After breaking out of Sentinel's facility, the first order of business was getting out of D.C. and back to Georgia. Our destination was Atlanta, but without powers that included instant teleportation or access to air traffic, that meant we had a long road ahead of us. The secret site we'd just fled from was embedded somewhere beneath Washington, D.C., which meant we had around three or four hours of travel ahead—assuming we could even find a way to travel.
Walking wasn't an option. Not with Booker unconscious, Sentinel likely on high alert, and every major villain organization now knowing we were on the run. We needed transportation—fast.
Chase, eyes glued to his custom tablet, spoke up while tapping furiously across multiple open schematics and encrypted code strings. "Give me ten seconds," he muttered, more to himself than any of us. A few more swipes and a final tap later, a quiet hum filled the air. Within seconds, a matte-black van shimmered into existence at the edge of the clearing.
"There she is," Chase said proudly. "Been working on this project ever since we arrived here. Hop in."
We didn't waste any time. The back doors slid open, and one by one we loaded inside. It looked deceptively standard from the outside, but the interior had a sleek, military-grade design—rows of cushioned seats, holographic control panels, and a faint bluish hue lining the seams of the ceiling.
As the vehicle eased onto the road, Maddie glanced out the window, clearly still shaken from our escape. "So... how come this thing can appear out of nowhere like that, but now we're crawling along like a normal van?"
Chase didn't look up from his tablet. "Because if I tried to move us at the speed it's capable of... well, we wouldn't be alive to ask that question."
She raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"It's not about how fast the machine can move. It's about how fast the people inside can survive that movement," he explained. "When I summoned it, the van performed a quantum fold—a super-condensed micro-jump through localized space-time. Teleportation in slices. But that only works for cargo—no living tissue. You try to ride through that, and your atoms arrive in pieces."
I leaned forward, staring out the windshield. "So basically, if we rode inside while it jumped, we'd be stretched, shredded, and possibly painted across the eastern seaboard."
Chase finally looked up and nodded. "Exactly. I'm working on layered inertial dampeners and shielding barriers that might make short rides survivable. But for now, low speed is our only safe mode."
Maddie crossed her arms. "So you built a teleporting super-van... and we're just using it like a regular road trip vehicle?"
"It's more than a van," Chase replied. "Triple-layer armor. Adaptive signal jamming. Self-repairing body. Optical cloaking. And a deployable turret under the roof if things go bad."
Jacob let out a low whistle. "So basically… a war machine in disguise."
"Built for emergencies," Chase said with a shrug. "Welcome to one."
Despite everything we'd been through, there was a moment—just a breath—where the tension lightened. The banter felt... human. We were fugitives, but for the first time, we felt like a team.
But the calm didn't last.
A creeping thought pulled at me. "How long before Sentinel Solutions tracks this vehicle?"
Chase met my eyes in the rearview mirror. "They won't. I pinged an old Phase Three node—long retired, buried behind outdated firewalls. They'd never expect us to activate something they scrapped five years ago."
"And you're sure no one's watching us?"
He hesitated. "No. Not completely. But I erased everything I could. If someone is tracking us... They're better than I am."
The van cruised quietly for another hour, tires humming on the freeway. For a while, no one spoke. I leaned back and closed my eyes, but something felt… off.
Time started slipping. It was subtle at first—barely noticeable. A word is said slightly before it should have been. A twitch of motion caught in my peripheral vision, but not matching real time.
Then Maddie and Rev's voices cut through the quiet.
"At least we get a free road trip out of this," Maddie laughed.
"I guess we get something from it," Rev responded.
They giggled, and the moment passed.
Then it repeated.
Word for word. Same cadence. Same pause. The same laughter.
I sat upright, eyes wide. "Wait... What's happening?"
Everyone turned toward me.
"Huh?" Jacob asked, confused.
I blinked, scanning their faces. "Never mind. I think I'm... just tripping."
But I wasn't. For the rest of the ride, strange anomalies danced at the edge of my vision—glitches of red light that flickered and vanished before I could track them. Chase glanced at me, concern written across his face.
"You're seeing it too?" he asked quietly.
"You see it?" I replied, feeling a chill creep through my spine.
The others looked at us like we were speaking a different language.
Chase nodded and tapped on his tablet. "At first, I didn't. But my system started logging energy spikes when they occurred. I thought it was a malfunction, until I put on these." He reached into his bag and slipped on a pair of high-tech glasses—lenses tinted a faint blue.
"With these, I can track the anomalies as they happen. They aren't glitches, Kaleb. They're... something else."
Before I could respond, everything around me froze.
The world stopped mid-motion. The hum of the van ceased. Everyone was frozen in time, their bodies caught in stillness—mouths open, arms mid-gesture.
Then, a single strand of light unraveled in front of me, like a ribbon spinning through the air. It curled and swirled around my body, enclosing me in its orbit until, in one violent flash, reality cracked.
I found myself standing in a fractured dimension—a version of Atlanta, but not as I remembered it. The city was engulfed in flames. Skyscrapers collapsed into themselves, smoke choked the skies, and buildings burned in crimson fire. Glass shattered in slow motion as ash and debris floated upward instead of falling.
From the shadows, a figure emerged—cloaked in a red containment suit, his voice distorted and low.
"Time has been generous to you, Kaleb. But that charity ends now."
My breath hitched. "Where... what is this?"
He stepped forward. "This is your future. The only future that remains. In this timeline, you surrender to your power. You lose control. You become destruction incarnate."
"No," I growled. "That's not me. I control it."
He raised his hand, and time rewound in front of me. In a swirl of sparks and red mist, I watched a corrupted version of myself tear through the world—levitating midair, blackened veins glowing, screaming as he ripped cities from the ground.
"You think you're different?" the figure asked. "You're not. I've seen all the variations. And in every single one, you lose. You become the Dark Nexus."
"Who are you?" I asked, even though I already knew.
He peeled back his hood slightly, revealing a pale, scarred face. "I am Chrono. I've walked the fractures of time, and in each one, you burn the world."
"Then why show me this?" I demanded.
"To offer you a choice," he replied. "Surrender yourself. Let Apauex complete the Null Seed. We'll suppress your abilities permanently. It's the only way to prevent this."
"I'm not giving myself up," I said through gritted teeth. "You people are insane."
Chrono's form flickered, and in an instant, he was inches from my face. "Then suffer."
He shoved me backward—and I fell.
Darkness swallowed me whole.
I was pulled into a hellish illusion, trapped in a temporal loop. I saw my team—my friends—die in horrifying ways. Maddie was atomized in a flash of red energy. Booker—my brother—was crushed beneath rubble. Chase's skull shattered from internal pressure. Jacob's limbs melted, his screams echoing in my ears. And Rev being dropped from a high place.
Over and over, their deaths replayed. Each time different, each time worse. The pain, the guilt, the helplessness—it all mounted, threatening to break me.
I finally screamed, a roar of resistance that shattered the illusion like glass.
I blinked and gasped, back in the van. Everyone around me turned toward me in shock.
"Kaleb, are you okay?" Maddie asked.
I clutched my chest, breathing hard. "I'm fine," I lied. "Just a nightmare."
No one pushed for more. But inside, I knew it wasn't just a dream.
Chrono had touched my mind.
And now, even more than the Harbingers… it was time itself I had to fight.
The van rumbled gently beneath us, and soon we rolled into the edge of Atlanta—our destination finally reached. But I knew deep down, everything had already changed.