Once winter set in, a strange, heavy drowsiness gripped me.
As the timeline shifted, I—a foreign anomaly from the future, something that should never have existed—could feel this world trying to "correct" me out of existence.
On the day of the first snowfall, Odette pulled me into the yard for a snowball fight. We teamed up, besieging Cassian from both sides.
I was just about to pack an even bigger snowball when, without warning, my vision went black. The world spun, and I crashed down heavily into the soft snow with a muffled thud.
The swirling snowflakes froze in mid-air. Odette's face slowly overlapped with another long-buried image.
*****
In a cold hospital room, a woman lay weakly on the bed, her face utterly colorless. It was Odette.
Darwin stood by the bed, holding a crying i
