John and Samantha moved down the corridor as the hum intensified. In the distance, doors loomed that were supposed to lead them to the Rift Gates — a device capable of destroying the world. John breathed deeply, remembering Ioanna, Darwin, Martha Crockford, and other friends from the Fracture Complex. John and Ioanna's families had perished in the collapse over ten years ago. He couldn't let that happen again. A new collapse would take everyone left, all those who survived that night. Millions had died, and he couldn't allow the rest to turn to dust in an instant. Finally, they reached the doors.
"Are you ready?" John asked. During the invasion of the complex, Jonathan hadn't killed anyone. He shot, but he didn't aim for the chest or head like the others did. He still hadn't crossed that invisible line that other Wanderers had in this journey, and he feared the moment would come when he would commit his first murder. Murder for the greater good was still murder.
"Yes," Samantha confirmed. "First, we need to deal with the staff," she never thought she would say those words "and then close the rift."
"Do you believe it can be closed?"
"That's all I have left," Samantha said, closing her eyes, taking a deep breath, and opening the door.
The Rift Gates. A great structure created in both the old and new worlds. A mechanism designed to find answers to all questions of existence was activated. The Rift Gates were designed as a metallic ring reminiscent of the stone ring of Arkan, rotating as it drew energy from the Reservoir. The rift was open. In the center of the ring, John and Samantha saw Primordial Space for the first time. A rift between worlds had already formed, emitting light. The ring continued to spin, drawing in energy and feeding it into the rift, preventing it from expanding. The Rift Gates... The great structure was preparing to destroy the world.
To the left of the entrance was the control room. A metal staircase led the travelers upward. Surprisingly, the hall of the Gates was empty — no scientists, no engineers. Climbing the stairs, they saw only one person: Eleanor Midwich. Samantha recognized her immediately. The elderly woman, around sixty, wearing glasses, stood at the control panel. Her gray hair hung down. Eleanor had spent her entire life at the District Council of the Third District, becoming the Deputy Chair and was known for proposing the idea of building the Cradle Complex near Corvin and overseeing its construction. Samantha couldn't believe her eyes. Such a great scientist was a member of a terrorist group. Apparently, she had restored the Cradle, as she had also been involved in the construction of the Rift Gates and had their blueprints. Moreover, she had likely used Martha Crockford's ideas from the Reservoirs and modified the original concept.
The woman slowly turned, noticing the Wanderers. The light from the rift reflected off her glasses.
"Well, well," Eleanor suddenly said, "I was wrong after all."
"Eleanor Midwich," Samantha aimed her weapon at the scientist, "step away from the control panel."
"I never thought you would actually be here," the woman continued, not noticing the gun pointed at her.
"I said, step away from the control panel!" Samantha shouted. John stood beside her, raising his weapon as well.
"So many years..." the woman went on, "so much effort... so many lives... All because of one mistake..."
"I won't let it happen again!" Samantha yelled. John gazed into the rift, from which light seeped.
"But who?" The woman looked at the spinning ring. "Who will make the choice? Who will become the paradox? I'm afraid..." The woman answered her own question, "I won't know."
Eleanor removed her glasses and placed them on the control panel.
"Why have you come?" she addressed the Wanderers. "What happened that made Martha send you here?"
"We came to retrieve the energy disk," John replied.
"Oh..." Eleanor nodded knowingly, "that makes sense." A strange smile appeared on her face. "You were right."
"Step away from the panel," John repeated Samantha's words.
"Can I ask you something?" The woman straightened up and turned to the Wanderers.
"What about?" John scrutinized the scientist's eyes but saw only emptiness.
"Don't talk to her," Samantha ordered John.
"When you finish," Eleanor adjusted the sleeves of her lab coat, "when you go back, tell Martha she lost."
"What do you mean?" John stepped forward.
"John, back! She's insane," Samantha shouted, cocking her weapon.
"Tell her I found the answer to the question that I'm sure still haunts her at night, keeping her awake." The woman smiled, one hand slipping into her lab coat pocket, "Tell her the truth is that in the games of fate, victory is not provided." Eleanor laughed loudly. "Nothing is eternal and infinite! Everything has an end!"
Eleanor Midwich pulled a gun from her pocket. A shot rang out. The woman, clutching her chest, fell to the floor, a screwdriver slipping from her hands. She continued to laugh, coughing up blood.
"Fate... The game was lost at the very beginning..." the cough intensified. Breathing became heavier. "The impossible requires the impossible... A paradox is needed." And she stopped breathing.
"You killed her," John turned to Samantha, "she didn't even have a weapon."
"She..." Samantha stepped forward, looking at Eleanor's body, "I thought she had a gun in her pocket."
"I think that's exactly what she wanted," John looked into the eyes of the Wanderer, "she wanted to die."
"But why?" Samantha tucked the Pulsar into her belt, and the fabric of her suit immediately enveloped the gun.
"What was she talking about, the games of fate, paradoxes?" John glanced again at Eleanor's body.
"I don't know." A brief silence. "Either way, we need to close the rift. At least try. Maybe there'll be enough energy."
Samantha rushed to the control panel. She moved her hand across the screen, reading lines of code, searching for a way to close the rift. First, she opened a window with streams, checking the incoming energy level, then explored the launch procedure. The girl even managed to access the automatic recorder. For several minutes, she checked the parameters.
"Are you there soon?" a voice crackled over the radio, Alexa was making contact, "I'm not rushing you, but it's getting hot here. As it turns out, scientists can handle weapons too."
"Yeah," John confirmed, "Samantha is trying to close the rift."
"Hurry up," Amanda joined the conversation, "I've captured the Hawk. I'm starting the engines and initiating the launch procedure."
"Just a few more minutes," John relayed over the radio and attached it back to his chest.
Turning to Samantha, he saw the girl leaning against the control panel, crying. Tears streamed down her cheeks, dripping onto the screen. She was breathing deeply, quietly sobbing. She closed her eyes and occasionally shook her head, as if trying to drive something out of her mind.
John approached her. He understood that the worst assumption had become reality. Eleanor Midwich had activated the Rift Gates to create a collapse. The energy was enough to destroy the Consolidated Nation and all of humanity. At that moment, John understood Eleanor's words: "In the games of fate, victory is not provided." John placed his hand on the Samantha's shoulder. A certain pain grew in his chest, and his heart began to beat faster. He took deep breaths, realizing that the end would come at any moment — the end of everything.
"I'm sorry, John!" Samantha said through tears, her voice unfamiliar to him. "I'm sorry, John!" she repeated. "Please forgive me." Samantha lifted her head and looked at Jonathan. "I was wrong."
"What do you mean?" John gazed into Samantha's tear-filled face.
"I've been wrong from the very beginning," she wiped her tears with her sleeve. "We all were."
"Samantha..." John stepped back, seeing her like this for the first time. Her hands trembled, and her tears kept flowing. What? What could be worse than the collapse? This question tormented him.
"The Rift Gates," she pointed to them. "The connection has been established."
"Impossible! A connection with the Center can't be established! Last time..."
"No, John," Samantha shifted her gaze to the control panel. "Not with the Center. The connection is not with the Center."
"Then with what?" John wasn't ready for the truth Samantha was about to reveal. No one was.
"I accessed the black box system. I... I reviewed the data that survived the collapse."
"And what did you find?"
"The Rift Gates never connected to the Center of the Primordial Space."
"What do you mean," John looked into her eyes, eyes filled with pain.
"Fifteen years ago, they initiated them, but the launch was interrupted..." Samantha shrank, as if something heavy was crushing her, preventing her from speaking. "The launch was interrupted by an incoming connection."
"What does that mean? From where?"
"I... I thought about it. In theory, it's possible, but... I never imagined it would happen..." she adjusted her hair. "What do we know about traveling between worlds? What is the core principle of the fracture? And why can't we return?"
"I don't understand..." John whispered.
"Every time we leave a world, we sever our connection with it, including with time itself. Martha Crockford managed to reduce the discrepancy to forty years. Meaning, if we take today as zero, the difference between worlds would be forty years earlier or later relative to ours."
"But what does this have to do with the Rift Gates?"
"When a connection is established between worlds, it's like a tunnel. But the Last Ones created a tunnel that leaves the bounds of our universe and enters the Primordial Space, severing the connection with the world. Then it returns to the world, but in another time..."
"Are you saying..."
"John..." Samantha approached the Wanderer. "We are now connected to the past."
"How far?"
"John..." Samantha wiped away her tears once again. "We're connected to the night of the collapse."
"No..." John cut her off, waving his hand and stepping back, refusing to believe it. "Why?" he shouted. "How?"
"John, listen to me," Samantha said. "That's not all."
"What? What could be worse?" John cried.
"John..." Samantha sighed. "We discussed the ideology of the Last Ones. They want to restore the old world, revive it. But only one world can exist — either ours or theirs. And..."
"What does that have to do with this?" John shouted. "What do the Gates have to do with it?"
"Listen... At this moment, they are transmitting data through the rift to themselves — in the past... to the night of the collapse."
"What data?"
"Everything... Everything that has happened since the collapse, all technological developments, historical records, Project Fracture, the new models of the Hawk, even the black box data are being transmitted to them."
"But... What does that mean? Why?"
"John," Samantha placed her hand on his chest, "to use that data and relaunch the Rift Gates but travel even further back — to the time of the Great Consolidation, when their world fell in the war they started. They believe that if they stop the Great Consolidation, their world won't die. But they're wrong. They started the war, and they destroyed the rest of the world. If the data is transmitted, they will travel to the past, stop the Consolidation, and humanity will perish!"
"Can you stop it?"
"John, you have to understand — if the data is transmitted and the rift closes, we will cease to exist. We are here because the collapse happened fifteen years ago, but even more — there won't be any life left. Once they stop the Great Consolidation, all of reality will change. There won't be a Consolidated Nation, there won't be you and me, your sister, or anyone living in the Consolidated Nation, not even your parents... Nothing will exist..." Samantha hugged John. "But I can't close the rift. The console is locked. Everything is automated. As soon as the data is transmitted, the Reservoir will transfer enough energy, and the rift will close. But if that happens, we will disappear. Our timeline will be erased."
"Then what do we do?" John's hands trembled with fear.
"The most we can do... is... manually terminate the connection. But in that case, John..." the girl began to cry again, "in that case, we will cause a collapse in the past and kill millions."
"No... No... It can't be. It can't be like this..." John turned to the Rift Gates; the light was so beautiful. "They... they're there! They're still alive. My parents... They... They're coming home after dropping me off at the train station. We can't... There must be another way."
"I'm sorry, John," Samantha looked toward Eleanor's body. "She was right. In the games of fate, there is no victory. Nothing is eternal and infinite. We have only two choices: let them transmit the data, and the whole world will cease to exist, and humanity will die in the Last War, or... the collapse, which will destroy the Third District."
"And what do we do?" a single tear ran down John's face. "What do we do?"
"John..." Samantha looked into his eyes. "If the connection is severed, the fail-safe protocol will activate. The fail-safe is linked to the energy disk, and for two minutes, it will protect the energy disk from destruction... I'm sorry, but I need to be there to extract the disk, and afterward, the fail-safe will take the energy hit. It will hold for twenty minutes, and then there will be an explosion... A collapse that will destroy the complex. But it will be weaker because..." Samantha clenched her fist, trying to feel pain, a pain to replace the agony in her mind, "because throughout the entire district, the Convergence Points are still open. They have released energy, but they remain open. They will absorb the energy and close. That's why..."
"No, Sam," John shook his head, "no, don't say that."
"I have no right to demand or ask you to make this choice. But I can't be here if you sever the connection. I must be there, at the Gates, to extract the disk."
"Samantha," he pleaded with his eyes, "I can't."
"I know, John. But if you do it, if you have the strength to make this happen, the lever on the right panel... you need to pull it down. The data transfer is almost complete. Eighty-five percent has already been transmitted. Just a few more minutes..."
"Samantha..."
The girl hugged him. She pressed her body against his, saying goodbye. Samantha could never have imagined that she would be involved in the collapse, that she would be responsible for the deaths of millions. But she knew she would never forgive herself for putting their deaths in John's hands. The most terrifying thought that flashed through her mind, consumed by pain, was that it had already happened. The collapse had already occurred. Which meant John had already made his choice, and he would make it again. Endless pain, frozen in a moment. That's what awaited him. Jonathan Brooks would become a paradox. The cause and effect of the collapse.
"Goodbye, John," the girl whispered, "if the data is transferred, we will never see each other again."
"No, Samantha..." John wouldn't let go of her hand.
"Forgive me..." she withdrew her hand, wiping away her tears of pain, and descended the stairs back to the hall where the metal ring spun, receiving energy and sustaining the rift.
She glanced one last time at the Wanderer in the control room. She wanted to die at that moment.
John watched as the girl opened one of the control panels at the Gates and began to wait. Samantha was waiting for a decision, waiting for the choice that John had to make. The Wanderer was left alone. Only the hum of the Gates, the sound of the universe tearing itself apart, filled the space. The Wanderer slowly approached the control panel, watching the numbers change as the percentage climbed higher. John couldn't make this choice. "Mom... Dad..." John whispered. He slowly placed his hand on the lever. Everything that had happened would become his responsibility, and he would be guilty of all the deaths. Of all the pain. It was him and no one else. He would become the killer of millions. He would become death.
His mind thrashed in agony, destroying everything in its path. Everything that was, everything that would be, all the choices in his life, all the decisions and desires led him to this moment when the collapse would happen. But he was wrong. John was mistaken. The collapse had already happened. It was in the Wanderer's mind. Jonathan Brooks pulled the lever.
"Attention! Connection is terminated!" the voice echoed through the speakers.
John could barely stand. He screamed, suffering, while tears burned his skin. He understood what he had done. He had killed his mother and father, killed millions. John screamed again, pounding his fist against the panel, shattering it. The energy field had long been deactivated. Shards of glass embedded themselves in his skin, droplets of blood fell to the floor. For several weeks after, people died from the pain and loss. He remembered his first step into the Third District, the dust beneath his feet, the boy at the station who repeated his death over and over... All of it was because of him. Because of John, millions had died, those people on the train — their bodies... All of it was the result of his decision. And he wanted to kill himself, wanted to stop this pain, stop the heart that beat, tearing him apart from the inside. He didn't want... he didn't want to feel this. What he had done, what he had chosen... There would never be peace. John's hands trembled, they were completely covered in blood, but it wasn't enough to atone for the pain of those who lost their families in the collapse, those who died there. He reached for his belt and took the Pulsar in his hand. He stared at it, watching the light from the lamps reflect off the metal. He slowly brought it to his temple. He longed for this, desired this. He wanted it all to end, for the pain to stop. The Wanderer closed his eyes. And a shot rang out.
"John! John!" Samantha held his face. "Come to your senses! John!"
The Wanderer opened his eyes; his gun lay beside him. He raised his head and looked at the girl. Samantha had shot the handle of his gun and knocked it from his hand. He couldn't tell if the pain in his palm was from the glass shards stuck in his fingers or from the girl's shot.
"Kill me," he whispered. "Let me die! I don't want to... I killed them..."
"John, everything here is about to explode, we need to leave!" Samantha glanced at his bloodied hand.
"I killed them, I killed them," the Wanderer repeated, no longer hearing Samantha or seeing anything but the past he had created.
"Amanda," Samantha pulled out a radio and pressed the button, "We're coming back, get the Hawk ready!"
"Are we still alive?" Amanda's voice crackled over the radio. "I pulled the Hawk out of the hangar, it's by the main entrance. Hurry!"
"The rift is not closed, energy is building up. There will be an explosion soon."
"Understood," Amanda replied, "I have an idea."
"John, do you hear me?" The girl held his hand, but there was no life in it. His mind refused to return and control the body. "John, get up! Get up!"
Samantha wrapped her arms around his body and pulled him up. "They're dead," John repeated.
"Let's go..." the Wanderer said, "slowly, step by step."
The Wanderers descended the stairs. John had left reality behind, diving into the hell he had created in his own mind. Slowly, step by step, they moved toward the door. Samantha glanced one last time at the Rift Gates. The metal ring had been stopped, and sparks were falling from the ceiling. The rift was not closed. The girl sighed and opened the door. The tunnel was so long it seemed like an eternity before they reached the hall where James and Alexa were.
"What happened?" Alexa rushed over, catching John. "What's wrong with him?"
"Later," Samantha replied sharply.
Alexa saw his eyes, his hands covered in blood, his body shutting down, refusing to wake up. The collapse had destroyed him, shattered his mind. James, stepping over bodies, picked up a rifle, and they all headed for the exit. There was no resistance, nothing left. Only the voice from the speakers constantly repeating, "Warning! Energy levels critical." Kicking the door open, James spotted the Hawk about a hundred meters away. The doors were open, the engines running. The metallic bird was ready to take off at any moment.
Alexa held John from the right while Samantha supported him from the left. John was starting to come back from oblivion. Though he didn't understand what was happening, he was beginning to take steps on his own. Behind them, the sounds of energy node explosions began. But then a signal blared. The convergence point sensor on Alexa's chest detected a point of contact. She looked at Samantha and John, who hadn't even heard the signal. She knew John had done something in the Rift Gates hall. Something no one could have imagined, not even her. Alexa saw his face, Samantha's, and the fully packed backpack. It could only mean one thing: they had retrieved the energy disk, stopped the plan of the Last Ones. But they wouldn't escape... The Convergence point was ahead.
And at that moment, Alexa understood... She realized this was the end of her journey. The girl pushed Samantha and John away, and the Convergence point consumed her. This Сonvergence point was so weak that it didn't even produce a shockwave. There was only a brief scream. Samantha, falling to the ground, saw Alexa being torn apart, dissolving into the void. Alexa became the latest victim of the Third District...
"No..." Samantha reached out.
Seeing Alexa sacrifice her life to save her comrades, James rushed to John, threw his body over his shoulder, grabbed Samantha by the hand, and they dashed toward the Hawk. Inside, James sat John in a chair and fastened the straps. Samantha took a seat next to Amanda, who was flipping switches and pulling the controls while holding her side, clearly wounded during the Hawk's capture.
"What happened in there?" James asked Samantha. "What's wrong with John?"
"Later," she replied. "We need to take off. Everything's going to blow."
"I have an idea, but you need to hang on. What's the height of the energy wave during a collapse?"
"I don't know," Samantha had no idea, "A kilometer, maybe three."
"Perfect," Amanda was flipping switches. "Hold on, we're heading to the dome."
"What?" James saw several people running out of the compound toward the Hawk, firing at it. "The dome?"
"Yes, the dome. Its upper boundary is eleven kilometers high. We'll get close, and maybe we'll survive."
The Hawk slowly lifted off the ground, the engines shifted position, and Amanda pulled the speed lever. A bright flash in the engines, and the machine shot diagonally into the sky. The speed rapidly increased.
But suddenly, the control panel started blinking red. The compound personnel had apparently damaged the engine with their shots. The speed and altitude began to drop. They wouldn't make it out alive. The Cradle explosion would consume them.
Samantha turned and looked out the window. Somewhere below stood a man, holding a gun. He looked up at the Hawk, then put the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger. Samantha saw the figure fell to the ground. Glowing points began to appear around his body, as if his death had given birth to something unknown.
Multiple explosions shook the compound. Samantha watched as the lights of the Cradle went out, as energy surged. And she saw a massive flash light up the night sky, as the energy wave rapidly closed in on the Hawk.
"Is that what I'm thinking?" Amanda asked, struggling to keep the Hawk in the air.
"That's the Collapse!" Samantha whispered.