Jacob and I stumbled out of the crumbling apartment building, coughing through the dust and smoke that blanketed the air like ash after a firestorm. My ribs ached from the fall, but nothing felt broken. My head, though—that was another story. Something was off, fractured. My powers buzzed at the edge of my skin like they were trying to warn me, like they already knew something I hadn't caught up to yet.
The street outside was in ruins. Cracked pavement, burning debris, scorched cars folded like paper. Atlanta had been turned into a war zone. And worse—it was quiet again. The kind of quiet that felt like a trap. The kind that didn't last.
Jacob checked his gauntlets, his fingers twitching like he needed to blow something up just to feel normal again. "Any sign of the others?"
I reached out, not with my eyes, but with that instinctive pulse—my energy senses. "No. Nothing close."
"Damn. We're blind."
"We're not blind," I said, stepping out into the street, "just separated."
We walked in silence, ducking between abandoned vehicles and shattered storefronts. I kept one hand low, channeling a faint pulse of energy around us, dampening our signature. If the Harbingers' tech was as advanced as we feared, even breathing too loudly could get us killed.
I didn't say it, but I kept checking for Booker's signal.
Ever since Chase revealed the match between his vitals and the Nullwave tech, I couldn't shake the thought—my own brother might be a walking time bomb. Or worse… a beacon.
"You good?" Jacob asked, glancing at me as we crept through a gutted gas station.
I paused by the register, listening. "No. You?"
He smirked, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Not even a little."
From the edge of the broken storefront, I spotted movement.
"Down," I whispered, pulling Jacob into cover.
A Harbinger patrol—three androids, sleek and matte-black with crimson slits for eyes—marched down the center of the street. They weren't searching. They were escorting something. Or someone.
I leaned out just enough to get a glimpse.
At the rear of the formation was a figure, cloaked in dark bronze armor that shimmered like molten glass. Not Vesper. Not Mr. Magnetic. Someone else.
Jacob saw him too. "Who the hell is that?"
"I don't know," I said, squinting to get a better look. "But I don't like how calm he looks."
The figure stopped.
As if he heard me.
And turned.
His face was covered by a smooth mask with no eyes, no mouth. Just shifting symbols—ones I couldn't read, but somehow understood. Equations. Timelines. Calculations.
"I think we've been made."
"Time to bounce?" Jacob whispered.
"No. Time to test something."
I stepped forward and fired a small pulse—nonlethal, just enough to get their attention.
The androids instantly rotated, weapons extending from their arms.
The armored figure raised a hand.
And everything stopped.
The wind, the dust, the flickering flames from nearby wreckage—all froze.
"Jacob—" I turned back.
But he was gone.
No, not gone. Frozen. Caught mid-blink.
I was the only thing moving.
A voice spoke—not aloud, but in my mind. A whisper in a tongue I didn't speak but still understood.
"You break every law, even those you cannot see."
The armored figure walked toward me. Slow. Measured. Like he had all the time in the world.
I clenched my fists, power building in my core.
"You another time traveler?" I asked. "Because I'm getting real tired of being told about futures I didn't ask for."
"I am not Chrono," the voice replied. "I am the equation that comes after."
He reached out and tapped his index finger to the air.
Lines of glowing red and white symbols formed, spiraling around me like a vortex.
"You are a variable, Kaleb. One that must be isolated or erased."
I threw a blast of pure kinetic energy at him.
He caught it.
Not blocked—caught, like it was a tangible object. Then crushed it into nothing.
I staggered back.
"What do you want?"
The mask tilted. "To prove that power without understanding is the purest form of chaos. You are not the solution. You are the problem."
My chest burned with pressure. Not just from the power I was trying to summon—but from something inside, resisting. Twisting.
The Dark Nexus.
He felt it too.
"Even now, it grows. Would you like to see what comes next?"
Before I could answer, the world shifted.
I wasn't in the street anymore.
I was inside a dome made of mirrored walls. Each one showed a different version of me. Some corrupted, monstrous. Some calm, cold, and emotionless. One laughed as he crushed the world between his palms.
I turned.
Behind me, the real version of me—the one still resisting—stood barely upright, blood dripping from his nose, shaking from the weight of his own energy.
I could feel it. I was slipping. Losing ground.
I slammed my fist into the mirrored floor.
"NO!"
The entire dome shattered, sending shards into the air like broken stardust.
I was back in the street, gasping, sweating. The armored figure was gone.
Jacob was still frozen.
Then, slowly, time resumed.
Jacob blinked. "Kaleb? You alright?"
"Yeah," I lied again. "Just… saw something."
"Chrono again?"
"No. Something worse."
I reached out to the fractured place where the figure had stood.
There was a trace left behind. A resonance in the air. Faint, but familiar. He had Nexus energy.
That meant one thing: whatever he was, he wasn't just watching. He was connected to the force inside me. Or maybe… born from it.
We couldn't stay here.
I pushed open the gas station's side door, guiding Jacob through.
We found a narrow alley and followed it deeper into the city, away from the patrol route. Atlanta wasn't safe, not by a long shot—but it was ours now. And whatever the Harbingers had planned, they didn't know what we were capable of.
We passed another collapsed building, and I stopped suddenly.
Someone was inside.
I motioned for Jacob to hold position and crept toward the entrance. My senses flared.
It was a kid—maybe twelve, dirty, shaking, clutching a metal pipe. Eyes wide with fear.
He backed away the moment he saw me.
"Hey," I said softly. "I'm not here to hurt you."
He didn't answer. He was trembling.
Behind him, a drone dropped into view.
Too close.
I yanked the kid behind me and launched a blast of electromagnetic energy. The drone exploded midair, sparks raining down.
Jacob ran over. "That gunfire's gonna bring more."
"I know. We're moving."
The kid looked up at me, eyes full of something I hadn't seen in a while.
Hope.
We got him somewhere safe—a crawlspace beneath a church. I left him food from my pack and told him to stay quiet until we returned.
And we would return.
I owed him that.
When we finally stopped to rest in the ruins of what used to be a library, Jacob collapsed against the wall, rubbing his temples.
"Whatever's happening out there… it's not just about the Harbingers anymore."
"No," I said quietly, watching the Nexus energy flicker around my fingers. "It never was."
He looked at me. "So what now?"
I stared at the sky—what little I could see through the broken ceiling.
"Now, we find the others. We save Booker. And we get ahead of whatever's coming."
Because if we didn't?
The next time Chrono or the one after him came calling…
There wouldn't be a city left to fight for.