Written by Gavink
Chapter 1 — The Last Breath in Augustus
Part 1 — The Echo Before Dying
Written by Gavink
Augustus breathed like a living thing. The city wasn't kind, but it was honest — its air thick with
iron, incense, and the residue of unspoken sins. Streetlights flickered like restless spirits, each
one dimming as if tired of bearing witness. Beneath a sagging neon sign, the world shrank to
rain, rust, and the low hum of a streetcar somewhere in the distance. The old pipes along the
walls exhaled steam, ghosts of industry whispering secrets through narrow veins of metal.
Somewhere, a temple bell tolled, its echo swallowed by the hiss of wet asphalt. And above it
all, Tiek Drayden watched. The rain always came in whispers before midnight. I'd gotten used
to it — the way the water beat against the tin roof of my apartment like impatient fingers.
Augustus had its rhythm, a pulse you could almost mistake for your own heartbeat if you
stayed too long. Tonight that rhythm faltered. Smoke curled from the end of my cigarette, a
slow spiral dissolving into the dark. Down below, the veins of the city pulsed — ribbons of blue
and magenta bending around puddles, bending around lives. Every drop of light looked like a
story ending somewhere. My phone buzzed. One word on the screen: RUN. I didn't question
it. Malik never texted unless it meant something. I grabbed my coat and keys, the cigarette
still burning on the windowsill. Tiek's boots hit the street with a sharp rhythm, his reflection
stretching thin across the flooded pavement. The chill gnawed through his sleeves, but the
adrenaline burned hotter. He cut through Lotus Alley, the narrow artery that connected
downtown's pulse to the underbelly of Augustus. The walls dripped with graffiti — half art, half
warning — and the dim light of vending machines cast the world in soft, shifting color. That
was when he saw him. A man in a long coat stood ahead, motionless beneath the flickering
glow of a broken lamp. Broad shoulders, hat pulled low, a glint of metal at his side. Tiek
slowed. The man's eyes found him — gray, flat, and ancient. They didn't just look at him; they
looked through him, measuring every sin, every survival. And in that moment, Tiek knew. This
wasn't random. This was reckoning. My breath came out sharp in the cold. I didn't know if
Malik had sent the warning because of this man — but my gut said yes. There was a
heaviness in the air that pressed down on my ribs, a silence too intentional to be weather. He
took one step forward, and I swear the whole street leaned away from him. I should've turned
and run. But something in me stayed. A whisper crossed my mind, soft and half-familiar: "If
you keep running, you'll never wake up." I clenched my fists, rain tracing cold lines down my
PART 2 — THREADS OF FATE
The man in the leather coat stopped three meters from Tiek.
The space between them felt like the final page of a book neither wanted to
finish reading.
The city seemed to withdraw — street sounds dimming, lights paling, the air
itself growing viscous with tension.
He didn't raise the gun immediately. He simply stared, eyes like wet asphalt,
heavy with something that wasn't hate.
"You shouldn't have come back to this street," he said. His voice was low,
measured, strangely calm.
The accent wasn't local. Eastern, maybe — but worn down by years in Augustus'
concrete mouth.
Tiek tilted his head. "Guess I missed the part where it stopped being mine."
There's a flavor to fear you never forget — metallic, bitter, half memory, half
instinct. But that wasn't what I felt.
It was clarity. Sharp and cold, like waking up mid-dream.
The man's hand hovered near his coat pocket, and I saw the faint outline of the
weapon. But I also saw something else — his hesitation. His jaw clenched once,
his eyes flicked sideways as if someone, somewhere, was watching us both.
Maybe fate itself was.
Lightning flashed. The neon sign overhead glitched, flickering between
SALVATION and ATION.
Tiek's reflection rippled across a puddle — one version of him standing tall,
the other already falling. Rain blurred the line between the two.
The man sighed. "It isn't personal."
Tiek smirked. "It never is."
And then the world folded into motion.
A flash. A deafening bloom of sound. The smell of ozone and rain-scorched
metal.
Tiek staggered back, the alley bending around him as if reality itself flinched.
His hand went to his side — warmth blooming under his palm.
The man's silhouette dissolved into the storm, swallowed by shadow before the
echo faded.
Funny… I thought dying would feel different. But there's no thunder, no grand
cinematic collapse — just this quiet drift. Like the city exhaled and took me
with it.
I dropped to my knees. The ground was cold, but not unkind. The rain hit my
face, washing away whatever name I'd made for myself.
The lights of Augustus stretched and bled together — yellow, blue, red — all
smearing into a single endless horizon.
I wanted to say something, to curse or laugh or pray. Instead, I whispered to
no one: "Don't forget me."
I didn't know who I meant — the city, my brother, or the version of me that
still believed tomorrow existed.
His body slumped against the brick wall, breath shallow. The puddles around him
shimmered like portals to another place.
Somewhere in the distance, a bus rumbled by, tires hissing on wet asphalt — the
last heartbeat of a city that didn't notice it was losing one of its own.
Above him, thunder rolled again. But this time, it didn't fade. It grew deeper,
stranger — a vibration that wasn't of this world.
---
PART 3 — THE UNRAVELING
Time fractured. Each raindrop froze in midair, suspended like glass beads. The
colors of Augustus folded inward, bleeding into darkness shot through with gold
threads.
Tiek's body remained still, but his consciousness — whatever spark still clung
to him — drifted upward, weightless.
For a moment, he hovered between two worlds: the familiar hum of the city below
and an endless, luminous void above.
Whispers slid through the light. Ancient, mechanical, divine.
"Soul integrity: compromised."
"Fragment detected."
"Reconstruction protocol… initiating."
I can't tell if I'm floating or falling. There's no body to move, no lungs to
fill, but I feel every heartbeat I ever had — all happening at once.
The light isn't warm. It's… aware. Like it's looking at me, through me,
rewriting my story in symbols I can't read.
I reach out — or think I do — and the light trembles. Memories spill out:
Augustus rooftops, my mother's song, Malik's laugh, the scent of incense.
They scatter like paper in wind.
"Wait—" I start to say. "Don't—"
But the light doesn't listen. It folds me in, pulling me through its veins like
ink into water.
Golden rivers of energy swirl around him — vast and alive. Within them, shapes
move: faceless beings whispering in forgotten tongues, the machinery of
reincarnation grinding with celestial precision.
At the center of it all, Tiek's essence condenses — a flame coalescing into a
fragile, human silhouette.
The voices converge.
"Soul anchor located."
"Rebirth… authorized."
A pulse of light — sharp, absolute — erupts.
Everything goes quiet. The rain, the city, the noise inside my head — gone.
There's only heartbeat and light.
Then, somewhere in the distance, a woman screams. Not in fear — in labor. A
newborn cry rises, thin and fierce.
And just like that, breath rushes into lungs that aren't mine.
I open my eyes.
A baby lies wrapped in silk, golden light fading from his forehead. The
midwives gasp, whispering about omens and stormfire blessings.
Outside, rain falls on a world far removed from Augustus — a land of stone
temples and glowing mountains.
The infant's eyes open briefly. For an instant, the reflection of a neon city
flickers in his gaze — then vanishes.
The mark on his brow pulses once, like a heartbeat carried across universes.
He has no name yet in this world. But somewhere deep inside, the soul
remembers.
(End of Chapter 1 — The Last Breath in Augustus)