The world was no longer a forest.Greyfenwood Forest had melted, dripping like oil paint on a burning canvas. The green of the leaves turned into wet concrete gray. The sounds of jungle insects were replaced by the honking of black taxis and the rumble of a distant subway train.Finnian was no longer sprawling on the muddy ground. He was standing in a narrow alley in the East End, London.Heavy rain fell, but it didn't wash his skin, it felt like needles of ice. In his hand wasn't a high-tech Gauntlet or a stolen pistol, but a suppressed Walther PPK with a barrel still smoking."No..." Finnian whispered, his voice trembling. "Not today. Please, not today."The VX-Red neurotoxin was more than just a poison; it was a cruel time machine. The chemical burned Finnian's hippocampus, forcing him to replay the one moment in his life he hated most. The archive of sins he had tried to bury with whiskey and women for the last five years.At his feet lay a young man. His face was ruined. Not by b