The table was quiet except for the clink of spoons. She sat across from Kai, watching him like she was waiting for him to mess up.
"You know what's funny?" she said, picking at her bread. "You're a doctor who tells people how to live better lives… but you always look half-dead in the morning."
Kai rubbed his eyes and took a sip of tea. "I'm going to the hospital, not a comedy show."
She smirked. "Exactly. Patients will think you're scarier than their illnesses."
He shook his head, trying not to smile. "Careful. Keep talking and I'll write you down as my first patient."
She laughed, sliding the plate toward him. "Eat something. Can't have the great psychological doctor passing out at work."
"You never eat enough yourself," he said, nudging the toast back.
"So we share." She tore the toast in half and put a piece back on his plate.
For a moment, it felt normal. Her teasing, his annoyance, the little rhythm they always fell into. Ordinary. Too ordinary.
Kai didn't know it would be the last time.
After breakfast, Kai Asher stepped outside. Keys in hand. The sun pressed on his neck, hot and sharp. He could smell smoke from someone cooking nearby, wet grass still clinging to the morning. He was thinking about Lisiona, her laugh, the way she rolled her eyes at him, when a scream cut through everything.
It was his mother.
His stomach dropped. He dropped the keys too. They hit the driveway and bounced. He didn't care.
He ran inside.
Lisiona was on the floor. Chair tipped over. Cup smashed. Tea ran across the tiles like dark water. His mother was on her knees, shaking her, crying, whispering something under her breath.
"Lisiona! Wake up! Please, wake up!"
Kai dropped beside her. She felt too light. Fragile. Cold. He brushed her hair from her face. Felt for her pulse. Weak. Barely there.
"I'm taking her to the hospital," he said, voice tight, shaking. His mother clutched his arm. He gently pulled away and lifted Lisiona.
Outside, he put her in the car. Her head lolled sideways, hair falling across her pale face. Her hand hung limply in his. He held it anyway, like holding it could keep her alive. Engine roared. Tires crunched over gravel. Red lights dragged. Horns blared. Voices shouted. He didn't notice.
At the hospital, nurses grabbed Lisiona immediately. He followed as fast as he could, heart racing, stomach twisting. His mother stayed close, hands on his shoulder, shaking.
A doctor came out, file in hand. Calm. Serious.
"She has a rare tumor," he said. "She needs an operation immediately."
Kai pressed a hand to his mouth. Chest burning. Ordinary mornings—Lisiona teasing, clinking spoons, burnt toast—gone. Everything ordinary gone.
He realized life could break. Just like that.
The doctor's face was calm, too calm.
"There's only one specialist who can operate," he said quietly. "But he can't get here. The city… it's falling apart. Gangs, blocked streets, riots—they've taken control. Even emergency routes are cut off."
Kai felt his stomach twist. "Then… what do we do?"
"We'll try," the doctor said. "But it won't be the same. The risk—"
He didn't hear the rest. He was staring at Lisiona, lying on the table, her skin pale, her lips slightly parted, her small chest barely rising. Her dark hair fell in a messy halo across the pillow. He wanted to tell her to hold on. He wanted to shake the world until it made sense. But there were no words.
The operation began. The bright lights above made everything harsh, unforgiving. Machines beeped around her, each sound slicing through the tense air. The smell of antiseptic burned in his nose. Every shuffle of footsteps, every whisper, every rustle of gloves pressed on him like a weight.
Time stretched. Seconds became heavy. Every tick of the monitor felt like a hammer in his chest.
Outside the hospital, the city was unraveling. Smoke rose in twisted columns from burning cars. People ran, some screaming, some shouting slogans against officials who had sold the country to the gangs. Stones flew through shattered windows, tires rolled through overturned barricades. Streetlights flickered in the chaos, casting everything in fractured shadows.
Kai's mind flickered with fragments of news he had ignored: politicians who promised safety, yet secretly funded the gang leaders to suppress dissent. Citizens had poured into the streets, furious. Ordinary men, women, teenagers—armed with little more than anger—clashed with hired thugs wearing badges like lies.
And yet, among the ordinary chaos, a strange shadow moved differently. At first, Kai thought it was a trick of the smoke and fire. But in the corner of the street outside, a figure seemed almost unreal: gliding, slipping between chaos and crowd, untouched by flame or debris. Its presence chilled him. A pulse of power that didn't belong in the waking world. He blinked. It vanished.
The room outside the OR was still, silent, as if the city's chaos had entered only his mind.
Then the door opened. The doctor stepped out. Face tight, eyes dark.
"She didn't make it," he said quietly.
Kai's chest tightened. His hands went to his face, fingers trembling. Nothing came. No tears, no sound. Lisiona was gone.
He looked at her small, pale form one last time. The hospital lights reflected off the metal rails. The sterile smell, the quiet beeping, the faint echo of voices in the corridor—they all pressed in, sharp and cruel.
Everything ordinary—her teasing smile, breakfast, burnt toast, clinking spoons—was gone.
And in the hollow quiet, one thought curled inside him, cold and certain:
They will pay.
He stayed there, still, letting the weight of it sink in. Everything safe was gone. And the city, the country, the very foundations of the world he thought he knew, were burning.
Somewhere in the darkness, something had changed. He could feel it. And Kai knew, as the shadow flickered at the edge of his vision, that nothing would ever be ordinary again.
The distant roar of the riot seeped into the sterile hospital walls. Flames licked at buildings blocks away, smoke choked the air, and the shouts of the desperate, the betrayed, and the furious filled every alley. Corruption had poisoned the city, and the people finally saw the rot.
Kai clenched his fists. Every ruined street, every broken window, every dying cry of someone caught in the madness was a reminder of what had been stolen from him. Lisiona. His family. His life.
The shadow flickered again in the corner of his vision. Not just smoke, not just fire—something else, something older, watching, waiting. A pulse of power that whispered in a language he didn't yet understand. It made his skin prickle, made his heart beat faster.
Kai let it in. He didn't understand what it was yet. He only knew one thing:
The world had broken, and he would not forgive.
And in that knowledge, a cold clarity settled in his chest.