Reborn Before The Apocalypse

CHAPTER 4: WHAT I WASN'T SUPPOSED TO SEE

I sprinted the last two blocks.

My lungs were on fire, my shoulder throbbed from where I'd slammed into that shelving rack an hour ago, but none of it mattered. Not while the coordinates were still pulsing steadily in the corner of my vision, pulling me toward Kyle's building like a hook buried in my chest.

[Distance to anomaly: 50 meters.]

I slowed down as I hit his street, ducking into the shadow of a parked delivery van. I tried to force air back into my lungs, trying not to do something stupid like run out into the open and get spotted. Kyle's building sat quiet ahead of me. Most of the windows were dark, save for a few flickering with the dim, blue-gray light of a TV left on late.

His window was dark, too. Third floor, the corner unit. No lights, no movement.

[Distance to anomaly: 20 meters.]

The number felt wrong. Twenty meters meant the source was behind the building, not inside it. I edged along the fence line, staying low and keeping my phone light off, letting my eyes adjust to the shadows.

The alley behind the building was a narrow gap between two chain-link fences, partially choked by dumpsters that looked like they hadn't been emptied in weeks. I pressed myself against the corner of the nearest one and peered around it, half-expecting to find whatever had triggered the warning.

[Distance to anomaly: 0 meters.]

[Anomaly no longer detected. Signal lost.]

The words faded before I could process them. Whatever it had been, it was gone either it had fled, it was dead, or it was something the system couldn't quite pin down.

I knew I should have turned around right then. I should have gone home and convinced myself it was just a glitch or a false reading, something I could look into later from the safety of my own apartment.

Instead, I heard voices.

They were low and careful. The kind of quiet people use when they don't want to be overheard, which is exactly the kind of quiet that makes you want to listen.

I eased forward along the fence until I could see past the dumpster, and suddenly, my whole body went rigid.

Kyle was standing near his building's back door, arms crossed, his shoulders tight in a way I'd never seen before. And standing across from him, close enough to keep their voices low, was Lilly.

Lilly. The woman who had told me not to stay out too late an hour ago. Lilly, who was supposed to be at home. Lilly, standing in a dark alley with my best friend in the middle of the night, neither of them looking even remotely surprised to see the other.

I pressed myself flatter against the fence, my heart slamming so hard against my ribs that I was sure the sound alone would give me away.

"can't keep doing this," Kyle said, his voice strained. He pushed a hand through his hair. "Not like this. Not behind his back."

"I know." Lilly's voice cracked. For a disorienting second, she sounded exactly like the woman who had kissed my cheek that morning warm, soft, and completely unlike someone standing in a dark alley keeping secrets. "I know, Kyle. I just I don't know what else to do."

"You could tell him."

"And say what?" She let out a short, hollow laugh. "That I've been " She cut herself off, glancing instinctively over her shoulder. I ducked lower, my pulse roaring in my ears, terrified for a split second that she’d spotted me.

She hadn't. She turned back to Kyle, wrapping her arms around herself, and they both fell into a heavy silence.

I didn't move. I barely breathed, crouching in the dark just thirty feet away from the two people I had built my entire second life around protecting. I didn't approach. I didn't call out. I didn't do any of the things the old me the first-life me would have done without thinking twice.

I just watched.

[Truth Sight: Active.]

The system's words surfaced unbidden, cold and quiet, overlaying them like a second skin that only I could see.

[Subject: Lilly Grant]

[Hidden Intent Detected: HIGH]

[Primary Emotion: Guilt]

[Secondary Emotion: Fear — Target: Jayden Cole]

[Subject: Kyle Marsh]

[Hidden Intent Detected: HIGH]

[Primary Emotion: Resentment]

[Secondary Emotion: Guilt — Target Unclear]

I read the data two, three times, my stomach twisting tighter with every pass. Guilt. Fear, specifically aimed at me. Resentment, aimed at... something. The system wouldn't say, and I was starting to realize it never gave me more than enough information to make the mystery hurt.

Below me, Kyle muttered something too low to catch, and Lilly's shoulders slumped, the fight seemingly draining out of her.

"Dinner's still on for tonight," she said finally, her voice steadier as she pulled herself back together. "Act normal. We'll figure the rest out after."

Kyle didn't respond immediately. When he finally did, his voice was flat and careful, a tone that made the hair on my arms stand up.

"Yeah," he said. "Normal."

He turned and walked back through the rear door without another word. Lilly stood alone in the alley for a moment, hugging herself, looking like she might actually break down.

Then, she wiped her face, squared her shoulders, and walked toward the street toward our apartment.

I stayed crouched behind that dumpster for a long time after they were both gone, staring into the dark, my mind looping through every second of what I'd just witnessed.

I didn't know what they were hiding yet. But I knew the shape of it the same shape I remembered from a life I had already died once to protect.

Something was happening between them. Something that had started long before the system, the anomalies, or any of this.

And I had no clue, just standing there in the shadows with my heart slowly breaking all over again, if what I’d just witnessed meant they were already plotting my next betrayal or if it meant something even more devastating.