Aven didn't sleep that night. He sat in his cramped apartment, staring at the metallic cube on his table. It no longer pulsed with light. It looked like an ordinary, lifeless artifact. But he could still see the older version of himself, burned into his mind—a future he wasn't supposed to have.
The words Rhea had left him with wouldn't stop echoing in his head.
Someone from a future that was erased.
At dawn, he returned to the museum. The corridors were darker than usual, the lights flickering overhead as if the place itself was unsure whether to keep existing. Aven walked past the halls of glass cases, filled with objects that whispered promises of impossible tomorrows: pills that claimed to stop death, helmets that claimed to erase memory, paintings of cities floating in the sky.
When he reached the back storage, Rhea was already there, leaning against a stack of rusted crates.
"You came back," she said.
Aven swallowed hard. "Tell me what that thing was. The projection. Was that… really me?"
Rhea tilted her head. "Depends on which version of you you're talking about. The museum archives possible futures, but they're futures that failed. Timelines that collapsed. Pieces of history that no longer have a place in reality."
She tapped the notebook in her hands. "I've been studying them for years. You're not the first to find your own dead future in here."
Aven felt a cold shiver run down his spine. "So what am I supposed to do now?"
Rhea stepped closer, her voice lowering. "You can forget. Pretend you never saw it. Or you can help me figure out why the museum started archiving your future at all."
Aven frowned. "Why would I do that?"
"Because," Rhea said softly, "sometimes, the things we find in this place aren't just dead futures. They're warnings."
Aven glanced down at the cube. "And what if I don't want to know?"
"Then you should walk away," she said, her eyes locking onto his. "Before you disappear into the cracks of history, like the others."
Aven's breath trembled.
The hum of broken lights filled the air.
He stayed.