Passages
Sneak peeks from the series. No spoilers.
The world was dying, and it bled red.
Crimson rain hammered the cracked pavement in heavy, relentless sheets, each droplet leaving rusty stains that pooled in the gutters like open wounds. The metallic tang hung thick in the air—a reminder of the atmospheric engineering that had turned the sky itself into a weapon. What fell from above wasn’t water anymore. It was contamination, slowly poisoning what little remained of the earth.
Just beyond the spill of morning light, something flickered—barely noticeable to the human eye. A shimmer. A glitch in reality, like heat waves rising from summer pavement.
And then, she was there.
Her suit was seamless and unfamiliar, pulsing faintly with lines of energy that traveled just beneath the surface—technology that didn’t belong to this time. The fabric seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it.
“Why do we always make this mistake?” she whispered—the words barely more than a breath against the static of the world.
“Daddy! Daddy, guess what!” She could barely contain herself, bouncing in her seat. “They gave us tiny snack bags! With pretzels AND cookies! And—” she paused dramatically, eyes going wide and bright, a perfect imitation of Ava’s theatrical timing, “I got TWO cookies!”
“Two cookies? That’s quite an achievement. Sounds like I’m raising a future Nobel Prize winner in cookie economics.” He leaned closer to the screen, matching her conspiratorial tone. “How did you negotiate that deal, my clever little cookie monster?”
His patience snapped. “Start talking, or I swear, the second I can move again, I will kill you.”
She stopped pacing and tilted her head slightly, studying him with an expression caught between assessment and amusement. “Big talk coming from a naked guy lying on the floor.”
Kevin signaled for his check, left two twenties on a ten-dollar tab, and walked out without waiting for change.
Reynold’s whole body went still. He looked around, like he was expecting someone to take it away, to tell him it was a mistake. Then, slowly, carefully, he picked up the bills and tucked them into his apron pocket.
The smile that crossed his face was pure. Unguarded. The kind of joy that came from something as simple as unexpected kindness.
Kevin felt something crack in his chest.