April 14. 8:00 PM.
Unit 1418. 28°C.
The last curl of vapor from Alessia's chamomile tea thinned, stretched, and dissolved into the black air of Unit 1418, the apartment dark with the lights off and only the green glow of the security monitors illuminating the space.
Jae-min sat at the obsidian-wood table with Alessia across from him, a mug of chamomile tea between her hands with steam curling up and dissolving into the dark.
Ji-yoo was on the sectional with her legs tucked under her and her phone in hand, scrolling without reading, her jaw tight and her eyes distant.
Rico stood by the glass slider with his back to the room, watching the skyline.
"Two days." Ji-yoo murmured, a hollow dread pulling the words from her chest as her thumb froze on the screen.
No one responded.
"I keep thinking about Mom and Dad." Ji-yoo continued, a tight anguish cracking through the stillness. "Incheon. The flight."
"Don't." Jae-min cut in, a brittle control snapping the word shut.
"I can't help it." Ji-yoo whispered, a fracturing composure trembling beneath the surface.
"Then stop talking about it." Jae-min ordered, an iron suppression flattening his voice.
Ji-yoo looked at him with her fingers tightening on her phone, but she closed her mouth and went back to scrolling.
Alessia set her mug down.
"Jae-min." Alessia began, a careful probing softening her voice.
"What?" Jae-min replied, a guarded wariness tightening his jaw.
"You said you were going to empty your warehouse tomorrow." Alessia pressed, a measured curiosity leaning her forward. "What does that mean?"
Jae-min was quiet for a moment and looked at the mug in her hands.
"Alessia. Give me your mug." Jae-min requested, a quiet command extending his hand.
She frowned slightly but handed it over anyway.
Jae-min set it in the center of the table right between them and raised his hand, hovering it over the ceramic, the cold spot behind his ribs pulsing as the crack in reality answered his reach.
He touched it.
The mug vanished with no sound and no flash, just a faint ripple of heat distorting the air above where it had been before dissolving into nothing.
Alessia didn't gasp and didn't scramble, just pressed her fingers flat against the bare wood where ceramic had been a heartbeat before, searching for something that was no longer there.
'Gone. Like it had never existed.' Alessia processed, a quiet, heavy knowing settling over her as her fingertips traced the empty wood.
Jae-min raised his other hand and the air tore open, a black crack splitting the silence, not a cut but a fold, with the temperature dropping three degrees in a single second.
He reached into the darkness up to his wrist; his forearm disappeared into the fold, and when he pulled his hand back, he was holding the mug.
He set it on the table and steam rose from the ceramic with the tea still hot, not a single degree lost.
Ji-yoo's thumb had frozen on her phone screen, with her jaw tightening, and she looked back down and scrolled without reading because she'd seen it before and it still wasn't easy to watch.
"The warehouse." Alessia realized, a quiet understanding surfacing through the shock. "You're going to put the whole warehouse in there."
"How much can you hold?" Alessia pressed, a sharp focus sharpening her gaze.
"Right now? About a hundred cubic meters. The size of a small apartment." Jae-min answered, a measured assessment delivering the numbers.
"And tomorrow?" Alessia pushed, a tense urgency quickening her voice.
"Tomorrow, I push it until it breaks." Jae-min declared, a grim resolve hardening his jaw.
Alessia stared at him.
"You're going to hurt yourself." Alessia whispered, a quiet fear softening her voice.
"If I don't, we starve." Jae-min countered, a flat necessity stripping the words of negotiation.
"So you're going to risk your life to steal food from your own company." Alessia measured, a wry helplessness curving her mouth.
"I'm going to risk my life to keep you alive." Jae-min corrected, a fierce conviction burning through the words.
Alessia didn't respond and just picked up the mug and took a sip, the tea still hot as if it had never left her hands.
"Why are you telling me this?" Alessia asked, a searching vulnerability pulling her brows together.
"Because you're here. Because you're part of this." Jae-min answered, an unflinching honesty meeting her eyes. "Because if I die tomorrow, you need to know how to access the supplies."
"You're not going to die." Alessia defied, a stubborn resistance squaring her shoulders.
"I might. The void has limits." Jae-min admitted, a reluctant truth dropping his voice. "If I push too hard, it could kill me."
Alessia set the mug down, stood, walked to the glass slider, and stood beside Rico, looking out at the lights.
"You're all insane." Alessia whispered, an exhausted surrender pressing her forehead against the glass.
"Yes." Rico affirmed, a gruff warmth softening the single word.
"Completely insane." Alessia repeated, a fragile resolve steadying her voice.
"Probably." Ji-yoo added, a fierce solidarity warming her tone without looking up from her phone.
Alessia turned and looked at Jae-min with those blue eyes sharp and unwavering.
"Fine. Then I'll be insane too." Alessia declared, a burning determination reigniting her voice as she walked back to the table and sat down. "What time do we leave?"
Jae-min blinked.
"We?" Jae-min questioned, a startled confusion breaking his composure.
"You're not doing this alone, Jae-min." Alessia countered, an immovable will squaring her jaw. "I don't care about your pocket dimension or your stupid warehouse. You're not dying tomorrow without me there."
"You can't come. It's too dangerous." Jae-min objected, a protective alarm tightening his grip on the table edge.
"Then make it less dangerous." Alessia challenged, a sharp edge cutting through his deflection.
"Alessia." Jae-min resisted, a desperate pushback hardening his voice.
"I'm a doctor. I've dealt with difficult patients my entire career." Alessia declared, a fierce devotion anchoring every word. "You're the most difficult one yet. But I'm not letting you kill yourself."
Jae-min stared at her.
"Fine." Jae-min conceded, a grudging acceptance dropping his shoulders. "You can come. But you stay in the car. No exceptions."
"Okay." Alessia agreed, a cautious relief easing her posture.
"Ji-yoo. Uncle. Same rule. You stay in the car." Jae-min commanded, a commanding authority turning his gaze to the rest of the room.
Ji-yoo didn't look up from her phone.
"But oppa." Ji-yoo protested, an anxious worry pulling her voice tight.
"No. I go in alone. You watch the perimeter." Jae-min ordered, an absolute finality cutting through the room. "If something goes wrong, you leave. Don't come after me."
"Jae-min." Rico cautioned, a grave concern turning him from the window.
"This isn't a debate." Jae-min closed, an iron resolve ending the conversation as he stood and walked to his room. "We leave at midnight. Be ready."
The door closed.
Ji-yoo looked at Alessia and Alessia looked at Ji-yoo.
"He's going to do something stupid." Ji-yoo murmured, a bitter worry tightening her grip on the phone.
"Probably." Alessia agreed, a grim resignation settling over her.
"We should stop him." Ji-yoo whispered, a desperate helplessness pulling her voice down.
"We can't." Alessia whispered, a heavy acceptance pressing against her chest.
"Then we save him when it fails." Ji-yoo resolved, a fierce loyalty reigniting her dark eyes.
"Agreed." Alessia confirmed, a steady solidarity extending her hand.
Ji-yoo took it.
Squeezed once.
Hard.
Rico stood by the glass slider and didn't turn around.
"He's not going to fail." Rico declared, a deep faith warming his voice.
"How do you know?" Ji-yoo challenged, a raw skepticism sharpening her question.
"Because he is a Del Rosario." Rico answered, an unshakable pride squaring his shoulders. "And Del Rosarios don't lose."
The lights of Manila burned outside, bright and beautiful and temporary.
In forty-eight hours, ten meters of snow would bury every one of those lights, only rooftops breaking the white plain, hard-packed frozen snow dense as concrete entombing every street and every overpass and every structure below four stories.
Two days left.
— • • • —
11:45 PM.
Unit 1418.
Jae-min stood by the master bedroom door with his hand resting on the handle, the door closed but not locked because there was no lock, the three-inch gap of amber light still visible at the frame.
He didn't knock.
He opened the door.
Alessia was sitting on the edge of the bed, pulling on a pair of dark jeans, having changed into a black long-sleeve shirt and the jeans, practical and dark, the kind of clothes that wouldn't stand out in a shadow.
She looked up when he walked in, and didn't flinch and didn't cover herself.
"You could knock." Alessia noted, a mild reproach raising her eyebrow.
"It's my room." Jae-min deflected, a flat dismissal pulling him toward the closet.
"It's our room now. That means you knock." Alessia corrected, a firm boundary holding her voice steady.
Jae-min didn't respond and walked to the closet and pulled out a black tactical jacket and shrugged it on with methodical preparation, checking the pockets: knife in the left and flashlight in the right.
Alessia finished zipping her jeans and stood and walked to him and stopped inches away.
"You're scared." Alessia observed, a gentle perception searching his face.
"No." Jae-min denied, an automatic resistance tightening his jaw.
"Your jaw is tight. Your pupils are constricted. Your breathing is shallow." Alessia catalogued, a clinical certainty reading his body like a chart. "You're scared, and you're pretending you're not."
"I'm focused." Jae-min countered, a stubborn pride straightening his posture.
"I'm a doctor. I can tell the difference." Alessia whispered, a tender knowing softening her voice as she reached up and touched his jaw.
Jae-min looked down at her and reached out, his hand finding her hip and squeezing with a possessive, deliberate pressure, then his other hand dropped to her ass and cupped and squeezed with one hard, greedy handful that pulled her flush against him.
Alessia's breath hitched, but she didn't pull away.
"If you die in that warehouse." Alessia whispered, a trembling threat brushing his lips.
"I won't." Jae-min promised, a rough conviction pulling her closer.
"Jae-min." Alessia breathed, an aching plea pressing her forehead against his.
He kissed her hard and fast with one hand still on her hip and the other sliding up her back and tangling in her indigo hair, a desperate hunger flooding through every point of contact.
'She's warm. She's alive. Don't think about the void.' Jae-min grounded himself, a searing need pulling her tighter against his chest. 'Just feel this.'
Alessia kissed him back with her hands fisting in the front of his jacket and her nails digging into his chest through the fabric, the kiss desperate and hungry and carrying the weight of two people who didn't know if they would have tomorrow.
Jae-min broke the kiss with his forehead pressed to hers and his breathing hard.
"Don't die." Alessia whispered, a raw vulnerability trembling through the words. "Promise me."
"I don't make promises I can't keep." Jae-min admitted, a pained honesty roughening his voice.
"Then promise me you'll try." Alessia pleaded, a fierce desperation gripping the front of his jacket.
Jae-min looked at her, those blue eyes wet and fierce.
"I'll try." Jae-min whispered, a breaking voice carrying the words out of his chest.
— • • • —
11:58 PM.
Manila Bay. 27°C.
The black Ford Raptor idled in the shadow of a rusted shipping container with the diesel engine rumbling low and the headlights off, the logistics hub looming through the windshield like a massive rectangular beast three football fields long with sheet metal walls corrugated like frozen waves.
No windows, just steel doors and a single guard booth lit by a flickering sodium lamp, the smell of salt and diesel and rotting kelp blowing through the AC vents.
Rico sat in the driver's seat with his hands resting at ten and two and the M4 carbine across his thighs with the safety off, his black eyes scanning the perimeter with the patient focused stillness of a man who had spent thirty years watching dark places.
Jae-min sat in the passenger seat with his hands steady on his knees and the void behind his ribs pulsing hungry and ready, a cold deliberate focus sharpening every breath.
In the back seat, Alessia and Ji-yoo were silent, Alessia staring out the window at the warehouse with her jaw set and her hands clasped in her lap so tightly her knuckles were white.
Ji-yoo had binoculars pressed to her eyes with her hands steady and her breathing even, focused and watching the perimeter.
'I'm here. That's what matters.' Ji-yoo determined, a fierce, stubborn loyalty steadying her grip on the binoculars. 'He needs me watching his back.'
"Guard booth is empty." Ji-yoo reported, a tactical observation lowering the binoculars slightly. "He's inside right now. Drinking coffee. Looking at his phone."
The guard stood up at 11:58, stretched, and walked out of the booth and disappeared around the back of the building toward the portable toilets.
"Now." Jae-min ordered, a cold command reaching for the door handle.
He opened the passenger door and stepped out into the wet, heavy night air, then looked back at the Raptor.
"Stay in the car." Jae-min commanded, an absolute authority carrying through the open door. "No matter what you hear."
"Oppa." Ji-yoo called, a desperate fear pulling her hand out to grab his wrist before he could step away, her fingers digging in. "Come back."
Jae-min paused and didn't turn around.
"Always." Jae-min murmured, a fierce tenderness softening the word before he pulled his wrist free and turned toward the personnel door.
The keypad glowed a faint green in the dark.
1-4-0-8-8-4.
The lock beeped, the heavy steel door clicked open, and Jae-min stepped inside, the warehouse swallowing him whole.