The only light source faded out into the distance, leaving the cell where Arthur, Angel, and I were locked in complete darkness. Suddenly I panicked. I couldn’t see anything. Were there any weird insects or spiders that might crawl onto me? How dirty was this place? Where should I sit down?

“Hey kid,” Arthur said, breaking my stream of thoughts.

“W-where are you?” I responded, trying to walk toward his voice, “Where’s Angel? We need to wake her up and tell her what happened!”

Arthur sighed, “Just sit down where you are.”

I dropped to my knees and crawled around, searching for Angel.

“She’s not here, kid.”

“What do you mean? She was put into the cell with us.” I felt something soft, but I immediately pulled my hand back and wiped it on my shirt. I had touched some sort of muddy surface.

“That—ugh never mind you probably won’t even understand.”

I paused and turned to where I thought Arthur was sitting. My curiosity was fueled by my sense of panic. “Did something happen to Angel? I need to know! What do you mean she isn’t here? She didn’t die, did she?” Then my hands touched something warm. It was a hand. I felt around more. It had to be Angel. I reached her face and hesitated for a moment before slapping her, trying to wake her up.

“See, she’s here!” I said to Arthur. “She’s still warm, so she isn’t gone! Come on, wake up! Wake up!”

I continued hitting her soft cheeks lightly with my palm. After that didn’t work, I shook her body, first lightly, then violently after it wasn’t working.

After trying everything, I turned back to Arthur. “Hey, do you know anything? She might have gotten hurt somewhere when she fell off her horse. You know any medical procedures we should try?”

Arthur sighed again. “She… her body is in a coma. She won’t be waking up anymore.”

I sat back onto my bottom and took a while to process what Arthur had said. “M–maybe if we give her a while, she’ll wake up… You know how sometimes when people get very injured, they go for days passed out?”

I waited for Arthur to respond, but he stayed silent, so I continued.

“But… we don’t have time for that… there are only thirty more minutes before those people come back… maybe twenty minutes now… Hopefully, it isn’t something severe, and we’ll be able to come back and stay like the rest of those prisoners we pass—”

“Daniel! Or Damien, but that doesn’t matter now!” Arthur had snapped. I could tell that he was standing up now. “Just accept it! She’s run off for good and she isn’t coming back!”

He paused for a moment, giving time for fear to sink into me, but I sat still and didn’t speak.

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Arthur took a few steps and sat down on the bed in a thud. “She’s another one of those time-hopping brats—doesn’t even give a damn about messing up the timeline. And she just goes and hops out of the situation, leaving us here to just die! So just listen! She is NOT coming back! She isn’t even in that body anymore! Ignore her!”

Judging by the sound of rubbing cloth, he had been passionately motioning around with his hands as he made his short speech. In the darkness, however, I couldn’t see any of it, and I was quite thankful for that. I didn’t want to see the furious look he must have on his face now.

There was a long pause as I tried to think. What had Angel done to make Arthur so angry? He said she was “time-hopping,” but wasn’t she asleep, or worse, in a coma, now? Maybe she did a time-hop, but left her body behind? Why would she do that?

Either way, what would become of me? Angel is the only person I knew from where I was from, even if I had only met her less than two days ago. Maybe this is where it all ends. In twenty, no, fifteen minutes those shooters who should have killed me days ago would finally be sending me to my death.

“Hey, I can trust you, right?” Arthur quickly asked me, interrupting my thoughts. “What is your relationship with her?”

“I…I barely even know her… I don’t even know why she just randomly came and took me around. All I know is that she isn’t a good person! She saved my li—”

“Stop. That was enough of an explanation.”

He hesitated.

“This…would probably be my final wish…so can you please cooperate with me on this?”

I turned towards Arthur. From the beginning, he had hated me. And even after he learned that Angel was on my side, his suspicions weren’t put away. Now that he found out something about Angel, I doubted he would help me.

“Just…stay alert. Don’t die. I beg you.”

Those were Arthur’s last words, telling me that I was wrong—wrong about how I was alone now and wrong about how he wouldn’t help me.

----------------------------------------

We sat there in silence until Diane and Wayne came back with the lamp to take me away, leaving Arthur there. I kept my eyes on Arthur as we left, but he just sat motionless, looking down to the ground.

Apparently, we were going to this “instance search” machine thing. I wasn’t sure what it did exactly, since Ben wasn’t there to explain everything. But at least I could guess that it searches for something.

At our destination, I was put into a small cylindrical chamber lined with vertical strips of bright green lights. The entire room had a low hum, which was pleasing compared to the silence and darkness of the prison areas. I was strapped to a chair in the center of the room to prevent me from moving around—not that I had decided to move around anyway.

So I sat there for maybe half an hour as they did some sort of analysis. My mind, however, was preoccupied with my next steps. If Arthur had really offered to help me back there, and he told me not to die, then I shouldn’t die. How would I do that though? It wasn’t that easy. After whatever they were doing to me now, they would probably send me to some execution area, but hopefully, they would get me my own prison cell here. Well, I’m not too sure myself which one would be better—dying now or spending the rest of my life in this damp, dark place.

Before I could get to a single conclusion as to how I could prevent either circumstance, the process finished. The door to the chamber opened, and Diane took me back out. Ben was also there to greet me.

“So, you liked your experience? You really loved your life, didn’t you? Sorry, I insisted on having you kept here in a cell until you died, but I couldn’t change their minds. Well, too bad.” Ben made an “I’m sorry” face, then gave a fake smile and walked away.

Arthur was right behind, and Wayne was taking him in to do what I had just done. Our eyes met, and I knew something was up. My adrenaline rushed, and I became focused.

Diane suddenly turned and called out. “Woah! Wait! Stop!” She had noticed it first.

Wayne reacted quickly. He took out a knife and planted it deep in Arthur’s back.

But it was too late. The same familiar aura surrounded Arthur. I felt a large push inside me.

And this time, I was ready. I clenched my eyes shut and focused.

I grabbed hold of that spot and used my muscles for the first time.

And that day, I, Damien Reyes, officially became a time walker.