My daughter was born during those four minutes and thirteen seconds when shadows covered the Earth. The doctors say I'm the only woman who stayed conscious during the delivery – something about maternal instinct overriding whatever knocked everyone else out. But I know the truth: I had to stay awake to make sure she didn't slip into the spaces between shadows.

The first sign something was different came during the newborn screening. The nurse drawing blood gasped when the needle passed straight through my daughter's arm like it wasn't there. A second try hit solid flesh. The doctor said it was sleep deprivation, told me to rest. But I saw the shadows under his desk reach toward my baby's crib.

They called her a "Parallax birth" – one of maybe thirty worldwide who came into existence during those precise minutes. The government sent researchers, but their instruments kept malfunctioning around her. One of them, a older woman with kind eyes, pulled me aside after a session.

"Has she shown any... unusual behaviors?" she asked, glancing at my daughter playing in her shadow-strewn playpen.

I didn't tell her about the times I'd find the baby's crib empty, only to hear giggles from inside the walls. Or how her shadow sometimes moved independently, reaching for things she couldn't grasp. Or the way electronics died whenever she cried.

"No," I lied. "She's perfectly normal."

The researcher didn't believe me. I could tell by the way she watched my daughter's shadow stretch across the floor, far longer than it should have been at that time of day.

The other Parallax births started making news when the children turned two. A boy in Singapore who aged backwards every time he slept. Twins in Brazil who could swap consciousness through their shadows. A girl in Kenya who spoke a language that made listeners see impossible colors.

My daughter just played with her shadows. They'd curl around her like cats, carry her toys, dance with her in empty rooms. I learned to stay calm when I'd walk into her nursery and find her floating in patches of darkness. She was always laughing, always safe.

But sometimes, in those shadows, I caught glimpses of... something. Shapes that shouldn't exist. Geometries that hurt to look at. And always, always, a sense of watching.

The night she turned three, I found her having a tea party with her shadow. Not her actual shadow – it was still attached to her, stretching normally across the floor. This was something else, a three-dimensional darkness shaped like a little girl.

"Mommy!" she said, gesturing to the empty chair. "Come meet my friend. She's me from the shadow place."

I sat down, hands trembling as I accepted an empty cup from fingers made of void. "The shadow place?"

"Where I go sometimes," my daughter said casually. "When I'm not here. It's like here but... sideways?"

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The shadow girl nodded, and I saw stars in the depths of what might have been her face.

That's when the government came back. Not researchers this time – men in tactical gear with specialized equipment. They'd lost contact with the Singapore boy, they said. The Brazil twins had disappeared into their own shadows. The Kenya girl's parents reported her speaking with something in their walls.

They wanted to take my daughter for "observation."

I was already packed. Had been since she was born, if I'm honest. The go-bag waited by the door, full of supplies, cash, and a notebook documenting everything I'd observed. I'd been writing it all down, hoping to understand what was happening to her. To all of them.

We ran that night. Her shadow friends helped, confusing our pursuers, leading us through dark spaces that shouldn't have connected. Now we move constantly, staying ahead of the government teams. Sometimes we meet other Parallax birth families, share information, trade theories.

Here's what we know: During those four minutes and thirteen seconds, reality cracked. Something slipped through – not into our world, but into the spaces between worlds. The shadows aren't just darkness; they're possibility itself, leaking through the cracks.

And our children? They're not just gifted. They're hybrids. Born half in our reality, half in whatever exists between moments. The government wants to study them. Maybe control them. But I've seen how my daughter's shadow friends protect her. How they watch over all the Parallax children.

They're not protecting the children from us.

They're protecting us from what's coming.

Last week, I found my daughter's shadow friend crying in the corner of our motel room. When I asked what was wrong, she pointed to the window. Through the glass, I saw normal shadows starting to move, to reach, to hunger. Regular darkness becoming something else.

"The spaces are getting bigger," my daughter said, holding her shadow friend's hand. "The in-between is leaking."

I asked what she meant.

"Reality is like a puzzle, Mommy. But someone took out all the pieces that hold it together. The shadows. Now the picture is falling apart."

This morning, I watched my daughter play with her reflection in a store window. Not her reflection – all of her reflections, infinite versions of herself stretching through possibilities. Some older, some younger, some made of shadow and starlight. They were discussing something in that impossible language they share.

I caught one word I recognized: "soon."

The government is still hunting us. Other parents call with reports of their children doing impossible things. Speaking of doors opening between realities. Of a war in the spaces where light fears to go.

My daughter is almost four now. She doesn't play with her shadow friends anymore – she studies with them. I've seen her practicing, learning to fold space around herself, to exist in multiple states at once. The other Parallax children are doing the same, each in their own way.

They're preparing for something.

Sometimes, late at night, I catch her staring into corners where the shadows are deepest. When I ask what she sees, she just smiles and says, "The ways between." Then she goes back to her lessons, learning to navigate spaces that shouldn't exist.

I should be terrified. But when I see her shadow friends watching over her, when I catch glimpses of impossible geometries in her eyes, I feel... hope.

Because whatever slipped through during those four minutes and thirteen seconds, whatever lives in the spaces between shadows – it chose our children for a reason.

I just pray we're ready when we find out why.

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