't have the strength left to curse.
This was the end of the great Kai Archer.
A ghost of a man who had never fought for anything except maybe the illusion of comfort.
The door to his room remained closed—had been closed for months. No visitors. No friends. No lovers. No coworkers. Not even the nurses bothered lingering beyond checking vitals. He was the kind of patient you saw, charted, and left quickly. A quiet expiration waiting to happen.
And he deserved it.
His breath caught as a familiar image flickered in his mind—warm brown eyes, soft smile, messy hair she was always too busy to brush properly. Selene.
His chest ached worse than the disease ever could.
She wasn't his biological mother. His real parents died in an accident when he was seventeen, and he remembered feeling nothing but numb confusion. Selene had been their closest friend, someone he vaguely recognized from childhood photos and the occasional holiday dinner.
And she took him in.
Just like that.
No hesitation.
No complaints.
No conditions.
She worked two jobs. Sacrificed sleep. Cooked for him even when he ignored her meals. Loved him even when he gave her nothing back. She supported his sports phases, helped him study when he bothered to try, held him when he broke down after losing his temper in boxing practice.
And how had he repaid her?
By leaving without a word when he turned twenty-five.
By ignoring her messages.
By skipping her calls.
By forgetting her existence until it was too late.
She had died alone too—he found out a year later, belatedly, through a mutual acquaintance who happened to run into him at a grocery store.
He hadn't even gone to her funeral.
A tear slid down his cheek, warm against his cold skin.
He forced a shaky breath and closed his eyes.
If there was a hell, he deserved it.
His memories drifted, unfocused, slipping between scenes like a broken film strip.
High school. The bullying.
Trent and his idiots pushing him into walls, mocking his thrift-store clothes, laughing at his silence. Kai could have fought back—he was bigger, faster, stronger. But every time his fist curled in anger, a hollow part of him whispered: Why bother? They aren't worth it.
University.
He tried for a semester—really tried.
Business classes. Computer science electives.
But effort was exhausting, and quitting felt like slipping into warm water. Familiar. Mindless. Safe.
Then she appeared.
Her.
The girl with the expensive perfume, beautiful smile, and poisonous heart.
The one girl who acted like she cared.
Who laughed at his jokes, held his hand, convinced him he was worth something.
Until he wasn't.
Until she robbed him blind—cleaned out his accounts, used his credit, dumped him for a richer man, and told him he "should've known his place."
That betrayal should have sparked something in him.
Anger. Rage. Determination. Something.
But he felt nothing.
Just quiet acceptance.
Life kept moving, and he didn't.
He started a company by accident—stumbled into success through pure talent he didn't appreciate. Money poured in. Recognition followed. But even at the height of his wealth, Kai remained alone. Emotionless. Empty.
He never built connections.
Never formed a family.
Never thanked Selene.
Never visited Selene—the woman his biological mother Mira trusted most, who helped raise him through her twenties. He hadn't seen her since the day he turned twenty-five and walked out of Selene's house without looking back.
Twenty-five.
God, he'd been such an idiot.
Another cough wracked his ribs, stealing his breath. His vision blurred again, the edges of the world going dim.
He was dying.
He knew it.
He'd known for months.
A slow, painful sickness that ate him from the inside out. He recognized the signs too late, ignored the symptoms even longer, and by the time he saw a doctor, the damage had already been done.
He told no one.
Because telling someone meant caring.
And caring hurt.
He dragged in one final breath—thin, trembling.
"...Selene…" he whispered. The name cracked out of him. "I'm… sorry…"
The room didn't answer.
Only the steady beep of a machine that didn't care if he lived or died.
His eyes blurred again, but this time not from weakness.
If he had another chance—
If he could redo it—
If he could go back—
He wouldn't be this man.
He wouldn't waste his life.
He wouldn't run from people who cared.
He wouldn't ignore Selene.
He wouldn't break her heart.
He would fight.
He would love.
He would build everything he never had the courage to chase.
He would become someone his parents and Selene would be proud of.
His vision dimmed completely now.
The world went quiet.
His final exhale trembled out of him.
"I… I just want… another chance…"
And for the first time in thirty-eight years, Kai Archer wanted something.
Wanted it with everything he had left.
As the last spark of consciousness flickered—
Something heard him.
A soft chime.
A distant ringing.
A cold voice echoing through the void.
[Request acknowledged.]
[Preparing reset…]
[Standby, Host.]
Then—
White.