The highway stretched endlessly under a moonless sky, the kind of dark that pressed against the windows like wet velvet. Inside the bus, the air had thickened with the smell of stale air-conditioning, cheap soda, and the faint metallic tang of Dave's dried blood. Most students had surrendered to sleep, their breathing uneven, faces slack against cracked vinyl seats. A few remained awake—eyes glassy, minds replaying the impossible events of the day in silent, looping horror.
Saki sat rigid at the very back, knees drawn up, the backpack containing the prototype clamped between her ankles like a living thing she was afraid to let escape. The bandage on her left arm had soaked through again; fresh blood had begun to darken the gauze in slow, blooming patches. She hadn't noticed. Her entire attention was fixed on the faint, rhythmic warmth pulsing against her shins.
The device was no longer content to hum.
It thrummed—deep, bone-resonant, the way a cathedral bell feels when you stand too close.
She glanced sideways. Dave had fallen asleep with his head tilted toward Michi, one arm slung protectively across her lap even in unconsciousness. Michi's fingers were still loosely threaded through his. Yudashi, two rows ahead, kept turning every few minutes to check on her; each time their eyes met he offered the smallest nod, a silent I'm still here. She wanted to smile back. She couldn't.
Another pulse. Stronger.
Saki unzipped the bag just enough to see the prototype's surface. The bluish glow had deepened to a bruised violet. Tiny fractures of light spiderwebbed across its casing—fractures that hadn't been there when she stole it.
She swallowed. Her throat felt lined with sand.
The glow brightened abruptly.
A low, staticky hiss filled her ears—then her mother's voice again, clearer this time, but fractured, as though the recording were being torn apart from the inside.
"Saki… listen carefully. There isn't much time."
The hologram flickered into existence above the device—smaller, more unstable than before. Her mother's face looked gaunt, shadows pooling under her eyes like bruises. Behind her, the laboratory walls were no longer clean white; they were scorched, streaked with something dark and viscous.
"I lied to you in the first message. Not about the seal… but about destroying it." Her mother's voice cracked. "You can't destroy it. If you do, the Rift tears open instantly. Everything we saved—Tokyo, Kunshi, every street you walk—will be swallowed again. The only way to stabilize it is to… link with it. Become its new vessel. But if you do that—"
The image stuttered violently. Her mother's mouth moved without sound for several agonizing seconds.
"—they win. They've been waiting for you to come back. The immobilization waves? They're not random. They're calibration pulses. Every time your power leaks, the device records it, maps it, prepares to harvest it. They want to rip the seal open just enough to pull me out… and then use you to hold it wide forever."
Saki's breath hitched. Her right hand flew to her stomach where the curse marks lay hidden beneath her shirt. They were already tingling—hot, restless.
Her mother leaned closer to the camera, voice dropping to a desperate whisper.
"There's one other path. A failsafe I built into the prototype before I sealed it. If you can reach the central core—there's a blood-lock keyed to us both. Drop your blood on it while reciting the sequence I taught you when you were six. The one we used to open the garden gate. It will… collapse the seal inward. Trap the Rift energy inside the device forever. But it will also trap you inside it. You'll become part of the seal. Not dead… but not alive the way you are now. Suspended. Watching. For as long as the device exists."
Tears tracked silently down the hologram's face.
"I never wanted this choice for you. I thought I could carry it alone. I was wrong."
The image fractured again—lines of static slicing through her mother's features.
"They're coming for you now, Saki. The van behind the bus isn't random. They've tracked the prototype's signature since you removed it from the barrier. If they take it—if they take you—the Rift reopens in less than seventy-two hours. Everything ends."
A final, desperate plea.
"Forgive me. And whatever you choose… don't let them win."
The hologram collapsed into sparks.
Silence.
Then—without warning—the entire bus lurched.
Not from the road. From inside.
A wave—far stronger than before—rolled through the cabin like black water. Lights died. Engines coughed and stalled. Every student snapped rigid in their seats, eyes wide and unblinking, mouths frozen mid-breath.
Saki felt it hit her too—except it didn't hold.
Her curse marks ignited beneath her clothes, violet fire racing across her skin. Her eyes flared bright enough to illuminate the row in front of her. The pain was exquisite, electric, almost euphoric. For one suspended heartbeat she could feel the Rift—vast, starving, ancient—reaching back toward her like a hand from the dark.
Then it retreated.
The wave passed.
The bus lights stuttered back on. The engine roared to life. Students gasped, coughed, clutched at throats and chests—convinced it had been nothing more than a collective nightmare or a sudden pressure change.
But Dave wasn't fooled.
He twisted in his seat, eyes locked on Saki. Her sleeves had ridden up; the glowing curse marks were still fading, leaving faint purple afterimages on her skin. He saw them. He saw everything.
"Saki," he whispered, voice raw. "What the hell was that?"
Michi turned too—then Yudashi, then Hensudo. One by one, the group stared.
She opened her mouth. No sound came.
The prototype pulsed once more—hotter, brighter, almost angry.
In the rear-view mirror, the black van had closed the distance. Its headlights flicked to high beam for a single, deliberate second—then dimmed again.
Saki's hands shook as she zipped the bag shut.
"I think…" she said at last, voice so quiet it barely carried over the engine noise, "…we're not going home."
Dave reached across the aisle and gripped her uninjured wrist—firm, steady, no teasing left in his expression.
"Then we fight," he said simply.
Michi nodded, tears still shining on her lashes from earlier. "Together."
Yudashi leaned forward. "Whatever it takes."
Hensudo cracked his knuckles, trying—and failing—to look casual. "I call dibs on punching the first guy in a lab coat who shows up."
Saki looked at them—at the people who should have run screaming from her days ago—and felt something crack open inside her chest. Not fear. Not guilt.
Something warmer. Something dangerous.
She nodded once.
"Okay."
Outside, the black van accelerated—slowly, deliberately—until it was no longer just following.
It was hunting.
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