Mia's POV
Time freezes.
Sophia's finger is on the trigger. Her empty eyes are locked on mine. That wrong, deep voice comes from her mouth: "You weren't supposed to remember."
Adrian's body tenses above me, ready to take the bullet.
"NO!" I scream, and something inside me SNAPS.
Power explodes from my chest—raw, invisible, impossible. It hits Sophia like a physical wave, sending her flying backward into the hallway. The gun fires, but the bullet goes wild, embedding in the ceiling.
Everyone stares at me.
"What—" Adrian breathes. "What did you just do?"
I stare at my hands. They're glowing. Actually GLOWING with soft golden light that fades even as I watch.
"I don't know," I whisper. "I just... I didn't want you to die."
My mother rushes to me, pulling me up from the floor. "Oh my god. Oh my god, you manifested already?"
"Manifested what?" But before anyone can answer, Marcus is at the doorway, checking on Sophia.
"She's unconscious," he reports. "But alive. Whatever hit her knocked her out cold."
"That was me," I say, voice shaking. "I did that. But I don't know HOW."
"The rebirth gift comes with powers," my mother explains quickly. "Different for everyone. Mine is seeing moments from other timelines. Marcus can sense when someone's lying. Adrian can—" She stops, looking at him.
"I can feel when people are about to die," Adrian says quietly. "That's how I knew to come back. How I knew you needed saving. I can feel death approaching like a cold wind."
I look down at my still-tingling hands. "And I can... what? Push people with my mind?"
"Apparently." Marcus rejoins us, phone already out. "Security is on the way up. We need to secure Sophia before whatever was controlling her comes back."
"What WAS controlling her?" I demand. "That wasn't Sophia. Her eyes were wrong. Her voice was wrong."
"Something took over her body," my mother says grimly. "Something that doesn't want you to succeed. The same something that's been trying to stop us for years."
"Us?" I look between them. "This has happened before?"
"Every time someone comes back, there are... obstacles," Marcus explains. "Bad luck that's too targeted to be coincidence. People getting in the way. Sometimes full possession like we just saw. We call it the Shadow. We don't know what it is, but it doesn't want people to fix their regrets."
A chill runs down my spine. "Why not?"
"We don't know that either," Adrian says. "But we know it's powerful. And it's angry that you remembered your past life. Most people who come back don't remember dying. They just wake up in the past with a vague feeling that something's wrong, that they need to fix something. You're different. You remember everything."
"So do you," I point out.
"Because I came back twice. The second time, the memories stuck." Adrian's gray eyes are intense. "But you remembered on your FIRST try. That's never happened before. That makes you dangerous to whatever is pulling the strings."
Security guards flood into the office, surrounding Sophia's unconscious body. Marcus gives them orders while my mother wraps a blanket around my shoulders. I didn't even realize I was shaking.
"We need to get you somewhere safe," she says. "Somewhere the Shadow can't reach you easily."
"I'm not running," I say, surprising myself. "If this thing wants to stop me, let it try. I didn't come back from death to hide."
Adrian's expression shifts to something almost like pride. "Then we train you. Your power is raw right now—you don't know how to control it. But if we can teach you, you'll be able to protect yourself."
"How long will that take?"
"Weeks. Maybe months."
"I have eighty-nine days," I remind him. "Eighty-eight now. I don't have months."
The room falls silent. Everyone knows I'm right.
"Then we accelerate everything," Marcus decides. "Training starts tomorrow. Vocal, dance, media... and power control. We throw everything we have at making you ready."
"Ready for what?" I ask.
"For whatever happens when you figure out your regret," my mother says softly. "Because once you know what it is, the Shadow will do everything to stop you from fixing it. Including killing everyone you love."
They don't let me go home that night. Too dangerous, they say. Instead, I sleep in a guest room at Adrian's penthouse—all white furniture and floor-to-ceiling windows showing the city lights.
I don't sleep. I pace, replaying everything. The golden glow from my hands. Sophia's possessed eyes. The Shadow that hunts people like me.
At 2 AM, I give up and wander out of the guest room. The penthouse is huge and silent. I find Adrian's home office by accident, the door slightly open, light spilling out.
He's still awake, staring at his computer screen.
"Couldn't sleep either?" I ask from the doorway.
He looks up, and for a moment, his carefully controlled mask slips. He looks exhausted. Haunted. "I keep seeing it," he admits. "The bullet heading toward you. I felt you about to die. The cold wind started blowing. And then you—" He stops.
"I saved us," I finish. "With power I didn't know I had."
"You saved me," Adrian corrects. "You could have let me take that bullet. I'm already on my second chance—I knew the risks. But you pushed Sophia away to protect ME."
I step into the office. "Of course I did. I'm not letting anyone die for me. Not again."
"Again?" His eyes sharpen. "What do you mean again?"
The words slip out before I can stop them: "In my first life, my best friend Luna died in a car crash. She was coming to pick me up after Ethan dumped me, and she was speeding because I was crying on the phone. A truck ran a red light. She died instantly." Tears burn my eyes. "I always blamed myself. If I hadn't called her that night, if I hadn't been so dramatic about a stupid breakup—"
"It wasn't your fault," Adrian says firmly.
"Wasn't it?" I wipe my eyes angrily. "She died because of me. And I never got to say goodbye. Never got to tell her how much she meant to me. How she was the only real friend I ever had."
Understanding dawns in Adrian's expression. "That's it. That's your regret."
I stare at him. "What?"
"You said you couldn't figure out what you came back to fix. But it's not about becoming a star or getting revenge on Sophia and Ethan. It's about Luna." He stands, crossing to me. "You came back to save her life."
The words hit me like a physical blow. Because he's right. Of course he's right.
All the anger about my failed career, all the rage at being betrayed—none of it compares to the guilt I've carried for five years about Luna's death.
"The crash happened three weeks from now," I whisper. "June 25th. I remember because it was two days before my birthday. I was turning twenty-three. She was bringing me a present." My voice breaks. "She died holding a birthday present for me."
Adrian's hands land on my shoulders, warm and solid. "Then we have three weeks to change that timeline. To make sure she never gets in that car."
"But what if I can't? What if the Shadow—"
"Then we fight it." His gray eyes burn with determination. "Together. I didn't come back twice just to watch you fail, Mia. I came back to make sure you WIN."
For a moment, we just stand there, close enough that I can feel his heartbeat.
Then his computer beeps. An alert.
Adrian's face goes white as he reads the screen. "No. No, this can't be—"
"What? What's wrong?"
He turns the monitor toward me. It's a news alert:
BREAKING: LOCAL WOMAN LUNA PARK CRITICALLY INJURED IN HIT-AND-RUN. DRIVER FLED SCENE. DOCTORS SAY SHE MAY NOT SURVIVE THE NIGHT.
My world tilts sideways. "That's impossible. The crash isn't supposed to happen for three weeks—"
"The timeline changed," Adrian says, already grabbing his keys. "The Shadow knows your regret now. It moved the accident up to kill her before you can save her."
"Which hospital?" I'm running for the door.
"St. Mary's. But Mia—" He grabs my arm. "This could be a trap. The Shadow might be using her to lure you out."
"I DON'T CARE!" I'm crying now, screaming. "She's dying! I'm not losing her again!"
We run.
Adrian drives like a maniac through empty streets. My phone won't stop buzzing with texts from an unknown number:
"Too late."
"She's already gone."
"You failed again."
"Just like you always do."
I throw the phone down. "Faster!"
We screech into St. Mary's parking lot. I'm out of the car before it fully stops, sprinting through emergency room doors.
"LUNA PARK!" I scream at the nurse's desk. "WHERE IS SHE?"
The nurse checks her computer, her expression shifting to sympathy. "I'm sorry. She's in surgery right now. The injuries were severe. Are you family?"
"I'm her best friend. I'm all she has." The lie comes easily because it's almost true.
"The waiting room is—"
I'm already running down the hall, following signs to surgery. Adrian is right behind me.
We burst into the waiting area, empty except for one person.
Sophia.
She's sitting calmly in a plastic chair, smiling that sweet, fake smile. But her eyes are her own again. Clear. Aware.
"Hello, Mia," she says. "I've been waiting for you."
I stop cold. "What are you doing here?"
"Making sure you understand the rules." Sophia stands, and there's something different about her now. Confident. Cold. "You think you're special because you came back? You think you can change everything? You can't. The Shadow already won. Luna's going to die in that operating room, and there's nothing you can do to stop it."
"You're wrong—"
"Am I?" Sophia tilts her head. "The surgery started ten minutes ago. But here's the thing, Mia—they're operating on the WRONG injury. While they work on her leg, internal bleeding is filling her chest cavity. She has maybe five minutes before her heart stops."
My blood turns to ice. "How do you know that?"
"Because I'm the one who hit her with my car." Sophia's smile widens. "The Shadow gave me one instruction: stop you from saving your regret. So I did. And now your best friend is dying, and it's all your fault. Again."
She turns and walks away, leaving me frozen in horror.
Luna is dying right now. In surgery. Where I can't reach her.
Where I can't save her.
Adrian grabs my shoulders. "Use your power. You pushed Sophia across a room. Maybe you can—"
"Can WHAT?" I'm hyperventilating. "I don't know how it works! I can't just walk into a surgery and—"
The door to the operating room swings open. A doctor emerges, pulling off his mask, his expression grim.
"Is anyone here for Luna Park?"
I raise my hand, unable to speak.
"I'm sorry," the doctor says. "We did everything we could. But she's gone."