The room was hardly what she had expected for such a place of power, but perhaps that was the point. A table had been turned over in her fight with the Residents guarding the Time-taper, but they had quickly been dispatched. Hardly worth her time. From the blood smeared across one wall, there had been a battle before hers. One that hadn't lasted long. She brushed a dead straight lock of strawberry blonde hair out of her eyes. This was not how she had planned it to go.
"Time-Taper Launch. Password: Gallion's Gate is near.
"Access Granted. Launching Time-Taper."
She frowned, the only emotion to have touched her since she had arrived. Wiping her cheek made a smudge of the dark orange blood. The defeated Residents were stacked up in a pile, out of the way so she could go through their gear. The three had been camped here on guard duty, which was deeply disconcerting to her. No one was meant to have known about this ship except her... and her team. She lifted a rucksack.
"Computer, access Time-Taper history files."
"Accessed."
"How many times has the Stasis Chamber been used?"
"Number: 3"
She cursed under her breath.
"Identify those life forms."
"Unable to Identify."
She swore again.
-Looks like there is no time to waste, one of those will have been her, but the other two? Damn it. If you want to do things right, you'll have to do it yourself.-
She only left enough time to scratch a diamond in the wall with her sword before entering the chamber.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"So... I'm from the future.""Yes."
"And so are you?"
"Yes."
"And you followed me into the past."
"Isadore, I have explained this already."
"Isabel. And I know you have, it's just so hard to imagine." My brow crinkled. "So, how come I wrote stories about you?"
"From the data we collected about your stasis journey, it was obvious that there was a high chance of things going wrong. In a way, we are lucky you only lost your memory. I guess the stories are your memories coming back, in the only way they could." His face, while completely serious, was also had a sad quality to it, as if there was something he wasn't telling me.
"So, why did I come here? To the past I mean..."
"We don't know, you never told us. One day you were there and then you were gone, leaving us only a hurried message of the system. It sounded to me like you were being chased. When we finally figured out where you'd gone, there was no trace of what happened. Looking at you now, I realise you have no idea what I'm talking about. I was really hoping you could explain. You gave us all a scare."
"And who's 'us'?"
"Our team."
I gestured for him to continue.
"There used to be more of us. A lot more. But, starting right before your disappearance, people began dying. Getting taken out by Residents - the creature you saw before - and other things. Before I went into stasis, there was only eleven of us left. Que died getting me here."
I could see his pain, but for the life of me I couldn't remember who Que was. All these things that had happened and I knew none of it. I wonder if this was how an Alzheimer's patient felt. Things had been turned upside down and I was confused about everything I knew. Like someone had swapped Day with Night.
"So, what about the first time I saw you? Outside the school gates."
"I had arrived the night before, when the stasis locked onto your memory of me while you were writing. I only caught a few seconds of you and by the time I had reached out to you, I materialised at a safer location. I ended up a few miles away. When I tracked you down again, you were at the school, so I gave you the signal for were we should meet..."
"The three fingers you held up."
"Yes, but when you didn't show, I became frustrated. I've been following you around since then, trying to figure out why you were avoiding me. I had no idea that one of the Residents had followed me."
I sat still for a moment, letting all this new information fit into the gaps in my mind, seeing if it matched my version of events. And as absurd as this whole thing sounded, I could come up with no rational reason that it couldn't be true. Suddenly, things began catching up and felt so tired that I could have gone to sleep then and there. He seemed to notice this and began making excuses.
"Well, I know this is all hard to believe, so maybe I should leave you to think it over. Give you some privacy."
"Wait," I said as he stood up. "What if one of those Residents comes back?"
He gave a small smile. "I won't be far, just yell if you need me."
He maneuvered his way past my desk, sliding the chair in. When he reached the window, he placed a hand on it to push it open, then dropped out it onto the roof. There was no sound after the original landing, yet I knew that he was no longer there. I stared after him for a while, having doubts about if it had really happened. I shook my head, sliding back under the covers, questions swirling around in my head like a slow soup. I had one last, ludicrous thought before I drifted off.
-Wait, does that mean he carried me in through the window?!-
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