The coffee his mother placed in front of him was hot, but it gave him no warmth.
It was only dark liquid in a white cup—something ordinary in a morning that no longer had room for ordinary things. He sat at the table and watched her move through the kitchen. Wiping the counter. Rearranging the cups. Moving from one small task to another with the kind of practiced rhythm that made it seem as if she belonged to the room as much as the walls did.
But Kyle could no longer look at her the way he used to.
One question kept following him:
Does she know?
Can she feel what is happening inside me, even if she doesn't understand it?
"How was your studying yesterday?" she asked without turning around.
Kyle stiffened slightly.
"It was… fine."
Even to him, the lie sounded thin.
Her hand stopped for a moment.
Then she turned slowly to face him.
"You're lying, Kyle."
He lifted his head.
"How…?"
Her eyes looked more tired than usual, but their steadiness hadn't changed.
"Because I'm your mother."
Then, more quietly:
"And I know when something is tearing you apart from the inside."
He couldn't answer right away.
Something sharp rose in his throat. He hadn't cried in years—not after his father died, not in the days that followed—but now he felt as if everything he had tried to keep in place was beginning to crack.
"What's happening to you, Kyle?"
There was real fear in her voice now.
Not the kind that belonged to grades or stress or the usual troubles of growing up.
The fear of a mother who could feel her son drifting toward a place she could not reach.
He lowered his gaze.
How could he tell her?
How could he say that there was something inside him that might one day turn him into a disaster wearing human skin?
"I just…" he began, then stopped. "I've been under some pressure."
He hesitated before adding:
"School. The future. Things like that."
She didn't believe him.
That much was clear in the silence that followed.
Then she said slowly:
"The future is bigger than we think, sometimes."
She picked up the cup in front of him, then set it back down without taking a sip.
"And sometimes… it chooses us before we choose it."
Kyle went still.
Before he could ask what she meant, the doorbell rang.
They exchanged a quick glance.
"Are you expecting someone?" he asked.
She shook her head.
"No."
Kyle stood up slowly.
A quiet tension had already begun moving through him. With every step toward the door, he felt something inside him stirring with caution.
"Who is it?"
No answer came.
He opened the door.
A woman stood outside.
She wore a black formal suit with no insignia, no symbol, nothing to suggest where she came from—as though she belonged to an authority that did not need to introduce itself. Her face was calm to the point of seeming inhuman. Not merely cold. Controlled. As if emotion were a luxury she had trained herself to live without.
"I'm looking for Kyle Arkan."
Her voice was clear and precise.
A chill moved down his spine.
Without realizing it, he stepped slightly in front of his mother.
"I'm Kyle."
The woman's eyes settled on him immediately—not as if she were looking at him, but as if she were reading him.
"My name is Nova."
A brief pause.
"I'm from the Balance Organization."
"What do you want?"
He tried to sound steady, but he heard the strain in his own voice.
Nova answered without hesitation.
"We have been watching you for some time, Kyle. We know the nature of your power. And we know what it means."
Something heavy dropped into his stomach.
For a moment, it almost felt as if the pulse in his chest had gone still—not out of fear, but as though it, too, were listening.
Then Nova said the word plainly:
"The curse."
In her voice, it sounded less like horror and more like classification—as if she were naming something from a report rather than a fate waiting inside a human being.
"It is moving through you faster than it should."
Kyle didn't look at his mother.
He couldn't.
"We did not come here to kill you," Nova continued. "Not now."
His head snapped up.
"What?"
But her tone remained unchanged.
"Our current orders are to observe. But you need to understand the rules."
Coldness spread through his hands.
"What rules?"
Nova held his gaze.
"When the first mark appears on your body… we will return."
A heavy silence settled.
"And when we do," she said, "you will be given your final chance."
"A final chance to do what?"
For the first time, her answer seemed to carry even the slightest weight.
"To end it yourself."
He didn't move.
Barely blinked.
"What does that mean?"
"It means you will choose. Either you allow us to end you… or you allow what is inside you to come out."
She paused for less than a second.
"And the second choice will be a disaster for everyone."
He turned, against his will, and looked at his mother.
She was crying.
Silently.
He had not seen her cry like that since his father died.
The air became too heavy to breathe.
"Why are you telling me this?" he asked.
Nova watched him for a long moment before answering.
"Because you are different."
She said it simply.
"Your power is not like the others. And your case may not be like any before it. We do not yet know what you will become."
Then she reached into her coat and held out a small black card.
There was nothing on it but a number.
"Call us when you need to."
He took it, but his fingers didn't hold. The card slipped from his hand and struck the cold floor.
And by the time he looked up again—
Nova was gone.
No footsteps.
No final movement.
As if her presence had only been a brief fracture in reality.
He and his mother remained in the kitchen.
The silence she left behind felt heavier than her arrival.
Kyle bent down and picked up the card. In his hand, it felt more real than anything else he had experienced in days.
"Kyle…"
His mother began to say his name, but her voice broke before she could finish.
He closed his fingers around the card.
"I'm sorry."
The words came out as a whisper, too weak to change anything.
Then he turned and ran to his room, shutting the door behind him.
He wasn't crying.
What he felt was deeper than that.
An emptiness.
A dense, hollow certainty t
hat he had lost something he hadn't even known he still possessed.
And inside his chest—
the Infinity Heart was pulsing.
Not violently.
Almost contentedly.
As if it were feeding on his fear.
As if it had been waiting for this exact moment.