The sky was red.
I don’t mean the beautiful kind of red you see during a sunset.
This was darker, almost crimson, with thick clouds twisting above the ruined city.
Every few seconds, violet lightning flashed across the sky, briefly illuminating the destruction around me.
I could barely breathe inside my armor.
My visor was cracked, several warning messages were blinking across my field of vision, and I could feel blood slowly running down my side.
I ignored all of it.
There wasn’t much point worrying about damage anymore.
I looked around at what remained of our army.
We had started with one hundred thousand soldiers.
Now, there were only a few thousand of us left.
The streets were covered with rubble, destroyed vehicles, broken weapons, and bodies.
Fires burned inside the strange buildings surrounding us, their metallic structures glowing from the heat.
Somehow, we had made it this far.
The enemy’s main fortress stood about three kilometers ahead.
Three kilometers.
After everything we had been through, it almost felt like a joke.
“How far?”
The voice came through my helmet.
I turned toward the soldier beside me.
He was leaning against a broken wall, his armor badly damaged.
Blood was running down one side of his face, and he was trying very hard not to put any weight on his left leg.
I checked my visor.
“About three kilometers.”
He stared at the fortress.
“Three kilometers…”
He gave a tired laugh.
“I can walk that.”
I looked at his leg.
“Can you?”
He followed my gaze.
After a moment, he sighed.
“…Probably not.”
I almost laughed.
Almost.
Then something roared above us.
The sound was so loud that the ground seemed to vibrate beneath my feet.
I looked up.
A massive shadow moved through the crimson clouds.
My stomach tightened.
“Get down!”
I didn’t wait for him to respond.
I threw myself behind the remains of a building just as the creature emerged from the clouds.
It was enormous.
I had seen plenty of monsters during the war, but this thing was on another level.
Its body was covered in dark scales and metallic armor, while enormous wings stretched from its back.
Strange symbols glowed across its body.
Aetheric runes.
The creature opened its mouth.
“Move!”
A beam of blue-white energy slammed into the street.
The explosion threw me across the ground.
I hit something hard and rolled several meters before finally stopping.
For a few seconds, I couldn’t breathe.
Then my armor began screaming warnings at me.
[Aetheric energy leak detected.]
[Armor integrity: 31%.]
[Internal temperature: critical.]
I stared at the messages.
“Great.”
I pushed myself onto one knee.
“Just what I needed.”
The creature was still flying above the battlefield.
Looking at it reminded me of how hopeless humanity’s situation had once seemed.
Aether.
When the first rifts appeared, we thought they were some kind of natural disaster.
We were wrong.
The beings that came through them possessed something we didn’t.
Aether Cores.
Those strange organs allowed them to absorb the energy that existed throughout the universe and convert it into what we eventually called Mana.
They could manipulate that energy.
They could use it to strengthen their bodies, create weapons, power machines, and perform what we had once called magic.
Their civilization had developed science and magic together.
We hadn’t.
We were trying to catch up while fighting for our survival.
I had spent most of my life studying them.
Every piece of technology we recovered, I examined.
Weapons.
Armor.
Power systems.
Materials.
Machines.
Runes.
Even the technology behind the rifts.
I had taken them apart, studied them, memorized them, and tried to understand how they worked.
Eventually, we discovered something important.
The rifts weren’t natural.
Someone was creating them.
That discovery was what eventually led us here.
If we could understand how the enemy opened their gateways, maybe we could use the same technology against them.
And now we were standing in front of their main fortress.
“Rafael.”
My communicator came alive.
I recognized the voice immediately.
The command center.
“I’m here.”
“What’s your status?”
I looked down at my armor.
It was barely functioning.
“My armor is damaged.
I’m still mobile.”
That was technically true.
I didn’t mention that my left arm was starting to go numb.
There was no reason to worry them.
“Can you reach the fortress?”
I looked ahead.
Three kilometers.
It wasn’t far.
But considering everything between us and that fortress, it might as well have been thirty.
“I can.”
“Once you reach the core, can you activate the gateway?”
I looked at the device attached to my arm.
It was one of the most important pieces of technology humanity had ever created.
We had built it using salvaged alien technology, then modified it using everything we had learned during the war.
I had designed most of it myself.
“Yes.”
There was silence for several seconds.
Then the commander spoke.
“We’ll cover you.”
I looked around.
There weren’t many soldiers left.
We both knew what “cover” meant at this point.
Still, I answered.
“Understood.”
The commander didn’t disconnect.
“Rafael.”
“Yeah?”
There was something different about his voice now.
“Come home.”
I froze.
For some reason, those words hurt more than they should have.
Come home.
I hadn’t heard those words in a very long time.
My thoughts wandered somewhere I hadn’t allowed them to go in years.
A classroom.
A sunny afternoon.
A girl sitting near the window.
Rosalie.
I could still remember her face perfectly.
Of course I could.
I remembered everything.
That was the curse of Hyper-Eidetic Memory Syndrome.
Most people slowly lost details as the years passed.
A face became harder to picture.
A voice became less distinct.
Memories lost their sharpness.
Mine didn’t.
I could still remember the exact layout of my childhood home.
I could remember the smell of my old classroom.
I could remember the sound of my mother’s voice when she called me to dinner.
And I remembered Rosalie.
I remembered the first time she smiled at me.
I remembered the way she looked away whenever our eyes met.
I remembered her friends teasing her.
And I remembered the song.
“Another Chance…”
I didn’t realize I had whispered it until I heard my own voice.
That song had started everything.
My younger brother had been sick, so I had been asked to submit his book report.
My teacher jokingly told me that she wouldn’t accept it unless I sang in front of the class.
I had reluctantly agreed.
Because of my condition, I could reproduce music almost perfectly.
Every note stayed in my head.
Every change in pitch.
Every rhythm.
So I sang.
The song was called “Another Chance.”
I didn’t think anything would come from it.
Rosalie did.
She started liking me after that.
And I liked her too.
I just didn’t believe someone like her could actually want someone like me.
I was poor.
Really poor.
One of my shoes had a large tear across the front, leaving my toes almost exposed with every step.
At times, I wrapped strips of cloth—what we called a foot mop—around my feet just to hold the shoes together.
I was embarrassed by it.
Rosalie’s friends tried to help us get closer.
Once, one of them asked me to walk Rosalie home because our houses were nearby.
I refused.
The next time, I made another excuse.
Then another.
I told myself there would be a better opportunity.
The truth was much simpler.
I was afraid.
I didn’t want Rosalie to see where I lived.
I didn’t want her to see my parents struggling.
I didn’t want her to see how poor we were.
Most of all, I was afraid that if she knew the truth, she would realize I wasn’t good enough for her.
Years later, I learned that she had cried because she thought I didn’t like her.
That memory still hurts.
I’ve fought monsters that could destroy entire world.
I’ve watched friends die.
I’ve helped create weapons capable of changing the course of wars.
But one of my biggest regrets was still something incredibly ordinary.
I should have walked her home.
I should have told her I liked her.
Maybe we would have dated.
Maybe we wouldn’t have lasted.
I don’t know.
That’s the part that bothered me.
I never gave us the chance to find out.
“Rafael.”
The commander’s voice pulled me back.
“I’m going in.”
“Wait.
Your armor—”
I cut the communication.
I didn’t need to hear it.
I knew my armor was failing.
I knew my body was exhausted.
And I knew there was a good chance I wouldn’t survive.
But the gateway had to be activated.
I tightened my grip on my weapon and started running.
The remaining soldiers immediately opened fire.
Missiles streaked across the sky while energy weapons tore through the enemy forces.
I didn’t look back.
I just kept running.
The fortress grew larger with every step.
When I reached the entrance, I fired directly into the gates.
The blast tore through the first line of defenses.
I rushed inside.
Alien soldiers immediately moved to intercept me.
I fought my way through them.
There was nothing impressive about it.
I wasn’t some unstoppable warrior.
I was exhausted, injured, and terrified.
I simply refused to stop.
Every time something tried to kill me, I found a way to survive.
Every time my body told me to rest, I kept moving.
Eventually, I reached the core chamber.
I stopped when I saw the machine in front of me.
The gateway mechanism.
I had studied countless images and scans of it.
But seeing it in person was different.
This machine was the reason we had come all this way.
I approached it and connected my device.
Nothing happened.
I frowned.
“Come on…”
I adjusted the connection.
Still nothing.
“Don’t do this now.”
I tried again.
The machine suddenly came alive.
Light spread across the chamber.
The gateway began forming in front of me.
I stared at it.
Then I smiled.
“We actually did it.”
A roar came from behind me.
My smile disappeared.
I slowly turned around.
The wall exploded.
The winged creature forced its way into the chamber.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
It charged.
I barely had time to react.
A massive claw struck my body.
My armor shattered.
I flew across the room and slammed into the gateway machinery.
Pain exploded through my body.
I couldn’t breathe.
My vision blurred.
Warnings appeared across my visor.
[Critical damage.]
[Internal bleeding detected.]
I tried to move.
Nothing.
I looked toward the gateway.
It was still open.
That was enough.
Outside the chamber, I could hear the soldiers fighting their way toward it.
They had their way home.
At least they had that.
I didn’t.
I could feel my body shutting down.
For a moment, I simply lay there and listened to the battle around me.
Then I thought about my parents.
My brothers and sisters.
My friends.
Everyone I had lost.
And, as always, I thought about Rosalie.
Her face appeared in my mind.
It was just as clear as the day I first saw her.
I closed my eyes.
“If I ever get another chance…”
I couldn’t finish.
My consciousness faded.
Everything went dark.
“Rafael!”
Someone was shouting.
I frowned.
I knew that voice.
When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was a ceiling fan slowly turning above me.
For several seconds, I simply stared at it, unable to understand what I was looking at.
This wasn’t a military shelter, and it certainly wasn’t the inside of my armor.
There were no alarms, no explosions, and no gunfire.
There was only the familiar hum of an old ceiling fan.
I slowly sat up and looked around the room.
An old wooden desk stood beside the window, with a stack of schoolbooks sitting on top of it.
My bookshelf was still in the corner, and the cabinet with the broken handle was exactly where I remembered it.
Even the small scratch on the side of my bed was still there.
My room.
My old room.
“What…?”
I looked down at my hands.
They were young.
There were no scars from the war, no calluses from years of working with machines, and none of the marks that had accumulated over a lifetime of fighting.
I immediately got out of bed and hurried toward the mirror.
The person staring back at me was a teenager.
My face was younger, my hair was still thick and dark, and the wrinkles I had grown accustomed to seeing were completely gone.
I raised a hand to my face, almost expecting the reflection to disappear.
It didn’t.
“No way…”
My eyes moved toward the calendar hanging beside my desk.
I stared at the date.
Then I checked it again.
My hands started trembling.
I knew this date.
I knew exactly where I was in my life.
High school.
Years before the war.
Years before the rifts appeared.
Years before humanity discovered Aether.
Years before the world I knew was torn apart.
I was back.
The realization was so overwhelming that I couldn’t move for several seconds.
My mind kept trying to find another explanation, but there wasn’t one.
I remembered dying.
I remembered the pain.
I remembered the gateway opening and the last thing I saw before everything went dark.
Yet here I was.
Alive.
Young.
Home.
Then another thought struck me.
My family.
I rushed out of the room.
“Mom!”
A woman’s voice answered from the kitchen.
“Rafael?
Why are you shouting?”
I stopped in the hallway.
That voice.
I hadn’t heard it in decades.
My mother appeared from the kitchen, holding a dish towel in one hand.
She looked at me with the same confused expression I remembered from when I was a teenager.
“What happened to you?” she asked.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
I couldn’t answer.
I just stared at her.
She was young.
Healthy.
Alive.
For decades, I had carried the memory of her final days in my mind.
I remembered every detail of the hospital room, every word she had said, and the way I had held her hand while knowing there was nothing I could do.
But none of that mattered now.
She was standing right in front of me.
I walked over and hugged her.
My mother froze.
“Rafael?”
I didn’t say anything.
I just held her as tightly as I could.
She eventually placed a hand on my back.
“Are you okay?”
I nodded, though my throat had tightened so much that speaking was difficult.
“Yeah.
I’m okay.”
She pulled back and looked at me suspiciously.
“You look strange.”
A laugh escaped me.
I couldn’t help it.
“I’m just happy to see you.”
She stared at me for another moment before shaking her head.
“You’re really strange today.”
I smiled.
She had no idea how much those ordinary words meant to me.
My brother was alive too.
My parents were alive.
People I had watched die were still living their ordinary lives, completely unaware of what was waiting for them years in the future.
I returned to my room and sat on the edge of my bed, trying to organize the thoughts racing through my head.
I had spent my entire first life preparing for the next crisis.
First it was school, then work, then the war, and eventually the invasion.
There was always something more important that needed my attention, so I kept putting everything else aside.
I had told myself that I would have time later.
Later, when I graduated.
Later, when I had enough money.
Later, when the war was over.
Later, when humanity was safe.
There was always a reason to wait.
Until eventually, there was no later.
Now, somehow, I had been given another chance.
I didn’t know why.
I didn’t know who had sent me back or whether there was some greater reason behind it.
Maybe I would never find out.
But I knew one thing.
I wasn’t going to waste it.
The war was still coming.
I knew that much.
In a few years, everything would begin to change, and eventually the rifts would appear.
I knew the monsters that would come through them, the destruction they would cause, and how badly humanity would struggle against them.
I also knew that knowing the future didn’t mean I could simply fix everything.
Right now, I was just a high-school student.
I had no money, no laboratory, no army, and no political influence.
I couldn’t simply walk into a government office and tell them that a war was coming.
Even if anyone believed me, I didn’t have the resources to do anything about it.
So I needed to start small.
Money first.
Then resources.
Then technology.
If I wanted to change the future, I needed the means to do it.
I was still thinking about where to begin when my mother’s voice came from the other room.
“Rafael!”
“Yes, Mom?”
“Don’t forget Edmund’s book report!”
I froze.
My mother’s voice continued from the kitchen.
“His deadline is today, remember?
He’s still sick with chickenpox, so you said you’d bring it to school for him.”
I stared at the doorway.
Edmund’s book report.
For a moment, I couldn’t breathe.
Then the memory came rushing back.
Of course.
How could I have forgotten?
Edmund had gotten sick with chickenpox and couldn’t go to school.
He had asked me to submit his book report for him because today was the deadline.
I remembered carrying that report to school.
I remembered walking into the classroom.
I remembered my teacher looking at the paper and then jokingly demanding that I sing before she would accept it.
And I remembered the girl sitting near the window.
Rosalie.
My heart began beating faster.
I looked toward the calendar again.
The date suddenly meant something completely different.
This wasn’t simply the day I had returned to the past.
This was the exact day I had first met Rosalie.
The day that eventually led to the song.
The day that started a relationship I had spent the rest of my life regretting.
“Rafael!” my mother called again.
“Did you hear me?”
“Yeah!” I quickly answered.
“I’ll bring it!”
I grabbed my school bag and started searching for Edmund’s report.
My hands were shaking slightly.
I found the report exactly where I remembered leaving it.
For a moment, I simply stared at the pages.
Something that had once been an insignificant school assignment had unknowingly changed my entire life.
I remembered everything that happened afterward.
The singing.
Rosalie’s expression.
Her friends teasing her.
The way she would look away whenever our eyes met.
And eventually, the opportunities I was too afraid to take.
I had spent decades thinking about that day.
Now I was about to live it again.
But this time, I wasn’t the same boy who had walked into that classroom carrying nothing but a book report and a lifetime of insecurities.
I had already lived the future.
I had watched the world fall apart.
I had fought monsters on another planet.
I had lost everyone.
And somehow, I had been given the chance to come back here.
I slipped the book report into my bag and stood up.
There was still a lot I needed to figure out.
The war, the rifts, Aether, the technology, the money, and everything else that would eventually become necessary to change the future.
But none of that needed to happen today.
Today, I had a much simpler task.
I needed to go to school.
I needed to submit Edmund’s book report.
And I needed to meet Rosalie again.
I left my room and headed toward the door.
My mother looked at me as I passed.
“Don’t lose the report.”
“I won’t.”
“And make sure his teacher gets it.”
“I know, Mom.”
She smiled.
“Then hurry.
You’ll be late.”
I stepped outside.
The neighborhood looked almost exactly as I remembered it.
Children were walking to school, Jeepneys passed along the road, and neighbors were already talking to one another as they started their day.
Nothing about the scene seemed extraordinary.
But to me, it was almost unbelievable.
I had seen cities burn.
I had watched millions of people die.
I had stood on another world beneath an alien sky, believing that I would never see Earth again.
And now I was walking to school with a book report in my bag.
I couldn’t help but smile.
This was where it had started.
Before the war, the rifts, the monsters.
Before everything went wrong.
And somewhere ahead of me, in the same classroom I remembered so clearly, was Rosalie.
The girl I had loved.
The girl I had never forgotten.
The girl I had lost because I had been too afraid to take the first step.
I didn’t know what would happen this time.
I didn’t want to assume that our relationship would simply follow the same path because I remembered it.
Rosalie didn’t know what I knew.
She had no reason to feel the same way she had in my first life.
If we found our way to each other again, I wanted it to happen naturally.
But I would at least give her the chance.
And this time, I would give myself one too.
As I continued toward school, I looked down at the road ahead and quietly laughed.
“Another chance, huh?”
The title of that old song suddenly felt strangely appropriate.
I had thought I was singing about getting another chance at love.
I never imagined that, one day, I would actually be given another chance at my entire life.
I tightened my grip on my school bag and kept walking.
This time, I wouldn’t run away.