Chapter 7 · If I don't shoot you, you may be the one starting it

"I'm not softening anything. I'm telling you Victor wanted me dead before I reached the wall. You gave him the chance."

Her eyes dropped to his mouth again. This time, she didn't hide it fast enough.

Kane saw the hesitation and used it.

"If you shoot me, Victor gets the only person who knows how the purge starts."

"If I don't shoot you, you may be the one starting it."

"Then put me in the fighter."

Her eyebrows pulled together.

"You just admitted the fighter kills pilots."

"It kills pilots who can't sync with it."

"And you can?"

"I already did."

Selena's hand dropped from his neck.

"That fighter has never launched."

"Not in this timeline."

The words hung there.

Kane knew he had crossed the line. He had been careful for an hour, feeding her pieces, turning every impossible fact into a threat. But the truth had teeth, and sometimes it bit through the leash.

Selena slowly stepped back.

"This timeline?"

Kane said nothing.

"You keep talking like time belongs to you."

"It doesn't."

"Then explain it."

"I can't."

"Can't or won't?"

"Both."

She stared at him for three long seconds.