For several seconds, nobody moved.
The living room held Jacob's ragged breathing, the television's low music, and the air conditioner's mechanical hum. Blood ticked from Jacob's nose onto his hand.
Jay stayed beside him near the couch. Jacob pressed one hand to his nose, the other trembling against his thigh. He kept glancing toward the hallway, memorizing possible escape routes.
The robber with the drum-magazine rifle stood at the hallway entrance, several feet away. Another guarded the front door, trapping Jay and Jacob between the hallway and the exit. Upstairs, Kristen was with two robbers. The three girls remained in the bathroom hallway.
Jay's mind raced.
Six people.
Four robbers.
No police.
No parents.
No neighbors who knew anything was happening.
And the front door was controlled.
The rifleman's finger rested along the trigger guard. Each shift of his weight produced a faint metallic click that punched through Jay's chest. His pulse beat hard in his throat.
Jay swallowed.
Don't do anything stupid.
Jacob leaned closer.
"Jay..."
"What?"
"Don't move."
"I ain't."
"Just do whatever they say."
Jacob nodded, eyes fixed on the rifleman.
"I know."
The robber nearest them noticed the whispering.
"What y'all talking about?"
"Nothing," Jay answered immediately.
The man's eyes locked onto him. Sweat gathered beneath Jay's collar. His fingers dug into the carpet. Then the robber looked away, tightening his grip on the weapon.
A heavy footstep crossed the ceiling. Dust trembled from the light fixture. Jay glanced up, then lowered his eyes.
A few seconds later, Kristen's voice echoed from above.
"I told you, that's everything."
"You sure?" one robber answered.
"Yes."
"Then we going back downstairs."
Footsteps descended. Kristen appeared first at the bottom of the stairs, hands raised, followed by the two robbers. He looked toward Jay and Jacob, fear beneath the apology in his expression.
Whatever had happened upstairs hadn't gone well.
The robber behind Kristen pointed toward the center of the living room.
"Sit."
Kristen obeyed, lowering himself onto the carpet. Now the three friends were together on the left half of the room, surrounded by four armed men: the leader near the center, the door guard at the front entrance, the drum-magazine rifleman at the hallway entrance, and the fourth robber covering the bathroom hallway.
Then the bathroom door opened.
All three girls stepped into the hallway and froze. The girl Jay had been talking to looked toward the living room, her face changing instantly. The tallest caught the youngest by the wrist.
The hallway robber raised his weapon.
"Come here."
The girls approached slowly. The first girl looked at Jay.
"Jay..."
He shook his head.
Don't.
She stopped.
The youngest stared at the rifle and began counting under her breath. The other girl kept her chin lifted, though her lips trembled.
The robber motioned them into the living room. They crossed in front of him and sat to Kristen's right, facing the television. One began crying silently. Another rubbed her palms against her knees. The tallest sat close to the others.
Now everyone was together: Jay and Jacob near the couch, Kristen in the center, the three girls on the right, and four armed men around them.
The leader looked around.
"Phones."
Nobody moved.
"Phones," he repeated.
His voice hardened. The robber by the front door lifted his rifle.
One by one, they placed their phones on the floor. Jay put his down first, followed by Jacob, Kristen, and the girls. His hand shook, and the phone struck the carpet with a soft tap. The door guard gathered them and checked the screens.
"Nobody called anybody."
The leader nodded.
"Good."
Something in his tone bothered Jay. He didn't sound relieved.
He sounded satisfied.
"Here's what's going to happen," the leader said. "Y'all stay right here. Nobody runs. If everybody listens, nobody gets hurt."
Jay stared at the carpet. Then he saw the leader exchange a brief glance with the drum-magazine rifleman.
It lasted less than a second.
It was enough.
They weren't planning to leave witnesses.
Jay looked at Jacob. He had seen it too. Across the room, Kristen began breathing harder. The girl beside Jay pressed her knees together. The tallest shifted in front of the youngest.
The leader turned toward the hallway.
"Check the rooms again."
The door guard returned to the front entrance. The leader moved toward the hallway, followed by the drum-magazine rifleman and the bathroom guard. The rifleman passed directly in front of Jay and Jacob, his barrel dipping toward them before rising again.
The girl beside Jay whispered through her tears.
"Jay..."
He looked at her.
"I'm sorry."
"For what?"
Her eyes dropped.
"I knew something was wrong."
"What?"
"Those messages weren't from my parents."
The pieces connected. She had suspected something and said nothing.
"Why didn't you tell us?"
"I didn't know what to say."
Jay looked away. For the first time that night, he thought about his mother, his room, his game cases, and the unfinished save file on El Cinco.
Everything he'd expected to do tomorrow felt impossibly far away. He imagined his mother checking the time, calling his phone, and hearing nothing.
Footsteps returned from the hallway.
The leader entered first and stopped near the center. The bathroom guard came behind him from the right-side hallway, while the drum-magazine rifleman resumed his position on the left.
"Everybody stay where you are."
No one moved. The crying girl made a small choking sound and covered her mouth. The youngest squeezed her eyes shut. Kristen's shoulders rose toward his ears. Jacob leaned forward slightly.
Jay looked from the leader to the others around the room.
The leader raised his weapon.
Jay met Jacob's eyes.
Neither needed to speak.
Jacob's eyes said run.
Jay's said there was nowhere to go.
The leader fired first. The shot struck one of the seated victims. The muzzle flashed, and the report slammed through the living room. Plaster and paint burst into the air.
The robber at the front door fired next. The round struck another victim, sending them sprawling across the carpet. Their scream broke beneath the next explosion.
The drum-magazine rifleman fired from the left hallway entrance, tracking across the seated group. Muzzle flashes strobed against the walls as rounds punched through furniture and drywall. The television shattered, though its speakers continued playing warped music beneath the gunfire.
The bathroom guard fired from the right-side hallway. His first shots struck the girls on the right, and another tore through the couch beside Jay and Jacob, sending stuffing into the air.
Someone screamed.
Someone shouted for everyone to get down.
Jacob caught Jay's sleeve. Blood appeared along his forearm where a fragment had cut him. His eyes pleaded for an answer Jay didn't have.
For one suspended moment, Jay thought of reaching for him, of the girl beside him, of his mother waiting for him to come home, and of the PlayStation still glowing beside an unfinished game.
He had believed there would be time.
Then a bullet struck Jay in the side.
The impact drove into him with crushing force. Pain exploded through his ribs. His breath vanished. He looked down and saw blood spreading through his shirt before his body folded onto the carpet.
The room lurched sideways. The television's blue glow smeared into a wavering band. His ears rang beneath the gunfire. He tried to breathe, but his chest would not open.
His final thought wasn't about the robbers, the money, or even the girl beside him.
It was about the unfinished quest waiting on his PlayStation.
Man...
I was supposed to finish that tonight.
The gunfire faded into a dull, distant pounding. Jacob's hand slipped from his sleeve. The blue light stretched thinner, then vanished.
The leader lay in the center of the living room. The victims lay across the carpet where they had been seated: Jay and Jacob beside the couch on the left, Kristen near the center, and the three girls together on the right. The robbers searched the rooms one final time.
Closets.
Bedrooms.
Bathroom.
Nobody remained.
No witnesses.
The leader looked toward the others.
"We're done."
The robber with the drum magazine glanced around.
"Let's go."
They moved toward the front door. The door guard opened it slightly and checked the empty street.
No headlights.
No pedestrians.
No police.
Nothing.
They stepped outside. The last robber glanced back.
The television was still playing. From the doorway, the living room looked almost normal.
Almost.
He closed the door.
The four men disappeared into the night, and their vehicle pulled away from the curb. Within seconds, the street looked as it had before they arrived.
Quiet.
Ordinary.
Unaware.
Inside, the television kept playing to an empty room. Jay's phone lay among the others near the couch, its screen dark. Miles away, his PlayStation still held the save file he had expected to open tomorrow.
The world would keep moving. Morning would come. Someone would eventually find the house and learn what had happened there.
But Jay would never finish the quest, never tell the story, never make it home.
A night that had begun with laughter, flirting, and jokes had taken everything from them before any of them understood it was the last night they would share.
The darkness did not feel like sleep.
There was no dream.
No sound.
No sense of time.
For what felt like an eternity, Jay simply didn't exist.
Then—
Warmth.
At first, it was so faint that he barely noticed it.
A strange pressure surrounded him. His body felt impossibly small, almost weightless, while a rhythmic sound pulsed somewhere nearby.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
He tried to open his eyes.
Nothing happened.
He tried moving his arms.
They barely responded.
'What the hell...?'
Panic immediately returned.
Jay couldn't see.
Couldn't speak.
Couldn't understand where he was.
Yet somehow, buried beneath the confusion, one thought remained.
'I'm still here.'
The realization hit him harder than anything else.
'I'm alive?'
He tried again to move.
This time, his fingers curled.
Tiny fingers.
Jay froze internally.
What?
Another sensation followed.
Cold air touched his skin.
Then came voices.
Muffled at first.
"...stable."
A second voice answered.
"Heart rate?"
"Normal."
Jay's mind raced.
'Who are these people?'
The darkness suddenly became brighter.
His eyelids fluttered.
Light flooded his vision.
Jay immediately squinted.
Everything was blurry.
Shapes moved above him.
A ceiling.
Bright lights.
People.
Someone leaned over him.
"He's awake."
Another voice answered.
"Already?"
"Yes."
Jay tried to speak.
His mouth opened.
What came out wasn't a word.
It was a tiny, confused cry.
The sound startled him.
'What the hell was that?'
He tried again.
"Waaah!"
The adults above him exchanged looks.
One of them smiled.
"Strong lungs."
Jay's panic intensified.
He couldn't understand why his voice sounded
like that.
He couldn't understand why his body felt so small.
Then he looked down.
His tiny hands were visible beneath a white blanket.
His fingers curled instinctively.
His entire body was that of an infant.
Jay stared.
His mind went completely blank.
No.
He tried moving his legs.
They kicked beneath the blanket.
No, no, no.
He tried remembering the last thing he had seen.
The living room.
The television.
Jacob.
The gunfire.
Pain.
Darkness.
Then nothing.
And now, this.
A woman stepped closer.
She had kind eyes and tired features. She carefully lifted him into her arms.
Jay felt her warmth immediately.
"Easy," she whispered.
Her voice was unfamiliar.
"You're okay."
Jay stared at her.
For some reason, the sound of those words made something inside him crack.
You're okay.
Nobody had said that before the end.
Nobody had been able to tell him that everything would be okay.
And now a stranger was holding him like his life mattered.
Jay's eyes began watering.
He didn't understand why.
The woman noticed.
"Oh, sweetheart."
She gently rocked him.
Jay wanted to explain.
Wanted to tell her that he wasn't supposed to be here.
That he was eighteen.
That he had friends.
A mother.
A home.
A PlayStation.
An entire life.
But all that came out was another infant cry.
"Waaah..."
The woman smiled sadly.
"It's alright."
Jay stared upward.
The ceiling remained blurry.
His thoughts slowly became heavier.
His exhausted newborn body couldn't maintain consciousness.
As his eyes closed, one final thought passed through his mind.
I got another chance.
Then everything faded.
Years began passing.
Not as Jay remembered them.
There was no school.
No job.
No gas station.
No Kristen.
No Jacob.
No living room.
Instead, there were new faces.
A new house.
A new family.
A new name.
The memories of his previous life remained buried somewhere deep inside him, inaccessible beneath the developing mind of a child.
He learned to crawl.
Then walk.
Then speak.
His first word made his mother laugh.
His first steps made his father cheer.
His childhood was ordinary.
Painfully ordinary.
And somehow, that was exactly what Jay needed.
He grew up surrounded by people who loved him.
He learned what it felt like to wake up without fear.
He learned what it felt like to fall asleep knowing someone would still be there in the morning.
Occasionally, though, strange dreams returned.
A glowing television.
A dark hallway.
A phone vibrating on a table.
Four shadows standing behind a door.
And sometimes—
A boy sitting in front of a game console.
Jay could never understand who the boy was.
Until one night, when he was six years old, he woke up screaming.
His mother rushed into his room.
"Jay?"
He sat upright, breathing heavily.
His heart pounded.
His mother switched on the lamp.
"What's wrong?"
Jay stared at her.
He was crying.
"I had a bad dream."
She sat beside him.
"What happened?"
Jay hesitated.
He couldn't explain it.
Because for the first time, fragments of the old
life were beginning to surface.
A name.
A face.
A house.
A game.
A final night.
He looked down at his tiny hands.
And suddenly remembered.
His eyes widened.
"I'm Jay."
His mother smiled.
"Of course you are."
But she didn't understand what he meant.
Jay stared toward the bedroom window.
The memories weren't complete.
Not yet.
But somewhere deep inside him, an eighteen-year-old boy had begun waking up again.
And this time...
He had been given something he'd never expected.
A childhood.
A family.
A future.
A second chance to live.