Claire set up the rocket launcher.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5ziVni9Gao
Thank God she'd actually read the manual.
Her fingers moved along it from memory—every latch, every safety, every angular adjustment played like second nature.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3WEOZyz6lq
She had never fired one of these before.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjTvv8Zd1Tv
But this wasn’t the kind of thing you practice. This was a “get it right once or die” kind of tool.
She reached for the payload—a small cylindrical canister—and gently placed it on the rooftop.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRjsU3gMPmZ
The sound of metal against concrete echoed sharply in the still air, like the only heartbeat left in the world.
With cautious precision, she twisted the seal.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡM4NFu7AEtZ
Dry. Temperature stable. Good.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6yPUgXdMul
That meant the containment had held.
No room for hesitation. Not for what came next.
This capsule wasn’t just a payload.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU4UY4Vs4cH
It was a vessel. A seed.
Claire stood, eyes sweeping over the city.
She hadn't lived just 296 repeated days—no, it had been far longer. She just couldn’t remember anymore.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb2Xj81M1Oe
Too many fractured timelines had worn holes in her memory.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQeqcnz6jbD
The truth was, she’d outlived herself.
The pages were torn. The bookmarks gone.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGQUifTr4sy
Only her body remembered.
Blood dripped from her left eye.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqf4lPv4sA1
One drop. Two. Each hitting the concrete with a soundless rhythm, forming tiny red circles.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ01y5rJvgee
She didn’t wipe them away. She just let it bleed.
Claire crouched down and pressed a palm gently over her left eye.
“Don’t be scared,” she whispered. “You’re going home now.”
Her voice was soft—like someone soothing a child.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuaQbTLo9JH
But she wasn’t lying. This entire journey had always been about this one moment.
She looked up.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSkttGbF7Jw
The slime hadn’t fully entered the city yet.
Purple strings of it hung from the sky like intestinal tendrils, squirming in midair with an almost biological pulse.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6YIhAV9nJp
She could tell which strands were new and which had been lingering for cycles.
That knowing didn’t come from sight.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf0bN46gVHj
It was something else—deeper.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7Da3kIl1Nl
A non-human perception now hardwired into her.
Then Claire reached with her left hand—
—and into her eye socket.
Her fingers moved with calm familiarity.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8LcuSc5AkU
She hooked beneath the eye, traced the optic nerves, and lifted.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0xpRA1npjm
There was no resistance.
It wasn’t a real eye.
It was a container.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdsMBwURouC
A seal.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtYttWw6Uqk
A stolen fragment of time she had smuggled out from somewhere else.
The thing in her hand trembled.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuVO5xXs9gJ
But it did not fight her.
Claire smiled at it—barely a twitch, a flicker of something tender.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1W6tV7yU2V
Then, gently, she placed it into the canister.
No words.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhtFBc5K6P4
Just the sound of a click as the lid closed and the capsule was sealed.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwowrswNuvh
She lifted the entire mechanism and slotted it back into the launcher.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoFRQnaRGy4
One final lock.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUl2LegXUOo
Everything ready.
The slime moved faster.
It wasn’t just falling now.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2yadr22GXe
The air changed.
Some invisible chemical pressure filled the atmosphere—she couldn’t smell it, but she felt it.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡScd4jTMrCX
A rising tension in the bones.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBPpKqKIgSk
Like whatever was up there had noticed.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdYc0Ls4wdn
And now it was coming.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbavtMwDPiU
All of it.
The world went quiet.
Not “soundless.”37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpRjOwSPUkx
Compressed.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ46NRn6OpZk
Like the frequency of the Earth had paused.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0eVnaXn1qg
The usual noise—wind, distant metal creaks, the rhythms of manmade life—gone.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWjWr9Ur49D
Because real rhythm was in her hands now.
And it was ready to be returned.
Claire looked up.
Every motion was clean.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpH6Z0k9AZP
She wouldn’t remember the details.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdd0eEvwtTD
But she would see them.
And when the last strand of slime breached the sky, she launched the rocket.
Her finger didn’t tremble.
A perfect strike.
Immediate ignition.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvyPErOIQqZ
The roar of engines.
A spear of fire split the sky.
The rocket didn’t explode.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmGerpwjQYH
It traveled.
Like a pair of wings, it carried Claire’s treasure back to where it belonged.
It passed through the creature’s edge.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXosmVJlwCs
Through Claire’s own personal gravity well.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoTQwEI3IwV
Through the membrane of time she had torn.
And somewhere along that trajectory—
—everything unlatched.
That trailing streak behind the rocket wasn’t smoke.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtJtyBiRjq7
It was a hook made of memory.
It dug into what never belonged here.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT8hkLQIAAr
And yanked.
No blast.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYAaWUnrDMn
No flame.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbq2OhCUjKT
Just a straight line, cutting through the monster’s silhouette, through the city’s fractured clockwork, through the fate Claire had been carrying alone.
And then—
Disconnection.
The cycle broke.
The burden lifted.
Claire would stay in the past.
And give the future back to everyone else.37Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡksQDiYqSiC
