The corridor narrowed as we approached the room.
Not abruptly. Not threateningly.
Just enough to make me notice.
The walls drew closer, their smooth surfaces absorbing sound instead of reflecting it. The hum of Galactors—ever-present elsewhere—softened here, like the facility itself had decided to lower its voice. The lights shifted too. No longer bright or clinical, but muted, warm, restrained.
As if this space wasn't meant for weapons or missions.
As if it was meant for something fragile.
The air here felt different too—thicker somehow, but not heavy. Like it had been filtered through too many decisions, too many quiet moments that never made it into reports. Even my footsteps sounded wrong, softer than they should have been, as if the floor didn't want to remind anyone they were still standing on something solid.
I slowed.
Then stopped.
My hand hovered inches from the panel beside the door, fingers stiff, locked halfway between movement and paralysis. The surface was cool, seamless, faintly warm beneath the skin—responsive technology waiting for a command I couldn't give.
My chest tightened.
Too familiar.
That moment before diving—before the whistle, before the plunge—when your body knows exactly what's coming and still rebels, lungs screaming for air you haven't lost yet.
What if I'm too late again?
The thought slid in quietly, poisonous and calm.
What if I open this door and—
I'd faced blades without freezing. I'd charged into things that should have killed me without thinking twice. But this—this was different. This wasn't about survival. This was about confirmation. About finding out whether hope was still allowed to exist, or whether it had already been taken from me while I wasn't looking.
Yuna noticed immediately.
She didn't rush me. Didn't fill the silence. Didn't pretend she didn't see my hesitation.
She simply stopped beside me.
"You don't have to go in yet," she said quietly.
Not reassurance.
Permission.
I swallowed.
The corridor felt longer suddenly, heavier. Like it was stretching time, giving me space to doubt myself.
My mind filled in images I didn't want—hospital floors slick with blood, my mother's eyes dimming, Jacklin's smile as she stepped aside.
What if—
A sound slipped through the door.
Soft. Unsteady.
"Kai… en…?"
The world cracked.
The sound hit me harder than any blade ever had.
My breath shattered in my chest, a broken inhale that burned all the way down. Every thought I'd been clinging to disintegrated instantly.
I didn't wait anymore.
My heart skipped, then slammed painfully against my ribs as my hand came down hard on the panel.
The door slid open without a sound.
And there—
Renya.
Sitting on a medical bed far too large for him, wrapped in a blanket that swallowed his small frame. His legs didn't reach the edge. His feet dangled slightly above the floor, toes curling instinctively as if he needed something solid beneath him.
Alive.
The room blurred.
I was moving before I realized it.
"Renya!"
He looked up.
His eyes widened, black and glassy and unmistakably real.
"Kai—en!"
I crossed the room in three steps and dropped to my knees so hard I felt it in my bones. My arms wrapped around him, pulling him close, closer than was probably safe, closer than any protocol would allow.
He slammed into me with a small, desperate force, arms locking around my neck like he was afraid the world might steal me back if he loosened his grip.
"I'm here," I whispered, voice breaking completely. "I'm here. You're safe. I promise. I promise."
I didn't know who I was promising — him, myself, or the part of me that still believed promises meant something.
He shook against me, small sobs hitching in his chest, face buried in my shoulder. His body was warm. Solid. Alive.
For the first time since the hospital—
My hands stopped shaking.
I hadn't realized how violently they'd been trembling until they didn't anymore. The ache in my shoulders dulled, the tight knot in my chest loosening just enough to let air in without pain. My body, it seemed, had been holding itself together on borrowed strength—and now that he was here, it was finally asking to be allowed to breathe.
Renya shifted slightly in my arms.
I felt it before I saw it — the tension leaving him in small increments, shoulders loosening, breath evening out against my chest. He pulled back just enough to look at me, his fingers still hooked stubbornly into my shirt like he didn't trust the world not to take me away again.
His eyes searched my face.
Then —
He smiled.
Not wide. Not playful.
Just a small, fragile curve at the corner of his mouth — like he was testing whether it was safe.
My chest tightened painfully.
That smile…
It wasn't happiness.
It was recognition.
The kind that says you're real… you're still here.
"Kai…en," he said softly this time, clearer.
I laughed under my breath, something breaking loose inside me that I hadn't realized I was still holding together.
"Yeah," I whispered. "I'm here."
His forehead rested against mine, warm and solid.
That smile — small and tired and stubborn — did something nothing else had managed to do since tonight began.
It reminded me why I was still alive.
Not to fight.
Not to endure.
But to stay.
For him.
For this moment.
For the chance to live again.
I stayed like that for several seconds. Minutes. Time didn't matter. Nothing did except the weight of him against my chest and the steady, fragile rhythm of his breathing.
I felt something loosen inside me.
Not relief.
Permission to breathe again.
Renya shifted in my arms.
Not away.
Just enough to look at me properly.
His small hands slid up my shoulders, fingers pressing into the fabric of my jacket like he was checking whether I was solid. Real. Still here. His gaze moved slowly — face first, then eyes.
Then he frowned.
Not fear.
Confusion.
"…Kai-en?" he asked.
I hummed softly. "Yeah?"
He tilted his head, studying me with the intense seriousness only children had — the kind that missed nothing because it didn't know what to ignore yet.
"Your eyes," he said.
My body reacted before my mind did.
I stilled.
"What about them?" I asked carefully.
Renya leaned back just enough to get a better angle, his grip tightening unconsciously at my collar. His brow furrowed deeper, lips pursed as he searched for the right words.
"They're… different," he said.
My chest tightened.
"Different how?" I asked, keeping my voice light. Normal. The way you talked when you didn't want a child to know something mattered.
Renya lifted one small hand and pointed — not accusing, just precise.
"They were black before," he said. "Like always."
He paused.
"Now they're…"
He squinted. "…red?"
The word landed quietly.
Not scared. Not alarmed.
Just observational.
Like noticing a bruise that hadn't been there yesterday.
My throat went dry.
I forced a small smile and shifted my grip, pulling him closer again, angling my face away just slightly — enough that the light wouldn't catch my eyes directly.
"I'm fine," I said quickly. "Really. No problem."
Renya didn't look convinced.
He reached up.
Before I could stop him, his fingers brushed my cheek — not my eye, just below it — the way he used to do when he wanted to check if I had a fever. His touch was warm. Careful.
"Did you get hurt?" he asked.
The question was simple.
That was what made it dangerous.
I swallowed.
"…A little," I admitted. "But I'm okay now."
That part wasn't entirely a lie.
Renya watched me for another long second, eyes searching my face the way he had in the hospital, the way he did when adults told him things they thought he'd accept without question.
Then he nodded.
Slow.
Deliberate.
"Okay," he said.
But his fingers stayed curled in my shirt.
Just in case.
I exhaled quietly and rested my forehead against his again.
"I promise," I murmured. "I'm not going anywhere."
That seemed to satisfy him — at least enough.
His shoulders relaxed.
His grip loosened.
And that was when—
I saw it.
Just above Renya's right temple, near the hairline where his hair parted naturally.
A mark.
My breath caught.
Not a bruise. Not a cut.
A shape.
Too clean. Too precise.
Like a faint star—or an asterisk—pressed into his skin, pale and shallow, as if it had been imprinted rather than injured.
My fingers stilled.
"…Renya," I murmured softly, tilting my head just enough to see it better.
He didn't react.
Didn't flinch. Didn't pull away.
Didn't even seem aware of it.
As if it had always been there.
That scared me more than blood ever had.
I looked up slowly.
Yuna was watching us from the doorway, posture relaxed but eyes sharp. She'd noticed the moment my focus shifted.
Her gaze met mine.
"It was there when we brought him in," she said quietly.
My throat tightened.
"When?" I asked.
She shook her head once.
No answer.
No explanation. No comfort.
Just certainty.
I looked back at Renya.
The mark didn't glow. Didn't pulse. Didn't move.
It just… existed.
It wasn't aggressive. It didn't announce itself. There was no sense of urgency to it at all—which somehow made it worse. Marks left by violence demanded reaction. This one didn't. It simply waited, like a note written in a language I didn't know yet, confident I would eventually learn how to read it.
A silent fact pressed into his skin.
A faint chill crept up my spine, slow and deliberate.
Not fear — recognition.
The mark didn't feel new.
It felt acknowledged.
Like something, somewhere, had just checked a box…
and moved us one step closer to a decision that had already been made.
For a moment, nothing else mattered.
Not Galactors. Not Executioners. Not portals or Spatial Hearts.
Just this.
Behind us—
Footsteps.
Measured. Unhurried.
The air shifted again, subtly this time, like the room had acknowledged a change in hierarchy.
I felt it before I heard anything else.
A presence approaching.
✦ END OF CHAPTER 19 — Not This Time ✦