CHAPTER EIGHT — THE ECHO THAT SHOULD NOT EXIST.
587 Words
Annastasia fell through the Gate like a star torn from its orbit.
There was no up.
No down.
No time.
Only light, fluid, blinding, alive, wrapping around her like silk woven from the universe’s first breath.
Then,
Silence.
A soft landing.
Annastasia gasped, stumbling forward onto a surface made of shimmering glass. Except… it wasn’t glass. It pulsed like a living memory beneath her feet.
The Starborn Realm.
Her realm.
She shivered.
The sky above wasn’t a sky at all, just a vast expanse of white-gold radiance swirling with distant echoes of galaxies. The air tasted like starlight. The silence hummed. Her skin glowed faintly, matching the world around her.
For a moment, the beauty was overwhelming.
Then the truth hit her.
Kael was gone.
Her breath broke.
He was still back there. Bleeding. Fighting. Overwhelmed. She saw the moment he was thrown down. She saw the silver blood. She saw his smile, gentle, terrified, selfless.
And she couldn’t reach him.
Her knees weakened.
“Kael…” she whispered.
The Realm responded instantly,
A soft hum. A warm pulse beneath her feet. A pull.
As if the entire dimension recognized her name.
Then,
A sound.
A sound that did NOT belong here.
A crackling through the air.
A distortion.
A voice, low, intimate, trembling, slipped into her mind like a warm hand brushing the back of her neck.
“…Annastasia…”
Her heart stopped.
Kael.
But not his strong, steady voice.
Not his battle-command tone.
No.
This one was soft, like he was speaking her name with his last breath.
And desperate, like he was clinging to her with the last part of his soul that hadn’t been torn away.
“Annastasia… don’t… don’t leave me—”
Her chest caved.
“KAEL??” she cried into the glowing expanse. “Kael, where are you?!”
Static answered.
Then his voice again, closer this time, like he was right behind her.
“Starlight… please… answer me…”
Her knees hit the ground. The realm flickered like her emotions were shaking reality.
“This isn’t possible…” she whispered. “You can’t be here. You can’t reach this place.”
But he could.
Because their connection was not natural.
Not logical.
Not allowed.
Something ancient bound them.
His voice cracked through the air again—soft and broken:
“I can’t see you… but I feel you… please… say something…”
Tears blurred her vision.
“Kael, I’m here!” she screamed. “I’m here, I’m listening!”
The realm trembled.
A fissure of light split the sky.
Kael’s voice grew stronger, strained with pain and devotion:
“I’ll find you… do you hear me?
I’ll tear apart every gate… every realm… until I’m with you again.”
Annastasia pressed a hand over her mouth, sobbing.
This wasn’t a message.
This wasn’t a memory.
This was Kael fighting the universe just to reach her voice.
Another ripple tore across the sky.
Then, his voice softened… unbearably gentle:
“Don’t be afraid, starlight…
Don’t let them take you away from me…”
Annastasia whispered back, voice shaking:
“I won’t. I won’t leave you. I swear—”
And the entire realm shattered with sound.
A boom.
A flare.
A shockwave of cosmic force blasting outward.
Her body lifted from the ground.
The light around her cracked like glass.
And the last thing she heard before everything went white.
Was Kael’s voice, breaking with emotion:
“I’m coming for you.”
Then,
Silence.
Darkness.
And Annastasia’s consciousness slipped away.
- Writer
