Fractures in Rhythm

The rehearsal room shimmered with soft blue light, the glass walls reflecting flickers of holograms and floating screens. Ren stood frozen in the center of the training hall, his pulse echoing in his ears louder than the tempo of the backing track. Sweat trailed down the side of his temple, his fingers trembling as he tried to reset his stance for the fourth time in less than an hour.
"You're off tempo—again," Kai snapped, arms crossed, standing like a sculpted god bathed in LED glow.
Ren winced, his gaze falling to the glowing floor beneath them. "I-I know. I'm trying."
"Trying isn't enough here. This isn’t some school recital."
The rest of the ensemble glanced between them awkwardly, their own movements slowing. Even the holographic instructor paused, flickering uncertainly before disappearing.
Kai stepped forward, his tone sharpening like a knife. "You're dragging every count. You can’t even follow the basic pulse. If this keeps up, we’ll be laughed off the preliminary showcase."
Ren bit the inside of his cheek. He’d been up all night studying the choreography, watching loops of the sequence until his vision blurred. The tempo shifts were unlike anything he’d experienced before—the beats felt mechanical, artificial, lacking the organic ebb and flow he understood.
But he had improved. He knew he had.
Still, Kai’s words hit like glass shattering in his chest.
"Maybe if you stopped being so... mechanical, and actually helped me, I could learn faster," Ren muttered under his breath.
Kai froze. "What did you say?"
Ren raised his chin. "You heard me. You talk like you’ve already decided I’ll fail. You think I don’t see that look in your eyes? You think I don’t feel how cold it gets when you enter the room?"
Silence fell. The backing track stopped playing.
For a moment, it was only the sound of their breath.
Kai’s eyes darkened. "If I’m cold, it’s because I have to carry the weight of this agency while you’re just stumbling through your little time-travel fairytale. You don’t belong here, Ren."
The words stung, sharp and sudden.
Ren flinched. Something in him cracked.
He turned and stormed out of the room.
--
The corridor outside was a tunnel of ambient blue, its curved walls humming with quiet energy. Ren didn’t know where he was going—just away. The world blurred around him as he shoved open a door and found himself in the practice dome overlooking the ocean sky. Endless aquamarine clouds drifted outside the transparent walls, and stars blinked faintly in the distance.
He collapsed onto the bench in the center.
"Maybe he's right," Ren whispered. "Maybe I don't belong here."
The door creaked open.
Ren stiffened, turning slightly to see Kai.
"I didn’t follow you to apologize," Kai said flatly.
"Of course not. You never do."
Kai stood there, silent.
Then, unexpectedly, he walked over and sat beside him. Not touching, but near enough for Ren to feel the tension humming between them.
"That lullaby you sang yesterday," Kai said slowly, "I knew it. From when I was a child."
Ren looked up, startled.
"I don’t know how. But when you sang it, it unlocked something I didn’t even know I’d forgotten."
Ren's lips parted, but no words came.
Kai turned toward him, his voice softer now. "Maybe I was hard on you. But this isn't a game. Everyone here has fought like hell to get where they are. You showing up... it scared me."
Ren blinked. "Scared you?"
Kai looked away. "Yeah. Because your voice—when you let it loose—it sounds like something from the stars. And that terrifies me. Because I can’t match it."
They sat in silence, the city below them shimmering like liquid light.
Then, slowly, Kai reached out and brushed Ren’s hand.
Ren looked down at their fingers, the contact electric.
"Let’s start over," Kai whispered.
Ren nodded.
And in that quiet dome, beneath a sky of stars that didn’t belong to their time, two boys sat side by side, unsure of the future, but not alone in it.
--