---
The double's boots echoed against the metal floor, each step heavy with time. His coat was scorched, torn at the sleeve. A sleek, unfamiliar weapon was slung at his hip—its casing marked with glyphs Elias didn't recognize.
Future-Elias looked him dead in the eyes.
"You opened the loop," he said. "And now they're coming."
Celeste stepped forward. "Define they."
He turned to her, hesitated—like seeing a ghost. "You don't remember me yet… but you will."
She frowned. "That's not how timelines work."
"It is now."
Elias holstered his gun, tension mounting. "You're me. Prove it."
Future-Elias didn't answer. Instead, he reached into his coat and pulled out a black datapad, cracked and flickering. On it was a photo. Of Bellamy. Celeste. And Elias—older, weary, standing with them in a place he'd never seen before.
A space station… floating in pieces.
"This is what happens if you keep chasing the clock," the double said. "Bellamy didn't die by accident. He forced the paradox. To try and trap them."
"Them?" Elias asked again.
That's when the lights flickered. The shop's walls pulsed.
From the hallway, a sharp buzzing noise built like a swarm.
"Chronovores," Celeste said quietly. "They found the crack."
The backward-running cube on Bellamy's desk glowed bright red.
"Elias," Future-Elias said, tossing the datapad to him. "When that hits zero, this shop becomes ground zero for a collapse. And if we're still in it—"
A shriek tore through the air.
"Too late!" Celeste snapped. "They're breaching the loop!"
And just like that, the wall split open—no explosion, no warning. Just a silent tear in space and time, as figures with featureless faces and skin like shifting static stepped through.
Elias raised his weapon. Celeste drew two sleek chrono-blades from her coat.
Time was breaking.
And they were out of it.
---