The screen flickers to life with a faint hum, illuminating the dimly lit room with a soft, blue glow. The camera adjusts, struggling to find focus before settling on a face—pale, eyes heavy with exhaustion, but filled with a quiet resolve. The person, a Man in his late forties with black hair, stares into the lens, he seems to have not eaten for months. Ripped t-shirt on top of blood drenched lap coat, his right hand trembling slightly as he presses record.
"This is April 26, 1986. I am Sebastian Thorne." he exhales to calm his mind and takes a deep breath. "This message is for my wife, Sofia Thorne" he pauses, letting the weight of his words settle into the stillness of the room. His gaze shifts slightly as if wrestling with the decision to continue, but then his eyes harden with determination as he slowly pulls his left sleeves up by his right arm
His left arm is gone.
In its place, a crude bandage made from layers of tape clings desperately to the stump, failing to stop the blood from seeping through. The sight is grotesque, but Sebastian's expression remains impassive, hardened by the pain and horror he's already endured.
"Don't cry," he begins again, his voice trembling, now laced with a mixture of rage and bitterness. "Do you know," he continues, a harsh edge creeping into his tone, "I have made exactly 882 groundbreaking discoveries in almost every field, and yet—" his voice breaks momentarily, caught between fury and despair, "No one believes me."
His eyes blaze with frustration, his breath quickening as the words spill out, raw and unfiltered. "I am the smartest person on the planet, goddammit!" The declaration echoes in the empty space, his voice cracking under the weight of his own desperation.
Sebastian punches the wall, his knuckles splitting open and leaving smears of blood on the cracked surface. "You see," he growls, the rage in his voice barely contained, "I discovered that you would need 30,000 MW of thermal energy to create a temporary hyperspace across dimensions—but only biological matter can pass through." He glances at the blood on his hand, a crazed grin spreading across his face as he drags the camera out of the room.
The scene shifts as the camera shakily reveals a massive, humming nuclear reactor. "This is why," Sebastian continues, his grin widening, "I sold everything to bribe every official at Chernobyl and completely redesigned the Number Four RBMK reactor."
The room is a hive of activity—technicians working feverishly at computers, some lifeless bodies slumped in the corners, and a line of strange, purple substance being fed into the reactor. In front of the reactor, several lasers are aimed precisely at a large cross.
Suddenly, a group of officials rushes in, their faces pale with fear. "Are you sure about this?" one of them asks, his voice trembling. Sebastian's eyes flare with anger as he turns away from the camera to glare at the officers.
The camera is snatched from his grip and carried into another room, now filled with frantic scientists moving between workstations. The air is thick with murmurs:
"Even if this is theoretically correct, practically it shouldn't be possible," someone whispers.
"As long as it's free money, who cares?" comes the cynical reply.
A man with a bald head firmly grips the camera, pointing it at his own face as he scratches his scalp. "Whose camera is this?" he asks, his tone indifferent. He shrugs, tapping the side of the camera, playing with the buttons as if it's a toy.
Suddenly, a deafening alarm blares through the facility. "System initiating turbine," a cold, mechanical voice announces.
The man's casual demeanor vanishes as he realizes the gravity of the situation. He rushes back toward the reactor, the camera swinging wildly in his hands.
In the heart of the chaos, Sebastian stands at the cross, his eyes wild with determination. "This is how far I'm willing to go to prove myself!" he shouts, his voice rising above the cacophony. The turbine in the background spins faster and faster, the machinery roaring to life.
A voice faintly shouts "Launch!" from somewhere in the chaos. The lasers surrounding the cross begin to charge, emitting a high-pitched whine. Suddenly, the alarms blare louder, drowning out all other sounds.
"System initiating lasers," the voice announces.
A blinding, whitish-rainbow laser shoots out, striking Sebastian directly. The air crackles with energy as the laser envelops him, the alarm escalating in pitch and volume.
"Starting 1%...
"Entering 10%...
"Entering 50%...
"Entering 100%...
"Stabilizing..."
The reactor pulses with power as the system stabilizes, the lasers now a steady beam of light. The room is filled with an eerie silence, broken only by the hum of the reactor and the distant echo of alarms.
The crowd erupts in triumphant cheers, the air thick with euphoria. People embrace, tears of joy streaming down their faces. A young woman rushes forward, her eyes wide with disbelief, as she screams, "Henry!" She throws her arms around him, holding him tightly as she sobs into his chest. "The professor was right to marry you—he was right!" she cries, her words tumbling out between gasps of relief.
Nearby, someone uncorks a bottle of vodka, the liquid sloshing out as they begin to pour. Laughter and cheers echo through the room as they force drinks into the hands of reluctant bystanders. "He'll be back any moment now!" one insists, while another slaps him on the back, grinning. "We've already won!"
An official, his face flushed with excitement, steps up to the microphone, his voice booming over the crowd. "Now, Americans can no longer stand against Soviet innovations! The generals will be arriving any—" His speech is cut short as the glass windows shatter inward, a shockwave blasting through the room. The man holding the camera instinctively turns toward the nuclear reactor, capturing the moment as a swirling vortex tunnel forms where Sebastian once stood. Energy crackles and pulses around the vortex, and within it, an eye-like particle appears, seemingly staring directly at the terrified onlookers before vanishing.
Panic sets in as the energy within the vortex begins to supercharge, shifting to a menacing, reddish hue. The lasers that were once steady now struggle, their beams distorted and pushed back by the overwhelming force. The man with the camera drops it in his terror, the lens catching brief glimpses of the chaos as he flees.
"System Overloaded," the cold, mechanical voice announces, red sirens blaring in sync with the flashing lights. As the alarm blares, the energy spirals out of control.
The first explosion hits—a deafening blast followed by a blazing inferno that tears through the lab, consuming everything in its path. Screams of agony rise above the roar of the flames, but they are swiftly silenced as the firestorm engulfs the room. The camera, now abandoned on the floor, sputters and dies, the screen going dark as the audio continues to capture the chaos. A second, even more violent explosion rocks the facility, and then—nothing. The audio cuts out, leaving behind only silence.
Meanwhile,
Sebastian drifts through an endless void, the sensation of weightlessness disorienting him. His voice, weak and uncertain, breaks the silence. "Where am I?" The question echoes, the sound carrying through the emptiness, yet no answer comes. Only the vast, silent expanse surrounds him, offering nothing but the cold isolation of the unknown.