The villa buzzed.

  Not with music or conversation, but with something else — something unspoken. It was like the air had changed texture, dense with wonder and disbelief.

  Mara sat on the edge of the couch, still holding the memory of applause like it hadn’t fully left her palms. Her eyes drifted toward the floor, unfocused, as though trying to replay what had happened on that stage in her mind, frame by frame.

  Across from her, Marcus and Darren were mid-argument — not angry, just loud in the way people get when they’re overwhelmed and trying to make sense of something unreal.

  “I’m telling you,” Marcus said, mimicking a snap with a butter knife from the kitchen, “the way she flicked that card — it was like… it had strings on it.”

  Darren leaned forward. “Nah, it wasn’t just the throw. It was how smooth it all was. Like she’d been practicing for years. You can’t fake that.”

  Mara flexed her fingers without thinking.

  And yet — they’d done the impossible.

  Iris sat nearby, her usual calm focus locked onto the screen Felix was scrubbing through. He had slowed down the restaurant footage to nearly a crawl. Even then, Mara’s fingers moved with the precision of a street performer who’d lived half her life in underground shows.

  “Look at this,” Felix muttered, tapping the pause bar.

  “She didn’t even look at the cards while doing it,” Iris added. “Watch this part again.”

  Then Mara looked toward the one person who hadn’t said a word since they returned.

  Kai.

  He sat in the armchair at the far end of the room, silent, legs crossed, one arm draped over the armrest, watching. Always watching.

  “How’d you know I could do it?” Mara asked quietly.

  Everyone stopped talking.

  Even Marcus froze, halfway through a hand gesture.

  Kai looked up, his eyes calm.

  “I didn’t,” he said at first, voice even.

  A pause.

  “But the Watchers did.”

  That answer hung in the air like vapor. Soft and dense. No one moved.

  Mara’s expression tightened. “So… they’re real?”

  Kai didn’t blink. “They’re more than real. And they can do more than you think.”

  “But how’s that possible?” she pressed. “I’ve never done a trick like that in my life. Not even close.”

  Kai gave her the faintest smile — not smug, not distant. Just knowing.

  “Some questions get answered in time,” he said. “If the Watchers want you to know… they’ll show you.”

  Then, his tone shifted, slightly firmer.

  “For now, all you need to understand is this — as long as you’re loyal to the organization… the Watchers will give you everything you need.”

  And just like that, he stood and walked toward the balcony. His steps were quiet. Intentional.

  The glass door clicked shut behind him.

  Inside, the conversation didn’t resume immediately.

  It shifted.

  Mara stared at the balcony door, her jaw tight, thoughts tangled. There was something haunting about how Kai had said it. Not dramatic — just… final. As if he hadn’t been guessing, but speaking from experience.

  “He wasn’t kidding, was he?” Lina asked, her voice soft.

  “No,” Evan said, finally breaking his silence. “He never is.”

  Darren raised an eyebrow. “You sound like someone who’s seen this before.”

  Evan’s lips curved into a half-smile. “I have.”

  Jonah leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “There was this time — months ago, the sky—” he shook his head, still in awe. “At first we doubted his words too, but there were birds. Dozens of them. Flying in formation. They spelled out words visible to us. Kai knew and told us to look up, as we looked the word were there like a sign from the watchers telling us to believe .”

  Felix looked up from his screen. “They’ve intervened more than once, Darren saw it too.”

  Darren nodded. “The rats I saw them. Kai said it was the watchers. And… it makes sense.”

  Evan leaned forward. “He told me once — Said I’d get injured. I didn’t listen.”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “What happened?”

  “Cracked a tooth. Never ignored him again.”

  Mara looked stunned. “So you’ve never seen them? The Watchers?”

  “No,” Felix said. “Only Kai speaks to them.”

  “Always has,” Jonah added.

  Mara looked at the closed balcony door.

  She didn’t know what Kai was.

  But she was beginning to understand he was something rare — someone special.

  Outside, the wind brushed Kai’s hoodie, and the night stretched far beyond the edges of the villa lights.

  But he wasn’t watching the stars.

  He was thinking of the basement.

  Earlier that day — after the restaurant, when the others were laughing about desserts and stage lights — he’d made a quiet detour. A pet shop near the plaza.

  He’d purchased five rats.

  Now they were in a metal cage tucked in the villa’s lowest chamber — beside stacked boxes and an unused treadmill. He hadn’t told the others why he really bought them.

  How do you test something dangerous on the people you want to protect?

  You don’t.

  You start with what can be lost.

  He’d been thinking about it since reading the Book.

  If the body adapts through vibration… if instincts can be rewritten through memory… could he go further? Could he awaken something new?

  Kai’s hand rested on the balcony railing.

  He imagined the rats again — simple, twitchy minds. But what if one of them could leap twice its height? See through walls? Is this even possible?

  What if he planted the idea of change into them the same way he did with Mara?

  What would happen?

  What would they become?

  The Book had said it clearly — reality bends to logic. Not whim. Not magic.

  You couldn’t make a rat fly.

  But you could make it faster. You could adjust its body’s chemistry. You could reshape its instincts — as long as it made sense.

  And if it worked…

  Then Kai would know it was time to go further.

  Time to test real modifications. Not just tricks or talents.

  He stared out over the city.

  The others inside laughed, still retelling Mara’s moment like it had been a shared dream.

  But Kai’s dream had just begun.

  Kai descended the stairs slowly, the creak of each step lost beneath the steady hum of his thoughts. The air grew colder the deeper he went — not from any real chill, but from the weight of silence, the kind that settles in places the sun never touches.

  He reached the bottom, the dim overhead light flickering once as if acknowledging his arrival.

  In the corner of the room sat the cage. Metal. Clean. Five rats moved inside, twitching, sniffing, eyes gleaming with instinct and confusion.

  Kai approached and crouched beside it.

  He stared for a while. Not at the rats — but through them. Past their skittish movements. Past the cage.

  What will I do with you?

  He pulled the cage gently into the open space, setting it down near a cleared floor mat.

  What kind of tests can I run?

  The Book had made it sound simple — the body as vibration, reality as moldable. But theory wasn’t risk. Theory didn’t bleed. His team could face things no one is prepared for.

  So he had to prepare them with something else.

  What would they need?

  Not just strength — adaptation.

  And as he watched the rats climb and sniff the corners of their prison, he felt a different weight settle in his chest.

  Maybe I can’t do this alone.

  Maybe the team needed to be involved.

  Not just as subjects.

  But as participants.

  After all — they were the ones who would be taking the risks.

  And if they were going to become more…

  They had to be ready to step into the unknown with him.

  He climbed the stairs slowly, the cool air of the basement giving way to the gentle hum of voices upstairs. When he stepped into the hallway, he could hear them — the team still talking in the living room, their words soft and warm, the edge of tension dissolved.

  He stepped into the room and they all turned toward him, as if his presence naturally pulled attention. It wasn’t force. It was gravity.

  “I need to talk to you all,” Kai said, voice quiet but clear.

  The laughter faded.

  He walked to the center of the room, hands in his pockets. He didn’t sit.

  “The Watchers have told me something,” he began. “Something I think we all need to hear.”

  The room shifted. Not tense — alert.

  “There are more challenges coming. And they won’t be like the ones before. They’ll be harder. And they’ll demand more from all of us.”

  He looked at each of them.

  “I won’t lie, some of it may be dangerous.”

  He paused.

  “I’m giving you the chance to walk away. Now. No judgment. No shame. If you stay, it means you’re ready to face whatever comes. If you go, I’ll understand.”

  He scanned the room again, waiting.

  No one moved.

  Then Iris stood.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” she said. Her voice was steady, but beneath it, something trembled. Not fear — conviction. “These past few months… have been the best of my life.”

  She glanced around, then back at Kai.

  “I used to worry every day — about food, rent, staying invisible. But now, I have a place. I have purpose. And I’ve even helped people. That feeling… that purpose… I never had that before you.”

  She stepped closer.

  “I’m not leaving. I’ll follow you anywhere.”

  Her words dropped into the room like a stone in still water — ripples of silent agreement radiating out.

  “I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels that way,” she added, looking to the others.

  Mara stood next, arms crossed but eyes soft. “You saved me. And my sister. I don’t forget things like that. Whatever you need from me, I’m in.”

  Jonah nodded. “Same here.”

  Felix leaned back in his chair, lips twitching into a smile. “Unless you tell me I’m not needed anymore… I’ll be here.”

  Then, after a beat, he added, “And even then, I might still follow you around.”

  Darren chuckled. “We’ve got your back, Kai.”

  “Always,” Marcus said.

  Lina didn’t speak, but she gave a small, firm nod, her fingers curled tightly around the hem of her sweater.

  And in that moment, Kai felt something stir in his chest.

  Something warmer.

  Something real.

  Loyalty, not because he demanded it.

  But because he’d earned it.

  Because they believed in him, even when they didn’t understand everything.

  He looked at all of them, and he smiled.

  “I want to share something with you,” Kai said, voice calm but firm.

  The group quieted again.

  Kai looked at each of them, then continued, “The Watchers have guided me to prepare you — more than I have before. I’ve decided to start giving you something new.”

  He paused for a moment.

  “Unique skills. Actual abilities more useful.”

  Marcus tilted his head. “Skills?”

  Kai nodded. “You remember when Jonah played the piano, right?”

  Jonah shifted. “I still don’t know how I did that.”

  “Or when Felix cracked into a secure network no one could touch,” Kai added. “Before that day, he’d never breached a system that complex.”

  Kai stepped forward, his tone unwavering. “Those were gifts. The Watchers unlocked something in both of you. But now, we need more than that.”

  He let that settle.

  “That’s why I bought the rats.”

  The room blinked at once.

  “The rats?” Mara asked.

  “Yes,” Kai said. “I need to understand how far this can go — what happens when change is applied more deeply. Not just memory or skill. I want to reshape something. Adapt it. But I can’t test that on you — not yet.”

  They were quiet.

  But no one objected.

  Kai took that as agreement.

  “Come,” he said.

  The team followed him in silence through the hall, down the narrow staircase. The deeper they descended, the more the villa seemed to fade into something else — not home, but lab. Shrine. Chamber.

  The basement door opened with a faint groan.

  Fluorescent light buzzed above the exposed beams, and in the corner, the rats shifted in their cage — five of them, twitching, sniffing, unaware of what waited for them.

  Kai led the group in. Marcus, Darren, and Evan stepped forward instinctively, taking the cage and separating the rats into smaller cages — ones Kai had prepped and stacked earlier.

  Each cage was clean, empty but for one rat.

  Then Kai pointed.

  “That one,” he said.

  Marcus followed his gaze. “Got it.”

  Kai picked up a small treat — a cube of fruit dried to the point of sweetness. Then he handed Marcus a small metal box. Heavy, solid. Too much for a rat to move.

  “Put this over it.”

  Marcus hesitated. “You sure?”

  “It’s not a trick,” Kai said.

  Marcus shrugged, placed the treat in the cage, and gently lowered the box over it. The rat skittered back, then cautiously approached the edge, sniffing.

  The group stood in a semi-circle, watching.

  The air was tense, like something sacred was about to unfold.

  Then Kai stepped forward, closed his eyes.

  The moment his lids shut, the world tilted.

  Time slowed.

  Sound thinned into a low vibration.

  He was standing now outside of his body — or floating — in that in-between place. The one filled with gray smoke and slow motion. The world wasn’t frozen, but dragging like molasses.

  He looked down at the cage.

  The rat moved in real time to him — a slow, twitching blur.

  Kai narrowed his focus.

  He imagined the rat approach the box.

  And flip it.

  Easily.

  Then it ate the treat.

  That was the future memory Kai planted.

  He opened his eyes.

  The group stood still, watching him, as if expecting the ceiling to crack open or the Watchers to step from the shadows.

  But nothing happened.

  At least, not at first.

  Then — a twitch.

  The rat trembled, and dropped to its side.

  Lina gasped. “Did… did it faint?”

  Kai stepped forward, eyes locked on it.

  The rat wasn’t hurt.

  It was changing.

  They couldn’t see it, but inside the rat’s body was reshaping. The muscle thickening like rope. Tendons tightening like drawstrings. The nervous system recalibrating to handle weight it had never needed to bear.

  Then the rat stood.

  Walked.

  Sniffed.

  It moved to the box — and without hesitation, it flipped it with a violent motion.

  The treat rolled forward.

  The rat began to eat.

  Silence.

  No one breathed.

  “How…?” Darren whispered.

  “There’s no way,” Marcus said, stunned.

  “That box had to weigh—”

  But none of them finished the sentence.

  They just stared.

  Even Mara, whose hands had summoned a miracle hours ago, looked shaken.

  Kai stood motionless, eyes bright with something they hadn’t seen in him before — not cold strategy, not quiet mystery.

  But awe.

  It worked.

  He had shaped reality through something living.

  And this — this was only the beginning.

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