Lee arrived at Taft Theater to see a crowd gathering around, towards a particular point in front of the North face of the Theater. In a pool of crimson ripples and viscera, a mangled corpse rested in an unnatural position. Aitu Xiore once again spoke directly to Lee's consciousness through Time's Keeper, and began conducting a dialogue.
'Well, this is disheartening.'
'That's an odd choice of words.'
'Is it though? I'm not talking about the corpse. You're in contact with my artifact, you should be able to see beyond the veil.'
'What veil-?'
'Look at the top of the awning. You won't miss it.'
With another crack of lightning, He looked up, and his heart sank. The corpse below was one thing, but the cause was a fair sight more unbecoming. It sat above the cover for the rain of the OLD Theater, upon the edge of the extension. A blotch of disrupted light marked the form it tried to forge itself, seemingly in the shape of a person; almost mocking what it was taking after in so doing. The shape of the limbs distorted and shifted between each other and swapping sides at almost random intervals. Just looking upon it sent a rush of fresh blood to his head, with an unnerving sense of uncertain clarity washing over him.
"That's not something that should exist in any world. What the fuck-?" He tried to finish, but found himself turning away from the crowd; evacuating the contents of his stomach when the stench of the corpse and the internal image of the abhorrency connected in Lee's brain case.
'You're half right. It's something that should not exist here. There is time to correct this error, but if that is not dealt with quickly, this world may fall. How what that is, has not managed to make its way to this world in the first place is almost implausible beyond extremity. I do not typically intervene directly in mortal affairs, but that is something born of misplaced malice with nowhere to go. It has no reason for being, and thus is an inexistence that does not function on reason.
'But see, these things don't just appear in this world. This is a first, and it's not something that belongs here. Mesophysical Grudges are not only rare, but dangerous beyond measure.'
'Mesophyical grudges?? The hell do you mean?'
'I will have to explain the details at the intermission, it is not wise to discuss it at this point in time. Right now, you've got two options you can choose from. Firstly, you can use Time's Keeper to place yourself at a point which would allow you to take the place of this man, sparing him in the process while you finalize your gateway to the next world.'
'Don't you mean the afterlife?'
'Ah, no. Again, fine print will have to wait until intermission.'
'Intermission... you say that word as though we're-.'
'The second option is to use Time's Keeper to absorb it while rewriting the victim's chain of events, making you an anomaly this world would naturally reject once your task is complete by meddling in your own chain of events... yes, I know you find it amusing to some degree that a Sovereign of Finality would hope to see this man's death undone.'
'Yes, I do. Is that also sealed behind some lock of causality you can't reveal?'
'This time, I actually can give you some context, since it doesn't have to do with something so abstract yet fundamental. You're already holding my artifact anyway, so *That Rule* should be overlooked for now. It'll be another fifteen years from now, but he's the man who eventually will come to crack the aging gene.'
'You're talking about Crispr? That just makes even less sense. You're supposed to feed off of-.'
'Don't mistake me for that overgrown edge-toddler masquerading as a lesser vampire named Varney*. I was not put into a world to consume, but to stabilize. Enough with the tangents! Every single moment this thing goes unchecked its influence spreads!'
Lee looked around at the faces of the crowd. Their eyes seemed dimmer than they were a moment ago. He then turned sharply to the corpse in front of the awning, which was turning visibly black in real time.
'Is that... necrosis?'
'A literal magnitude of hell worse! Make your choice!'
He was hyperventilating. Too much new information too quickly introduced to an unready environment. Sensory processing disorder and all the sensations blending together with his fractured sanity threw him into flight-or-flight response as he prepared to scream. Unbeknownst to even his subconscious, a primal urge drove him to pop the notch on the pocket watch, and turned it counter-clockwise before he even had a chance to vocalize the screams he wanted to usher; as the present faded to nil before his eyes, he felt an offsetting force trying to wrest him back into what felt like place as small fractal iotas of data pierced his cerebellum. His desire to scream fell silent with the pulling of the knob.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
{One-half layer between Narrative Dimensionalities}
"Brother, what have you done?"
Aitu Xiore raised his head from meditation to acknowledge the beckoning of his youngest sibling.
"You have more important questions to ask me than what you know you can already feel, don't you?"
"Making an Exception in their world is not something you should write off in front of your Kin as something you are indifferent about! Are you hoping he'll die from the recourse??"
Three seconds passed before he answered.
"Would it be cold of me to say yes?"
"Would it be- HAVE YOU FINALLY LOST IT? THE FIRST ONE IN AGES EVER SINCE THE DUALITY OF SATURN AND JANUS ON OUR END AND YOU WANT TO CLAIM HIM BEFORE HE EVEN HAS A CHANCE TO THRIVE???"
During this whole interaction, Aitu Xiore never turned around to face him.
"Are you putting words in my mouth, brother?"
"What!?"
"You heard what I said. I said I'm hoping he'll experience death. Not that I'd be claiming him. Indeed, that would be something foolhardy considering all we are bound by. Tell me, as Sovereign of the Mind, how much have you known me to do without reason? Go on and recant all several hundred millennia of the memories in your blood and tell me the answer."
"And despite all your reason, you never seem to divulge your schemes to us. Were we not born of the same three who braved the chasms and heights of the Apollicus Canyon to reach the Summit of Babel in order to call us down from our places among our kin on behalf of everyone but themselves? Why do you hide behind that crown?"
Aitu Xiore lowered his head.
"If that is what it appears to look like, then I truly can't blame your frustrations even in spite of my reasoning."
"I'm not frustrated over that though! I just wanted you to explain..."
"... He's the last descended son of our third progenitor."
His brother held seven seconds of silence to react.
"Ok, well that explains why you chose him; it does not explain why you made him an Exception before bringing him out!"
Aitu Xiore's wings unfurled and every single eye on each one gazed intently at his younger brother.
"Anduro, this is something that should be discussed in front of him. Can you please be patient until then? I would have both you and our Sister present. You know I do nothing without necessity, so I'd appreciate you meeting him before you decide for yourself what you know naught about. We are not beings which can simply shake off the consequences of our actions; I know because I am still paying the price half an existence later."
"..."
"..."
"I sincerely hope you haven't ruined us, Eldest."
"Death is not ruination, it is equalization, but again, Anduro... you'll understand when it's time for me to explain myself, which I swear upon our Progenitors True Names to uphold; sooner rather than later."
"... I'll see to it that you're held to your word then, Aitu Xiore."
"I wouldn't have it any other way, Brother."
Anduro's presence faded. Anduro, the Last of the Triad of Sapience to be called down from celestial forms beyond sight of the Universe itself, but the first to be given form by the same, thusly the Youngest Brother; The Baron of Blood, Flesh and Marrow. Aitu Xiore recanted, all that had been wrought by decree of boiling blood. War, billions sent unto him for petty gains and childishly irreconcilable ideological differences, and covetousness alike. It was unlike him to be so... patient... with expressing his temperament, even unto his Elder Brother. The Lord of the Mind, Time and of Death nodded solemnly, knowing Anduro could understand very well why he didn't turn to face him.
In the face of eternal existence on behalf of the many, Gods are not afforded the luxury of making mistakes; they had paid the price for so doing many, many eras ago in a world that no longer exists as a result of their own. It is wrong to envy the dead, even being the Lord of Death, this he knew, but he and his siblings were not mortals. What choice did he have?
________________________________________________________________________________________________
{Back on our narrative level, prior to the Events of Chapter 001 - Location: Roof of Taft Theater - Time: 4:17 P.M. (1617) Eastern Standard Time}
The air fizzled and shook with discharging static, disrupting light in the shape of a human adult above the north-most of three service shafts accessible only by staff-only stairwells. Lee Kühren materialized in a moment in space-time he was not familiar with, despite being familiar with where it was, dropping a half meter onto the top of the service shaft and landing on his feet. The sky was much less overcast than it was before he had been woken up from his lunch break micro-nap. Upon surveying his surroundings and opening the watch again, Lee began thinking out loud, going over the information at his disposal, trying to rationalize in some degree what all had just transpired.
"So... Gen and I assumed that the scream was about someone being abducted or the like, which we were wrong about beyond any comprehensible measure; I've come into contact with some self-proclaimed supreme deity who replaced my heirloom with the IRL equivalent of mythical rarity loot in a game... And that article in particular... just sent me backwards in time, to a location I have not been. Well, I still have my body, so I suppose I can't assume that time travel functions in the same manner as 'that game.'
"Now, I'm supposed to utilize either myself, or this artifact to contain a meso-physical grudge in place of someone else... as per the decree of something claiming to be 'The Lord of the Mind, of Time, and of Death.' Right..."
Lee hopped down from the shaft's cover, took a moment to process what he had just said, and then exclaimed to what he thought was nothing:
"AM I OFF MY MEDS? I DON'T REMEMBER HAVING TO TAKE MEDS, BUT I FEEL LIKE I TAKE MEDS AND I DIDN'T."
"Oh!" A voice from behind him exclaimed as the service door swung wide open, barely missing Lee's back by mere centimeters. "I remember watching that series on off-days while I was working towards my Bachelor's!"
Lee turned around and saw the unmangled face of the person who had been the corpse he had seen in the future he'd come from.
'Yeah, I need to get back on those meds that don't exist,' Lee said to himself this time.
As spring's lively gusts started churning about on the rooftop, the attention of the two was drawn towards a visible crack in space just off the side of the building. Just as quickly as the winds rolled in, they ceased; followed by a sharp drop in temperature. Lee heard a noise coming from the watch.
Ticking... but vocalized.
'The choice is yours to make, but if it is not made you will have failed your first task,' A voice with uncanny familiarity spoke directly into his mind.
'You're not Aitu Xiore... what has he done?'
As the crack grew larger and miasma started pouring it, the voice responded three words.
'Made necessary preparations.'
Opening Time's Keeper, Lee saw it was 4:23 P.M. Some nagging feeling in his bones told him that if he did not complete his task before he woke up in the prior timeline, that he'd be reliving it until he passed; gazing upon the tear in reality, he held the artifact in between himself and the maw. The other man's attention was drawn away from the maw and towards Lee.
"What are you doing??"
4:24 P.M. Lee turned to him smiling as torrent of miasma spilled forth from the maw in all directions for the briefest of moments.
"Just one last good deed in this world. So do me a favor and watch over it for me, eh?"
The watch began radiating with a light alien to this world, as the miasma spilling over suddenly converged into a singular wave, beginning to be drawn towards the center of the device itself. Lee felt a sudden burst of anguish wash over him, but he also found himself unable to scream out in pain despite every nerve in his body urging him to wail at the top of his lungs.
'You must not draw more attention to yourself by crying out. This world for its own sake must not know what you are going through. He must be the only one to see this.'
'Damn it... so this last fight is mine alone?'
'Ours.'
The maw appeared to decrease in size. Proportionately, Lee's anguish increased the more the maw spewed its contents and shrank. His only recourse for the pain was to see it through to the end.
At 4:27 P.M., the maw beside the Taft theater was no more, and a sundered iteration of Lee Kühren awoke in a park just a ways down the road from Procter & Gamble Cincinnati, and would live his life out as though nothing of it had happened. Simultaneously, the Original iteration of him ceased to exist in the world from whence he came. Not even ashes remained, much less a corpse mangled by unnatural forces.
In this world time went on for the rest of the world, not having to worry about the fracture in fiction a second time for the sacrifice of one willing to bear the consequences of temporal/causal displacement for the sake of one aspiring scientist. And where with a noble action one life ended, a noble cause soon began, despite no one remembering what allowed it all to take place. All caused by divergence of fate...