Miyako didn't move.
Not right away.
Not after the rift vanished.
Not after the stars blinked back into view.
She just held him—arms locked around the wreck of what was left—and let time do nothing.
Let it pass. Let it hover.
Let him be real a little longer.
The Plateau was still beneath her knees.
Still, but not silent.
She could hear it now—subtle things. The shift of wind through broken stone. The whisper of blood drying on fabric.
The low, near-silent rasp of a breath that should not have still existed.
He was alive.
Barely.
But not gone.
Her fingers twitched around his back, afraid to loosen, afraid to confirm how little weight he had left.
She didn't speak. Didn't dare. The wrong sound might finish what the rift hadn't.
So she sat there—embracing ruin.
Holding the boy who hadn't asked her to.
Clutching onto the pieces because he couldn't anymore.
And when her own breath finally shook free from her chest, it came quiet.
Like an apology.
Like a prayer.
Her throat tightened.
"It should've happened by now."
She pressed her forehead to his, barely breathing. "Come on… come on, you stubborn bastard.
This is where it's supposed to happen. This is where the plateau gives something back."
Her hands curled tighter. Not to protect him. To hold him in place.
To stop the nothing from claiming what little was left.
"I did everything right," she whispered, eyes squeezed shut.
"I followed every step and you bled for it. So where is it?"
No answer.
Only the slow, failing rhythm of a body that didn't know whether to let go.
"Please."
She didn't know if she said it out loud. She didn't care.
And then—
Something stirred.
Not in him.
In the air.
A flicker. A thread. A pulse that didn't belong to breath or blood.
Miyako's eyes snapped open.
A glow—thin at first, then growing—began to curl along his ruined shoulder. Not gold. Not white.
A dark, greenish light. The color of old forests.
Of life that had kept going long after the world stopped watching.
It wrapped around him like mist, like memory made visible.
It didn't blaze.
It bloomed.
Where it touched, flesh returned. Muscle knit. Bone reformed.
The wreckage of his ribs pulled inward, folding themselves into symmetry.
His leg straightened with a crack that should have made her wince—except it wasn't pain anymore. It was correction. Renewal.
His breath hitched.
Then evened.
The light deepened. Sharpened. Spread.
The cloth on his shoulder fell away as skin reformed beneath it. His hand flexed—once, weakly, then again with strength that hadn't been there seconds ago.
Miyako couldn't speak. She just watched. Held him. Trembled as every broken piece of him came back together like the world had finally remembered who he was supposed to be.
She let out a breath that felt like it had been caged in her chest for hours.
And for the first time since the rift opened—
She believed.
However.
As his body knit itself whole again, something deeper stayed broken.
Not in flesh. In self.
Miyako held him.
The Plateau waited.
But inside, he was falling.
Not gently. Not peacefully.
Like dropping through his own bones.
Through every moment he'd survived just enough to regret.
Darkness swallowed the edges of thought. Time went thin. Weightless.
And then—
A voice.
"Wooow… You really scraped your way out of that one, huh?"
Not Miyako's.
Not his.
His.
The other one.
The voice stepped out of the dark like it had always been there. Waiting. Same tone. Same mouth. Same face. But sharper. Hungrier. Not broken—burned in.
Averic tried to speak, but the words caught.
He smirked. "Don't bother. You're not in the part of you that talks."
Around them, the dark shimmered—like oil on water.
Like blood under torchlight.
He watched Averic in silence, head tilted, like inspecting a cracked mirror.
Then he laughed.
Not loud. Not sane. A cracked sound, like bones grinding under a grin.
"She begged for you to live," he giggled, head tilting. "And this world—ha—actually listened."
He leaned in, eyes gleaming with something too sharp to be pity.
"But look at you. Look what it took. You crawled out with your soul duct-taped together and your spine made of spite. Barely."
A pause. His smile faded just enough to let something colder bleed through.
"And you still think that counts as winning?"
Averic's fists clenched. Or thought they did.
No body here.
Just weight.
Just will.
But it was enough.
—
"Get out of my head," I rasped.
He laughed. Quiet. Cruel.
"I never left."
His grin cracked.
Not in malice. In something closer to pain.
"You really don't get it, do you?"
He stepped closer—just once. The dark shimmered around his boots like it didn't want to touch him.
"I've been the one holding the line. Every time you fell, I stood up. Every time you broke, I kept you moving."
"And still, you scream at me for what I am."
"You lock me away in this void—no light, no voice—like I'm the shame you don't want to carry."
His voice didn't rise. It dropped. Heavy. Real.
"I didn't drag you through hell, Averic. I carried you."
The silence between us turned colder.
"You call me a monster. A mistake. You fight me every time I try to keep us alive. But you're wrong about one thing…"
His hand hovered in the air—then closed, slow and trembling, into a fist.
"I never wanted your place."
A pause. His next words quieter. Barely spoken.
"I wanted your trust."
He looked away, jaw clenched.
He began to walk away.
Didn't wait for an answer. Didn't expect one.
Each step he took sank into the dark, the shadows folding up around his heels like a curtain drawing shut.
But before the last of him vanished, his voice cut through the silence—low, steady, not cruel this time.
"I'll be watching."
A pause.
"And if you fall again… I'll take the reins. Not because I want to—but because I can't watch you crawl through that kind of pain again."
Then he was gone.
And I was alone—if I'd ever really been anything else.
But something stayed.
Not the echo of his voice.
Not the threat.
Just a feeling.
Heavy.
Unspoken.
Real.
I didn't want to believe him.
But I did.
Not all of it. Not yet. Just enough to wonder who I'd be without him.
And maybe that was the part that scared me most.
The dark didn't vanish.
It faded. Slowly. Like breath on a mirror.
The weight of his words stayed with me, echoing somewhere deeper than thought—but the shadows peeled back.
Just enough to let something else in.
Warmth.
Not just around me. Under me. Holding me.
Arms.
Breath.
Miyako.
My head lolled to one side, and pain followed—duller now, like the edges had been sanded down just enough for me to remember I was still made of skin and not smoke.
Her face was close. Too close. Worry carved into every line like it belonged there.
I blinked once. Twice. The world didn't disappear.
Neither did she.
"…you're still here," I rasped. My voice sounded like it had lost a fight with gravel and sarcasm.
"Great. I was worried I'd wake up in
hell and find you waiting."
She stiffened. Pulled back just enough to see my face.
Then smacked it.
Not hard.
Just enough to prove I was solid.
Just enough to make me grunt.
"You absolute bastard," she hissed—half a sob, half a growl.
"Don't you ever scare me like that again."
"Can't make any promises," I muttered. "Dying's kind of my side hobby now."
She smacked me again.
"Ow."
We stayed like that a moment longer—her arms still around me, my head resting against her shoulder like it might roll off otherwise.
Eventually, she pulled back.
Not far.
Just enough to meet my eyes.
Then, slowly, she helped me sit up.
Everything in my body groaned like a rebuilt doorframe—not pain, not exactly. Just the echo of where pain had lived for too long.
I caught my breath. Rolled my shoulder. Flexed my fingers.
Whole again.
But not untouched.
She rose first, brushing dust and dried blood from her knees. Then offered me a hand.
I took it.
We stood together—wobbly, but upright.
The Plateau stretched out around us like nothing had happened.
The rift was gone.
The silence stayed.
Miyako looked at me.
Not demanding. Just searching.
"What happened down there?" she asked softly.
I hesitated.
Not because I didn't know what to say—but because I wasn't sure which part to say first.
So I settled on the truth.
"The worst version of me gave a pep talk."
She blinked. "…What?"
I exhaled. "Long story. Not one I'm proud of. But I'm here. We're here."
Her brows furrowed. "That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I've got right now."
And somehow, she didn't press further.
She just nodded. Her mind Tired from worry.
But still standing.
Just like me.
We didn't say anything after that.
Didn't need to.
Just stood there—watching as the world caught its breath.
And then…
The Plateau shifted.
It didn't crack or split like before. It expanded.
A deep, resonant hum rolled through the stone beneath our feet. The horizon didn't move—it unfolded.
Like it had only been pretending to
be finite until now.
Land stretched outward in all directions, tripling in size within seconds.
The sky seemed to lift, the air thinned, and something older stirred beneath the surface—less like a creature.
It was more like a memory waking up.
The ruins that once dotted the Plateau stood taller now.
Stronger. No longer crumbled and bent with time, but rebuilt—clean lines, polished stone, light humming in seams where moss had once grown.
Doors that had once been locked by history now glowed faintly with invitation.
And the color…
Where once the Plateau had been gray and bloodstained, dry and hollow, it now pulsed with life.
Grass pushed up through cracks like it had always been waiting.
Trees bloomed with impossible colors—deep emeralds, glowing orange veins, soft violet leaves that shifted in the breeze like silk.
The wind smelled different too.
Less like ash.
More like beginning.
Miyako turned slowly, her gaze wide—not in shock, but recognition. Like she'd been waiting for this.
"It's alive," she whispered. Not in awe. In certainty.
"Finally."
I blinked, watching the world shift around us—the stone breathing, the buildings reshaping like they'd never been ruins, the colors bleeding back into the land like the Plateau had finally decided to wake up.
"…What does that mean?" I asked, still half on my feet.
"Miyako. What's going on?"
She didn't answer right away.
Just stared forward—shoulders tense, eyes locked on the horizon where the edge of the Plateau no longer ended.
Then, soft enough to feel like a warning:
"The next part has begun."
Unfortunately.
We didn't get to enjoy the Plateau's new look for long.
Because the sky had other plans.
It hiccuped. Then vomited a person.
A rift cracked open midair—deep blue, pulsing, pissed off—and chucked a full-grown human like a cosmic cannonball.
"Is that a—"
"Yep," Miyako said, deadpan.
"They're screaming."
"Yep."
"They're not slowing down."
"Definitely not."
We both squinted up.
The figure flailed.
Then zeroed in on our exact location like fate had rage-aimed them.
Miyako pointed at me. "You catch em."
"What?!" I pointed right back. "It's your turn!"
"They're doing terminal velocity! Your bones are already broken!"
"I just got them back!"
The shadow above got bigger. Louder. Closer.
"Oh motherfuc—MOVE!"
We didn't run. We dove—arms flailing, faces first, opposite directions—screaming like synchronized lunatics.
BOOM.
Something hit the ground behind us like a god's bowling ball.
Dust exploded in every direction. Pebbles rained from the sky. I had a rock in my ear.
We both groaned.
And in the center of a brand-new crater…
Someone also groaned.
Face-down. Smoking slightly.
Miyako coughed. "Next time, the sky drops someone, you're playing trampoline."
I spat dirt. "I will literally throw them back."
We crept toward the edge of the crater, boots crunching over scorched stone.
Dust curled up from the impact site, still thick, still settling.
At the center lay a figure—probably still breathing.
..Hopefully.