Broken Hourglass (Sanscest Multiship)

Chapter 1- The Beginning of the End

Another blip. The monitor shows the soulrate as steady. One of the med staff writes down the results. This one is newer, but they've been here a few times. The patient does not respond as a light is shined onto their face. [Response to stimuli: No | Vitals: Steady] The med staffer inspects the equipment. [All medical devices are in place and functioning properly]

They turn to a visitor, the only one who ever visits this particular patient. "There's still no change. Most coma patients recover, but there's no way to know right now. We'll schedule another brain scan in a few days if there's still no change." The medic put a hand on the visitor's shoulder comfortingly. "Try talking to them. It may not do anything, but many loved ones have said it helps. I have to go check on other patients. Don't forget to eat, we don't need anyone else taking up beds in the med bay, and it's soup day at the cafeteria. I promise we're doing as much as we can Fresh. I'll let Arc know you're here again." And with that, they exited the room.

Fresh stared at the patient intently. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen. I know I keep saying that, but I don't know what else to say. I wish I could take it back. I wish I knew your name."

—
The farmhouse was quiet when Fresh walked to the kitchen except for the creaking of the old wood floors, just like every morning. Epic was already awake and eating cereal while leaned half over the counter for a better view of the tv. He acknowledged his friend with a nod and paused the gameshow he was watching.

"I think we should get a cat."

Epic had been trying to talk him into getting a cat for years, probably because spending so much time with Ccino had put the idea in his head. It wasn't a good idea at th moment, but the little critters were cute. Fresh gave a non-commital grunt and grabbed a box of cereal from the cabinet and opened the fridge, but before he could ask where the milk went, Epic shouted at him.

"Catch!"

He barely turned around in time to grab the mostly empty milk jug before it hit him or the floor. Instinctively, the writing on his sunglasses changed to [Not]-[Cool]. The other skeleton barely contained his laughter.

"Bro, you should see your face," Epic said, chuckling.

"Oh yeah?" Fresh responded, "Well, you should see yours." In the split-second when his roommate looked confused, Fresh threw the milk jug back, hitting the other in the chest, and bolted out of the kitchen.

He barely got to the hallway when Epic teleported in front of him, causing him to crash into his friend and them both to fall onto the floor.

A beep sounded from the time distorter on Fresh's wrist. It was a device that looked like a normal watch, solid black with a small round screen that could project holograms or display vitals. Despite being retired, Epic had been allowed to keep his time distorter to monitor his Distortion Sickness. A benefit of medical retirement if there were benefits to such a thing.

Epic got up first and held out a hand to help his friend up, which Fresh accepted. With a tap, the message appeared in a projected holoscreen hovering above the time distorter.
[You are needed at base immediately]
It wasn't signed nor did the display tell him who sent the message.

"What's that about," Epic asked.

Fresh shrugged. "Dunno, but I hope they wouldn't contact me unless it was urgent."

"Then you better go see about it," Epic told him. He was right; it wasn't a good idea to ignore a message from HQ, but he'd only been home for 3 days and the first day had been spent quarantined to not flare Epic's Distortion Sickness as badly.

"Probably decided to finally fire me," Fresh joked. If only it were that easy. Time travelers didn't just get to be fired. They decided when they were done with you, and it wouldn't be until you literally couldn't do it anymore. The last time someone had been actually fired was Umber and Tephra. The R&D disaster was an entirely different can of worms, but almost everyone involved was forced to retire. The only two left were Asylum, the prison warden, and Classic, who had barely been out of training when it went down.