I hear Mei’s laugh, and I look across the room to see her hurrying down the stairs. She lands at the bottom with a thud, throwing her arms around me like we haven’t seen each other in a long time.

“Where are you going? Can I come too?” she asks, looking up at me with soft, hopeful eyes.

I smile, unflinching, because I love my sister more than she even realizes.

And then her clothes shift. Pink jeans. A yellow hoodie. Clothes I’ve never seen Mei wear before, but I’ve seen them somewhere.

Something metal clicks beside me. A horrible familiar sound that scrapes against my eardrums. I turn back to where Finn should be, but he’s not there. He’s been replaced by a man wearing a black mask, the barrel of a gun pointed at my head.

“Everyone stay where you are.” His voice is distorted—a mess of sounds and frequencies that don’t sound human.

Mom and Dad walk into the room, their faces beaming like they’ve never been so happy to see me.

Like they’re happy I’m finally home.

Terror races through me like flames devouring a pile of kindling. My parents shouldn’t be here.

It’s not safe.

And when I look back at Mei, the jubilation on her face disappears. I see my own fear reflected in her eyes, and I’m unable to stop it. Unable to protect her from the monster eating me from the inside.

She looks at Mom and Dad.

“Everyone stay where you are.” That voice again, grating and metallic.

I squeeze Mei’s shoulders. “Don’t run. Stay with me. I’ll keep you safe.”

But Mei was never very good at listening to me.

She runs, and the world slows.

The masked man follows her with his gun, and I see everything. Their faces, their fear, their desperation. Every single one of them, trapped in the briefest moment of time, not realizing it will all be over soon.

The man’s knuckle closes over the trigger, and I throw myself between him and Mei. It isn’t a choice. It isn’t a decision at all.

But I won’t let a little girl die today.

The bullet pierces my chest, and the world snaps back into place.

I bolt upright, clutching my heart. My lungs feel like they’re full of broken glass, and every breath I take heaves in and out of me with a forceful ache.

“Welcome back,” Yeong says from beside me.

I see past him at first; there is a strange machine behind him, the holograph projected near the wall and the wires slithering up the couch and attached to—

My fingers find my temples, and I tear at the foreign objects like I’m covered in insects, ripping the wires from my skin until I’m free of whatever machine this is.