Renn spends the following days adjusting to a version of his own history missing a piece he can never fully reclaim. He doesn't complain, though I catch him sometimes staring at old photos on his phone, expression distant in a way that makes my chest ache with guilt I can't fully shake.
"I'm okay," he says, catching me watching him one evening at Talia's apartment, where we've gathered again to plan the next steps. "Genuinely. It's strange, missing a piece of myself I know used to exist. But I don't regret the choice."
"You shouldn't have had to make that choice at all," I say quietly.
"Maybe not. But I did, and it gave us something real." He straightens, some of his usual determination returning despite the visible toll the extraction clearly took. "Calloway's connection to Havenbrook.
