He stopped at the doorway.
Ivy looked up all sunshine and wrongness.
Hale muttered under his breath, voice dry and distant, almost like he didn't fully understand the words himself.
"You should go back..."
Ivy blinked.
"What?"
Hale stared at her
but it wasn't really her he saw.
Not this Ivy.
It was the memory of another Ivy...
standing just behind her, in a space where she didn't belong.
A flicker. A shadow of her.
The version that never made it out.
He spoke again, softer this time.
"Before you forget"
But before he could finish
A voice sliced through the moment.
Easy. Sharp. Inevitable.
"Before you forget you're supposed to live, not rot."
Gyroson.
Stepping into view with a coffee mug in one hand and that dangerous, familiar half-smile on his face.
He leaned lazily against the doorframe.
His eyes caught both of them, like he already knew how the scene would end.
"Back to school, both of you."
The words hung in the air like a sentence written before they were even spoken.
Ivy opened her mouth, halfway to protest
Then stopped.
Even Hale blinked dazed.
Gyroson tilted his head.
His voice was light... but there was no room to argue.
"Trust me, kiddo.
Staying still too long turns the wrong parts of you permanent."
Tick.
Tick.
Neither sound came from the walls.
Both were real.
Hale didn't argue.
Neither did Ivy.
They just nodded.
Because somehow deep, deep down
Something inside both of them already knew:
If they stayed here...
They'd forget what it meant to leave.