ConfirmationThe front door crashed open, the sound echoing like the splintering of wood in a storm, jagged and unsettling.Sarah burst inside, breathless and flushed, hair half loose from its tie and clinging to the back of her neck. Sweat darkened the fabric of her shirt, and the wooden practice sword bounced awkwardly against her hip as she kicked the door shut with her heel."I ran," she said unnecessarily, already shrugging out of her shoes. "Traffic was awful and..." She stopped, scanning the room. Did I miss it? The thought echoed in her mind, unspoken but pressing, as though the answer might tip some unseen balance."No," Harold said. "You're early. Go shower real quick."She exhaled, relief flashing across her face before she caught herself. "Good." Then, more urgently, "I need two minutes."She disappeared down the hall at a near sprint, the sound of drawers opening and shutting following her. A moment later, the shower kicked on.Josh leaned closer to Beth and lowered his voice. "She's like you," he murmured, a grin playing at the corners of his mouth. "When you decide something needs to be done." He gave a little chuckle, revealing a kind of teasing warmth.Beth didn't smile, her expression instead turning thoughtful and serious. Her eyes, quiet and focused, flicked over to Josh for a moment before returning to the kitchen. "She's already bracing. You could tell something was wrong just by how she was acting in the car," she replied, her voice steady and calm. Her right hand, however, clenched slightly as if holding onto an invisible thread of worry.Harold listened without interrupting. He stood, grabbed three more beers from the fridge, and set them on the table. No one commented on the fact that it was already the third round. It felt appropriate; the world was gonna end. The shower shut off. Footsteps followed faster than necessary.Sarah came back into the room, towel-dried and hastily changed, hair damp and brushed back, cheeks still flushed. She looked younger, cleaner, softer, but there was a sharpness in her eyes that hadn't been there a few days ago. Her fingers traced absent-mindedly over the nicks in the wooden sword's handle, feeling the grooves and ridges worn into the wood.She didn't sit. "Has it started?" she asked for some reason, still holding onto the wooden sword.Harold glanced at the clock. "Any second, you almost missed it."She perched on the arm of the couch instead, fingers tapping once against the wood before she forced them still. The practice sword rested against her leg, forgotten but present. The TV flickered. A familiar anchor appeared, expression measured and calm, as it always did before bad news."Breaking news," the voice cut through the air.Josh straightened. Beth folded her arms.Harold stayed where he was."Multiple observatories. Confirm. Near-Earth asteroid. Trajectory. Planet's orbit." Sarah's breath caught. "Current projections. Impact. Twenty-eight days." The room went very quiet. The clink of Harold's bottle hitting the counter resounded through the room. "Size of the object. Not determined. Estimated above threshold for concern."Josh whispered, "Jesus.""Impact location. Uncertain. Wide margin of error." Beth closed her eyes briefly, then opened them again. "Officials stress. No immediate panic. International efforts underway." Sarah turned slowly toward Harold. He met her eyes, feeling a familiar heaviness settle in his chest. "I told you," he said quietly. The words hung in the air, laden with a quiet conviction and a touch of something unresolved. For a heartbeat, he resisted the urge to look away, and his pulse quickened. She nodded once, swallowing hard. "It's different seeing it for myself."Josh leaned back, running both hands through his hair. "Okay," he said. "Okay. That's real. That's very real."Beth didn't speak. She was watching Harold again, measuring something that had nothing to do with the broadcast.On the screen, experts gestured at diagrams and timelines, words like mitigation and probabilityfilling the air.Harold didn't look at it anymore. "I know this isn't enough," he said instead. "You're going to need more than predictions and coincidence."Josh turned toward him. "More than that?" He gestured vaguely at the TV. "You're good, Harold, I remember you making explosives and stuff for the fun of it, but you aren't an astrologist."Beth placed a hand on Josh, shushing him."Yes," Harold said. "Because knowing something bad is coming isn't the same as believing the rest of it."Beth watched him closely now. "What did you do?"Harold stood and walked toward the garage without answering.The door opened and shut softly. The hum of the fridge cut off. Footsteps crossed concrete, then returned.He came back holding a small glass vial between two fingers and a kitchen knife in the other hand. The blade was clean. As Harold paused, the cold knurling of the knife handle pressed into his sweating palm, its chill a sharp reminder of the gravity of what he was about to do. His heart thudded once, loud and deliberate. Sarah straightened. "Harold." Her voice heightened."I need you to stay calm," he said, and that alone set her on edge.Josh stood halfway. "Okay, nope. Whatever this is, we can—""Stop," Harold said, voice commanding for the first time. "And I won't ask one of you to do it."Beth's eyes flicked to the vial. Then the knife. "You don't have to prove this to us by hurting yourself.""Yes," Harold said gently. "I do."Before anyone could stop him, he dragged the blade across his forearm.It wasn't deep, but it was real.Blood welled immediately, dark and fast, spilling down his skin and dripping onto the floor.Sarah gasped. "Harold!"Josh swore and moved forward, but Beth caught his arm."Wait," she said sharply. "Look."Harold didn't flinch. He uncorked the vial with his thumb and tilted it, pouring the cloudy liquid directly onto the cut.The potion soaked in, mingling with the blood.Nothing happened at first. Then the bleeding slowed.Just... wrong in a way that made the skin crawl. The wound edges drew together with a faint whispering sound, unnaturally knitting themselves. Color shifted from angry red to something closer to normal. The cut sealed over in front of them, leaving behind faint pink skin where there should have been damage.The last drop of blood fell.Then there were no more. Harold let the empty vial slip from his fingers. It clinked softly against the table, missing the papers and notebooks that were strewn about.Silence swallowed the room.Sarah stared at his arm, eyes wide, one hand pressed over her mouth. "That's not possible," she whispered.Josh's face had gone pale. "People don't do that," he said. "That's not—there's no—"Beth stepped closer. She didn't touch Harold. She didn't need to."How could you have made that? That's not from here," she said quietly."No," Harold agreed. "It Isn't" He turned to Josh, who was standing there in shock.He rolled his sleeve down slowly, carefully, as the movement itself mattered. His hand was steady now. The shaking had stopped."I made that this morning," he said. "With things you can buy at a corner store and pull out of a park."Josh looked at the empty vial again. "You're saying this is just… the beginning.""Yes," Harold said. "I can still feel the same energies I used to craft on Gravesend, they are just a lot more muted here."Sarah swallowed hard. "And when it starts?"Harold met her eyes. "Then things like that won't be rare."Beth exhaled slowly. "Okay," she said. "Okay. I believe you."Josh laughed once, breathless and disbelieving, differently now. "I don't know what the hell is happening," he said. "But I believe that."Harold nodded, the weight finally settling where it belonged."Good," he said. "Because now we can prepare."On the screen, the experts kept talking.
