---
Kael watched Rin devour her third cookie like someone who hadn't tasted sugar in weeks. She sprawled across his couch like a cat who owned the place, eyes bright, feet tapping to an invisible beat.
He wasn't sure if she was dangerous, delusional, or just disarmingly chaotic. Possibly all three.
"So," Kael said, arms crossed, "you said you dreamed about me fighting a mirror dragon."
"Mhmm." She nodded with her mouth full. "And Ayame was there too, sort of. Except… not really her. Like, shimmer-Ayame. You know?"
"No," he deadpanned. "I don't."
She tilted her head. "She wasn't solid. Like light trapped in a reflection. But she *was* humming. Same song you've been playing on loop."
Kael stiffened. "The lullaby."
Rin nodded, crumbs flying. "Exactly!"
That confirmed it. She was seeing fractures. Maybe even crossing them in dreams.
He grabbed a notebook from the table, flipping it open to a page titled **"Subjective Echo Cross-Timeline Theory."**
"Okay," he said. "Tell me everything you remember. No matter how weird."
Rin leaned back, eyes narrowing as she tapped her temple. "Alright, so it started with this weird field of glass roses—don't look at me like that, I'm serious—and there was this tower growing sideways into the sky. Not up. *Sideways.* Like gravity was just, nope."
Kael's pen scribbled furiously.
"And there was a figure watching. Tall. Cloak like starlight. Couldn't see its face. But it said one word."
She paused dramatically.
Kael looked up. "What word?"
"*Kismet.*"
Kael froze.
That word had appeared only once before—in Ayame's final transmission, moments before she tethered herself.
He dropped the pen. "That's not a word people just *say*, Rin."
She shrugged. "Well, maybe I'm not just people."
There was something eerie about her confidence. Like she knew things she shouldn't.
Or couldn't.
---
### **Elsewhere…**
Ayame floated in a prism of still light, her body anchored to a realm beyond time.
Not alive. Not dead.
Held.
"Another Echo awakens," the Custodian murmured, voice reverberating like a cathedral bell. "And the boy listens."
Ayame stirred slightly, lips parting—but no sound came. Only a pulse. A ripple.
The Loom trembled.
The stars blinked.
Balance shifted.
---
### **Back in Kael's Apartment…**
"So what now?" Rin asked, flipping through Kael's notes. "Do I get a badge? A cool title? You're building a team, right?"
Kael paced.
"This changes everything," he muttered. "If you're seeing fragments of the Loom… then you might be a conduit."
"Like a magic Wi-Fi repeater?"
"…Sure."
She bounced. "Neat!"
He grabbed his datapad and ran a scan of her energy signature.
A soft chime.
Reading matched one he hadn't seen since Ayame.
Her frequency… was tether-compatible.
"Holy stars," he whispered. "You're not just dreaming. You're syncing."
Rin blinked. "Syncing with what?"
He stared at her.
"With *her.*"
---
They didn't sleep that night.
Between energy tests, dream-mapping, and trying not to accidentally open a rift in the living room again (Rin: "Oops!"), Kael's whiteboard quickly looked like a conspiracy theorist's dream.
Thread patterns. Lullaby frequencies. Inter-timeline bleed markers. All pointing toward one conclusion:
Ayame was calling to them.
"I think she's trying to break through," Kael said, rubbing his temples. "Using Echoes as anchors."
"And you think I'm the first?"
"I think you're the first *on purpose.*"
Rin paused. "So what do we do?"
Kael looked up, eyes burning with resolve.
"We go to where the thread began. The Academy."
Rin made a face. "Ugh. School?"
"It was more than a school," Kael said. "It was a crossing point. That place… it might still hold residual Loom energy."
"And we'll just waltz in like 'Hey, don't mind us, just doing some light multiversal spelunking'?"
Kael smiled faintly.
"Exactly."
---
### **Two Days Later…**
The school hadn't changed much.
Same ivy-covered walls. Same cracked bell tower. Same courtyard that once held their laughter, whispered secrets, and first kisses.
It felt like a lifetime ago.
Rin adjusted her goggles. "Looks normal to me."
Kael knelt beside an old oak tree—their tree—and pressed a palm to the roots.
The air shimmered.
A hum beneath the soil.
"Here," he said. "This was the epicenter."
He activated the scanner. Readings spiked instantly.
"Whoa," Rin whispered, crouching beside him. "That's off the charts."
Kael didn't speak.
He was listening.
Because beneath the static, between the layers of space—
A voice was whispering.
Soft.
Familiar.
**Ayame.**
His heart stopped.
Then…
**"Kael?"**
Clear. Echoing.
Rin gasped.
"You heard that, right?! That wasn't just me being weird?"
Kael stood. "She's *here.* Somewhere."
A low rumble interrupted him.
From beneath the earth, the grass split, revealing a shimmering gate pulsing with golden light.
The portal to the Tethered Realm.
Only now… it was opening on its own.
Kael turned to Rin.
"You ready for this?"
She grinned, eyes blazing.
"Born weird, raised weirder. Let's go get your girl."
They stepped through—
And vanished into light.
---