The fog was thicker than ever, a wall of silence and vapor that swallowed sound and memory alike. The trees groaned with secrets, their bark etched with symbols we hadn't noticed before. Or maybe we had, but they'd been different last time. In this place, time looped like a wounded animal, always circling, never healing.
I led the way, the others following close behind, their shadows stretched too far in the wrong direction.
We were heading back to the node.
Not because we wanted to.
Because we had to.
The timelines weren't just wrong anymore. They were bleeding.
We'd woken up that morning to find the sun rising in the west. Bobby's phone had started speaking in reverse. Ambrose's reflection blinked when he didn't.
We were unraveling.
Bobby said the rift was no longer a place. It was becoming a state of mind.
Jacob didn't sleep the night before. When I asked why, he just said, "I saw you walk past my window twice. You were already asleep in your bed."
I didn't know what to say to that.
We passed the last boundary marker before the shimmer. The stones were cracked, humming softly. Bobby dropped one of his scanners, muttering about interference he couldn't trace.
And then we were there.
The node looked different.
Bigger.
Pulsing.
It wasn't waiting for us anymore. It was beckoning.
"You sure about this?" Jacob asked.
No one answered.
I stepped forward. The shimmer parted like breath on glass.
Inside, everything was wrong.
The sky was a deep crimson, like it was bleeding out. Trees floated a few feet above the ground. Echoes whispered from every direction, words we hadn't said yet.
Ambrose clutched his head. "I just remembered something that hasn't happened. We argue. Soon. You blame me for something."
I stared at him. "Why would I blame you?"
He shook his head. "I don't know. But I think... I think I lose someone."
We pushed deeper.
The path looped. We kept ending up at the same forked tree. Bobby finally took out chalk and marked the bark. Five minutes later, we passed the same tree.
It had two marks.
"Guys," Bobby whispered. "We're not in a loop. We're in an overlay. Multiple versions of us are crossing the same space."
I felt sick.
We reached a clearing filled with fog and static. Something moved inside it. Evelyn?
No.
It was me.
Another me.
This version looked older. Tired. Eyes sunken. He looked at me, and I felt it—a rush of grief, anger, and acceptance.
He mouthed something I couldn't hear.
Then he vanished.
Jacob broke. "We're not meant to be here. This isn't exploration. This is dissection."
Ambrose laughed, a dry sound. "Too late. We already cut ourselves open. Might as well see what spills out."
We reached the center.
The node had changed.
It was now a spiral staircase made of light and bone, leading downward into a chasm that wasn't on any map, in any memory.
"The heart of the fold," Bobby whispered. "Where echoes become songs. Where choices become chains."
We descended.
With every step, memories peeled away. I forgot what year it was. Forgot what Anita's voice sounded like. Forgot how many times we'd entered this place.
The final platform was a mirror.
I looked in and saw all of us. Every version. Alive, dead, lost, laughing, screaming, aged, young, warped.
The node spoke. Or something did.
"You seek answers. But you are the answer."
Jacob turned to me. "This is it, isn't it? The end of the road."
"No," I said. "This is the center. The still point."
Bobby stepped forward and touched the mirror. It rippled.
He turned to us.
"One of us has to stay. To stabilize it. Anchor it. Or it consumes everything."
Silence.
Then Ambrose stepped forward. "It's me. I'm the joke, remember? The one who makes things lighter. Maybe that's what this place needs."
I reached out. "Ambrose—"
He smiled. "Tell my mom I was a superhero after all."
He paused, turned back with his signature grin, and added, "Though if she asks, tell her I wore a cape. Don't let her think I went down in jeans and a hoodie."
And then he stepped into the mirror.
The world folded inward.
The light shrank.
We were falling.
When I opened my eyes, we were outside the cottage.
No shimmer.
No fog.
Just birds.
Sunlight.
Normal.
Too normal.
I looked at the calendar inside the cottage.
It was a month before we ever arrived.
We hadn't returned to the present.
We had returned too early.
Everything was still ahead.
Except now, Ambrose was gone.
And only I remembered what he had said at the end.
"Tell my mom I was a superhero."
So I did.