Reborn Before The Apocalypse

CHAPTER 5: ACT NORMAL

I beat Lilly home by twenty minutes.

That was just enough time to scrub the stench of that alley off my skin, and just enough time to sit at the kitchen table and stare into space until the shaking in my hands finally subsided. When she finally walked through the door, her cheeks flushed pink from the cold, she kissed my cheek just like she did every other night. Then she asked what I felt like eating for dinner.

"Kyle's coming over," I told her. "Let's make it something special."

She gave me a smile a real one, warm and effortless, as if the last six hours hadn't even happened. "Yeah," she said. "Let's make it nice."

As I watched her hang up her coat, the word guilt felt like it was branded into the back of my mind, but I forced myself to smile back.

If they wanted to play normal, fine. I could play, too.

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Kyle arrived at seven sharp, clutching a bottle of wine and wearing that same easygoing grin. I knew better now; I'd seen that smile crack in the middle of an alley three hours earlier.

"Smells incredible," he said, breezing past me into the apartment. He slapped my shoulder the bruised one just a little too hard, forcing me to bite back a wince. "You doing the cooking, or is Lilly handling the heavy lifting?"

"A bit of both," I replied. My voice sounded steady, which honestly surprised me more than it should have.

We sat down and ate. Lilly kept the conversation flowing with easy chatter about work work she hadn't actually been at, despite how she’d made me believe. Kyle laughed at all the right moments, and I just sat there, watching the two of them perform a play where I already knew the ending.

"So," I said, once the plates were half-empty and the wine was winding down. "You mentioned you had some news."

A flicker passed over Kyle's face. It was momentary, gone before I could even process it.

"Right." He set his fork down, and when he smiled this time, the warmth didn't quite make it to his eyes. "I figured I'd wait until we were all settled before bringing it up."

Across the table, Lilly went completely still.

Kyle reached into his jacket and placed something on the table between us. It was small and metallic. It caught the kitchen light in a way that felt wrong it didn't belong in this room, or this life, or on this table where we’d shared a hundred perfectly ordinary dinners.

"What is that?" I asked, keeping my tone even.

"Something big," Kyle said, his grin widening into something hungrier. "I found a guy in private tech prototype stuff. He says by the end of the year, everyone is going to be begging for one."

I heard Lilly’s breath hitch, a sharp, sudden sound. She was staring at the object as if it might suddenly spring to life.

"Kyle," she whispered. "What is that?"

"Insurance," he said, his gaze fixed on me, wearing that hollow smile. "For all of us."

My fork froze halfway to my mouth. Suddenly, the system flared to life in the corner of my vision, unbidden and jarring.

[WARNING: Object contains unidentified energy signature.]

[Classification: UNKNOWN.]

[Recommendation: Do not touch.]

I looked from the metal object to Lilly’s pale face, then to Kyle’s manic grin. It hit me all at once: this wasn't a coincidence. This had nothing to do with the tech he was talking about and everything to do with the alley, the guilt, and the fear that Truth Sight had pointed me toward earlier.

"Where did you get it?" I asked.

Kyle didn't blink. "Told you. A guy."

"And what does it actually do?"

"You'll see." He reached out with a casual, almost lazy motion and closed his hand around it before I could protest. "Relax, Jay. It’s not going to bite."

The moment his skin made contact with the metal, the object began to glow from within with a dull, rhythmic red pulse that had nothing to do with consumer tech and everything to do with the words screaming in my peripheral vision.

[WARNING: Signature spike detected.]

[Proximity alert: HOSTILE.]

The grin slid right off Kyle's face.

His entire body went rigid. His eyes went wide, and his fingers clamped around the object as if he were physically unable to let go. Across the table, Lilly screamed his name, scrambling back from her chair, but she was already too late.

The apartment lights flickered once.

Then, everything went black.