Chapter 217: Waking Hours
The sky hadn’t moved, but time had.
The stars above the lean-to flickered in slow pulses, like dying embers cast too far from the fire. I lay there, unmoving, eyes open to the black canopy of night, each breath a deliberate, even drag through my nose. I didn’t dare close my eyes. Not because I was afraid of what I’d see—nothing haunted me worse than what I saw while awake—but because I couldn’t afford to lose another minute.
Six hours. That’s all I had left before the System reactivated. Six waking hours. And I was burning them by the second.
Beside me, Sienna slept in fits. Her hand rested against my forearm, a reflexive contact she made without realizing. Every time I shifted, she’d stir, tighten her grip for just a moment, then fall still again.
The fire popped faintly in the center of the camp. A few embers kicked up and spun in the air like miniature red ghosts. Evelyn’s footsteps passed nearby—slow, deliberate pacing as she monitored the perimeter traps. She hadn’t spoken in over twenty minutes. She didn’t have to. We were all waiting for the same thing:
A sign.
A light.
A voice.
Something.
But it never came.
Camille and Alexis had said "two hours." It had been nearly four. No signal. No flash. No sound. And now that I had time to think—too much time—I couldn’t shake the image of that red light blinking between the trees, then vanishing like it had never existed.