Speed's eyes snapped open.
His breathing came in short, sharp gasps—the kind that made his chest burn. Sweat covered his forehead, his neck, the tank top clinging to his skin like it was trying to suffocate him. His heart wasn't beating. It was hammering, slamming against his ribs so hard he could hear it in his ears, in his teeth, everywhere.
What the hell was that?
He jolted upright, the movement jerky and panicked. His hand flew to his chest, pressing hard like he could slow his heart down by force. His other hand went to his mouth—teeth, jaw, tongue. He ran his fingers across his teeth frantically, checking, checking, checking. They were real. Still there. Still his.
He touched his face. His arms. His legs. The sheets beneath him. Real. Real. Real.
But the dream felt more real than any of this.
The war. The light. The angel falling, burning, his wings torn away like they were made of paper. And then—that thing at the end. That smile. Those red eyes looking directly at him, asking if he was still watching, and Speed felt the weight of that gaze even now, awake in his bedroom, the afternoon sun nowhere to be seen because it wasn't afternoon at all.
He didn't need to check the clock to know it was early.
His room was that particular shade of dark that only happened right before sunrise—not quite black, not quite blue. The kind of dark that meant the world was still asleep, and he was the only thing awake in it.
Speed's breathing was still ragged. He forced himself to take a longer breath, hold it, let it out. Again. His heart rate started to drop. Slightly. Marginally. Not enough.
That dream had been vivid.
He'd been having the same one since he was twelve—angels, war, fire, demons, all of it bleeding together like watercolors in a nightmare. But tonight it had felt different. Sharper. Like someone had reached into his skull and cranked the resolution up. Like he'd been there, actually standing in that void, watching that thing get thrown out of Heaven.
Speed ran both hands through his hair, gripping it hard. His skin was still clammy. His sheets were soaked.
Man, I'm losing it, he thought. Just a dream. Just another one of those stupid dreams.
He lay back down, staring at the ceiling. The plaster was boring, featureless. He could count the texture if he wanted to—he'd done it a hundred times on nights when sleep wouldn't come. But his eyes wouldn't focus. His mind wouldn't settle.
He didn't realize how much time had passed until he noticed the dark had shifted slightly. The world wasn't holding its breath anymore. It was starting to wake up.
Speed closed his eyes. Just try to rest. Just—
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.
Loud. Piercing. The kind of sound designed to rip you out of sleep whether you wanted to come out or not.
His entire body jerked. Speed's eyes flew open, and for one stupid second, he thought something was actually wrong. An emergency. A fire. Something real and immediate and terrifying.
Then his brain caught up.
The alarm.
The clock on his nightstand blazed bright in the pre-dawn darkness: 6:00 AM.
Speed's hand shot out and slammed the alarm off. The noise died. The silence that followed felt like relief, but it was thin—fragile. His heart was still running at a sprint even though there was nothing to run from.
He lay there, breathing hard, staring at his alarm clock like it had personally betrayed him.
5:59 AM had become 6:00 AM and his brain had convinced him the world was ending.
Speed groaned and rolled over, pressing his face into his pillow. It smelled like sweat and something stale. How long had he been sweating through this thing?
He didn't want to get up. Didn't want to move. Didn't want to keep living in a world where dreams felt realer than reality and alarms made you think you were dying.
But the alarm had already gone off.
His day had already started.
And that red-eyed smile was still burning somewhere behind his eyes, waiting for him.