That night, Ilia didn't sleep.
She sat on the rooftop of the drop house, knees drawn to her chest, watching smoke drift across the dark city. Rien stayed below. He was giving her space. Or avoiding her.
The fragment rested against her sternum now, tied inside a strip of cloth beneath her shirt — too dangerous to keep in a pocket, too strange to leave out.
She touched the cloth. Her fingers tingled.
The rooftop shifted.
Not physically — not in any way she could explain — but she was no longer alone in her head.
It began with a scent: scorched jasmine.
Then the sound of wind through stone arches.
And then — a name.
Not hers.
"Myel."
The voice came from within. Not a whisper, not a memory, but a declaration. As if the cube — or whatever lived within it — had pulled a string too tightly.
Her mind bent sideways.
She saw fire climbing temple walls, columns collapsing, bells ringing not in warning but in defiance. She stood — or someone stood, someone in her shape but not her bones — on the steps of a ruined library, shouting orders to those who fled behind her.
"Seal the well!" the other-her commanded. "It's not complete — it will never be complete if we leave it open!"
A man turned toward her — hooded, bleeding from the eyes. "You've already lost."
The other-her reached inside her robe and pulled out something small — a cube. It was glowing white-hot.
"Then let it burn."
Ilia gasped, and the rooftop snapped back into focus. The sky above Calligro was still heavy with clouds. Her hands were shaking.
The cube under her shirt was cool now. Innocent. Waiting.
She heard movement behind her.
Rien had come up, holding two mugs.
He stopped when he saw her face.
"You saw something again."
She nodded. "No. I was something."
She told him. Not every detail — she didn't have every detail. Just the sense of it: the city that wasn't Calligro, the fire, the voice, the name.
"Myel," she said again. "That was her name. My name. Then."
Rien sat beside her, silent for a long time. Then: "Time fragments don't just hold temporal code. Some of them… some of them hold imprints. Souls, maybe."
"Ghosts?"
He shook his head. "No. Ghosts are what's left when something ends. This is something that's still happening. Just not here."
Ilia stared out at the city, her voice low. "Am I her? Or am I just… infected by her memory?"
"I don't know," Rien admitted. "But if what you saw is real, then this isn't just a message device. It's a resurrection."
A silence passed between them.
Then Ilia whispered, "She died to seal something."
"And you just unsealed it," Rien said.