13/4/2024
8:34pm
The house shook violently. The blue light outside flared brighter, shadows moving fast against the walls. The Bureau had found them.
Mirabel's mind raced. No time.
She turned to Adunni. "You have to pretend to be me. Convince them I'm back in my timeline."
Adunni blinked. "What?"
"If they think I'm here, they'll stop chasing me." Mirabel's voice was sharp with urgency. "And as for Eliot—he's in the past now, right? Isn't that what they wanted?"
Olamide nodded in understanding. "It might buy you time."
"But what about you?" Adunni asked.
"I have to go." Mirabel clutched the key halves tightly. "This is what Dad wanted me to find."
Before Adunni could protest, Mirabel grabbed Eliot's wrist—and jumped.
---
The Bermuda Triangle
Mirabel and Eliot landed hard on wet sand. Eliot groaned beside her, brushing grains from his hair.
"Warn me next time," he muttered.
Mirabel ignored him, her eyes locked on the massive stone door rising from the ocean. The key in her hands glowed, pulling her forward like a magnet.
Eliot stepped beside her. "This place feels... wrong."
She swallowed. "Or exactly right."
Fitting the two halves of the key together, the ground shuddered.
The water split apart—not like a wave, but like something tearing reality itself.
A hidden staircase spiraled downward into darkness.
Eliot exhaled sharply. "No way we're actually doing this."
Mirabel grabbed his hand. "Come on."
They stepped inside.
Mirabel and Eliot moved cautiously through the underground observatory, the dim glow of golden light pulsing from the floating console at the center. The room smelled of damp stone, metal, and something ancient—something that had been waiting for them.
Papers littered the circular table, some torn, others hastily scribbled with numbers and notes. But one detail made Mirabel's blood run cold.
The dates.
She recognized one immediately.
The day of the excursion. The day she disappeared.
Her throat went dry. "Eliot… this is the exact day I jumped."
Eliot leaned in, scanning the scattered pages. "Whoever was here knew something was going to happen that day. Maybe they even saw it."
Mirabel swallowed hard and turned toward the glowing console.
Her fingers trembled as she pressed her palm against the smooth, glass-like surface. The hum of the machine deepened, responding to her presence. The floating screen flickered to life.
She took a deep breath. "Show me what happened on this date."
The AI processed her request. The golden glow sharpened, and suddenly—
The past unfolded before her eyes.
She saw their school group, laughing, exploring the ruins. She saw herself—smiling, unaware of what was about to happen.
Then, she saw Emeka and Tolu.
Her stomach clenched.
Emeka stepped forward cautiously, his hand raised . " No , she's still in there. I know she is."
For a brief moment, Tolu's expression softened. And her glowing eyes flickered. Her voice breaking through weakly." Emeka …I… " but the book's influence surged back.
Tolu magic lashed out uncontrollably. A crow made of dark energy shot towards Emeka, piercing his chest. He staggered , clutching his chest as the venom spreads." T…Tolu" Emeka said checking, as he fell to the ground .
Mirabel's nails dug into her palm. "She didn't mean to…"
Eliot's jaw tightened. "She was possessed by something dark. But that's not the worst part."
They both watched as Tolu immediately sprang from her bed. And ran towards the forest . Her heart racing and her breath labored. As she got closer to the spot.
There were broken trees all over and a clearing in the middle of the trees. But Emeka's body was gone. " No…no,no,no." He was here, right here."
She searched frantically, hoping to find him . But there was no trace of his body .
"Emeka where are you?" Tolu screamed. Her voice echoed through the forest.
Tolu returned back to the hostel. Her face pale , her movements frantic. She began to ask students if they've seen Emeka.
" Have you seen Emeka." She asked .but students shook head in confusion.
" wasn't he suppose to meet you " a random student spoke .
The realization that Emeka was missing spread quickly and the students organized a search party. Looking for him.
She lied.
The screen flickered.
The scene shifted.
Tolu, desperately searching the ruins for Emeka's body. But she never found it.
Mirabel frowned. "If Emeka died there, then where did his body go?"
She pressed the console again. "Show me what happened after I jumped."
The AI hummed, processing the request.
New images formed. Mirabel saw herself, running—being chased by that mysterious figure she still couldn't fully remember. She saw herself dive into the river, vanishing in a burst of blue light.
And at the same exact moment, Adunni jumped from another timeline.
Two jumps, same time, same location.
The screen glitched—then showed something terrifying.
A rift cracked open in the timeline.
And from that rift—Onome's monster stepped through.
Mirabel watched, frozen, as the creature—a towering mass of twisted mud and shadows—reached down… and took Emeka's dead body.
Then—vanished into the darkness.
Eliot's breath was shaky. "His body it was taken."
Mirabel gritted her teeth. "Tolu never found him because he wasn't there anymore."
Silence hung in the air.
Finally, Mirabel turned back to the console. Her hands curled into fists.
it was taken."
Mirabel gritted her teeth. "Tolu never found him because he wasn't there anymore."
Silence hung in the air.
Finally, Mirabel turned back to the console. Her hands curled into fists.
"Show me what happened to the other timelines."
The screen flickered.
And then—she saw it.
Worlds collapsing. Universes erased.
Timeline after timeline, turning into nothingness.
Everywhere she looked, the same words kept appearing on the screen.
THE DARKNESS.
Mirabel's voice was barely above a whisper. "What is the Darkness?"
The AI responded, its voice eerily calm:
"The Darkness is the entity that existed before time, before creation itself. It seeks to return all things to nothingness."
Silence.
Mirabel and Eliot stood there, staring at the screen, as the weight of the truth settled over them.
Emeka's death. Tolu's possession. The missing body. The rift. The Bureau of Time. Everything was connected.
And the Darkness wasn't just coming.
It was already here.
---
Mirabel scrolled through the records, her breath shallow. The AI projected ancient writings onto the glowing table before her, old Benin script flickering into view. The Darkness didn't start with Tolu. It started centuries ago.
It was first contained inside a powerful Benin witch.
Her name was Adesuwa.
Mirabel whispered the name, and the AI responded, shifting the projection to a series of sketches. The woman in the drawings had dark eyes filled with something… wrong. A presence that didn't belong to her.
And then came the story.
The elders of Benin knew they couldn't kill the Darkness, so they did something worse.
They shattered it.
Using seven enchanted items, they split the Darkness two different pieces, hoping to weaken it. But each praise separated into different parts of the earth
away across time. So long as the fragments remained apart, the Darkness could never return to its full form.
Mirabel's stomach twisted.
The spirit had been trapped like that for centuries.
Now it was trying to put itself back together.
The AI screen flickered again, revealing an image of a burnt book.
One of the seven items.
Mirabel's mind raced. She saw the book in the background of the last video she'd just watched before tolu killed Emeka. Thanks
Her pulse quickened. If Tolu has the book…
It meant the Darkness had already started gathering its pieces.
And someone—someone alive—had given it to her.
Who Gave Tolu the Book?
Mirabel's hands moved swiftly, rewinding through the past. She zoomed in on the exact day Tolu found the book.
She zoomed that day and say a mysterious brown box on her door step .
But she couldn't find who put it there .
Mirabel's heart pounded. "Who put it there?"
She rewound the footage. Slower this time.
A shadowed figure walked into view. A hooded figure.
The person bent down, carefully placing the box where Tolu would find it.
Then, just before they turned to leave…
The hood slipped back slightly.
Mirabel leaned closer, eyes wide.
She saw their hair.
Her breath hitched. No. No, it's not possible.
That hair… That face…
The hooded figure who delivered the book was Emeka.
The same Emeka who was supposed to be dead.
The screen glitched violently.
Mirabel's mind screamed.
How?!
---
Eliot stepped forward. "Mirabel? What did you see?"
Mirabel swallowed hard, her voice barely a whisper.
"It's Emeka. He gave Tolu the book."
Eliot stiffened. "But… Emeka is—"
Dead.
Or at least, he was supposed to be.
Then who… or what… did Mirabel just see?
---
Mirabel's fingers flew over the glowing console, her mind racing.
There had to be a way.
The Darkness was like a virus. It consumed, erased, corrupted. But even viruses had weak points. If she could find the right loophole, something that disrupted its cycle, she could stop it before it spread further.
She scanned through the Observatory's files, flipping through history like pages in a book. Time rippled across the floating screens—wars, discoveries, disappearances. But everywhere the Darkness touched, the records were glitched, distorted, or missing entirely.
It was hiding something.
Or someone.
Her pulse quickened as she traced the patterns of its movement. That's when she noticed it—a pattern.
The Darkness never moved alone. It always worked through someone.
And the worst part? It was always in two people at a time.
Mirabel frowned. "Why two?"
Eliot, standing beside her, leaned over. "Maybe it needs balance?"
Mirabel's mind flashed through everything she had learned so far. The Darkness was older than time itself. It wanted to return everything to nothingness. But time was made of dualities—light and dark, past and future, cause and effect.
Two hosts. Two anchors.
She turned back to the console. "Then if I find the two hosts in our timeline…"
She didn't finish her sentence.
She didn't need to.
If she could find who the Darkness was inside, she could change the course of events before it consumed them.
She started inputting filters. "Show me all recorded instances of possession by the Darkness."
The AI hummed, processing the request.
Then—the screen flickered.
Two profiles appeared.
Mirabel's stomach twisted.
The two hosts were…
1. Tolu. (The one who accidentally killed Emeka.)
2. A name she didn't recognize. But she would soon.
The second host had no recorded history before the 1700s. No past. No future. Just a single entry.
Mirabel tapped the name. The screen glowed.
The name read: Onome.
Eliot frowned. "Wait. Isn't that the witch who sent the monster after Adunni?"
Mirabel's hands clenched into fists. "She's not just a witch. She's the other host."
---
Mirabel exhaled sharply. Now she knew who. The next question was how to break the cycle.
The Darkness was tied to both hosts. It needed them both to survive in this timeline.
So… if she could stop one of them before they reached their full power—
She didn't have to destroy the Darkness. She just had to weaken it.
Mirabel's hands shook as she tapped on the AI console. The flickering blue light of the hologram reflected in her eyes.
Rewind.
She had to see it again. See who chased her that day.
The video played from the excursion trip.
She saw herself running. The mysterious figure in black chasing after her. The river raging ahead.
She watched her past self struggle, the moment she swung the blade and slashed at the figure's hand.
The figure stumbled back, gripping their arm.
Pause.
Mirabel squinted, zooming in on their hand.
Dark gloves. Blood seeping through the fabric.
The figure hesitated, looking toward the water where Mirabel had jumped.
Then, they pulled out a phone.
Mirabel's heart hammered.
Who were they calling?
The figure's voice was calm, emotionless.
"It's done."
Then—slowly, methodically—the figure removed their mask.
Mirabel's stomach dropped.
Eamon.
Eamon had been the one chasing her.
Her mind reeled. That's impossible.
Eamon ,Sunmi's boyfriend .but the one from this time line but why? Butthe Eamon she met in the past was the one who warned her about the Bureau. The one who fought to protect her mother. The one who was captured. The one she trusted.
Then why was he the one who pushed her into the river?
Eliot's voice cut through her shock. "What did you find?"
Mirabel swallowed hard. "Eamon."
Eliot frowned. "Eamon?"
She pointed at the screen. Eamon's face stared back at them.
"He's the one who chased me," she whispered. "The one who made me jump."
Eliot took a step closer, disbelief written all over his face. "That doesn't make sense. If Eamon is on our side, why would he—"
"I don't know." Mirabel's voice cracked. "But I'm going to find out."
Adunni's words echoed in her mind.
"Eamon's capture was strange. He just… disappeared one day. We never found out what really happened."
Mirabel clenched her fists.
If Eamon had betrayed her, there had to be a reason.
She pulled up the timeline records.
"When did Adunni say Eamon vanished?"
She searched. Scrolled.
Her breath caught when she found the date.
1858
That was the year he disappeared.
But if she wanted answers, she needed to see what happened after that.
She pushed forward.
1858.
Her next destination.
She turned to Eliot, determination burning in her eyes. "We're going back to 1858."
Eliot crossed his arms. "And what exactly do you plan to do when you get there?"
Mirabel's grip tightened around the key
"Find out the truth."