Waves crashed against the rocky shore, their rhythm steady and indifferent. The purple-tinged fog had retreated with the morning light, revealing a coastline of jagged stones and twisted driftwood.

This felt so, so strange.

Adom stood at the edge of the water, watching the angry sea pound against the cliffs. No boat could navigate those waves, not without being dashed to splinters. They were effectively stranded.

Behind him, seated on various rocks and fallen logs, his classmates rested. They still looked shell-shocked, both from their ordeal in the Highlands and from their unexpected rescue via giant lizard-beast.

Nyx, as Adom had introduced the creature, was currently curled up in a patch of sunlight, her massive scaled body rising and falling with each breath. Zuni had made himself comfortable on her snout, apparently having formed an immediate friendship with the beast that had nearly given everyone else heart attacks.

"You're lucky I found you when I did," Adom said, turning back to face the group. He wasn't angry, exactly, but concern made his voice sharper than intended. "What were you thinking, coming into the Highlands unprepared?"

Karion scowled. "We were looking for you."

"I told Sam I'd be back in a few days. It's barely been two."

"You're a student like the rest of us," Eren countered. "What makes you think you should be exploring this death trap while we sit back at the hotel?"

Adom sighed. They had a point. "Fair enough. But still—do you have any idea how dangerous this place is?"

"We do now," Gus muttered, stroking Luna.

"At least you're all okay," Adom said, softening. "More or less."

Mia raised her bandaged hand. "Define 'okay.'"

That earned a small laugh from the group, breaking some of the tension.

Sam approached, leaving the others behind. "Can we talk?" he asked quietly.

Adom nodded, and they walked a short distance down the beach.

"Thanks for coming back for us," Sam said once they were out of earshot.

"Did you think I wouldn't?"

Sam shrugged. "Honestly? I wasn't sure we'd last long enough for anyone to find us."

Adom glanced back at the group. "You weren't deep enough, luckily enough. How bad was it?"

"Bad." Sam kicked at a piece of driftwood. "Those vine things nearly got Karion. Eren burned half the forest trying to save him. Then the hallucinations started..." He shuddered. "If Mia hadn't kept her head, we might have all wandered off separately."

"And Damus?" Adom asked, keeping his voice neutral. "How did he end up with you?"

Sam hesitated. "That's... complicated."

"Zuni filled me in on some of it."

Sam's eyebrows shot up. "Zuni did?"

"Yeah."

"Right. Druid stuff," Sam said with a half-smile. Then his expression grew serious. "So you know about Damus's mother? And your history?"

Adom nodded slowly. "It was... unexpected."

"He wants to talk to you," Sam said. "Privately."

Adom glanced toward where Damus sat alone, perched on a rock at the edge of their makeshift camp, staring out at the ocean.

"I know," Adom said. "Zuni mentioned that too."

"Are you going to hear him out?"

Adom was quiet for a moment. "I think I have to."

Sam squeezed his shoulder. "For what it's worth, I think he's genuinely sorry. Though it took Karion nearly punching his face in to make him admit it."

That almost made Adom smile. "Karion did that?"

"Shocking, I know. He might actually have a heart under all that attitude."

Adom watched the waves crash against the shore. "It's makes sense. Now that I think about it, I remember when Damus changed. It was right after his mother died."

"You knew her well?"

"Yes," Adom said. "I remember her showing us a few spells when we were kids. She was kind."

He thought back to the times he'd spoken with Jasper, Damus's father. The man had always been effusive in his praise, comparing Damus unfavorably even while greeting Adom warmly. At the time, Adom had brushed it off as adult awkwardness. Now, looking back, remembering Damus's expression during those encounters...

Adom straightened his shoulders. "I should talk to him."

Sam nodded. "Want me to come with you?"

"No. This should be between us."

As Adom approached the group, he caught Naia's eye. She gave him a small nod and then quietly directed everyone else to help her collect firewood. Even Karion followed without argument, though he shot a warning look at Damus before leaving.

Soon, only Damus remained, still perched on his rock, staring out at the water.

Adom crossed the distance between them, his footsteps crunching on the pebbly shore. Damus didn't turn around, but his shoulders tensed, showing he was aware of Adom's approach.

"Mind if I join you?" Adom asked.

Damus shrugged, not meeting his eyes.

Adom settled onto a neighboring rock. For a long moment, neither of them spoke. The only sound was the steady crash of waves against the shore.

Finally, Adom broke the silence. "Sam says you wanted to talk."

Damus nodded, still not looking at him. His hands fidgeted in his lap, picking at a loose thread on his torn sleeve.

"I'm listening," Adom said gently.

Damus opened his mouth, then closed it again. His jaw worked, as if he was physically struggling to form words. When he finally spoke, his voice was so low Adom had to strain to hear it over the waves.

"I don't know how to start."

"Start anywhere," Adom said. "We've got time."

Damus glanced up briefly, then back down at his hands. "I've been awful to you."

"Yes," Adom agreed simply. No point denying the obvious.

"And you don't know why."

"I think I'm starting to understand."

Damus looked up sharply, his expression guarded. "What did they tell you?"

"Enough," Adom said. "But I'd rather hear it from you."

Damus's shoulders slumped. He turned back to the ocean, silent again. Adom waited, patient, watching the struggle play out on his former friend's face.

"I'm sorry," Damus finally said, the words coming out in a rush. "For everything. The taunts, the pranks, the rumors—all of it." His knuckles turned white as he gripped the edge of the rock. "I wish I could go back and undo it all."

His breath was shaky as he picked up a small stone and rolled it between his fingers. "I know I've been cruel. Vindictive. There's no excuse for it. I just... I needed someone to blame, and you were..." He trailed off, tossing the stone into the water.

"Convenient?" Adom supplied.

Damus winced. "Yeah. But that doesn't make it right."

Adom watched the ripples spread from where the stone had disappeared beneath the surface.

He wasn't really angry at what Damus had done. The bullying, the harassment—all of that felt like child's play, really. Typical thirteen-year-old cruelty born from grief and confusion. Nothing that couldn't be corrected with time and guidance.

The anger burning in his chest had nothing to do with this Damus at all.

It belonged to another person entirely.

In another timeline, another world, Damus Lightbringer had pushed Sam over the edge. Literally. The bullying had escalated and escalated until one gray morning, Adom had found his best friend hanging from the rafters of their dormitory room.

The image was burned into his memory with perfect clarity. Sam's body swaying gently, neck bent at an impossible angle. His face had been purple, tongue protruding slightly, eyes bulged and staring at nothing. The rope had bitten deep into his throat, leaving angry red marks that spoke of struggle. His hands hung limp at his sides, fingernails torn and bloody from clawing at the noose in those final moments.

The overturned chair. The creaking sound of rope against wood beam. The smell of released bowels that nobody ever mentioned when they talked about death.

No child should see that. No child should carry those images.

The way Adom's vision had gone black when his mind simply refused to process what he was seeing. He'd woken up on the floor, surrounded by concerned faces, but the damage was done. For years afterward, he couldn't look at rope without his hands shaking. Couldn't see anything hanging from anything without his vision tunneling.

It had taken the Mage Wars to cure him of that particular terror. When you're surrounded by public executions daily, when the streets are lined with corpses swinging from lampposts, when you have to cut down allies and enemies alike just to clear the roads—eventually your mind builds calluses over the trauma. Exposure therapy at its most brutal.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

But the memory remained. Would always remain.

Only one question kept circling in his head at that moment:

How can one forgive the actions of someone who hasn't done them?

Damus hadn't even felt remorse when confronted. He'd just shrugged, looked Adom in the eye, and said Sam was weak. Weak. As if driving someone to take their own life was simply natural selection at work.

That Damus was dead now. Decapitated by a mage hunter in a timeline that would never exist again.

This Damus was thirteen years old and missing his mother.

He had been cruel, yes. He'd made cutting remarks and alienated his classmates. But cruelty wasn't murder. Being an ass wasn't the same as driving someone to suicide.

Adom had stopped this Damus before he could become that one. He'd confronted him, exposed the root of his behavior, forced him to face what he was becoming. This Damus had never had the chance to push anyone that far because Adom hadn't let him.

So... who exactly was he angry at?

A dead man from another world? A thirteen-year-old boy who was grieving his mother? Or himself, for carrying the weight of something that had never actually happened here?

Memory was a cruel thing. It preserved pain with perfect fidelity while letting joy fade at the edges. He could remember every detail of finding Sam's body, but struggled to recall the exact sound of his friend's laugh before he came back. Trauma carved itself deeper than happiness.

The mind was supposed to protect you from harm. But sometimes it became the source of its own suffering.

Adom closed his eyes and tried to release the ghost he'd been carrying. That other Damus was gone. This one needed help, not hatred.

The waves kept crashing. The world kept turning.

It was time to be the adult he was supposed to be.

"Don't sweat it," Adom said finally. "It's behind us."

Damus looked up, surprised. "Just like that?"

"I'm not saying it didn't hurt," Adom said quietly. He wasn't really talking to the boy sitting on the rocks behind him. Not this Damus, anyway. "Or that what you did was okay. But holding onto this anger isn't going to help either of us."

The words felt strange on his tongue. Like a conversation he should have had years ago, with someone who could no longer hear him. Someone who wouldn't have cared even if he could.

But saying it out loud—finally saying it—felt like setting down a weight he hadn't realized he'd been carrying for too long.

And to be fair, holding a grudge against a kid for something that happened decades ago would’ve made Adom look pathetically small. And he had enough self-awareness to avoid that particular humiliation.

The image of Sam's lifeless body still lingered at the edges of his vision like a persistent shadow. Without thinking, Adom glanced back toward the group.

Sam was looking directly at him, eyebrows raised in that familiar questioning expression. When their eyes met, Sam tilted his head slightly and gestured with one hand, you want me to come over?

His posture was relaxed, one arm draped casually over a piece of driftwood, the other hand scratching Luna behind the ears. He was laughing at something Karion had just said, his face bright with amusement.

Alive. Safe. Growing into himself with each passing day.

This Sam–vibrant, curious, full of potential–was real.

The other image, the one that had haunted him for decades, belonged to a world that no longer existed. A nightmare that had shaped too many of his choices for too long.

"You alright?" Damus asked quietly, following his gaze.

Adom blinked, realizing he'd been staring. "Yeah. Just..." He shook his head, forcing himself to look away from Sam's questioning expression. "Nothing."

But it wasn't nothing.

For the first time in longer than he could remember, Adom found himself actively choosing which image to hold onto. Not the purple face and bulging eyes, not the creaking rope or the smell of death. Instead, Sam's easy smile, his quick wit, the way he'd squeezed Adom's shoulder earlier with concern.

This was a new life. What point would there be in holding onto ghosts from a timeline that had ceased to exist? Letting nightmares dictate his behavior in a world where those horrors had never come to pass?

"I appreciate the apology, Damus. That counts for something."

"More than I deserve," Damus muttered.

They fell into awkward silence. Adom's mind drifted to the forest he'd explored in the restricted zone—to the bodies he'd found there. Ancient remains, most of them, but some more recent. Explorers who'd never made it back. Could Damus's mother be among them?

He decided not to mention it. No need to reopen that wound.

"I'm sorry about your mother," Adom said instead. "I realize I never properly had the opportunity to say that before."

Damus stared at his hands for a long moment. "Thank you," he said quietly.

The waves filled the silence between them.

The truth was, Adom hadn't really considered Damus a friend for quite some time. For the boy, this enmity and indifference might have gone on for a few years, but for Adom, it had been decades.

Even when Damus was killed by the mage hunter, Thessarian Valdris, Adom had been more angry at the fact that it was an attack on mages as a group than at Damus's actual demise. That's how detached he had become.

So he couldn't really say everything would be back to normal now, that they would suddenly be the best of friends again. That ship had sailed a long time ago.

But ships that sailed away could always return to port.

Maybe, with time, they could rebuild something. This was a good start, anyway.

"We should head back to the others," Adom said, moving to stand.

"Wait," Damus said, not looking up. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"Do you think we could ever..." He paused, searching for the right words. "Not be friends, exactly, but at least not enemies?"

"I think we're already there," Adom said honestly. "The rest... we'll see."

Damus nodded, accepting the answer. He stood up, brushing sand from his pants.

Adom turned toward the ocean, preparing to follow Damus back to the others, when something caught his eye. A dark shape in the water, moving against the current. Not a wave or debris—something deliberate.

He squinted, focusing on the spot where he'd seen movement.

There it was again. Something—or someone—was swimming toward the shore.

"Do you see that?" Adom asked, pointing.

Damus followed his gaze. "See what?"