She had to make a wise decision. If did something stupid at this moment, then it might affect many lives.
At the brink of time, Rhyme decided to go for time travel. It seemed to be a clever idea to travel through time then risking your life for someone you aren't even sure still loves you back.
Emotionally speaking, it wasn't the best idea. Rhyme still wanted to go and check whether he is healthy and fit or not. She even thought of calling Tervey and asking him about the current whereabouts of Jay, but it was too late to do that.
This is something that Rhyme was very good at. Taking decisions from her brain and not her heart in case of dilemmas. It is also a reason she is so successful in this little game called life.
She does ends up regretting many of her decisions taken from her brain afterwards. She still regrets refusing Jay even though she loves him. But had no choice at that moment, as she did it for his own good.
There was a hospital just two buildings away from the site of accident, so she thought it would be stupid if she called an ambulance, as it arrived in no time after the huge bang which was loud enough to be heard upto the other end of the central park (it is pretty huge, like a few kilometres long).
The doctors and MRs opened the door of the luxurious Porsche, and to Rhyme's shock, on taking a closer look, she realised it was him.
It was Jay.
He was bleeding very badly and it looked like he got a lot of injuries. Rhyme was devastated to witness a scene like this. She never thought that she would have to see her first love in such a vulnerable condition.
Even if it were a stranger, the wounds on his body were so severe that it could weaken anyone's heart. But it was him. It was way more difficult to see him in this condition.
But Rhyme certainly knew that this wasn't a time to weaken her heart. It was a time to change everything.
At this point, if she decides to choose time travel over him, she can go back to past and stop the accident from taking place altogether. She even had a fair chance to confess her true feelings after saving him from the accident.
With the power of time in her hands, Rhyme knew that she could definitely save him, after all, Rhyme hasn't failed in being successful in any of the experiments she has conducted so far.
If she wanted to choose time travel, there was no more time left to think and she ran at the to of her lungs towards the gate number 2 of the park, as it was 6:05 in her watch already.
"I had a feeling that someone might be late. But this is your last warning Ms. Rhyme. There are no other last chances for you after this. Since this is a trial trip, you are supposed to go to your younger self, and relive some of the best memories of you life. In the time trips we conduct in future, you can go to a time and place of your choice. Your lockets are made in a way that you disobey even one of our commands, it won't work. You might get struck in another time realm forever if you do not follow this rule. Also, the latitudes and longitudes can be found by a pre-installed application in your tablets. So no need to worry about ending up in a completely different place. I hope everyone got it. "
"Yes sir" all of them said in unison.
The chief assigned everyone tasks which they had to perform while or after getting into another time realm, like checking the exact size of the loop of chorisis, the exact time that it takes for a big enough chorisis to form, etc.
When it was Rhyme's turn, he said, "Ms. Rhyme, you have the most important and the most dangerous thing to perform. You have to check if one can survive in another time realm without causing harm to themselves or the others around him/her. This would require you to be very careful at each and every decision you make in another time realm. You should first take a small part of you body such as a fingernail out of your cloak to see if anything happens. If it gets burnt or damaged, you must immediately retreat from the task. If nothing happens, try to take off the cloak completely. "
Since everyone on the road and around the park went to the site of the accident, no one was there to see these people disappear under invisibility cloaks, or did they just thought that way?
"We will return back to this realm in 5 seconds irrespective of our time spent in any other realms. This is applicable for all the trips of time travel. "
"We will put on the invisibility cloak one by one, just in case someone finds us suspicious. "
Lowering his voice further, Mr. Robert said, "First lay down on the grass under a tree and cover yourself with the invisibility cloak as if it is a blanket. This way, even if someone far away from us is suspicious, won't find any solid evidence of our disappearing. After you are converted completely into dark matter along with your belongings, you have to first set the dials on your time locket to desired latitude, longitude and time. Once you have done that, you will have to insert one of the ten time capsules from your briefcase into the socket present on the time locket. A bright amber coloured chorisis will open right in front of you and you will have to enter into the chorisis to reach to the respective place in a respective time realm."
When it was Rhyme's turn to put on the invisibility cloak, she strictly followed the instructions given by Mr. Robert and very carefully slid into her cloak.
The moment the soft and thin invisibility cloak came in contact with Rhyme's smooth skin, she felt a little tingling sensation. In a few seconds, all the matter which made up Rhyme's body, got converted into dark matter.
After being converted to dark matter, Rhyme did not feel her body weight at all. She felt as if her body was floating over ground. She was still able to see her body, but it was faint, i.e., not solid. Others completely lost the sight of Rhyme as soon as she slid the cloak over her body.
Rhyme still had to decide the part of her life that she wanted to revisit. In the little amount of time she had before conducting this crazy experiment of time travel, various thoughts crossed her mind.
Rhyme thought of going back to the day she dumped her one sided lover (or got dumped by her one sided love; it was confusing) but then she realised that she wouldn't be able to handle the amount of guilt she would feel after leaving him hanging in between life and death just a couple of minutes ago and also refusing him despite loving him.
She now kinda realised how bad she was to Jay all her life. At first, she liked him, gave him hopes that would never get fulfilled, then probably dumped him and now she is leaving him in this time realm to die.
However, she didn't had time to think about all this. She had to act quickly as many seconds passed already after she had put on her invisibility cloak.
After a few moments of thinking hard and not finding any other memory she wanted to revisit, she had to choose that one. It was a very pleasant memory, but at this moment, it was more saddening than pleasing to Rhyme.
Without a second thought, Rhyme adjusted the latitude, longitude and time on the dials present on her time locket, and inserted a time capsule from her briefcase into the socket present on the locket.
A bright amber coloured chorisis started forming in front of the part of Rhyme's chest where the locket was hanging from her neck. It was emitting brilliant glow in the New York's evening glow. Rhyme immediately entered the chorisis without thinking any further.
Rhyme was shocked to see what was on the other end of the chorisis.