“‘Past-Ayliva here. Is the grumpy idiot hopelessly in love with you yet?’” Nazmir’s voice, usually a low growl, finished the sentence with a peculiar lilt, almost a question. He held the crumpled parchment, his gaze fixed on Ayliva, who stood frozen, a cheerful hum dying on her lips. The green glow from the regulator dial cast a pallor across his cheekbones, highlighting a hollow stillness. Ayliva felt her breath snag on a lump of dry flour. The breezy penmanship had soured right in his grip. Nazmir’s expression, previously softened by the steam and her presence, hardened with each passing second, retracting like a snail’s horns into a shell of pain. He slowly lowered the note, his fingers trembling almost imperceptibly. “So,” he said, his voice flat, devoid of any previous affection. “This was… an assignment?” He gestured toward the humming turbine, at the tea station, at the spot where he had rested against her apron. “All of it. Aggressive affection. Cuddling. Thawing the gloom-frost. A checklist item.” Ayliva felt a desperate scramble of words in her throat, but none seemed adequate. How could she explain? How could she convey the truth that her past self’s instructions had merely pointed her towards a path she would have chosen anyway? That the feelings, the *real* feelings, had bloomed entirely on their own, far beyond any bullet point? “No, Nazmir, it’s not like that!” she cried, stepping towards him. Her hands reached out instinctively, wanting to touch his arm, to reassure him, but he recoiled before she made contact, a sharp, almost violent flinch. “My illness,” he continued, his gaze drifting over the engine, then settling back on her with chilling clarity. “My debilitating, terminal gloom-frost. It’s… it’s a time-magic manipulation, isn’t it? Something your past self engineered, just to give you a challenge, a goal?” A bitter, humorless laugh escaped him, sounding like rust grinding metal. “A convenient affliction for your little project.” The accusation, so utterly unfair, stung more than any insult. Ayliva felt tears prick at her eyes, not for herself, but for the profound wound she saw opening in him. He truly believed she had been playing a cruel game, that his deepest vulnerabilities were mere props in her time-traveling scheme. “No!” she insisted, the protest scraping her throat. “My past self’s notes only told me how to *help* you, Nazmir. They didn’t *cause* anything. And my feelings for you… they’re real! More real than anything on this stupid paper!” With a sudden, fierce resolve, Ayliva snatched the small, smudged letter from his loose grip. She tore it in half, then in quarters, then into tiny, confetti-like scraps, letting them flutter to the ground around their feet. “I don’t care about the plan anymore,” she declared, her voice trembling but firm. “I care about *you*. I want you to succeed because *you* deserve to, because you’re brilliant, and kind, and… and I love you, Nazmir Talan. Not some instruction. *You*.” Her confession hung in the air, raw and vulnerable. Nazmir blinked, the line of his mouth twitching as if stung by hot tea. But it was quickly extinguished, replaced by a glacial mask. He stared at the torn pieces on the floorboards, then back at her, his irises clouded like winter pane. “No,” he whispered, his voice barely carrying past the turbine's purr. He took a step back, then another, his hands clenching at his sides. The air around him grew heavy, colder. Wisps of dark, silvery frost spread over his skin, tracing branching patterns up his forearms toward his throat. The dial's vibrant green needle flickered, dropping toward a dull crimson marker. Nazmir turned, stumbling toward the massive brass contraption. The frost intensified, swirling around his retreating frame in a rimed shroud. He reached out, ice-coated fingers scraping against the polished brass teeth of the primary regulator. With a low groan of stressed metal, the gears shuddered, then seized beneath a sudden crust of blue-black rime. The rhythmic thrum faltered, choking into a metallic rattle. The lab air bit sharp and stale. Ayliva wrapped both arms around her cardigan. Nazmir huddled against the cold housing, his shoulders trembling in jagged hitches. He was retreating, sealing himself off, and her heart broke to witness it. Just then, the heavy brass door to the lab exploded inward with a deafening crash, ripped from its hinges. Dilmura Zandesh stood framed in the doorway, a triumphant smirk on her face, flanked by two burly guards in the pristine, shimmering silks of the upper city. Behind them, Ozirun Vel, looking significantly less affluent and more rumpled than usual, hovered awkwardly. “Well, well, well,” Dilmura purred, stepping over the ruined door. Her sharp glance swept over Ayliva’s damp cheeks, the silent apparatus, and settled on Nazmir’s shaking frame. “It seems your little project has hit a snag, dear sister.” She glided towards Nazmir, her silks rustling with an almost audible superiority. “Nazmir Talan, isn’t it? Such a shame to see such brilliance wasted in this… squalor.” She extended a manicured hand, her fingers adorned with rings that caught the dim light. “My dear scholar, the Qel-Zaman Grand Collegium has expressed… considerable interest in your talents. Abandon this doomed venture, and more importantly, abandon this… *distraction*.” She gestured dismissively at Ayliva. “Come with me to the upper city. Endless funding, state-of-the-art facilities, a position of unparalleled prestige. You would be free from all this… unpleasantness. Free to truly achieve your potential.” Ayliva watched, her chest aching. Nazmir was her future, her happiness. His rejection had already splintered her world. Now, Dilmura was offering him an escape, a path that would lead him far from her, and he was so clearly broken, so vulnerable. Nazmir slowly lifted his head. The frost still clung to him in jagged scales. He looked first at Ayliva, his eyes still holding that deep, unreadable pain, then turned to face Dilmura, a flicker of something dark and dangerous entering his gaze. His lips, previously chapped and pale, curled into a slow, chilling smirk. The frost around him didn’t dissipate, but it seemed to shift, hardening, no longer despairing but sharp, like shards of molten steel. “I’d rather choke on the toxic surface than spend five minutes with you, Dilmura.”

The Time-Traveling Elephant in the Room