Buck wakes with the quiet certainty that today is about closure.

  Not fear. Not dread. Just the pressure of a checklist nearing its final line.

  “All right,” he murmurs, sitting up on the narrow bed in the cellar room. “Readiness assessment.”

  The HUD settles into view almost immediately, restrained and clinical, like a report meant for someone who understands the consequences.

  READINESS CHECK

  Buck nods. “I’ll take it.”

  You should, B.U.C.K. replies. This is about as clean as you get before a surge.

  He eats lightly, dresses carefully, and steps into the morning with deliberate normalcy. Bread. Twine. A fresh whetstone. Errands that look like routine because routine keeps people from asking questions.

  He’s turning down a narrow street when the rhythm of the world falters.

  Not a sound. A hesitation. Buck looks up.

  The familiar henchman from the Atlantic Guard stops short, surprise flashing across his face before recognition lands. His gaze snaps to Buck’s hands, searching for the blade that isn’t there.

  His own hand shoots up to his neck anyway, fingers brushing the place where memory still lives.

  For a heartbeat, neither of them moves.

  Buck gives a small even nod. Neutral. Purposely unthreatening.

  The henchman’s eyes widen.

  He turns and walks away too fast, then faster still, boots striking stone with uneven urgency before he breaks into a run.

  Buck watches him go.

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  No escalation, B.U.C.K. notes. But he’s going to tell someone.

  “Yeah,” Buck murmurs. “That clock didn’t start today.”

  He finishes his errands. Same pace. Same casual demeanor. Not allowing his heightened sense of awareness to set tempo.

  Back at the boarding house, the common room hums with late-morning life. Maeve is behind the counter, locked in a quiet argument with a supplier who is already losing. She glances up when Buck enters.

  “You’re back early,” she says.

  “Just about done with getting my affairs settled,” Buck replies.

  She studies his face a second longer than necessary, then nods. “Cellar’s open, I left a crate out for you to store what you won’t need while you are away.”

  Buck inclines his head in a deferrence to her and heads down, closing the door to his small room behind him. With a now practiced flourish, he opens the seam in the air.

  The Time Locker unfolds.

  The space feels more settled now. Familiar. Shelves in orderly rows. Soft, even light that casts no harsh shadows. A place designed for continuity, rather than comfort.

  Buck moves with intention.

  First, the coin pouch. He weighs it in his hand once, then places it into a slot in the grid of various sized slots and boxes that are in front of him, the system acknowledged it’s position with a message on the hud. Next, the tools. The better whetstone goes onto its rack. His strop and hones into a small crate.

  Assigning quick slots, B.U.C.K. says.

  Buck nods. “Knife, first.”

  The HUD confirms. The blade becomes present in his hand, accessible with thought instead of fumbling fingers.

  “Coin pouch, second.”

  Confirmed as well.

  He hesitates, then reaches into his jacket pulling out an object from a hidden inside pocket, turning it over in his hand.

  The compact pulse pistol rests in his palm, heavier than it looks. He turns it once, feeling the smooth casing, remembering the first night in the city when he’d crouched by a sewer grate, needle and thread biting into his fingers as he sewed a hidden pocket into the lining of his coat because he didn’t trust the world yet.

  “Better here,” Buck says quietly sliding the device into the gridded storage device that resembles a corporate office mail sorter from the 1990s.

  Much better, B.U.C.K. agrees.

  Buck assigns it to a quick slot. The HUD acknowledges the transfer, the weapon now closer than his heartbeat, no longer buried in cloth and hope. He adds one more item, then steps back, scanning the arrangement like a quartermaster before deployment.

  “That’s enough for now,” he says.

  For now, the AI repeats.

  Buck steps out. The doorway folds closed behind him, seamless and final.

  Upstairs, Maeve is alone now, wiping the counter with a cloth that has obviously survived several seasons of bad judgement and tipsy patrons.

  “I’ll see you soon,” Buck says.

  She stops wiping.

  “Soon?” she repeats.

  “Soon enough, Yes.”

  Maeve nods once. “Don’t make me a fool.”

  Buck smiles. “I won’t.”

  Outside, he pauses, drawing one steady breath.

  Then he turns into the narrow alley behind the boarding house.

  Same bricks. Same damp stone. Same smells.

  Different Buck.

  Ready, B.U.C.K. says.

  Buck closes his eyes and finds the place inside him where decisiveness lives. Less thought or muscle memory, more like intent.

  He clicks the button that hangs in the air in front of him and steps slowly forward.

  The sensation comes immediately.

  Smoother than before. Easier. Much like a door that remembers being opened.

  There is no resistance now, no friction. Time doesn’t brace itself. It yields, recognizing the pattern, the alignment.

  Yes, B.U.C.K. says almost like an exhale, awe threaded with relief. That’s it. You’re syncing faster now.

  Buck notices more this time.

  The way the air thins around him for a fraction of a second. The way the world stretches instead of tearing. The way the moment feels almost lubricated, cooperative, as if the universe has decided not to make this difficult anymore.

  No pain.

  No white.

  Just motion.

  The alley reforms around him, subtly altered, like a memory adjusted at the edges.

  Buck opens his eyes, heart steady, breath even.

  “That was easier,” he says.

  It will keep getting easier, B.U.C.K. replies softly. If you keep listening to time. And me.

  Time settles behind him leaving the image of the past to evaporate as the current timeline settles around him.