Scene 1 — Crystal
Crystal blinked and found herself already walking.
Not arriving—continuing. Like she'd been moving for minutes and her mind had simply decided to start paying attention now.
Warm light pooled ahead in soft patches. Voices drifted nearby—low, familiar, threaded with the lazy ease people only carried when they believed they were safe. It should've comforted her.
It did.
For a moment.
Then she noticed how the quiet behaved.
No wind. No incidental noise. No distant life. Just the chosen sounds—conversation, a soft crackle, the occasional laugh that landed a fraction too neatly, like it had been placed where it belonged.
Crystal slowed without meaning to.
Odin was already there.
Seated like he'd always been seated there—calm in that infuriating way he had when the world tried to panic and he refused to participate.
And Sophie was with him.
Sophie looked… right.
Not right as in safe.
Right as in the way memory edits a person until they fit inside your chest without scraping.
Relief loosened something behind Crystal's ribs. She stepped forward before she could stop herself.
Her mouth opened.
"Don't."
The word came out on its own.
Sophie's face softened like she'd been waiting to hear it.
Crystal took another step—and felt the pressure change, like the space between them had thickened into something you could drown in.
A low boom rolled through the world.
Thunder.
Except it didn't come from above.
It came from underneath the moment—like a door had slammed in a room beneath the floor, and the vibration had found her late.
Crystal flinched hard. "Did you—"
No one reacted.
Not Sophie.
Not Odin.
Odin's gaze lifted with mild interest, as if he'd been waiting for her to notice.
"What was that?" Crystal asked. Her tongue felt too big for her mouth.
"Sound arriving late," Odin said.
"Late from where?"
His eyes stayed steady. "From the moment you think you're preventing."
Her pulse stumbled.
Crystal stepped closer, forcing herself to ignore the wrongness gathering at the edges—the way a laugh landed half a beat after the mouth moved, the way the crackle didn't match the flame, the way her own footsteps didn't sound until after her weight had shifted.
Sophie rose.
Crystal's chest tightened with a hope she didn't trust. Rising meant talk. Rising meant choice.
Sophie reached for her hands.
The touch was cold. Not the absence of warmth—cold like deep water, cold that didn't belong inside comfort.
Crystal gripped harder, like pressure could anchor her. "Don't," she said again, and hated how small it sounded.
Sophie spoke.
The words arrived a heartbeat late, as if they had to travel through something thicker than air.
"You're doing it again."
Crystal's skin prickled. "Doing what?"
Sophie's thumbs brushed her knuckles, tenderness delivered with unsettling precision.
"Arriving after the moment."
Crystal pulled her hands back.
It was too easy—like Sophie had never been holding her at all.
Crystal stared at her fingers, suddenly unsure they were attached to her. Then she looked up—and Sophie's outline flickered for an instant, like a reflection distorting when the water beneath it moves.
"What is this?" Crystal demanded.
Odin answered like he was explaining a kindness.
"A version you can tolerate."
Crystal's breath caught. "So it's not real."
Odin didn't deny it.
He just watched her with that calm, almost gentle patience that made her want to break something.
The thunder rolled again—identical to the first. Same distance. Same length.
Like the same sound played twice.
Crystal's stomach twisted.
Odin's gaze narrowed slightly, approving.
"There," he said. "You feel it now."
"Feel what?" Crystal asked, more to stay upright than to argue.
"That you're not watching a choice," Odin said. His eyes flicked to Sophie. "You're watching your mind catch up to one."
Crystal's chest tightened with fury. "Then why show me at all?"
Sophie's lips moved.
The words arrived late again.
"Because you'll need the titles."
The air thickened—not physically, but conceptually. Like the world had added a rule: understanding has weight.
Five impressions slammed into Crystal, one after another. Not faces. Not names. Pure meaning, clean and merciless, like labels on sealed doors.
The Paradox.
Two truths settled into her mind without conflict. The ease of it made her nauseous.
The Sun.
Not warmth—center. Authority. Gravity.
The Life That Can't Stop Giving.
A generosity so endless it became violence. An open wound mistaken for virtue.
The Ending Who Watches Beginnings.
The sensation of being observed from the far side of her own future—patient and cold.
The Recorder.
Not power. Not mercy. Documentation. The certainty that this moment wasn't happening—it was being filed.
Crystal's knees softened. She caught herself before she fell, but she couldn't stop the feeling spreading through her bones.
She was an echo.
Odin's voice cut through the pressure, quiet as a verdict.
"You can keep begging," he said, "but begging is only useful before the jump."
Crystal's eyes widened. "Jump—?"
Sophie reached out again.
Crystal felt the cold touch—then nothing, as if her body registered contact after her mind had already processed the absence.
"If we don't go," Sophie said, her voice arriving a heartbeat late, "someone else will. And they'll do it wrong."
Crystal lunged.
Her hand closed on air that smelled faintly of salt.
The thunder rolled again—not louder, but closer. Like the sound had finally reached her from wherever it began.
And in the instant before the world rearranged itself, Crystal understood the cruelest part.
They weren't leaving.
They had already left.
She was simply watching her own awareness crawl toward the truth—thirty seconds behind reality—while the Sea, patient as a god, held the scene steady long enough for her to suffer it.
Scene 2 — Jessica
The hallway outside the room smelled like antiseptic and old stone—clean enough to pretend this was ordinary, layered enough to admit it wasn't.
I stopped at the door without touching it.
The seals were visible if you knew what to look for. Hairline patterns along the frame, faint as frost. Huginn's work, layered with Baldur's signature—less elegant, more absolute.
Tony stood half a step behind me. Silent. A witness.
"You're certain she's contained?" I asked.
The lead on duty nodded. "Restraining seals in place. Physical restraints too. She's still Explorer-grade. If she breaks, the restraints only buy time."
I looked through the prep hole.
Crystal sat upright on the cot in a straight jacket. Wrists strapped. Ankles strapped. A gag set with deliberate tension—tight enough to stop inadvertent phrasing, not tight enough to damage tissue.
No thrashing. No shouting.
The most dangerous patients rarely looked violent. They looked occupied.
"She's been calling for Odin?" I asked.
"It started that way," Baldur said. "At first."
"Define started," I said. "Don't interpret. Recount."
"Last night she woke me," he said. "Whispering. Saying she was late."
"Late in what context?"
"That something already happened and she was behind it."
Delay-language.
"She kept reaching forward," Baldur continued. "Not at the walls. Not at me. Like someone was right in front of her and her hands couldn't register them."
"Did she name who?"
Baldur hesitated. Then: "Sophie."
Tony stiffened behind me.
"Frequency," I said.
"Enough that we stopped letting her speak."
"Exact phrasing."
"'She's here.' 'I'm late.' 'Don't.' Over and over."
"And Odin?" I asked. "Person, threat, or consequence?"
"Consequence," Baldur said immediately. "She said he was calm."
A calm Odin was never neutral.
"When did you restrain her?"
"When she started writing."
"She tore paper from anything," Baldur said. "She didn't write names. She wrote titles."
"And when she tried to read them?"
"She started choking. Like the words had weight."
Information hazard confirmed.
I took the stack of papers from him and stepped away from the door.
She hadn't written like a madwoman.
She'd written like a translator.
Five recurring headers. No names. Just functions.
"I'll speak them once," I said. "Quietly. Watch vitals."
No one objected.
"The Paradox."
Pause.
"The Sun."
"The Life Giver."
"The Watcher from the End."
Crystal's fingers twitched against the straps.
Recognition.
I spoke the last one.
"The Heavenly Scribe."
Crystal inhaled shallowly. Exhaled late.
Her throat worked under the gag, fighting speech.
I stopped.
"Only the last one is cataloged," I said. "By systems you don't access."
"So the rest are—" Baldur started.
"Unstandardized," I said. "Or older than our taxonomy."
"This isn't delusion," I continued. "It's residue. A contact event embedded categories in her cognition."
"Can you fix it?" Baldur asked.
"Containment prevents collateral," I said. "It doesn't restore identity."
I watched Crystal through the glass.
"She doesn't need stronger seals," I said. "She needs an anchor."
"Who?" Baldur asked.
"Alexis," I said. "Now. Before the delay deepens."
Tony spoke quietly. "What's the risk?"
"That she stops arriving," I said. "Permanently."
"Call Alexis," I said. "And tell her to bring something Crystal still recognizes as now."
Scene 3 — Crow
"Everyone ready?"
Orcs spilled from the dungeon portal in rough waves—B to C-rank threats with superhuman muscle and enough speed to turn rookies into statistics.
This was standard now. Controlled violence as curriculum. Rookies cleared the field. Veterans controlled the tempo. An SS-tier commander ran the region.
I led five-man units, keeping losses low and spacing tight. The weak stopped being dead weight. The strong stopped being alone.
"Crow," Amber said, "once we finish here and hand off to the SS teams, we need to regroup with Alexis' group. Something happened back home."
"My mom gave me the surface details," I said. "That's Alexis' problem."
Amber grinned. "So… when do I meet your parents?"
"I'm orphan—"
"You know that's not what I meant."
"I only know my father through stories," I said. "That's why you cling to Meg."
She froze.
"They call me the Prince of the Underworld for a reason," I added. "I notice things."
She sighed. "Fine. You can meet them. Mrs. Jessica and Mr. Tony."
The names hit like an old file header.
"The cosmic therapist?" I stared at her. "And the Doctor of Madness?"
"They're just my guardians," she said.
Relief slipped in before I could stop it.
At least she'd had someone.
I turned back to the dungeon as the next wave surged forward.
The dungeon didn't feel like the threat.
The names did.