Lyra's POV
The lab was never this loud — not with noise, but with presence.
He sat too still. Watched too intently. Every now and then, Kael would whisper to himself in a language that sounded like poetry woven with thunder. And it rattled her.
He wasn't just playing pretend.
His confusion wasn't staged. His curiosity wasn't fake.
And worse... he was too calm about it all.
"You're adjusting way too well," she muttered, cross-legged on the floor beside the console, scribbling formula corrections onto her worn notebook.
Kael, lounging beside a 3D printer like it was a throne, tilted his head. "Your world spins with invisible winds. The air hums with trapped lightning. How could I not be fascinated?"
"That's electricity," she grunted. "Not... trapped lightning. And that 'box' is a vending machine, not a war artifact."
He had the decency to look embarrassed. "I thought it was guarded when it demanded coin."
She snorted, despite herself.
Stop it. Don't warm up to him. He's a walking hallucination with good hair.
She turned back to the console. Something was still wrong. The logs didn't show any power surges. No time signatures. Nothing that could explain how or why the machine had triggered.
No cause.
No trace.
It didn't add up.
And that terrified her more than Kael's arrival.
---
Kael's POV
She moved with purpose, this girl of glowing screens and gritted teeth.
Lyra.
A name he'd heard whispered by fate. Now it pulsed on every label in this strange world — "LYRA ELLISON – Junior Assistant. Clearance B."
She was no ordinary girl. He'd known it the moment she touched the machine's core with bare hands, unafraid of power that could unravel timelines.
In Umbrosia, power like that belonged only to priests and kings.
Here? It belonged to her.
Yet she didn't believe in it.
She flinched when the lights flickered. Cursed when the circuit sparked. But she never questioned it with wonder — only logic.
"You don't trust magic," he said quietly.
She glanced up. "I don't trust anything that can't be proven."
"And if it can?"
She hesitated. "Then I still don't trust it. Just… respect it."
He nodded, as if she hadn't just insulted everything he was born to uphold.
"You're not from here," she said slowly, her voice a bit softer. "But not just in location. You're... different. Like your mind runs on myths and destiny."
"I was raised on them," he admitted.
"And you actually think—what? That fate led you here?"
Kael looked her dead in the eyes.
"I think... fate was just the path. You were the destination."
She blinked.
And for once — had no clever comeback.
---
Lyra's POV
Her hands trembled, so she dropped the screwdriver.
"Okay," she breathed, backing away. "Enough storybook lines for one night. I'm going to reboot the system, run diagnostics, and see if I can send you back to wherever you came from. Until then—"
"I'm not going anywhere."
His voice was quiet but firm.
She turned sharply.
He stood, towering in the dim blue light of the lab. There was no arrogance in his posture. Only... longing.
"I don't belong here," he said. "And yet, I feel like I was meant to be here. To meet you."
"You don't even know me."
"Not yet. But I will."
He said it like a vow.
---
CRACK!
The console sparked suddenly. Lyra ran toward it.
"No no no—don't fry on me now—" she hissed, slamming the emergency switch.
The lights flickered. The machine hummed. And the core pulsed again.
But this time... it shook.
Kael's hand shot out, grabbing her wrist.
"Step back!" he shouted.
A burst of blue energy shot from the core, hitting the wall and evaporating a steel pipe.
They both froze.
Lyra's heart thundered. "What the hell was that?"
Kael looked at the core.
"It's not just time that's broken. Something... followed me through."
---