Yuna, a young woman of nineteen with black hair that barely brushed her shoulders, studied the three men who had been here the longest. Her voice, though quiet, cut through the tension. "Did you all get here during the first Catastrophe?"

  In unison, Valerius, Valtos, and Roland answered, "Yes."

  Roland’s head snapped toward Valerius, his eyes narrowing with suspicion. "What the hell are you saying? You're a Yilheimer." He then turned back to Yuna, waving a dismissive hand. "Ignore him. He's... complicated."

  Valerius paid him no mind, his thoughts hurtling down a terrifying new path. If three years here is twelve on Earth... then I can't stay. We have to find a way back, and quickly. A cold dread settled in his stomach. If I stay here until I'm thirty, Gramma Blessing and Grampa Charles will be long gone. And Mom... how much has she changed? She must think we're dead. She must be...

  He was pulled from his spiraling thoughts by Valtos's voice, softer than usual, directed at his father. "What happened after you got here, Dad?"

  Kevin’s gaze was distant, lost in a memory that was still raw. "It was twenty days ago for me," he began, the words heavy. "But for the past twelve years... I thought you and your mother were dead. I had gone to your graves."

  ---

  Twenty Days Ago. Earth. England.

  The television in the corner of the quiet pub showed a somber-faced news anchor. "—today marks twelve years since the Great Catastrophe, when a million people vanished from across the globe. Hundreds of thousands more perished in the subsequent seismic events. To this day, the phenomenon remains without scientific explanation."

  The screen cut to old footage of crumbling buildings and panicked crowds before Kevin looked away, the pint in his hand forgotten.

  He stood in a well-kept cemetery, a light drizzle misting his jacket. He knelt before two sleek headstones. One read: Isaac George Brigarde. The other: Beatrice Emily Brigarde. He placed a fresh bouquet of flowers on each, his hand lingering on the cold, damp stone.

  "I miss you both so much," he whispered, his voice thick.

  A shadow fell over him. "Come on, Dad. Haven't you cried enough?"

  A young woman knelt beside him. At 5'7" with her father's blond hair, she was a living echo of the family he'd lost. She spoke to the graves, her voice firm with conviction. "Mom, Isaac... Dad thinks you're dead, but I don't. I believe you're still out there. Somewhere."

  "This again, Olivia?" Kevin sighed, the sound weary and worn. "Where could they possibly be? You saw them disappear with your own eyes. They're gone."

  "Gone, yes," Olivia countered, her gaze unwavering as she stood up. "But not dead. Did you see them die, Dad? I didn't." She turned, pulling her coat tighter against the chill. "Come on. Let's go."

  Kevin looked back at his wife's headstone, a fresh wave of grief washing over him. "Our little girl has grown up, Beatrice," he murmured. "If only you could see her now."

  Later that afternoon, in a small restaurant, they sat across from each other, pushing food around their plates. The silence was broken by Olivia.

  "Hey, Dad, remember Oscar? He asked me out."

  Kevin looked up, a forkful of food paused halfway to his mouth. "Who?"

  Olivia took a sip of her water, her tone deliberately casual. "Oscar drove me home the other day. We work together, so it was convenient."

  Kevin's brow furrowed, a familiar, protective crease forming. "Didn't I tell you not to mix work and pleasure? It always complicates things."

  "I know what you said," Olivia replied, meeting his gaze steadily. "But I already said yes to the date."

  Kevin let out a short, weary sigh, looking down at his plate. "Then why bother telling me, if you'd already made up your mind?"

  A softness returned to Olivia's expression. "I just wanted you to know," she said quietly. "I want you in my life, Dad. Even the parts you don't agree with."

  Olivia pushed a piece of broccoli around her plate. "Oscar asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday. It made me think... do you remember what Isaac did for my tenth birthday?"

  A faint, pained smile touched Kevin's lips. "He saved up for three months and bought you those concert tickets. The band you screamed your lungs out for. He was so proud of himself."

  "He was a good brother," Olivia said softly, her gaze distant. "Sometimes I wonder what he'd be like now. If he'd approve of Oscar."

  "He'd have probably already looked him up online and found some embarrassing childhood photo to threaten him with," Kevin mused, and for a moment, they shared a quiet, bittersweet laugh. The sound faded quickly, leaving the weight of the past twelve years hanging between them.

  Kevin’s smile vanished. He set his fork down, his voice dropping to a near-whisper. "The solicitor called me again, Liv. About... the legal status."

  Olivia’s head snapped up, her eyes flashing. "No."

  "We have to be practical. The bank needs it to sort out your mother's accounts. The house... it's all in limbo. It's been twelve years."

  "I don't care what the bank needs!" she hissed, leaning forward. "Signing those papers is telling the world they're dead, and I will never do that. You didn't see them die. I didn't see them die. They're just gone."

  Kevin looked at his daughter, at the fierce, stubborn hope that had kept her afloat and now threatened to drown her in a sea of what-ifs. "I know, sweetheart," he sighed, the fight draining out of him. "I know."

  Olivia stirred her drink, the ice clinking softly. “I think I should get my own place.”

  Kevin looked up from his meal, a wry, slightly wounded smile on his face. “Tired of your old man already?”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  “It’s not that,” she said, her voice gentle but firm. “I’m twenty-two now, you know.”

  “You’ve barely started working,” Kevin countered, his paternal practicality surfacing. “Do you even have the money for your own place?”

  “I’ve been sav—” Olivia began, but her words cut off as she stared at her glass. The water inside was trembling, creating frantic, concentric rings.

  Kevin saw it too. They exchanged a single, horrified glance before the entire world began to shudder. Tables skittered across the floor, chairs toppled, and from the kitchen came the shattering of plates. A deep, groaning rumble filled the air.

  “An earthquake!” someone shouted. “Everyone get down!”

  But Olivia was frozen, her gaze locked on the window. “Uuuh, Dad…” she whispered.

  Kevin followed her line of sight. The sky was bleeding, a deep, malevolent crimson staining the heavens. He stumbled to his feet and pushed through the door into the street. “It’s just like last time,” he breathed, the memory a physical blow.

  Chaos erupted. A woman across the street screamed, “Bradley! Bradley, where are you!” as the asphalt split at her feet with a sound like tearing flesh. In the distance, a high-rise groaned and folded, crashing down onto a smaller building in a cloud of pulverized concrete.

  Then, the restaurant behind him began to glow with an unearthly red light.

  “Daaad!” Olivia’s scream was a lance through the din.

  Kevin spun and ran toward the entrance with every ounce of strength he possessed. His hand stretched out, fingers mere inches from the door handle.

  The entire restaurant vanished.

  Not collapsed. Disappeared. The vacuum of its absence created a concussive blast of wind that slammed into Kevin, throwing him backward. His head struck the curb, and the world went black.

  He came to moments later to the symphony of catastrophe—screams, twisting metal, and the endless thunder of falling structures. Pushing himself up, his eyes frantically scanned the hellscape. And he saw it. The restaurant, or a grotesque, compressed fragment of it, was now embedded in the side of a shattered office block half a mile away.

  “No. Liv!” He scrambled to his feet, his body screaming in protest. “I’m coming, Liv!”

  He ran.

  His body, soft and unprepared, fought him with every gasping breath. The wind howled around him, a physical wall trying to beat him down, lifting cars and hurling them like toys. He weaved through a hailstorm of glass and debris, a desperate dancer in an apocalypse. A sedan tumbled past, missing him by inches.

  To think it would happen again, the thought seared through his panic. But not this time. He gritted his teeth, a raw, guttural yell tearing from his throat. “You’re not taking my daughter! Not if I have anything to say about it!”

  A sound answered him—a deep, masculine roar that seemed to emanate from the sky itself, from the trembling earth below. Kevin ignored it, his vision tunneling until only the wreckage containing his daughter existed.

  The world continued to unravel. Tornadoes of dust snaked between buildings. The very ground beneath his feet shuddered and began to rise, a colossal piece of the street lifting him skyward.

  “Oh no, no, no, no!” he pleaded, his eyes frantically searching. And then he saw her. Trapped. Pinned under a slab of concrete in the shifting labyrinth of wreckage.

  Fear was a luxury he could not afford. Adrenaline flooded his system, a potent, burning fuel. As the fractured landscape ascended around him, Kevin became a mountain goat of desperation. He leaped from one floating debris to another, his feet finding purchase on sheer concrete faces and twisted rebar. He slid down a tilting wall and launched himself across a gaping void, his movements fueled by a purpose that defied physics.

  Olivia saw him, her hand stretching out. “Daaad!”

  His foot caught on a jagged edge. He fell, the impact driving the air from his lungs. Pain, hot and sharp, exploded in his head as it connected with the ground. He pushed himself up, blood sheeting down his temple, and saw her again. He ran.

  A building gave way behind him. A spear of reinforced concrete shot out from the collapse, slicing deep into his back. A scream was torn from him, but his legs, miraculously, did not stop. My wife. My son. Not my daughter. The mantra was a drumbeat in his soul. “So fuck you, whoever is responsible for this!” he roared at the crimson sky.

  He scrambled up the final slope of wreckage and collapsed at her side.

  “Dad, I can’t get out! I can’t get out!” Olivia sobbed, her panic absolute.

  Kevin’s eyes scanned the chaos, finding a length of steel rebar. He jammed it under the slab pinning her legs and leaned his entire weight into it. The slab didn’t budge. The metal bar bent. A searing, white-hot agony shot through his shoulder as the joint dislocated with a sickening pop. He cried out and fell to his knees, breath rasping in his throat.

  “Just leave me, Dad!” Olivia begged, her voice thick with tears. “Save yourself!”

  “No!” The word was absolute. “What kind of father would I be if I left my own daughter to die?” He tried again with his one good arm, a futile, Herculean effort against the weight of a world ending.

  Above them, the skeleton of the building they were trapped in cracked, splitting into two colossal pieces. The shadow of death fell over them.

  Kevin gave up. He stopped pushing and simply took his daughter’s hand, his grip firm and final. He looked into her terrified eyes, his own filled with a bottomless, aching love.

  “I’m so sorry, Liv.”

  The world fell in on them, and there was only silence.

  ---

  To Be Continued...