RECAP OF ALL THE PREVIOUS CHAPTERS:incase you forgot
Pete, a game developer, notices Kevin, a neighborhood kid who goes missing. After promising Karen, Kevin's mom, to help find him, Pete becomes obsessed with the case. He discovers Kevin, an old man, and himself all share the same birthmark. Kevin is found dead with a missing eye, but when Pete goes to tell Karen, Kevin answers the door—alive.Pete's heart stops—Kevin is alive, smiling with Karen. Overwhelmed, he rushes to the station, but everything feels wrong.
In the chief's office, Pete is unrecognizable to the man. Worse, the date reads 12-06-2024, not 19-06-2024.
"What's up with the calendar?" Pete demands, but the chief kicks him out angrily.
Driving aimlessly, Pete pulls over at the spot he'd found the kid's birthmark. He stares at the photo, heart pounding.
"Did I time travel or something?"
Pete, overwhelmed and starving, heads to McDonald's. He shares a table with Anika, an Indian woman, who notices his distress. She encourages him, and they chat about her homeland and its safety issues.
Anika reveals she's a scientist specializing in quantum physics and time travel. Desperate, Pete confesses he thinks he time-traveled. Intrigued, Anika takes him to her home lab for a scan.
The results? Pete's body contains rathadium chronate, a rare element enabling time travel. However, it only allows travel to the past, not the future. Anika warns him he may time-travel again unpredictably—he's stuck in a dangerous loop.
Peter tells Anika he needs help saving the kidnapped kid in his original timeline. Anika warns that changes in the past won't alter his present but will create temporary timelines. They agree to gather information to help him.
Suddenly, Peter feels a sharp pain and loses consciousness. He wakes up tied to a chair, facing a man who refuses to tell him where Anika is. When Peter demands answers, the man reveals the shocking truth—Anika betrayed him and handed him over.
Arthur had been searching for Peter for a day when he found two thieves driving Peter's car, claiming it had been abandoned near the woods.
Back at the station, Arthur reviewed the missing kids' files and noticed a connection: all listed Shelly Cardigan or Vanessa Cardigan as emergency contacts. At Peter's apartment, his friend Victor revealed Peter's family had severed ties with the Cardigans due to dark rituals.
The mystery deepened as Arthur raced to connect the dots. Later he gets a call from his constable saying Peter's found dead at the kid Kevin's house Arthur rushed to the scene after hearing Peter was found dead. With no obvious cause of death, he ordered a full investigation before learning Vanessa Cardigan had been living in South Australia for two years. Arthur flew out and met his friend Oscar, who helped him locate Vanessa's house.
There, Victor Cardigan claimed Vanessa had left him a year ago. As Arthur searched through Victor's belongings, he found a photo of his police station. Suddenly, Victor and Oscar vanished, and the house shifted into darkness. Confused, Arthur wandered into a nearby town, which looked like it was stuck in the 1980s.
At a café, Arthur met Anika Morgan, who claimed it was 1983. She took him to a lab and confirmed he had time-traveled, but there was more—Arthur had entered his "minus reality," a timeline where he was never born. Remaining in this reality could have dangerous consequences, and Arthur's presence here defied all logic. Now, he had to figure out how to return before it was too late.Anika tells arthur that it's impossible for one person to go to his minus reality.
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"If it's impossible, then how the fuck did I end up here?" I got up from the bed.
"Arthur... I'll figure it out, but you have to give me some time," she said, stepping back when I stood.
"How long is that gonna be? Months? Years?" I snapped. "I can't even wait for a second, a'ight? I've got a case that's been hunting my mind since day one. So all you gotta care about right now is getting me home."
She held my hand tightly. "I can't do that, Arthur. You're a potential source for Rathadium Chronate, and you'll be really helpful for my time project."
I stepped closer, inches from her face. "Look, I don't give a fuck about your science project, a'ight? You're gonna help me get home, or I'll put a fucking bullet right in your eye. Don't make me do that."
She took a few steps back, her face pale. "I'm sorry, Arthur... you're making me do this." She pulled out some kind of white, gun-shaped tool and fired a huge beam of light at me.
The next thing I knew, I was unconscious. Hours, days—who knows how long passed. All I could hear was the muffled noise of people chatting around me. My eyes fluttered open, blurry vision making it hard to focus. I was tied to a chair, but it wasn't rope. Something heavy pinned my hands down, making movement impossible.
"Well, well... look who's up." The voice sharpened through the muffled haze.
I grunted. "Listen, if you're planning on hurting me—trust me, I've been hurt more than you can imagine. If you're planning on killing me, I'd really appreciate the help. But if you're planning on trapping me here to use me, I swear to God I'll fuck you up the second I'm free."
He laughed. "Yeah? But who's gonna free you? Your friend Peter gonna help?"
My blood froze. "How do you know Peter? How the fuck do you know Peter?" I strained against the cuffs, but they held strong.
"Easy there, Arthur. Peter was way calmer than you," he said with a chuckle.
"Peter and I aren't the same, you cunt. Tell me what happened to him, or things are gonna get real bad for you."
He smiled, unbothered. "Arthur, of course you're the same. You both are." He gestured to one of the guards by the door, whispering something in his ear.
"So, Arthur, I'll be leaving now. But I'll be back. Hopefully, you'll have a more positive attitude by then."
He walked out, and the guard followed, leaving me alone. I struggled with my restraints, but they wouldn't budge. Darkness started creeping in at the edges of my vision. Before I knew it, I was out again.
I woke up to gunshots outside the room. Footsteps approached the door, and then—bang. The door flew open, and a man rushed in, untying my hands. His face was completely covered except for his eyes.
"I'm here to help you. Let's go."
I stumbled after him, passing bodies of men in suits, all shot dead. We got into a black car. No one else was with him, and I couldn't believe he'd managed to breach the place and kill all those people.
"Hey... my friend's in there," I said, tapping his shoulder.
"He's with us. Don't worry," he replied, driving off.
The car's AC hummed, and I drifted into sleep. When I woke, we were at an old, partially burned house.
"Who are you? Why are you helping me?" I demanded.
"You'll know soon enough," he said, walking inside. I followed.
Inside, he pulled off his mask. My jaw dropped. "Peter? How the fuck are you alive?"
He stepped close. "It's a long story. You might wanna sit down."
I collapsed into a chair, still processing. A woman appeared from a room in the corner.
"This is Serina," Peter said. "She's the reason you and I are still alive."
I stared. "I don't understand, Peter. What kind of fucked-up situation is this?"
Peter sat down. "The dead body you saw at Kevin's house wasn't mine. I mean, it was Peter's, but not me—the one you know."
I nodded slowly. "Yeah, some lady explained the sci-fi stuff to me, but I still can't wrap my head around it."
Peter leaned forward. "That Peter was trapped in his 'minus reality.' It was his reality but inverted and broken. He had nowhere to go, and this place became his prison. So... I used him."
"I was trapped by Anika," Peter began, his expression somber. "She did it for the same man who tied you up in that room. But Serina was there to save me. She helped me escape, but in the process, her son was killed by them." He paused, pain evident in his eyes. "After that, she explained everything to me."
My head started to ache from all the information I'd been fed. "What explanation?"
Peter took a sip of water, his hands trembling. "You and I have a rare chemical component in our bodies. We don't know how we got it, but it wasn't something we were born with. The people after us need this component."
"Rathadium chronate," I said, completing his sentence for him.
Peter nodded slowly. "Yes. This component somehow allows our physical bodies to travel faster than the speed of light, enabling us to time travel. But the issue is that we can't control when or where we travel. That's why Serina built this watch—it regulates the rathadium flow in our blood, allowing us to take full control of our time-traveling ability."
I stood up abruptly. "Then how the hell was Peter found dead at Kevin's house?"
Peter sighed. "That's kind of my fault. I replaced him with myself when I reached a point where I couldn't hide anymore. They still believe they killed the real me and absorbed the rathadium. They left the boys at Kevin's house, thinking their mission was complete."
"Why are these bastards doing this? What do they want with rathadium?"
Peter sat down, looking weary. "So they can time travel to the past."
I leaned closer, my frustration boiling over. "Why do they want to time travel to the past?"
Peter raised his gaze to meet mine. "December 7, 1941."
I felt a jolt of surprise. "What does Pearl Harbor have to do with this?"
Peter pulled out a torn, filthy piece of cloth. An inverted crescent moon with a triangle in the background was printed on it. "On December 7, the Pearl Harbor attack occurred, and thousands of people died—including a prophet named Benevolet Carrigan."
The last name hit me hard. "Carrigan?"
Peter nodded. "Yes. Carrigan was the original name, but it was later changed to Cardigan. That's the name you've been seeing this whole time."
"Tell me the rest," I urged.
Peter pointed to the torn piece of cloth. "This symbol belonged to a secret society operating underground during the Pearl Harbor incident. Their entire purpose was to bring back their deceased prophets and ancestors, whom they worshipped as gods. They didn't have a traditional god to follow—they viewed their ancestors as divine. Benevolet was believed to be the reincarnation of their great-grand ancestor, Bulthovigh Carrigan. His death shattered the entire community.
"The society was called The Lantern Society, but the public began calling it The Dusk Society. After Benevolet's death, the Dusk Society performed their darkest ritual to bring him back: they sacrificed the newborn child of their opposing community—the Catholic Christians.
"The Dusk Society despised Christianity. They hated the belief in a supreme power guiding humans and saw human sacrifice as something abhorrent. But to the Dusk Society, human sacrifices—along with offerings of human flesh and blood—were their sacred practices."
My mind raced to keep up. "Peter, I still don't understand how any of this connects to everything that's been happening."
Peter held up a photograph. "This is Morrissa Carrigan. She was Benevolet's direct heir and led the human sacrifices. The society kept their activities hidden by pretending to be Christians in public. They succeeded in capturing a Christian newborn and performed the sacrifice. After the baby's death, they offered its blood to their gods.
"But somehow, the Christian community found out. All hell broke loose. The Dusk Society vanished. Morrissa was later found dead, and none of the society members were ever found by the police."
My frustration hit its limit. I grabbed Peter by his collar. "Alright, you bastard. I've heard enough of this nonsense. It sounds like you're stalling. My mind's already fucked beyond what you can imagine, so just tell me what's going on. How is all this science-fiction bullshit happening to me? And how do I have some chemical in me that makes me time travel?"
Peter struggled against my grip. "Okay, okay! Let me go, and I'll explain everything." He coughed, catching his breath. "You know me as Peter Mullary Frankson. But my birth name is Peter Mullary Cardigan."
His real name hit me like a punch. Without thinking, I delivered a hard punch to his face. "You son of a bitch!"
Peter staggered back, coughing. I grabbed him by the collar again, ready to hit him a second time.
"Stop it!" Serina rushed forward and grabbed me. "Let him talk!"
Peter wiped the blood from his mouth, gasping for air. "I get it. You're angry. But you have to let me finish. I didn't know about any of this until I got here and met my relative—Vanessa Cardigan."
"You met her?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.
Peter took a slow sip of water, watching me carefully. "Yes, I did. And I learned a few more things." He hesitated. "Arthur... where were you born?"
I frowned. "Why are you asking that?"
"Just tell me."
I crossed my arms. "I was raised in an orphanage. I'm an orphan. The name was given to me by the mother at the orphanage."
Peter stepped closer, his eyes serious. "You're not an orphan, Arthur. You have a mother."
My grip tightened on his shirt. "The hell are you talking about?"
He didn't flinch, holding my gaze. "Your mother's name is Monica Cardigan."
To be continued