Rhea guided Aven deeper into the Archive, where few dared to go. The air grew colder, and the hum of old machines faded into silence. Here, the shelves were lined with black boxes, unmarked and covered in thick dust. Rhea stopped in front of one and carefully opened it.
Inside lay dozens of small metallic cubes, just like the one Aven had found. Some pulsed faintly with dying light. Others were dark, lifeless.
"These are remnants," Rhea whispered. "Broken pieces of futures that never found a place in reality. Most of them are harmless. Some… some try to rewrite the present."
Aven's eyes widened. "Rewrite the present?"
Rhea nodded. "When a timeline collapses, it sometimes fights to survive. Artifacts like these bleed through the cracks, infecting the reality we know. If we don't understand them, they can change us."
Aven stepped back, his heart pounding. "Why is this happening to me? Why my future?"
Rhea closed the box gently. "That's what we're going to find out."
She turned and led him into a small room at the end of the corridor. It was filled with old papers, scattered blueprints, and flickering screens showing random images of streets, people, explosions. On one of the screens, Aven saw his older self again—this time lying on the ground, bleeding.
He felt his knees buckle.
"That's not me," he whispered.
Rhea glanced at the screen and said nothing. She placed a hand on his back, steadying him. "The museum is showing you something for a reason. I don't know what yet. But I promise, I'll help you figure it out."
Aven swallowed the bile rising in his throat. "If I'm just a failed future… what does that make me now?"
Rhea met his eyes, her voice soft. "It makes you real. At least for now."