Chapter 7: Choice

The weight of his offer still echoed in the back of my mind.

"Join me…Accept Reality…"

No. Not this time. Just for once, I had to think beyond myself…

This had to be a test—yes, it had to be.

I pulled my hand back, "No. I won't become this—look at your emo self wearing all black ."

He blinked, momentarily thrown off by my comment. "What?"

"Seriously," I said, crossing my arms. "You look like a walking wanted poster"

A comforting smile spreads across his face 

"Should I take this as a no?"

I swallowed hard, the weight of his words pressing down. "Maybe? Besides, power without control is just chaos. And I'd rather face chaos than lose who I am."

He chuckles, "Yep, that proves it. You are me after all…Very well I respect your decision"

The air between us thickened. "But remember, Kiran, the future doesn't wait. And we will eventually meet again."

The world around me started to fade, colors bleeding into shadows until everything slipped away.

I woke up slowly, sweat on my skin and my heart still steady.

I checked the clock and it's morning, however outside there is no sunlight.

Strange… 

That cheap mattress didn't exactly help me get a good night's rest.

His words stayed with me, "We will eventually meet again."

Was it a warning?

I sat alone in the quiet corner of the room, the weight of the dream pressing down on me.

Why was I seeing them? What was the reason behind these glimpses?

The strange silence of the room—the hum of machines, Arlie came munching on something crunchy like it was just another Tuesday—made me come back to my senses.

"I had a dream," I said quietly, breaking the silence.

Arlie glanced up from her snack. "About what?" her eyes were watchful.

I didn't answer. Just stared down at the floor.

That was enough.

Her smirk faded. She tossed the snack aside and leaned in. "Was it that bad?"

I nodded, my voice low. "Yeah."

I quickly explained what happened in the dream—every detail. The confrontation, the offer, the strange feeling that I wasn't entirely repulsed by it.

"He offered a choice," I continued. "Told me to 'accept reality.' Said we could refine the equation together. And the worst part? For a second… it didn't sound so bad."

Arlie didn't laugh this time. She looked genuinely concerned. "It's a mind game, Kiran," she said, her voice softer. "He wants you to consider it. That's how it starts. But… It's just a dream. Cheer up, will you?"

I shook my head sideways. "I don't think it's just a dream. The truth is… I've been having dreams like this for a while now. I just couldn't remember them until now. But this one… I remember everything. Every word. Every second."

Arlie stood up, expression shifting from concern to something sharper.

"You should've said something earlier," she said, already heading toward the door. "Come on. We're talking to Seren. This might be connected to something deeper."

She paused with her hand on the doorknob.

"Can you promise me one thing, though?"

I looked up, sensing the seriousness in her voice. "What?"

"Now I know it's an alternate version of you… and I get that you might want to trust him. Because he is you. But please—don't."

Her voice wavered for just a second. "Do not trust him."

I gave a small nod. "I'll try."

She opened the door. "Try harder than that."

The lab downstairs was dimly lit as usual, casting in pale blue light from countless flickering displays. Machines ticked and pulsed with rhythmic precision.

Seren stood in front of a console, eyes scanning. She didn't look up when we entered.

Arlie didn't wait. "He's been having recurring dreams. Detailed ones. But this morning, he remembered everything—full conversation with a future version of himself."

Seren's fingers paused mid-type. Her eyes met mine. "Go on."

I repeated the dream, as much as I could—his offer, the temptation, the fear. By the end, her expression had sharpened into something unreadable.

"That wasn't a dream," she said finally. "That was a bleed."

I raised an eyebrow. "A bleed?"

"A cross-temporal consciousness overlap also known as Temporal Bleed. Kiran isn't just dreaming—he's syncing with another version of himself in a nearby or this timeline. And it's growing stronger."

I felt my stomach drop. "So… this isn't just in my head."

Seren shook her head. "No. It's in time itself."

I felt a cold pressure.

"This... this doesn't make sense," I said. "Why now? Why me?"

Seren turned back to the console, her fingers moving with purpose. "Because you're unstable."

"Wow, comforting," I muttered.

Arlie shot me a smirk. "She means your temporal energy, genius. Not your mental health—though, that's also unstable."

Are you serious?

I looked between them ignoring her joke, the weight of it starting to settle in. "So… these dreams, these visions—they're not just in my head?"

Seren shook her head. "No. It's in time itself. Therefore It's not a prophecy—it's a possibility."

I swallowed. "And the more it happens… the more likely that version becomes real?"

Seren nodded. "Exactly. If you let it guide your decisions, it stops being a glimpse and becomes a blueprint."

Arlie stepped forward, letting out a sigh. "Which is why we're not letting that happen. We're gonna figure this out before it figures you out."

Seren was already inputting new parameters. "We'll run tests. Controlled exposures. See how deep this connection goes and if we can break it."

"And if we can't?" I asked.

Seren didn't answer at first. Then, calmly: "Then you'll become him eventually. Whether you want to or not."

A heavy silence fell between us. I could feel it—the shift in the room, in the air, in me.

Arlie exhaled slowly "Alright. Let's get this doom spiral under control before you start wearing black,"

She shot me a look, then turned to Seren. "How long until the Testing Room is ready?"

"Ten minutes," Seren replied without looking up. "Diagnostics are running. We'll need to calibrate and set a limiter in case he starts bleeding more…"

I raised an eyebrow. "Limiter?"

"It means we're gonna poke your veins with a needle, and hope you don't explode," Arlie said with a grin.

"I specifically remember saying no needles," I said, concerned.

"Kidding~"

Seren finally looked at me. "You'll be fine. As long as you don't resist what you see in your dreams. Let it play, but don't let it decide for you."

Seren handed me a small metallic band. "Put this on your wrist. Lay down on the platform, Try to have a lucid dream. If anything destabilizes, Arlie can pull you out"

"Wait—lucid dream?" I blinked. "How do I even do that?"

Arlie groaned. "Try not to overthink. Just stay aware. It's like dreaming while knowing you're dreaming. You've probably already done it—you just didn't know it."

"Great," I muttered. "No pressure."

Seren gestured to the platform. "Lie down. The moment you feel the shift—follow it, don't resist it. The more aware you are, the more control you'll have."

She continued speaking in from a microphone

"Day 2 of testing"

I lie down on top of the platform, the surface is hard and cold beneath me. The lights above dimmed, casting a pale blue glow across the room.

Arlie moved to the side console. "Alright, dreamboy, we're syncing in… three… two…"

I closed my eyes.

"One."

A gentle vibration pulsed beneath me. Then a quiet hum. My breath slowed. My thoughts didn't.

Alright time to follow the instructions.

The next time I'm dreaming, I'll realise I'm dreaming.

The next time I'm dreaming, I'll realise I'm dreaming.

In my head I kept repeating those words.

The next time I'm dreaming, I'll realise I'm dream—

The next time… I'll realise I'm drea—

Suddenly I wasn't lying on the platform anymore.

I was standing.

The world around me was cracked and colorless, the sky breaking apart, and I could see him again—my future self—watching me sitting down beside a coffee table?

Huh? What's going on?

"Coffee?" he asked while raising a mug.

I stared at him. "What… is this supposed to be?"

"A dream," he said simply. "But dreams are made of thoughts. And you've been thinking about me a lot lately." He sipped. "You manifested this. I just made it cozy."

The absurdity of the scene only made it more unnerving. A broken sky. A perfect table. And him—completely unfazed.

I stepped closer. "So… this isn't real?"

"Oh, it's real enough to matter," he said, tapping the edge of the mug. "You're lucid. Which means we can talk properly now."

"I don't want to talk."

He shrugged. "You say that, but you keep showing up."

My fists clenched. "I keep showing up because I'm trying to stop myself from becoming you."

Future Me smiled. Not smug. Not cruel. Just... tired. "And yet, here you are—standing exactly where I once stood."

And then I remembered…

I had this exact dream once. This exact place.

This exact Greyscale location.

The nightmare from before. The one that ended with everything crumbling. With me crumbling.

But now, standing here lucid, it wasn't just familiar—it was identical.

The realization hit like a cold punch to the gut.

"I've… I've seen this place before," I whispered, mostly to myself.

He didn't react. He already knew.

"This is where it all started for me," he said quietly, staring into the distance.

"My turning point."

He glanced at me, eyes dim beneath the cracked sky. "Remember when I told you your nightmares are a reality of mine?"

"Yeah…" I said, cautiously lowering myself into the empty chair across the table.

"I nearly died," he said, voice low. "Over and over. Again and again. Trying to fix things. Trying to reverse time. Protect people I thought I could save."

"Protect" He quoted with his fingers "My dying world…"

His hands gripped the coffee mug like it was the only warm thing left in the world. "And each time I failed… It Punished me."

I said nothing. The wind—or what passed for wind in this place—moved in strange, fragmented pulses, like the world was buffering.

"I didn't even know why it was happening," he continued. 

He looked up at me again, and for the first time, I didn't see power or certainty—I saw someone haunted by every choice they couldn't undo.

"I became the villain on purpose to the world I was trying to save," he said. "And now... here you are, standing at the same edge."

He leaned back in his chair, eyes distant, voice hollow. "Each time I reversed, I got stronger… but more exhausted. Like stretching a rubber band that never snaps—just thins. Weakens. Hurts."

His gaze fell to the table, to nothing in particular. "But I had to keep going. I had to. I kept doing it. Over and over. Repeating that same moment, that same choice, hoping maybe it would finally work."

"Did it?" I asked, the words slipping out before I could stop them.

He smiled—but it wasn't joy.

"If it did… would I be here?"

The question hit harder than I expected.

He continued. "You think you're here to stop me. But what if this is just your first step toward becoming me?"

"No," I said quietly. "I'm not like you."

He leaned forward again, cold and calm.

"Want me to continue?"

At this point, might as well hear him out.

"Sure," I responded.

"I kept thinking if I could just save one person, it would be worth it," he continued.

"But timelines don't want saving. They want balance. And when something tips the scale—like you, like me—time finds a way to correct it."

"Because after that I started glitching…I ended up in this world, Your world, Your timeline."

"Year 2390 AD," He Replied "Eight years before AGD begins."

"My body had absorbed so much raw Temporal Energy that it started… changing," he continued. "At first, I thought it was decaying. But it wasn't. My cells stopped aging. Or slowed to the point of near stillness."

He looked up again, his eyes scared—like they'd seen too many centuries.

"I became a paradox made flesh. Time couldn't figure out whether to kill me or preserve me. So it did neither."

I swallowed hard. "So you're immortal?"

He smiled faintly. "Not immortal. Just… unstuck. I don't live forever. I just haven't run out of time yet."

The cracks in the sky above us pulsed like a heartbeat. I could feel the dream—or whatever this was—beginning to fall apart.

"Eight years before AGD," I repeated. "You were already here before everything started."

He nodded once. "And what happened next… what the world remembers as Global Diplomacy... wasn't a diplomatic triumph."

"It was the foundation of my power. The necessary beginning… to write the original Equation."

I stared at him, breath caught. "What are you talking about?" I replied, getting up from the chair.

"I didn't invent time travel," he said.

"John Titor did."

I blinked. "Wait—Titor? The guy from those old conspiracy forums?"

He gave a humorless smile. "Not all myths are fake. Some are just early drafts of the truth."

He leaned back slightly, gaze distant. "But I refined its language. I made it programmable. Predictable. Containable. I gave them a way to measure the energy… to regulate time like it was just another resource."

A cold chill ran down my spine.

"The Nexus Empire was born from that," he continued.

"Not out of diplomacy, but desperation. They saw what I could do—what I was—and instead of destroying me, they institutionalized me."

"You let them?" I asked, horrified.

"I thought I was helping," he said, almost defensively.

"I thought if I gave them the tools, they'd fix things. That I could step away. That someone else would carry the burden."

"And instead, they built a prison."

"They built an Empire," he corrected, voice bitter. "And called me a god."

"I don't want to be a God."

The world around us pulsed—slowly now, like a dying heartbeat. The cracks above had grown wider, leaking strands of light and godrays bleeding through.

"You turned time itself into a weapon," I said.

He nodded. "And it worked."

"You think this is still about you being better than me," he said, stepping closer. "But you're not. You're me… before the clarity."

"I'm nothing like you."

"You will be," he said, calm and certain. "Not because you want to. Because you'll reach the same conclusion I did."

"What's that?" I spat.

"That mercy doesn't fix time unfortunately," he said.

"Authority does."

The words hung in the air like a verdict.

Then the sky shattered.

No warning. No transition. Just a deafening, splintering crack as the cracks above split into triangular shapes wide open—like a pane of glass exploding under pressure. Light poured in, blinding and colorless, devouring the edges of the dream.

I stumbled back as the ground beneath me jolted, fragmented—chunks of nothingness tearing free and The air warped, folding inward. My body felt stretched, pulled—like something was trying to rip me in two.

He didn't move.

Future Me just stood there in the storm, unmoved as the reality collapsed around him.

"I'll see you again," he said, voice perfectly calm despite the chaos. "Sooner than you think."

I opened my mouth to respond—but time beat me to it.

A shockwave blasted outward—pure force—ripping through me like a scream I couldn't hear.

Everything went white.

I shot awake.

Breath sharp. Sweat cold. Mind racing.

The lab ceiling greeted me—dull and cracked—and I gasped, anchoring myself back in reality.

Arlie's voice rang out from across the lab, worried. "Kiran?! Wha— You alright?!" she asked, gripping my shoulder. "Blink twice if your brain didn't melt."

I blinked twice, smirking, barely able to form words. "Define melt…"

Relief washed over her face, but she didn't smile. "You flatlined. For seven minutes."

Seven minutes? Felt like a lifetime.

Seren's voice chimed in from behind the console, steady but tight. "Vitals just re-stabilized. He's syncing back to baseline. Pulse elevated but holding."

"What the hell did you see?" Arlie asked, eyes locked on mine. Not playful. Not sarcastic. Just… worried.

I nodded. "The Nexus Empire? They didn't build it around the Temporal monopoly. They built it around him."

"Time really knows how to pick its monsters," Seren muttered.

"And I'm next in line," I said. My voice came out flatter than I expected.

The room felt colder than it had before.

"Not if we get ahead of this," Arlie said. "We still have a window. He may have written the first Equation… but maybe you'll be the one to erase it."

Arlie looked away first. Not in doubt—but in fear she didn't want to show.

No one said it, but we all knew the truth.

Someday soon I too might end up taking the wrong path.