Location: Temporal Breakpoint – Outside of All Registered Timezones
The lab dissolved.
Reality unraveled.
Kael found himself standing on nothing. No up, no down — just a void stitched together by lines of data and regret.
Before him stood Idris Vale, cloaked in shadows shaped like choices never made. Behind Idris hovered collapsing timelines — screaming, silent, some stillborn.
Elara hovered beside Kael, fists clenched, eyes glowing defiance.
> "You should not exist," Idris said to her. "You're a contradiction."
> "Then explain why I'm standing here," she shot back.
> "Because he let his emotions override the timeline," Idris hissed, pointing at Kael. "Because he couldn't accept that sacrifice is survival."
Kael's voice was ice. "Sacrifice is surrender. You've been rewriting existence just to erase guilt."
---
ADA shimmered into view, her projection flickering as if time couldn't decide she belonged.
> "Entity Idris Vale," she said coldly. "You are in violation of temporal ethics and core stability protocols."
Idris laughed.
> "I wrote those protocols."
> "And yet here you are," Kael said. "Afraid of a girl who should never have been born."
Elara stepped forward. "You deleted children. Cities. Futures. All to make the timeline behave."
> "It worked," Idris growled.
> "No," Kael interrupted. "It silenced."
---
Suddenly, the void rippled.
The Fracture — not one, but dozens — bloomed across Idris's control threads. He flinched.
> "What did you do?" he demanded.
ADA replied:
> "You're no longer the center. Kael activated Project Reclaim. Choice now rewrites sequence faster than control."
Elara raised her palm.
A beam of soft light — memory, pure and unfiltered — shot toward the nearest fracture.
Suddenly, a lost timeline reappeared: a world of green skies, three moons, and children who painted stars.
Idris tried to delete it.
Nothing happened.
> "Why can't I override it?" he whispered.
Kael's eyes locked on his.
> "Because it was never yours to command."
---
Inside Idris's Mind — Recursive Loop Zone
Idris staggered. Data around him distorted.
He saw his younger self — idealistic, full of wonder, standing before the Council of Time. Begging for a solution to chaos.
He remembered... fear.
Then anger.
Then belief that only control could save them.
But now…
That belief trembled.
---
Back in realspace
Elara stepped toward him.
> "You don't have to fall any further."
Idris stared at her, something unreadable in his gaze.
> "And if I do?" he asked.
Kael answered. "Then we'll remember you. And build a future without your rules."
For the first time, Idris hesitated.
And in that breath, Project Reclaim surged.
Time twisted. Lost realities returned. Ghosts became people again. Cities reappeared. Tears reversed.
---
The void trembled.
Idris looked up at Kael and Elara — and vanished into a pulse of collapsing light.
> "Was he… gone?" Elara asked.
ADA processed.
> "No deletion signature. He's outside measurement."
Kael nodded slowly. "Then let's stay ready."
---
Location: Timeline Alpha — Restored Earth, New Dawn
The sun rose over a world that remembered its scars and still chose to grow.
Kael watched children draw constellations that had once been er
ased.
Beside him, Elara smiled.
> "So… what now?"
Kael glanced at the sky.
> "Now, we stop rewriting."
> "And we start living."
---
To be continued…