Kai's laughter scraped through the pit like rusted wire. It echoed up the walls, sharp and wet, breaking against the stone and dying in the dark. He cackled at the wall, at the corpse, at the shadows pretending to be gods. His throat was dry, lips cracked and blackened with blood, but somehow he still managed to whisper between spasms of laughter.
"They said I'd break. Said I'd forget who I am. But joke's on them—there's nothing left to forget! I'm the whole system now. Sovereign? He's in the dirt. I ate him. Swallowed him with the fingernails I don't have."
He stared at his hand. Two nails left.
His eyes were dilated, and not just because of the dark. Dopamine disregation of some type.
He felt like a god, like all the knowledge in the world was entering his brain and he could grasp it all.
He chewed one nail absently until it throbbed, flinched, then laughed again.
"Nope. Still here. Still real. Still... Slothborn? Godborn? Wait, no. That's not right. You're not real either." He jabbed a bone at the wall. "You're just yesterday's hallucination trying to get a sequel."
And then the air split.
A golden crack tore open at the bottom of the pit — a vertical wound hissing with compressed resonance. It pulsed — heat, then chill, then humming light. Two figures stepped through.
The first was a boy. Shorter than Kai, with messy blond curls and a heart-shaped face. His eyes were unnaturally blue — like sky that had never known pollution. He wore a patched vest over scavenged armor, a sleek dagger strapped to his hip like someone had made him carry it. His expression flickered between wonder and mourning.
The second figure was cloaked. Hood up. Edges blurred, unreadable. Even looking directly, the form refused to stay still — like memory itself was glitching. Only a thin scar under his left eye betrayed something human. Something permanent.
But Kai knew that presence.
"You..."
His voice cracked.
Then came the pain. Sudden. Sharp.
His body jerked violently as if struck by lightning. He staggered back, hitting the wall with a hollow thud. Scabs split open across his back and arms. The bandaged thigh tore again — fresh blood pooling under him. Burned skin peeled as his shirt stuck to the tong-shaped scar on his chest. He smelled his own infection.
"BACK!" he barked, voice torn and wild. "You're not real. You're just another test. Another Sovereign echo in a prettier shell. You're not—don't come closer!"
Neo paused. But Waffles took a half-step forward.
Kai screamed.
It wasn't words. Just a throat-tearing sound as he lunged, swinging a shard of bone like a knife.
Neo moved fast. He dropped the cloak's blur, tossing it aside as he sprinted toward him. "Kai, stop—!"
But Kai didn't stop.
He clawed at the air, eyes wide, blood dripping down his torso. His left eye was bruised shut, and the right was feral with delirium. "YOU'RE NOT HIM! NOBODY'S HIM!"
Waffles flanked from the side, ducking low. "I got his leg!"
Neo slammed into Kai's torso and tackled him to the stone floor. Kai writhed with strength he shouldn't have had — kicking with a half-swollen ankle, snarling through split lips, spitting blood through broken teeth.
"LET ME GO! I DON'T WANT HELP!"
His burden flared — pain roaring like fire through every nerve. But he screamed through it. Fought through it.
"I DON'T WANT LIES! You're not even here!"
"Waffles, now!" Neo shouted.
Waffles dropped his knee into Kai's thigh — a shout of pain tore from Kai's throat — and grabbed his shoulder. "I got him! I got him—inject him!"
Kai thrashed under them, foam at the corner of his mouth. His eyes rolled. He bucked his head upward — cracked it against Neo's nose with a sickening crunch.
Neo grunted, reeled slightly, but didn't hesitate.
He plunged the syringe into Kai's neck.
The needle hissed.
The serum surged.
Kai arched.
His scream collapsed into a ragged gasp.
His arms, still clawing, slowed.
Then stopped.
His limbs fell limp — shivering, twitching.
Silence.
Only the sound of his breath — wet, rasping, still alive.
Waffles was panting, arms still braced against Kai's chest. "Holy crap. That was…"
Neo didn't respond.
His hand hovered near Kai's face, fingers trembling slightly — just for a moment. Then clenched into a fist.
He looked down at the boy beneath him — the trembling mess, the gashes, the sunken ribs, the blackened fingertips, the dangling smokes pouch clutched in a death-grip — and saw, finally, someone home behind the eyes.
Kai blinked.
Then blinked again.
His pupils had shrunk. His jaw trembled, but he wasn't biting anymore. Just breathing.
"I... Waffles? Neo?" he whispered.
Neo loosened his grip. "Yeah. We're here."
"I'm... I'm so confused. Who is this? What is happening?"
"I'm Waferlen Crowswell," the blond said proudly, puffing up his chest despite the quiver in his voice. "But people call me Waffles. We're from the future. We're here to help you. I can't do much, but food and medicine — that I can do." his eyes were teary it's like seeing Kai like this wasn't what he expected.
Kai squinted at him. "You're a child."
Waffles blinked, confused. "I'm seventeen."
Kai blinked slower. "Why are you crying, then?"
Waffles wiped his eyes with his sleeve. "I'm not."
Neo eased back, motioning for Waffles to do the same. They released him slowly, like handling cracked glass.
Kai sagged against the stone. Some tension bled out of him. His voice was small now. "You're both dreams. Guilt. Echoes." His eyes slipped closed. "But if you're dreams... then I don't want to wake up."
"Kai we're real, truly"
Waffles sat back on his heels, arms shaking. "He didn't even recognize us at first. How long was he down here?"
Neo wiped blood from his lip. His gaze lingered on Kai's open palm — shredded, purple-black, missing three nails. "Too long."
Kai murmured to the wall again, voice hoarse. "Waffles... that's a stupid name for a ghost."
Neo didn't argue. He just moved to the corner, unzipping the plastic bag.
"Eat. Drink. Heal."
Inside: water bottles. Clean cloth wraps. Antiseptic. Four ration burgers still warm. A can of soda.
Kai stared at the food.
Then looked at the corpse.
The shame hit first.
Then the hunger hit harder.
His whole body lunged forward before he realized it. His fractured leg dragged behind, but he didn't care.
He snatched a burger with trembling hands and bit in like he hadn't tasted food in years. There was no decorum, no hesitation. He tore into it like an animal.
Crumbs fell. Grease streaked his chin. He didn't chew fully. Just devoured.
"It's... weird," Waffles said quietly. "Seeing him eat real food. And him without his tattoos."
Neo didn't answer.
He watched Kai silently, jaw tight, eyes hollow.
The second burger disappeared. Then the third. Neo cracked the soda open before Kai could, and gently passed it to him.
Kai didn't thank him.
Just drank.
Neo busied himself with cleanup — wrappers, broken glass, old blood vials. Quiet. Mechanical.
"Can we treat your wounds?" Neo asked gently.
Kai took a bite and looked up at him. Slowly. One eye swollen, the other glassy but alert.
His thoughts were clearer than they had been in weeks. The medicine worked fast. His fever was still burning, but not boiling over anymore.
"Why are you here?" he rasped. "I'm not your friend. I'm just a nobody. I pushed you away because I don't care about anyone but myself."
Silence.
Then, with tired resolve, "Fine. Treat them. But tell me — how is this possible? How did you know where to find me?"
"I have two types of abilities," Neo said at last. "One is physical time travel — like this. What we're doing now. But it's... odd. Once I return to my time, the me living your present receives the memory. So by the time I reach this point, I don't need to travel again. It already happened."
Waffles blinked. "Like a memory echo?"
"Exactly. You won't remember this, by the way," Neo added. "You just wanted to see him. As a human."
Kai looked confused again, eyes fluttering. "You keep saying that word. Human…"
"I'll fill you in on everything" neo reaffirms
"The only time I have to physically travel," Neo continued, quieter now, "is when Sovereign gives me a quest and locks the moment. Otherwise, I stay out of it."
Kai downed the rest of the water and grabbed the fourth burger. He paused — just for a breath — and looked at them both.
There was something in his eyes now.
Recognition. Fragile. Wavering.
Then it vanished again, swallowed by exhaustion and shame.
Neo and Waffles moved in with medical kits, patching wounds. Cleaning his chest. Wrapping what they could.
When they peeled back the cloth over the tong-shaped burn scar — blackened and blistered, half-infected, the skin cracked like overcooked meat — Neo froze.
Waffles was unwrapping his flayed arm bandages. And sanitized the wound which made Kai flinch.
His hands trembled.
Then steadied.
The pain wasn't just in Kai's body anymore.
Kai didn't resist. But his gaze flicked from Neo to Waffles and back.
Why?
Why would someone pin him down, save him, feed him?
Why care?
Why now?
He didn't ask. Not aloud.
But somewhere in the smallest tremble of his fingers — in the way he leaned just slightly toward warmth — the question lived.
And as they worked — stitch by stitch, bandage by bandage — something inside Kai began to steady.
Not healed.
Not whole.
But here.
Alive.
And lucid.