Five in the evening.
In the sky, clouds hung low in broken intervals, like frayed veils drifting.
On the south wall of Shattered City, a hard wind battered; cloud-fluff strayed like souls from a past life, searching for lost memories overhead.
From a distance, it looked like a fine, cotton-white rain.
“You came here,” Evelyn said, helping Hedi up the iron-cold steps, “did you forget something?”
“Forget me. What’re you doing?”
“Catching Olivia Viola.”
Hedi’s eyes widened, surprise mixing with sudden clarity; she muttered, “So that’s it—you want to drag her out.”
“Great acting.” Evelyn’s lip curled, mockery sharp as a knife-edge.
“I truly didn’t know.”
“You came here not knowing?”
“Think about it. Selina and I escaped with a guard’s help. We haven’t paid our respects.”
“Buried on open ground near the gate.”
Hedi asked Evelyn to lead the way, then slid Selina a sideways glance.
A heavy wind brushed her cheek, sweeping her sketched thoughts like charcoal dust into the dusk.
“You stay here,” she told Selina.
“Professor...”
Hedi didn’t explain like usual, didn’t offer comfort.
She followed Evelyn quickly, moving like a gear through sand-shifting time, toward the guard’s burial ground.
“Alone, to pay respects?” Evelyn stood sideways, back to the slanting sun.
Twilight stretched a blade of shadow before her, landing square on the earth that held the guard.
She drew a cigarette tin and spoke as if to herself, yet clearly for ears nearby. “Didn’t expect Selina to be this cold.”
“Facing the dead needs inner scaffolding. She isn’t ready.”
“Are you ready?”
“Not really. But how can an elder let the young take the hurt?”
Her voice was a windbreak pine in a storm, stubborn and rough.
“Sounds grudging.”
“Who would be willing?” Hedi tucked her hands into her pockets, a fond smile tugging at her lips.
“To turn a living person into a forever-sleeping body takes time.”
“I don’t feel much.”
“Same when you sent the Investigators in?”
Evelyn smoked in silence; the ember glowed like a captive firefly.
Hedi watched the sun slide behind tall buildings like a coin into a slot.
“The same,” Evelyn said at last, slow as dusk settling. “They sacrificed for the Empire’s future.”
“As long as it isn’t for personal desire.”
“Olivia is the key to unraveling Dark Realm Magic. She agreed to the experiment.”
“The people of Shattered City agreed too. The guard who got tied down as ordered also ‘agreed’...”
A faint anger shadowed Hedi’s face like storm-cloud lace.
“So many joined your experiment—must be effective.”
“Your mood shifted, Melvina—can you still move?”
“Do toes count?”
“Cold, this time.”
“That slap rattled you too.” Hedi blinked, teasing. “What are you staring for? I can’t even move.”
“Till I catch your core emotion, I won’t risk it.”
“As you wish.”
Hedi lifted her arm. At her fingertip, a dazzling beam gathered—lightning spearing clouds.
It struck Evelyn before breath could form.
Evelyn had expected a hit, but Hedi’s release was too fast.
The magic, thunder-strong, smashed into a half-formed barrier.
The roar shook Shattered City; even the mist coiling the streets blew clean like torn gauze.
“Professor!”
Selina ran to the call.
As she entered Evelyn’s sight, an unseen force hooked her like a fishing line, pulling her toward Hedi.
“Dammit! Please move!”
“Ah...”
Hedi saw regret clouding Selina’s face. She sighed like wind in reeds and didn’t fight.
She let Selina lock her arms.
“Looks like you have an Investigator’s decisiveness.” Evelyn nodded and guided Selina’s body like a puppeteer’s hand.
Selina’s heart resisted, but her limbs obeyed like strings, and she pinned Hedi to the ground.
Hedi lay quietly and sent Selina a doting smile, warm as lamplight.
She’d expected this. You can’t stop people acting out of worry.
Their moves may upset the board, but they rise from kindness like spring water.
“I truly can’t control you,” Evelyn asked, thoughtful as a cloudy pool. “Why?”
“Dynamic equilibrium.”
“I know that—”
“Save it. I’m the tortoise you’ll never catch. You can only close in, never grasp my emotional core.”
“Still so calm.”
Hedi’s cheek pressed the cold ground. Each breath lifted dust; coughs shook like brittle leaves.
“What else can I do? Since the café, you’ve been steering my moods.
You stoked my anger to find a resonance that could shake me—
but back then I still took you as human, until you tried to seize my body.”
“The lab’s mishap caught me off guard.”
“Uh-huh. And right now you control me.”
“Just a common bind. Use magic and you can slip it.”
“It’s fine, Professor!” Selina shouted, like a drumbeat. “I can hold it!”
Hedi shook her head in silence, thoughts threading shadowed corridors.
Stratford had sent Investigators into the Dark Realm first—there was depth in that move.
Whether she’d planned to enter it herself and our arrival ruined it,
our sparring alone showed she was weaving a plan behind the curtains.
“Want to know why I sent the Investigators in first?”
“I was, yeah.” Hedi raised her eyes to Evelyn’s face. “To wear down Olivia’s strength?”
“To test aggression. But it’s been quiet... her headaches are bad.”
“Maybe the roaches ate her.”
“In that case, I’ll test using you—the one who escaped the Dark Realm.”
“Sure!”
As Hedi spoke, fear rose like tide to her face.
Eyes once calm flooded with heavy worry; deep inside, clouds smothered the sun.
It showed a deep, near-instinctive dread of roaches.
“So you agree.”
“No... I just want—”
“Tough spirit’s a good thing.” Evelyn spoke while weaving magic over Selina, half-lifting Hedi.
She carried her toward the Dark Realm that lapped at the south wall like a night sea.
“I really hate roaches!”
“Now you start begging?”
“More than dealing with you!” Hedi drew a deep breath, like a bellows.
“Know what’s worst?”
“Not interested in riddles.”
“Worst is—roaches and you existing at the same time!”
As the Dark Realm’s shiver-inducing border neared, Hedi clenched her fist and pooled power in her palm.
Like a volcano bursting, she blasted a shock that flung Selina—who held the strings—clear.
“Harming your own comrade—” Evelyn began.
Hedi’s grip clamped her collar like iron.
Evelyn tried to counter with magic, but power wouldn’t gather.
“Anti-magic ward... why...?”
“Wards remember magic.”
“You cast here before—so what does triggering it do? It only stops me from controlling Selina.”
“Is the lab’s Deputy Director only this good?”
Evelyn understood at once. She glanced at the swelling Dark Realm, black tide rising.
“You’re insane! It’ll swallow us both!”
Hedi poured her strength, holding Evelyn’s collar like a mooring rope.
She saw Selina rush toward them and soothed her with a warm wind of voice.
“I’ll be out soon. This time, listen.”
As she said it—just as her figure thinned into the Dark Realm—
she left the pocket watch from her coat to the receding world of stone and light.
Clink.
The watch hit the ground.
