On the list of weird things I had ever done, walking through the halls of the E.F.A Headquarters after waking up would have been in my top ten; along with being cryogenically frozen and that one time I ate a broccoli blindfolded and somehow managed to guess sausages instead.

For me, I had walked through the halls in the same black jeans and blue shirt I had just a few hours ago. Yet, everything seemed foreign in one way or another. The once pearl-white walls had a grey tint of age to them that, to people who saw them everyday for the past few years, would not have noticed. Nor would they have noticed the fade of the blue of the carpeted floors. The stain on the windows hit my senses and memories hard, but definitely not as strong as what I saw after them as I walked out the sliding glass door to G, standing beside a black sedan just as when I first saw him.

Still looking up as I walked to the car, I asked, “What happened to the sky?”

G turned his attention upwards, only to show a short look of puzzlement before realizing what I was talking about.

“The Mist has been getting lower,” he explained. “And as it gets lower, it gets denser, since there's not as much surface area around its atmosphere level.”

I remembered the last time I saw the sky, it was a light teal. At that moment though, standing there with G, it was noticeably sea blue. Though light still managed to shine through, the surroundings were slightly darker in exposure.

“Is that what I'm trying to stop? The Mist from engulfing us?” I thought of my own predicament with Mist Poisoning and how exposure to the gas had led me on a path to certain death.

“Maybe,” G replied. He headed round to the driver's side as I entered into the passenger's. “But I highly doubt it,” he finished as we both closed out doors behind us.

He started up the car and we both buckled up. I asked him, “Why not?”

As the car revved out from the pathway and onto the road that lead through the guardhouse, he replied, “Cause the Mist will be on ground level in about a decade. Nowhere close to your hundred and thirty-two years.”

“Thirty-two?” I replied, confused, before connecting the situation. “Right! Seven years in the future. But won't everyone just end up dead in ten years at this rate?”

“Don't worry your time travelling head about that,” G said as the guardhouse raised the gates for us to pass through. “We're already working on something for that. It's quite cool actually.”

“And what 'master plan' is that?”

“Oh, you'll see when we get to the city.”

“And where are we going exactly?”

“That's...” G's tone of voice softened considerably. “That's um...you'll know it when you get there.”

The city had expanded over the years and for a moment, while we drove through the refurbished outskirts, I could not believe my eyes that we were in the same New Roagnark that I grew up in.

“It's just Roagnark now,” G corrected. “We got rid of the 'New' a few years back.”

The city had expanded by over a dozen streets, with much more pedestrians on the road than there were before. I wondered how many of those walking around were my students from half a decade back. How many of them are people I could have met had I not been terminally ill. How many were living the life I could otherwise had.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

We crossed back into the part of the city that was familiar to me. The older, more inner portions had buildings that were around my time, and suddenly the streets and roads were as clear to me as the back of my hands. One detail stood out from the older buildings though. Hundreds of glass covered walkways connected each of the structures, spanning over the roads like human delivery tubes.

As I scanned the sights in wonder, I asked G, “Is that the 'solution' to the Mist?”

“Yeah,” the agent replied, “That, and the underground road that's being dug out right now to extent the infrastructure below.”

“Amazing. And all this happened in seven years?” I asked, astounded at the progress.

“A lot of things happened in the past half a decade Milton. The team assigned to the research for a method to protect us from the Mist initially wanted to build a giant glass dome over the city.”

“That's stupid,” I replied without thinking.

“That's what they thought as well. So they came up with this instead.” He turned the vehicle up one of the familiar highways out to the eastern suburbs. “We're in the process of connecting the ventilation system of the entire city to the Sun Dome. And we're building more of them plant domes around the city as well to provide clean air for everyone once the Mist settled down.”

My wife, Joan, worked as a herbalist at the Sun Dome, researching ways to repopulate the dying plant life around the globe. Her knowledge of plants and their chemicals from making medicines ended up being used to research on which plants were better suited for growth in different areas of the polluted world. “Did my wife help with any of this?” I asked. Something in me already knew the reply.

“Helped?” G laughed at my words. “She's one of the people leading the team on the project. Just five years ago, she got a Doctorate in Environmental Sciences and made a few high profile breakthrough in both medicine and plant growth research. It was her idea to build more domes and connect them to the city as well.”

I couldn't help but smile. My grin must had stretched from ear to ear. A small part of me couldn't believe just how amazing my wife had become, only to be overshadowed by the part that knew she was fantastic to begin with.

G continued, “In a way, she's saving the world. Her ideas are being adopted by the rest of the Five Cities and construction progress have been beyond smooth.” He passed a quick glance of pride my way. “Must run in your family, saving the world. First your grandparents, now your wife.”

“We usually don't let people into the family until they've at least stopped a falling plane,” I joked.

G laughed, “You'll be up there with them in a hundred odd years. Saving us from the end of the world, fire burning across the lands, monsters attacking helpless damsels. You'll ride to their rescue on a hover bike with a plasma blasters, shouting out one-liners with hordes of demons chasing you down.”

“I'd more likely hit them with a walking stick with the rate my body's going.”

“Ah, you'll be fine,” G waved off my walking stick idea. “You're here aren't you? That means you're a survivor!”

As we continued down the road, I recalled the path would lead us pass the old graveyard. A question hit me. “You mind if I ask about Matthews.”

There was a short pause from G before he replied, “Sure.”

Making sure to be more sensitive in my questioning, though unsure just how sensitive one can be in asking questions like this, I asked, “How did he, you know...” I didn't finish.

G took his eyes off the road for a second to look at me and nodded, indicating he was comfortable with talking about it before returning his attention to the streets. “There was um...there was a robbery at this restaurant. When the cops came, he and the rest of the people there were held hostage, including his family.” He paused and took a deep breath after that. I sort of knew where we were going with the story. “Him being him, tried to talk the robbers out from the whole situation. From what the hostages said, Matts almost succeeded too. But cops got anxious and charged in at the wrong time. He got caught in the crossfire. Dead at the scene.”

“I'm...” I managed to pause my body before I finished my sentence, running over the words to make sure they were right. “I'm sorry. For your loss.” It was the same sentence I said to him back at the lab, but nothing else seemed to fit.

“You know, after that day we met you and put you to freeze, he talked about you a lot,” G continued, shooting right pass my condolence. He must have heard them countless times by then. “Said you inspired him to a be a better person. Started going out more, making more friends, and doing more charity work and all that.”

“But I didn't do anything,” I replied truthfully.

“That's what he said when I asked him. What about you made him want to change?” G answered, a tone of surprise at the similar reply I gave. “He said you were symbol of hope for him that things will be better. He reasoned that...believed that, you were going to make it to year hundred and thirty-nine. That meant the world would last at least that long as well. You were his hope that there will be a future.”

I was unsure how to reply and could only sit in silence even when he finished speaking. It seemed G didn't knew how to continue from there as well, and we rode the rest of the trip in quiet contemplation. At least, that was the case until we reached the graveyard which earlier, I thought we were going to pass. Instead, I let out a small gasp as G took a turn into the road that led up to it.

We called them graveyards but that's not entirely accurate. They were more of an underground catacomb made to look like a 'yard'. The road we turned into lead up to a building, a church atop a small hill in the middle of a suburban forest of houses.

As the car pulled up the drop-off point, I asked numbly, “Who are we visiting?”

G turned off the engine and as the noise winded down, replied, “I think it's best if you see for yourself.”