The journal had answered.
Not in the moment I wrote her name. Not even that night. But when I opened the book the next morning, it was there—written beneath the words—
Dr. Helene Eberhardt.
In the same hand that wasn't mine.
The Shepherd of Timelines.
I stared at it until the others stirred. I didn't show them. Not yet.
We set out before daylight, the road slick with frost and wheel ruts.
Helene led us north through a thinned forest trail that ended in a crumbling rail yard. The tracks split and converged again like tangled threads, looping toward a building half-swallowed by snow and bramble.
An old transfer station. Concrete and rust. The kind of place time tries to forget.
Helene stopped at the edge of the platform and faced us. Her coat caught the wind like a shadow trailing her voice.
"This place was tied to something that never finished waking," she said. "A thread that failed to stabilize. We may find echoes. Traces of what might've been."
Clara shifted beside me. "Like a memory?"
"Like a warning," Helene said.
Erich clicked his tongue. "We're chasing ghosts now?"
"No," Helene replied. "You're meeting them."
The doors opened on their own.
Inside, the air was colder. Not the cold of winter, but the cold of something preserved too long. The walls breathed with quiet tension. Dust hung without falling. The scent of oil and ash lingered without source.
We stepped through the main corridor—Konrad first, rifle in hand. Clara and Erich followed. I stayed close to Helene. Not because I trusted her. Because I didn't know what not trusting her looked like anymore.
We entered the main hall.
The room was circular, with long-discussed benches lining the outer walls. Clocks hung above each archway—each one stopped at a different time. The second hands ticked, but never advanced.
Clara stopped moving.
"I've been here," she whispered.
"You haven't," Helene said calmly. "But something inside you might remember it."
That's when the lights cut.
For a moment, we saw each other only in silhouettes—frozen in place like statues.
Then the room changed.
And so did we.
***
When the light returned, I wasn't where I had stood.
The platform was gone. The others were gone. Even the station felt different—hollowed, stretched, as if the building had been peeled from time and left suspended in the memory of its own ruin.
Across from me stood a child.
No older than ten. Black hair, blank face, hands at his sides. He wore a coat too large for his frame, the sleeves falling past his wrists.
There was something ancient in his stillness. Something that didn't belong to any living moment.
He didn't blink. Didn't breathe.
But I felt the weight of him—the kind of pressure that builds behind silence. Like standing in a room just before something shatters.
There was something about him—something that made the air feel older. No recognition. Not even memory. Just pressure.
"Who are you?" I asked.
He didn't respond. He tilted his head, like he was listening to something just behind my words. As if a second version of me was speaking just out of sync.
Then he moved.
Time warped.
He didn't strike like a fighter—he blinked through moments, cutting diagonally through space. Each motion came a beat before I registered it. He didn't move fast. He moved early.
My reflexes saved me. Barely.
I rewound a half-second. Dodged. Shifted.
Stepping carried me behind a bench that hadn't existed a second ago, and likely wouldn't a second later. The floor pulsed beneath my feet.
This wasn't a fight. It was a trial.
The child lunged again. Not a swing. Not a charge. He glitched—appearing mid-stride—fist already on its way. I ducked, felt the thread beneath my ribs tighten until it vibrated.
Another pulse flared in the air—his, not mine.
A sound like reversed wind.
"WHO ARE YOU?" I shouted.
He said nothing.
But the world twisted.
The ceiling curled like parchment. The bench beside me unraveled into dust. I reached forward—and the space between us stretched, warped, stitched together with ticking that didn't match.
I stumbled.
The station vanished.
And then I saw Clara.
***
Not in person. Not really. I saw her through him—through the boy.
A flash of another room, another corridor. Clara faced a girl in the shadows. Her outline blurred, like she was built of echoes. I couldn't hear what they said—but I felt it.
Pain.
"I'm sorry." I heard myself whisper, purely by instinct.
Then they were gone.
The boy struck again. His foot connected with my ribs, and I reeled backward into another memory—
Konrad.
He stood face-to-face with someone that looked like me. Not me as I was now. A darker version. Smirking. Ruthless. His rifle raised—jammed. The false me lunged. Konrad dropped the gun. They vanished into silence.
The boy raised his hand. The illusion broke. He was before me again.
"You want to understand?" he said for the first time. His voice hollow. "Then see what I've seen."
The thread behind my ribs ignited.
I screamed.
Everything blurred—Erich now, dueling a Clara that wasn't her—voice was off, smile too precise.
Then it was me, standing alone in a field of ticking clocks. My journal in my hand again, but the pages were blank, bleeding.
"You were always too late," the body said.
He struck again.
I rewound—missed the timing.
His fist connected. I hit the floor.
Blood in my mouth.
I saw Clara, reaching toward the false girl—out of breath. Crying.
I saw Konrad disarmed, his hands bleeding.
I saw Erich hesitate. Lower his guard.
We were losing.
And Helene was nowhere.